After running on Saturday, Mike and I spent the day around the house. He did some yard work, I did some house work, and then I got serious about some cooking. I have been wanting to make my own pasta sauce for a while now, since everything that is store bought is full of sodium. I had done a little research, so I knew how to get things started, then I just started adding ingredients until it tasted the way I wanted it.
Not only did I have some homemade pasta sauce to make dinner on Saturday night, but I also have leftovers to make something else this week, plus 3 bags of pasta sauce for the freezer. It will be so nice knowing those are there to pull out and use whenever we want.
We happened to have had a bunch of tomatoes on hand from my mom's garden, the produce delivery box, and even a few from our garden, so I just used everything we had. As soon as I finished making the sauce, our delivery arrived with 3 more tomatoes... perfect!
Carolyn's Homemade Pasta Sauce
makes: A TON!
10 cups of chopped tomatoes
4-5 yellow onions, chopped
4 cloves garlic, chopped
3 tablespoons of olive oil
1 teaspoon of chopped fresh basil
1/4 teaspoon dried oregano
1 tablespoon dried parsley
1/2 teaspoon sea salt (to taste)
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1/4 teaspoon Italian spices
1 cup sugar
I made mine in a crock pot, which made things really easy. I started by adding the olive oil, onions and garlic to the crock pot, setting on high for about an hour. I stirred it frequently and turned it down once the onions were translucent. Then I added everything else. Left the sauce on low for about 2-3 hours.
After everything was cooked, I put the sauce into the blender and blended for a quick 5 seconds to puree the veggies a little more. I like my sauce kinda chunky, so you can do whatever you like.
Place in freezer safe containers (which apparently mason jars are not) and freeze or use immediately.
It just looks so cute in mason jars! But after a quick freezing lesson from Mike, I moved them into quart sized bags, which makes a lot more sense for defrosting and using. I can simply cut these bags open and throw the frozen sauce in a pan if I really wanted to. That Mike... so smart.
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Mike and I were out running errands while the sauce was cooking in the crock pot, so when we got home, I got started on dinner. GoLocal had sent a spaghetti squash in our produce box last week, so I decided to make a spaghetti squash spaghetti casserole. The sauce was already piping hot, so all I had to do was cook the squash, the meat, and then put it all together. Are you sure you can handle this? 2 recipes, 1 post!?!
Spaghetti Squash Casserole
1 spaghetti squash, seeds and guts removed
1.5 cups of pasta sauce (I used my freshly homemade sauce)
0.5 lb ground turkey (optional)
4 oz. cream cheese (I accidentally bought fat free, yuck, but you couldn't tell in the casserole)
1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese
1/4 cup shredded mozzarella cheese
To cook the spaghetti squash, cut it in half lengthwise and place it face down in a microwave safe dish after smearing with olive oil. Be sure to use a dish with a lid. Place covered in the microwave for 10-12 minutes, until you can easily insert a fork through the skin of the squash.
While that is cooking, brown the ground turkey in some olive oil until cooked through. When the spaghetti squash is done, use a fork to scrape the inside of the squash. You will see how easily this just comes out in strands to look like pasta. Place the squash "pasta" in the bottom of a 9x9 oven safe pan, preheat oven to 375F.
Add the sauce to the cooked ground turkey and allow to heat up. Once hot, add in the cream cheese and parmesan cheese and stir until melted. Pour the sauce mixture over the squash and then top with mozzarella cheese. Bake for 5-10 minutes, until cheese is melted and dish is warm.
This was AWESOME! Mike and I really, really liked it and plan on making it again. I love the spaghetti squash and helped me not to feel guilty about having a piece of real italian bread with garlic butter!
Along with our dinner, we each had one of Mike's home-brewed beers.
Finally, for dessert... homemade ice cream. Homemade mint chocolate chip ice cream to be exact... I know. You are jealous. ;)
Mike put together a batch after we ran out to get some peppermint extract and saw these were on sale.
The ice cream turned out fantastic. We have so much leftover and we just keep going in for spoonfuls here and there.
Yum!
Part 3 will include updates to our garden and some yummy blueberry lemon muffins that I made on Sunday. Stay tuned!
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