This is an extremely simple meal, but it’s packed with nutrition. Lots of vegetables and good fats. The ingredients listed are for 2 portions, but it’s easy enough to scale to what’s needed. It’ll keep well in the fridge for a week or so.
Ingredients
- olive oil
- 150g pasta shapes
- a few broccoli florets
- 2 medium carrots
- 1 bell pepper
- handful of fresh basil
- 1 medium white onion
- 1 tin of peeled plum tomatoes
- 3-4 garlic cloves
- salt and pepper
Method
Finely chop the garlic, then fry it in some olive oil on a low to medium heat for a few minutes. You want to mix it into the oil, and wait until you can smell it.
Finely dice the onion, and add it to the pan. Add some salt, mix it in and let it cook for 15-20 minutes. You want it to soften, and turn translucent. You don’t want this to brown or caramelise at all. Probably the longer the better.
Add the tinned tomatoes. I ended up using chopped tomatoes this time, I normally use peeled plum tomatoes, and that’s what I’ve listed in the ingredients, but the tin I picked up was in the wrong section in the shop, and since the labels are nearly identical I didn’t notice. I prefer plum because I just like to know that I’m getting full tomatoes. Ah well, it doesn’t make all that much difference, you just need to break up the whole tomatoes in the pan. You want to keep this on a low temperature, I was using 4 out of 9 on my hob. This’ll take around 40 minutes at least, you want to thicken it, get rid of the water and concentrate the flavour.
Whilst the tomatoes are cooking, chop the bell pepper, carrots, and broccoli into small chunks. Place them in a roasting pan, drizzle them with some olive oil and season with salt and pepper. Roast them for around 30-40 minutes, until they’re soft and slightly blackened. A tiny bit of black is no bad thing, it adds a depth of flavour to the sauce.
Once the vegetables are fully cooked, mix them into the sauce.
Cook the pasta in heavily salted water according to the packet instructions. Actually, I find it’s usually best to cook it about a minute or so less than the pack says to give it a little bite.
Add the pasta to the sauce and vegetables.
Cut the leaves from the basil, then tear it up and drop it into the dish. You want to be quite quick with this, the longer you take the more it loses flavour.
Separate into bowls and serve.
