Embarrassing Pringle Situation

~ Menu ~

Fresh Pappardelle

A totally inappropriate Spicy Fresh Tomato Salsa

White Wine Spritzer

No Pud

Bit of a strange lunch today – a sort of fusion dish that could have been better!

I had half a bag of fresh pappardelle left over from my recent trip to Waitrose. I ate the first half of the pack a few days ago with a delicious …

Creamy Chilli Roasted Tomato Sauce 

Enough to coat 225 g (raw weight) pasta and feed 2 people

about 8-10 cherry tomatoes

drizzle olive oil

salt and pepper and a few chilli flakes

1 tsp tomato paste

15g butter

200 ml double cream

50g freshly grated Parmesan plus more for sprinkling

~ Halve the tomatoes and toss together with a little olive oil, salt and pepper and a light sprinkling of chilli flakes to taste.
~ Pop into a hot oven for about 10 minutes, during which time …
~ make the sauce.
~ In a medium sized sauce pan melt together the butter and the tomato paste.
~ When melted add the cream and bring to a boil.
~ Immediately turn down the heat, add the cheese and stir till melted.
~ Simmer, stirring, till thick.
~ Add the roasted tomatoes and any juices.
~ Toss with the hot pasta and sprinkle with more parmesan cheese.

Pictured before the
embarrassing Pringle situation

Unfortunately I wanted a quick lunch and hadn’t got anything really appropriate with which to dress the pasta. I did, however, have some fresh tomato salsa that needed using up and some parmesan cheese (of course) so I cooked the pasta and tossed all three things together. It tasted well but the sauce was too runny and tended to slide off and lurk about in the bottom of the bowl. I had to eat in a scooping and slurping fashion. 

 The other problem I had was that, as previously mentioned, I do like a bit of crunch with my food and I had none. So I’m afraid I did something rather strange. I am not proud of this but I crumbled a few Pringles over the dish and they did help a bit. I know, I know - I am a complete Palestine!

Fresh Tomato Salsa – some vague guidelines

~ Peel, seed and finely chop about 500g nice ripe red (and yellow and green if you can get them) tomatoes.
~ Seed and finely chop a mild or a hot (or medium heat) chilli.
~ Crush 1 or two garlics to a mush.
~ Finely chop a handful of fresh coriander or parsley.
~ Mix all together, add a mini-glug of olive oil and the juice of half a lime (or an orange is good and a lemon's not bad).
~ Taste and season.

Of course it is pretty cold here and snowy but has been a lovely bright sunny day. This morning the air was full of what looked like tiny silver threads that weren't snow and that drifted about (both upwards and downwards) and sparkled in the sunshine but didn’t seem to lay on my sleeve however hard I tried to catch some. Very pretty and I tried to take a picture but it came out nowt (I am under a severe Geordie influence reet noo!) No-one we spoke to knew what it was or had seen such a thing – any ideas?