It’s Pasta Time – Tortellini

After reading Marie's pasta making post over at Proud Italian Cook, Bev and I are inspired to try our hand at it, but for now, I’ve had a package of Buitoni Four Cheese Tortellini sitting in the fridge for several weeks that really needed to be eaten. Bev also used part of a package of homemade Italian sausage for pizza the other day and we had a half pound she'd cooked to add to the dish.

Sometime ago, Bobby Flay had a Meatball Throwdown with Mike Maroni, owner of Maroni Cuisine in Northport, New York and I’d been wanting to try their meatballs and sauce since. This wasn’t the day for their meatballs, but since I needed sauce for the pasta, I decided to go with Maroni’s, except - d*&n.  As it turns out, Bev had used most of the pkg of fresh basil for something else and the only tomatoes we had already contained basil and oregano - it's 18 miles to the store at $3.35 a gallon.  So I used Maroni's recipe for the onions, garlic, and tomato volume (but just 4oz of olive oil), then added a bay leaf, my sausage, S&P to taste, and the fresh basil we had at the end.  I also added about 1/4 tube of tomato paste to thicken it up some but left it chunky.

I cooked the pasta per package directions, added it to the sauce, tossed, and served – topped with some grated Romano.

It was very good, especially the throw together sauce - I'm glad we had leftovers. 

Gotta go, it's time to head down to Roane County to speak to their Master Gardener Group about veggie gardening - I'll wear my tomato pants for the occasion.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by.

Larry