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Sauces

Sauce That Any G Would Love

In the summers when I was younger, I spent a lot of time on canoe trips in northern Ontario and Quebec.  On these canoe trips, the fresh food would only last us a few days, so creativity in preparing something as time dwindled on the freshness of the vegetables was a big priority – needless to say, I ended up cooking some “inspiring” meals with a variety of ingredients.

After college when I was living by myself, I adapted this “forage cooking” for many of my meals and was often pleasantly surprised by what I came up with.  Recently while I was home alone and was wondering about how to spice up some pasta, I stumbled upon this sauce by combining some ingredients that were in or around the refrigerator.  It’s simple, tasty, and just healthy enough to make you feel like you’re ready for the summer.

Here’s how it went:

• 8 to 12 cherry tomatoes (halved or whole, or half and half)
• Drizzle of grape seed or olive oil (i usually eyeball it, but enough to coat the bottom of a frying pan with some left over).
• A pat of butter
• Half of an onion, diced or chopped
• 1 clove of garlic (chopped/minced)
• 6 to 8 mushrooms (or more if you want good dreams) sliced
• Fresh ground black pepper to taste
• Crushed red pepper flakes to taste

In a warm frying pan or sauce pan add the oil and butter until they can be mixed together.  Add the onions and give them some time to sweat and begin to caramelize.  Once the onions are looking good, add the mushrooms and garlic, stir the ingredients together, and put the lid on the pan.

Cook until the mushrooms get floppy, but not browned.  Add the tomatoes, stir to mix, and put the lid back on.  Let things get down to business and flavors mix.  When the tomato skins are blistered and the chopped tomatoes are runny, give the mixture a stir, add pepper and pepper flakes to taste, and serve.

This sauce is really tasty with spinach pasta and fresh grated cheese – I used Parmesan, but I am sure that its topping usages are infinite – maybe on an open faced sandwich; maybe as a grilled cheese filling; on baked chicken?  Sure – live it up!