Last night I cooked and made a little antipasti plate, my old favourite of penne pasta with a tomato sauce and a robust salad.
My little antipasti plate follows a well established pattern: olives (this time dried), pickled mushrooms & artichoke hearts and toasted breads spread with Diane’s pesto. Simple but with a glass of wine it does put you in the mood for the coming meal.
The main course was the pasta course so there was no second course after the pasta because that is too much food for retired folks like us. The pasta main course was penne with a passata tomato base. I flavoured the tomato base with the usual Sicilian suspects: chopped anchovy fillets, halved pitted black olives, a spoonful of capers, the main addition-a small tin of tuna and a handful of fresh chopped parsley and marjoram. The passata was a little thick so it just needed some water to thin it a bit. Because of that thinness, the sauce was able to thoroughly penetrate the penne (to do what the pasta was designed for) and made for a superb meal (even if I do say so myself.)
The salad also contained the usual suspects: lettuce, olives, tomatoes quartered and sliced mushrooms.
The wine also was an old acquaintance: Riparosso Montepulciano d’Abruzzo.
