Personally, I detest meat sauce and only use meatballs (ground beef, pork, and veal), Italian sausage links, or do something like chicken or veal parmesan when I use meat with spaghetti. I usually just have spaghetti with a nice marinara when I use a tomato based sauce. What I use to spice the spaghetti up is spices… oregeno, basil, garlic, etc…, and I usually add at least a little extra virgin olive oil to the spaghetti before any sauce.
Most people I know, however, prefer meat sauce though.
Yes, that’s what I do. I cook the sausage like ground beef, drain it and put it in the sauce. It’s really more of a meat sauce than meatballs. Although, I suppose you could make meat balls out of the sausage.
Here’s what I do: (I just made this up; no credentials whatsoever)
Brown some ground beef. Add canned psghetti sause (I use Classico). Add garlic thru a press, and red wine, and salt&pepper. Simmer forever; or until the pasta is done.
A very easy way to vastly improve on canned spaghetti sauce.
For the love of God, Wesley, do not cook your pasta for 20 minutes! It’s not meant to be soft and soggy. You know of the concept of al dente, right?
If not, here’s a pasta primer:
Boil up the biggest pot of water you have, perhaps 3 or 4 litres of water for every 500g of pasta (a gallon per pound, I guess?). Add salt. Add the pasta when the water’s boiling. Stir well and often, and make sure the pieces / strands are separated. Pull out a bit of pasta after a few minutes and bite into it. Different pastas take different times, so check the packet to get a rough idea. It’s cooked when it’s no longer crisp (ie not like a cracker, even in the middle), but still offers some resistance to your teeth. That’s al dente. Drain it in a sieve / colander, then add the sauce and serve quickly to prevent it getting all dry and stuck together.
Adapting to my adopted home, Milwaukee, I have made some great spaghetti sauce with bratwurst. It tastes really good with bottled marinara sauce. I slice one open, brown like ground beef, drain carefully (lottsa fat) and savor.
Usually, I’ll have added salt, pepper, onions, some wine, canned mushrooms, chopped garlic, sometimes sugar, dried basil, and, when its done, hot giardineria and red pepper flakes.
I start by cooking onions and green pepper in olive oil until just starting to turn tender. Then I add fresh garlic and italian sausage (usually ground up, but I have sliced it for a change of pace) Add sauce (yes, I use a jar, but there are some good ones out there) add chopped tomotoes (I like to use one fresh and one can. They have different flavors) fresh basil and oregano.
I’m not much for extra veggies in it, but my brother likes to add brocolli and cauliflour to his and a friend of mine swears by zuchinni, but personally, I find it too mushy.
Top with fresh parmesan cheese. (I also will not eat the shaker stuff. )
I might give that basalmic vinegar idea a try though. It sounds wonderful.
Pasta cooked for 20 minutes has got to be one of the most revolting items that could ever come out of a kitchen. Like eating soaking-wet bread. Ich.
As for sauce, try and find a recipe for a good Bolognese. That’s “meat sauce” elevated to the stars.
Pasta should be al dente. I can’t imagine changing that.
But sauce, even from a jar, can be doctored all sorts of ways. I always add a can of tomato sauce to a jarred sauce, because otherwise, after I’m done doctoring, it will be impossibly thick. The tomato sauce brings it back to something fluid, not a solid.
I almost always brown sliced mushrooms seperately, and then throw them in towards the end of the sauce cooking.
I always add red wine and good extra virgin olive oil to the sauce. Sometimes a little balsamic vinegar too. I also always add fresh garlic.
I don’t care for ground beef, but I do put sausage in fairly frequently. Bratwursts peeled out of their casings and browned like ground beef are good, or else hot italian sausage.
Shallots are good! Saute them a little first. Actually, garlic is the only thing that I’ll let cook completely in the sauce. Everything else likes a little individual attention before it goes in.
Spices - fresh ground black pepper, oregano, or basil are my favorites.
If you’re buying jars of sauce and then adding a lot of extras to make it better, then you’re wasting your money. Jars of Classico and the like are expensive ($2.50 to 3.50) compared to cans of diced tomatoes or tomato sauce (.35-$.40 per 8 oz. can). Since you’re going to completely change the flavor, why not buy the cheaper item (which, by the way, will contain no flavor enhancers or other chemical additives) and save yourself a bunch o’ green?
Canned tomatoes, by the way, are generally superior to fresh tomatoes unless you’ve allowed your fresh tomatoes to ‘go over the hill’. Canned tomatoes are made from over-ripe product, which is sweeter and more flavorful. They’re also already peeled, which is important to the texture in tomato sauce.
I too will add in some Owens Sausage - Italian with the ground beouf.
Also, top yer plate off with a dollop of real sour cream.
For meatballs, I like a 50/50 mixture of veal and pork with some breadcrumbs, egg, and whatever spices you want (I usually use garlic, basil, oregano, maybe a bit of sage and red pepper). After you form the meatballs, dredge them in flour and fry until brown all around. This will keep them from falling apart in the sauce and adds a nice flavor.
Buy some of those frozen stuffed pastas-ravioli, tortellini, etc and boil that up.
Instead of tomato sauce, melt a pat of butter, add a Tbsp of Olive Oil and then some spices–I like salt, pepper, garlic, thyme and nutmeg. Yum. You can even use the poultry seasoning that’s all mixed together – great for folks on a budget who don’t use a lot of spices in cooking. 2 TBSP of this mix is enough for a serving or 2. Sprinkle some cheese on top and eat, eat, eat.