2+5 Challenge-Friendly Real Pasta Sauce

hels's Note:

This is a slightly reworked version of my Real Pasta Sauce Real pasta sauce to allow it to fit in with the 2 fruit and 5 veg challenge going on in the Vegetarian/Vegan forum (Dec 05/Jan06) As far as I'm aware, my fruits are the tomatoes and pepper and my veg are the onion, mushrooms, courgette, garlic and the very recent addition of sweetcorn :o)

• Total Time: 45 mins
• Prep Time: 15 mins
• Cook Time: 30 mins

Ingredients:

Servings: 3

• 400 g chopped tomatoes
• 1 onion
• 1 pepper (bell pepper or capsicum or whatever you want to call it! I think yellow looks pretty here, but you c)
• 6 -8 medium mushrooms
• 1 courgette (zucchini?)
• 150 g sweetcorn (a small can if using canned)
• 1 garlic clove
• 1 teaspoon dried herbs
• 1/2 teaspoon paprika
• salt and pepper
• olive oil (for frying)

Directions:

1. Chop onion, pepper, courgette and mushrooms and fry over a medium heat in a saucepan until the pepper is soft.
2. Add the tomato, sweetcorn, herbs and paprika to the saucepan and let simmer for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.
3. Check the taste and add salt, pepper and/or more paprika if necessary.
4. Leave to simmer for another 15-20 mins (continue stirring accasionally)- this is the perfect point to start cooking the pasta!
5. Add garlic about 10 mins before serving - if it gets cooked for any longer it will lose its taste.
6. serve with pasta. Cheese melted over the top is nice if you eat cheese.

Reviews

[McDebs]

I bought very cheap courgettes on their sell by date and searched for a recipe. This was perfect as I also had all the other ingredients in the kitchen. I missed out the garlic as I had meetings at work in the morning! Added Italian seasoning for the dried herbs and a tin of chopped tomatoes. Very nice! Low in fat - only used one tablespoon of olive oil and did the whole thing in my electric wok. This will become a favourite for sure!

[directions]

When i finished making it and before I ate it, I thought it would get a low rating because it didnt look as if it would go with the pasta..but it did and was extermely nice. It is a bit dry which I dont know whether it is because of the non juicy nature of my tomatoes or the general low number of tomatoes in the recipie Otherwise, good and healthy :D..will make again with more tomatoes