It is a beginner-friendly tomato sauce pasta using mainly tomato passata without long-cooking soffritto. This absolutely delicious pasta can be ready in 20 minutes.
How do you cook tomato sauce pasta? I normally use tinned tomatoes to cook for a long time, but I find tomato passata plus ketchup is even better for making a robustly fragrant tomato sauce.
Tomato Passata is pureéd tomato and then strained, and its texture is smoother, silkier and thicker than tinned tomatoes. It offers a vibrant and fresh taste, which is very good for cooking pasta sauce. Since its flavour is concentrated and already well-blended, the cooking time can be shortened too!
I also added some ketchup and sugar for brightness and to balance the overall flavour.
Ingredients
Serves 2
- 160 g penne
- 8 ripe cherry tomatoes, halved
- ½ courgette, cut into batons
- 3 mushrooms, sliced
- ¼ onion, sliced
- a clove garlic, minced
- 1 dried chilli, deseeded
- 150 g tomato passata
- 1 tbsp ketchup
- 1 tsp sugar
- 10 fresh basil leaves
- Parmesan cheese
- olive oil
- salt and pepper
How to Make
- Bring a pot of salted water to a boil, cook the pasta as per packet instructions.
- Warm a tbsp of olive oil in a pan over medium-low heat, cook the onions until translucent, then add garlic and chilli to cook until fragrant.
- Add the courgettes, mushrooms, tomatoes and 3 tbsp of pasta cooking water, cook for 5 minutes or so, until the veg are softened.
- Pour in the tomato passata, ketchup and sugar, stir well and bring to simmer for 10 minutes. Return the cooked penne to the pan and toss well. Have a taste and adjust.
- Garnish with basil, crack in black pepper and freshly grate Parmesan cheese before serving.
