Mafalde

We start by heating the olive oil in our dutch oven. We add the onions and saute on medium-low heat until translucent. This takes 5-10 minutes. The minced garlic cloves are then added and cooked for 30 seconds.

We remove the dutch oven from the heat, and spoon the onions and garlic into the blender. We pour the tomato liquid from one can into the dutch oven, and put the whole tomatoes from the one can into the blender. We puree the tomatoes with the onions and garlic until smooth. We are very careful not to add the 2 cans of tomatoes to the blender. We have learned, from rather messy experience, that adding too much of anything to a blender can cause rather violent overflows (not quite an explosion, but it sure seems so at the time!).

When 1 can of tomatoes is completed, we pour it into our dutch oven. We then pour the tomato liquid from the second can into the dutch oven and puree these tomatoes. Once these have been pureed and added to the stove, we add the dried basil, fresh parsley stems, salt & pepper, hot pepper flakes, and bay leaves. We then simmer the sauce for about 30 minutes, partially covered, over medium low heat.

After about 15 minutes, we bring enough water to a boil for a pound of pasta and add a little salt. We cook the mafaldine for 6 minutes until al dente and drain it in a colander. We add the chopped parsley to the sauce at this time and turn off the heat. In a large serving bowl, we mix the pasta with some sauce and add 1 cup of the ricotta cheese.

We serve this pasta meal with additional tomato sauce, ricotta cheese, and some Locatelli.