One of the Best and Worst Dishes I've Ever Made: Amazing Slow-Cooker or Stove-Top Tomato Sauce with 'Raw' Cheese on VERY Not Raw Fresh Pasta

Sounds a bit Dickensian, doesn't it? "It was the best of dishes, it was the worst of dishes".

Here's what happened:
I made the most amazing tomato sauce. I'm serious. If you were me and I was you I would marry you for this tomato sauce. Honestly the best tomato sauce I've ever made, including many attempts with San Marzanos, supposedly the best and naturally sweetest canned, imported tomatoes. No, I used market fresh big ones from my farmer John at the Mile End market. I hope he knows what a difference his tomatoes have made in my life. Am I being overly dramatic? No, you need to try these tomatoes and this sauce. Italian Grandmothers will love me for this sauce. I will never again be hit over the head with a spatula by a woman yelling, "Che stupida!" I don't think that one needs translation...it hasn't actually happened yet, the yelling and the beating by spatula I mean, but it seems rather inevitable when I make such horrible pasta.

That was the problem, see, the pasta. The sauce was divine and the pasta was a disaster. I tried to do it quickly. You take 2 cups of flour in the pasta maker (I used Première Moisson, not my gluten-free blend, to make it fuss-free. I can't remember the last time I had so much wheat and gluten in my stomach...it feels like a pile of rocks) and then pour in a combination of a beaten egg, 1 tablespoon of olive oil and a bit of water up to the line on my little container that comes with the magical machine. MIX for 4 minutes, and then EXTRUDE with whichever pasta die you want. Simple. Couldn't be easier. Except the pasta maker wasn't properly set up, so everything seemed to be mixing correctly and then when I pressed extrude things started spinning and falling over and flour flew all over the floor and nothing was coming out and I swore...a lot...and probably scared my relatively new roommate. I didn't even swear in Italian. Do I even know how to do that? I do now:

"Vaffanculo a Lei, la sua moglie, e' la sua madre. Lei e' un cafone stronzo. Io non mangio in questo merdaio! Vada via in culo!"

 

Yeah, look it up. I'm going with this one because there's no direct translation of what I actually said...I wasn't quite as long-winded, and I was certainly more repetitive, but this one gets the gist of it.

The point is, I took all the marble-sized pieces of pasta and threw them straight in boiling, salted water instead of extruding them into linguine, or fettucine, or penne. The pasta was dense from a bit of over-mixing, and then I boiled it too long because I didn't care at that point, and, well, it really didn't matter in the end, because:

Tomato Sauce 

Ingredients:

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil (yes, I actually used all two tablespoons. You don't need a lot of this sauce, since it coats everything and is so flavourful, but olive oil is good for you, and as long as you don't abuse it too regularly, you will be happier using 2 tablespoons than 2 teaspoons)

2 shallots, diced

3-5 cloves garlic, crushed with flat of knife and sliced thinly (remove the germ, the greenish bit in the middle, since it supposedly makes the dish bitter. Apparently crushing the garlic also makes it less bitter. I actually did this step. Normally I read this instruction and scoff, but I wasn't taking any chances)

1/2-1 cup diced, fresh parsley. I wrapped it all around itself and kind of did a chiffonade (wrap it up like a cigar and then make thin slices. It doesn't bruise the herb as much this way)

1/2 cup red wine. ("Good enough quality to drink". I went overboard on the quality part because I had an incredible - well, for me, very nice - bottle of a Languedoc-Roussillon wine open that needed to be used)

1/2 tablespoon cane sugar (I used xylitol, a sugar substitute, since it's so little)

Salt (a pinch) and freshly ground black pepper (a few grinds)

5 very large, sweet, ripe, perfect market tomatoes

1 tsp lemon juice (use this only if you DON'T use parmesan or another cheese on top. It's too much acid with the cheese and takes away from the incredible sweetness of the sauce. There's enough acidity in most cheeses to do the trick)

3 tablespoons brandy (optional. I think it will overwhelm the tomato and wine flavour so I skipped it. I ate the pasta with the rest of the red wine, so I didn't want different alcohol messing up the wine pairing either. Don't worry, I'd been working on this bottle for a week, so it's not as though I downed a whole bottle minus a half a cup. You're probably laughing at me because who drinks a bottle of wine a half a glass at a time over the course of a week?)

As I said, my farmer John was the key to my success. Buy incredible tomatoes, let them ripen, don't eat them all for salad. So do like I did with my figs, buy way more than you think is necessary so some are left for this sauce by the time you get around to making it. Blanch the tomatoes in boiling water until the skins are loose and wrinkled (about 45 seconds-1 minute, 15 seconds). Use tongs to transfer them to a bowl of ice water (you don't want to drain the whole pot in case the skins aren't ready to be removed and you under-blanched them. Sucks having to wait for water to boil AGAIN. What are you? Pregnant?) and remove the skins once the tomatoes are cool enough to touch. Then dice them.

Now the important part: drain the excess juice from the tomatoes. Put the tomatoes over a big sieve or put them over a little sieve like I did in batches. It's mind-numbing and frustrating (to the point where I bought a big strainer today after I'd done this, so next time it will be easier) but it makes all the difference in the world. If you do this sauce on the stove you only need to drain the tomatoes a little since some of the juice will evaporate in the cooking process and you don't want it to burn. But if you do it in a slow-cooker like I did, you need to get rid of all the excess liquid. Don't bother removing the seeds. If the seeds make it more bitter, then the sauce would have been too sweet if I'd taken them out. 

 

Heat the olive oil over medium heat in a pot if cooking on the stove, or in a frying pan or pot if cooking in the slow-cooker. When hot, add the shallots. 

Turn the heat down to medium-low, cover the pot, and sauté for 10-12 minutes. I forgot to cover it, but I don't think it really mattered since the heat was so low and there was so much oil.

Add the garlic and parsley and re-cover for another 5 minutes or so. This time I actually read the instructions correctly and covered it.

Uncover and add the wine. Reduce the liquid by about half (5 minutes-ish). 

Add your diced, sieved tomatoes, and salt and pepper. Transfer the contents of the pot to the slow-cooker, or cook fifteen minutes on the stove. I like the slow-cooker method because you turn the heat to low for a good 2 or 3 hours and all the flavours marry. It's more like the traditional idea of leaving the pot on the stove all day to cook. 15 minutes feels like a quickie - convenient, but not as satisfying. So I hear, mom.

If you're using lemon juice or brandy, add it 20 minutes before you want to eat for the slow-cooker version. In the stove-top version add it 3-4 minutes before serving.

Serves 4. Top with fresh parsley and cheese, or my version of cheese:

Raw Cashew Cheese:

A handful of soaked cashews (a few hours in a big bowl of water, and then drained. Or soak them in advance and then dehydrate them and freeze them until you need them) thrown in the blender with a splash or 3 of lemon juice, a sprinkle of salt (as much as you'd get from a parmesan - "parmiggiano"...what am I? English? - cheese, to a good pinch), and a few grinds of pepper. If you don't die of happiness on first tasting the tomato sauce it's your tomatoes' fault. Trust me. It's all about faith and good tomatoes and a little bit of prayer thrown in because it's Italian. You could yell a little if you want, too. That makes it more authentic.