Penne Pomodoro

The basic setup for this recipe actually came from the back of the penne box that I had.  Their amounts were for an entire box of ziti though, and while I do like ziti a lot, I didn’t think I wanted a whole box.  So like a lot of things I make, this is half based in recipe and half in “winging it”.  Anyway, here goes:

Assemble Your Ingredients:

  • Olive Oil – You won’t need much.  For my single serving I think I probably used around four or  five tablespoons.
  • Tomatos – You’ll be cutting them up (I used one for me)
  • Garlic – However much you want.   I used three average-sized cloves for mine.
  • Basil – Fresh or frozen.  You can see in the picture below how much frozen basil I used.  I suupppppose you could use dried too, just use your intuition as to how much to use.
  • Chicken Broth – I used probably about a teaspoon of chicken boullion disolved into about a 1/4 cup of water.
  • Your Favorite Pasta – I always recommend ziti!
  • Some Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese to grate on the finished plate.
  • Salt and Pepper

Water Heating and Preperation  

Get your pasta water heating up.  While you’re waiting for that to boil, you might as well start cutting up those tomato(s) and garlic:

Now would also be a good time to cut up your basil.  I didn’t go too crazy here, but you want to make sure there’s no really big pieces.  Hopefully around this time you water has begun to boil and you can add the pasta to the water.  The next steps don’t take very long, so your pasta should be ready just about when you need it.  Obviously this will have to be adjusted depending on how much pasta you’ll be cooking (and how much water needs to heat up to 210 degrees).

Start Cooking

Add the chicken broth and olive oil to a nice wide frying pan and set the heat for high, you’ll be adding your pasta to this pan later, so make sure you’ll have room.  This part is where you’ll have to use some judgement.  You want the final sauce to be reduced enough so that the end-product isn’t too watery, but you obviously want it to be able to coat the pasta too.  Speaking of pasta, have you checked it lately?  You also don’t want to cook the tomatoes too much, the’ll fall apart if you do.  You really just need to get them hot.  So once the Oil/Broth mixture looks close, and the pasta is nearly done,  add the tomatoes, garlic and basil.

Dump in the Cooked Pasta

Dump the cooked pasta into the pan with your other ingredients.  Salt and Pepper to taste.  Remember, the chicken broth probably has a lot of salt in it, so you might not even need any more salt.  Toss it around to get all those good flavors covering the pasta.

Plate it Up!

Dump the finished product onto your plate, and grate a little fresh cheese over the top. 

Enjoy!