Thursday, September 10

Pasta in White Sauce with a TWIST!!!!!

I always feel that we as a generation are at a very advantageous situation. Our mothers were taught ‘food-making’ directly from the kitchens of their mother or grandmothers, which they duplicated with great precision. And we grew eating that, very religiously made traditional food. But we as a generation, when started off with our families, we brought in the twist. It is still the traditional food as was made by our grandmothers but with a noticeable twist in it. And I don’t hear any one complaining about that! After all experimentation is the essence of life. And what better lab than, our very own kitchen.
I am sure everyone since childhood has relished the traditional pasta in WHITE SAUCE. I personally love making pasta and my husband personally loves eating them. For all who have cooked white sauce, knows that to getting the right consistency is not easy at all. So in my imperfect cooking, I did figure out how to get the perfect white sauce after its completely gone wrong. Trust me and try my tip once. It never fails!!
Ingredients:
Pasta – 1 cup
For white sauce:
Butter – 1 tsp.
Plain flour or maida - 1 tbsp.
Milk – 1 to 1 ½ cup
Salt
Black Pepper powder
Oregano herb
Red chilli flakes
Fresh coriander and mint leaves
One cube of cheese
For the pasta:
Oil- 2 tbsp
Onions – 2 small ones
Ginger-garlic paste – 1 tsp.
Salt
Any tomato based sauce or as I had used, Thai sweet Red chilly sauce.
Green chillies only if one wants to make it a little spicy. It can be avoided in case u can’t manage spicy food.
Vegetables like mushroom, corn, or capsicum, whatever is available with you. Remember capsicum has a strong flavour, so if u want to use it, use it in less quantity. As I didn’t have capsicum at my place, I used corn and mushroom.
Before I start the recipe let me tell u a secret from my kitchen. The mushroom and corn that I had mentioned earlier came from a subzi my cook made the day before. Once u have eaten and relished a kind of vegetable on your plate, never fear from trying out something different from that same vegetable lying in your fridge. And that’s what I did. I washed it clean of all the Indian masalas and used it in the very Italian pasta!!
Method:
Boil 4-5 cups of water in a pan. Then put in the pasta in the boiling water accompanied with salt and a little oil. Now let it cook till the pasta is soft and easily breakable. Once done put it on a strainer and pour cold water on it.
In a wok, heat some butter. After its melted, put in the flour and let it fry in the butter for some time. Now pour in the milk carefully bit by bit so that lumps are not formed. I have always seen that whenever I make white sauce, it becomes lumpy. So for all souls like me with imperfect cooking, u can easily right the mistake by putting the sauce thru a fine strainer. Then with a spoon strain the lumps in the sauce.
Also as I am fond of runny sauce, I like to add a little water along with the milk. Now add some grated cheese and as the sauce comes to the right consistency, lower the heat and add the seasoning- salt, oregano, chilli flakes and black pepper powder. Once the flavours are nicely blended, add some finely chopped fresh coriander and mint leaves, and remove from the heat. At this stage cover the wok properly and keep it like that for some time, so that the flavour seeps in to the sauce.

For the pasta, in a non stick saucepan, heat some oil. Put in the chopped onions and fry it for around 5-7 mins. Remember as the dish is supposed to be white; don’t let the onion change its colour to brown. Put in the ginger garlic paste and fry it for some time. Now add your choice of vegetables in it and let it cook till the vegetables are soft. Add the desired seasoning, put in the pasta and toss it on low heat. Once done, season it with a little sauce and remove from heat.

Now depending on your way to serve, either mix the pasta and the sauce together or serve it separately. Garnish the dish with mint leaves and enjoy my pasta in white sauce WITH A TWIST!!!