Mahanandi

Living in Consciousness ~ Indi(r)a’s Food and Garden Weblog

Spaghetti in Spicy Cherry Tomato Sauce

(Imitating Rachel Ray’s 30-minute meal episode narration
for this month’s IMBB-Make it in 30 minutes)

Hi I’m Indira Singari, I’m going to prepare a 30 minute meal today. Spaghetti in spicy cherry tomato sauce. Who said we couldn’t have pasta in a spicy sauce? You know, I’ve tried commercial pasta sauces but my tastebuds, once you are used to spicy stuff, it’s tough to go back to that kind of childhood bland, flat taste. giggle… ok enough of chit chat…

Going to the pantry area… Grabbing 2 pints of cherry tomatoes. You know, I like cherry tomatoes. They have a very thin skin and have more zing than the romas. I bought two of these boxes for 99 cents each from the local grocery shop. What a deal, you know. gigggle…

Next thing on the list is, pasta – I’m in the mood for thin spaghetti. So thin spaghetti it is then. Also to add to the tomatoes… here is a teaspoon of cumin, 5 dried red chillies and 4 big garlic cloves. I see some nuts in my cupboard, ya…grabbing those…hmm…Quarter cup of watermelon seeds and a tablespoon of chironji(sara pappu), just to give that extra nutty sweetness to the tomato sauce. It’s going to be one Yum O sauce… giggle… I’m also going to add boiled and sliced eggs to the pasta as a side dish. 4 eggs are enough…

Garbage bowl is a handy one, I can carry all these in this big bowl and later when I am chopping I can dump all the waste like eggshells etc in the bowl. Believe me, it’s one handy thing to have by side. … giggle

Ok… first cooking the pasta: place the big saucepan on the burner. Fill two thirds of pot with water. Nothing is wrong with tap water, so fill it up. Drop 2 teaspoons of salt into water and cover with a lid. Bring to a boil. Also in other saucepan, take pot full of water, add eggs and pinch of salt, cover and cook them.

Prepping the cherry tomato sauce: It takes at least 5 minutes for water to come to a boil, so in the meantime, we prepare tomato sauce. Let’s go…Separate 10 cherry tomatoes from the box and keep them aside. You are going to see what I’m going to do with them later. Ok, back to tomatoes. Take the remaining cherry tomatoes in a blender; add cumin, garlic, dried red chillies and a teaspoon of salt. Blend them finely. This is going to be our spicy sauce… it took less than one minute, the time it takes to open a can of tomato sauce. giggle…

Now cooking the sauce: heat a teaspoon of EVOO.. that means extra virgin olive oil giggle…and drop one or two finely minced garlic. Also watermelon seeds and chironji (sara pappu). Sauté them till golden, then add the pureed spicy tomato sauce and one cup of water. Close the lid. Hmmm that starts smelling good. Cook this mixture on medium heat for at least 15 minutes, stirring in between.

Checking on the water — the water is boiling ready now. Add the pasta, you know, some people like to break the pasta to half before adding to the water. But I like them long, so here they go into the boiling water. I’ll wait for 5 minutes then I remove them. Checking the other pot…the eggs are cooked perfectly. I’m going to take them out of water with a big spoon.

Now getting ready to plate the meal: everything is coming together perfectly, ahh… the smell… I wish you could smell the tomato sauce… all that cumin, garlic… it’s like heaven in here. giggle… Ok, slice the cherry tomatoes we kept aside, to halves. Place them on a round plate to the edges. Peel and slice the boiled eggs into thin strips.

Pasta is cooked perfectly… slurping one spaghettial dente, just perfect. Pour the whole thing into a colander to drain the water. Add the spaghetti to the spicy tomato sauce and stir. Look how beautiful it looks… Wheaty white spaghetti in ruby red tomato sauce… Gorgeous!

Plating: Grab a couple of forkfuls of pasta and place them on the plate. Arrange some more sliced cherry tomatoes and some egg slices around the pasta to give that pretty look. Our 30-minute meal is ready. For dessert I’m going to have one of those muffin sized Mango Halwa pieces, I prepared yesterday. Just perfect to end the meal.

Tasting: Yum O…not only appealing to the eyes, this super simple meal has everything going on for it. It has carbos, nutty fat, eggy protein and veggies in the form of cherry tomatoes. Even more its spicy…taking a bite…hmm… loving it.. giggles

Hey I’m Indira Singari, you can prepare a great, satisfying meal in just 30 minutes. See… Signing off…(Camera focuses on the meal.)

Spaghetti In Spicy Tomato Sauce
30 minute meal – Spaghetti in Spicy Tomato Sauce served with cherry tomatoes and boiled egg slices

Ingredients
2 fistfuls of thin spaghetti
2 pints of cherry tomatoes
4 garlic cloves
5 dried red chillies
1 teaspoon of cumin
¼ cup of watermelon seeds and chironji (sara pappu, charoli)
Olive oil and salt to taste
Additions: 4 boiled eggs- yellows removed and sliced thin

Thanks “Too Many Chefs” for hosting this month’s IMBB event.
Tagged with: +

Posted by Indira©Copyrighted in Pasta,Tomato (Friday March 24, 2006 at 2:56 pm- permalink)
Comments (34)

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34 comments for Spaghetti in Spicy Cherry Tomato Sauce »

  1. Was very depressed yesterday and while browsing came across krishnaarjunas blogger and found a link from there to yours. I am a food fanatic and constantly in search of new ideas man i loved your site and like visited it nearly 20 times since yesterday………i feel like i should start blogging. Your recipes are too intersting and will try for ugadi…….. keep up the good work

    Comment by madhuri — March 24, 2006 @ 3:03 pm

  2. Hi Madhuri, cheers!
    Thanks for your nice words.

    Comment by Indira — March 24, 2006 @ 3:06 pm

  3. WOW!!! is all I can say.

    Comment by Tanuja — March 24, 2006 @ 3:13 pm

  4. spaghetti looks delicious. Iam little hesitant in cooking pasta, dont know how it’l turn out. And with recipes form other sites , i have to go hunting for the ingredients. ur can be cooked with wats stocked in the pantry.
    The write up makes me feel like iam watching rachel ray’s show. Iam only missing the video.

    Indira replies:
    Give it a try, Priya. Follow the instructions on the package to cook the pasta. Prepare a sauce to your liking and mix the pasta with it. I usually add some sort of sauteed vegetables or boiled eggs to make the meal more substantial. Vijay sometimes adds grilled shrimp or chicken pieces to the pasta as side dish.
    If you try this recipe, let me know how you like it.:)

    Comment by priya — March 24, 2006 @ 3:14 pm

  5. That was awesome.Would I be wrong in assuming that it is a sorta/almost/unintentional/intentional spoof on Rachel Ray :-d
    Sushma

    Comment by Sushma — March 24, 2006 @ 3:39 pm

  6. Wow Indira…You exatly imitated Racheal Ray.
    hats off!!

    Comment by Celeste — March 24, 2006 @ 3:40 pm

  7. Hi
    U exactly sounded like Racheal Ray.. Keep up the good work.

    Comment by JP — March 24, 2006 @ 3:43 pm

  8. Indira, that was brilliant! It really made me laugh like a loon at work.

    I tried making your spicy peanut sauce for spaghetti yesterday, and it was totally Yum-O, as Rachael would say.

    Comment by surya — March 24, 2006 @ 3:52 pm

  9. Hey Indira…

    Welll did u become Rachel Ray today? U made a 30 min meal…giggling like her…and making pasta…Did u meet her/talk to her…welll sorry just kidding around…

    Comment by BDSN — March 24, 2006 @ 3:54 pm

  10. what a funny spoof…:):)
    Only thing missing is the voice…:)
    I totally Love the giggle part.:):):)

    Comment by Santhi — March 24, 2006 @ 4:30 pm

  11. hahaha…i really enjoyed. Felt like watching her show. Nice try.

    Comment by Kavitha Senthil — March 24, 2006 @ 4:36 pm

  12. Haha!!
    That was hilarious!
    If I’m not mistaken, you don’t seem to think very highly of Rachael Ray 🙂

    Comment by roopa — March 24, 2006 @ 5:24 pm

  13. Great show, Indira! RR sort of grows on everyone… I am not a big fan of her recipes but your recipe sure is ingenious.

    Comment by mika — March 24, 2006 @ 6:06 pm

  14. Yum O… Enjoyed the show! giggle!

    Indira, you should be on FoodTV’s “The Next Food Network Star”!

    Comment by shanta — March 24, 2006 @ 7:19 pm

  15. Indira..that was funny! I cant stand RR..She talks like she almost had a stroke. But I have a few of my favorite recipes from her. Again, nice take on the 30min IMBB idea!

    Comment by Gini — March 24, 2006 @ 9:01 pm

  16. LOL, very Rachel indeed. Goor work, Indira

    Comment by cin — March 24, 2006 @ 9:26 pm

  17. You caught the irritating giggle perfectly 🙂 and nice looking pasta too

    Comment by Ashwini — March 24, 2006 @ 11:57 pm

  18. I never seen her myself but I realize that this is an excellent imitation! And a great dish!

    Comment by Ilva — March 25, 2006 @ 2:21 am

  19. hahaha..hilarious!! Impeccable imitation of Rachel Ray.

    EVO & Yumo..and the giggle=*THE Joker grin* (Batman’s nemesis)..mind numbingly funny 🙂

    Comment by subbu — March 25, 2006 @ 9:34 am

  20. That was really funny. And you have displayed the spaghetti so nicely too!

    Comment by yum — March 25, 2006 @ 12:17 pm

  21. Wow!! That giggle, garbage bowl, and EVOO……Perfect!

    Comment by RP — March 25, 2006 @ 2:59 pm

  22. Great post!

    Comment by AreEyeTeeYou — March 26, 2006 @ 7:38 am

  23. c’mon people, why be mean to poor RR? making everyday simple things sound like ingenious ideas (the garbage bowl) indeed is an art. i love watching her show. just add a dash of indian spices to her recipes and they aren’t too bad… like how you did indira, it was great!

    Comment by Bharti — March 26, 2006 @ 12:32 pm

  24. LOL! Great post, Indira!

    And the dish looks very tasty too–tastier than most of the food photography in Ray’s magazine. (Which looks icky….)

    Comment by Barbara — March 26, 2006 @ 1:44 pm

  25. Great presentation Indira:)..Also amazing photographs..Its mouth watering too..

    Comment by Annita — March 26, 2006 @ 11:01 pm

  26. Great presentation Indira:-) and you are just like me..always trying to spice up the Italian and Mexican stuff. mana andhra touch isthe evayinaa baaguntaayi. pure fusion. BTW, I made a black bean Bouritto in Andhra style. Will share with you soon.

    Comment by Vamsi Poondla — March 26, 2006 @ 11:18 pm

  27. Indira,
    Great post, really hilarious! Rachel’s giggling sound still echos in my ears *lol* I think she’s very cute and entertaining though.
    I haven’t tried using cherry tomato to make sauce… when its price is good will give it a try.

    Comment by gattina — March 27, 2006 @ 4:30 am

  28. LOLOL, very funny and clever, Indira. i LOVED reading this post, definitely more enjoyable than watching RR.

    Comment by stefoodie — March 27, 2006 @ 10:12 am

  29. Your comments made my post more interesting and some of your comments are really funny. Thanks for the fun read!

    I wrote this post after watching the “The Next Food Network Star” on Food TV. On that episode, the judges asked the contestants to prepare food, while talking entertainingly to the audience and also they must finish off the preparation and plating of the meal in alloted time slot.

    That gave me an idea of writing a post, as if it’s happening live. I used to watch RRay regularly back in the days, so thought to write a post in her episode style.
    Just trying something different from my routine recipe, preparation writing style.
    I’m glad to see that it’s taken in the same note it’s intended. Thanks!

    Comment by Indira — March 27, 2006 @ 1:20 pm

  30. This made my day! Thanks so much. I don’t think I giggled like this since high school. hehehehehehe!

    Comment by eqj (the chocolate lady) — March 27, 2006 @ 10:47 pm

  31. Too clever! I’ve only seen Rachael Ray a couple of times but INSTANTLY it was obvious what you were doing! Thanks for the good laugh …

    Comment by Alanna — April 1, 2006 @ 3:03 pm

  32. Don’t laugh. If she hears this, she might take it serious and steal it!! Hey, if she’ll put cut up hot dogs in hamburger meat…..

    Comment by Diane — October 4, 2006 @ 11:15 am

  33. A good spoof on she-who-must-not-be-named. I run a culinary discussion forum, and this was one of the better chuckles I encountered today. Thanks.

    More please ! 🙂

    Comment by Brad — October 4, 2006 @ 3:17 pm

  34. Hi Indira..
    Regular visitor of ur blog. i some how missed this post in ur blog . when i was reading, i felt ” this doesnt sound like Indira.. and then it felt totally like RR..” Nice write up.
    Lala

    Comment by Lala — January 3, 2008 @ 1:43 pm

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