Tag Archives: Italy

Italian Crock Pot Pasta Sauce – “IT’S A EASY”

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Thick and meaty pasta sauce

One of the crates we made from old barn wood – holding wine, pasta and our canned pasta sauce.

Here is our recipe for our Italian-style pasta sauce that can be made in the crock pot in 10 to 15 minutes before you leave for work in the morning – and be ready for hungry mouths when you get home! Pasta may be one of the easiest ways to feed a large family.  It’s inexpensive, and it goes a long way towards filling up hungry stomachs. With everyone at the house involved in sports and activities – the crock pot works out great – we can make the pasta as needed – and simply ladle the hot pasta sauce over it, and your ready to eat.  Although store bought tomato juice works great – this is an great way to use up tomato juice left over from last year’s garden in  your pantry.

A great way to use all of that canned tomato juice

Ingredients :

2 quarts of tomato juice  (For home canned juice, drain off the top 1/8 to 1/4 of the jar to get rid of the watery part)

2 cans of tomato paste

3 cloves of garlic minced fine or run through a press

Pasta drained and ready for sauce!

1 cup of red wine (we use Merlot)

1 to 1.5 pounds of ground hamburger, drained

3/4 cup of grated Parmigiano Reggiano cheese

1/4  teaspoon of red pepper flakes

1/8  teaspoon of onion powder

1 teaspoon of sugar

Ready to Eat!

1 teaspoon of salt (we use garlic salt to add a little more flavor)

1 teaspoon each of dried Oregano, Italian parsley and Basil.

1 to 2 bay leaves

Start by getting the  hamburger browned.  While that’s going, we pull out the crock pot and pour in half of the wine along with all of the other ingredients and turn it on high to get them a jump-start heating up.  I’ll go back and drain the fat from the meat, and put it back on to finish browning, adding the other half of the wine into the browning meat for about another 5 minutes.  Then place into the crock pot with the other ingredients – give it a final stir – set the crock pot back to low - and your done!!  That’s it.  Pretty simple.   I will usually take off the lid when I come home for the evening and keep the heat on low…it allows the sauce to thicken even more before serving.  We ladle it on top of each serving onto whatever pasta we are having that night.  It works great with spaghetti, penne, rigatoni, or bow tie pasta.  If we have any left over (which is usually not the case with the mouths we feed!) we just put in the fridge for leftovers.  If you would like to receive our Recipe Of The Week each Friday – be sure to sign up to follow the blog, hit the “like” button on the Facebook sidebar, or follow us on Twitter.

Making Home Made Pasta – Passing Down A Family Tradition From Italy

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My Grandmother. Born in Italy in 1899, she came to the US where she met and married my grandfather.

This past weekend, we spent the day making home-made pasta noodles with my mom, my sister and brother-in-law.  Mary and I both grew up with parents who made fresh pasta, and although I am sure we both may have been “little helpers” in our youth – this was truly the first time for either of us to really learn the art.  The best part of all, was in addition to making incredible fresh pasta – we learned so much more about the past.

Tried and true recipe with vintage tools of the trade

The recipe itself is simple.  Two basic ingredients. Eggs, and flour – with about 1 egg for every cup of flour.  It can’t get more simple than that – and it’s easy to see why pasta of all types has fed many a generation of hungry people.  It’s inexpensive and easy to make – and it filled you up!

On this day we had the privilege of using my mother’s pasta maker. It was imported from Italy over 65 years ago as a wedding present from my Italian grandmother to my then newlywed mom.

The pasta maker that was given to my mother as a wedding present in 1953 - still as beautiful as it was then!

As the day unfolded – I became amazed at just how many things my mom still used and that still looked and worked so well from those earlier years.

In addition to the pasta maker, we beat the eggs and mixed flour in brightly colored vintage Pyrex mixing bowls, and worked the dough on an old wooden pie board that was a wedding shower present.

If that wasn’t enough – we rolled and cut dough out on a classic cherry red kitchen table from the 50′s – in the extra downstairs kitchen my father had built for mom, complete with their matching vintage refrigerator and oven (still both working by the way!).

Working in the vintage kitchen - Admiral Fridge and Stove, along with a classic red table and the pasta machine.

We joked with my mom that all of her older “things” are so “in” right now – but after spending the day working with everything – it’s easy to see why that’s the case.  There is no mistaking the quality and workmanship built into the tools and appliances of our parents and grandparents era. Things were built to last, and taken care of by a generation who valued what they had.  Something that I think our generation should and could learn a lot from.

6 farm fresh eggs from our hens in a vintage red Pyrex bowl - ready to be beaten and mixed into the flour

So while we rolled the dough through the machine – We got to hear great stories about how my grandmother would make mountains of pasta right on the kitchen table – and all about big sunday dinners of the past, complete with spaghetti, fried chicken and of course, homemade wine.

We finished the day with a great family style spaghetti feast – topped with pasta sauce we had canned from our garden – and yes a little wine too (someday, hopefully we can use one of our own bottles!)   It felt like after all that pasta we should have included a nap as well!

The dough balls - all ready to be rolled through the pasta machine and then cut into noodles.

All joking aside – this day will go down as a favorite.  Spending time with family, passing on recipes, hearing stories of the past and enjoying great home-made food – that is something no amount of money can ever buy – and something I will cherish for the rest of my life.

Fresh Pasta with our Homemade sauce!

We also learned some valuable lessons from my mom in keeping a pasta machine working.  Never ever use any type of water to clean it. And never use salt in the dough.  If you follow those two simple rules…you end up with one vintage machine that can crank out a lot of noodles in it’s lifetime.  We included our little step by step process of the pasta making at the bottom of the post – if you have never tried it – it’s so worth the time!