I’m a huge fan of noodles and living on my own again I realized I don’t make rice as much as I'm used to eating; instead, I opt for noodles. I guess when I get to make the choices of what’s for dinner each night, I always want noodles and that works for me. So this past week, I’ve decided I’m going to make my first pasta with Vodka Sauce, with the guidance of Molly Baz at Bon Appetit. I have a bunch of these recipes saved up waiting to try and I was a little busy this past week. I haven’t been home to cook often and when I do cook it lasts for a few meals so the number of new dishes I make per weeks is pretty low. I’ve been getting better at cutting recipes in half so I get to try more dishes but I’m not going to lie, it’s work. There’s a lot of planning involved and luckily I enjoy going to the grocery store which is less than 10mins away from me.
So, Molly’s recipe is actually a Basically recipe which I get very excited about because that means there are few ingredients and the recipe is super easy and fast. Molly makes hers using rigatoni but I didn’t have any in my cupboard so I went with a farfalle which worked perfectly fine. The pasta goes in one pot and the base of the sauce starts in another with onions and garlic. Now, the recipe calls for the cloves of garlic to just be lightly smashed and throw in almost whole and while I did that this time, I would totally cut them down at least a little next time because i like getting chunks of garlic, not a whole clove. Tomato paste went in then the vodka to deglaze the pot. Then a mix of pasta water and heavy creme to ensure the dairy didn’t break. I like that technique and it was super easy and smart to just mix the cream with hot water first to temper and add it into the pot warm. The sauce was a really nice color an when I added the pasta it was a good sauce to noodle ratio so I ended up not adding more pasta water to the mixture. I feel my sauce was a little heavy on the tomato paste and could’ve used a tad bit more cream but I’m not going to lie, the tomato paste was the one thing I didn’t measure out fully so I’m 100% sure I added a little more than what the recipe calls for (halved).
I added parm to finish and actually had a side of green peas to cut the pasta with some vegetables which completely helped. The Vodka sauce was actually really good and I did a better job than I was expecting to for my first ever Vodka sauce. The dish overall was a little rich with the tomato paste and cheese so a little more cream to the sauce to lighten it up would likely help but adding a veggie also helped cut the richness with a little fresh/sweet pop. I would totally make this again. I love Basically because they feel so easy and they keep coming out perfectly that I can’t help but be happy when I make these dishes. Would totally recommend trying this one out.