Linguine with tomato, chili, olive and basil sauce

[Andy Lynes]

Linguine with tomato, chili, olive and basil sauce

Serves 4 as Appetizeror 2 as Main Dish.

Sometimes, the desire to crash on the sofa with a glass or three of wine is much stronger than the desire to spend hours in the kitchen generating washing up for my long suffering wife.

I'm therefore always on the look out for recipes that take less than an hour to prepare, but still deliver in the taste department.

Here's a dish that I recently knocked up out of store cupboard ingredients and that I enjoyed eating enough to want to record and share with others.

I make no great claims to authenticity (well, I've used ketchup, so how could I?) or particularly original thought, but it is a genuinely quick and easy plate of food to prepare and worth having in your repetoire for those occassions when the inner-chef is demanding an early night.

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Ingredients

• 1 T olive oil
  
• 1 medium onion, finely diced
  
• 1 fat clove of garlic, finely diced
  
• 1 red chili, halved, deseeded and sliced
  
• 400 g canned tomatoes or passata
  
• 1 T tomato ketchup
  
• 8 black olives, pitted and chopped
  
• 8 leaves basil, torn or sliced
  
• sea salt and black pepper to taste
  
• 320 g linguine
  

Heat the oil in a pan and sweat the onion until soft, add the garlic and chili and fry gently for a moment. Pass the tomatoes through a mouli legume (omit this stage if using passata) and add to the vegetables. Cook for 15-20 minutes to allow the sauce to thicken, then add the ketchup (you may not need a tablespoon, you want just enough to add sweetness to balance the acidity of the tomatoes.) Stir in the olives and the basil at the last moment. Season with salt and pepper.

Cook the linguine as per packet instructions, drain, toss with the sauce and serve immeadiately with grated parmesan, a splash of extra virgin olive oil and some more torn basil leaves if you wish.

Keywords: Main Dish, Italian, Easy, Vegetarian, Pasta

( RG634 )