Wednesday, June 30, 2010

No spaghetti for you!


There are literally thousands of so called spaghetti recipes out there. Everyone thinks that they 'know the secret' or that their mom's is the best. And that is why I am not going to give you a recipe.

On a side note, spaghetti is a type of noodle, just like macaroni. What people commonly call "spaghetti" is a bolognese sauce. I was at a restaurant once and got a so-called 'marinara' sauce, it had meat in it. The big difference is that bolognese sauce has meat in it, and marinara does not. One is not better than the other, just simply a different beast. There was another time I was at an event and they had "vegetarian bolognese" and this brings me to my current gripe. You cannot call it bolognese sauce if there is no meat in it. You can't call it a chicken nugget, if there is no chicken in it, and it is not bacon if it is not made from pork. There are other things to call these foods and they should be labeled as what they are: vegetarian spaghetti sauce, soy-nugget, processed-liquid-turkey-meat-pressed-into-a-cube-and-sliced. Delightful! Americans are so wrapped up in a plastic, sheltered and clean little world that they don't even know what they are eating because it's much easier to label our food with words of comfort than actual descriptions! Honestly soy-nugget doesn't sound good and chick-nugget does, but chick nuggets should come from baby chickens, or chicks right? That sounds really gross. Perhaps there is a method to our madness, but let's at least get our pasta sauces sorted out.

Anyhow I made up a spaghetti sauce the other day and it's not smooth like marinara or made from meat like bolognese so I call it... spaghetti sauce. Let's talk about vegetarian links for a bit. There are many out there. Some are good, some are meh, and some are downright awful. Actually there are several that are quite tasty. I like the Soyrizo brand of soy flavored with traditional Chorizo flavorings. Even though I know it's good, if I think about what Chorizo is made from when I eat it I do get a slightly ooky feeling in my tum tum. When making spaghetti sauce I recommend Tofurky or Field Roast. These particular brands have enough fat in them to hold up well during cooking, and taste good.

So here is my spaghetti sauce ingredient list, it's not your mom's and it's not traditional. It is tasty though. Oh, you get to guess on proportions, as I said earlier, this is not a recipe.

Ingredients:
Pomi strained tomatoes
diced tomatoes
diced New Mexico green chili
red chili flakes
onion
garlic
celery leaves
oregano - fresh
basil - fresh
red wine - one you would have a glass of
soy links chopped and browned
salt and pepper
Romano cheese to serve

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