Pasta Alla Vodka
An Original Recipe by Lorraine Elliott
Preparation time: 10 minutes
Cooking time: 15 minutes concurrently
Serves: 4
- 400g/14ozs. rigatoni or penne
- 1 tablespoon salt
- 30g/1oz/2 tablespoons butter
- 1 onion, finely diced
- 5 cloves garlic, peeled and thinly sliced
- 2/3 cup/185g/6.5ozs. tomato paste
- 400g/14ozs tin finely chopped tomatoes or your favourite arrabbiata pasta sauce
- 6 tablespoons vodka or tequila
- 1 tablespoon red chilli flakes (optional but not really IYKWIM :) )
- 3/4 cup/185ml/6.5flozs. cream
- 1/2-1 cup pasta cooking water
- Freshly grated parmesan cheese to serve
Step 1 - Put a large pot of water onto boil and add 1 tablespoon of salt to the water and cook the pasta until al dente
Step 2 - While it is cooking heat a large frypan on medium heat and add the butter and melt. Sauté the onions in the butter until soft and fragrant and then add the garlic and saute for a minute. Add the tomato paste, tinned tomatoes or pasta sauce, alcohol and chilli flakes and bring to a simmer and cook for 7 minutes.
Step 3 - When the pasta is ready reserve some of the cooking water and drain the pasta. Add the cream to the sauce base and stir. Then add the pasta and some of the cooking water - I start with 1/4 cup and use around 1/2 cup total. Taste for seasoning adding more salt if needed and add more pasta water if you need to loosen the sauce. Spoon onto plates and grate cheese over the pasta and ground black pepper.
Truthfully I'm getting a bit tired of having so many dinner parties because it's every weekend and I need to cook up so much but it's nice to have everyone over to our new place and I think they are curious to see it. Pasta alla vodka fitted the easy requirements and I also made up a warm lamb shoulder salad, some home made focaccia and a salad to go with it and cake to finish. I was exhausted after this and I swore to Mr NQN that we were hitting pause on the dinner parties. Once a month or so is nice but once a week is too much for me.
When they came over we started off in the living room having drinks. It's one of my favourite rooms in the house. We had the walls painted matte black and the architraves and ceiling gloss white and it came up beautifully. It has a cosy, wintry, library vibe with the fireplace and bookshelves. And sitting pride of place is a bit of crafting I did. Yes Dear Reader, I did a bit of low level crafting!
A few weeks ago my friend Denise offered me her black metal bar cart. It was the perfect size for our lounge room but I wanted to give it a brass look. I went off to Bunnings where I was going to purchase some brass spray paint. I've never spray painted anything in my life and the spray paint is behind lock and key because kids buy it to graffiti.
"Which one do you want?" asked the guy that was helped me.
I needed all the help I could get. "Whichever one is best for a novice?" I answered. He bypassed the $7 cans and handed me the $30 can.
We waited for a cool, not humid day where it wasn't raining and lay out some cardboard to protect the grass. I had prepped the metal by sanding it and removed the glass and plugs and covered the wheels. I started off doing the underside so it would be inconspicuous if I screwed it up. I put on one coat and surveyed my handiwork and it didn't look half bad! I'm sure a lot of it had to do with the quality of the spray paint that went on nice and thick and even. When he saw how much fun I was having, Mr NQN came outside and finished it off. Now we both feel a bit of pride when we see our bar cart.
After drinks we moved to the dining room where I served up a platter of this rigatoni alla vodka along with the other dishes. Although there was a large platter of this it quickly got scooped up and Miss America in particular was a big fan of this.
"Now darling tell me what is in this sauce," Miss America said to me leaning over. He was grabbing pieces of rigatoni with his hands saying each piece would be his last. I explained that it was a simple dish made only of a few ingredients. And like spray painting a bar cart, it looks deceptively hard but is in fact very easy!
So tell me Dear Reader, how often do you have dinner parties? Are you good at crafts? Have you ever spray painted anything? And are you a fan of pasta alla vodka?