There is nothing more beautiful than the sight of a fresh, fully ripen plum tomatoes. The blessed tropical weather that we have means that having fresh tomatoes is an occassion we savour all year round. The dish has a thick creaminess that you can never duplicate with canned plum tomatoes, no matter how good or expensive the are. There is an ideal instant, a tell-tale sign, for serving this sauce: when the tomatoes soften and all of their juices are in the pan, the sauce will suddenly begins to thicken. At that moment, at its’ peak, another minute or two later will result in the juices evaporating and, although the essence of the sauce is equally intense, it won’t be able to coat the pasta well. Observe the sauce as it cooks, but should it happen, just add a little olive oil or butter to the finished dish.
Serves 4
8 medium-sized fully ripen tomatoes (cored and roughly chopped)
2 cloves of garlic, minced
one shallot, minced
a good slab of butter, about 4 tablespoons
400 grams spaghetti or linguine
a handful of freshly grated Parmesan cheese
salt and freshly ground black pepper
Cook the pasta in a large pot of salted boiling water. Melt butter in a skillet of a saute pan, add the garlic and shallot and fry for a minute or two over medium heat. Add the tomatoes, cook, stirring occasionally until the tomatoes begin to juice up, then turn the heat to low and continue to stir until the sauce thickens. Season the sauce to taste. Once the pasta is cooked, drain, and toss with the tomatoes and cheese.
Variation:
- Add some shrimp when together when frying the garlic and shallot just before adding the tomatoes
- Add a few branches of basil, remove them just before serving and stir in about half cup of roughly chopped basil leaves into the pasta
- Toss the pasta with about a cup of cubed fresh mozzarella
- Add dried chilli to taste along with the tomatoes to install a bit of heat into the pasta
**A note on preparing fresh tomatoes: Always core fresh tomatoes before being used (remove the cone-shaped wedge from the stem end). Peeling is optional – but if the tomato skin is an issue, simply remove it by blanching (score the bottom end of the tomatoes, drop the tomatoes into hot boiling water for 30 seconds, remove with a slotted spoon into a bowl of cold water and slip the peel right off the score marks). Alternatively, you can also fish out the skin as the sauce simmers; it automatically separates from the flesh.
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