Simple and cheap, noodles are probably the poor college student's food of choice. There's ramen and mac & cheese (anything other than Kraft isn't worth my time), but even simpler than those is pasta (and sauce). The former two require mixing stuff in with the noodles; to make the latter, all you have to do is boil the noodles, remove them from the water and put on the sauce. All told, it takes almost 20 minutes, factoring in time for the water to boil.

But jarred sauces get boring. As good as Classico or Newman's Own may be, there's always something to be said for homemade food. And considering how easy it is to cook up tomato sauce, it makes no sense not to do so.

All you need is a pot, a stove, a knife, a wooden spoon and a can opener. plus the ingredients. Here's how to make a vegetable and meat sauce:

Pour the olive oil in the pot and turn on the stove. Drop in the garlic and onion once the oil starts to sizzle. Let it go for about five minutes, and in the meantime rinse and chop up the pepper, carrots and celery, then dump 'em in. Stir the vegetables around for 10 minutes or so.

By this time at least half of the oil should have been absorbed by the veggies, but if not, it isn't a big deal; pour in the cooking wine and add the ground meat. Let it go until either the meat browns or the wine evaporates, whichever happens second.

The base for any kind of tomato sauce is crushed tomatoes and tomato paste. Add those both, and stir it a lot, ideally with a wooden spoon. Then chop up the mushrooms and dump those in. Also add in whatever spices and/or herbs you'd like; I prefer basil and paprika. Cover the sauce and let it simmer for about an hour, stirring it every so often.

Serve and enjoy!

Let whatever leftover sauce there is cool down, put it into a giant Ziplock bag and freeze. To reheat, let it simmer in a pot with a little water.

Depending on how much sauce you and yours like, this recipe will make enough for 8-15 people.

The great thing about tomato sauce is that there are so many possible variations. Don't like turkey? Use beef. Want it to be more tomato-y? Chop up fresh tomatos and put them in. Use any other combonation of vegetables, or none at all!

Remember, food should be enjoyed in moderation; I got a bad stomach ache from eating too much spaghetti with this sauce!










Pasta Sauce Recipe

NB: These amounts are for the most part approximates, as cooking pasta sauce is so easy that I no longer use hard amounts, but go by sight.

1/2 cup olive oil
1/2 tablespoon minced garlic
1 1/2 cups frozen chopped onions
1 bell pepper
2 carrot sticks
2 sizable stalks celery
1 cup cooking wine
1 pound ground turkey
28 ounces crushed tomatoes
10 ounces tomato paste
1/2 carton mushrooms
Dried basil
Dried oregano
Paprika
Chili powder