Last month, I spent most of my money before I could do my last few weeks of groceries. This, I soon realized, equaled eating white flour rottini for lunch every day (and maruchan for dinner) until my next paycheck. If you can relate to this, or just really love pasta and want to spice it up a bit, join me on my journey to enlightenment through better noodles.
First off, shout-out to Barilla Rotini; they sell this brand of pasta at Target, Jewel-Osco, even CVS and it costs around two dollars for a full box (which is 8 servings). It’s the curly kind, which somehow makes it taste a lot better than spaghetti.
For this article, I actually read the instructions on the box, and after you put the pasta into your pot of boiling water, you’re supposed to take it out after 7 minutes. This does make a difference since it leaves the noodles “al dente,” which means “to the tooth” in italian and is how restaurants usually make them. Besides this, I read on another pasta box that noodles made of white flour keep cooking when you take them out of the stove, so it’s better to take them out earlier than later if you like that perfectly cooked taste.
While my pasta is cooking, I like to add 2 tsp. of olive oil so they don’t stick together, and a tsp. of salt.
After it’s done, I drain the pasta and then put it back into the pot, so I can mix the ingredients together. First, I add a tbsp. of butter and mix it into the noodles until it’s all melted. Then, I add tomato sauce, which is a major key in making your dish taste like it’s a better quality than it really is. I invested in some good, organic, Trader Joe’s sauce and it really made a big difference, as it makes the recipe taste fresher in the end and less canned. After this, I add a little bit of garlic powder, as well as some basil or oregano on top. Mixing in the garlic powder and herbs makes a big difference and has made my food a lot less sad! To finish it off, add as much parmesan cheese as you’d like.
I can genuinely say that this recipe changed my life- hope it changes yours too!