Best spaghetti ever!

I've been cooking spaghetti for decades, and have been doing it all wrong! I always ate my pasta plain, with just lots of butter and salt, no sauce. If I have meatballs in spaghetti sauce, I don't mind a little of the sauce that comes with grabbing the meatballs, but usually I'll have a small bowl of plain spaghetti first, then a little more with the meatballs and a touch of sauce. I've become more tolerant of sauce with spaghetti lately, and since learning this new trick a couple of weeks ago, I've eaten spaghetti with sauce several times and now love it. It tastes sooo much better now that I'm using this preparation tip, and you won't believe how simple it is.

Do you drain your spaghetti in a colander when it's done cooking? STOP! I always strained my spaghetti too, and was amazed at the difference when I used the method shown in this video.


 



Basically, just don't drain your pasta. Fix your sauce in a pan, cook your spaghetti as usual, then just ladle it out of the water with your pasta server and put it directly into the sauce instead of draining the spaghetti, putting on a plate, then adding sauce.

So don't add sauce to your plate of spaghetti.  You want to add your spaghetti to your sauce.

I don't understand the full physics of it, but I guess it has something to do with the sauce soaking into the pasta noodles better.  I don't really care about the science behind it, I just know that it works, and the spaghetti with sauce tastes MUCH better.

I live alone so don't cook a lot of large meals, but boiling spaghetti is quick and easy, so I've made it for lunch 3-4 times in the last several weeks since learning this trick.  What I do is take my regular jar of spaghetti sauce (don't judge me!) and pour a little in my bowl, add a touch of garlic and other herbs, chop a mushroom or two into it, then warm slowly in the microwave just before my spaghetti is done.  When finished, I scoop out the noodles with my server and allow it to drip/drain just a bit, then add directly to the sauce in my bowl, add a dab of butter and mix well.  Best.  Spaghetti.  Ever.

The other day I turned my spaghetti lunch into a yummy yet still frugal meal by combining a bit of the chicken soup I'd made several days before.  The pot of soup was almost empty and I really didn't feel like another bowl of soup for lunch, but I didn't want to waste the little bit that was left. I fixed my tomato sauce and spaghetti as above, but scooped out the little bit of chicken and noodle or two that was left in the soup and added it to my sauce before warming.  Yum!

Don't forget to try this no-drain method of cooking spaghetti.  Let me know how it turns out!

~ Marie Anne


Looking for a nice set of pasta bowls? Check these out on amazon.com.