Rawan's Special Pasta Sauce

We had pasta last night. Again. I had to make dinner quick so I used a jar of pasta and ready-made turkey meatballs. It tasted fine. They make some pretty decent jarred pasta sauce these days.

But it reminded me that I haven't made my friend Rawan's sauce in a while.

So here is a re-post of her pasta sauce recipe. You really should try it. It's quite delish.

The addition of cinnamon in the sauce gives it a delicious, unique flavor that you will crave and want to make again. The good news is, most of the ingredients are things you probably have on hand. So it's a good recipe for those days when you don't know what to make.

Rawan's Special Pasta Sauce

4 T extra virgin Olive oil

1 large onion, chopped fine

1 lb ground beef

3/4 can of tomato paste

1 1/2 t. dry basil

1 1/2 t. dry oregano

2 bay leaves

1/2 t. cinnamon

Sprinkle of sugar

Salt and pepper

Box of your favorite pasta

Roux

2 T unsalted butter

1 T flour

In a medium saucepan, saute onion in olive oil until soft. Add ground beef. Cook through. Drain grease. Add cinnamon, tomato paste and water to cover the beef. Add basil, oregano, bay leaves, a sprinkle of sugar and a few shakes of salt and fresh ground pepper. Stir to combine. Cover and let simmer for 3o -45 minutes.  Add the roux to the sauce and stir. Cook for another minute.

To make the roux, melt butter and flour in a small saucepan. Let cook until golden brown in color. Add this mixture to the sauce.

Make your favorite pasta. Be sure to add a lot of salt to the pasta water. It adds great flavor to the pasta. And I'm not talking about a shake or two. Grab the Morton's and pour it in. (The goal is to make salt water.) Drain the pasta. Don't rinse it. In fact, it's ok if there is still a little pasta water on the noodles. Add the pasta back into the pot. Pour in the sauce and gently combine.

Serve with garlic bread and a simple tossed salad of lettuce and tomatoes and a light vinaigrette.  Of course you'll also need some wine.  A nice bottle of red should do the trick!

Enjoy!