The joy of six ingredients: Four new pasta sauces that punch well above their weight (2024)

Pasta in all its forms is what keeps the weekly wheels rolling. Here are four new six-ingredient sauces to make your back-pocket pasta night a win.

These recipes presume you have pasta and olive oil as your cupboard basics, but the other ingredients are mostly easy on your wallet, your time and your shopping list.

And I also presume you like cheese because all of these involve cheese. What is pasta night without it?

Pork sausage ragu of sorts with burrata and casarecce

This is shortcut ragu at its finest. Caramelising the sausage meat and coating it in sun-dried tomato pesto is a shortcut to deep flavour in less than a quarter of the time, making this a superb midweek dinner option and a balm for the soul.

Ingredients

• 500g casarecce pasta

Sauce

• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1kg excellent quality pork and fennel sausages, skins removed, meat chopped
• 200g store-bought sun-dried tomato pesto
• 250ml (1 cup) white wine
• 1.6kg (4 x 400g cans) finely chopped tinned tomatoes
• 125ml (½ cup) thin cream
• 1-2 knots burrata
• basil leaves (optional), to serve

Method

1. Place a large frying pan over medium heat. Add the oil and once hot, add the sausage meat and cook until you have lovely caramelisation on every side and the meat is cooked through. Add the tomato pesto and cook until it darkens and coats the meat, and it looks as though the sauce is coming away from the side of the pan a little.
2. Deglaze with the white wine then add the tinned tomatoes and simmer for 20 minutes. Add the cream and season generously with sea salt and pepper. Let it simmer while you cook the pasta.
3. Bring a pot of water to the boil and cook the pasta according to packet instructions until just al dente. Strain and add to bowls.
4. Top with the ragu sauce then tear the burrata over the top of the bowls. Season with olive oil, sea salt and pepper. If you have a few basil leaves on hand, throw these over the top. Serve.

Serves 4-6 (with leftover sauce)

Tip: Any leftover sauce will freeze superbly for another day.

Peruvian green spaghetti

I love this green spaghetti over and above any other green sauce. Migration can make for innovation, and the influx of Italians in Peru in the early 1800s resulted in this twist on the Ligurian pesto pasta, known as tallarines verdes.

It is usually made with queso fresco but given this cheese can be hard to find, I have used a soft feta instead. I’ve also subbed the traditional pecans for smoked almonds, but this is adaptable enough to use with whatever nuts you have on hand. You will be eating this straight out of the pan – it’s mind-blowingly simple and incredibly delicious.

Ingredients

• 500g spaghetti

Sauce

• 3 tbsp olive oil
• 4 garlic cloves, crushed
• 300g English spinach, washed thoroughly, large stems removed
• leaves from 1 large bunch basil
• 170ml (⅔ cup) tinned evaporated milk
• ½ cup soft creamy feta
• ¼ cup smoked almonds, chopped, plus extra to serve

Method

1. Bring a large pot of water to the boil.
2. To a frying pan, add the olive oil and place over low heat. Once warm, add the crushed garlic and cook until incredibly fragrant, ensuring the garlic isn’t taking on any colour.
3. Add the spinach and basil and cook, stirring constantly, until the leaves wilt and start to soften − the leaves should reduce in volume by about three-quarters. Season with ½-1 tablespoon of sea salt flakes and transfer to a high-powered blender with the remaining ingredients, then blitz to a smooth sauce-like consistency. If the sauce seems a little thick, add a splash of evaporated milk or wait until you have cooked the pasta and use some of the starchy cooking water to thin the sauce in the pan.
4. Pour the sauce back into the frying pan you used to cook the garlic and spinach. Keep warm while you cook the pasta.
5. Add the pasta to the pot of water and cook until al dente. Strain and transfer the pasta to the sauce, and using tongs, gently toss to coat. Serve pasta in bowls and scatter with extra smoked almonds. Season with sea salt flakes and freshly cracked pepper, and serve.

Serves 4-6

Caramelised fennel, lemon and chilli pasta

I have a firm rule: nothing requiring a mandolin for preparation is happening in my house during the week. So instead, I make use of the blender to blitz this into a decadent, silky sauce and to cut down significantly on chopping time.

Ingredients

• 500g bucatini pasta

Sauce

• 3½ tbsp olive oil
• 2 fennel bulbs, finely sliced, fronds reserved
• 6 eschalots (French shallots), peeled and halved lengthways
• juice and zest of 1 lemon
• 500ml (2 cups) pouring cream
• ¾ cup finely grated parmesan
• chilli flakes, to serve
• fennel fronds, to serve

Method

1. Add 3-4 tablespoons of olive oil to a deep-sided frying pan and place over low-medium heat. Add the fennel, eschalots and lemon juice and cook over a low heat until completely soft, stirring regularly to prevent catching. This can take about 15-20 minutes. You want the fennel to be as soft as possible for a silky, flavourful sauce. Allow to cool before adding to a blender with the lemon zest, cream and parmesan. Blitz until smooth.
2. Bring a pot of water to the boil. Cook the bucatini until al dente. Strain and return to the pot. Pour the sauce over, using tongs to coat the pasta in the creamy sauce.
3. Plate up, sprinkle with chilli flakes and season with salt and pepper. Scatter over reserved fennel fronds and serve.

Serves 4-6

Pasta with shallot, chorizo and tinned tomato sauce

Slow-roasted eschalots do ungodly decadent things to anything they lend their flavour to, bringing depth, silkiness and caramelisation. Here, when combined with smoky chorizo and a head of garlic, a very simple tomato pasta sauce is levitated into the stratosphere.

To minimise midweek mayhem, I often make the sauce at the weekend or when time is on my side, so it’s ready to go at a moment’s notice. It will keep for at least a week covered in the fridge or a few months frozen.

Ingredients

• 500g paccheri pasta

Sauce

• 3 tbsp olive oil
• 2 fresh chorizo sausages (about 250-300g), skin removed, meat chopped
• 10 eschalots (French shallots), peeled and halved lengthways
• 1 head of garlic, halved horizontally
• 800g can (or 2 x 400g cans) finely chopped tomatoes
• pinch sugar
• parmesan, to serve

Method

1. Preheat your oven to 160C fan-forced (180C conventional).
2. Add the chorizo, eschalots, garlic and a very, very generous lug of olive oil to a roasting dish. Season generously with sea salt flakes. Pop in the oven and cook for 45 minutes to 1 hour, or until everything is cooked through and golden.
3. Squeeze the garlic cloves out and discard the peel, then add the remaining sauce ingredients, except the parmesan, to the tray and give everything a good stir. Return to the oven while you bring a large pot of water to the boil.
4. Add the pasta to the boiling water and cook until al dente, following the packet instructions. Strain and add to the roasting dish of sauce, and turn gently to coat the pasta in the sauce. Transfer onto plates and season generously with parmesan, salt and pepper before serving.

Serves 4-6

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