My manager and I agreed on a simple bolognese pasta and we originally wanted to do beef bolognese but we changed it to chicken as some of them don't eat beef.
I'm quite please that they actually enjoyed the food. Some even went for seconds and thirds. One of them said "Sedap sial" not knowing that others overheard her. She was basically talking to herself which made all of us cracked up cause she didn't notice we heard what she said.
I cooked the dish on the day itself as I was on afternoon shift, bought a few ingredients the night before after I finish work around 10pm and I can only go to either Tesco or Giant as they close at 1am, so I went to Tesco thinking that they would have more choices but boy was I wrong. They have limited ingredients unless you're cooking local food then sure, they have lots. I managed to buy only a few ingredients, which means I have to get up early the next day to go to Village Grocer. I was so relieved that they open quite early (8.30am!) and I didn't know that, I've always thought their operation hours is from 10am onwards.
As expected, Village Grocer had everything that I needed. I reached home before 9.30am and started preparing my ingredients. I'd love to write down the recipe accurately but I honestly could not remember how much I used per ingredient (I'll note down the ones I can recall) and also, I tend to just follow my instinct and the taste would vary depending on the size of the pan I'm using, how much I'm cooking, etc. I can tell you what I used though, and yes it really is my own recipe. From what I know, I used the basic ingredients for Bolognese sauce and I added a few other things that I personally think would make the sauce more.. me.
Ingredients:
For the Sauce
2 x 300 grams Minced Chicken
Butter & Olive Oil
2 cups of grated Celery
2 cups of grated Carrot
1 big Onion, finely diced
7 cloves of Garlic, fine grated using microplane
2 cans of Tomato Paste (I don't remember how many grams but it's the small one)
1 can of diced Tomato
1/2 cup of Chicken Broth
2 Bay Leaves
Milk
Balsamic Vinegar
Salt and pepper
Fresh Oregano
Fresh Thyme
Chili Flakes
Few tablespoons of Lemon Juice (from Fresh Lemon)
Pasta Bake
2 x 500 grams Pasta Shells
Butter cubes
Olive Oil
Salt
Cherry Tomatoes
Parmesan Cheese
Mozzarella Cheese
Basil Leaves
Phew. I think that's pretty much it. The ones that has no measurements means I don't remember how much I used. LOL. I'm such a horrible recipe writer.
I'll summarized the methods I used as best as I can.
For the sauce:
- Heat the pot on low heat and put in a little bit of butter and olive oil, just enough to coat the pan.
- (I don't saute the onions and the vegetables) Sweat the onions, carrots and celeries on low heat for a couple of minutes, stirring occasionally to make sure none of them gets browned.
- Once it's perfectly sweat through, make a well in the center of the pot and toss the minced chicken in and let it sit for a minute and then mix it thoroughly.
- After stirring every few minutes, pour in the tomato paste and diced tomato. Mix well.
- Add on the chicken broth. Drop in the bay leaves.
- Let it cook slowly, making sure to stir every few minutes. After 15 minutes, pour in the milk - only a little bit. Maybe.. 1/4 cup?
- Add in the oregano and thyme, How much? I can't remember. Trust your instinct on this one.
- Pour in the Balsamic Vinegar, if I had to guess maybe 1/4 cup or less, continued by the lemon juice, salt and pepper and chili flakes.
- Let it slowly cook - about 30 minutes. Remember to stir occasionally so that everything in that pot is cooked thoroughly. To know when the sauce is done, for me.. it's when there's not much liquid in the pot left but I don't want it to be completely dry though as I have to put it in the pan foil and get them baked for few minutes.
For the pasta:
- While waiting for the sauce, boil salted water for the pasta. Drop the pasta in when the water is boiling like maddddddd and drizzle olive oil. Follow the time on the packaging, or follow your heart, up to you hehee.
- Once it's cooked, strain the pasta and toss butter cubes and parmesan cheese and mix well. I used a big bowl when doing this.
- Once that is mixed well, pour in the sauce and mix mix mix mix! Work that arms.
Throw everything in the foil pan or whatever dish you're using to bake it in the oven. (Please take note, the pasta is tasty enough by this stage to eat on its own. The baking part is just to make it more fun to eat them).
Halve the cherry tomatoes and sprinkle them over the pasta. Place a few basil leaves on top as well. Then sprinke lots and lotssssssssssssssssssssss of mozzarella cheese.
Bake for 3 minutes.
Voila! it's done. Dig in.
