Easy Weeknight Veggie Tomato Pasta Recipe from Pasta Sisters

Paoloa Da Re moved to L.A. from a small northern Italian town in 2010. She began working as a nanny for local families, often preparing fresh pastas, lasagna and other homemade meals from her family’s generational recipes. In 2015, with the help of her children Francesco, Francesca and Giorgia, she opened her first restaurant, Pasta Sisters, on Pico Boulevard in Mid City. They soon expanded to locations in Culver City and Costa Mesa.

Beginning this March, Angelinos can make their own Italian dishes with Pasta Sisters’ restaurant-qaulity pasta and sauces right at home. The brand is now selling spaghetti, tortellini, gnocchi, bolognese sauce and more at Southern California Gelson’s and Claro’s Italian Markets.

One of the Pasta “sisters,” Giorgia Sinatra, shares her go-to pasta recipe for a weeknight meal her and her kids love.

Weeknight Veggie Tomato Sauce & Pasta

Ingredients:

• EVOO
• ½ yellow onion, roughly chopped
• 2 medium carrots, roughly chopped
• 1 zucchini, roughly chopped
• 1 (28 oz) can whole peeled tomatoes with basil (Mutti is our favorite brand, but any will do — or use fresh tomatoes and add your own basil if you can’t find the basil variety)
• Salt to taste

Directions for Veggie Tomato Sauce:

1. Heat a sauté pan over medium heat and add EVOO (about 1 tablespoon, or as desired).
2. Add the onion and sauté until golden and beginning to soften, about 3 minutes.
3. Add the carrots and zucchini and sauté 6–7 minutes more, until fragrant and starting to soften.
4. Add the whole peeled tomatoes, roughly breaking them into pieces as you add them. (Tip: Use kitchen scissors to dice them right in the can — no mess!)
5. Fill the empty tomato can halfway with water and add it to the pan. Bring to a boil and season with salt to taste.
6. Reduce to a high simmer and cook for 20 minutes, or until the vegetables are soft and the sauce has reached your desired consistency. (Feel free to simmer longer to develop the flavor, or pull it earlier if you’re short on time — you really can’t go wrong!)
7. Transfer the sauce to a blender and blend until smooth. You’ll have a beautiful, veggie-packed tomato sauce the whole family will love!
8. Serve over your favorite Pasta Sisters pasta and enjoy!

Directions for Pasta:

Cook according to package directions — simply boil water, add your Pasta Sisters pasta, and cook for just a few minutes for perfectly al dente, scratch-made pasta. Use any shape you like! Pasta Sisters offers tagliatelle, spaghetti, and tortellini in the frozen aisle at Gelson’s, and gnocchi and tortellini at Claro’s Italian Markets. Their pastas are flash frozen to preserve flavor, texture, and color—and unlike with conventional freezing—are indistinguishable once cooked from fresh-never-frozen pasta!