Garden Spaghetti

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It’s hard to beat a plate of spaghetti as a weeknight meal. Simple ingredients combine together to make a delicious and satisfying meal that can be on-the-table ready in 30 minutes.

This garden fresh take on the classic Italian dish adds even more flavor and goodness without adding minutes on the clock during preparation.

Simply blend your vegetables, add the basil and a dash of salt and pepper, then toss in your spaghetti noodles to soak in the savory liquid.

It’s a plate full of yum, not to mention it’s fresh from your back yard and ready in minutes.

Tomatoes

The world really is a better place thanks to tomatoes. All of the Italian-inspired sauces and foods that begin with a base of tomatoes, not to mention the tomatoes addition to Thai food, Latin American foods, salsas, and ketchup. I mean, really, what would we eat without tomatoes!?

We love tomatoes in our house (even the kids … they just don’t know it).  And we don’t discriminate about our tomatoes.

Sure, some tomatoes are small and juicer than others, while others are larger and beefier. Some tomatoes are red, others orange, still some are yellow or maybe even a little green. Some are round, others are pear-shaped. Some tomatoes just look like a glob.

We love eating all tomatoes.

Big ones, small ones, reds, yellows, and even those that got split in the rain. We enjoy all the flavors and try to use up as many of these delectable tangy vegetables as we have growing in the garden.

Cooking with Tomatoes

If you’ve ever been told that some tomatoes are meant for salads and others are meant for salsas or canning, that may very well be true for what the tomato was bred for.

Cherry and grape tomatoes were bred to be smaller, sweeter, juicier, with a crunchy exterior to pair nicely in salads.

Roma tomatoes were bred to be a sauce tomato. They are thicker, meatier, less flavorful or juicy than a cherry variety, but their fleshy interior lend them to less simmer time for a thicker sauce.

Tomatoes are, and historically have been bred, for certain flavors, textures, and area uses. But that doesn’t mean that a tomato – of any kind – cannot work in all courses of a meal.

Use What You’ve Got

If you’ve ever been told you couldn’t make sauce out of a cherry tomato, or that you couldn’t use Roma tomatoes in a salad, think again my friend.

Use what you’ve got, when you’ve got it.

A few years ago, I found myself with six thriving cherry-variety plants, and felt overwhelmed what to do with this bounty of grape-sized tomatoes.

They were delicious, to be sure. But there were so many of them. Reds, yellows, orange…

Despite what all the canning books said and the canning blogs, I set about canning all my cherry-variety tomatoes into spaghetti sauce.

Guess what?! It was delicious, and adding cherry tomatoes to my sauce is now something I try for to give the sauce some added sweetness that it just doesn’t get from other tomato varieties. (Get my Canned Spaghetti Sauce Recipe here).

Cooking with Kids

It can often be difficult to convince young eaters to eat their vegetables. In our house of young ones claiming to not like tomatoes, we get crafty. When possible, our tomatoes (and onions because the kids claim they don’t like those) they all go into the blender.

Yep. That’s right. We go straight from the garden to the sink for a quick rinse, then into the blender we go, and voila! My kids are licking up their evening dinner loaded with tomatoes and onions (and sometimes other vegetables) and no one is the wiser.

For this Garden Spaghetti recipe, or as I like to call it “Garden S’ghetti”, I like to throw everything in the blender. Tomatoes, onions, garlic, fresh basil – it all goes in the blender before they ever makes their way to the saucepan.

This makes a thick sauce that is easy to come together, and best of all, makes a kid-happy meal.

With or Without the Meat

I have eaten many meals of spaghetti that didn’t include meat on the plate. Spaghetti and meatballs are a classic pair, but aren’t a “kill one without the other” duo. Spaghetti still tastes great without the meatballs.

Likewise, spaghetti can be a standalone meal without any meat added.

Grated Parmesan or Romano cheeses can add plenty of protein to a portion of spaghetti, plus an exceptional flavor that makes the dish. If you are looking for ways to add some extra protein (and flavor) to your meal, a coating of grated cheese over these red-sauced noodles is an excellent way to go.

If you are a die-hard meat lover, you can’t go wrong adding pre-cooked ground beef, ground sausage, or chicken to a meal of spaghetti.

In the pictures I use for this recipe, I added some Italian seasoned ground sausage, which tasted (as you can imagine) simply delicious. On the other hand, my family ate Garden S’ghetti just last night for dinner, but left out the meat and simply coated with a generous layer of grated cheese. Both meals were full of flavor and had everyone asking for seconds. So… it is completely up to you whether you add meat to your spaghetti or opt to leave it out.