Off Duty Chef: Bringing It Home airs Wednesdays at 8.30pm on RTÉ One.
Ingredients
Serves 4
- 10 high quality, ripe tomatoes (San Marzano)
- 1 whole head of garlic
- 8 tbsp olive oil
- 2 tbsp tomato paste
- 1 tbsp caster sugar
- 1 tbsp dried chilli flakes
- Sea salt
- 320g penne pasta
- 80g parmesan cheese, grated
- Handful basil leaves
Method
- Preheat the oven to 120c, line 1 large oven tray with tinfoil.
- To make the sauce, begin by halving your tomatoes and placing flat side up on the lined tray, find space on there for the whole garlic bulb as well.
- Place the olive oil, tomato paste, sugar, chilli flakes and salt in a bowl and whisk until incorporated, season heavily with sea salt.
- Pour this dressing over the tomatoes on both trays. Cook in the oven for 4 hours until the tomatoes become leathery in texture and reduce in size.
- Once the tomatoes are like this, place a heavy based saucepan filled with water on the heat. Season with sea salt and bring to the boil. Drop the penne and cook for 10-12 mins until just soft.
- While the pasta is cooking, get your tomatoes into a blender along with all the oil and juices from the tray. Using a serrated knife, carefully remove the base (thicker end) of the garlic bulb, gently squeeze out all the roasted garlic pulp into the blender. Blend to a smooth and thick puree and adjust the seasoning with salt. This will keep for a few days in the fridge and also freezes well.
- Now to the pasta, once cooked, strain off the water keeping a small amount remaining in the pot, add in your tomato pasta and mix with the pasta water over a medium heat until a smooth sauce coats the pasta.
- Get your grated parmesan in at this point and remove the pot from the heat. Mix with a spoon until the cheese melts and coats the pasta. Serve in warm bowls with some basil leaves.
