Mediterranean weather ....

Lulled into a false sense of security by a week on the Med in 30°C sunshine we stocked up on the old healthy salad options on the last shopping trip and looked forward to vitamin-packed summer-style nosh. Bad move. Our estival eating plans were promptly disrupted by rainfall, plummeting temperatures and snow above 1800m. Not that there’s any real reason why you can’t eat salad under those conditions, but it rather loses its appeal when the rain is hammering down outside and you’re seriously thinking of breaking out the heating again.

Still, having purchased the stuff we dutifully carried on eating it up until yesterday, when it got so parky I was reduced to lurking in a hot bath before hiding in the fleece I’ve been wearing all winter. It’s June, for God’s sake, what’s going on?

I refused to go out and spend more cash on extra food, so we were stuck with whatever was lying around the house, which as usual meant pasta and …….. something. Bit of a challenge, as there’s not much potential for pasta sauce in a load of lettuce and radishes. Apparently other people in this position generally just heat up a tin of tomatoes and stick them all over some spaghetti, but frankly I think salad would still sound more appealing even in the middle of January with a raging blizzard outside.

But fortunately my trusty Sainsbury pocket pasta book came to the rescue. I’ve recommended this tome before and I do so again. (Actually, looking at that post I discover that the weather played exactly the same trick on us last year. Doh.)

....... and spring in the Alps.

Basic tomato sauce

You will need: a can of chopped tomatoes; a carrot; an onion; a clove of garlic.

Chop the onion and garlic, and fry until soft. add the grated carrot, tinned tomatoes and a bit of water. Simmer until the onions and carrot are cooked through, then blitz with a hand blender.

And that’s it, tomato sauce. You can liven it up by using red wine rather than water, adding shredded fresh basil at the last minute, throwing in a handful of lardons or chopped mozzarella ……………. etc. Whatever sounds tasty. It also freezes very well, so you can have a supply of it hanging around for emergencies, and it’s even better with fresh tomatoes so it’s a good way of getting rid of a glut of those, should you find yourself with such a thing.