Recipes

Spaghetti Bolognese will warm your cockles * and your cabin

Great dish for Fall cruising in the Northeast

Alex cooking capellini in the galley, adding a generous dollop of olive oil to the cooked noodles. See the steam rising and spreading its warmth to the saloon.

Have you ever known anyone who was a not a vegetarian and did not like spaghetti with meat sauce? I have not. It is one of the ultimate comfort foods. It is hearty and tasty, and it warms the cabin on cool evenings.

Alex's Spaghetti Bolognese for Fall Cruising

Serves 4

Ingredients:

1 lb ground beef (90% lean or better)
1 onion chopped (Maya preferred)
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
olive oil
sliced mushroom (optional)
sliced olives (optional)
1 can chopped tomatoes
salt & pepper to taste
dashes of basil, oregano, and parsley for flavor

1 package capellini or thin spaghetti
Parmesan or Romano cheese, grated

Instructions:

Chop onions and saute until transparent in some olive oil in a medium size pot. Add the garlic and saute lightly. Add the beef and saute until crumbly. We like very lean beef because it's healthier and it creates less of a greasy mess. When the beef is ready, add mushrooms or olives if you like and saute a little longer. Add the chopped tomatoes and stir well. Add spices to taste. Cook about 30 minutes until done.

In a separate pot, boil salted water with a tablespoon of olive oil. We use seawater when we're anchored in clean waters. It adds a lovely flavor to the spaghetti. We actually choose to use capellini because it does not take as long to boil, which conserves gas and limits the amount of steam in the cabin to just enough to get warm but not so much that we get heavy condensation. Strain the capellini and mix with a little olive oil to keep it from sticking together. (My first spaghetti dish turned out to be a cake I had to slice because I did not know about olive oil back then!)

Alex spoons some of the warm water from the spaghetti over the bottle of red wine to de-chill it! Oh, what cruisers will do to extend their season.

Serving suggestions:

Serve capellini topped with the rich sauce. Sprinkle with grated cheese.

Goes great with a tossed salad - Caesar dressing in individual packets are great to have onboard. Otherwise, keep a bottle of Balsamic vinegar and mix with some olive oil for a quick and delicious Balsamic vinaigrette.

A nice bottle of red wine, and you'll be as close to heaven as Earth (or Ocean) can be.

* What's a cockle anyway, and why is it always needing to be warmed?

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