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Danielle Lachana

Our first dish from Italy could not be any other than pasta, which most Italians eat as a first course on a daily basis.

There are hundreds of different shapes of Italian pasta and over a thousand different regional names for them. Naturally these are accompanied by an infinite variety of sauces, so, faced with such a bewildering choice, I decided to make this particular one as it actually doubles up as one of the components of next week's dish - which is a little time consuming, but well worth the effort! (You can save time in advance by just doubling the amount of the sauce ingredients below and keeping half of it to use in next week's  recipe).

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RECIPE

Serves 4-6

METHOD

Heat the oil in a saucepan and add the onion, pancetta or bacon, sliced sausages, salami and mushrooms.

Cook over medium heat, stirring frequently until the onion softens and becomes transparent.

Stir in the tomato paste, cook for 1 minute, stirring continuously, then add the wine. 

Boil until the wine is reduced by half then add the stock. Cook for a further 5 minutes then add the pureed tomatoes, sugar, basil, salt and pepper to taste.

Reduce the heat and simmer over a low heat, partially covered, for around 1/2 hour, stirring occasionally.

If the sauce starts to thicken too much, totally cover the pan.

Serve the sauce over penne pasta or any other type of your choice, such as Linguine pasta below.

Sprinkle with grated pecorino romano cheese or parmesan and ''Buon Appetito!'' Enjoy!