Quarantine Episode 2: Midnight Meat Sauce for Spaghetti and Crunch Salad

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RIP, Southwest Airlines in-flight magazine, where I found this surprisingly delicious and easy pasta sauce recipe 20-plus years ago. Alongside: a very simple carrot-celery-almond salad. And DIY vinaigrette. It all takes a lot longer than it should, but hey, there’s some proper podcast banter at the end.

NOT-shopping list

  • ground beef (or any ground meat, really)
  • milk (must be real dairy milk, alas, but you could use a smaller amount of half-and-half, or even a little bit of yogurt or yogurt whey, or some buttermilk…)
  • olive oil
  • garlic
  • anchovies (filets in oil, salted, or anchovy paste; could also use dried mushrooms if you have that instead; maybe even…miso?!)
  • tomato paste
  • nutmeg (ideally whole, so you can grate fresh)
  • parmesan or other hard grating cheese for pasta (skip it if you have to)
  • spaghetti or any pasta shape, really
  • carrots
  • celery
  • almonds
  • fresh herbs, if you have them (dill, parsley, even cilantro)
  • vinegar
  • mustard

Midnight Meat Sauce for Spaghetti

Meat sauce on spaghetti in a blue and gray bowl.
This is a relatively dry “sauce.”

This recipe was published in the Southwest Airlines inflight magazine (which recently shuttered — RIP!) in the late 1990s or early 2000s. I clipped it out and stuck it in my recipe scrapbook, and it has been my go-to way of transforming just a smidge of ground meat into a really rich-tasting pasta topping. And it all takes only about 20 minutes to prepare (never mind the slow timing in the podcast). The recipe here is double the quantity of the published recipe.

3-4 servings
1/2 pound ground beef (or other meat; suggestions in audio)
2 cups milk
4 cloves garlic
2-4 anchovy filets
Olive oil
3-4 tablespoons tomato paste
Nutmeg for grating
Parmesan or other hard cheese for garnish
1/2 lb. spaghetti

Combine the meat and milk in a bowl and use a fork to break the meat up into smaller pieces. Let this soak while you get the rest of the ingredients (and any other part of your dinner) ready. The longer it soaks, the better the texture. Half an hour will do the trick, though.

Put on your pasta water, well salted, to boil.

Finely chop the garlic, and if you’re using salt-packed anchovies, filet them.

(If you’re using dried mushrooms as a substitute umami flavor, set some in a small bowl and pour over boiling water. Let soak about 15-20 minutes, then pick out and dice very fine. You can use some of the soaking water in the sauce too, but be careful to not pour in grit from bottom of bowl.)

In a shallow nonreactive (stainless steel) saucepan, heat a generous glug of olive oil on medium heat. Add the garlic and stir and fry briefly, then add anchovies. Turn eat to low and let simmer until anchovies dissolve — you can help break them up with the back of a spoon.

Add tomato paste and raise heat to medium. Stir and fry for a minute, just to cook off a little excess liquid and any raw taste — the olive oil should be bubbling through.

Add the meat and milk, and turn heat up and stir well, breaking up any big lumps with a spoon. After it’s bubbling well, turn down to a simmer. Let cook, uncovered and stirring occasionally, for about 15 minutes. In the end, the meat should be very fine-grained, and much of the liquid cooked away.

Serve over al dente pasta (for timing, most spaghetti takes ~10 minutes). Grate over fresh nutmeg, or stir in a pinch of ground nutmeg. Grate cheese. Serve immediately.

Crunch Salad

Chunks should be small enough to make a nice mixed bite of all ingredients.

This is a satisfying salad to make with stuff that usually hangs out in your bottom fridge drawers for weeks. In the audio, I mention that cilantro is a good option, and if you take it, it’s nice to add a pinch of cumin to the dressing. It’s also totally fine without any herbs at all.

For each person
1 medium carrot
1 rib celery
Small handful almonds
Fresh herbs (dill, parsley, cilantro)
Vinaigrette (scroll down the page)

Wash and peel carrot; rough-chop or dice in small pieces. (You want every bite to have some of everything, so chop accordingly.) Chop celery in roughly the same size.

Rough chop almonds and toast in a dry pan over med-high heat until fragrant, with some brown spots. Add to celery and carrots. Rough chop herbs, if using, and add to salad, then dress with vinaigrette.