Penne with white sauce & bell peppers

Our menu for a Friday evening is quite often this very special Penne served with style. I am sure it has always been a no-fuss no-waste food in my kids table. Oh I have made it so many times and sure that it will continue for quite a while to come. Even my mil loves this so much that we dont have to change the menu even if we have her for dinner on a Friday night. She absolutely loves it and the proud me is happy that my mil made this at her home just for herself some day :) That really makes me happy.

I have had this served on many occasions to so many kids and believe me its always a hit. Infants to toddlers to college going fellas all have loved this to their fullest extent.

Here is the recipe for the evening Pasta ride at home 

Serves... 4 ppl 
Serve option... Warm and gooey topped with veggies

This is what u'll need....

Pasta - 2 cups
Butter - 1 tbspn
Garlic - 4 big cloves
Maida / All-Purpose Flour - 2 tspn
Milk - 1/2 cup
Capsicum/ Green Bell Pepper - 1 medium
Onion - 1 medium
Olive oil - 2 tspn
Pepper to taste
Salt to taste

Here is the stir....

• Cook penne to al-dente as per instructions on the package. Usually it is like adding penne to water + salt + a tspn of oil and boil them for 8-12 mins. Drain them and keep them aside. Keep a small amount of the drained water in case we thicken the sauce more than expected

• Thinly slice capsicum and onion. Heat a wok and a tspn of olive oil to it. Toss in the veggies in and stir fry them for a couple of minutes. We usually add all three peppers - red, yellow and green but this time we did not have the other two so just green here. When using all three peppers use half pepper of each color. The taste of every pepper is so different - sweet, spicy, sour ... It makes a great difference

White sauce :

• Peel the garlic cloves and grind them in a food processor to a fine paste. Would suggest not to use store bought garlic paste
• Heat a wok/kadai and add a tbspn of butter. Keep the flame on medium so that the butter melts gradually. Make sure of the flame as you dont want to make ghee here ;) 

• Scoop in the garlic paste into the butter and stir on low-medium flame till you can smell the garlicky flavor filling your kitchen and also moving towards the living room :) Once you can smell the garlic cooking it is time to make the sauce

• Add maida or all-purpose flour and stir with the garlic for a minute. It doesnt take more than a minute to completely cook this mixture

• Pour milk and keep stirring. The mixture will start thickening immediately. This is the time to check for the consistency and switch off the flame. Some like their sauces too thick but we prefer keeping it a little thin so that it can ooze around a bit

• Sprinkle salt and pepper powder according to your taste and voila your garlic white sauce is ready

Bringing it all together

• Penne's turn now to bring in the dish together. Toss in the perfectly al-dente penne into the wok and give it a good stir. Add the veggies too and mix it. For our case my elder kid doesnt enjoy capsicum so we serve a different way. We transfer this to the plates at this stage and top it up with veggies on each individuals serving. And thats right.. penne is ready to be served for a full-toss dinner :) Enjoy warm and have a great time

Note:

• Dont fry the garlic too much or on high flame as they turn bitter. And we will have no choice other than tossing them in trash and start fresh again
• Keep stirring when making the sauce to avoid sticking to the bottom of the pan
• If the sauce thickens too much add a little from the water drained after cooking the pasta. This will loosen up the consistency and bring to as you might want it
• Use three colored peppers for the best taste but i know that doesnt happens at ours all the time 
• Dont overcook the penne as it doesnt taste perfect if squishy-mushy
• Prefer using garlic cloves rather than store bought garlic paste. This is in response to one of my friends who asked about it