Vegetable- Clam Marinara

In a way, Marinara is an all- around sauce. Since it's made with fresh tomatoes/ tomato sauce, herbs, garlic, red wine, olives and capers it's perfect as:

1. Pasta Sauce

2. Dip/ salsa for croquettes, chips,  burrito, etc...

3. With a little water, as soup paired with your preferred bread.

I personally thought with it's name "Marinara", the sauce should come with seafood. Apparently, it's just basic tomato sauce made of fresh ingredients.

Today, I made some Vegetable- Clam Marinara. The clams in this recipe is optional. I just so happen have a supply of my favorite red clam sauce so I decided to throw in a can.

Ingredients:

• 250g spaghetti noodles or any pasta of your choice (cooked al dente)
• 1 whole garlic (minced)
• 1 medium green bell pepper (sliced thinly or chopped)
• 1 eggplant (chopped)
• 2 medium red tomatoes ( chopped)
• 1 can of whole button mushrooms ( chopped, I prefer fresh mushrooms)
• 1 400 g can of chopped tomatoes or crushed tomatoes
• 1 can Red Clam Sauce
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1 tbsp dried basil or 1/2 cup of chopped fresh basil  
• 1/8 cup of chopped fresh parsley
• 1 1/2tbsp Parmesan Cheese
•  a dash of salt and black pepper granules

 

Procedure:

• Cook pasta until firm/ al dente. Set aside.
• In a sauce pan, heat olive oil and saute minced garlic until light brown.
• Add chopped red tomatoes, green bell pepper, egg plant and mushrooms. Stir until vegetables are half- cooked.
• Add Red Clam sauce and simmer for a few seconds.
• Add, canned tomatoes and Parmesan cheese then mix everything evenly. 
• Salt and pepper to taste.
• Serve sauce on top of the pasta or mix the pasta in.

Note: 

Set aside a little of the chopped parsley for garnishing.

Add red wine as desired. I did not include red wine in this recipe, because the Red Clam sauce is already a good base for seafood marinara.

Meat or any seafood is an option. You can add anything you want to make this your own. I just like mine to be filled with vegetables and I did not add any meat or sea food because the Red Clam sauce is just amazingly rich with flavor and real clams.