This pasta dish is amazingly simple to prepare. By roasting ripe cherry and sun-dried tomatoes, olives, goat cheese, onions, and garlic with fresh herbs, you can create a very simple but luxurious pasta sauce. Serve it with interesting pasta like farfalle (bow tie pasta) which adds nice texture and surface area for the roasted cherry tomato sauce to stick to.

Cherry Tomatoes

As you can see, these cherry tomatoes were vine-ripened, red, and plump.  You’ll want to use fresh cherry tomatoes as they add sweetness to the sauce, and nicely balance the saltiness of the olives and anchovies.  Click the link for the complete recipe and HD cooking video.

High Definition Video Presented Here:

Preparation time: 10 minutes

Roasting Time: 60 minutes

Serves: 6

Ingredients:

• 600 g (1.5 lb) of vine-ripened cherry tomatoes, each tomato pierced with a paring knife
• 3 tablespoons of sun dried tomatoes, left whole
• 1 head of garlic, cloves removed, paper off, and finely chopped
• 1 red onion, chopped
• 4 anchovies finely chopped
• 5 stalks of oregano leaves, stem removed and chopped
• 5 stalks of thyme, stem removed and chopped
• 1/4 cup of extra-virgin olive oil
• 1/4 tsp (1 ml) each of salt and pepper
• 1/2 cup (125 ml) crumbled goat cheese
• 2 cups of green olives, pits removed
• 2 cups of black Kalamata olives, pits removed
• 1  500g package (1 lb) of farfalle (bow tie) pasta
• 1 cup grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese

Directions

1. Preheat your oven to 375°F
2. In a large mixing bowl, combine cherry tomatoes, sun dried tomatoes, garlic cloves, red onion, anchovies, oregano, thyme, olive oil, salt and pepper, and mix well.  Mix well.
3. Pour out the contents of the mixing bowl into a large oven-safe baking dish (like a CorningWare dish or roasting pan)
4. Sprinkle with crumbled goat cheese. At this point your cherry tomatoes are ready to be placed in the oven, and should look like this:
   

   Cherry Tomatoes and Goat Cheese

5. Roast in 375°F oven for 40 minutes.  The tomatoes will be tender and wrinkled
6. Remove baking dish from oven and add green and black olives.  Mix everything together well
7. Place baking dish back into oven for another 20 minutes of baking.  This will allow the olives to warm and incorporate well into the cherry tomato sauce, but not wilt down completely.
8. Cook Farfalle pasta per package instructions
9. Remove baking dish with your roasted cherry tomatoes from oven, it should look something like this:
   

   Cherry Tomatoes Roasting in Pan

10. Drain cooked farfalle pasta and add to baking dish.  Mix tomato sauce and farfalle together well.
11. Serve in pasta bowl, garnish with oregano leaves, and sprinkle with grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese.  Here’s what the final product will look like:


Roasted Cherry Tomato Sauce with Farfalle Pasta

Enjoy with a nice glass of red wine.