it’s kind of a genius meal. the tomato based sauce with fatty flavor and decent nutrient density and the carb noodles for calories. it can be jazzed up a lot of ways with other veg and/or protein, the pasta shape can change form or even what it’s made from. so there are a ton of permutations to mimic diversity but it’s fundamentally still prepared the same, fairly quickly and without a bunch of complicated procedures or faffery: a pan for sauce and a pot to boil water and you’re in business.

it’s pretty legit to develop one’s own personal take on tomato-based sauce, developed over time from making it over and over and over.

I mean, there’s a reason even premade sauces sell pretty routinely. it’s yum. hot and ready, cold from the fridge the next day. it’s genius really.

I read this book by this guy from like the 1700s in China, sort of a far east analog to France’s gastronomie. (Recipes from the Garden of Contentment, Yuan Mei… only recently translated to English). anyway, he was super opinionated and crapped all over complex foods and ornate feasts as muddled and wasteful, but was fascinated by simple, economic dishes of just a few ingredients which all worked in concert to satisfy us aesthetically. it made me realize that working people’s meals in history are what we all salivate for. rich snobs have their banquets and amusebouche b.s. , but really what entices people’s hearts and satiates them are old peasant and working people’s uncomplicated dishes, using cooking forms invented by working people to quickly and efficiently feed their families. even many industrial preprepared foods are imitations of these, like Mac n cheese or a cup of noodles, pretty much all the classic canned soups.