Drunken Pioneers

The name’s a wink at the ingredients: wagon-wheel pasta (pioneers) and a sauce built on red wine (drunken). The result is a quick, hearty pasta dish that’s somewhere between a stew and a pasta with sauce, and it comes together start to finish in 25 minutes.

Char the bell pepper and onion hot and fast in a dry skillet (the recipe skips fat in the saute step, which means you need to keep the vegetables moving). High heat gives you that almost-blistered, slightly sweet exterior that adds a layer of grilled-vegetable flavor.

Red wine and beef stock build the sauce base. Dried basil and rosemary go in for the herb backbone. Ten minutes of simmer reduces the alcohol and concentrates the flavors into the broth.

A quick flour-and-water slurry is what thickens the broth into a real sauce that clings to the pasta. The trick is dissolving the flour in cold water first, then adding it to the hot pan to prevent lumps.

Kitchen Tips

• Use real drinking wine, not bottled “cooking wine"; cooking wine has added salt that throws off seasoning and tastes industrial
• Wagon-wheel pasta has hollows that catch the sauce; rotini or rigatoni work as substitutes if you can’t find it
• Add a tablespoon of butter or olive oil to the pasta if you want a richer dish; the original is fairly lean
• Top with grated Parmesan, fresh parsley, or red pepper flakes for a more finished plate

Variations

• Brown a half pound of ground beef or Italian sausage in the skillet first for a meatier version
• Add sliced mushrooms with the peppers for extra umami depth
• Swap beef stock for vegetable stock and the wine for balsamic vinegar for a vegetarian version