Okay, let's talk sauce

Sauce, as in Red Sauce. Meat Sauce. Ragu.

You know, the authentic stuff, that if you think you're Italian, you have to make it from scratch stuff. In a 5 gallon pot no less.

With a million vegetables that have to be sauteed first.

I swear, Top Chef should come to my kitchen and have a quick-fire challenge to make sauce. This is as close to a "I am Italian because my last name says I am" exercise as you can possibly get.

He speaks only one word of Italian, "Manga" (means eat), and while in some weird twist of genetics he has Italian coloring, stature, features, and due to very smart marrying down the line he's maintained an incredibly Italian name...this sauce thing is just hilarious.

For starters, it's his mother's recipe, and she's not Italian.

For seconds, I am the enlisted help and I'm so far from Italian it's nearly sad.

For thirds, while it's excellent sauce, it is not life-blood (although try to tell him that).

Seriously...it's good. And it's excellent stuff to take to pot-luck dinners because everyone just moons over it, and I have a pot-luck on Saturday. I have never seen anyone turn this stuff down, it's basically a meat stew with tomato sauce in it.

Aw, hell. He's cute when he's all kitchen bossy. And I like this, as it's a reminder that when in the right situation, I can take orders well (well, almost well).

Sauce tonight it is. The only thing is, we can never agree on rigatoni (again, he thinks he's Italian) or angel hair.