As I searched the web, I found that there really were several recipes of this kind of sauce. Rachael Ray used saffron with lotsa butter and parsley and mint and orange, but I was short on those ingredients. All I had was some tomato sauce and then the search for tomato+saffron yielded one even by the great Emeril himself. Bam!

To begin at the beginning, this whole thing started because I was presented with a bottle of rich saffron syrup. This was so heady and intoxicating that I immediately wanted to make something of it, something savory and other than the obvious desserts that came to mind. Pasta was the obvious vehicle, since I was craving pasta. Although all the recipes use pinches of saffron fronds, I decided to be bold and make the sauce using syrup.

Most recipes had certain elements – the usual onion, garlic, basil/spice, wine, cream, tomatoes and saffron. I made so many substitutions to this concept, that I fear I may have ended up with something totally different. I also made a much lighter version using whole milk instead of cream, and saved the cheese just for the garnish.

I used mushrooms and olives as the vegetables, and everything worked together well to give a unique flavor where you can’t really taste one particular thing.

Cavatappi is a long screw shaped pasta. You can use any ‘rigate’ or ridged pasta for this sauce. Something like penne or rigatoni will go really well with this sauce.

The recipe for Cavatappi pasta in saffron tomato sauce is as follows –

[amd-zlrecipe-recipe:42]
This is a very rich tasting pasta with big flavor, that will make a great impromptu meal served with some salad and good bread.

I hope you enjoy this unusual sauce laden with the goodness of saffron.