Give Pasta Sauce A Protein Boost With One Canned Ingredient

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A pasta-based meal is easy to make with the staples that you have in your pantry. Other than dried pasta, pasta sauce can be another jarred or canned product that encompasses many flavors and brands. While it's easy enough to pour a jar of pasta sauce over cooked pasta, there's another canned ingredient that'll give your meal a protein boost: beans.

There are many types of canned beans on store-shelves, and some are likely to be in your pantry right now. They're pre-cooked, packed with protein (around 30 grams in a can of kidney beans, for example), and among the most versatile canned ingredients you can find. Beans have an earthy, savory flavor and a pillowy, starchy texture that melds seamlessly into sauces, stews, and soups. In fact, they're already a key ingredient in many Italian pasta dishes like pasta e ceci and pasta e fagioli.

You can utilize a bubbly pan of pasta sauce as a flavorful foundation to add a drained and rinsed can of beans. If you want to make the sauce more texturally cohesive, you can take the back of a wooden or metal spoon to the beans to mash them as you stir them into the sauce. You can also use a hand-held blender like this one from BonesenKitchen to completely pulverize beans, transforming them into a sauce thickener. Of course, beans are ready to eat right out of the can, and they'll bring a pop of texture to pasta sauce or a simple plate of pasta without any further processing.

Considering beans are popular additions to pasta and soup dishes in Italy, there is plenty of fodder for bean-and-sauce combo inspiration available. For example, the classic tomato-based pasta e fagioli uses white beans like these Bush's Great Northern beans. You could likewise mash white beans into your favorite brand of marinara sauce; if you're looking for a recommendation, we ranked Carbone marinara as our favorite popular store-bought pasta sauce. In fact, we tasted all of the sauces in Carbone's repertoire, providing glowing reviews for every single one. Kidney beans would also taste delicious whole or mashed into a red sauce, bringing a firmer bite and a more robust flavor than white beans. Canned lentils are perhaps the most protein-packed staple to transform a bottle of marinara sauce into a plant-based bolognese sauce to spoon over spaghetti.

Beans also pair beautifully with cheese, so you could mash chickpeas or cannellini beans into a jar of alfredo sauce. Of course, beans are sometimes the base of their own sauce that can be elaborated with other canned staples like broth and tinned fish. For example, you could start by sauteing garlic in olive oil with a few tinned anchovies like this Cento brand, adding a cup of chicken or vegetable broth, canned tomatoes, and a can of white beans, stirring and mashing to combine. The dish would be finished off perfectly with a hearty sprinkling of parmesan cheese. For a creamy, cheesy vegan pasta sauce, blend beans with some starchy pasta water, vegetable broth, nutritional yeast, and Italian seasonings.