Mom's Ma'karuni & Salad

I featured this recipe before (read Ma'karuni) but now I realize that I missed few nuances as I watch mom making it.

The sauce is a small can of tomato paste mixed with 2 cups of water - thick and red.

The spaghetti is broken into smaller pieces (about 4 inches) and boiled with a bit of salt.

Pine nuts (fresh from Lebanon - see Goodies from Abroad - Part 2) are fried in vegetable oil until browned.

Once pasta is ready, drain the water, return to the pot and add (a) cooked ground beef (see recipe) (b) pine nuts (c) sauce.

Bring all to a boil then simmer for 15 - 20 minutes until the pasta absorbs all the sauce. 

The flavours of meat and pine nuts are absorbed in the sauce. The pasta turns orange. The outcome is delicious.

What I did wrong before was not adding pine nuts and not simmering long enough. 

Now a nice lettuce salad will go well with it.

But just like the art of ground beef, mom's salad making is a complex production.

First, the lettuce head is separated into leafs.

The leafs are put in a large bowl (it has to be very large that mom had to use a large turkey baking pot as a bowl).

Lettuce is then soaked in Fruit & Veggie Soap for 5 minutes, rinsed, let sit to dry and chopped for the salad.

And finally a delicious home style Ma'karuni & Salad meal is served.