There was often a uniquely delicious smell filling my great aunty’s house when we’d drop by for a meal. This is in contrast to my poor nonna, whose penchant for boiled broad beans left her house more often than not smelling like sweaty feet. It was many years before I learned that the characteristic ingredients of my aunty’s famous pasta bake (and to be fair, my nonna’s equally famous prupettone) were in fact rather representative of southern Italian cooking in general: the humble hardboiled egg and a chunk of salami.

Sausages are fantastic; what more is there to say? They’re a self-contained, considered balance of meat, fat, and spice. I can relate. And they’re versatile: as perfect slow-cooked in a stew or sauce as they are grilled and rolled up in a slice of white bread. Think of this deliberately uncomplicated pasta sauce as a celebration of the sausage-maker and their hard work. Or at least a really quick way to make a very flavourful ragu.

The best things in life are often simple. It’s with great pleasure that we spend a whole afternoon making pasta, but with even greater pleasure that we remember the sugo to go with it will only take half an hour to make. This is our super quick and tasty tomato and basil sauce.

Here’s one that comes from the heart. This is our signature family sugo: meatballs in tomato sauce. It’s the sauce that bubbled away quietly in the background every Sunday, filling the house with delicious anticipation; it’s the sauce that simply holds everything together. In fact, when I talk about pasta and what it means to me, this is the sugo that I think of.