Aglio e Olio
"Simple but complex."
Most people think sauce for a pasta takes hours to cook. The following is a sauce that from the heating of the pan to the serving at the table should take no longer than half an hour. It's not red, it's not white. It's a beautiful concert of oil, garlic, and cheese.
My gramom would make this for us on Monday nights, served with a big hunk of Italian bread and maybe some sausage. Whatever was left over would go into the fridge for frying up the next day for lunch. That recipe, fried Iaoi, would be your next month's recipe.
1/2 cup olive oil
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
2 cloves of garlic, minced
Ground Cayenne red pepper (store bought dry spice)
3 tablespoons parsley, fresh chopped
2-3 tablespoons salt
1 pound spaghetti, thick, not angel hair
Parmegiano Reggiano ground into small flakes, not into teh fine dust like you shake out of stubby glass jars at pizza parlors
Preparation:
Start boiling water to a slow roll in a Teflon® coated pot. Use a big Teflon® coated frying pan, wider in diameter than your typical fry-a-couple-eggs-for-your-kid kind of frying pan because after you have drained the spaghetti, you are going to need to fry the entire pound in the pan that you cooked the Iaoi in.
Heat the oil and butter on medium in the pan. Add the garlic. Stir and swish it around by moving it back and forth on the burner. This will help the garlic stay coated all over. Don't walk away from it because in a minute or two you'll want to take the pan off the burner so the garlic isn't overly brown or burnt black. If the garlic does burn, which happens occasionally to everybody, trash the oil, butter, and garlic and start again. Burned garlic will whack the Iaoi.
As soon as you move the pan to a cold burner, stir in the crushed red pepper, salt, and parsley. Swish it around, cover, and set it aside. The heat and stirring of the oil is enough to cook the parsley and red pepper and dissolve the salt.
Heat the oil and butter on medium in the pan. Add the garlic. Stir and swish it around by moving it back and forth on the burner. This will help the garlic stay coated all over. Don't walk away from it because in a minute or two you'll want to take the pan off the burner so the garlic isn't overly brown or burnt black. If the garlic does burn, which happens occasionally to everybody, trash the oil, butter, and garlic and start again. Burned garlic will whack the Iaoi.
As soon as you move the pan to a cold burner, stir in the crushed red pepper, salt, and parsley. Swish it around, cover, and set it aside. The heat and stirring of the oil is enough to cook the parsley and red pepper and dissolve the salt.
Keep checking the blog to see Tony's Recipe of the Month. Did you try this recipe? Let us know what you thought of it and if you have questions for the chef, post them below!
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