Pasta Patterns

A month's worth of magnificent meals using one tasty technique
by Paul Franson

Many popular foods come in families, with different ingredients added to basic sauces or techniques to vary them and turn them into new taste treats. Examples include Chinese stir-fry dishes, omelets, quiches and stews. Italians have many pattern dishes, notably risotti containing anything from chard to lobster, or tomato sauces with sausage and other meats, fish and shellfish, assorted mushrooms, eggplant and other vegetables. Perhaps the most versatile pattern dishes, however, are the pastas flavored by sauces based on oil and garlic.

In itself, few dishes taste better and are more satisfying than aglio e olio, oil and garlic sauce with or without a hot pepper added, served on perfectly cooked pasta with fresh-gated asiago or parmiggiano cheese. But there are many other ingredients that can be added to this basic combination to turn it into a new meal.

The enclosed chart, in fact, provides a month's worth of variations on this theme, not that I would expect anyone to eat one every day. Yet though based on the same roots, these dishes have quite different characters.

In general, all these recipes start with boiling water for pasta and heating olive oil for the sauce. Most can be completed in the time it takes to boil and cook dried pasta. Some require time to prepare other ingredients, though this can sometimes be done while you're making the basic sauce and pasta.

A word on pasta

All these recipes use dried pasta, which cooks in a few minutes (for angel hair or capellini) to 20 minutes (for heavy, thick varieties like orchietti). Enough has been written by now so that anyone who reads a recipe knows that dried pasta is most tasty and interesting if it's cooked until it's just done - al dente, to the tooth - not soft (or hard, for that matter). I've found the most reliable test to bite or cut a piece. It's ready when the white inner core just disappears.

There are enough varieties of pasta to inspire a collector, and Italians have a strong sense of which pasta goes with what sauce. At the risk of oversimplifying, I'll make a few suggestions: spaghetti goes with anything. But if you prefer to be more elegant and make the combinations easier to eat, long-skinny ingredients go best with long skinny pasta and hunks or ingredients go best with similar sizes and shapes of pasta: penne with pieces of asparagus, farfalle (butterflies) with pieces of broccoli. Sticky sauces like carbonara are perfect for spaghetti, and thin sauces based on broth (none here) with complex shapes that hold them, like orchietti (ears) or conchigli (shells) or thin pasta like capellini.

Both domestic and imported pasta can be excellent, but there are more interesting shapes available in Italian imports.

There seems to be a belief here in the United States that fresh pasta is "better" than dried, but it ain't so. It's just different. These dishes are all from, or inspired by, Southern Italian recipes. They're not particularly suited for the soft fresh pasta that originated in Northern Italy, which is great for many other dishes.

The parsley included with many of the dishes (not those containing greens) adds color, flavor, and reputedly, helps kill the taste of garlic. Good luck with the latter. None of these dishes are designed for garlic-wimps or vampires.

The process

Most of these sauces can be prepared quickly very quickly, really in the time it takes to cook the pasta: Boil a lot of water and add a small among of salt (Yeah, I have high blood pressure, too, but I'll skip the potato chips at lunch tomorrow.) Add the pasta at the proper time, which may be suggested on the label, but take the time with a grain of the salt. If it gets ready to early, drain and toss with a small amount of olive oil to keep it from sticking and put a top on the pan or bowl to keep it warm. It's better to have everything come together at once, however.

Basic oil and garlic sauce

water for boiling
1 lb. spaghetti or other pasta
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup olive oil
4 cloves fresh garlic (Don't use powdered garlic, and "jarred" tastes funny.)
Chopped Italian parsley to taste
1/4 cup or more freshly grated parmesan or asiago cheese

Heat a heavy skillet and add good olive oil, extra virgin for strong ingredients like peppers and greens, regular for delicate ones like artichokes and scallops. Don't let the pan get too hot. Add finely sliced (for mild flavor) or crushed garlic. Sauté for 5 minutes. The flavor should slowly sweat out of the garlic. It shouldn't brown or it will get bitter.

Drain the pasta. Add sauce (or add the pasta to the sauce), parsley and cheese, toss and serve. Offer salt, freshly ground pepper and additional cheese to taste.

Serves four as first course.

Additions

Some of the additions are added with the garlic and allowed to cook with it, whereas other ingredients should be introduced at the end of the process, just being heated before serving. The following list provides some details.

Asparagus

Fresh asparagus is best boiled until it is just tender but cooked through, then blanched in cold water to maintain its bright color, then sliced on the diagonal into pieces a few inches long. Frozen asparagus is already partially cooked, so can be added midway in the cooking of the garlic. Add at the end of the process to heat. Penne rigate is a good pasta for asparagus.

Artichoke

Fresh artichokes should be precooked until tender, and sliced or quartered depending on how tender the leaves are. The bottoms are the best part, of course. Frozen artichokes can be used as is. Add at the beginning of the cooking of the garlic in either case, adding a little chicken broth halfway to help blend the flavors. Farfalle is a good pasta.

Broccoli

Broccoli is one of the best additions, with or without a dried hot pepper or anchovy added initially. For best color, broccoli should be precooked, cooled and added at the end. It can also be cooked with the garlic, adding some broth midway. Traditionally served with orchietti (little ears).

Greens including broccoli rabe

Greens are surprisingly good with pasta and garlic oil. Any will work if they are precooked, sliced into narrow strips and added to the sauce with a little broth to loosen them up. The most popular are chard, either green Swiss chard or red chard, which is a variety of beet greens, a cheap and easy substitute. Spinach and arugula are so tender that they can be added toward the end of the cooking of the garlic and simply wilted, but the other greens should be fully cooked first. Radicchio (a "red," not a green), dandelion greens and broccoli rabe (or rapini, a variety of turnip greens, which can be substituted) are quite strong, even after cooking, so are a bit of an acquired taste. They can be toned down with other greens or a little acidity such as a small amount of lemon juice or vinegar. Linguini is a good match.

Bell peppers

Sweet bell peppers (red, yellow, green or orange) are best cut into long strips and sautéed with the garlic. Add a small amount of oregano with the peppers. The colored peppers are sweetest; by the way, pricey purple peppers lose their color, so don't bother using them in cooking. You can roast and peel the peppers first for an interesting smoky flavor.
Gemelli (twins) are a good complement.

Green beans

The best - slim French haricot verte or young blue lake beans - are superb barely boiled and immediately set in cold water, then added full length to the cooked sauce. A fat version of spaghetti or hollow ziti, perhaps broken into pieces similar in length to the beans, seems a good match.

Green peas

A simple but tasty dish is created by adding tiny frozen peas and a small amount of broth (1/4 cup) toward the end of the cooking of the garlic, bringing to a boil before serving. Good with traditional macaroni.

Sugar (edible) peapods

Treat like green beans.

Tomatoes

All ripe tomatoes can be added early for a richer, thicker sauce, or late for a fresher mixture. All go well with basil added, or even oregano for a more traditional-tasting Italian-American sauce. For a special treat, slice cherry tomatoes in half, drizzle with oil, and dry for 20 minutes or more in a 300-degree over to concentrate the flavors. Spaghetti or other large pasta is a preferred choice with these thick sauces.

Hot peppers

Simply add a dried hot pepper (peppericini) or two with the garlic. Don't eat them! Spaghetti.

Nuts

Toasted sliced walnuts, pecans and pine nuts make an excellent addition to basic oil and garlic. In this case, butter is an alternative to oil. Toasted bread crumbs are often added with them to expand the sauce's flavor. Conchiglie (snails) make it easier to get some nuts in the same bite.

Mushrooms

Any mushroom from boring white domestics to reconstituted dried porcini, with their meaty, smoky flavor, to truffles (!), can be added to the sauce, added early to blend flavors. Butter is a better fat than olive oil for most mushrooms. Pasta shapes should be chosen based on the mushroom.

Zucchini

Long zucchini stripes or other shapes can be briefly precooked, then added to suitable pasta, but it's better in the more complex primavera (spring) pasta. Anyway, one summer 20 years ago, my wife's bumper crop of the versatile vegetable burned out my daughters and me on zucchini forever, and I can't stand to eat it alone.

Eggplant

Eggplant is best cut into small pieces and deep fried before adding to the pasta, but it can also be grilled or sautéed with the garlic. It's better with some tomatoes added, too.

Primavera

One variety of pasta primavera is made with a cream sauce, but I prefer simply adding sliced or chopped precooked spring vegetables to the basic garlic-oil sauce. Candidates include asparagus (almost vital), zucchini, broccoli, carrots, beans, peas, tomatoes, young leeks, red peppers and yellow squash. Fusilli seems a good pasta choice for this mixture. Make it with thin asparagus and baby vegetables (carrots, parsnips, zucchini, green beans and squash) for oo's and ah's.

Puttanesca

For the traditional spicy "prostitutes'" pasta, add hot dried peppers and anchovies to the oil with the garlic, then add strong black olives, canned tomatoes and capers and cook to a thick sauce. Best on spaghetti, I think.

Anchovies

You have to be a salt freak to like this one, but oddly enough, it's not as fishy as you'd think. Dissolve the anchovies (a whole can, according to tradition) in the hot oil with the garlic. Don't add salt. I think anchovies are better flavoring other varieties, including broccoli, eggplant and tomatoes.

Caviar

Don't mix this in. Put it on top as a flavoring, much like salt. Capellini is suitable for this dish. No cheese with this.

Seafood

Mixing shellfish adds to the flavor and interest, but remember that they cook in different times. It's safest to cook them separately and combine at the end. A little chopped ripe tomato is an excellent addition as well. Cheese doesn't seem to complement most seafood.

Shellfish (clams and mussels)

There are two approaches. One way is to steam the shellfish over a small amount of boiling white wine until they open, then add them and the juices just before serving. Another is to add the shellfish to the hot garlic oil. They should open, adding their broth to the sauce. Mussels, having thinner shells, cook in a few minutes, clams taking as much as five or six minutes. Don't eat any shell fish that doesn't open. Don't add cheese to shellfish, but you can include a hot pepper or two. Serve with lemon.

Shrimp

Shrimp is prettiest in its shell, since it turns a bright red color. Add raw shrimp halfway through the cooking of the garlic sauce, then add a little broth when they turn red and cook for two minutes more - no longer. Add cooked shrimp at the end, but they won't have as much flavor. Serve with lemon.

Scallops

We usually only eat the white muscle of scallops, but they can be treated the same way as shrimp. Cook for only a few minutes or they get tough.

Carbonara

The famed "coal-miner's wife's spaghetti" may be the best dish from Italy, but my cardiologist would stop seeing me if he knew I ate it. Basically, add some chopped pancetta, ham or bacon to the garlic and oil mixture, then add it to hot, just-drained thick pasta (spaghetti, linguini or ziti) along with beaten raw eggs. The heat of the oil and pasta cooks the egg into a magnificent creamy sauce if you do it right. Otherwise, you may be scrambled eggs and pasta, which isn't bad, or may need to carefully heat the pasta (a tricky process) until the egg cooks unless you're positive your chickens lived an exemplary, healthy life. Lots of coarsely grown black pepper adds a little reminder of the coal miner's dust to the dish.

- end -

Tasty Additions to Basic Oil and Garlic Pasta

* Broccoli is good with anchovies.

** Eggplant is good with anchovies and tomatoes.

© copyright by Paul Franson 1997