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Prostitutes' Pasta
is cheap, fast and easy with a pungent perfume that you can smell
coming at you from blocks away. This spaghetti dish with a tarted-up
red sauce, sporting a scarlet name, escaped from the brothels
of Naples, Italy.
1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
8 large garlic cloves, minced and mashed
2 - 28 ounce cans peeled and diced tomatoes
1 cup oil-cured black or Kalamata olives, pitted and chopped
6 anchovy fillets, chopped and mashed
- or 2 tablespoons Vietnamese vegetarian 'fish' sauce
2 tablespoons salted or brined capers, rinsed, drained, minced
and mashed
2 teaspoons dried basil, crumbled
2 teaspoons dried marjoram or oregano, crumbled
1 teaspoon dried red pepper flakes
1 tablespoon dry white wine
Sea salt and black pepper, freshly ground
1 pound dry linguine or other pasta
4 tablespoons fresh Italian flat-leaf parsley, coarsely chopped
Parmesan cheese, grated
Pine nuts, toasted.
1. Heat the oil in a large cooking pot over
a medium flame.
2. Saute the garlic for a minute or so, until the fragrance starts
to fill the kitchen.
3. Add the tomatoes, olives, anchovies, capers, basil, marjoram
or oregano, red pepper and wine. Simmer over a medium-low flame
for 20 minutes or so. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
4. Cook the pasta in a large pot of boiling salted water until
barely al dente (tender but still firm), per the package directions.
5. Drain the pasta and toss it with the sauce and parsley. Simmer
for 3 minutes or so over a low flame until the pasta is thoroughly
coated with the sauce and finishes cooking to an al dente firmness.
6. Serve at the table directly from the cooking pot with grated
Parmesan and pine nuts on the side.
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