The Simplest of Pasta (spaghetti with a Neruda – 117 years – tomato sauce)
‘…the tomato,
star of earth, recurrent
and fertile…’
Pablo Neruda
July big flavor, small price menu poll
Each month we’re asking you to choose from a list of real cheap menus prepped in the preceding weeks ( and accompanying verdict on the actual outcome, a vote from 1-5.) Last month turned out to be risotto with asparagus followed by classic tiramisu. Any preferences for June?
Wednesday Will: Shakespeare’s Vermouth Shrimp alla Elsinore
‘In his recipe, however, Shakespeare does at least change the liquor Belleforest used as well as adding the “Wha’s up!” exchange, taken from the noted add campaign by Bud-of-Weiser, in the opening scene, a second sea scallop dish later in the recipe and of course the ghost of Julia Child.’
Is it the figs you miss, or the people attached to them in memory? Prosciutto and Melon (or figs) big flavor, small price (June menu 2).
But one important smell, for me, that you can find here as well as in hotter, more southern blue places: fig tree. I was surprised to find out: in my hick-ignorance I thought they’d be a rarity. Instead they’re all over – as they should be. One of the easiest, hardiest trees to plant and grow.
Wednesday Will – A Midsummer Night’s Spaghetti with Saffron and Lamb
Though Shakespeare often, ah, borrowed the basis for his recipes every so often he came up with something completely different. His immensely popular Midsummer Spaghetti is one of those original dishes. It’s been rumored that he got the idea after attending a wedding in Greece at which peculiar homegrown ouzo was served, but Shakespeare’s always been mute on the point.
literary recipe: Dan Brown’s Travel Pasta with Butter, Sage and Ricotta
“That was really, really close,” you adroitly say after you’ve escaped by running through a mysterious antique ruin that just happened to have a store of the special butter made from the milk of cows fed exclusively on a rare flower that grows only on one particular European hillside that you were looking for. Eureka!
Big Flavors, Small Price (June meal poll): Spaghettoni with Fresh Goat Cheese
t’s nearly always a balance, almost a dance – an equilibrium, a playing, contrast and synchrony, surprise and familiarity. Cooking that is, organizing a plate, adjusting for salt and sweet, umami and creamy, crunch and mushy and heat and bite and…
Bloomsday Recipe – Joyce’s Moo-Cow Ragout
James Joyce’ Portrait of a Pasta with Ragout “Mr. Leopold Bloom ate with relish the inner organs of beasts and fowls.” Ulysses For more literary …
literary recipe: Allen Ginsburg’s Howling Espresso Pasta. With Mushrooms. (Rest in howling peace.)
…for more literary recipes: on sale – The Pasta Papers vl. 1 “…and you, Garcia Lorca, what were you doing down by the watermelons?” A Supermarket …
Small Price, Big Flavor: Penne with scampi without the scampi
….long sigh. Tough times, lots of people around Italy and elsewhere don’t have much cash, ‘no tengo dinero’, not in small part because a …