Attack of the Over-ripe Tomatoes!

I'm a gal that can't resist a bargain. I was telling you yesterday how the fabulous yellow/orange tomatoes I found at my local grocery store were only 99 cents a pound! Well yesterday, as I was mentally scanning the store's inventory once again, I found that the tomatoes have been reduced to 69 cents a pound!! Are you kidding me?! Well I have to admit that this was the last of them and they were going over to the state of mush and over-ripeness (sp?). A lady near me also saw the amazing price and quickly turned away from seeing their state. Well, I couldn't just leave them alone. So, I picked up just over a pound of gorgeously ripe and bright colored tomatoes! Thank goodness Tom had a recipe that would utilize these beauties in his Pasta chapter!

85. Chilli, Basil and Almond Sauce (Picci Pacci) - *Pasta*

Picci Pacci, Tom indicates, literally means 'this and that'; meaning the pasta had elements in the sauce that incorporated a few ingredients here and there. For this dish, the sauce would have tomatoes, an herb (Tom said I could use parsley instead of basil, and I did), chilli and almonds. Like the Quicker Tomato Sauce, this combo of ingredients did not need any cooking as such, but they do need to sit together for a while so that all the flavors could develop and mingle.

I first started the sauce for the pasta (Tom recommends spaghetti, but it is not mandatory) by crushing my glorious over-ripe tomatoes over a colander. Once I was happy with the pulp I got, I mixed it in a bowl with some chopped garlic, extra virgin olive oil, chilli flakes, chopped parsley, salt and red wine vinegar. I covered the bowl and let the sauce macerate for about two hours.

Then it was just a matter of toasting some almonds -- Tom says to use blanched almonds but I already had almond flakes lying around needing to get used, so I toasted them on a hot and dry frying pan. Once they were cool, I chopped them coarsely with my mezzaluna.

The last part of making the dish was to just simply boil some spaghetti, drain it, and mix it in with the sauce. The chopped almonds then went on top.

Isn't it just glorious?! It looks like a crown for a summer queen, if there ever was one, to symbolize the heat and beauty of summer! I just love the color of the orange tomatoes against the paleness of the almonds and the sharp green of the parsley! I think with a fabulous sauce such as this one, this could certainly turn into an impromptu pasta salad for a barbecue. And I'm not talking about ones that are coated in mayo and sweeter than grandma's peach cobbler! I mean a cold pasta, such as rotini, with a beautiful and sharp coating of sauce, such as this one! Here's another view:


I have to give a fair bit of warning, though I think this may fall on deaf ears, or rather, over-enthusiastic, spice-seeking, tongues. For two portions, the sauce must have 1/2 tsp of chilli flakes. I found this way too much for me. Not oppressingly so for me, as I was able to eat the dish and not experience the metal-tongue I usually do when eating extremely spicy things that kill all my tastebuds, but enough that in addition to it being about 100 degrees in my tiny apartment, I was sweating buckets! (And I even used 1/4 tsp!) So I think next time I will use only a pinch of the chilli flakes unless I need to get rid of a sinus cold or something!

Anyway, this is a great last-minute type of recipe to try; I actually was not planning on cooking at all last night, but once I bought the tomatoes I knew that I had all the ingredients I need!