Garlic

Last night was one of those nights where I had no intention of cooking at all, and faced with a nearly empty fridge, I remembered a very simple sauce recipe in the Pasta chapter.

105. Garlic and Tomato Sauce (Aglio Dorato) - *Pasta*

The sauce for the pasta just combines life's best ingredients -- tomatoes and garlic. I don't think there is any other combo that is a match made in heaven as these two. I wonder who was the first caveman that discovered it.... or it was probably much later on. I haven't really brushed up on my historical anthropology!

The technique for making the sauce is long, but surprisingly, not time-consuming. It is not one of those stirring type of recipes, where you need to hover over a hot stove. That was good news for me, since our heat wave continued last night. I was keeping cool in the living room watching Jeopardy and Wheel of Fortune while the sauce was cooking. Here's the process:

5 minutes - heat up a cup (yes!) of olive oil on low heat
10 minutes - slowly cook 8 peeled, but whole, garlic cloves on a low, low heat
(extra 5 minutes of cooking garlic until they become tender)

15 minutes - simmer on a slightly higher flame the sauce, to which you added the pulp of some peeled whole plum tomatoes (San Marzano tomatoes, but of course!)

The sauce is then left to cool for about ten minutes, and then it is pulsed in a food processor till blended and emulsified.


I had to process it twice because I found that the sauce tended to separate a bit. At this point I also added some salt and pepper.

I boiled up some linguini, drained it, and then added a few tablespoons of the sauce to the pasta. Then I just sprinkled on some grated parmesan and pepper, and that was it!


Mmmm, so so good! I thought that the pasta would be oily, like while eating it I would get little oil puddles on my coffee table (I'm a messy eater!), but it wasn't at all. The sauce was like a warm winter coat on the pasta; the two just blended together perfectly.

If the kids (and adults!) are not too garlic-phobic, I recommend this as a weekday family meal. A big bowl of pasta in the center of the table, some garlic bread, and some wine for the parents!

Also, since you only use a bit of the sauce for each serving of pasta, the rest of the sauce could be kept in the fridge and used in the future. I think I will probably have this again this weekend. YUM!