Summer spaghetti with courgettes

A lot of us probably have a glut of courgettes right now, trying to pick them before they seemingly overnight turn from tiny to marrow-sized monsters!

I like to peel and julienne them and have raw in a spicy Thai-style salad - they have a very similar texture to green papaya so make a great substitute when you’re craving som tam.

And last week at my sister’s in Cornwall (first time out on a train since lockdown! Seeing the sea! Seeing family!) we made a really nice lunch from a recipe I’d been reading (by Letitia Clark) and immediately wanted to try.

As the courgettes were begging to be picked and cooked, it was pretty immediate too.

That recipe is HERE and is a delicious Italian dish of slow-cooked courgettes with mint, chilli and almonds. We had it warm with crusty baguette and my favourite Roquefort cheese.

So when I arrived home a couple of nights later, yes to the sound of those begging courgettes here too, I made a kind of version of this to have with spaghetti.

I am slightly obsessed with very simple pasta recipes this year and this is now a new favourite. Cook the courgettes slowly so they’re a bit mushy and creamy and they are just perfect with the spaghetti and a good grating of fresh parmesan cheese.

Quantities are really up to you as you can make as much as you like, perhaps saving any leftover courgette sauce for lunch the next day, or just because you already know you’re going to be wanting more than one bowl of this summer lushness.

But this is what I used to make enough sauce for two:

olive oil

2 courgettes, washed, sliced lengthways and then into thin horizontal slices

1 clove of garlic, peele and squashed and finely minced (there’s two in this photo but I changed my mind and used on one - you use what feels right for you)

2 anchovies from the jar, with a little of their oil, roughly chopped (optional - just leave out if you don’t have or don’t like)

1 dried red chilli, or just a pinch of dried red chilli flakes

1 big fat spring onion, topped and tailed, any tough outer layer removed, and sliced

zest and juice of half a lemon

fresh mint and/or parsley leaves, chopped

salt and pepper to season

fresh parmesan to grate over

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OK, so firstly, I’m going to ignore the cooking of the spaghetti as I’m sure you’ll get that underway while the courgettes are cooking.

Personally I bring a big saucepan of water to the boil with a pinch of salt and when boiling add the spaghetti, stirring as it folds into the water, and then cook for - I think - ten minutes, maybe 11.

I like to do this alongside the sauce so that if the sauce needs loosening at all I can use a little of the nice hot starchy pasta water to do so.

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Anyway.

Put a good sized non-stick pan over a medium heat, add a slosh of olive oil and then courgettes and garlic and cook, stirring often, for 5-10 minutes until they start to slightly brown in places. Add a slosh of water if it looks like sticking though at any time and take it slowly and gently - maybe reduce that medium heat to a medium-low if that’s feeling more like it for you today.

Throw in the anchovies, reduce the heat to low and stir, stir, stir (gently) for a minute or two until the anchovies do their anchovy trick of just vanishing and leaving behind a full savoury slight saltiness to the dish (without tasting fishy either).

Crumble in the dried chilli and add the spring onion and a little slosh of water and cook for another ten minutes of so on a low heat with the pan covered, stirring every once in a while.

Uncover the pan, stir and taste. Add the lemon zest and juice, and the herbs, stir again and taste again before adding seasoning.

You can cook for a bit longer of course if you’d like your courgettes even creamier and mushier.

You might not need to add salt if you added the anchovies but a good grind of pepper might be good.

Tip the spaghetti into the pan of sauce to make sure it’s thoroughly coated and then put into a bowl and grate over (lots of) fresh parmesan.

So summery, so good and so good for using up those courgettes too!

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Spaghetti for sick days

Spaghetti for when you’re just not feeling so good …. why this recipe?

Because it’s super-simple when you don’t want to faff about making anything more complicated.

Because it’s just perfect comfort food.

And because lots of lovely immune system boosting garlic and antioxident-rich broccoli

And because this one just feels nurturing and lovely. Treating yourself is the best idea when you’re under the weather.

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Cook wholemeal spaghetti in a big pan of boiling water with a pinch of salt for about eight minutes and throw the broccoli in for the last few minutes (approx 4-5).

And then it’s all about making the garlic sauce … the trick is not to put garlic into hot oil all sizzling and burning - no, this is about kind of infusing the olive oil with the garlic.

So the peeled and sliced garlic (one clove or two, up to you, but I’d go with two) is added to the cold pan with cold oil, heated so slowly and when just about to sizzle, remove the pan from the heat and stir again, cool down and little.

Repeat. And repeat. And ... if necessary, repeat.

When you’ve made a beautiful fragrant infused garlic olive oil ... THEN allow it to come to a sizzle and then add in 1/2 tsp dried chilli flakes and a ladle full of the pasta cooking water.

Simmer for a minute or two, add the spaghetti and broccoli and keep turning in that gorgeous oil.

Add some grated Parmesan and stir through.

Remove from heat; add more cheese and some ground black pepper and that’s it.

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Cacio e pepe (spaghetti with cheese and pepper)

You know sometimes when you just keep seeing something you hadn’t noticed before and then you do and then you see it everywhere?

That’s been me and cacio e pepe over the last week or so.

I noticed it in two or three recipe books and immediately wanted to eat it, and wanted to make it.

It’s a dish or beautiful simplicity: pasta, pasta water, freshly grated Parmesan or Pecorino and freshly grated black pepper. Sometimes butter too.

So I read more - I googled and read many more reviews and recipes online.

And actually it started sounding complicated! It started sounding like one of those things that is SO simple that’s it’s going to be hard to get it perfect.

I read more and more of the advice and tricks and ‘secrets’ … and then amalgamated all the bits of advice that sounded sensible to me and made my first one.

My first realisation is that no-one should have that fear that it has to be ‘perfect’ because really how wrong can you go with spaghetti and cheese and black pepper?!

It was delicious. However I wanted to make more of the cheese sauce as mine was a little thin.

I also wanted to simplify the method as I’d been swept along with these tips and tricks and so had used both olive oil and butter, a little too much pasta water and had taken the advice on board to let that mixture cool slightly before adding the cheese. Totally unnecessary, I now thought.

Second go I just followed the same basic method but omitted the oil, added less pasta water and didn’t wait before stirring in the cheese to make the sauce before adding the pasta.

Attempt number 1

Attempt number 2

Again; delicious!

But this time slightly too much and too cheesy a sauce.

I re-read the original recipe I’d seen from Giorgio Locatelli’s book ‘Made at Home’.

And I found the episode where Anthony Bourdain has it for the first time in Rome - and then it becomes his favourite pasta dish - and watched them make it in the restaurant.

SO much simpler than recipes I’d been reading online.

I discovered the classic version doesn’t even use butter … I haven’t tried that yet as I like the the butter! But I will.

For my third attempt I simplified even further and just went with what I’d now seen and what I feel would work - no more tricks and secrets; just cook the thing and do so with love and anticipation of a good meal.

No more even making the cheese sauce before adding the pasta.

No timing to cool one part before adding another or cooling the pasta slightly.

This is my favourite of the three I’ve made and definitely the simplest (not that any of them could really be called hard but oh goodness do some people like to complicate stuff - I found recipes for this online with PAGES of explanation!).

So, here’s how to make this utterly divine and nourishing and elegant and easy pasta.

If making more than a couple of portions at a time make sure you’ve got a big pan with lots of space for the pasta and the sauce to become one.

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To make a quick lunch or dinner for one, you’ll need:

a small handful of spaghetti (about 100g)

a knob of butter (maybe a couple of heaped teaspoons)

1/2 - 1 teaspoon of freshly ground black pepper

a small handful of freshly grated Parmesan or Pecorino cheese

more cheese and more pepper to serve, if liked (personally I didn’t think it needed it)

serve with a big green salad to make it more of a meal

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Usually with pasta we use a big saucepan and lots of water but for this dish use a little less water than normal because we want the pasta cooking water to be good and starchy to make the sauce. So I used a slightly smaller pan than usual and a little less water but a good big pinch of salt.

Bring to the boil, add the spaghetti and when it’s back on the boil cook for eight minutes.

Get everything else ready and a couple of minutes before the pasta’s ready get a good big non-stick pan over a medium heat and add a ladleful of water taken from the spaghetti pan.

Then add the butter and stir until it’s melted and the butter/water mixture simmering. Then heat to low and add the black pepper. Add a little more pasta water if needed - you want want it loose but not too much of it.

The pasta should be done by now but don’t ever worry!

If it’s not then turn the sauce off for a minute.

If it was done before you’d finished putting the pepper in then turn the sauce off for a minute while you drain the pasta. Nothing’s a problem.

If the pasta is going to wait for a minute though I’d run cold water through it after draining so it doesn’t get sticky as it waits patiently in its sieve.

OK so now we have a little simmering sauce and we just add the pasta maybe in two batches so each gets to expand into the sauce. Add the first then stir and combine with the sauce before adding the rest of the spaghetti.

Simmer the pasta in the sauce another minute or so so that it can absorb some more liquid and then add the finely grated cheese, tossing and mixing it all together so the cheese melts and you can’t even really see it any more.

That’s it. That’s it done.

Remove pasta and sauce from pan to dish, taste, add more pepper and cheese if liked.

Eat, wonder how something so simple can be so delicious and start planning when next to make it …

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