Triple Green Pasta

twirly or stubby - you choose, each is prepared differently

Spaghetti with garlic and oil and sometimes broccoli, is the dish that I’ve eaten more than anything in my life (probably). So the other night, when my mom cooked me this dinner - I noticed something was different. It was extra good or strabuona. She used mint, the broccoli florets were perfectly seasoned and soft, almost too soft - but in a way that let the spaghetti’s texture really shine without competing. I ate and ate, still I couldn’t see beyond those two main points. Finally in passing she mentioned the zucchini, “the zucchini?” I said inquisitively.

It makes so much sense, the first time I’d ever had Spaghetti alla Nerano, a zucchini twirler from the Amalfi coast - I couldn’t believe how rich and cheesy it tasted, even in the total absence of cheese. So here we are, cooking zucchini down so much that it disintegrates, gives us body and carries even more of the sweet garlic flavored oil in a suspension of imperceivable plant-based cellular disbelief. That was a mouthful, literally and figuratively.

If cheese is to be used, a hard sheep’s cheese is the way to go, it’s funkier and saltier than parm. Pecorino Romano is the go-to, but if you have access to a cheese monger/shop, try a Pecorino Sardo, Bosco or a Manchego. Using a coarse grating apparatus is ideal, microplanes should be avoided.

Lastly, both the short pasta and the twirl pasta can be made with the same ingredients, however, the short pasta may benefit from a knob of butter in the final “mounting” stage - and if that’s used, more cheese can also be mounted - making the short pasta more of a green Mac and cheese. Why does the short pasta get this treatment only? In my view, all dried pastas or pastasciutte, serve a unique purpose and pair with a specific set of criteria of the sauce/condiment with which they will be served. Spaghetti and Linguine are delicate and petite, they shine when cooked al dente and not over sauced. After all, how can one enjoy the simple pleasure of noodles tightly twirled around a fork and the multiple moments of textural resistance they offer in that initial bite, if they are swimming in a chunky, busy sauce that clouds the simplicity? This is why we KISS, Keep it simple spaghetti.

With a chunkier pasta, there’s a strength a robustness that can be paired with more however you interpret that. I used radiatori their multiple folds grab onto more robust sauces and resemble, you guessed it - steam radiators. In short there’s a reason Mac and Cheese isn’t served with a twirly pasta, there’s a reason the cacao e Pepe the Roman adult version of American Mac and cheese is simply dressed with an emulsion of cheese and pasta water - and that reason is: the sauce is less heavy and therefor can be served with a twirler.

Those are my thoughts, here’s the recipe - please pass it around to anyone you think may enjoy it. Happy weekend!

FC

Triple Green Pasta

ingredients:

2tbsp extra virgin olive oil + 4tbsp later

4 cloves garlic thin slice

1 lb Zucchini thin slice, skin on

1 pound broccoli florets, - cut into the natural shape of the florets

1 pound radiator or spaghetti pasta

20 mint leaves

1-4oz of sheep’s milk cheese, pecorino. (less for spaghetti more for radiatori)

plenty of kosher salt (for boiling water mostly, but also for the zucchini)

options: 1tbsp butter for radiatori +/or 3tbsp brie

equipment

high sided sauté for sauce

large pot for pasta

spider

box grater

knife / board

steps:

Add 4-5 quarts of water to the large pot and set it over high heat to boil.

In the sauté over medium heat, add 2tbsp of oil and the garlic. season with a pinch of kosher salt, stir and when you smell the aroma of garlic add the zucchini at once.

Sauté the zucchini for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Salt the boiling water to 1% salinity (that’s about 1/4c of diamond crystal kosher salt per 5qts water - much less if using other salts). Taste the water, it should have a brininess to it. Add the broccoli to the boiling water and cook for 4 minutes.

Remove broccoli with the spider (save the water) and add them to the zucchini - turn heat to high on the zucchini, turn down only after (and if) all the water has boiled off.

Cook the pasta in the salted broccoli water for 1 minute under what the box says, stir occasionally.

Add the pasta to the greens and over high heat mix well for one minute. The broccoli should disintegrate.

shut off heat

Add the mint leaves

Add 1/4 cup of pasta water (if needed)

Add 4tbsp of olive oil (if desired)

Add grated cheese (if you like that)

mix well again, and serve.