Penne all'Arrabbiata
Arrabbiata means angry, and the name refers entirely to the chili, not to anyone's mood while making it -- though my father, who finds this dish too mild by half, has been known to add a second chili out of what I can only describe as pure spite toward the original recipe.
Ingredients
- 400g penne
- 3 tablespoons olive oil
- 4 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
- 1 teaspoon chili flakes (or 2 dried chilies, crumbled)
- 400g crushed tomatoes
- Fresh parsley, chopped
- Fine sea salt
Serves 4.
Cookware Required
- la pentola grande (large pot, for the pasta water)
- la padella larga (wide skillet)
Method
Warm the olive oil in a wide skillet over medium-low heat, and cook the garlic and chili gently until the garlic turns pale gold. Add the crushed tomatoes and a good pinch of salt, and simmer for fifteen minutes, until the sauce has thickened slightly.
Meanwhile, cook the penne in well-salted water until just short of al dente. Scoop out some pasta water, drain, and toss the pasta into the sauce, adding a splash of pasta water if it needs loosening. Finish with parsley.
Quando Va Storto
If the dish tastes too mild despite the chili being right there in the pot, it went in too early and lost its heat to the long simmer, or you simply used too little; add more toward the end of cooking next time, not just at the start. If the garlic tastes bitter, it browned too far before the tomatoes went in. And if the sauce tastes thin rather than concentrated, it needed longer at a simmer -- fifteen minutes is a minimum here, not a fixed number.