Mark Bittman's Quick and Easy Recipes from the New York Times (37 page)

1.
Bring a large pot of water to a boil and salt it. Put the olive oil in a 10- or 12-inch skillet over medium-high heat. A minute later, add the zucchini; cook, stirring only occasionally, until very tender and lightly browned, 10 to 15 minutes. Season with a little salt and a lot of pepper.

2.
Meanwhile, beat the eggs and ½ cup of the Parmigiano-Reggiano together. Add the pasta to the boiling water and cook until it is tender but firm. When it is done, drain it and combine it immediately with the egg-cheese mixture, tossing until the egg appears cooked. Stir in the zucchini, then taste and add more salt and pepper if necessary.

3.
Toss in the herb and serve immediately, passing the remaining Parmigiano-Reggiano at the table.

VARIATION

Fettuccine Alfredo

Omit the zucchini. Just toss the pasta (preferably fettuccine) with eggs, cheese, and enough heavy cream to bind the sauce. Best served as a small first course for 6 to 8.

NOTE

The eggs will cook fully from the heat of the pasta. If this makes you at all nervous, however, do the final tossing of eggs, cheese, and pasta in the cooking pot, over the lowest heat possible.

MAKES 4 TO 6 SERVINGS

TIME: 30 MINUTES

THIS DISH IS
a minimalist’s take on the northern Italian autumn staple of tortelli filled with zucca, a pumpkinlike vegetable whose flesh, like that of butternut or acorn squash, is dense, orange, and somewhat sweet. The flavor and essential nature of that dish can be captured in a thirty-minute preparation that turns the classic inside out, using the squash as a sauce and sparing you the hours it would take to stuff the tortelli.

1.
Cut the squash into chunks and put it in a food processor. Pulse the machine on and off until the squash appears grated. Alternatively, grate or chop the squash by hand. Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil for the pasta.

2.
Put a large skillet over medium heat and add the butter or oil. A minute later, add the squash, salt and pepper to taste, and about ½ cup of water. Cook over medium heat, stirring occasionally. Add water, about ¼ cup at a time, as the mixture dries out, but be careful not to make it soupy. When the squash begins to disintegrate, after 10 or 15 minutes, begin cooking the pasta. While it cooks, season the squash with the nutmeg, sugar if desired, and additional salt and pepper if needed.

3.
When the pasta is tender, scoop out about ½ cup of the cooking liquid and reserve it, then drain the pasta. Toss the pasta in the skillet with the squash, adding the reserved pasta-cooking water if the mixture seems dry. Taste and add more of any seasonings you like, then toss with the Parmigiano-Reggiano and serve.

NOTES

Peel the squash with a knife, not a vegetable peeler, which is likely to break. And don’t worry if you take a bunch of the flesh along with the peel; remember that squash is almost always inexpensive.

Some butternut squash is sweeter than others, and there’s no way to predict this by appearance. Since this sauce relies on sweetness for its character, if the squash seems a little bland as it cooks, add about a teaspoon of sugar. It will brighten the flavor considerably.

MAKES 4 TO 6 SERVINGS

TIME: ABOUT 40 MINUTES

THE FUNDAMENTAL PROCEDURES
required to make this pasta dish are easy, but this is as instructional as any simple recipe I know, and one that builds a wonderfully flavorful dish with just a few ingredients.

1.
Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Trim the cauliflower and divide it into florets. Salt the water and cook the cauliflower in it until it is tender but not mushy. Remove the cauliflower and set it aside; when it is cool enough to handle, chop it roughly into small pieces. (If you have a little extra time, you can poach the cauliflower whole—even leaving the leaves on if you like; they’ll add a little extra flavor to the water, and therefore to the pasta—which will save you the trouble of cutting it into florets.)

2.
Meanwhile, cook the oil and garlic together in a large, deep skillet over medium-low heat, stirring occasionally, until the garlic is golden; start the pasta in the same water as you used for the cauliflower.

3.
When the garlic is ready, add the cauliflower and bread crumbs to the skillet and turn the heat to medium. Cook, stirring occasionally. When the pasta is just about done—it should be 2 or 3 minutes shy of being the way you like it—drain it, reserving about a cup of the cooking liquid.

4.
Add the pasta to the skillet with the cauliflower and toss with a large spoon until well combined. Add salt and pepper to taste along with some of the pasta water to keep the mixture from drying out. When the mixture is hot and the pasta tender and nicely glazed, serve.

VARIATION

Feel free to add 3 or 4 anchovy fillets, with their oil, to the skillet along with the garlic if you like; when I’m cooking for a group that enjoys bold flavors, I always do.

NOTE

The bread crumbs are best when freshly made from good but slightly stale bread; coarse bread crumbs, such as those made in a food processor, are infinitely preferable to the finer store-bought variety.

MAKES 4 TO 6 SERVINGS

TIME: ABOUT 30 MINUTES

ALL WINTER I
dream of the time when there are so many fresh herbs that it seems imperative to use them at almost every meal. One of my favorite ways to take advantage of this abundance is to mix large quantities of herbs with pasta and a simple base of olive oil and garlic. In winter, a dish like this would not only seem exotic but would also cost a small fortune. In summer, however, it is an inexpensive no-brainer.

1.
Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Combine the olive oil and garlic in a small saucepan over medium-low heat. Cook gently, just until the garlic begins to color, then remove from the heat. Meanwhile, wash and mince the herbs. Put them in a bowl large enough to hold the pasta. Cut the butter into bits if you’re using it and add it to the bowl.

2.
Salt the water and cook the pasta until tender but not mushy. Reserve ½ cup of the pasta-cooking water, then drain the pasta and toss with the herbs and reserved olive oil-garlic mixture. Add a little more olive oil or some of the pasta water if you did not use butter and the mixture seems dry. Season with salt and pepper and serve.

MAKES 4 TO 6 SERVINGS

TIME: 30 MINUTES

PESTO HAS BECOME
a staple, especially in late summer when basil is best. But pasta with pesto does have its limits; it’s simply not substantial enough to serve as a main course. The Genoese, originators of pesto, figured this out centuries ago, when they created this dish, which augments the pesto with chunks of potatoes and chopped green beans, making it a more complex, more filling, and more interesting dish. Recreating this classic dish is straightforward and easy.

Note that if you start the potatoes and pasta simultaneously, then add the green beans about halfway through cooking, they will all be finished at the same time and can be drained and tossed with the sauce in a snap. This technique may sound imprecise, but it works.

1.
Bring a large pot of water to a boil and salt it. Combine the basil, garlic, salt to taste, and cheese in a blender or food processor; pulse until roughly chopped. Add the olive oil in a steady stream and continue to blend until the mixture is fairly creamy, adding a little more olive oil or some water if necessary. Add the pine nuts and pulse a few times to chop them into the sauce.

2.
Add the potatoes to the boiling water and stir; then add the pasta and cook as usual, stirring frequently, about 10 minutes in all. When the pasta is about half done—the strands will bend but will not yet be tender—add the beans.

3.
When the pasta is done, the potatoes and beans should be tender. Drain the pasta and vegetables, toss with the pesto and more salt or olive oil if you like, and serve.

MAKES 4 TO 6 SERVINGS

TIME: 20 MINUTES

YOU MIGHT THINK
of this as winter pesto, with a higher percentage of walnuts and the always-available parsley filling in for summer’s basil—though if you can find good basil, by all means use it.

1.
Bring a large pot of water to a boil and salt it. Meanwhile, combine the nuts, parsley, and garlic in a small food processor (or use a mortar and pestle) and turn the machine on. With the machine running, add the oil gradually, using just enough so that the mixture forms a creamy paste. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

2.
Cook the pasta, stirring occasionally, until it is tender but not mushy. When it is ready, drain it—reserve some of the cooking water—and toss with the sauce; if the mixture appears too thick, thin with a little of the pasta-cooking water or more olive oil. Serve.

MAKES 4 TO 6 SERVINGS

TIME: 20 MINUTES

THE DISH HAS
a thick creaminess that you can never duplicate with canned tomatoes, no matter how good they are. So the season when you can make it—when there are good, ripe tomatoes in the market—is fairly short; where I live, just two or at the most three months a year.

There is an ideal instant for serving this sauce: When the tomatoes soften and all of their juices are in the skillet, the sauce suddenly begins to thicken. At that moment, it is at its peak; another minute or two later, many of the juices will have evaporated and, although the essence of the sauce is equally intense, it won’t coat the pasta as well. If this happens, just add a little fresh olive oil or butter to the finished dish.

1.
Bring a large pot of water to a boil and salt it. Put the butter or oil in an 8- or 10-inch skillet over medium heat. When the butter melts or the oil is hot, add the tomatoes and turn the heat to high.

2.
Cook, stirring occasionally, until the tomatoes begin to juice up, then turn the heat to low and cook, stirring occasionally, until the sauce thickens.

3.
Cook the pasta until it is tender but firm. Drain and toss with the tomatoes and cheese. Season with salt and pepper to taste, toss again, and serve immediately.

VARIATIONS