When you are engulfed in flames, or Whoops, I put too many red pepper flakes in my Arrabbiata sauce

Meal: Arrabbiata Sauce over linguine, served with a Trader Joe's cesar salad
Scene of the crime: my kitchen
Partners in crime: my sister in law, my son
Listening to: Christmas Lounge on somafm.com

Oh...did you enjoy the David Sedaris reference?

The best thing about not cooking for the first 39 years of my life is that I never take being able to cook for granted. Just 15 months ago I would never have dreamed of inviting someone over and just "whipping something up"...I might have invited someone over to order pizza with me, but never would I have offered to cook for them. Fast forward to this, me, inviting my sister in law over for dinner, and not only cooking for her, but cooking for her after - gasp - working all day! And having nothing in my kitchen! This is new territory for me, and I love it.

I find it helpful to have a go-to recipe for when I don't feel like shopping. Something I can make, ideally, from items I already have on my shelves. Seriously, I had every ingredient for this recipe in my cupboard, except for the flat-leaf parsley garnish, which I never would have used anyway.

I freehanded the red pepper flakes, apparently adding much more than the 1 and 1/4 tsp. the recipe called for, and my mouth was en fuego. I also was a bit lazy and didn't chop the canned tomatoes - I just added them whole - and the texture and consistency of whole, canned tomatoes "weirds out" my son. Still, it was delicious, and my sister in law even took some home with her to eat tomorrow. Makes me beam with culinary pride.


From The Gourmet Cookbook, Arrabbiata Sauce, which I served over linguine.

3 T olive oil
4 garlic cloves, minced
1 and 1/4 t red pepper flakes (I may actually measure this one out next time)
2 28 oz. cans of whole tomatoes in juice, drained and chopped (save the juice)
1 and 1/4 t salt
1/3 cup chopped fresh basil or flat leaf parsley (again, a garnish I was too lazy to add)

Heat oil in a 5-6 quart pot over moderately high heat. Add garlic and red pepper flakes and cook, stirring, until garlic is golden, about 1 minute. Stir in tomatoes, with their juice, and salt, bring to a simmer and simmer, uncovered, stirring occasionally, until thickened, about 35-40 minutes. Stir in basil (or parsley).

Note - sauce can be made ahead of time and frozen for up to two months, or refrigerated for up to a week.

Enjoy!

Spaghettini with garlic and lemon, or News Flash: Teens and Moms don't always agree

Meal: Spaghettini with garlic and lemon
Scene of the crime: my little bohemian kitchen
Partner in crime: my 13 year old son, M
Listening to: Christmas Lounge station on http://www.somafm.com

My son said that if I started blogging about cooking I'd want to cook more, to have something to blog about, and you know what? He's right. Normally on a Friday I'd order him pizza and call it a night, but tonight I found myself wandering the Von's aisles getting ingredients for one of my favorite recipes from The Gourmet Cookbook: spaghettini with garlic and lemon, on page 204.

I've made this recipe before, and it still excites me. It's the recipe that first introduced me to the wonders of adding lemon zest to food. This sauce is so simple, yet the flavors are so magical: crushed red peppers (the kind you sprinkle on pizza!), sauteed garlic, olive oil, lemon zest, and lemon juice. This meal is very light, and super fast to cook.

Of note: I didn't even know what lemon zest was a year ago, in fact, I had no idea you could eat that part of the lemon peel. As I type this, I even wonder...to make lemon zest, does one grate the outside or the inside of the lemon peel? I suppose I should have checked. For the record, I grated the outside of the peel.

I have to cop to a few other modifications: I did not finely grate the lemon peel, as the recipe called for, I just used the cheese grater I have at home, and it tasted fine. I also omitted the flat leaf parsley, as I hate washing parsley. The parsley was not missed.

I did find myself craving some sort of animal fat this go-around. I wanted to melt some butter into it, even fantasized about frying up some bacon and crumbling it into the pasta, or even trying my hand at making a lemon and red pepper cream sauce, but in the end I simply poured myself a glass of non-fat milk and was satisfied.

My son did think this pasta was a little plain, but I think that's because he is used to pastas with heavier sauces. I don't know. He's a tough critic. I loved it.

The recipe - serves 4-6:

• 1 lb spaghettini or capellini
• 4 large garlic cloves, minced
• 1/2 to 3/4 teaspoon dried hot red pepper flakes
• 1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil
• Finely grated zest from 2 lemons
• 3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
• 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
• 1/2 cup chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley

Cook pasta in a 6-quart pot of boiling salted water until al dente. Reserve 1 cup cooking water and drain pasta in a colander.

While pasta is boiling, cook garlic and red pepper flakes (to taste) in oil in a 12-inch heavy skillet over moderate heat, stirring, until garlic is golden, about 5 minutes. Stir in zest, then juice, salt, pepper, and 1/2 cup reserved cooking water and bring to a simmer.

Toss pasta in sauce with parsley. (Add more cooking water if pasta seems dry.)

In the beginning

I spent the first 39 years of my life not cooking.

In fact, I prided myself on it.

Don't get me wrong - I've always been a bit of a foodie. Not a food snob, but I love to eat, and I appreciate both lowbrow and highbrow food culture. I'm an adventurous eater and haven't yet met a country whose food I don't like. I traveled quite a bit as a child, and time spent living overseas afforded me many opportunities to sample tastes outside of the mainstream U.S. diet.

Still, I never developed much confidence in the kitchen, and made it a point, as an adult, to avoid the kitchen as much as possible. I have almost always dated people who are brave cooks themselves, making it possible for me to sit back and be cooked for.

Enter Ruth Reichl...well, enter Piper, who gave me Ruth Reichl. For Christmas 2007, my colleague Piper gave me Ruth Reichl's The Gourmet Cookbook, a big yellow tome including the best recipes from 60 years of Gourmet Magazine. Ruth's food writing is amazing, and I would be a better person for having read the book even if I never had lifted a finger to actually CREATE one of the recipes....thankfully, though, her writing inspired me to...start cooking. I pledged to create one new recipe a week, and for the most part, I have kept that promise to myself.

A year later, I think I'm a pretty good cook.