Pasta all’assassinaJulie Van Rosendaal/The Globe and Mail
Despite what some might have you believe, there are few hard-and-fast rules when it comes to cooking. There are traditions, of course, and scientific principles. But there are also recipes that go against the typical preparations and techniques behind other dishes in their genre, generally in pursuit of flavour – such as spaghetti all’assassina.
The spicy, garlicky, concentrated tomato pasta dish, whose name translates to “assassin’s spaghetti,” ditches the pot of cooking water and utilizes more direct heat and as little moisture as possible to generate complex flavours and aromas. Caramelization and the Maillard reaction – a series of reactions between amino acids and reducing sugars that occur at higher temperatures – cause your food to brown while developing layers of flavour you don’t get from boiling.
Originated in Bari, Italy, in the late sixties, it is done almost like risotto, using a technique called risottatura: You cook the pasta by gradually adding a thin sauce or broth a bit at a time, adding more as the starch absorbs moisture and your pasta swells and softens. Once any excess liquid has reduced and the pasta is tender, the sauce becomes concentrated and caramelized, the edges of the pasta toasty and crispy. It’s an excellent example of a meal that doesn’t cost much to make, but the technique makes it feel more elaborate – even good-quality pasta and canned tomatoes are relatively affordable, so you can feed a small group of friends or family for around $5.
Spaghetti all’Assassina
Tomatoes in any form can be used here – the idea is to create a very thin tomato sauce, something between sauce and broth, that contains enough liquid to cook the dry pasta. Use any variety of canned tomatoes, or even passata, and if it has chunks, you can purée in a blender or right in the pot with a hand-held immersion blender, and thin with broth or water.
- 1 796 ml can whole, diced, puréed or San Marzano-style tomatoes in purée
- Water or stock (any kind)
- Olive, canola or other vegetable oil, for cooking
- A few garlic cloves, peeled
- Dry chili flakes
- 2-3 tbsp tomato paste
- 1 lb good-quality dry spaghetti
- Salt
Empty the can of tomatoes into a saucepan. If the tomatoes are whole or chunky, purée them right in the pot with a hand-held immersion blender (or transfer to a regular blender and return to the pot). Add a canful of water or stock and a pinch of salt and bring to a simmer, then turn off the heat.
Place a skillet large enough to accommodate the length of your spaghetti over medium-high heat and add a generous drizzle of oil along with the garlic cloves and a big pinch of chili flakes. Some start by toasting the dry spaghetti in the hot pan, getting some toasty colour on it before adding the tomato broth.
Otherwise, add the tomato paste to the pan along with a ladleful of tomato broth, and let it reduce a bit. Add the pasta to the pan, ladle in about a third of the tomato broth and a big pinch of salt. Cook, turning and separating the spaghetti with tongs, and as the pasta softens and the broth reduces, add more broth a ladleful at a time, cooking until the pasta is tender and what’s left of the sauce has thickened, and the pasta starts to singe again. Serve immediately.
Serves about four.
