If you like anchovies, or even if you don’t, I recommend trying this recipe. My flatmate says she doesn’t like them, but when I made Puttanesca Pasta, I didn’t tell her what was in it. She loved it! I think it’s because the strong flavour of the anchovies is softened by the onion and tomato and disguised a little by the garlic, chilli and basil. It’s a very flavourful sauce that I think deserves to be served with fresh pasta, which apart from being tastier, is also faster to cook.
Accompany with this no-egg caesar salad, which also uses an anchovy paste, a perfect complement to the pasta recipe.
The origins of Puttanesca sauce (sugo alla Puttanesca in Italian) are not certain, but many say it has something to do with “ladies of the night” because puttana is a colloquial word for prostitute. It’s said that prostitutes in Naples created this dish with readily available ingredients and that they used its fragrance to tempt customers into their brothels, offering them dinner and then “dessert”!
Italian Puttanesca Pasta combines anchovies, capers, garlic, chilli and basil in tomato sauce.
Ingredients
300g tinned sieved tomato (Passata)
200g fresh pasta
1 large clove garlic, finely chopped
1 small onion, finely chopped
1 heaped tbsp capers
6 tinned anchovy fillets, drained and chopped
1 heaped tbsp finely chopped basil
10 pitted black olives
1 or 2 tsp sugar
1 pinch of chilli powder
Olive oil
Salt
Instructions
Fry the garlic in 1 tablespoon of olive oil for about 1 minute. Then add the onion and a pinch of salt and fry over a low-medium heat until it is soft and transparent.
Add the sieved tomato and simmer for about 10 minutes.
Cut the olives in halves or quarters, or leave whole if preferred.
When the sauce has thickened to your preferred consistency, add the capers, anchovies, olives, basil and chilli powder and stir.
Taste the sauce, add more chilli if you like it spicier and a little more sugar if you find it’s sour. Remove from heat.
Cook the fresh pasta according to the instructions on the packet (usually no more than 3 minutes).
Canada
Russia
Greece
Spain
Mexico
Brazil
Argentina
Wow, that really is something else!!! Had to make it as soon as I saw it.
Interesting origins…