pasta with anchovy red sauce

I love how easy and fast this is! And in these times of crisis, it can be made with long-lived pantry ingredients. So it is a self-quarantine specialty. It comes from the 'fuzz's friend Emily.

While your pasta water is heating, sauté in olive oil one finely chopped onion and one finely chopped clove of garlic and one 2-oz can of anchovies until the onions are very soft. The anchovies will dissolve in this process. Add one 6-ish-oz can of tomato paste and as much red-pepper flakes as you can stand, and maybe a bit of salt (the anchovies already provide some salt). Simmer this mess while half of a one-pound package of pasta cooks (preferably spaghetti, says the 'fuzz). When the pasta is done (don't over-cook it), mix the very thick sauce with one cup of pasta water and the pasta itself.

Serves four. If it isn't the end times, garnish with lots of chopped parsley. Variation: Cook without the hot flakes and add them to the garnish. That's good if you have some guests who don't like it hot.

Update: This post supersedes this slower and slightly more boring version of this dish.

steamed mussels in white wine

This one is in high rotation Chez Hogg: Burn some chopped onion, carrot, and celery in a few tbsb of butter. Add 8-ish ounces of white wine, bring to a boil. Add 2lb of ice-cold, rinsed mussels. Boil/steam until all the mussels are open and plump (and give them a few more minutes after that); should take less than 15 min.

Partition mussels into shallow bowls, and then finish the soup with (lots of) salt, pepper, parsley, and (optionally) cream. Pour soup over mussels in the shallow bowls. Top with a bit more parsley and finely chopped fresh onion or shallot.

Serves four with french fries or salad or eight as a first course for something. Can be expanded arbitrarily (as we learned on Christmas Eve this year). Also consider adding curry to the soup, or harissa.

tuna pasta

Here's a crowd-pleaser in high rotation chez Hogg: While pasta (1/2 to 3/4 lb) is boiling, put together a few minced (or pressed) garlic cloves, one finely chopped shallot (or most of an onion or most of a leek), and a can of oil-packed tuna in some additional olive oil (enough for the pasta). Heat it up until it gets fragrant and then turn off the heat. Add salt, pepper, lemon juice, chopped parsley, and chopped, oil-cured olives. Maybe also pine nuts, capers, lemon rind, be creative!. Mix cooked pasta with tuna mixture. Serves 3 1/2 (that is, less than 4) but it is easy to double.

pasta in a mushroom cream sauce

The 'fuzz brought back 1 oz of dried porcini mushrooms from her last trip to Italy (that jet-setter). Today we turned them into a mushroom cream sauce that was easy, fast, and exceeded all our expectations. Our only regret is that we did not have some crusty Italian bread to soak up the remaining sauce; I was drinking it from my bowl at the end. This recipe only serves two hungry people.

• 1 oz dried porcini mushrooms
• garlic, olive oil, wine
• 1/2 cup cream or half-and-half
• few tbsp grated parmesan or equivalent
• pasta for two (not much!)
• fresh flat parsley, chopped a bit

Soak 1 oz dried porcinis in 1 cup boiling-hot water for 20 min. Sauté a clove or two of garlic, minced or pressed, in a few tbsp of olive oil. Add the porcinis (reserving the water they were in) and 1/2 cup of white wine. Keep at a low boil until the wine is fully evaporated. Add in the mushroom liquor—after straining it through a coffee filter to remove grit—and boil it down a bit too. Add cream and cheese and bring back to the boil. Salt (generously) to taste.

If you are clever, your pasta will be on the stove boiling, and just become done at this point; drain it and mix it in. Serve in shallow bowls with a mound of parsley on top, and crusty bread on the side.