Yo Yo

Last night I had a quadruple whammy.

Problem #1: Because of a health issue, I am currently (and temporarily) on a low- to no-fiber diet – not as easy as you would think;

Problem #2: A couple of nights ago, I came down with a cold, which for some reason has knocked me on my bee-hind;

Problem #3: We had plans to have dinner with my stepmother, but because of my cold, we had to cancel; as a result, I had nothing planned for dinner, and little to work with; and

Problem #4: It was Friday, and as a Catholic, I am not eating meat on Fridays during Lent.

But since I think I could be breathing my last breath and still be hungry, and because my husband does not cook (and I mean never – something I knew prior to marrying him so I can’t complain) and was looking at me with woeful eyes, I had to put on my thinking cap.

(As an aside, I’ll bet none of you under the age of 40 knows where that term thinking cap came from, and many of you over the age of 40 can’t remember – perhaps because you aren’t wearing your thinking caps. But I digress.)

There are a few things that I recommend you always have on hand in your pantry. Among those are fresh garlic, extra virgin olive oil, some kind of Parmesan cheese, and pasta. And I had all of those ingredients in my pantry. The result? I was able to put together a healthy dinner –Pasta Aglio e Olio – in literally the time it took to cook my pasta (which, since I used gemelli, was eight minutes).

Here’s how you do it.

Bring a big pot of heavily salted water to a boil. It is better if you bring the water to a boil and then add your salt as the water will come to a boil quicker without salt; however, when I do that, I almost always forget to add the salt. Sigh.

Once your water is at a rolling boil and is salted, add however much pasta you need. Typically, spaghetti is used for this traditional Italian dish. Last night I chose to use gemelli. Gemelli is one of my favorite pastas, and I find it hard to get. Gemelli means “twin” in Italian, and gemelli pasta is two short strands of pasta twisted together. I found it recently at a wonderful Italian deli and market in Scottsdale. Since I used it last night, I must wait until I’m back in Arizona to replenish. Sigh again. And again, I digress.

Once your pasta is in the water boiling away, put about ½ c. of extra virgin olive oil in a skillet and begin warming the oil. Mince anywhere from four to six cloves of fresh garlic – depending on how much you like garlic, but remembering that aglio e olio translated from Italian to English means garlic and olive oil. Garlic is key to this dish, and if you don’t like garlic, you shouldn’t be making this particular recipe.

Place the minced garlic into the oil in your skillet, and slowly brown the garlic. (I have learned the hard way that garlic turns from golden to burned very quickly, so I emphasize slowly. Keep your temperature down. Burned garlic is bitter.) Also add a pinch of red pepper flakes. Red pepper flakes are traditional in spaghetti aglio e olio, and I always have them on hand. However, if you don’t, forge ahead without.

Once the garlic is golden brown, add a ladle of water from the pot in which you are cooking your pasta. Let this water cook a bit in your skillet until the amount diminishes a bit, but doesn’t disappear. When your pasta is slightly undercooked, use a slotted spoon or tongs and put the pasta into the skillet with the garlic and pepper flakes. Mix thoroughly. Let it finish cooking for a minute or so, and then turn off your heat. Add Parmesan cheese and minced Italian parsley (if you have it, which I didn’t last night).

Serve with bread, a salad, etc.

A couple of notes: If you only have regular olive oil rather than extra virgin olive oil, use it, because I’d rather have you use that instead of not making the dish. However, you can buy extra virgin olive oil at a fairly reasonable price (you can also buy it at a price that would require you to take out a second mortgage), and you should really have it on your shelf if you want to be a serious cook. Do not use any other kind of oil in this particular recipe.

And regarding your cheese, parmigiano reggiano is, in my opinion, the most delicious cheese in the world (well, I could probably be talked out of that opinion since I love so many cheeses), but it is painfully expensive. Buy it when you can afford it. When you can’t, use regular Parmesan cheese. Don’t use, however, the kind that’s in a little container that looks like a sink cleaner. Buy it in the cheese department.

My favorite neighborhood pizzaria makes spaghetti aglio e olio, but has shortened the name to Spaghetti Yo Yo. Clever.

By the way, thinking cap comes from Tom Terrific, a cartoon character from what was my absolute favorite program as a child – Captain Kangaroo. It’s unnerving how many times I use names of characters from that program in my everyday life. For example, I kept referring to my husband, who recently painted our fence, as Mr. Bainter the Painter, and I’m not sure there was a single soul who knew what I was talking about. Of course, that’s nothing new.