Rigatoni all'Amatriciana

This is an easy recipe and one I decided to make today since I didn't feel like going to the store and happened to have all the necessary ingredients on hand. Of course you could make this with spaghetti or whatever pasta you want.

1 1/2 pounds rigatoni (I used half a box of Latini brand rigatoni)
2 1/2 tbsp olive oil
1 shallot, diced
5 ounces pancetta, diced
1/2 cup dry white wine
28 oz can tomatoes, seeded (I used San Marzanos)
salt & pepper
1/2 cup freshly grated Pecorino

Heat the oil and saute the shallots over a very low heat until soft. Add the pancetta and fry it for a few minutes. Pour in the white wine and continue cooking until it evaporates a little. Add the tomatoes to the pan and roughly chop up using the back of a spoon or a potato masher. Season with a little salt and pepper and cook down on low heat for no more than 15 minutes.

Separately, bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Cook the rigatoni until within a few minutes of being al dente. Using a slotted spoon, transfer the pasta out of the boiling water and add it to the sauce. Add a small amount of the pasta water and continue cooking on low heat until the sauce and pasta are properly married and the rigatoni is done cooking. Sprinkle with the fresh pecorino and serve.

Seafood soup

Continuing the fish stock theme, I made up a seafood soup recipe last week that I really liked. It goes a little something like this:

1 carrot, diced
1 onion, diced
6 tomatoes, seeded (I used canned San Marzanos)
1 small red pepper, diced, some seeds removed (I used a Fresno)
1/2 pound monk fish (or any firm white fish), cut into bite-sized pieces
some fresh clams
some fresh shrimp, cleaned and deveined
1 qt fish stock (see below)
1 tsp dried oregano
1 tsp dried thyme
fresh shredded basil
fresh parsley, finely chopped
olive oil
salt and pepper to taste

Heat the olive oil in a deep sauce pan. Add the onion, red pepper and carrots and saute until soft. Add the tomatoes, thyme and oregano and any tomato sauce from the can and cook down for about five minutes. Pour in the fish stock and bring to a boil. Return to a simmer for 20-30 minutes. Add the fish to the broth and cook gently for a few minutes; add the shrimp and clams and cook until the clams open up. (Be sure not to let the fish boil or it will turn tough.) Stir in the parsley and basil. Serve the soup with fresh croutons on the side.

Grilled Seabass in Acqua Pazza

Acqua Pazza (crazy water) is a simple sauce of fresh tomato with chile pepper into which you can poach any firm white whole fish or fillet. When I learned this recipe in Italy, we used bream fillets and slipped them into the sauce to simmer until just cooked through. When I was shopping at Fish King I found some beautiful fresh seabass caught off the coast of Santa Barbara. Since these pieces of fish were thicker and better suited to grilling or pan-sauteing, I went that route. Buddy wanted to try the fish grilled, so that's what we did. Fresh tomatoes are out of season so I used some leftover canned San Marzano (Italian) ones which are great. I used a simple fish stock in my sauce so that it tasted of the sea and complemented the fish perfectly.

In my version, the fish and sauce never meet until they both show up on the plate, but the result was fantastic. Like all cooking, it's about starting with the best food you can find and improvising along the way.

1 pound seabass (two pieces)
5 tomatoes (peeled and seeded)
1 glove garlic, chopped
1 red chile pepper, diced
1 tbsp parsley, finely chopped
1 tbsp dried oregano
1/2 cup olive oil
1/2 cup white wine
2 cups fish or vegetable stock
salt to taste

Saute the garlic and chile pepper in the olive oil until the garlic is just softened but not brown. Add the tomatoes, oregano and stock and cook about 10 minutes. Mash up the tomatoes. When complete, turn off the heat and stir in the parsley.

Separately, set the grill on high. Salt the fish well with sea salt on all sides. Oil the grill and cook the fish with the cover down for about 4 minutes. Turn and cook for another 4 minutes. The fish should not be totally cooked through but will continue cooking as the sauce is completed.

Once the sauce is done, arrange fish on a plate and spoon over the Acqua Pazza sauce.

Fish stock

According to Julia Child, all that's required for a fish stock is to buy some fresh scraps and simmer them in lightly salted water for about half and hour. I'd never tried it so the other day while shopping for fish at Fish King in Glendale, I asked for a pound of fish heads and meaty skeletons. I covered the scraps until they were covered with about an inch of water then kept skimming the scum that rose to the top as it all boiled. After 30 minutes I removed the scraps to the trash and passed the liquid through a couple different strainers to remove any other little bits that remained. I used the fish stock in place of vegetable stock in an "Acqua Pazza" tomato sauce I cooked later that night for some grilled seabass.