Good Shit: The Pasta Edition Vol. I

Who knew writing about pasta would be so sexual.

This is Good Shit: the monthly edition of stuff I’ve bought or used (or read or cooked or liked or things I’ve done) and want to recommend to make your life better. Edition themes will vary, they will traverse many niche interests but all are tried, tested and vetted by me.

Carb Queen

Welcome to your new favourite matchmaking session. Putting together pasta and sauce can seem pretty obvious and also not that important but I’d like to put it out there that a dodgy pairing can yield devastating consequences. And life is simply too short for that. So allow me to provide the service you didn’t know you needed until now. I will be the Hitch, the Hinge, the Cupid of your culinary quest to pair sauce and pasta perfectly. 

After publishing Good Shit: The Kitchen Edition, I got some requests for a recipe-themed issue, so it only makes sense for it to follow on when this issue rolled around. Some of the combinations listed are those that I have cooked or those I choose to order when I’m out because I know they’ll be, wait for it, chef’s kiss. Some of the explanations on why I like them probably won’t make a lot of sense either, but just go with it, okay? This is not a comprehensive list because I couldn’t possibly cover all the options in one issue or you’d be stuck reading a newsletter longer than Anna Karenina, but it’s a start. I hope it gives you a lick of inspiration and a deep curl of pleasure next time you’re eating.

Good Shit: The Kitchen Edition

A note on pasta

Unfortunately, pasta does adhere to the rule of more expensive = better quality. I’ll tell you why. When pasta is made commercially and for less money, it’s often dried fast at a high heat and the moulds used to create the strands of starchy joy are smoother and more durable (teflon, for example) than the more expensive brands. The ingredients matter too, cheaper pasta can have lower quality wheat and some fillers or preservatives in the dough as opposed to the pricier brands that only use either organic or high quality durum wheat flour. More expensive pasta brands dry the pasta slower and use bronze dies (i.e. moulds) to extrude their shapes. This is also why more expensive pasta looks a bit rougher, more textured and rustic than other types. That’s a good sign, because it means the pasta is more grippy and can latch on your luscious sauce easier, coating it more fully and leave you closer to gustatory and sexual fulfilment. Saying this, I don’t always buy the expensive shit, the basic stuff can also work just fine!! In our current economic climate, you might not be able to afford to spend upwards of $7 on a box of pasta, but if there is any time that you can, it’s absolutely worth it. And if you can buy or make fresh pasta to eat, well then your tastebuds will thank you for doing God’s work.

 

Extras

Look, it’s the same as the pasta chat. The bag of Bega or any pre-grated stuff will do the job but if you can afford a wedge of parmesan or pecorino, even better. Same with the anchovies. You can buy the supermarket ones (I do) but I always get the imported Spanish ones and if I have the time/brain function, I make the effort to get the Ortiz brand. Expensive but there’s a reason they’re the best. I’ll also repeat it for the tinned tomatoes you’ll use. Buy the good ones, the Italian ones. Please. 

Spaghetti

Right, no fucking about here, let’s get straight into it. Spaghetti is probably the most used and hardest working pasta shape in your kitchen. The OG gets thrown with every single sauce known to man because it does a great job of holding it together for most of them. Diameter is important here, though, and while most brands have a standard size for their noodles, I have always reached for the Barilla Spaghetti No. 5 and now, I have swapped to their premium spaghetti instead (see above). I went through a phase years ago of cooking with angel hair and quickly decided against it. It’s too easy to overcook because of the fast boiling time which leads to more breaking and sludge-making when you’re serving. It starts to resemble the chopped mess you make for a toddler and I always find the sauce to pasta ratio never works because there’s too many noodles and you end up overeating starch and missing out on the joy of enough sauce. I’m sorry to the die hard angel hair fans out there, but no. 

COOK - Alison Roman’s caramelised shallot pasta

This recipe exploded during the time of our collective misery in 2020 and I have been making it ever since. The way this sauce grips the spaghetti like a desperate lover is incredible. It’s a drier sauce with lots of chunky bits that just wrap around the spaghetti so beautifully but you can play with this easily by adding more tomato paste or pasta water at the end. I know you’re going to have a fit over the anchovies but don’t you dare be a wimp and leave them out, the umami base they give the sauce is vital to its success. I’ve started adding a splash of white balsamic shallot vinegar at the end to bring in a little bit of acidity for balance, but a plash of lemon juice would also work well too. Eat with shaved parmesan on top.

I have a sweatshirt with this image on it. Credit: Alison Roman

ORDER - Carbonara

I do not cook this dish (not sure why) and I eat it infrequently but when I do, you must get a proper spaghetti carbonara and the sauce must not contain milk or cream. I’m not going to explain it to you. The first time I ate a carbonara was when my cousin Jack cooked it for me when I was about twenty-two (i.e. fucking years ago), on a mission to convince me it wasn’t creamy and heavy like I had originally assumed. He used Heston’s recipe, which I can attest, is delicious. 

Casarecce

Quite possibly, my favourite pasta shape. It’s a big call, I know, but I always have it in my pantry and I always order it when I go out. It’s rustic and chewy and holds chunky sauces so well. It’s sort of a cross between and open penne and a spiral and that interesting shape helps those little dollops of deliciousness hide in its crevices, awaiting devouring. Similar-ish shape variations you might have heard of or used before are strozzapreti (because it’s a literal S-shape), busiate (more like a corkscrew curl, a traditional Sicilian pasta) and trofie (a miniature busiate). These are all closely related on the Sauce Grip Scale, so the choice is yours. 

COOK - Arrabbiata

I can’t even remember where I got this recipe but it’s been written in my personal recipe book I’ve been carting house-to-house since I was eighteen. Any pancetta will do but I prefer one that’s not too fatty and if I get the rolled type, I always buy the spicy one. And as is becoming a theme, it will taste better with good quality balsamic and parmesan but whatever works for you. The parmesan should be finely grated so it melts into the sauce easier, leaving it nice and tangy with the vinegar backing it up. Eat it with a great glass of red wine. 

• 2 onions, finely diced

• 5 cloves garlic, minced

• Pancetta, chopped (up to you how much but I usually do 150g-ish)

• Chilli flakes

• 2 x tins chopped tomatoes

• 2 tsp balsamic vinegar, you can add more if the sauce needs it

• Parmesan, grated

• Basil

1. Fry onion, garlic, pancetta and chilli until soft

2. Add sauce and vinegar, bring to the boil and then simmer, uncovered until the sauce thickens 

3. Stir in cooked casarecce, then add the cheese and stir until the cheese is melted in. Add basil.

COOK - Alla Norma

I first discovered this sauce while watching Antoni Porowski on Queer Eye a couple of years ago and was so disappointed that I hadn’t found it sooner. When I went to Sicily last year, this was one of the first dishes I ate and it’s now firmly in my top tier of sauces. On the surface it’s quite simple but the labour comes in the salting and roasting of the eggplants but it is 100% worth it. I did a bunch of reading on the dish and kind of wing it with my own, but this article from the Guardian was a great help. I also add anchovies into the base (duh) and crushed, salted capers near the end for some salty pops of fun (make sure you rinse the capers before they go in or you’ll die of thirst later). In Italy, they serve their alla Norma with ricotta salata, a hard, dry cheese made from ricotta. It can be a bit hard to find so I normally opt for pecorino on top because I like the bite against the richness of the sauce. A hard goats cheese would work well here too. Devour this with a crisp white wine. 

Trottole/trottolini

Trottole is a new stallion in my pasta stable and I’m really enjoying cooking with him. And I say him because he is like fusilli’s hotter, older brother. Aggressive and individual, the larger spiral and shorter strands overshadow his little brother easily. As a bonus, I find that the trottole is easier for my toddler to stab with his fork (or pick up with his fingers, let’s be real here) than those floppy fusilli’s. This guy can handle a big, chunky sauce thrown at it. This is not for something dainty; it requires a worthy opponent. Enter: the humble pork and fennel sausage. The perfect thing to break up across a sauce to be able to go toe-to-toe in a wrestle with the trottole. It’s fight night and your mouth is the winner.

COOK - Sausage and spinach trottole

I only crafted this recipe recently and I’m still fiddling with it, so I’ll give you the main players so you can go off and shape it to your own liking but it is very good. Red wine would also be a beautiful addition to add more depth if you have time to cook it longer. Eat this with a giant pile of grated parmesan. 

• Onions and garlic, as per usual in a sauce base

• 4 x pork and fennel sausages, squeeze the sausage meat into your pot and use the flat edge of an egg flip or some such device to break up the sausage meat into chunks. Cook on a med-high heat so you get a nice browning on the meat before you add everything else

• Chilli flakes, to your personal taste preference/heat tolerance

• Tinned tomatoes 

• Washed and shredded spinach (or cavolo nero or rainbow chard), this cooks down a lot so quantity is up to you

• Parsely, heaps

• Lemon rind, for freshness

Orecchiette 

That last one was a lot, let’s finish with some dainty little cups of contentment. There is nothing like the comforting feel of a lovely little (big) bowl of orecchiette coated in a smooth, slippery sauce. Orecchiette, meaning ‘little ears’ in Italian are exactly that, little curved dishes of pasta that resemble the look and feel of a soft lobe of flesh. This is not a pasta that plays nice with anything aggressive or chunky. This is a pasta that is made for easy eating and to be slathered in a simple sauce left to pool in its divots. I don’t cook with this very often but I do like to order it when I’m out. Specifically at Fugazzi on Leigh St in Adelaide, where they serve an orecchiette alla vodka with stracchiatella. I wish I wasn’t so enraptured by the addition of the creamy, stretchy cheese in it but I am. Sorry to my usual lover, pecorino. It’s just a phase, babe.

COOK - Gigi Hadid’s vodka pasta

Another viral internet recipe during Covid but I promise, it’s good. I remember rotting on the couch and watching Gigi’s instagram story as she made this and I was instantly salivating. You definitely don’t need to add the vodka if you don’t have your bottle of Smirnoff lying around but if you do, make sure you cook it out well. I sometimes add finely chopped parsley at the end and the next time I make it, I’m going to hunt down that stracchiatella to add instead of the parmesan. Enjoy it on its own, probably with a second helping. 

The famous vodka pasta

Don’t worry, there will be more. Good Shit: The Pasta Edition Vol. II coming early 2025.