Pasta alla Norma

Good morning sweethearts,

 

It’s been a very busy week, so i wanted to make a super simple classic. Pasta alla Norma. It was a long day of writing my thesis and pottering about and I had a birthday party to attend that evening. So dinner had to be quick, simple, and filling. I had bought three gorgeous aubergines at the Friday morning market, so naturally I thought of Tucci’s recipe.

It seems Ambre is mentioned in every entry on this website. Every book review, every email, every recipe. She doesn’t even live in the same country as me, but I seem to be at me most culinarily productive when I’m around her.

 

She came to stay in Milan for a week, and I made the most of her stay. We knitted, made cupcakes, went for some post-work walks and bench talks, and we wrote letters. My sticker collection has just expanded to include a constellation of autumnal, Gilmore Girls core, Halloween black cat this is the season of the witch, stevie nicks singing silver springs type stickers. So I wrote some autumn letters to my friends in London, and she made something sweet for someone special.

 

Aubergines are autumnal. They start with the same two letters so it must be true. I used my homemade tomato sauce (you’ll see it here in the next few weeks) which made the dish all the more delicious. Aubergine and tomato make a great pair. If I could recommend anything, it would be removing some of the skin from the aubergines, make in a fun zebra-like pattern, so there’s just a little less of it.

 

Here is the recipe I followed,

Until next week x

 

Evie

Ingredients

2 large garlic cloves, halved

Extra virgin olive oil

2 large eggplants (aubergines), diced

Sea salt

1 litre marinara sauce

500g pasta (rigatoni, ziti or a thick spaghetti)

A handful of basil, roughly chopped

A handful of grated ricotta salata or Pecorino

  • In a very large frying pan, fry the garlic in a glug of oil over a low heat for about 2 minutes. Add the eggplant, raise to a medium heat and cook for about 15 minutes, until slightly golden. Salt to taste.
  • Add the marinara sauce and cook for about 5 minutes more.
  • Cook the pasta and drain, reserving half a cupful of the water.
  • Stir the reserved pasta water into the pan mixture and sprinkle with the basil. Measure about three-quarters of the sauce and put it in a serving bowl. Add the drained pasta to the pan with the remainder of the sauce and gently stir it all together. Sprinkle with grated ricotta salata or Pecorino and serve with the extra sauce on the side.
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