spaghetti with garlic chives, chilis, pine nuts, fennel pollen

Simply delicious.

While I was in the Greenmarket on Monday I heard somebody say, “garlic chives are like ramps”, and I knew immediately what I was going to make for dinner, the next day (I already knew there would be fish that night).

So last night I imagined I was putting together a meal that would show off my late-winter high tunnel ‘ramps’. Then I pulled some of the ingredients, making it even more simple.

It worked beautifully.

But don’t try this without a very good pasta, cooked perfectly al dente.

  • a couple tablespoons of olive oil placed inside a large, high-sided, vintage tin-lined copper pot    over a medium flame until warmed before 8 ounces of Afeltra 100% grano italiano spaghetti, produced in Gragnano, from Eataly Flatiron, cooked al dente and drained, stirred in, about three quarters of a cup of the reserved pasta water gradually added until it was emulsified, a bit of dried  pepperoncino Calabresi secchi from Buon Italia added, followed by a generous amount of washed, rinsed, and dried garlic chives from Lani’s Farm, the lengths cut into thirds, and a handful of pine nuts from Buon Italia, toasted, finished with a dusting of Sicilian wild fennel pollen and a sprinkling of more garlic chive sections
  • the wine was a California (Sonoma) white, Scott Peterson Rumpus California Sauvignon Blanc 2016, from Naked Wines
  • the music was François Joseph Gossec’s 1782 opera, ‘Thesee,  Guy Van Waas conducting the ensemble Les Agrémens and the Namur Chamber Choir