{"id":5919,"date":"2015-11-05T02:29:59","date_gmt":"2015-11-05T02:29:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/food.hoggardwagner.org\/?p=5919"},"modified":"2015-11-05T02:29:59","modified_gmt":"2015-11-05T02:29:59","slug":"paccheri-and-mrs-nicks-simple-san-marzano-tomato-sauce","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/food.hoggardwagner.org\/?p=5919","title":{"rendered":"paccheri and Mrs. Nick’s simple San Marzano tomato sauce"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"paccheri_tomato_sauce\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I had not realized, before I put it on the table, just how appropriate this dish\u00a0would be for\u00a0a day on which we had revisited the Donald Judd house<\/a>.<\/p>\n

To begin with, it’s probably the second most minimal\u00a0recipe in my kitchen ‘kit’\u00a0(the first has got to be this spaghetti aglio olio e peperoncino<\/a>). <\/em>but beyond that, while the sections of pasta I always use\u00a0start out as round tubes (a shape not much encountered in Judd’s work or his SoHo house, once\u00a0they have been cooked\u00a0they flatten almost completely, and equally seductive\u00a0rectangles<\/em> emerge.\u00a0 Although it may be\u00a0something of a stretch, I imagine the shape as\u00a0relating\u00a0to Judd’s kit.<\/p>\n

Every Italian bachelor, full-time or temporary, is alleged\u00a0to know how to whip up one meal by himself, the\u00a0dish of spaghetti with a simple sauce of\u00a0garlic, oil and peppers I mention above. Maybe\u00a0this simple tomato sauce (which incidentally goes\u00a0with\u00a0virtually any pasta)\u00a0should be in the repertoire of every single girl (or homo), Italian or otherwise, since the recipe requires a little more lead time than the aglio olio e peperoncino<\/em>, requiring advance\u00a0planning\u00a0most bachelors might not be\u00a0up to.<\/p>\n

The story of this dish begins with my visits to a West Village barber shop, beginning in the mid-eighties. \u00a0But it wasn’t just any barber shop, as I\u00a0learned over time.<\/p>\n

Nick’s Hair Salon, which sadly no longer exists, was located at 5 Horatio St. \u00a0It opened in 1956, fronting\u00a0on the north sided of\u00a0an extremely tiny (about 100 square feet) Greenstreets triangle<\/a> bounded by Horatio, West 4th Street, and 8th Avenue.\u00a0 Once it had been ‘adopted’ and planted, I would often point out its rich\u00a0greenery to visitors from less densely-populated realms, as “one of our parks”).<\/p>\n

Nick Soccodato was a lovely, affable,\u00a0and gentle man (with a great full head of hair).<\/p>\n

He was a\u00a0barber and had been a barber, he once told me, from the time he graduated from his first job, which he described as\u00a0hanging around shops and sweeping up the hair on the floor (I don’t recall where he said that was, but it may have been the same location he eventually owned). Nick\u00a0was also a dealer, a very special dealer. At some point in the\u00a0history of his shop\u00a0he began a second career, dealing\u00a0in food, Italian food, specifically the vegetables and fruits\u00a0associated with\u00a0his family’s Italian\u00a0bel paese, <\/em>the\u00a0Agro Nocerino<\/a><\/em>\u00a0, and most specifically, with the San Marzano tomato<\/a>,\u00a0which has been, and always will be, associated with the area.<\/p>\n

I don’t know, but Nick and his Italian nephew,\u00a0Savino Zuottolo, might have\u00a0created the American market for San Marzano tomatoes almost on their own, in the back of the\u00a0business that was later called, ‘Nick’s Hair Styling<\/em>‘.<\/p>\n

I had occasionally seen people come into the shop and walk out with packages, cans, and jars of Italian food, but I hadn’t thought much of it, probably marking it up as just another eccentricity of the owner and a\u00a0staff not without such things. \u00a0But one day I found myself talking to Nick about his\u00a0family’s homeland. \u00a0I told him how much I loved the Campania<\/a>,\u00a0on every level,\u00a0and also\u00a0told him that I loved cooking,\u00a0generally using the simplest Italian dishes, and usually southern Italian, as my models.<\/p>\n

For sharing my interest with him, I was rewarded\u00a0with a\u00a0tour of the barbershop’s back room, where\u00a0cans,\u00a0jars and packages of dry stuffs were\u00a0stocked and displayed\u00a0something like\u00a0a much smaller version of the wonderful emporium,\u00a0Buon Italia<\/a>, in the Chelsea Market. \u00a0I already knew that the various sized cans of San Marzano tomatoes were the stars, but my eyes really lit up when I spotted the packages of short sections of huge tubes of dried pasta. \u00a0I thought their contents\u00a0were absolutely, beautiful, and as perfectly minimal as a bunch\u00a0of long spaghetti.<\/p>\n

I had never seen anything like that pasta\u00a0before, and I had to take some home. \u00a0I had the wits to ask Nic what kind of sauce it\u00a0would traditionally be served with. \u00a0In his answer he\u00a0described relaxed Sunday afternoon meals of\u00a0a Paccheri with a simple tomato sauce using canned San Marzano plum tomatoes, and he promised he would ask his wife to copy her\u00a0recipe and he would give it to me.<\/p>\n

I, or rather,\u00a0we<\/em>, have dined like Barone\u00a0ever since, regularly enjoying minimal feasts of\u00a0paccheri<\/em> served with Rose Soccodato’s simple San Marzano tomato sauce. \u00a0I didn’t remember her name when I transcribed the instructions to my file, so the recipe has always been known as\u00a0‘Mrs Nick’s Simple Tomato Sauce’ in our kitchen.<\/p>\n

I can’t recommend it enough, but please do\u00a0not to try it with anything other than San Marzano tomatoes, although, as with so many food source questions, even with ‘Denominazione d\u2019Origine Protetta<\/em> (DOP<\/em>)’ printed\u00a0on the can, exactly what that means may not be perfectly clear<\/a>.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

THE\u00a0RECIPE<\/strong><\/p>\n

In an enameled cast iron pot or other non-reactive pan<\/a>, large enough to hold the pasta after it’s been cooked,\u00a0saut\u00e9 2 or 3 cloves in 4 to 5 tablespoons of olive oil, but only until the garlic is pungent.<\/p>\n

Add one 28-ounce can of San Marzano tomatoes (already-chopped or whole, and ideally without basil), crush the tomatoes with a wooden spoon if they are whole, \u00a0saut\u00e9 uncovered at high heat for 5 minutes, stirring a few times to reduce the liquid (yes, the juices\u00a0will spatter a bit; I use a black apron and check the surrounding environment after this step).<\/p>\n

Reduce the heat to very<\/em> low, so the sauce is barely bubbling, add salt and freshly-ground pepper to taste, and simmer for a full 30 minutes.<\/p>\n

Add a few whole leaves of fresh basil and continue simmering for 15 \u00a0minutes more, again stirring occasionally.<\/p>\n

Note: The sauce can be prepared a little ahead of time, so there’s no competition with the boiling pasta.<\/p>\n

When the pasta has cooked, drain it and add it to the pan, or mix sauce and pasta in a warm bowl.<\/p>\n

Serve, but do not add cheese.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n