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The big badass pasta thread

I've seen that a pasta throwdown has been done. And i've seen beautiful and interesting things!
So... Why not a pasta thread?
Pasta is, of course, my main lunch dish. Simple, cheap, good and recommended form dietist. What do you need more? Well if you could eat 200g of it with an heavy ragù and still ok with dietist, but nothing is perfect! :D
There's an huge amount of types (shapes, ingredients, if it's fresh or dry, whith or without eggs, etc) that can be used with another huge amount of toppings (tomato, salsa, ragù, meat, fish, seafood, cheese, vegetables, etc... Even in soup!). In my opinion there are little combinations that don't make good use of hot peppers...
 
Here a nice simple recipe, Spaghetti with anchovies, capers and hot pepper.
There are some very basic and empirical cooking tips if someone is new to pasta...
 
Here another simple recipe (many thanks to Umberm from pepperfriends.com forum for the excellent recipe and the permission to use it here!):
 
Pasta pangrattato e peperoncino! Pasta with grated bread and hot pepper!
 
Somewhat remembers pasta "aglio, olio, peperoncino" (garlic, oil, hot pepper)...
Note that this is a base, you can add the spices you like better with bread when roasting it, or also in the oil...
But even in this very simple form it's very good!
 
Ingredients:
  • pasta (long as spaghetti or short as macaroni at you discretion)
  • toasted breadcrumbs
  • evo oil
  • hot peppers
  • water
  • cooking salt (to cook pasta on water)
  • spices (optional and not used here)
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I used 2 peperocini calabresi.
 
Preparing ingredients:
 
cut finely peppers and put in evo oil:
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if you can keep peppers in oil  for some hours is better, anyway it's good if it's done only during pasta cooking time too...
Short moment of contemplation, this is my everyday topping for pasta!
 
Now you can start to heat water to cook pasta...
 
You need to toast breadcrumbs in a pan:
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You need to cook until it becomes darker for some minutes like that:
 
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Very important: you must stir this nearly continuously to prevent burning!
 
Then, you strain pasta and stir with pepper/oil and bread.
If you want you can pan fry adding other oil to amalgamate it better. I didn't.
 
Here when it's ready:
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Share recipes and post pics! :D
 
Lately i'm cooking a classic that i overlooked for some time: Amatriciana!
I checked a bit on the net the original recipe and i found similar ones but not all equals. I bet if you ask a random roman he would say that just he knows how to make it and nobody else.
I don't even know if hot pepper is part of the authentic recipe, but, who cares?
 
I picked a recipe that used 400g spagehtti, 100g guanciale, 75g pecorino di Amatrice, 350g San Marzano. Then pepper, salt, wine, hot pepper, even some oil to grease the pan.
I discarded oil and used more guanciale.
 
Some of the guests:
 
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A late Bleeding Jigsaw SLP... Kept 2 plants and none bleeded... Given away some, all bleeded. :confused:  :confused:  :confused: Heat wise is a low end super (but still definetly a super!).
 
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I don't remember if i already posted those... My fav store bought pasta. So good!
 
All toghether:
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Some things:
-guanciale. To be honest, with carbonara and amatriciana, forget bancon/pancetta... Guanciale is the way. For long i used pancetta and i was wrong. I've read that seasoned guanciale of Amatrice should be used... I can't get that so i'm fine with the one i find here (this one isn't the best i can get, but today couldn't get the other. Still works wonder).
- the cheese: usually i use Pecorino Romano. I've read that Pecorino di Amatrice is best because it's less salted. I found that one in a specialized cheese store (that's also a renowed cheese factory that produce excellent Grana Padano). This one is called Matru and i guess it's a good one and suited for amtatriciana... Costs more than twice than a Romano (i'll stick with Romano btw, is more available and for my taste result is just as good).
-home made tomato
-super cheap wine... For cooking is ok. :P
 
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I like big pieces. A bit less than 1 cm thick, like 0.8.
 
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Cooking with Bleeding Jigsaw SLP.... With some wine. And nothing more.
 
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Recipe says to remove guanciale at some point... So why not?
 
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Some recipes says to remove also fat... That's just crap imo. The liquid here is only fat. Why on Earth would i remove that goodness? So i placed tomato and cooked for some minutes.
 
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Eventually i put guanciale back and left to simmer till spaghetti were cooked. I grinded a bit with a fork tomato and i forgot to remove pepper before that...  So i could remove barely half (that i've eaten straight and was good!).
 
I had also grated some cheese, recipe said to strain spaghetti, mix with cheese then put da sauce. And so i did (i add a bit of cooking water while mixing cheese and spaghetti).
 
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Ready to be topped with more cheese!
 
That never disappoints!
 
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