spaghetti aglio e olio
Do you ever look around at the ingredients available to you, the energy you have to give to the cooking process — or, as I recently explained to a medium-sized child shortly before I got uninvited from future family events, the amount of fudge you have left to give from your, uh, bucket of fudge — and decided to boil spaghetti, toss it with garlicky olive oil, and call it dinner?
This dish has a real name: aglio e olio. And nothing—not even your most impressive culinary skills—can compete with the smell of garlic sizzling in olive oil. It’s the kind of aroma that pulls people away from their phones, wakes them from post-beach naps, and sends them peeking around the corner with a hopeful “Ooh, what’s that?” Summer days and poorly stocked vacation kitchens are exactly when this simple magic shines brightest.
Aglio e olio is a pasta dish from the city of Naples, Italy, but it has legions of fans among exhausted home cooks far and wide due to its short list of ingredients I bet you already have around, and the disproportionately high amount of flavor and joy yielded from them. I’ve used this as a backpocket recipe for years, eating it as-is with a salad, with a side of whatever looked good at the market that week, with a scattering of diced roasted vegetables that had been on their last legs in the fridge, and even, if you so desire (I bet you do) topped with lemony grilled shrimp or chicken thighs. But I also forget that it exists for months at a time, and when I remember it, we’re always thrilled to have it back in the rotation, so consider this a nudge. August is for working less hard in and outside of the kitchen, and that’s exactly where I hope this finds you, too.
- Kosher salt
- 8 ounces (225 grams) dried spaghetti, or any pasta you have around
- 4 tablespoons (60 ml) olive oil, plus more to finish
- 4 cloves garlic, minced, or whatever amount feels right
- 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes and/or many grinds of black pepper
- A big handful of chopped flat-leaf parsley
In well-salted water, boil your spaghetti until it’s 1 to 2 minutes shy of done. Before draining it, set aside 1 cup of pasta cooking water, then drain the rest. In your empty pan, combine olive oil, garlic, and pepper flakes and then turn the heat to medium. [Starting the mixture cold is how I keep the garlic from cooking too fast.] Cook, stirring, until the garlic begins to take on a golden color. Add the drained pasta and half the reserved cooking water and heat together, stirring vigorously, until the pasta water and garlic oil combine to make a glossy coating for the spaghetti. Add more of the reserved pasta water as needed to keep it loose — I almost always use the second half-cup. Toss in parsley, any additional seasoning, if needed, and serve right away with an extra drizzle of olive oil on top. Parmesan on top is not traditional, but your house, your rules, okay?
