By Lizzie Moss
I’ve hit the jackpot with my little tomatoes this summer.
I’ve got a steady flow of everything from deep-chocolate Black Russians to both brilliant red and golden-yellow Cherries. Judging by my sticky-beaking in the neighbourhood’s front yards, this year’s tomato lottery is well and truly paying dividends to all. It’s easy to cook with very few ingredients when the produce is this good. I made fresh spaghetti for this recipe, because I had a few Christmas pasta toys to play with, but you can, of course, use pasta from a packet.
Serves two, adjust as necessary.
Ingredients
- A small bowl of Cherry tomatoes, mixed variety (2–3 small punnets, if you’re buying them)
- A few sprigs of parsley
- 3 cloves of garlic
- A sprinkle of chilli flakes
- Salt
- Very good extra-virgin olive oil (something with a ‘punchy’ or ‘robust’ flavour)
- Enough pasta for two hungry people
Method
- In a hot pan, put a decent glug of olive oil. (Glug is a technical term!)
- Crush your garlic cloves with the back of a knife.
- Place the garlic, parsley sprigs and chilli flakes in the pan.
- Let them sizzle for a few minutes, then turn the heat down.
- When the garlic is beginning to brown, remove it, as well as the parsley. Set them both aside.
- Add your fresh whole tomatoes to the hot oil.
- Allow these to blister and reduce, adding water periodically so they don’t stick.
- Lower the heat and carefully continue to cook the tomatoes down. This can take as long as 30 minutes if you have the time to give your sauce some TLC.
- Meanwhile, cook your pasta.
- Once you’ve got a nice sauce developing, add your garlic back in.
- Add your pasta in next and toss it around, adding some pasta water to help the flavours combine.
- Top with some freshly chopped parsley.
