Admittedly, it's taken me a long time to get around first making and then writing about this dish, but I assure you, it was almost well worth it in the end.  Next time, in an attempt to improve the dish, I'll try not to improvise so much.  Here's what they asked for, and my interpretation of each:

• tagliatelle (seemlingly fresh made?) <-- Don't know what this is, but I took a stab with whole wheat penne from the package.
• artichokes <-- the recipe droned on about preparing these, but I saved myself buckets of time by substituting chargrilled artichokes from an oil filled glass on the local Sainsbury's shelf.
• 10 garlic cloves <-- 10?!  I took a risk and went with one.  But then again, I just added them to the dish as opposed to threading a wooden cocktail stick through them while cooking with the artichokes.  
• Olive oil <-- check
• sea salt and pepper <-- check and check
• 3/4 pint of single cream <-- skim milk okay?
• unsalted butter <-- I'm sure they meant margarine here
• parmesan <-- Drat, I knew I forgot something.  Put in a frantic call to my dinner guest to pick some up on the way in.
• 250 ml full fat milk <-- ummm, more skim milk (starting to doubt myself at this point)

So here's what I've got to start off, including Anna's book, already sufficiently covered in olive oil and whatever else I managed to drop while just removing from the cupboards:

So as I said earlier, I kick-started the recipe by skipping out on preparing fresh pasta (yeah right), and prepping artichokes (I don't even know what she means with 'remove the beard' and 'cut into rounds').  My first step was to sizzle some garlic in olive oil, and add some artichokes to warm up and take on flavour.  

I then set a pot of salty water to boil for the pasta.

At this point, I realize that I need something to go with this pasta dish, and hastily chopped up some broccoli and tossed it in for boiling.  By now, I've made a mess, and the garlic/artichoke blend is mildly burnt:

I drain the penne, add some margarine and the garlic and artichokes, and drizzle with skimmed milk, keeping it on a warm burner.  

So far, so good. It's smelling delicious, and not looking half bad. Except that my dinner guest has called to announce a late arrival, meaning the parmesan won't be available to add to the dish to be baked.  No worries, I throw it in anyways.

20 minutes later, and the cheese hasn't arrived.  The pasta's looking a little brown on top, and the broccoli is a tad wilty.  I top up the pasta dishes with a bit more milk and lower the heat.

Final product:

With the shaved parmesan added on top, and the broccoli adding a bit of colour to the plates, this turned out not bad at all!  It sufficed for 3 full meals, giving me leftovers for another night.

Lessons learned:

• When they say full fat milk, they probably mean it.
• Don't cook broccoli in excess of 20 minutes, even if trying to keep it warm to keep pace with other dishes.
• Tagliatelle = Long, flat, ribbon-like fresh pasta.... Penne ≠ Tagliatelle

I got home from work absolutely drenched from the Autumn downpour so headed for the shower to warm up. I'd just put the washing on when Gar (the husband) came home. I was about to start on dinner (like a good wee wife) when Gar stopped me so I could write our our responses (in my pretty hand-writing) to a consultation about parking in our estate. So I was in a bit of a hunger-fueled rush to make my Italian dinner, and so forsook the main ingredient - tuna for quickly microwave-defrosted mince. I don't think Anna Del Conte will mind as I had the two most important elements, to quote "good ingredients and love." Although my love might have been waning a little.

I made a start with what was on hand (for those following at home - head to page 22 of the book):
garlic
olive oil
tomatoes (canned & a couple off the vine out the back door)
black olives
dried herbs (rather than the fresh basil Anna mentions)
sea salt & pepper
spaghetti
and mince rather than tuna
(the capers were surprisingly absent from my pantry so I improvised with green beans, chilli & some mixed veges sent back with us from Gar's mum in Wales, as you do.)

Some of the ingredients:

I added the oil & mince to the wok, then the tomatoes, then the garlic - which was completely out of order (because I often skim read and miss the important bits). But I forged on adding green beans, black olives, chilli seeds & veges and simultaneously putting the spaghetti into the boiling water alongside the wok. Unfortunately I was working at top speed and forgot to take any photos of these important steps. Just use your imagination.

I knew the spaghetti was cooked by throwing a piece at the wall and seeing if it stuck (if it sticks the spaghetti is done - which reminds me of a friend's theory that dating should be akin to throwing spaghetti at a wall. The more you throw the more likely some of it will stick.) I then rinsed the spag in a colander and put into plates then serving the bolognese on top and adding the essential parmesan.

The dish was served up, grace said and forks flew to devour this yummy dish. The black olives definitely made this meal.

Dinner is served:

The left-overs for Gar's lunch:

 Any rude comments from the Webjam team about this meal will result in some stern looks in your direction and loud mutterings.

Being such a lover of good food, and Italian food in general, it would be valid to ask why I didn't get into this task a little earlier. My answer would be based on my only criticism of the pasta chapter of Anna Del Conte's book 'Amaretto, Apple Cake and Artichokes' is that the pasta dishes described therein were either creamy (not a fan of creamy pasta), or required the making of fresh pasta (effort!) or had simply already been done by someone else. So I cheated. Not in a bad way - I simply chose to re-interpret the directive to 'make something from the pasta chapter in the book' into 'make some pasta from the book'. As penance, and as a difficulty multiplier, I thought I would show off and simultaneously make a variation on 'Bruschetta Toscana' as (mostly) described on page 78. So the recipe I chose for the challenge was the 'Spaghetti Vongole' on page 132.

There is a little trattoria on Bourke St in Surry Hills in Darlinghurst (just off to one side of my old Sydney stomping ground) called 'Il Baretto' in which I fell in love with this particular dish. They say mimicry is the most sincere form of flattery, so I thought I'd give it a go and see how close I could come to recreating the magic. Or how close I would come to never again murdering something I love. How would it end? Let's see ..

The sticking point was going to be finding the right clams. Vongole Verace is the specific species to find - but that was going to be a stretch. As was going to Billinsgate markets before 8:30am when they shut their doors for the day. Is there anything like the Sydney Fish Markets (open 364 days a year from 5am to 4pm) in London? No wonder London's seafood offerings are so dismal. Not even Loch Fyne restaurants do seafood particularly well, but I digress. A trip to Fishworks on the Marylebone High St sufficed, however these clams weren't especially 'baby' sized, but I had little choice unless I fancied my chances at Selfridges, and at 3pm on a Saturday afternoon, these were vanishing rapidly. Some fresh parsley and red and yellow baby tomatoes for the bruschetta from Fresh and Wild in Camden and the rest of the ingredients in the cupboard, and it was game on. Well, until I got home and realised that the spaghetti I thought was in the cupboard had undergone variety change therapy and turned itself into Linguine, but that wasn't going to stop the show.

Reading about preparing molluscs on page 129 of the book encourages you to wash the molluscs plenty of times in plenty of cold water so that the little buggers disgorge any sand they might be holding onto. This seemed prudent, so I took the opportunity to begin preparing the bruschetta. The author also recommends adding lemon and garlic when opening the clams to help kill any bacteria, which also seemed prudent, so that was on the cards. The recipe in the book does not call for onions, but I am a bit of a veteran bruschetta maker, having worked for about a year in a half in Haberfield, Sydney's lesser known and better behaved little brother to the well-known Italian enclave of Leichhardt. The guy who owned the building we worked in grew his own beautiful basil in the backyard, and with a fresh bread shop across the road and fresh, ripe tomatoes and garlic and onions a stone's throw up the main street, bruschetta was frequently thrown together as a delicious afternoon snack. And so I added my onions, which may have not been specifically Tuscan, but the bruschetta I ate in Rome had it, so I felt confident that I wasn't breaking any rules.

After the bruschett mix was ready, it was time to prep the garlic, parsley, chili and lemon rind, and this was, again, a fairly straight-forward endeavour. After a bit of soaking and a few changes of water (and yes, there was more than a few grains of sand in the bottom, so it was worth the effort) the clams were ready to be cooked. First things first - boil the water for the pasta. The cooking time for the linguine was going to be ten minutes, but I thought that I would get the clams open. Also, I turned the grill on so that the bruschetta bread could be popped under a few minutes before the pasta would be ready. I also brushed the bread with some olive oil (not in the recipe, but a personal choice, and I think a good call) and rubbed it with garlic (this was in the recipe. good call).

So - white wine in the pan over a lively heat, let it warm right up, throw in the lemon eighths and garlic pieces. From the book, you might think that the clams just open right up, but they take about five-seven minutes. Perhaps I didn't shake the pan often anough or vigourously enough, and this is probably why they took longer than the book gives the impression they will. Nonetheless, all but one of the clams opened, which I discarded, the clams were put aside and the liquor was strained thru some kitchen paper and into a small sacuepan to reduce. By this stage, the pasta has been in the boiling water for a few minutes, and it was all going rather well. Time to cook the garlic, lemon, chili and parsley. Easy.

By the time the liquor had reduced, the pasta was almost ready, The garlic was just turning golden, and it was time to toast the ciabatta. It was going well - perhaps too well. And sure enough, the fail whale turned it's ugly head on my kitchen and hid the pasta strainer. Ciabatta getting too warm, garlic getting more golden, pasta al dente, and nothing to seperate the water from the pasta! The missus was called in to help - she's a good woman!! Ciabatta blackens slightly around the edges, garlic goes the a darker brown, and pasta starting to soften!! There is the strainer - exactly where it sould have been. Pasta comes off, ciabatta out from the grill, garlic etc off the hob. Pasta is strained and thrown into pan, stirred through. Ciabatta is sliced and loaded with tomatoey goodness and plated. Vongoles and the liquor are added in and stirred through. Wine is poured and photos are taken. And although the pasta was a little way past al dente, all in all it was delicious, and went down a treat!!

In hindsight I wouldn't have added the parsley when cooking the garlic as it wilted pretty badly and wasn't too tasty in that state - I would have perhaps added it with the vongoles and the liquor, and I would ask Anna del Conte what happens with the other half of the parsley (my guess is that it would have been added with the vongoles). The clams take as long to open as the pasta takes time to cook, so perhaps I could have started the pasta a little earlier, and I would have had the strainer on hand so that the pasta didn't overcook just that little bit, but not bad for a first try of cooking clams!!

It's taken me a while to write about this dish, simply because the first time I cooked it, it didn't exactly bowl me over.

Initially when I first cooked this dish I didn't have all the ingredients, which obviously wasn’t my fault blame it on my local Tesco.

Anyway I got most of my ingredients, apart from the anchovies, and headed home to treat some friends to a robust rustic Italian dish.

First of all I washed the peppers and cut them in half removing the seeds. Once the grill was piping hot, I grabbed the peppers and plonked them on the grill. They sat there for a good 8 mins before I flipped them over to grill the other side. I'd never tried this method before, I usually just hover the peppers above a gas flame, but considering I had a few to do, the grill was probably the best option.

During this time, I was preparing the 'sauce'. For this I chopped us some garlic, red chilli, basil, flat leaf parsley and 12 un-seeded black olives. The latter proved to be tiresome, honestly don’t use a knife to de-seed olives, it takes ages! Just grab it and rip the skin off from the seed, you have to chop them up anyway!

Once done I poured some oil into a frying pan and sizzled the ingredients. They immediately exhaled their rustic flavours, predominantly garlic, but it filled the kitchen with a great aroma. By this time the peppers were pretty much done. I got them out from under the grill and placed them in a plate to cool down and started to cook the pasta (Fusilli if you must know). With surprising ease I started to peel the black skin off the peppers to reveal beautifully cooked peppers.

Once your pasta is done, drain the water and cover it with olive oil, preferable extra virgin, it just tastes better! You also need to oil a nice big dish for the oven, just use your hands and swish some oil around.

Pour half of the pasta into the oiled dish, cover with the sliced peppers and top with some of the 'sauce', then cover with some more peppers and oregano, give it a mix and whack it into the oven at 150 degrees for 15 minutes.

To improve this dish I recommend you fry some sausages, chop them up and add them to the dish before you put it into the oven. This really adds more depth to the dish and gives it more substance.

I'm not very good in the kitchen. I'm great at ordering, and setting the table and generally being a fab hostess - but cooking is just not my thing (unless its fruit salad, that I'm very good at). So, lots of make-shift equipment and accidents later I produced Tagliatelle (not lini) on a plate (not in a ring) with no fat yogart (not cream) - oh, and I don't have a scale, or a liter measuring cup thing - more on that later..

Here, is my eqipment 1/ computer with Skype so I can finish board presentation with Yann while I cook, 2/cook book, already stained 3/pen and calculator - so I can divide Anna's generous portion for 10 to a more reasonable portion for two 4/  food processor just bought at John Lewis this weeked for £20  5/ and finally, a 250gram tube of Quince Jam, so I can use that as a way to kinda guess the ingredient amount.. 

 Then the cooking.. errr.. spilling started. First the cap came off the salt grinder so it all dumped into my water for the courgettes (sorry, no photo), then as I took he flour out from the top shelf and it fell, and dumped all over the floor (yep, got that photo)

 Daniel vacuming... (you get away with a lot when you are expecting)

No fat organic yogart - healthier than heavy cream - thanks, but I'm putting on enough weight on my own without added help from Anna ; - ) 

 Me cooking..  Its looking yummmm --- or am I scared?

 The finished product! It was delicious - Daniel even had some when it was all finished, even though during the cooking (droping) process he kept repeating, "I am not hungry".  I woud have this again, and might even buy a scale, measuring cup, and who knows - some cream!

Kerstin and I decided to try the Thin Spaghetti with garlic, oil, and chili - a relatively quick pasta dish and fairly easy on the shopping list.  As you can see in the picture, only 5 ingredients - garlic, olive oil, sea salt, chili peppers, and spaghetti.

And for you pasta experts, yes, that is normal spaghetti, not 'thin spaghetti' as in the recipe.  However, we couldn't find thin spaghetti at the local store so we went with the thinnest spaghetti we could find - as the cookbook mention, improvisation is okay.

Here we are cooking the garlic and chili in the oil while the pasta cooks in the background...

The final product...  Unfortunately, for this particular recipe, the thin spaghetti requirement can't be ignored - our version was way too heavy on the pasta taste for the rather delicate garlic/oil/chili flavor.  Also, could have had more chili...  But there was potential....

So, we decided to try again - with a few adjustments.

For this new version, we found angel hair pasta, decided to use more chili pepper, and also use Tarturo (Black Truffel) Olive Oil.  We thought the truffel would be a nice addition as the flavor was very light in general - nothing to overpower the truffel.

Cooking was basically the same and this variation was much better.  Our biggest problem was that we used too much pasta for the amount of oil/garlic/chili that we had prepared.  While not 100% successful, good enough to try again sometime in the future.

 GIve it a try if you want, but be wary of making too many alterations...

So, when I got to my fridge on Tuesday evening ready to cook something from Anna Del Conte's book I was greeted with, not very much. Half a fennel, some courgettes, a few onions. But, enough to concoct something in typical bit of that bit of this Sam style, and let's not forget Del Conte's famous last words... She wants us to improvise, she is just giving us the basis for our dinner.

I took my onion, fennel and courgette and cooked with some butter, olive oil, a sprinkling of sugar and some sea salt. Using olive oil keeps the butter from burning. Added some garlic and a fresh chili from my overly spicy, chili plant and continued to cook. I was going slowly as I knew Roberta *not from spotify was on her way home. I put the Linguine on to cook in some boiling water and it did just that. Added some red wine to my sauce and simmered it for ten mins. 

Obviously, the pasta was al dente, that's the way to do it. 

I took everything off the heat and put it in a big bowl, mixed it together, no fancy la la's here, threw on top some Parmasan (from Sicily I'll have you know) and mixed it all up so the parmasan coated everything. 

Then I put it in one of those big pasta bowls like and bish bosh bang dinner was served

Preparation :)

 Cooking Spaghett they must be al dente :D

Et voila..

....It is a bad - but sometimes necessary habit of mine to skim rather than read - and in the same way as being quizzed reveals massive gaps in your knowledge - when unpacking the shopping bag and approaching the cooker the lack of essential ingredients creates a momentous chasm in your recipe. Luckily for me - one of Anna's top tips is improvisation on her recipes (thank you Sam for this vital info - as i also skimmed the introduction!!).

I made a baked Artichoke Paste which was actually very simple. Literally pan fried artichokes - loads of garlic cloves - salt pepper - tagliatelli al dente - cream - then bake and a badabing badaboom! See page 29.

Also - because i wanted to lighten things up from all the cream in the dish i turned to the vegetable section and the recipe on page 253 - which on closer inspection actually also had cream in - and pasta - and actually was  ANOTHER pasta dish... darn!
.... i quickly improvised and took some of the tips from the recipe - mainly cooking the vegetables in stock.

James' improv Shallot and Courgette thingey

Sliced Shallots
Sliced Courgettes
Cooked in butter with ample sugar, salt and pepper

Add chicken stock with white wine.

PERFECTO!

 AMAZING!

This month, we're reading "Amaretto, Apple Cake and Artichoke" by Anna Del Conte. 

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