Easy Easy Dinner

This is one of those recipes that is so easy it is hardly a recipe and yet it is better than whatever you did on your own before you tried the “recipe” version. This is from Teresa Giudice’s Skinny Italian book where she goes into a whole thing about how what we eat here in the US as fettuccine alfredo is really not at all anything anyone in Italy would really make or eat. 

(Sidebar, yes, I am a “Housewives” fan and that was my initial impetus for buying the book. It turns out the recipes are great. Although the recipes in this book are all very simple, everything I have made has been incredibly good.  When I put up tomatoes this summer hers are the recipes I will be using for red sauce and she steps goes step by step through the whole canning process, so I am really excited about trying it ) Anyway.

The quality of ingredients and the technique is what matters here because there “twern’t nothin’ to it”.

Bring a huge pot of salted water to a full rolling boil.

Add 1 pound of fettuccine.  You are supposed to use fresh, but I didn’t see any at the store and this box was 50 cents. So, yeah.

Melt 2T butter and 3T really good olive oil in a big sauté pan. Set aside. Real butter and high quality olive oil. This will just be nasty otherwise.

While waiting on the pasta, finely chop a handful of fresh parsley. Not dried. Fresh. It’s like $1.  It’s worth it. (hopefully soon I won’t be paying anything for it, it’s one of the things I planted last weekend!)

Grate 2 ounces of the best parmesan you can afford.  The book recommends aged 24 months but I could only find/afford 12 months. Goodness gracious it was good.  Keep in mind so far the meal has cost me like $2.00 so $4 worth of a $8 block of insanely good cheese is ok.

Start the garlic toast.

When the pasta is al dente, drain, reserving 1/4 cup of the starchy water.

Put the drained pasta into the sauté pan and put it back on the heat for a minute, add in the water and stir it all up and it will combine to make a light, glossy, sauce.

Salt and Pepper to taste.

Eat.

I put mine on the table without the parsley or the cheese because of the kids. But the adults added it to their own plates.

It would be healthier with less fat, whole grain pasta and some fresh veggies but at our house, this one is going into rotation exactly like this because it was awesome.  And everyone ate it and loved it. And it was $6. And meatless for Lent if you do that. So just perfect.