You see a lot of what goes on in my kitchen–the cookies, the soups, the roasts–but there’s a fair amount you miss. Mostly you luck out: I save the ever-growing stack of dirty dishes for myself, you don’t have to burn your nostrils every time you open the fridge because of the cornichon brine that spilled all over and hasn’t quite gotten cleaned up yet, and you’re spared from having to deal with the enormous black dog that is constantly plotting his next attack on whatever edibles are on the counter (most recently, it was a ball of pizza dough…grr…).
But, sadly, you also miss some of my best meals. I’m talking about the meals that are thrown together in a hurry when I just need to eat and can’t dream of slowing things down to take pictures and notes and think of how much I’m adding of this and that. There are an awful lot of quick pasta dinners in my real life and not so very many present in my blog life.
Renditions of spaghetti aglio e olio make their way to my table a couple of times a week. Here’s a version that I thought was good enough to slow down and share with you. It’s my basic olive oil and garlic spaghetti, but with a few extra touches. I add a ton of broccoli that’s been roasted ’til it’s brown, crispy, and awfully irresistible. I melt a few anchovy fillets into the oil because anchovies and broccoli are a match made in heaven. I love the salty, subtly fishy taste of the anchovies with the almost sweet roasted broccoli. And to finish, the pasta is sprinkled with what I consider the best thing to happen to pasta since parmigiano-reggiano: fried bread crumbs.
Sound good? Great, let’s make this happen!
I’ve always been a big fan of polenta, but with how miserably cold it’s been this winter, I’m turning into a complete fiend. I think I could eat polenta morning, noon, and night until the day comes (probably sometime in late May) when I can step out my front door without seeing my breath and wearing fewer than 10 layers of clothing.
This is one of those non-recipe recipes; it’s really just a list of ingredients for a salad too stunning not to share. Plus, it’s a good way to use up all that 
A few weeks back, I got off work late and stopped at the grocery store on my way home. There I was, around eleven on a Wednesday night, walking through the store, absolutely stupid with hunger. You know the kind of hungry where you can’t begin to make a decision and, before you know it, you end up in a trance in the pickle aisle? You go home and end up having a dinner of sweet-hot pickles, eaten with your fingers, standing over the kitchen sink.