Between the availability of fresh, summer vegetables and the oppressiveness of the not-so-fresh summer heat, I haven’t been cooking a lot of heavy food. But it cooled off a little and my wife, Terri had been working really hard so I was feeling like I should cook something really substantial. No roast or stew—especially since I waited until late in the day to even consider dinner. I figured pasta would work so I made a version of carbonara.
I skipped the eggs and though this would probably be better with all fresh ingredients, I have nothing against canned tomatoes or artichokes in a pinch so the only things I chopped up for this were some basil, garlic and shallots. You could definitely make this in 30-45 minutes with a quick trip to the grocery on the way home from work.
Ingredients:
28 oz. can whole peeled tomatoes with juice
10-15 pitted black olives (kalamta or some dark variety)
4 cloves minced garlic
about a Tbsp. of capers
black pepper to taste
13.5 oz. can artichoke hearts, drained
1.5-2 Tbsp. of chopped fresh basil or dried basil
2 shallots (could substitute half an onion)
4-5 slices of prosciutto a couple of slices of bacon
linguini
Throw the tomatoes, olives, capers, minced garlic, basil and a little salt and black pepper into a saucepan to start simmering, covered. Go easy on the salt since the pork and olives add so much. Break up the tomatoes a little as they begin to cook. In a skillet, brown the prosciutto or bacon breaking it up as it browns (drain off excess fat if using bacon). Saute the shallots in the pan with the pork for about a minute. Add the artichoke hearts to the pan and saute until they start to brown a little. Remove from heat and set aside. Cook and drain the linguini. Add the linguini and sauce to the skillet along with some more black pepper and cook the mixture together for a few minutes, scraping the brown bits from the bottom.
Terri ran late the night I made this and I think the sauce benefited from some extra cooking time. I’m positive it would have been good even if the sauce only cooked for 30 minutes. It’s a great thing to cook if you don’t know exactly when dinner is going to be served. The sauce simmered, the artichokes and prosciutto sat covered and some hot water waited for the pasta until she was home. I dropped in the pasta and within 15 minutes we were eating.