Raid the Fridge Fridays: Spaghetti puttanesca

We all have our likes and dislikes when it comes to food, don’t we? They’re all personal and prized rather possessively, like a badge of honour. As adults, we feel proud of our tastes - they set us apart and make each of us a little less ordinary.

I love starting this conversation with other foodies, as they tend to have the weirdest preferences - answers to ‘do you have a strange eating habit?!’ have ranged from olive tapenade with scrambled eggs to potato waffles topped with instant noodles. (I know, weird right?! My strangest eating habit is probably eating kiwis whole, skin and all. Please don’t judge my taste in food from this one anomaly. And, now, please join me and share yours so I feel less vulnerable - what is your strange eating habit?!)

The same goes for dislikes, some of which are often formed all the way back at school - if only school lunches knew they had the effect to make or break a future adult’s palate! Associations and flashbacks can still make stomachs churn. By just mentioning macaroni cheese to my mum, she can recall with a shudder the mushy texture of one of her school meals, and one she hasn’t eaten since.

Another culprit is that cruel form of child torture: peer pressure. My internal child still squirms with shame after being announced as weird for liking egg mayonnaise of all things. Once you were weird, you had one foot outside the pack. School was survival of the fittest at the end of the day.

The other day, I made spaghetti puttanesca. A recipe full of popular dislikes if ever there was one!

Spaghetti puttanesca wasn’t originally intended for this week’s Raid the Fridge Fridays, especially as it’s pasta and I was hoping to give you inspiration to avoid pasta! However, its utter ease, speed and deliciousness convinced me otherwise. I would happily eat this as a mid-week lunch (quite possibly on a daily basis with no regrets). And according to a poll I put on Instagram, apparently 76% of people would agree! (Apologies if you’re in the opposing 24%!)

Raid the Fridge Fridays: Chicken egg-fried rice with a sweet 'n' sour salad

Puttanesca is a classic Italian pasta sauce, yet its flavourful ingredients can divide audiences, splitting it between our like and dislike categories. Alongside the fairly bland tomato, there are anchovies, olives, capers, garlic and chilli, all of which are loud and pungent. The over-bearing characters that they are, they take the tomato and knock it about a bit, fighting for distinction and defining this dish’s origins from those murky back streets of Naples in every rich and briny bite.

So, if your food tastes are anything like mine - kiwis aside - spaghetti puttanesca is the perfect 15-minute lunch for you!

Don’t forget - I want to know your foodie guilty pleasures, so leave a comment and we can share our weirdness!

Spaghetti alla puttanesca

A spaghetti dish which wants to punch your taste buds! Spaghetti puttanesca is made with store cupboard essentials and can be whipped up between Zoom meetings in less than 15 minutes.

Prep Time: 5 mins

Cook Time: 15 mins

Course: Dinner, Lunch, Main Course

Cuisine: Italian

Keyword: anchovy, capers, garlic, olives, spaghetti puttanesca, sundried tomatoes

Servings: 1

Ingredients

• 2 small/medium tomatoes

• ½ clove of garlic, crushed

• 3-4 anchovies from oil in a tin

• Pinch of chilli flakes

• Small handful of black pitted olives

• 1 tsp capers, rinsed

• 75 g dried spaghetti

Instructions

• First, put a pan of salted water onto boil. Chop your tomatoes into wedges and remove the watery seeds.

• Heat olive oil in a frying pan over medium heat. Before it gets hot, add the crushed garlic, the anchovies and chilli flakes. Bring them to temperature as the oil heats through, and the anchovies will break down (you can encourage them with your wooden spoon).

• Once sizzling, add the tomato pieces and sauté with the anchovy oil. The tomatoes will soften and gradually become pulpy. Add the olives. Cook for 10 minutes, add splashes of water to the pan if it seems to be drying. Lower the temperature and put a lid over it as you cook the pasta.

• Once the water starts boiling, add your spaghetti and cook according to packet instructions.

• Stir the sauce occasionally as it cooks. Add splashes of water if it appears to be drying out. Once the pasta is cooked, drain it, but first set aside a little of your pasta water in case you need it.

• Add the capers to the pasta sauce and warm through. Pour in the cooked spaghetti, and stir everything together to coat in the puttanesca sauce - a dribble of pasta water can bind everything together.

• Tip it all into a bowl and devour.