Ingredient Spotlight: Passata do Pomodoro
A staple in the lalian pantry, passata di pomodoro is a smooth, relatively thin strained tomato puree, Unlike American tomato puree, which has been cooked and reduced to develop a rich, sweet taste, passata is made with raw tomatoes to maintain the fresh, clean brightness of the fruit, It's available in jars or aseptic boxes.
It’s Good to Be Clingy
When pasta is boiled for a standard recipe, it absorbs lots of liquid: 12 ounces of dry spaghetti weighs about 30 ounces after it's cooked. That means you're serving 18 ounces of salted water as part of the meal, and plenty of flavorful sauce is needed to compensate. But spaghetti all'assassina simmers the pasta directly in a tomatoey base, so the noodles are permeated with flavor, not just moisture. When we weighed the components of our finished assassina separately, we found that the exterior sauce amounted to less than 2 ounces; the rest either evaporated, leaving the flavors all the more concentrated, or was absorbed by the pasta.