12 Dollar Pantry Pasta

I challenged my friend Patrick with 16 dollars in cash as the budget and we made a provincial vegetarian dinner on the fly that was delicious for $12.00 !

Penne pasta, a package of cherry tomatoes, one shallot, 21 basil leaves (from the garden), some black olives and castelvetrano olives, and capers I had in the fridge. Olive oil. Salt. Pepper. Good feta cheese. That’s all there is to this one. Luxurious and budget-friendly. Isn’t that what all recipes should be made of ?

If my memory serves me, I asked my friends Katelynn and Patrick to come see my garden. It was looking particularly lovely (at least to me) and what use is having a garden if not to share it ? It was 7:00 or 8:00 PM and I offered to order dinner. Patrick said, “No, there is no where we could go and nothing that appeals to me that would be as romantic as it is here. Let’s cook.” Basically saying, for a small amount of money, we should cook. I like to think of myself as mildly on the fly and open, but my mind was blank at this late hour. He said, “I can go to the store in 15 minutes, give me 20 dollars if you feel bad about it.” I ran to the entry way and had $16.00 in cash. I said; “Here then, make it work.” My offer that I could give in return was to open a very good bottle of wine. It was a gift, but may have been a $200.00 bottle ? No matter! The pasta cost $12.00 in total and was highly enjoyed with said wine and company. Absolutely a perfect night that was magical, on the fly, and unexpected. But aren’t the best nights?

We kind of cooked this one together. By that I mean, I got to be involved, pick basil leaves from the back deck, chop up cherry tomatoes, and follow instructions. But largely, this was Patrick’s vision. And he was proving a point that luxury can often be done on the cheap. What he brought back from the store were one package of cherry tomatoes, one shallot, a box of Barilla penne, and some really good Feta cheese from Murray’s at Kroger. The feta was the splurge here. No use doing without the good cheese, he said. I had a mix of black olives and castelvetrano in the fridge, along with some capers. We used what I had and pitted them. And I did have the basil growing to be fair. An anchovy sort of incorporation was debated, but we went against it.

What we ended up with was perfect.

Ingredients

An arbitrary amount of castelvetrano and black olives, pitted

Capers, amount also arbitrary

A container of cherry tomatoes, halved

One shallot

21 fresh basil leaves, divided

Olive oil

Maldon salt

80 g of pasta per person ( I used Barilla Penne and learned this is apparently the official pasta amount for a serving in Italy. So, I measured this out on my scale for 3 people.)

Freshly ground black pepper.

How-To

Basil Oil

Basil oil: blanch 11 basil leaves, shock in ice water. Blend with olive oil in a mortar and pestle. Strain.

The pasta

Sweat shallot. Add capers, olives and tomatoes. Sweat. Add a tiny bit of salt and some freshly ground black pepper.

Cook pasta in salted water (like the sea) according to package instructions. Add pasta along with some pasta water to emulsify the sauce. Add basil 11 more leaves. Toss. Add basil oil. Top with feta.

Enjoy! We did. They said we were going to have a provincial summer cooking simple food and eating in the garden . I hope that’s true !

Alex