Puttanesca
and the men who have made it for me
Puttanesca roughly translates to ‘whore’s pasta’. There is no uniform theory as to why. As summer in Paris came to an end, I told my friends of a peculiar coincidence wherein two married men had made me puttanesca in the space of two weeks. My friends, who found this very amusing, subscribe to the theory that it was a dish the women in brothels in Rome or Naples used to whip up on the fly. Over cheap beers under the neon lights of the bar, I fruitlessly insisted that the pasta was actually birthed by a restaurateur who, having run out of food at the end of the night, threw together ‘random shit’ or ‘una puttanata’ for some hungry mouths.
One of the aforementioned men I met by chance. We sat and drank out on a terrace in a small town on the blustery northern coast of France. We surprised each other with our easy company given our significant difference in age. While we sat, him with a heavy red and me with a sweet vermouth, we talked about all manner of things including architecture, literature, and the Australian desert. At no time in the two hours we were there did he mention his wife. Each statement made was a clear and solitary ‘I’. I want to buy a boat. I might sell up and move at some point. I’m going south for the summer. When there is no ‘we’ you would think it safe to assume. How naive of me.
The second man I had been put in touch with through friends of friends. We had met on a Monday night, a terrible night to find food in Paris. We had intended to meet only for a drink but were both in the mood to make a night of it and, though having only just met one another, could tell we made good company. After trying to satiate our hunger with a martini and hot dog at Harry’s Bar, he proposed we sniff out a half decent bottle of wine and return to his apartment for a bowl of pasta.
When someone is cooking for you, they leave themselves vulnerable. They are letting you sit in their home, in their space, without being able to control what you see or how you see it. You watch them in the kitchen. Watch how they move in their world and when the conversation lulls and their attention is drawn away by the hiss of the stove, you are free to look around and take in the space they have made for themselves. Some people make spaces with the intention of telling you who they are. Some let it naturally unfold, their personality settling in over time.
Photo: Freya McInnis
In both of these men’s spaces I felt at home. One had evidently spent time at the flea markets of Paris gathering silverware and old french linen tablecloths. He had placed paintings and posters thoughtfully on the walls. I could have sat in his small apartment for days on end and felt entirely at home and at ease among the cookbooks and the warm light, who’s source, I could see, would shift around the room depending on the time day — mornings through muslin curtains at the window, evenings from the lamp on his desk. The other man had let the space evolve with piles of books in the corner next to boxes of nails and gumboots. Handmade beeswax candles had dripped all over the large dining table that was home to a bowl of walnuts, packets of seeds, a week’s worth of newspapers and designs for a new studio. It too was a space in which I could see myself, this time with a fire and low pendant light over the table providing warmth. It differed, however, in that it was not a space to hole up in for days on end but one which you return to with relief after a day working hard outside.
On the coast, the man fried up garlic and unceremoniously dumped what was left of the jar of anchovies straight into a fry pan — oil included. This meant the intensity in the pasta came from the fish, especially since he was almost out of capers and the olives were late harvest and had lost what little potential they had in the home-brining process where the maker had unfortunately feared too much salt. He slopped in a tin of tomatoes and let it simmer while the pasta boiled. I sat at the table cracking walnuts and prodding him for stories I knew he would have, one foot up on the chair with me. The easy conversation and hearty Bordeaux we were quickly making our way through matched the punch of the fish and I went back for seconds while he stoked the fire and let slip that he had a wife. I ate and left.
photo: Freya McInnis
In Paris, I lay on the man’s couch somewhat precociously (a martini or two having been drunk by now) as he warmed a generous amount of good quality olive oil in a well worn red Le Creuset. My keen eye was excited by the markings of identity around the room and I had to steel myself from judgment, envy and a moment of shock as I spied a small photo of him and a woman kissing. After equal parts garlic, anchovy, capers, and olives, he added tomato paste and let it infuse for a good time as we opened another — perhaps unnecessary — bottle of wine. Those are, however, the most fun bottles to open. This time, the richness came from the intensified tomatoes with the flavour distributed elegantly but concertedly throughout the dish by the richly infused oil. This time, his marital status was revealed as the pasta was boiling. I ate and left.
I pulled off my own version the other night. My secret ingredient was meeting a friend for a bottle of wine before everyone arrived. I had eaten little that day so the wine went straight to my head. I was perfectly tipsy, giving me the confidence and gusto to serve this dish with lots of love and not much care as to whether anyone liked it. It meant I was bold on the anchovies, certain that we needed lots of garlic, perfectly unfussed that I put 2 tins of tomato in to make it stretch to feed five (it turned out Michael was joining us after all) and was very pleased with the impressed murmurings of my friend as I chucked the rind of parmesan in with the whole lot. Had I been sober and in a neurotic mood, I would have fussed that there was no tomato paste, deliberated too long over quantities and whether it was worth using up a whole parmesan rind.
The key to this dish is all in the delivery. Its brilliance is not in the technicalities and nitty gritty. It is in its heartening ability to increase the flow of wine and conversation through salty mouthfuls that soothe all tensions by filling bellies with ease. Indeed, it grounded me and two men in a heady place and time, each making it as only they would or could. When you make it, think back to the Napoli restaurateur: throw some ‘random shit’ together and your ego out the window, get on with the conversation and bottle – or two – at hand.
Puttanesca
Serves 4 (five, if Michael is coming)
Remember, everyone has their own version, this is a rough guide and quantities are highly dependent on what you’ve got in the fridge and what your personal taste is. This is an opportunity to play and cook by feel. That being said, ideally you want the following:
Ingredients
• Lots of good quality olive oil – three tablespoons at least
• 6 anchovies (this again is to taste and depends on the quality of your anchovies, I use 6 ones from the semi-crappy jars, if I can afford the good ones I use more, some people also add some of the anchovy oil)
• 2 cloves of garlic, chopped
• 2 handfuls of sicilian olives, again you can use whatever olives you like but I like the texture of sicilian and how they hold their shape in the sauce
• 100 grams of capers
• Four tablespoons of tomato paste (reduce this amount by half and add 1 tin of tomatoes if you need to stretch the sauce for more people)
• Sprinkle of dried chili flakes if you like that kind of thing
• Spaghetti
Method
Heat the oil in a pan and add the anchovies and garlic. Once they’ve had a minute add the capers and chili if you are using it and let them fry for a couple of minutes. Before the garlic starts to burn, add the olives and tomato paste and let the flavors cook through for as long as you can and season to taste, noting that all of the above ingredients are pretty salty (if you are using the tin of tomatoes, this is where you add it). I like to time it so that, at this point, I start to prepare the pasta. I like to turn the sauce down to a low heat while I wait for the water to boil and then the pasta to cook.
Once the pasta has boiled, set aside a cup of the pasta water before draining it. Use the water to loosen the sauce with a little glug of the pasta water. Add the pasta and stir all together. If you need it a little looser add a little more water – again, all by feel, taste and personal preference. Serve with parsley and plenty of parmesan.
Caitlin is a writer and cellar hand who yearns for a pantry big enough to store home-made passata, bottled plums and other preserves. She has written for Australian magazines Kill Your Darlings and Veraison, and publishes weekly pieces to her personal substack that are snapshots of people and places that move moments into meaning, often with food and wine present.
Sophie anson is an illustrator based in north west england, using mixed media, collage and looping animations to bring wonky shapes to life. follow her on instagram: @sophieaillustration