Pasta con le Sarde ala Chita Rivera

In a recent post, in which I basically trashed the recent research on Calium supplements, I noted that the current recommendation is for women to get the majority of their calcium intake from food sources. I decided to take my own advice and made Pasta with Sardines, a classic Sicilian dish. Sardines are a great source of calcium – 4 oz has 300 mg of elemental calcium, a full 1/3-1/4 of the daily recommended requirement for most women.

I planned to make this dish on Saturday, hoping for an early dinner and a nice evening at home with my family. Late that afternoon, all plans for a leisurely dinner were quashed. Around 4 pm, we found out that Chita Rivera’s show “The Dancer’s Life” was going to close in 2 days, which made our tickets for Tuesday night obsolete. My husband had rushed to the box office to see if he could get tickets for the closing night show on Sunday. He returned instead at 5:15 with 4 tickets for that very night! Fine, we figured we’d eat a rushed dinner at 6:30 or so, and still have time to get to the theater at 8. We set to work together in the kitchen, my husband cutting up the veggies while I deboned the sardines.

About halfway through our preparations, the phone rang. My younger daughter’s friend was calling to see why my daughter wasn’t at her house for the special sleepover they had planned (and that we had thought was the following weekend). Now we had an extra ticket! Calls were frantically made to find a friend of my older daughter to accompany us to see Chita. My husband took my younger daughter to the sleepover while I finished the sauce and put it in the fridge to hold. By then it was past 7.

My older daughter’s friend’s father graciously drove us all to the theater. In usual New York fashion, we got stuck in traffic at 54th and 6th. So we jumped out of the car and ran through the freezing night the remaining 6 blocks to the theater, cursing ourselves for not taking the subway, stopping only to warm ourselves on a subway grate (now we knew why the homeless slept there.) We just made the curtain.

We returned after the show to cook the pasta and eat our dinner, in relaxed European style, at 10:30 pm. Luckily, the sauce kept beautifully.

Was it worth all the running around? You bet. Chita was amazing! Singing and dancing for 2 hours at the age of 72! And do you know that her left leg was broken in 12 places in an automobile accident in 1986? Now that’s a woman who must get enough calcium!

Pasta con le Sarde

Most recipes for Pasta con Sarde (and there are probably as many recipes as there are cooks in Sicily) call for anywhere from 1 to 3 8-10 oz. cans of sardines in oil. The recipe on which I based this dish comes from Mario Batali, who calls for 3 pounds of whole fresh sardines! I like sardines, but not that much, so I used about 9 ounces. If I make this again, I will also add a can of anchovies in oil.

2 lbs fennel bulbs, greens removed and reserved, bulb cut into sticks.
9 oz whole fresh sardines
flour, for coating
1-1/2cups extra-virgin olive oil
2 medium onions, minced
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 (28 oz) can whole tomatoes with juice, pulsed a few times on the food processor to chop
3 tbsp pine nuts, lightly toasted
3 tbsp raisins, soaked in a little white wine
salt and pepper to taste
7 saffron strands
1 lb dried bucatini (also called perciatelli, basically thick spaghetti with a hollow center)

In a hot skillet, add olive oil and saute fennel until caramelized. (Next time I’ll add the onions at this step and carmelize them too. )

Remove the heads of the sardines and pull out the backbones and entrails. (You don’t need to do this if you decide to use canned sardines instead.) Select a few sardines for garnish. Chop the rest of the sardines for the sauce, set aside.

Season the flour with salt and pepper, and dredge the selected unchopped sardines in it. Heat 1/2 cup olive oil in a small saucepan until it starts to smoke. Cook the flour-coated sardines in the oil until a light golden brown, about 1 minute on each side. Using a slotted spoon, remove the sardines from the pan and set them aside to drain on a paper towel.

In the skillet with the caramelized fennel, add the onions and cook about a minute. Add the garlic and cook a bit. Add raisins, tomatoes, pine nuts and saffron. Season, to taste, with salt and pepper. Bring the sauce briefly to a boil and then lower to a simmer. Add the reserved sardines and cook, stirring occasionally with a wooden spoon, until the sardines have broken into pieces and are thoroughly mixed into the sauce, about 10 to15 minutes. If the sauce appears too thick at this point, add a little of the pasta cooking water.

Bring 6 quarts of water and 2 tablespoons of salt to a rolling boil. Add the bucatini and cook until tender but still al dente. Drain the cooked pasta into a large serving bowl, add 3/4 of the sauce and stir to combine. Top with the remaining sauce and the fried sardines.

This pasta tastes best if allowed to sit for several minutes, soaking up the flavors of the sauce, before it is served. Keep the pasta covered during this waiting period, then garnish with reserved fennel fronds.

Category: Food, Second Opinions