Capers & Spaghetti Puttanesca

It’s time for Kalyn’s (of Kalyn's Kitchen) Weekend Herb Blogging, which is hosted this week by another favorite food blogger of mine – Paz of The Cooking Adventures of Chef Paz. Yesterday I came across a recipe someone gave me that came from one of Jamie Oliver’s cookbooks (I’m not sure which one, because it was handwritten)…Spaghetti Puttanesca – don’t you just love the name?! I’ve never actually made it before because no one in my family is a fan of anchovies and I only recently discovered capers with a vengeance. But last night I was on my own for dinner, and since I stumbled across this recipe I felt it was Kismet.

But first, what the heck are capers anyway? Are they a plant, an animal, do they live on land or in the sea? Hmmm, well according to Wikipedia.org ....

“a Caper (Capparis spinosa L.) is a biennial spiny shrub that bears rounded,rather fleshy leaves and big pinkish-white flowers. Native to the Greek archipelagos, it grows wild on walls or in rocky coastal areas throughout the Mediterranean region. It is best known for its edible buds and fruit which are usually consumed pickled.”

Of course I’ve seen them sprinkled over gravlox (smoked salmon), but that’s about it, until I discovered a number of Donna Hay recipes (particularly some of her pastas) that included this little, but pungent bud.

But back to my Spaghetti Puttanesca…lots of Kalamata olives, anchovies and capers make this a very salty sauce, but you don’t need a lot to give the pasta flavor. I used multigrain spaghetti, because I’m watching the type of carbs I eat now that I’m following
theSouth Beach Diet (at least Phase 2) and it was delicious.

Of course, even though I cut the recipe in half, there’s enough left over for an army, so for breakfast we’ll be having a Puttanesca frittata. I can’t wait.

Menu

Spaghetti Puttanesca

Related links: Food and Drink recipes Weekend Herb Blogging South Beach Diet