Sometimes the easiest pasta sauces are just the best. In this case, the extra virgin olive oil is the star of this recipe as it is the main ingredient and therefore, it has to be of a very good brand. Although a fairly large quantity goes in the pot, it is not oily to the palate. This is by far one of my favourite ways of eating pasta. Believe me, you can never go wrong with spaghetti aglio e olio. What can I say, it’s simply delicious! 😋

Serves 3 people

Ingredients

320g spaghetti (a good brand tastes better than cheap pasta)

150g red cherry vine tomatoes, cut in quarters

30g fresh flat-leaf parsley, roughly chopped (20g to add to the sauce and 10g to sprinkle on top of pasta just before serving).

5 small fresh garlic cloves, finely diced

A splash or two of home-made chili oil (made with a good brand of extra virgin olive oil)

70g Extra virgin olive oil

50g freshly grated parmesan cheese

Salt to taste

Note: To make your own chilli oil, buy a good brand of olive oil, and add to it a few hot dried chillies, including the seeds. Leave the oil to rest for a few days and enjoy! I don’t advise using standard tomatoes because they are tasteless and of course, a good brand of pasta makes the difference to this dish because the cheap brands tend to overcook pretty quickly. And finally, if your pasta look a little dry, just add extra olive oil to the sauce and mix well.

Method

In a medium pot, bring to boil some salted water on a medium-high heat.

In a small pot, add the extra virgin olive oil, the chili oil with the garlic, and fry it for a couple of minutes until it reaches a pale golden brown.

At this point, the water should boil. Add the pasta and cook it for few minutes until “al dente”.

When the garlic is cooked, add the cherry vine tomatoes, a good pinch of salt, and the parsley.

Cook the sauce for a couple of minutes on a medium-high heat.

The pasta should now be cooked at point. Drain it, return it to the pot, add the sauce, mix well and plate it.

Add the parmesan to the pasta, sprinkle some parsley, and enjoy!