Spaghetti alla napoletana
Spaghetti alla napoletana are the original and simplest version of spaghetti with tomato sauce . They belong to the classics of the Neapolitan cuisine.
history
Tomatoes have been known in Italy since around 1500, but initially only as ornamental plants with cherry-sized, yellow fruits (hence the name pomo d'oro , "golden apple"). Large, red cultivated forms have been part of the Neapolitan cuisine since the second half of the 18th century at the latest; towards the end of the century, pasta with pummarola 'n coppa (with "tomatoes on top") was one of the standard dishes in Naples' cookshops . Spaghetti alla napoletana has a forerunner in Sicily , where dock workers ate pasta with tomatoes as early as the 17th century, although these were not yet cooked, only cut into small pieces.
The term spaghetti was first mentioned in a dictionary for the Piacenza region in 1836 . The first written mention of a pasta dish with tomato sauce comes from the year 1790, contained in the cookbook Apicio moderno by Francesco Leonardi .
preparation
To prepare the sauce ( called pummarola by the Neapolitans ), cloves of garlic are heated in olive oil , which is then flavored, and the cloves are then removed. Then tomatoes (or a mixture of tomato paste and water) and a sprig of basil are added to the oil, slowly boiled down and passed through a sieve, which removes the skin and kernels of the tomatoes and the sauce gets a creamy consistency. In old recipes, peppermint is used instead of basil . In addition, it is only seasoned with salt and possibly a little sugar . To serve, the spaghetti is mixed with the sauce that has been heated again.