I wonder what others do making this simple sauce. Yes, one can go all in and make the ultimate cheesy goodness but what is the everyday put together if this is a regular dressing for pasta.
Normally, I don’t mess about and just add a slab of butter, garlic powder, dried Italian herbs and the half&half I use for coffee and whisk in a shallow pan with the cheese added slowly, maybe five minutes from prep to dish.
The story goes: "In 1914, Alfredo di Lelio, a Roman restaurateur who was popular among American tourists, named his butter and cheese linguine after himself. He had claimed he created the dish to please his pregnant wife."
"Pasta al burro e parmigiana," pasta with butter and parmigiana is fairly common in most of Italy, varied with additional ingredients from herbs, seafood, poultry, garlic, whatever. However, neither butter nor cream get much use in Italian cuisines. You'll never find a restaurant or home that serves butter for bread in Italy. Instead, each table will be graced with small bowls of olive oil for dipping the bread. Pasta was always considered a peasant's dish, street food, low end cuisine. Prior to the introduction of the Tomato from the "New World" the most common dressing for pasta was rendered pig fat with a couple of chopped olives. Variations of this go back to extant recipes from the Roman Empire, more than 2,000 years ago. Some have turned up on ancient scrolls, other recipes announced in advertising chiseled into building walls. "Eat at Luigi's." After the Italian wars to unite the city states during the 17th and 18th centuries, there was a shortage of swine, and that's when butter with parmigiana forcibly became accepted. BTW Marco Polo did not bring pasta back from China, a myth. Pasta was believed to have been brought back to Rome by soldiers who had been stationed in Egypt under Caesar, but more likely, based on evidence found by archeologists, pasta was a common dish long before Caesar was born.
In the Isle of Ischia, off the coast of Capri, an island where Italians like to vacation to escape other tourists from elsewhere, and one of high end food baskets of Italy, a common dish is Pasta y Reggiani. Fresh cooked and hot wide noodles, wider than fettuccine, are tossed in the center of a large wheel of an aged Parmigiana Reggiani. The heat from the pasta melts the cheese, infusing the pasta with the flavor of the cheese. Served immediately with ground pepper after the tossing on a cart next to the table, a bit of fresh ground pepper, and diners are satiated and wash it down with a table chianti. Olive oils, and olives, along with aged cheeses, oranges, lemons, figs fresh and dried, local wines, cheeses fresh and aged, are among the best to be found in all of Italy, prized by top end chefs worldwide. Burrata, a buffalo mozzarella with a light creme center, is believed to have been invented in Ischia, a treat for any who indulge especially if lightly warmed. Some of the island's still producing fig trees and olive vines have been dated back more than 2,000 years.
As always, any dish, no matter how traditional, or how specific the recipe from wherever, is subject to local ingredients, local tastes, and the innovations of both the preparers and diners. So enjoy however you make it. Not many of us can afford or have the room to keep giant wheels of cheese at home, but we can fake it.
Here's a quickie:
prepare 2 ounces of your favorite or available dry pasta
in a working glass, scramble one egg gently with 2 tsp's of fresh grated parmigiana, with black pepper to taste
drain the pasta thoroughly, but toss back into the same cooking pot with about a 1/2 ounce of the reserved cooking water at the lowest possible temperature, turn off the heat after a minute, slowly stir in the egg and cheese mixture until the heat from the pasta cooks the egg mixture and the same is absorbed and coating the pasta. Serve immediately, with some chopped fresh oregano sprinkled on top (marjoram will do) or sprigs of fresh parsley, preferably Italian wide leaf. Enjoy. Variations on a theme. Goes well with tall glasses of iced and sweetened Asti Spumante (one ice cube, 1/2 a cube of cane sugar).
