A common debate in our house whenever we make spaghetti is his spaghetti or mine. His spaghetti is a sauce from an amazing deep dish pizza that he cooked for me on one of our first dates, mine is one I watched my mom make growing up that involves lots of herbs. Last night, we compromised with the spaghetti of one of my favorite Food Network chefs, Alex Guarnaschelli. I recently ordered her *signed* cookbook and was eager to get to work.

This recipe is a great twist on classic, sweet, and spicy. We used her requested Bucanti pasta, which was good and thick. It also had a hole in the middle which was pretty amusing. The sauce stuck so well to the pasta, and we weren’t left with lots of sauce in the bottom of our bowls and no noodles.

I also want to say that sometimes I don’t read things carefully, or totally get in a hurry and grab the wrong stuff. I’ve learned to go with it! Cooking is all about learning and experimenting. Here we go!

• Kosher Salt
• Olive oil
• 1 small yellow onion, thinly sliced (I could only find medium, so I wound up using maybe 3/4 of it)
• 1 medium carrot, grated
• 5 medium garlic cloves, grated
• 1 teaspoon red pepper flakes (more if you like it spicy. I used 1.5 tsps)
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• 1 (28-oz) can whole peeled San Marzano Tomatoes
• 1/2 cup fresh basil leaves
• 1 lb dried bucatini pasta
• 2 cups freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese (you could get away with 1.5 depending on how much you want to sprinkle

I used my huge double boiler to cook my pasta. Make sure you use a ton of salt! Alex says “the pasta water should taste like seawater.”

In a good sized skillet, heat your olive oil. Add the onion, garlic, carrot, salt, and red pepper flakes. Cook until the onions are clear. Add the sugar and tomatoes with their juices.

I made a mistake here, and grabbed the wrong can of tomatoes from our pantry. My husband accidentally put the San Marzano tomatoes behind the peanut butter and I couldn’t see them. So I wound up using plum tomatoes. Plum tomatoes are the recommended replacement for San Marzano anyway, so it wound up being totally ok. If you do use the San Marzano, just crush them up either with your hand or a wooden spoon.

As your sauce simmers, add the basil and a cup of water. I like to let mine simmer for a while, but this sauce is so quick that once the water has been incorporated well, it’s ready.

Drain pasta, reserving a little bit of the pasta water in case you need to adjust your sauce, and return pasta to your pot.

Mix 1 cup of the grated cheese into the pasta. I accidentally dumped both cups in there, and it was great. The cheese melts all onto those really thick noodles.

Once you’ve tossed the cheese, pour your sauce in and mix it up. Top with any remaining cheese!

Time to talk wine, specifically Sangiovese. Sangiovese is an Italian grape, with the name coming from the latin sanguis Jovis, which means blood of Jupiter. We definitely had to pull up GrapeJuiceMoms blog because we couldn’t find it in our wine holder. It wasn’t labeled as Sangiovese, but it was the only unnamed wine we had.

Sangiovese is one of my favorite reds. It is so mild that it doesn’t give me a headache. This particular one is 85% Sangiovese, 10% Merlot, 5% Cabernet Franc. When I did my research here, I discovered that because this particular grape lacks some of the color creating compounds and is high in acidity that it is normally blended with other grapes to highlight its strengths and fill in where it lacks. This wine was really fresh and fruity, with just the tiniest hint of spice. We liked it so much that we ordered more!