I adopted the original recipe, ‘Midnight Pasta With Anchovies, Garlic and Tomato’ by Melissa Clark at The New York Times. The most notable changes are using red lentil spaghetti, cashew nut ‘parmesan cheese’ and omitting the additional oil. This recipe will work with any pasta. It can be easily made vegetarian by omitting the anchovies and using a mixture of olives and capers as Clark suggests.
I saved some of the pasta cooking water in a jar stored in the refrigerator to use for heating up my leftovers!
Red Lentil Spaghetti With Anchovies, Garlic, Tomato And Cashew Nut ‘Parmesan Cheese’
Serves 2-4
Ingredients
250 grams of Red Lentil Spaghetti
8 anchovies in olive oil
6 cloves of garlic, peeled and sliced
1/4 tsp hot chilli flakes
2 heaping tbs organic tomato paste
zest from 1/2 lemon
pinch of Himalayan pink salt
1 cup water from cooking pasta (plus more if needed)
2/3 cup cashew nut ‘parmsan cheese’
handful of fresh parsley leaves, finely chopped
Method
Bring a large pot half filled with water to a boil. When it comes to a boil, add in the red lentil pasta and cook for 10 minutes, 2-4 minutes less than the required time.
While the pasta cooks, peel and slice the garlic, finely chop the anchovies and grate the lemon zest. Heat a dutch oven and cook the garlic and anchovies for about 5 minutes on low so that the garlic cooks but does not burn. Add in the tomato paste and cook for a couple more minutes. Add in the zest, one cup of water from the cooking pasta and with tongs, add in the pasta. Mix together and continue to cook covered for a couple of minutes. Add in the cashew nut ‘parmesan cheese’ and mix together along with more water from the cooked pasta if needed.
Mix in the finely chopped parsley, adjust flavours if needed by adding salt, additional chilli flakes, pepper or lemon juice if required. Serve and enjoy immediately!