I told you all I was holding on to my last tomatoes from the farmer's market with white knuckled panic. Well, I wasn't kidding. Every morning, I'd wake up and pad into the kitchen, caress their soft little skins, cradle them in my cupped palm and sniff their herbal, earthy selves. It pained me to use them up, so I did so sparingly - one tomato here, another one there. But I'd bought six pounds and after two weeks I realized that I was headed towards a mound of ruined rot if I didn't accept the fact that cooking and eating my little friends was their God-given fate.

But what to make? Canned tomatoes, tomato jam, conserva, roasted tomatoes - I needed 30 pounds, not six! In the end, Molly won out - I saw a little corner of an empty plate with seasoned oil in one of her photos and when she told me that tomatoes had once swum in that oil, I was sorta, kinda hooked. I'm easy that way, you know.

So last week I set about sacrificing those last tomatoes of 2008, cutting them in half, ridding them carefully of their seeds, nestling them in a pan of olive oil and seasoning them with my Sicilian oregano, salt and a bit of sugar. Into a slow oven they went, and what torture that was. I'm not ashamed to admit that clock watching ensued. I've got a one-track mind when it comes to tomatoes.

Instead of serving the tomatoes with toasted baguette and Bucheron, I boiled a box of pasta and tossed half the tomatoes, gently chopped, with the hot pasta - the warmth opening up the flavor of the raw garlic and parsley. I normally am not a fan of raw garlic, but here it sharpened and brightened the softer, rounded flavors of the tomatoes that concentrated in the slow heat of the oven, gave a little edge to the sweetness. It was delicious.

The benefit of this preparation was that I had half the tomatoes left over, to be plopped on bread with some cheese for lunch, or served with fried eggs for dinner. Or, and this was really the best, to be popped in my mouth while I stood at the counter, thinking about the seasons changing and the things I have to look forward to as fall comes in. Letting go can be pretty simple when you've got roasted tomatoes to ease the way.

And, bless her heart, Molly says this works pretty well with canned tomatoes, too. What a relief!

Roasted Tomato Pasta
Serves 4 to 6

1 cups (or more) olive oil, divided
2 pounds plum tomatoes, halved lengthwise, seeded
1 1/2 teaspoons dried oregano
3/4 teaspoon sugar (I used less sugar, a little less than 1/2 teaspoon)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 to 2 garlic cloves, minced
2 teaspoons minced fresh Italian parsley
1 pound penne
Parmigiano, for serving

1. Preheat oven to 250°F. Pour 1/2 cup oil into 13x9x2-inch glass or ceramic baking dish. Arrange tomatoes in dish, cut side up. Drizzle with remaining 1/2 cup oil. Sprinkle with oregano, sugar, and salt. Bake 1 hour. Using tongs, turn tomatoes over. Bake 1 hour longer. Turn tomatoes over again. Bake until deep red and very tender, transferring tomatoes to plate when soft (time will vary, depending on ripeness of tomatoes), about 15 to 45 minutes longer.

2. When the tomatoes have cooled somewhat, gently pull off their peels. Transfer half of the tomatoes and some of the oil to a serving bowl and gently chop with a dull knife in the bowl. Add the garlic and parsley to the tomatoes and mix. Bring a pot of salted water to a boil and cook the penne until al dente. Drain, reserving some of the starchy, salted pasta water. Add the pasta to the tomatoes in the serving dish and add pasta water, as needed, to loosen the sauce. Grate some Parmigiano on top and serve immediately. Refrigerate the rest of the tomatoes in the oil for up to 5 days.

I keep staring at this photo, seeing that golden tangle of fresh tagliatelle luminous in the afternoon sunlight, and rubbing my eyes. I'm used to seeing a tray like this on our table, for sure, but there's one small difference this time. This time, I'm the one who made that pasta and it's tickling me pink.

Every time I go to Italy, to the little village where my grandfather lived for so many years, our friends there keep us flush in good things to eat: like homemade tagliatelle and a bagful of fresh peaches from Franca, a freshly killed and roasted rabbit from Maria, homemade crescia sfogliata that Eugenia made and stuck in the freezer for later cooking, or a handful of black truffles foraged by Stefania's son Federico and delivered in a paper towel on an afternoon social call.

This year I decide I want to learn to make pasta myself. So one afternoon I sling my camera across my back and set out for Maria's house, walking past the shuttered houses where our neighbors sleep while the sun beats down on the fields around us. The human silence is warm and familiar while the birds swoop above with abandon and cats blink lazily in patches of shade. I've done this walk a hundred, a thousand, times but this year it's suffused with nostalgia and a faint pain grips my heart. I feel like I did twenty years ago, as my sandals gently slap the concrete of the road. The town looks as it did twenty years ago, the same weathered shutters and swaying trees. But so much has changed and no matter how hard I tried to hold on to the way it used to be, I have been forced - I am being forced - to let go.

As I walk, I see former versions of myself, walking alongside me. I see my cousins, racing me up the hill, and our friends, sitting on the curb late at night, thrilled by the possibilities that life holds for us all. I see my whole life so far, reflected in the memories that the hills and valleys around me hold. I see my grandfather, or I try to, but it's hard. His absence is flat and final. He's difficult to conjure.

Down at Maria's, she leads me into a room where she has her pasta station set up. Maria started making fresh pasta at the age of seven, standing on a chair to reach the table, and had to do so every day for years. There's an old wooden board and a long rolling pin, fresh eggs from the chickens outside, and an industrial-sized bag of flour. She measures out a little less than 300 grams of flour and tells me that the flour should take around three eggs, three of her eggs, she cautions, from the chickens outside, not those larger industrial eggs you find at the store.

We make a well of flour on the board, then crack the eggs into the well. The yolks are impossibly orange, they practically glow. I remember making a hole in the fresh eggs we'd get from Maria, and Gina, who lives behind my grandfather's house, as a kid, and sucking the sweet, raw egg through that hole into my mouth as a special treat. Using a fork, Maria shows me how to beat the eggs without breaking the well and then slowly begin to incorporate the flour as I beat until the whole mass comes together as a rough, yellow ball of dough.

Maria instructs me to start kneading that ball of dough, so I do. I knead for several minutes, while she observes my hands silently, then several minutes more, and several minutes after that, too. My shoulders start to tire. I look up at her, but it seems I'm not done yet and I feel a bit fraudulent. When the dough is as smooth and plasticky as Play-Do, when it feels like the underside of your arms, untouched by the sun, that's when it's ready to go.

Maria's technique for rolling out that chubby round of dough into a sheet so thin you can read newspaper through it involves that long rolling pin, the shuffling movement of palms, the slapping and rolling of the dough over the pin and onto the board and onto itself, and then back again. She makes it look so easy, of course, even though it's not, not at all.

We cover the dough with towels and let it rest for a bit. My mother comes down to the house and we talk about old times. I used to hear chickens squawking in the yard outside, but over the years Maria has landscaped her house and the chickens and rabbits are now farther away, removed by a terrace. It's quiet and a fly drones above us. Finally, it's time.

Maria rolls one side of the dough halfway into itself and then rolls the other side halfway into itself. She brings out a long, narrow board that fits snugly onto her tabletop and equips me with a serrated knife. I start to slice, watching the curls of tagliatelle emerge on the other side of the knife, suddenly marveling in the simplicity of the whole thing. Who needs hand-cranked machines or boxes of store-bought noodles? Not me, not anymore.

We say goodbye to Maria but not before I snap her photograph. She's beautiful but acts bashfully, is uncomfortable in front of the lens. We eat the tagliatelle the next night, the last meal I'll have in Italy this year. They're good, delicious even, tender and eggy and sauced with tomatoes and basil from the garden. I wonder if I'll ever make them in New York. If it will be as nice as it was in Maria's kitchen, with her standing behind me, watching.

Summer is almost here, beach season is almost upon us. Have you tried on last year's bikini yet? Figured out what diet to use to whittle down those last few pounds of winter insulation before you slip into something a little more revealing?

Well, this is your last chance to change your life. How about the Total & Utter Disgust 'n' Despair Diet TM? It's remarkably effective. Why, all you have to do is read a couple of books, starting with Fast Food Nation and The Omnivore's Dilemma and ending with Bottomfeeder, and maybe watch a documentary or two, like King Corn or Super Size Me - yes, from the comfort of your very own couch! no movement required - and you'll lose your appetite, ensuring slimmer thighs and a chiseled face, guaranteed.

Protein will lose all its allure - poultry, beef, pork, even fish (shrimp!) will be entirely nauseating! Turn your nose up at rice - millions of people need it more than you do - and eye vegetables, both conventional and organic, with suspicion: the twin dangers of E. coli and murky ethics lurk everywhere, didn't you know? You'll find yourself grateful to have nothing but HFCS-free cereal with antiobiotic-free milk for dinner, and that can do wonders for the flabby, late-spring body.

The Total & Utter Disgust 'n' Despair Diet TM! There's simply nothing else like it.

(Side effects may include depression, rage, and hopelessness. But everyone knows you hate to eat when you're feeling like the world is coming to an end - so look on the bright side: You'll drop a dress size in less than a week!)

*****************

Yes, folks, I seem to have lost my appetite. I'm 182 pages into Taras Grescoe's Bottomfeeder (which is a must-read, especially for people who like to eat fish) and it feels like the straw that broke the camel's back. About the only thing I feel good about eating now from the piscine world are a dozen oysters and a can of sardines. You might end up feeling that way, too. So in anticipation of that, here's a recipe for pasta with canned sardines that's quite delicious.

(Don't even try serving it to people who are avowed anchovy haters - the hate seems to extend to all small canned fish. Believe me, I tried. And failed. Miserably.)

Pasta con le Sarde
Serves 4

½ cup currants
¼ teaspoon red-pepper flakes
½ cup dry white wine
1 tablespoon butter
½ cup unseasoned dry bread crumbs
½ cup plus 6 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 medium onion, finely chopped
2 small cloves garlic, minced
1 pound fennel, bulb finely chopped, fronds chopped and reserved
1 tablespoon fennel seeds, crushed
Salt
1 pound canned sardines
1 pound bucatini pasta
½ cup pine nuts, toasted
¼ cup capers, rinsed
Freshly ground black pepper

1. Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Combine the currants, red-pepper flakes and wine in a bowl; set aside. In a small sauté pan, melt the butter. Add the bread crumbs and cook, stirring, until golden brown. Transfer to a bowl, stir in 2 tablespoons of the olive oil and set aside.

2. In a heavy skillet, heat ½ cup olive oil over medium-low heat. When hot, add the onion, garlic, fennel bulb and fennel seeds. Season with salt. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the fennel is tender, about 25 minutes.

3. Add the wine mixture and the sardines, breaking them into pieces with a fork. Bring to a boil and gently simmer for 10 minutes.

4. Add enough salt to the boiling water so that it tastes salty. Boil the bucatini until al dente, 6 to 8 minutes; strain. Return the pasta to the pasta pot and set over low heat. Fold in the fennel-sardine mixture. Toss in the remaining 4 tablespoons olive oil. Add 3/4 of the fennel fronds, the pine nuts, the capers and a quarter of the bread crumbs. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

5. Divide pasta among plates and sprinkle the remaining bread crumbs and fennel fronds over each. Serve immediately.

Oh, how I love thee, Internet.

Shall I count the ways?

I saw this recipe in a magazine - I can't remember which one - like, almost 10 years ago or something. Way before this blog was a twinkle in my eye and way before I even really understood what the Internet was all about. (Er - not that I now have much of a clue, but still. Fiber optic cables! Coal-fired power stations! Personal websites! I am way more informed.) I clipped it and made it and filed it away and then totally forgot about it, only to have an inquisitive reader ask me about it recently (hi, Charlotte!) because she'd read a comment I left on Adam's blog two years ago in which I waxed rhapsodic about said pasta.

So! I set myself to digging among my recipe clippings. It embarrasses me slightly that it took me, a somewhat neurotically organized person, more than ten minutes to find the darn thing. In fact, it took me more like a week.* A week in which I desperately emailed Adam (Hadn't I emailed him the recipe? Apparently, I had not.) and had to slowly face up to the fact that perhaps my organizational skills weren't quite what I imagined them to be.

(Sob!)

And then, of course, ten minutes after telling myself this, I found the recipe, glued sweetly and snugly into some binder page, exactly where it should have been, obviously.

After all that effort, I was hungry and, frankly, a little curious. Wouldn't it be fun to see how the recipe stood up, after hiding out for so long? I marched myself out to the store, bought a pound of fettucine and got to work.

And it is, just as you might have already imagined from the words "Mario", "Batali", and, oh, perhaps "Pappardelle", "Peas", and "Parmesan", quite tasty. Peas and mint are a match made in heaven, of course, and when you throw a silky tangle of fettucine into the mix and the long strands get all green and velvety from the pea puree and sweet-salty from the honey and Parmigiano, well then, you can imagine your delight at dinner. But there are a few things I have to note, because I strayed from the original recipe ever-so-slightly, and I think you should, too.

First of all, watch it with the honey, folks. Mario asks for two entire tablespoons of the stuff, but this makes the dish brazenly sweet instead of delicately nuanced and I think we can all agree that nuance is better than in-your-face sweetness, no? Then, he also says you need an entire stick of butter. And you know, if you're into that kind of thing, by all means toss the whole stick in there. But this dish can do with a whole lot less of the stuff. Also, one more thing, you need to loosen the sauce with pasta water before you toss it with the pappardelle, otherwise you lose precious minutes trying to coat the pasta properly, so that by the time you do and bring it to the table, it's well on its way to being lukewarm. And we all know there is nothing worse than lukewarm pasta.

(Don't we? DON'T WE? Sheesh.)

Anyway, this is the story of the little recipe that could, powered by the Internet - it made it into a magazine, into a binder, into a comment section, into an email, and now finally, out to you all. May you all like it as much as I do.

*Yes, I tried Googling it, but heavens to Betsy, this recipe was nowhere to be found online. So now it is. Thank God for blogs, wouldn't you say?

Pappardelle with Peas and Parmesan
Serves 8 as an appetizer or 4 as a main course

4 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 medium Spanish onion, chopped fine
1 tablespoon wildflower honey
3 cups fresh shucked peas (or frozen)
Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
4 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 pound fresh homemade pappardelle or 1 pound dried fettucine
1 cup freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano
1/2 cup packed fresh mint leaves, torn in half

1. In a large saute pan, heat the oil until it is just smoking. Add the onion, honey, and 2 cups of the peas, and saute until softened and cooked through, about 10 to 12 minutes.

2. Place peas in a food processor and pulse until coarsely pureed, season generously with salt and pepper, and set aside.

3. Bring 6 quarts of water to a boil and add 2 tablespoons salt. Melt the butter in the saute pan, add the remaining peas, and cook slowly until just softened, 4 to 5 minutes. Add the pea puree to the whole peas and set aside.

4. Just before the pasta is done, pour a ladle of the starchy cooking water into the pan with the pea puree and stir to loosen the sauce. Cook the pasta until al dente and drain well, reserving more of the pasta water. Immediately toss the pasta into the pan with the pea mixture and place over medium heat. Stir gently to mix well, adding a little pasta water to achieve the correct texture, not too dry and not too wet - the noodles should be dressed like the greens of a salad. Add the cheese and mint leaves, and toss to combine. Serve immediately.

I find it unendingly ironic that, even though we live in the most diverse borough of New York City where 44% of our neighbors are foreign-born, our choice of good ethnic food for takeout is severely limited. We love Forest Hills, we really do. We love our apartment and our view, our neighborhood grocery stores, and the quiet streets. We love the crusty pizza at Nick's and the pierogies at Just Like Mother's. If we're up for a little journey, we can hop in the car and be the only white people in a stuffed-to-the-gills Korean restaurant or a Chinese dim sum hall or an Indian buffet in just a few minutes.

But this isn't really enough.

What I mean is, we're New Yorkers. We expect good ethnic food to be brought to us, still hot, in under half an hour. It seems like it should be one of the small benefits of living in New York. Yes, we'll put up with noise and filth and cramped quarters and expense in return for  old black-and-white movies at Film Forum, the incomparable experience of walking from the West Village to the Lower East Side on a warm spring morning, and authentic immigrant cuisine at a moment's notice.

But since we left the aforementioned filth and noise and cramped quarters for the comparative expanse of Queens, does that mean we also forfeited our right to good takeout? Because, surprise or no surprise, Forest Hills has been downright disappointing in that area. We've ordered mediocre Thai from the same little place so often that Ben finally told me this weekend that he is officially putting it on the No-Order list, along with the sub-par, yet expensive, Indian down the road, and the creepy Chinese that definitely resembles no other Chinese food I've ever come into contact with. And that's it. That's all we've got. So we're in a bit of a pickle, I'd say.

One that requires taking matters into our own hands. When I read about Irene Wong's Burmese noodles (can we talk for a minute about how much I am liking this new New York Times column, One Pot?) last week, though, I realized, suddenly gripped by a burning urge to make them, that I could just stop whining and simply make my own takeout.

And truthfully, in the time it would have taken to make the phone call and then wait for food to be delivered, the dish came together one, two, three. It was delicious: earthy and slick at the same time. At first I thought it odd that the highly seasoned, turmeric-stained chicken (well, er, tofu, actually - I took one liberty there) mixture didn't get incorporated into the noodles, which were relatively bland upon first tasting them. But then, as we ate, the tastes all started to mix together pleasantly in our bowls and it turned out to be just the right amount of flavors and spice.

Paired with an ice-cold beer or two you might even start to think that life without takeout is livable, indeed.

***

We're planning a trip to Israel quite soon and I'm wondering, dear readers, if you have any tips for interesting markets or bakeries or other food-related visits? If so, please leave them in the comments. Thank you!

Panthay Noodles
Serves 2

6 tablespoons canola or other vegetable oil
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
7 ounces fresh Asian noodles or dried egg noodles
5 ounces skinless, boneless chicken thighs or extra-firm tofu, cut into slices 1 1/2 inches long by 1 inch wide by 1/2-inch thick
1 medium onion, diced
1 1/2 teaspoons (about 2 cloves) minced garlic
1 1/2 teaspoons minced fresh ginger
1 teaspoon curry powder
1 teaspoon paprika
2 teaspoons fish sauce
8 ounces baby bok choy, cut lengthwise into pieces 1 1/2 to 2 inches wide
1/4 cup peeled, finely slivered carrot
1/2 cup chopped cilantro leaves
2 to 4 lemon wedges, for serving 

1. Bring a large pot of water to a boil and add 1 tablespoon oil and a sprinkle of salt. Boil noodles until barely tender, 2 to 4 minutes. Drain, rinse thoroughly under cold water and drain again. Set aside.

2. Season chicken pieces with 1/4 teaspoon salt and 1/4 teaspoon pepper; set aside. Place a medium skillet over medium heat and add 2 tablespoons oil. Add onion, garlic and ginger, and sauté until lightly browned, about 2 minutes. Add chicken, curry powder, paprika, fish sauce and 2 tablespoons water. Cover, reduce heat to low and simmer until chicken is cooked, about 5 minutes. Turn off heat and keep warm.

3. Place a large skillet over medium heat and add remaining 3 tablespoons oil. Add bok choy and sauté until wilted, 3 to 5 minutes. Season with a pinch of salt and pepper. Add carrots and noodles and sauté until well heated, 2 to 3 minutes. Adjust salt and pepper to taste.

4. To serve, divide noodle mixture between two warm plates. Top each portion with half the chicken mixture. Garnish with cilantro and lemon wedges.

I suppose it's true that every Italian has their version of ragu, a long-simmered meat sauce to be tossed with fresh pasta or layered in lasagna. And all of them (us) think their version is the best, the only one worth spending five hours in the kitchen for, the sauce to end all sauces. (Not all Italians actually make this sauce themselves; they wait until they're home for a visit and it gets made in their honor, further elevating ragu into the stratosphere of heaven-sent manna.) Some people have had their recipes passed down in the family, from great-grandmother to grandmother to mother and so on. But others, like me, got their recipe through other means, like abject begging.

You see, my mother and grandmother, well, they aren't/weren't big cooks. I don't have any recipes in my arsenal that came from my grandmother (unless you count a simple tomato sauce made with onions and carrots that is still the subject of ample controversy between my mother and father. My father insists that my grandmother taught him how to make it; my mother says he's crazy for thinking my grandmother could have ever taught anyone any recipe, ever.). And my mother is so uninterested in what happens in the kitchen that it's probably still a marvel to her that I have ostensibly made my career around the subject.

So when the time came for me to start making my own ragu (sometime in college, this was. Yes, I know, some people spend those years getting high and finding themselves; I started building my recipe arsenal.), I turned outside the family to our dear friend, Gabriella. Gabriella is from Bologna and is possibly, besides my Sicilian uncle, the best cook I know. (You should have yourself invited over to her place sometime when she's making an all-fish dinner. Or a Marchigianian meal. Or, frankly, even just stuffed tomatoes. Good lord.) One summer evening in Torre, I sat next to her and took notes as she carefully told me how to make her meat sauce. And then I went back to the States and proceeded to make it - over and over and over again - until I committed it to memory.

It's "my" sauce now and I love it. It reminds me of my family and Gabriella's and our summers together and my childhood. It makes Ben smile with his mouth full and my friends clamor for the recipe and generally, it's one of the things I know how to make that I'm proudest of.

But you know this post isn't about that sauce. This post is about someone else's sauce. I'll be honest, I'm not really in the market for a new meat sauce. I'm pretty happy with the one I've got. But then I went and read about Marco Canora (he of the addictive red cabbage) and his grandmother's sauce and the fact that it ends up the consistency of pudding (the mind boggles) and before I knew it, there was a little kernel of curiosity planted within me. Plus, I had explicit plans to do nothing but stay home and nest on Saturday. This would give me something to do.

And, boy, did it ever.

Getting the sauce to the point where you just let it simmer for three hours takes more than an hour. You slowly, carefully build layers of flavor - soffritto, minced garlic, diced pancetta, then beef. There's tomato paste and canned tomatoes, red wine and whole milk, even meat stock. It's quite impressive. The sauce gets thicker and richer with each stir. But what puzzled me was the complete lack of herbs: no parsley, no bay leaf. So I decided to add one bay leaf to the pot. After two hours, I felt guilty about it and took it out again. This was Marco's grandmother's sauce, after all, and I wasn't supposed to be messing with it.

The sauce does indeed become quite pudding-y. It practically quivers. It's very rich, and thick with meat. Someone remarked that it tasted like meat sauce made with pot roast and there is something to that. It's as if the sauce took apart the meat, altered the flavor molecules, and then stitched it back together again. It's darn good, I have to say, and makes an impressive amount, which is a relief because then at least you have some leftovers of your hard labor to put in the freezer.

But it almost doesn't matter than this sauce was as tasty as could be. I missed "my" sauce. I missed the minced parsley and the bay leaf. I didn't like the gaminess of the pancetta or the addition of minced garlic. Nothing against Marco or his grandmother, but I think these things end up being more than just a matter of taste, don't you think? They're about family and memory and love and tradition and other intangibles.

I know it's absolutely cruel to leave you hanging without a recipe for my meat sauce. I promise I'll write a post on it soon, maybe even combine it with a post about lasagna (in which I shall rail against the forces of evil who made millions of Americans think it's supposed to be made with part-skim ricotta or some such travesty). In the meantime, try Marco's sauce. And try Marcella's. Fiddle with them a bit until what you've got is your very own. Make that sauce so often that it becomes a tradition. Someone's favorite recipe. Something you pass on to your children or your children's children, or the daughter of a friend who always likes sitting near you when you cook, being watchful and quiet, absorbing every little thing you do.

You might realize, then, that food, in a way, immortalizes you.

Beef Bolognese
Serves 6 with leftover sauce

3 tablespoons unsalted butter
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 ½ cups finely chopped onions
¾ cup finely chopped celery
¾ cup finely chopped carrots
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 clove garlic, minced
1 pound ground beef
1/3 pound pancetta, finely chopped
1 1/3 cups tomato paste
1 ½ cups whole milk
2 cups red wine
2 2/3 cups whole canned tomatoes, drained of juices and torn
2 cups meat stock
Pappardelle, cooked al dente
Grated Parmesan

1. Combine the butter and olive oil in a large, heavy pot set over medium heat. When hot, add the onions, celery and carrots, season with salt and pepper and cook, stirring frequently, until the vegetables start to brighten in color, about 20 minutes.

2. Add the garlic, and just before it starts to brown, add the beef and pancetta. Season with salt and pepper. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the meat is thoroughly browned, about 25 minutes. Stir in the tomato paste and cook for 5 minutes. Add the milk and cook at a lively simmer until the milk is absorbed, 5 to 10 minutes. Add the wine and simmer until the pan is almost dry.

3. Stir in the tomatoes and the stock, scraping the bottom of the pan with a wooden spoon. Bring to a gentle simmer and cook for 3 hours, stirring occasionally. Skim the fat off the surface. Toss with al dente pappardelle and serve with grated Parmesan.

I'm not one for meat substitutes. Give me steak or don't, but please don't make me pretend that grilled tofu cloaked under some peppercorn sauce is meant to stand in for a juicy, rare side of beef, or that tofu crumble - for Pete's sake - is meant to be eaten by beings, human or otherwise, in an otherwise perfectly acceptable ragù. It's not that I don't like tofu, because I love it, it's just that I prefer it under more honest circumstances (oh, lord, that sounds pretentious). Tofu is gloriously wiggly, perfectly squishy, the curd of beans and nothing else. Steak is juicy and chewy, perhaps tinged with smoke and subtly gamey - nothing else. They each serve their own delicious purpose, and there's no need to confound them. Right?

My point is that I am not one to look for anything other than the real thing. If I'm in the mood for steak, I buy myself a nice one, I sprinkle it with salt, I broil it, and I eat it. If it's steak I'm craving, I'm usually ravenous, trying to fill some deep-seated hunger, some molecular clamoring for iron and protein. So I don't buy a seitan slab, or a portobello mushroom for grilling, because I've learned that if you trick your body like that it ends up resenting you for it. And who wants a resentful body? Not me. Honesty is the best policy.

All of this to say that when I first read Florence Fabricant's recipe for a meatless meaty pasta sauce, I sort of shook my head and moved to turn the page away. But something made me stop, and read again. Minced mushrooms, okay, but then tomato paste and tapenade for ballast and flavor, mmhmm, red wine for depth and body, yes, and fresh pasta to elevate this into something really good, perhaps. Suddenly, I was making a shopping list and planning dinner.

(Alright, I'm easily swayed. I'll give you that.)

And it's not like this holds a candle to a real ragù. No way, no how. But it's not really supposed to. It's its own splendid little sauce, earthy and dark and interesting, one of the fastest meals you'll ever make (now that certainly doesn't compare to a typical Italian meat sauce) and richly satisfying, much to my surprise. You'll finish your plate and find yourself swiping the sides with bread just to pick up all the little extra smears of sauce.

Perhaps you'll even think, who needs meat? I swear I didn't...

Fettuccine with Mushroom Ragù
Serves 4

3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
3 cloves garlic, slivered
1/2 cup chopped onion
1 pound cremini mushrooms, very finely chopped
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 tablespoon black olive paste (tapenade)
1/3 cup dry red wine
1 tablespoon minced fresh oregano, or 1 teaspoon dried
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
12 ounces fresh fettuccine
Grated pecorino, for serving

1. Heat 2 tablespoons oil in a large skillet. Add garlic and onion and sauté until soft. Add mushrooms and cook over medium heat until they wilt and give up their juices. Do not let juices evaporate. Stir in tomato paste and tapenade. Add wine, cook briefly, then season with oregano, salt and, generously, with pepper. Remove from heat.

2. Bring a pot of salted water to a boil, add fettuccine, stir to separate strands and cook about 3 minutes. Drain. Transfer fettuccine to skillet. Add remaining oil. Cook, gently folding ingredients together, until mushroom mixture has reheated and is evenly mixed with fettuccine. Add salt and pepper if needed. Serve, with cheese on the side.