Prep Time: 30 minutes
Cook Time: 90 minutes
Ingredients:
- 3/4 pound (350 g) spaghetti
- A half a chicken, weighing 1 1/3 pounds (750 g)
- An onion, finely sliced
- 2 tablespoons tomato paste form a can or tube
- 1/4 cup olive oil
- 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
- A hot pepper or some hot paprika (to taste but go easy)
- Salt and pepper
- Boiling water
Preparation:
Flame the chicken if need be to remove pinfeathers, and cut it up into pieces, eliminating the larges of the bones. Heat the oil in a pot, and when it begins to sing add the onion and chicken all at once; cook, stirring often, for about 5 minutes, or until the chicken pieces are all browned. Add the tomato paste, hot pepper, and enough boiling water to cover the chicken pieces.Cover and simmer over the lowest possible flame for about an hour.
Break the spaghetti into 4-inch (10 cm) pieces. When the chicken is done, remove the pieces from the pot with a slotted spoon, taking care lest you leave a bone behind, and put them in a heated bowl. Put the bowl in a warm place.
Pour a pint (500 ml) of boiling water into the pan drippings in the pot, turn the heat up, and as soon as the water boils add the spaghetti and cook them until they are al dente, by which point almost all of the water will have been absorbed. Remove the pot from the fire and stir in the butter. Check seasoning, and turn the pasta out into a tureen. Arrange the chicken pieces over the pasta and serve at once.
This will be afine one-course meal; I would serve it with a Cirò, or perhaps a zesty Dolcetto, and accompany it with a tossed salad. Cheese should not be necessary.
Yield: 4 servings spaghetti with chicken sauce.
