In defence of garlic: fettuccine aglio e olio.

(I hope I spelt that right.) Pasta with garlic and oil is almost a cliché of Italian cuisine.

Probably the tastiest cliché ever. Some may cavil at the garlic: you have to like garlic to like this dish. Having said that, garlic is possibly the most unfairly maligned ingredient in the history of food. How would you feel if you were a root vegetable but people kept calling you ‘Herb’? Of course, if you want to call garlic a herb there’s plenty of justification for that on the internet, just as there is if you want believe a cat is a human, a tote bag is a criminal accomplice, or an apple is a timepiece.

But then there's the flavour. Many may be more concerned with the aromatic after-effects of garlic than the flavour itself which is earthy and pungent and adds so much to so many dishes. 

In any case, the pleasure derived from eating a large bowl of rustic-style pasta aglio e olio flecked with freshly-picked parsley (a((n))herb) outweighs any fear of what people may think about your post-prandial redolence. It’s none of anyone's business. Of course, there has always been that censorious strain of workplace warrior who feels it his duty to detect and disarm food aromas such as tuna, salami, curry, cheese etc etc, or to stick juvenile post-it notes on notice boards in office kitchens with messages such asking  consider your food aromas when bringing your lunch to work, before returning to his desk and lighting a lychee, pine and guava aromatherapy candle (for workplace harmony). I knew that attitude from my earliest days at school when eastern Europeans (who moved into predominantly Irish Niddrie after the war) were ostracised for bringing polish sausage sandwiches to school. 

We're off the track.

Fettuccine Olio e Aglio.

Splash some good quality olive oil into your sauté pan. Roughly chop (throw out your garlic press) several cloves of garlic and warm them through without burning. If they brown, throw them out with the garlic press and start again. This dish, like so many, is trial and error. The idea is to merely warm the garlic through: once overcooked - meaning even brown at the edges - garlic will taste burnt.

Cook fettuccine to al dente. Toss the pasta through the garlic in the pan. Add more olive oil to thoroughly coat the pasta. You don’t eat this dish every day. You want it to slide onto the serving plates with a kind of slippery sensuality. 

Shower chopped parsley - including stalks - over the pasta and serve with ciabatta and a glass or two of purplish-red Heathcote Shiraz to cut through the oil and garlic. 

*

Garlic breath? Rather that than no breath - and the word with which it rhymes.