Fear of frying: pasta with fried zucchini, vinegar, capers and mint

Do any of Annalena's ragazzi out there remember an ad campaign called "Wessonality?"  The point of the ad was that if you fried with Wesson oil  "it all came back except one tablespoon."  In other words, when you poured the oil back after you cooked your food,  you were missing one tablespoon.

Now, a few things ragazzi.  First, the ad used chicken as a marker.  Chicken releases fat when it's frying and it also takes fat into the coating. So, there was no way to know what was absorbed. Second, ANY oil, not just Wesson, will behave that way, if you cook properly .

Annalena is making these points because as you read the recipe, you will see it calls for one cup of oil.  Now, don't get all nervous on her.  What follows is a picture of what she poured back, after she finished frying:

Annalena wants you to know that this is a jar that holds nine ounces.  So a cup (8 ounces), would not fill it completely anyway.  But you see the point:  the oil did come back.  Most of it.  Some of it wound up on the paper towels that she used to adsorb the fat, and the final dish, was not greasy.  So, ragazzi, when frying, here's the trick:  make sure your oil is hot enough.  How can you tell if you don't have a thermometer?  Annalena recommends the wooden spoon test:  turn your wooden spoon (or spatula), upside down, and put the end of it in the oil.  If furious - and she means FURIOUS- small bubbles are forming, you're at about 350, which is generally a good temperature for frying.  Less furious bubbling is about 325, which is good for oils like olive oil, which break down faster.  And use enough oil.  Again, this is something that is odd, but true:  if you do not cook with enough oil, your food will absorb it  (eggplant is especially notorious for this).  If you use enough, it won't soak it up.  There are probably reasons for this, but we won't explore them here.

Annalena got this recipe from the website of David Rocco, who in turn got it from a place called Villa Maria, in Ravello Italy.    Annalena thinks that the recipe is Sicilian, and she's calling on her gal pal Melissa (who's restaurant Eolo you should visit), to confirm this.  All the signs are there:  the frying, the zucchini fried to almost feel like meat on your tongue, the capers, the vinegar, the mint.  This, in Annalena's frame of reference, is Sicilian summer cooking.    So here we go.  This is going to make you four servings if you have a standard appetite, or three if you're eating a lot (as Annalena, the Guyman, and Vinnie the doorman from heaven did ).

You need a pound of zucchini.   Now, when Annalena says zucchini, she means any small summer squash.  She used zephyr, which is yellow and green today.  Use what you've got, but try to get smaller ones.    You also need three tablespoons of capers.  Annalena uses the salted ones from Pantelleria, so she soaked them for half an hour, and changed the water half way through.  Finally, you need mint.  If she could, Annalena would be using the wonderful nepitella from Italy, which is, alas, near to impossible to find here.  In fact, in shopping for fresh mint on Saturday, she ran into the converse problem that her friend Tarek (aka  "TA DA") did:  she could NOT find fresh peppermint or any other mint but spearmint.  The Guyman has issues with spearmint, but he did fine with this.  If you really adverse to mint, remember that basil is in the mint family and make a switch.   You need a good handful of the leaves, and chop them.

Now, we're gonna cook.  Slice your zucchini thin.  While you're doing that, get a cup of olive oil (not the stuff you paid 40 bucks a bottle for), in a wide frying pan.  Start heating it (look above for how to tell when it's hot enough, gang), and get a plate or baking sheet ready with some paper towel, or newspaper (if it's Sunday), to drain the zucchini.  Get your hand as close to the oil as you are comfortable doing, and put in the zucchini. One layer, no doubling up.  (if you drop the vegetables from far up, you will risk splashing yourself and getting burned. Trust Annalena on this).  As the zucchini brown (you'll be able to tell:  the edges change color very apparently), turn them and cook some more. All in all, a layer will not take more than three or four minutes.  As they're done, put them on the paper, and immediately sprinkle salt on them.  This is a restaurant trick:  the salt almost seems to "melt" and hold on the veggies.  You won't need much, because of the capers, but there it is.

Now, when the zucchini are cooked, drain off the oil, and clean the pan.  Put it on one burner, and start a pot of water to boil, big enough to hold a pound (or, half a kilo) of dried pasta.  Long ones.  Annalena used tagliatelle from farro.  Spaghetti, fettucini, trenette, they'll all do here.  Put a couple of tablespoons of fresh olive oil in the pan , while the water is coming to a boil, and then add 3/4 of the zucchini. Drain the capers, and add them.  Pour in 2-3 tablespoons of red wine vinegar  - don't use white, and don't use balsamic, or sherry.  Just good quality red wine vinegar.  Most of it will go off, but some of it will stay, and flavor the zucchini.  Add about 3/4 of the chopped mint.  When this is all done, turn off the heat.

Cook the pasta to the point where it's just a bit more aldente than you would want it, because we're going to finish it in the sauce.  Drain it off, and save about half a cup of the cooking water. You may need it , although Annalena didn't this time.  Turn the heat back on your sauce, and then toss the pasta in it.  Add the water if you think it needs to cook a bit more, and just before you serve it, add back the reserved zucchini and mint.  This is what Annalena got:

You think you could eat that?  Annalena could have eaten the whole pot.  Remarkably, it did not feel like it needed cheese - a VERY odd thing to Annalena's palate, but the Guyman concurred.

You can use that oil, by the way, one more time.  So if you like this dish and you're looking for what to do with the zucchini this time of year (and who isn't)? , well, make it again.  Or cook some eggplant.  Or squash blossoms.  But get to it , ragazzi.  No more fears, no more tears.  Make it today.   Baci...