The HOT Weather

In a word, the weather has been "HOT." Word of advice? Hydrate.

No kidding. Everyone knows that during hot weather you need to keep your fluids up. The non-alcoholic kind.

I heard a story that made it all hit home. An on-air radio personality was talking about his Saturday morning. He admitted he'd been out the night before and stayed up rather late but not too late. He had been drinking but not a lot. He hadn't eaten much for dinner. He was having too much fun. He got up the next day and decided to walk to his neighborhood diner for breakfast. It was mid-morning but you can imagine how hot it was already. He walked seven blocks. When he got to his seat in the booth at the diner, he said he almost passed out. He realized in this much heat he needed his water bottle to make it just seven blocks. He was wiped out!

One small town in South Dakota reported a 120-degree temperature last week. That was without the heat index added on! They said it had not been that hot since the disastrous Dust Bowl days of the 1930s.

This is serious stuff.

I'll never forget a time we were traveling on business in England. It "never" gets real hot in England. Ha! While we were there, the temperature hit 104 degrees on a Saturday. Well, the British went wild! They thought hot meant "get out and celebrate on the beach!" We were in southern England in Brighton, staying at the lovely Grand Hotel. It's right across from the beach.

Much of England has no air conditioning. Because it "never" gets hot, they don't need it. Well, we were roasting! We stood on our balcony overlooking the sea and tried to soak up every bit of breeze we could, but we knew better than to go lie on the beach. The English did not. They drank beer all afternoon and slept on the beach. Drinking beer and sleeping on the beach in that kind of temperature are a deadly combination, and the next day the news reported that four of them never woke up. It was sad.

So what do you cook on days that are so hot? When I was small we didn't have air conditioning in our Victorian house where my parents raised the seven of us. We used to stand in front of box fans to get cool. My mother didn't even want to turn on the oven, so she made bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwiches. Somehow the cold lettuce and tomato tasted extra good on those hot days.

Everyone has their own secrets for a great BLT, but today I'm going to share with you what I made for dinner last night when it was 90+ degrees.

There's a thing called a "fresh" sauce in Italian cooking. It just means the ingredients are fresh and you never heat them up. You chop the ingredients, let them macerate for a while so they blend and soften, and then you put them on top of pasta. The recipe I'm going to give you can be a side dish for 4 or entrée for 2. You can easily double it if you have more mouths to feed.

The feeling in your mouth is sort of like the cold tomato and lettuce in the BLT. Here you're putting a cold or room temperature sauce on top of warm pasta. The juxtaposition feels refreshing in your mouth on a hot day.

Enjoy!

Angel Hair pasta with "Fresh" Tomato Sauce

Angel Hair pasta for 2 (Follow box suggestion for portions and cooking instructions.) Most angel hair pasta takes just 3 to 4 minutes to boil, so you won't have a hot pot on your stove for long. You can use any pasta you choose. The angel hair delicacy just seems to taste better when it's hot outside.

5 ripe plum tomatoes (The secret here is FRESH, RIPE tomatoes.)
2 tsp garlic (Jar garlic will work but fresh will give your dish more "bite.")
1 large shallot, minced
A sprinkle of cracked red pepper (optional) (The kind some folks put on pizza.)
6 Tbl olive oil (divided)
Salt and pepper to taste
8 fresh basil leaves cut into chiffonade (Chiffonade is explained below.)
1 cup grated Parmesan cheese

Up to a few hours ahead...In a medium bowl, place your tomatoes, garlic, shallot, cracked red pepper and 3 tablespoons of olive oil. Mix thoroughly. Grate your salt and pepper over the mixture and mix again. You want some salt to bring out the flavor in the tomatoes. How much is up to you. The cracked red pepper is optional but gives the sauce extra zip. If you use the cracked pepper, you probably don't need much black pepper.

You want this mixture to sit now for up to a few hours. You can put it in the refrigerator if you like the idea of COLD sauce, or you can leave it on your kitchen counter. The flavors will meld during this time and you'll have a nice, chunky sauce.

When getting ready to cook and serve your pasta: While the pasta is cooking, you are going to make your chiffonade. This is a French term for "little ribbons." Stack the basil leaves on top of each other. Then use a sharp knife to cut them into little thin ribbons. That's your chiffonade. Stir this into your tomato mixture.

Drain your pasta and put in a large serving bowl. Pour on the rest of the olive oil and stir in the Parmesan. Mix it up really well. Put a portion of pasta on each plate and spoon on the sauce. You're ready to eat.

Serving suggestions: This is a great vegetarian entrée. You can serve with a side salad (Zola's Caesar Salad is available at www.dinnerwithzola.com). A hunk of bread with olive oil for dipping might be nice.

You can also use this dish as a side. Served with a piece of grilled chicken, it makes a fun meal. Even a piece of grilled fish would be good. A halibut or sea bass come to mind.