Answers:
1. Vampires are creatures of the night, darkness made manifest, right?
So I decided to make some inky, black-as-night, pasta to set the stage...or the plate, in this case.
2. Vampires are powerful and strong and magical.
So I decided to make the pasta spicy, but with layers of spice. A bold strong spice from the red chile flakes and the subtle but magical flavor from preparing the pasta in chile infused water.
3. Vampires are repelled by garlic.
So of course I added a boat load of garlic to this dish to repel those blood suckers. Roasting the garlic mellows it out so it doesn't burn our mere human taste buds.
4. Even Vampires like cheese. ...it's true. It's written somewhere.
So, I topped off the whole thing with generous amounts of Parmesan cheese. So there you have it...Vampire inspired Pasta!
Now...what do I call this wonderful dish?
Initially, I named this garlicky and spicy pasta, Death by Garlic but my husband suggested, Love at First Bite Linguini playing up the vampire inspiration by naming it after the 1979 movie, Love at First Bite. It was the perfect name for this dish.
If your not old enough to remember this movie, it's a comedy starring Susan Saint James and George Hamilton. George Hamilton plays Dracula who moves to New York where he falls in love with a supermodel played by Susan St. James that he wants to make his vampire bride. It's absolutely hilarious and of course George Hamilton is perfect as Dracula.
Spend the evening at home, make this cool dish and watch Love at First Bite. Enjoy!
Serves 6
1 lb linguini
12 cloves of garlic
4-6 hot chiles, (I used Serrano chiles)
2 cups water + more for boiling pasta
salt
1/2 t. Black gel food coloring
6 heads roasted garlic
Parmesan cheese
olive oil
salt and red pepper flakes
parsley (for garnish)
Preheat oven to 425 degrees.
You will want to roast the six bulbs of garlic first so they have time to cool. Cut the top off of each bulb and then lightly drizzle olive oil over the cut tops. Wrap bulbs in foil or place bulbs in a shallow roasting dish and cover with foil. Roast in 425 degree oven for 30 minutes. Remove from oven and set aside to cool.
Prepare the Pasta water:
Add chiles and 12 garlic cloves to a food processor and pulse until well chopped. Add 2 cups of water to the processor to further chop up the vegetables. Add this mixture to your well-salted pot of water. Bring the salted water with garlic and chiles to a boil. Boil water for 20-25 minutes to infuse the garlic and chile flavor into your water. Add black gel food coloring to water and mix well, boil for a little longer to make sure the food coloring is dissolved. Turn off heat, get a new pot of similar size along with a fine mesh strainer over the top of the pot. Transfer the chile garlic water into the new pot while straining out the garlic and chiles from the water. Discard the chiles and garlic.
Place the strained pot of water back on the stove and bring it back to a boil. Add linguini and cook according to package directions. Strain the pasta, do not rinse and make sure to reserve 1 cup of black pasta water.
Place pasta in a large bowl and add olive oil, some of the reserved pasta water (you may or may not need the whole cup, add enough to flavor the pasta and keep the noodles from sticking as you add the olive oil) and chili flakes. Mix well.
Taste and add salt as needed. Serve pasta on plates. Top each plate of pasta with one whole bulb of roasted garlic. Squeeze roasted garlic cloves out of each bulb and top generously with a little more olive oil, Parmesan cheese and additional red chile flakes. Garnish with minced Italian parsley. Enjoy!
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