Pasta Puttanesca

One of my favorite pasta sauces. Delicious!

for a meatless dinner I was so surprised how awesome this was! I made a few changes to add some flavor and "beef it up some. I added one small can of sliced mushrooms, 1/2c (or more if you like) minced red onion, and I didn't have crushed tomatoes so I just substituted 1 15oz can of diced tomatoes. I have 2 boys, 7 and 10, and though they eat "different" things with interesting ingredients, they are still kids and can be picky with to "different" of ingredients they tend to turn their nose up at it. They ate it up! A quick, interesting, and tasty dish! I would definitely turn to it in the future. My only issue was that, Opening up a small can of anchovy fillets for only 3 of them seemed slightly a waist because I don't use anchovies often enough to use the rest. I ended up tossing the rest.

This was a quick and tasty recipe. It was the first time I made a puttanesca and it turned out really well.

I loved the rich flavors in this dish and how quick and easy it was to prepare. To add a little protein, I grilled up some sliced italian chicken sausage, which was a nice addition. If you like spicy foods, add a little extra crushed red pepper because as written, this recipe is pretty mild.

This is a salty dish that is very flavorfull. I always have leftovers after making it.

This was FABULOUS! I did add about 2 cups of chopped mushrooms and two small onions to the mix and it was AWESOME! Wonderfuly quick too!!

Great, quick recipe. I goofed (in a rush) and cooked the pasta the full time suggested on the box and didn't reserve any pasta water. It still had great flavor and I didn't mind the consistency. Will put this into the rotation every couple of weeks. (We try to do one vegetarian night per week and this essentially fits that criteria. Although, I do like the shrimp idea that another reviewer suggested!)

I doubled the recipe and added 4 cans of solid white albacore packed in water (drained, of course). Delicious!

I skipped the anchovies because the ones I had in the fridge looked a little old so I tossed em. How long can you keep a jar of opened anchovies in the fridge? I also doubled the red pepper which created a perfect punch of flavor. Olives added a meaty texture that caused my husband to comment that he didn't even miss the meat.

Modifications: for the sauce, I mashed about 1/2 of a 2 oz. can of anchovies with a mortar and pestle and subbed fresh oregano for the parsley. I let it simmer covered for about 20 minutes and twice added 1/4 cup of water before adding the pasta and cooking liquid. At the same time that I added the linguine to the sauce (fettuccine was unavailable), I added 1/2 pound of peeled and deveined large shrimp, and I also chopped the remainder of the can of anchovies and threw them in. "Add this to the rotation!" said the boyfriend. Next time, I may up the amount of crushed red pepper.

Made this for dinner tonight - so easy and used so many pantry staples. I used fresh fettucine and rinsed the capers before adding them (I salted my pasta water and was worried the sauce would be too salty w/o rinsing them) and the whole thing came together in a half hour. Very flavorful and the anchovies add the perfect zing!