Recipe box: The Seafarer's Pasta

Perhaps one of my favorites recipes as of yet: The Seafarer's Pasta, so aptly named for its cost effectiveness, bold flavors, and taste of the rustic seas. I came up with it while scouring my pantry for something to cook for dinner, and I was dismayed to find it mostly barren. Luckily I managed to muster up a few seemingly odd ingredients; one can of baby clams in brine that I have been avoiding for nearly a year, an old jar of Bertolli's Alfredo sauce, a bag of sun-dried tomatoes, organic wheat thin pasta and roasted Rocoto hot red peppers. Rocoto's are a wonderful pepper that originate from Peru and resembles a red bell pepper but it's surprisingly spicy. I found it while randomly searching in the ethnic food aisle at T.J. Maxx which usually has great deals on select items that are high in quality. Needless to continue, I was making pasta tonight, however I've always associated a good pasta to come with some sort of beef and wasn't sure how to incorporate the baby clams in a way anyone might enjoy them, after some trial and error, I discovered pan-frying them in garlic and extra virgin olive oil was the best way, and much healthier than the typical butter based sauce. Also to flavor the the Alfredo sauce I used my aged mixed pepper paste (found in th eback of my fridge on the verge of creating either Gremlins or Critters), which was comprised of four different kinds of pepper from my organic garden, in addition to whole chopped garlic cloves and  crushed yellow onions. A suitable substitute is a Chinese rooster sauce or a garlic chili paste. This recipe is designed to serve 2-3 people heartily.


Ingredients

• Canned baby clams
• Parmesan cheese, shredded or powdered, though shredded preferred 
• Rocoto hot red (bell) pepper, 2 wholes cut in half and roasted
• Minced garlic
• Crushed yellow onions, powdered onion as substitute 
• Pure sea salt, medium granulated 
• Wheat thin pasta
• Sun dried tomatoes, canned or dried (canned better due to moistness, retaining more flavor)
• Pepper paste (gelatinous Cayenne with seeds) 
• Olive oil
• Marsala wine, though any wine is fine

Directions

1. In a large pot boil water with olive oil, garlic, salt and pepper to taste, add pasta and cover.
2. Prepare 2 skillets with olive oil, minced garlic and seasonings, heat to med-high.
3. Use a small simmer pot for the sauce and add olive oil and Alfredo sauce, set for low-med wait until light boil and then add two scoopfuls of pepper paste, minced garlic, finely diced sun-dried tomatoes and a few dashes of Marsala wine.
4. Reduce heat to sauce, prevent boiling by stirring often.
5. Pan-fry baby clams and roasted Rocoto's at med-high heat with seasoning; garlic, onion powder, salt. Stir/flip often, add little bits of oil as needed.
6. Cook until edges are blackened with encrusted flavorings.
7. Once noodles are done, drain water and immediately add butter and mix well.
8. Slice two halves of the Rocoto peppers into strips and leave the other two whole.
9. Use excess flavorings (garlic from pan) as garnish for the peppers.
10. In the pictured order, add the noodles, sliced pepper strips, clams, sauce parmesan cheese and to decorate the other uncut slice of the hot pepper.

Wait till most of the olive oil is used up and each clam is thoroughly cooked and lightly blackened

This is the color the sauce it should resemble after adding the sun-dried tomatoes and pepper paste 

The pan-fried roasted hot peppers, garnished with the minced garlic from the pan

The sliced half goes first on top of the noodles

Time to add a hearty amount of the clams, they are not especially strong to taste (as seafood) with the sauce, and blend quite well. I was surprised by the amount one small can of clams produced...

Add sauce and  additional whole decorative half of hot pepper

Finally the Parmesan cheese and you are ready to be deliciously stuffed!