You will impress the people you cook for when you serve them this dish. It has everything you could ever want:
- It’s fast – cooks in about the time it takes to get the water boiling and cook the spaghetti
- It’s cheap – who doesn’t like that?
- The flavors are perfect together, like a symphony

I took the recipe from Rachael Ray, but she does say she didn’t make it up. It’s a classic and with good reason. She calls it Spaghetti con Aglio e Olio, but since I’m kind of lazy, I just say it in English.

I do admit to being afraid of anchovies before I made this recipe. (Don’t leave me now! Hang in there, it will be okay!) I’d never bought them or eaten them, but Rachael promises that they don’t taste like fish when they’re cooked up in this recipe – and she’s right! They are outstanding. Don’t leave them out. Even my kids know they’re in there, but the still love this dish. (I kept the anchovies a secret until they tried the dish and liked it.)

I wish I had more step-by-step photos for you, but I was in a hurry to fix this for my hungry family after church and forgot to take any pics.

You’ll need:
1 lb. spaghetti (I like angel hair or vermicelli)
1/3 cups olive oil (RR says 5 times around the pan)
8 cloves of garlic, chopped
8-10 flat anchovy fillet
1 tsp. crushed red pepper flakes (a small pile in the palm of your hand)
fresh flat-leaf parsley

For the Tomato and Onion Salad:
6 Roma tomatoes (or any garden fresh, vine-ripe tomato)
1 small white onion
more flat-leaf parsley
salt and pepper (I like Kosher salt and fresh ground pepper)

Add a loaf of crusty bread and extra oil for dipping it in.

Okay, here’s how you fix it:
Put on a big pot of water to boil. Put the bread in the oven at 200 degrees while you fix everthing else. Chop the garlic. In a skillet over medium -low heat add the olive oil, garlic, red pepper flakes and anchovies. Stir this every once in a while, using the back of the spoon to break up the anchovies. They will melt into the oil and become very yummy.

I wanted some oil to dip the bread into so I chopped more than 8 cloves of garlic and added them to another small skillet with olive oil to get toasty and yummy. When we served it we added oregano, basil, salt and pepper. Very yummy to dip bread into.

While the sauce is cooking, slice the tomatoes and onions thin. Chop up some parsley – just a handful each for the spaghetti and tomatoes. Drizzle some olive oil over the tomatoes and onions. Add a bit of salt and pepper and stir in some of the parsley.

Drain the spaghetti and add it to the skillet with the oil/anchovy mixture. Stir it around to coat the noodles and add the rest of the parsely. Season with salt and pepper.

That’s it! It sounds like a lot of steps but it really does come together fast and it tastes like a bit of Italian heaven!