Anchovy pasta

Not a bad day today in the scheme of things.  The Woo went to her mum and dad's first thing this morning and found her mum sitting up in bed and looking a bit like her old self.  When we dropped off a couple of lamb shanks for their dinner at around eleven I popped up and saw her and she looked great!  I left Wendywoo there for the day and came back and had a bit of a tidy round of the front room, kitchen and conservatory.

The Woo cooked their dinner.  Slow cooked lamb shanks with carrots, onions, pearl barley and a few peas bunged in at the last minute.  Jen had hers as it was with a bit of spinach from their garden and Arthur tucked in to a mini-mountain of mash with his.  The mere fact that Jen had breakfast, eggy bread for lunch and wanted the lamb shanks for dinner is an absolutlely wonderful bit of news.  The added bonus that she was downstairs when I popped round this afternoon and was bossing everyone around was a real sight for sore eyes!

I came back home to give the dogs a second walk and finish the conservatory while The Woo served up their dinner and then left them in Dave (youngest son) and Louise's capable hands.

For our supper it's a tasty and bargain basement anchovy pasta.  This is a real favourite of The Woo's and mine but varies a teeny bit every time.  The basis is olive oil, anchovies, garlic and chilli but you can do pretty much what you want to glam it up...the world is your anchovy (lobster) so to speak!

This evening...in a pan on a low heat a good lug of olive oil, a small finely sliced onion, four green finger chillis (we do like it spicy!) sliced into half centimetre chunks, a three inch squeeze of anchovy paste and the same of tomato puree, half a dozen halved baby plum tomatoes, two large chestnut mushrooms finely sliced, a sprinkle of dried orgegano, a good sprinkle of crushed dried chillis and a decent grind of black pepper...stirred until the pastes are well incorporated and then covered and simmered on a very low heat until the tomotoes are well gooey.

Linguine for two done in a separate pan and then the whole lot stirred together and served with more black pepper and parmesan cheese.  Simples!

You can use proper anchovies obviously but the whole point is that it melts into the oil so the paste is a very economical alternative as only a couple of fillets are needed and the leftovers tend to get forgotten about.

The dried chillis work well with the fresh and give the finished dish an added dimension...but, as I've said before, this is your meal so adapt it as you will.  This is a very forgiving dish as long as you stick to the basics.