Rigatoni with Easy Vodka Sauce
An onion, a whole tube of tomato paste, and a splash of cream. Twenty minutes of patient stirring turns three cheap things into a sauce that tastes like it simmered all afternoon.
Method
Fill a large pot three-quarters full with water, throw in a real handful of salt, and set it over high heat. It can come to a boil while you do everything else.
Peel and finely chop the onion.
Smash the garlic cloves flat under the side of a chef's knife and pull the skins off.
Grate the Parmesan on the smallest holes of a box grater.
Set a Dutch oven next to the pasta pot and heat the oil over medium. Add the onion and garlic and stir constantly until the onion is just starting to color at the edges, 5 to 7 minutes.
Squeeze in the entire tube of tomato paste along with the red pepper flakes. Stir until the paste coats the onion, then keep cooking and stirring until it turns deep brick red and starts catching on the bottom of the pot, another 5 to 7 minutes. That browning is the whole recipe. Don't rush it.
Pour in the vodka and scrape the bottom of the pot until everything lifts. Drop the heat to low.
Dip a heatproof measuring cup into the boiling pasta water and pull out about ¼ cup, then pour the heavy cream into the same cup. Warming the cream this way is what keeps it from breaking when it hits the pot.
Add the warmed cream to the Dutch oven in a slow stream, stirring the whole time, until the sauce comes together smooth. Take it off the heat.
Add the rigatoni to the boiling water and cook to al dente per the box. One minute before the timer goes off, scoop out about a cup of pasta water. Put the Dutch oven back over low heat.
Lift the rigatoni straight into the Dutch oven with a spider. Whatever water rides along with it is doing you a favor.
Add ½ cup of the pasta water and stir, then add half the Parmesan a handful at a time, stirring constantly until it melts into a glossy sauce that clings to every tube. Season with salt, and loosen with a splash more pasta water if it tightens up.
Divide among bowls, top with the rest of the Parmesan, drizzle with more oil, and tear basil over the top.
Notes from the line
The tomato paste step is the one that matters. Pulled early it tastes like a can; cooked until it darkens and sticks, it tastes roasted. Give it the full seven minutes and scrape as you go.
No vodka on hand? A dry white wine gets you most of the way there. You lose a little of the sharpness that keeps the cream from going flat, but nobody at the table is going to file a complaint.
Adapted from Bon Appétit. Headnote and method rewritten for Dad Made.