I grew up hating spaghetti. I was resistant to any pasta with red sauce. Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely adore pasta but I’ve always found pasta with a tomato-based sauce to be too sweet and lacking balance. So when Anthony wanted to make spaghetti for dinner one night, I told him he couldn’t be mad if I didn’t like it. He made a regular spaghetti and to no one’s surprise, I wasn’t impressed. I told him it needed to be spicier. It wasn’t very sweet but it still lacked balance. When he made it the second time, we began experimenting to find that balance and add that bit of spice I thought it needed.
This recipe started as a classic spaghetti but became much more. We still call it Firehouse Spaghetti although now we’ve learned that bucatini is a better noodle and our marinara turned into more of an arribbiata. The story of how Anthony and I came up with this recipe is actually kind of funny. Anthony was making his classic spaghetti sauce and began adding freshly cracked black pepper from our grinder when the grinder failed and all of the black peppercorns suddenly poured into the sauce. I was busy prepping the garlic bread and didn’t notice, so Anthony quietly began fishing the peppercorns out of the sauce.
When he served it, he told me to be careful as there was a small chance I would bite right into a whole peppercorn. We laughed about it and proceeded with caution. While carefully eating our spaghetti, I realized this was the best spaghetti I had ever had. I actually enjoyed it.
Anthony continued to make it and we tried to recreate that exceptional flavor we found after he had soaked the peppercorns. Adding more pepper didn’t work, subbing for red pepper flakes wasn’t quite right, tossing in fresh red chili peppers created too much heat… so we decided to try to recreate the happy peppercorn accident in a more controlled manner. We added them to a tea infuser and let them cook in the sauce. Delightful! It was perfect and here we share it with you so you can experience this complex dish without having to accidentally spill peppercorns in your sauce.
I think this recipe is a great example of how accidents are only ever accidents if you don’t learn from them. Instead of throwing the sauce away and calling it ruined, we had a little fun and learned that this was exactly what we were looking for in this dish!
The Details
This recipe feeds 5 – 8 depending on serving size.
Prep time: 30 minutes
Cook time: 25 minutes
The Ingredients
- 16 oz bucatini pasta (or other similar pasta)
- Meatballs of your choice (optional)
- 2 lbs lean ground beef
- 1/2 white onion, diced
- 3 tablespoons minced garlic
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1/2 tablespoon dried oregano
- 1/2 tablespoon dried basil
- 1 teaspoon sugar
- 6 oz tomato paste
- 15 oz tomato sauce
- 7.75 oz hot tomato sauce (we use El Pato)
- 14 oz crushed tomatoes
- 1 tablespoon whole black peppercorns
- 1 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
- Salt & pepper to taste
The Equipment
- Tea infuser (choose one that is all metal that can be fully submerged in the sauce)
- Meat thermometer for the meatballs, if cooking from raw
- Large saucepan
- Large pot
- Strainer
The Steps
Step One – Cook the Ground Beef: Heat the saucepan over medium-high heat and add olive oil. When the olive oil is hot, add the ground beef and stir to break it apart. You want to cook the ground beef until there is no pink left. While the meat is cooking, season lightly with some salt, pepper, garlic powder, and onion powder. You don’t want to add too much seasoning at this stage.
Step Two –
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