Easy Bake: Italian Bachelor Spaghetti

The phone rings. Your friend is a mess. She's been sacked/ dumped/demoted or all of the above. So you say "Casa mia, casa tua" and she's on the way with a bottle of red. The only problem is a) you're skint and b)there's nothing in the house but hard bread, spaghetti, olive oil and a slightly suspect head of garlic. Under these circumstances, times call for Italian Bachelor Spaghetti!

This recipe was passed down to me by a little Italian man in a tiny Italian flat...about 18 months ago in Vauxhall. Though it's simple, it's delicious. Even my little brother, who only diets on chicken fingers and fries, gobbled this up. So to begin:

1. Fill a large saucepan with enough water to cook your spaghetti in. Put it on to boil.
2. Once the water begins to bubble, put in about 165 g of pasta (approx. a 1/3 of a box) for the two of you.
3. Heat a generous amount of oil in a pan and heat on medium.
4. Peel a couple of garlic cloves and toss them into the oil to give it flavour. Once the garlic begins to brown, remove them from the oil.
5. Answer the door, hug your friend and open the wine she's been clutching. Generously pour two large glasses.
6. Put the dried bread into a large sandwich bag and pass your friend a rolling pin. Convince her to roll the bread into crumbs and not hit it.
7. Take a piece of pasta and throw it at the wall. If it sticks, it's done.
8. Drain the pasta then cool it quickly by rinsing it in cold water.
9. Refill your wine glasses.
10. Mix the bread crumbs, the garlic infused oil and the pasta together until the noodles are completely coated in crumbs. Add salt, pepper and serve.

This should be enough carbs to heal a broken heart for the night especially if it's accompanied with plenty of red wine. It's also good for an all weekend Godfather marathon or vegging out in front of your favorite omnibus. Buon appetito!

Photo by Ishikawa Takanori