moroccan spaghetti

as the weather in nyc change from cool to "nowhere to hide" cold, i hazily relive the dog days of summer by remembering what i cooked and what my inspiration was. i remembered cooking a vegetarian dish, with the intention of adding it to our "kinda growing" recipes for our meatless mondays, otherwise known as "mea-mo", which sometimes become "mea-tue", "mea-we" and well, you know. . . marrakesh was an inspiration but i mostly wanted to use the cinnamon, turmeric and cloves that have been gathering dust in the pantry. and, almost perfectly enough, i have this book of vegetarian recipes called "the accidental vegetarian" by simon rimmer that i stumbled upon barnes and noble a few years back.

auditory pairing: rock the casbah - the clash

in this recipe, you would need about 10 oz of dried spaghetti, 1/2 c of olive oil, 1 finely chopped onion, 2 crushed garlic cloves, 8 finely chopped tomatoes, 1 tsp of ground cinnamon, 1 tsp of ground cumin, a pinch of turmeric, 1 c of toasted, slivered almonds, 1/2 c of cooked garbanzo beans, fresh parsley, fresh cilantro leaves, fresh mint leaves, salt and pepper.

1. cook the spaghetti in boiling water, i add salt generously in the pot.
2. meanwhile, heat the oil in a pan and gently fry the onion and garlic until soft.
3. add the tomatoes, cinnamon, cumin and turmeric over a medium heat for about 15-20 minutes until the tomatoes kinda break down.
4. season the sauce with salt and pepper and then add the almonds and chickpeas.
5. drain the pasta, fold the herbs into the sauce and mix with the pasta.

it's of that crazy casbah jive good.