Copywriters’ Kitchen Manifesto
Why fast-living people need slow food

You don’t fool me.

You may have a Live Simply that Others May Simply Live bumper sticker slapped on your Prius, but I know the truth.

Your life is very complicated. And you’re busy. As busy as I am. All the time.

What to do about it?

Step into Copywriters’ Kitchen.

You can change the world with a bowl of noodles.

You can find inner peace with a cup of navy bean soup. You can hold family together with a plate of mashed potatoes.

That’s the premise at Copywriters’ Kitchen. The blog is written for busy people like you. Creative workers, artists, parents, students who want to make and eat simple, satisfying home-cooked meals.

Meals that let you recharge, relax and reconnect with family and friends.

Copywriters’ Kitchen Manifesto

Like you, I have prejudices about food and cooking.

Here’s what I believe in:

• Scratch-cooked meals made by hands that love and respect food.
• Kitchen magic, the pinch of powder that leavens, the mixing that aerates, food’s elemental transformation from solid to liquid to air to fire. And—woo-woo—I believe in the alchemy of home cooking. I believe in its power to heal, bind, give pleasure and enhance life’s most important rituals from birth to death.
• Love as the essential ingredient in all delicious food. Not just love for the people for whom you cook. But a healthy regard for yourself: You show self-respect through commitment to food preparation and sitting at table each day.

  As you appreciate foods’ origins, you feel loving humility for the sacrifices made to feed you: The exchange of money for groceries. The workers who labor to plant, harvest, steward and butcher. For the animals that live and die to nourish you. For the Earth’s bounty.

• Healthy, ethically grown ingredients: I like Michael Pollan’s advice to “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.” Half of my family is sensibly near-vegan like me. Others are unapologetic children of Cain.

  As a compromise I buy pastured, grass-fed meat and chickens raised by a farmer I know. I buy milk from a family-run dairy that pastures its cows.

• No food fascism: Since I’m picky about meat and dairy, you’d think I’d be strict about organic produce. But here illogic reigns: When I can, I do buy organic veggies. But if availability, selection—and my shrunken wallet—dictate otherwise,I buy plain ole.

  My definition of “scratch cooking” is idiosyncratic. Canned Italian tomatoes? Yes. Canned peas? No. Bouillon cubes? Yes. Hamburger Helper? No. Frozen corn? American cheese? Bottled lemon juice? Yes, no, sometimes.

  I gratefully use selected “convenience” ingredients if they help me whip dinner together in 20 minutes so I can sit down and eat with my family.

Bucatini all’Amatriciana is one of those divine quick recipes that can be made with canned Italian plum tomatoes and not suffer a bit. Try my recipe, below.

And then tell me about you. What’s your Kitchen Manifesto?

Bucatini all’Amatriciana

This spicy pasta is traditionally served during Ferragosto, Italy’s August holiday. But it’s so delicious and easy to make, we serve it all year long in Copywriters’ Kitchen.

Originating in Amatrice, a town outside Rome near the Lazio-Abruzzo border, this pasta takes only 20-30 minutes to put together.

A bowl of Bucatini all’Amatriciana makes a meal if it’s just you and la famiglia. But this pasta stands up credibly as a company dish as well. Just round out the meal with a seasonal salad, loaf of crusty bread and bottle of your favorite Italian wine.

4 oz. guanciale, pancetta or bacon, diced (optional)
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 Italian sweet pepper, diced
½ teaspoon dry red pepper flakes
½ cup dry white wine
1 pound Italian tomatoes, peeled, seeded and chopped; or 1 can Italian tomatoes, chopped
Salt, to taste
1 pound bucatini or spaghetti
3/4 cup grated pecorino cheese

1. In a large pasta pot, heat four quarts of salted water for the bucatini. (Bucatini is long, slender hollow pasta. If you can’t find it, substitute spaghetti.)
2. In a medium-sized skillet, heat the olive oil over medium flame.
3. Chop the guanciale, pancetta or bacon. Guanciale is smoked pork jowl. You can buy grass-fed smoked pork jowl or bacon from Sap Bush Hollow Farm—always my first choice for delicious, humanely raised meat. (Tell owner Adele Hayes that Lorraine Thompson sent you.) You can also buy imported guanciale at better Italian salumerias. There are a number in the Bronx, New York City’s Arthur Avenue neighborhood. Vegetarians, leave out the pork altogether.
4. Okay. If you’re using pork, add it to the heated olive oil—oil should be heated to just below smoking point before adding pork. Throw in the pork, stirring to cook on all sides. Lower the flame to keep the meat from browning. Cook, stirring occasionally, for 5 minutes.
5. Stir in the diced Italian peppers and red pepper flakes. Cook, stirring occasionally, until Italian peppers soften—about 5 minutes.
6. Pour in the white wine. Bring to boil. Lower flame and simmer until wine almost completely evaporates.
7. If using meat, use slotted spoon to remove pork. Reserve.
8. Add the tomatoes to the peppers and simmer for 15 minutes. Taste and add salt, if needed—guanciale is very salty.
9. Add reserved meat and stir. Keep on lowest flame while you boil the bucatini or other pasta until al dente.
10. Drain pasta, then toss it back into the pot.
11. Pour sauce over pasta, add cheese and toss until pasta is well coated. Spoon pasta into large bowl and serve immediately. Pass extra cheese at table.

Buon appetito!