Quick

In springtime, when farmers’ markets sell really fresh, locally grown asparagus—or if you’re lucky enough to pick spears in your own asparagus bed—cook them by the skillet method. You’ll find it concentrates the natural sweetness and subtle asparagus flavors that are at their peak for only a day or two. Butter and cheese are natural complements to asparagus, and here they both get a final delicious toasting. For details on how I trim asparagus—and a fine cooking method for the year-round spears that have been shipped to supermarkets—see the Scallion and Asparagus Salad recipe (page 35).

Marinara with the addition of canned tuna and capers makes a great pasta sauce.

This is a fine fast sauce for Shrimp and Tomato Ravioli and Simple Ricotta Ravioli (preceding recipes) as well as for Potato, Leek, and Bacon Ravioli (page 186). Make the sauce just before the ravioli come out of the pot, for the freshest taste. You should definitely peel the tomatoes for this: see my method on page 261.

Spinach pasta is essential to Pasticciata Bolognese (page 200), but you can enjoy it in all the cuts and shapes of fresh pasta. It is best to start prepping the spinach well ahead of time, as detailed in the recipe, for the best texture. You can always freeze the dough until you need it. Spinach pasta is usually more moist than other fresh pastas and so will cook more quickly.

Marinara is my quintessential anytime tomato sauce. I can start it when the pasta water goes on the stove and it will be ready when the pasta is just cooked. Yet, in its short cooking time, it develops such fine flavor and pleasing consistency that you may well want to make a double batch—using some right away and freezing the rest for suppers to come. The beauty of this marinara sauce is that it has a freshness, acidity, and simplicity of taste, in contrast to the complexity and mellowness of the long-cooking tomato sauce that follows. This recipe for marinara includes lots of fresh basil, which I keep in the house at all times, now that it is available in local supermarkets year-round. I cook a whole basil stalk (or a handful of big sprigs with many leaves attached) submerged in the tomatoes to get all the herb flavor. Then I remove these and finish the sauce and pasta with fresh shredded leaves, giving it another layer of fresh-basil taste. (If you are freezing some of the sauce, by the way, you can wait until you’re cooking with it to add the fresh-basil garnish.) This sauce can be your base for cooking any fish fillet, chicken breast, pork fillet, or veal scaloppini. Sear any of these in a pan, add some marinara sauce, season with your favorite herbs, and let it perk for a few minutes—you’ll have yourself a good dish.

Corn is a nice addition to minestra—it adds texture and sweetness. It is also a good addition to other vegetable soups, such as fresh fennel, zucchini, or chicory and white bean.

Cook rice just before serving to get the consistency of soup you like: 1/4 cup of rice per quart of base for a lighter minestra, and up to 1/2 cup of rice for a hefty and hearty minestra.

Raw spinach salad can be delicious, but, in my opinion, a brief cooking—really just a dip in boiling water—brings out the vegetable’s best qualities. Use really young, tender spinach for this salad. It’s easy to find baby spinach in plastic packs these days, but whenever you can—especially in springtime—buy clusters of tender leaves with tiny reddish stems joined at the roots, as they were plucked from the earth. Trim only the hairy tip of the roots, and cook the leaves and stems still together. Make sure you wash them several times, since dirt lodges between the stems.

These small frittate make a wonderful appetizer cut in wedges and served at room temperature. Or serve one per person as a nice lunch dish. We always thought they were best made in the springtime, when nettles, fennel fronds, young shoots of wild asparagus, or ramps could be gathered in the fields. But if you are more city-bound, you can infuse the eggs with fresh thyme leaves, parsley, and chives, which you can get year-round.

In Sicily, citrus fruits (agrumi) are enjoyed as a savory as well as a sweet, usually served between courses or at the end of a meal. A salad—called pirettu—is made from thick-skinned citrons (cedri). The green rind is peeled off, the center pulp is discarded, and the pith is sliced and dressed with salt, pepper, oil, and a pinch of sugar. Since fresh citrons are hard to find in America, here’s another citrus salad popular in Sicily, especially in the winter months, when oranges are at their best. Customarily it is made with blood oranges—sanguine or tarocchi—and that’s the way I like it best, though any small, juicy oranges will be delicious. Serve this in the Sicilian style, laying the rounds of orange and rings of red onion artfully on a platter with the dressing drizzled over, rather than tossing everything together. It is great as an appetizer, a refreshing end-of-the-meal salad, or an accompaniment to boiled or grilled meats.

Maltagliati means “badly cut” and is usually applied to fresh homemade pasta. Here I give you a shortcut way to enjoy the shape by breaking up dry lasagna sheets. If you want to make fresh maltagliati, follow the recipe for pasutice on page 20—the regional names vary, but the shape is the same. When using fresh pasta, remember you need more cooking water and you must stir maltagliati frequently, as the flat pieces have a tendency to stick. And if you don’t have lasagna, a long dry pasta such as fusilli lunghi or spaghetti will also be delicious with this sauce.

Here is a classic pasta, as delicious as it is simple and fast. But because it is such a minimalist creation, every ingredient is of utmost importance. Use a very good authentic pecorino, one produced in Lazio (the Italian region where Rome is located), Tuscany, or Sardinia. The cheese is at its best when aged only 8 to 10 months. And grind the black peppercorns just before making the dish—I like to crush the black pepper by hand in a mortar, into coarse bits that explode with flavor as I enjoy the pasta.