Alla Nerano
Fried zucchini, aged provolone, basil, and starchy pasta water, a creamy sauce that contains no cream. From the fishing village of Nerano on the Amalfi Coast, made famous by Stanley Tucci.
Spaghetti alla Nerano comes from the village of Nerano, on the Sorrento Peninsula above the Amalfi Coast. The dish is said to have been born in 1952 in the kitchen of the Maria Grazia trattoria, when a visiting prince was fed from whatever the pantry held, the last zucchini of the garden, provolone, pecorino, spaghetti, and a handful of basil. The restaurant still guards the recipe. What is known is that the zucchini is fried, cooled, and worked into the sauce, and the creaminess is pure technique.
Only a few ingredients
Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Generous, enough to fry the zucchini in batches. It doubles as the base of the sauce later. The good stuff, though it need not be your most expensive.
Zucchini
Sliced into thin coins. Fry until deeply golden. This is the flavour of the dish and it is not negotiable. Drain, salt lightly, and set aside. The resting time lets the oil settle and the sweetness develop.
small, freshGarlic
Crushed, into a little of the frying oil. Thirty seconds, just enough to perfume it. The zucchini returns here with a splash of pasta water and is broken into a paste.
Pasta Water
A ladle of starchy water into the zucchini paste. The starch is what makes this sauce creamy without cream. It is the vehicle for the cheese.
Provolone
Aged provolone, grated fine. Off the heat entirely, tossed hard with the pasta until it melts into a glossy, silky coat. The pan too hot and it seizes.
aged, not smokedBasilico Genovese DOP
Torn in at the very end, when the flame is off. It brightens the creaminess without getting cooked flat.
Creamy, and there is no cream in it.
The silkiness of Nerano is not cream. It is the fried zucchini mashed into a paste, combined with starchy pasta water and an aged cheese worked in off the heat, the same cacio e pepe principle that runs through the best Roman pasta. Cream muffles the zucchini and misses the entire point of the dish.
Spaghetti
The classic pairing, the strands carry the creamy coat evenly.
Vermicelli
Slightly thinner, slightly more delicate. The Neapolitan alternative.
Ready to cook?
These sources we trust. Each one makes it correctly.
Other sauces from the same region
Marinara
A Neapolitan sauce with no pretensions. Tomato, garlic, oil, basil, oregano, done in the time it takes to boil the pasta. Simplicity is not the same as easy.
Alle Vongole
The sea served on pasta. Clams, white wine, garlic, parsley, nothing added, nothing covered up.
Puttanesca
A bold, pungent sauce of Neapolitan street food. Built on tomatoes, olives, capers, and anchovies, complex, salty, assertive, and unapologetic.
La Genovese
A Neapolitan ragù built on time and onions. The beef is there, but the onions are the sauce, slow-cooked until they collapse entirely into something sweet, dark, and unlike anything else in Campania.
Colatura di Alici
Colatura from Cetara, the direct descendant of Roman garum. Added raw at the end. The anchovy does all the work.
Alla Carrettiera
Garlic, chili, parsley, and oil, with cherry tomatoes to distinguish it from aglio e olio. A cart-driver's sauce from Campania, designed to be made on the road.
Al Limone
Butter, lemon, and Parmigiano. From the Amalfi Coast, where the lemons are so fragrant they define the landscape. Three ingredients, and every one of them must be excellent.
Alla Natalina
Spaghetti from the Neapolitan countryside, anchovies melted into the oil, walnuts, pine nuts, sultanas, olives, and tomato. Salty, sweet, and completely surprising. The anchovies disappear. Their flavour stays.