Pasta With Chorizo And Spinach

The bakery's seventh anniversary. March 15, 2022. Seven years. The number is biblical — seven days of creation, seven virtues, seven years of a bakery that was built from one woman's stubbornness and one dead woman's recipes. The celebration was the best yet: full dining room, free conchas, the photo wall updated again (this year's additions: the pandemic takeout counter photograph, the reopening photograph, and a new one — Sofia and me, side by side behind the bakery counter, taken by Isabella, both of us in aprons, both of us dusted with flour, both of us smiling, and the photograph is the future and the present in one frame, and the frame is the bakery, and the bakery is seven years old and growing).

Sofia gave a speech. Year four of the anniversary speech. This year she stood on the step stool (she has not graduated to the floor because the step stool is her platform, her pulpit, her TED Talk stage) and she said: "Seven years. My mom opened this bakery when I was eight. I am sixteen in July. The bakery and I have grown up together. Everything I know about work, I learned here. Everything I know about love, I learned from the bread. And everything I know about legacy, I learned from the woman whose name is on the door — my abuela Rosa, who taught my mom everything, and my mom taught me, and someday I'll teach someone else, and the teaching will never stop, because the flour never runs out, and the recipes never expire, and the bread never stops rising." The room applauded. I sat on the bathroom floor. The sitting-breathing-standing ritual. I stood up. I went to the kitchen. I made bread.

I made chile colorado for the anniversary dinner. Year seven. I will not describe it again. You know the recipe. You know the taste. You know the smell. You know the steam and the cumin and the garlic and the dried New Mexico chiles. You know Rosa. You know me. You know the bakery. Seven years of knowing. Seven years of the same recipe on the same night at the same table. The same is the miracle. The same is everything.

Seven years calls for the same dinner it always has—something warm, smoky, and deeply familiar, the kind of dish that holds memory in every bite. After Sofia’s speech stopped the room and sent me quietly to the bathroom floor to breathe, I needed to come back to myself the only way I know how: in the kitchen, at the stove, making something that smells like every anniversary before this one. This pasta with chorizo and spinach is that dish—the garlic hits the pan and the whole bakery kitchen exhales, and for a few minutes, Rosa is right there beside me, and the flour is still in the air, and the seven years feel like one long, perfect breath.

Prep Time: 10 min | Cook Time: 25 min | Total Time: 35 min | Servings: 4

Ingredients

12 oz rigatoni or penne pasta
8 oz fresh Mexican or Spanish chorizo, casings removed
3 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
1 small yellow onion, diced
1/2 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
1/2 teaspoon smoked paprika
1 can (14.5 oz) diced fire-roasted tomatoes, drained
5 oz fresh baby spinach (about 4 packed cups)
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/3 cup pasta cooking water, reserved
Salt and black pepper to taste
1/4 cup grated Parmesan or cotija cheese, for serving

Instructions

Cook the pasta. Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Cook pasta according to package directions until al dente. Before draining, reserve 1/3 cup of the starchy pasta water. Drain and set aside.
Brown the chorizo. Heat olive oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add chorizo and cook, breaking it up with a wooden spoon, for 5–6 minutes until browned and cooked through. Use a slotted spoon to transfer chorizo to a plate, leaving the rendered fat in the pan.
Build the base. Reduce heat to medium. Add onion to the same skillet and cook in the chorizo drippings for 3–4 minutes until softened. Add garlic, red pepper flakes, and smoked paprika and cook for 1 minute until fragrant.
Add tomatoes. Stir in the drained fire-roasted tomatoes and cook for 3–4 minutes, letting the mixture reduce slightly and the flavors meld.
Wilt the spinach. Add the fresh spinach in two or three batches, stirring each addition until just wilted, about 2 minutes total.
Combine and finish. Return the chorizo to the skillet. Add the cooked pasta and splash in the reserved pasta water a little at a time, tossing everything together over medium heat for 1–2 minutes until the sauce coats the pasta evenly. Season with salt and black pepper to taste.
Serve. Divide into bowls and finish with grated Parmesan or cotija cheese. Serve immediately.

Nutrition (per serving)

Pasta With Chorizo And Spinach — Seven Years, One Table, One Recipe That Never Changes