Pasta with Prosciutto

The Senior promotion was announced on Monday. A flurry of congratulations in Slack, a very nice LinkedIn post from Priya, a bottle of champagne from my team delivered to the condo. James held it up and said, "Do we open it?" I said, "No. Not yet. I don't have the bandwidth for celebration this week." He put it on top of the fridge. It is still there. We will open it when something else happens that deserves champagne. Or when we run out of things to celebrate and need to manufacture an occasion. Either way.

The first week of being Senior has not been different from the week before except that Priya is now CC-ing me on things that used to go only to the principals on our team. The scope is widening. I noticed this week how much of my time is meetings now. I used to code eight hours a day. I code maybe two hours a day now, if I am lucky. I am not yet sure what I think about this transition. I suspect I will think negative things about it eventually.

Nine weeks, waiting. The database envelope I have checked approximately six thousand times. No email. I am in the normal range. I am in the normal range. I am repeating this like a mantra. Dr. Yoon suggested I build a ritual around the waiting so I was not checking the inbox all day. I built one: every morning, I check once at 9 AM Pacific. Every evening, I check once at 9 PM Pacific. The rest of the day, email is closed for that account. It has been two days. I have broken the ritual three times. Progress is nonlinear.

I made janchi guksu on Friday. Long-life banquet noodles. A clear broth with a slice of yellow egg and a slice of white egg and chopped green onion and thin-sliced zucchini and dried seaweed. It is a celebratory dish. I did not make it for a celebration. I made it because I needed something gentle and the noodles take eight minutes. James ate two bowls and said, "This is the first thing you've cooked all month that tastes happy." I said, "That's because I wasn't paying attention to whether it was happy. I was just feeding us." He said, "That's probably why."

Karen is learning to live with the diagnosis. She has started physical therapy. She has started an app on her phone that reminds her when to take the medication. David has taken over the grocery shopping, which he is terrible at, and they laugh about this together in a way that seems new. Some couples, I am realizing, are held together in part by the small shared inconveniences of adapting. David buying the wrong kind of pasta. Karen correcting him with enough grace to not humiliate. They are still learning each other at age sixty-five and sixty-seven. It is, in its own way, a kind of proof.

The recipe this week is janchi guksu. Clean, clear, celebratory. A soup for banquets, or Tuesdays. A soup for whatever you need it to be.

Janchi guksu is the dish I made that Friday, but when I went looking for something to leave here — a recipe you could actually cook from — I kept circling back to the same instinct: long noodles, a light hand, something that comes together before you have time to think too hard about why you need it. Pasta with prosciutto is that dish for me in a different season. It has the same quality as those banquet noodles — a little ceremony, very little effort, the kind of thing that tastes like you meant it even when you were just feeding yourself through a Tuesday. If you are waiting for something, or working toward something, or quietly marking something that does not yet have a name, this is the recipe for that.

Prep Time: 10 minutes | Cook Time: 20 minutes | Total Time: 30 minutes | Servings: 4

Ingredients

12 oz linguine or spaghetti
4 oz prosciutto, thinly sliced and torn into pieces
3 tablespoons olive oil
3 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 cup dry white wine
1/2 cup reserved pasta cooking water
1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese, plus more for serving
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
Salt and black pepper to taste
Fresh basil leaves, for garnish

Instructions

Cook the pasta. Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Cook linguine or spaghetti according to package directions until al dente. Before draining, reserve 1/2 cup of the starchy pasta cooking water. Drain and set aside.
Crisp the prosciutto. While the pasta cooks, heat 1 tablespoon of the olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add the torn prosciutto in a single layer and cook for 2–3 minutes, turning once, until lightly crisped at the edges. Transfer to a plate and set aside. Do not discard the drippings in the pan.
Build the base. Add the remaining 2 tablespoons of olive oil to the same skillet over medium-low heat. Add the garlic and red pepper flakes and cook, stirring frequently, for about 1 minute until fragrant and just golden. Do not let the garlic brown.
Deglaze the pan. Pour in the white wine and increase heat to medium. Simmer for 2–3 minutes, scraping up any browned bits from the bottom of the pan, until the wine is reduced by about half.
Finish the pasta. Add the drained pasta directly to the skillet. Toss to coat, adding the reserved pasta water a splash at a time until the sauce loosens and clings to the noodles. Remove from heat and stir in the Parmesan until melted and glossy. Season with salt and black pepper.
Serve. Divide into bowls and top with the crisped prosciutto pieces, fresh basil, and extra Parmesan as desired. Serve immediately.

Nutrition (per serving)

Pasta with Prosciutto — Noodles for No Occasion in Particular