From starring in “Julie and Julia” to publishing his memoir “Taste: My Life Through Food,” it’s become clear that Stanley Tucci knows his food.
Being a big fan of pasta, when Tucci’s Emmy award-winning show, “Searching for Italy,” premiered in the UK in late February, I had to watch it.
In the first episode centered on Naples and the Amalfi Coast, one moment stuck out to me when Tucci visits the restaurant Lo Scoglio on the Bay of Nerano. It was there that he said he had a life-changing pasta dish, which he loves so much he has “yearned” for it since and even tried re-creating it at home. During the show, he saw how Chef Tommaso de Simone made the dish in the kitchen.
The dish, known as spaghetti alla Nerano, was first created in 1952 and named after the village of Nerano in Campania, according to La Cucina Italiana.
I was surprised to see how few ingredients were in the dish, which is effectively just deep-fried zucchini tossed with pasta and a tiny bit of butter, then topped with Parmesan.
How good could this pasta dish really be with just four ingredients? Even though it would require deep-frying in my apartment and having to wait overnight to soften the zucchini, I decided to find out.
Dining and Cooking