BUTTER AND FRESH SAGE SAUCE

Butter and Fresh Sage Sauce image

Yield for 1 pound of pasta

Number Of Ingredients 5

8 to 12 tablespoons (1 to 1 1/2 sticks) butter, to taste!
10 whole fresh sage leaves
Hot water from the pasta-cooking pot
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper, or to taste
1 cup grated Parmigiano-Reggiano or Grana Padano

Steps:

Melt the butter in the pan over medium heat, lay in the sage leaves, and heat until the butter is sizzling gently. Toast the leaves for 1 minute or so.
Ladle in 1 cup boiling pasta water; stir the sauce, and simmer for about 2 minutes, reducing liquid by half, before adding pasta. Grind the black pepper directly into the sauce.
Keep the sauce hot over very low heat; return to a simmer just before adding pasta.
Finish cooked pasta and sauce in the skillet. Off the heat, toss in the cheese just before serving.
Substitute about twenty shredded leaves of basil (1/2 cup packed) for the sage leaves. Long thin dry pastas like capellini or long flat-cut fresh pastas are good with this.
Fresh pastas
Gnocchi
Gnudi
Ravioli
Or a box of ziti, if that's all you have