ZITI WITH SAUSAGE, ONIONS, AND FENNEL

Steps:

• Heat 6 quarts of water with the tablespoon of kosher salt to boiling in the pasta-cooking pot.
• Remove the sausage from its casing and break the meat up a bit with your fingers.
• Trim the fennel bulb (see box and photos, pages 78-79). Slice the bulb in half lengthwise, then slice each half in 1/4-inch-thick lengthwise slices. Separate the slivers of fennel if they are attached at the bottom; cut the long slivers in half so you have about 3 cups of 2-inch-long matchsticks of fennel. Chop and reserve 1/3 cup fronds for garnish.
• Have the remaining sauce ingredients ready and nearby.
• Pour the olive oil into the skillet and set it over medium-high heat. Add the sausage meat and cook, stirring and breaking it up more with a wooden spoon, until it is sizzling and beginning to brown, about 1 1/2 minutes.
• Push the sausage a bit aside and drop the onion slices into a clear part of the pan; sauté, stirring, till they're sizzling and wilting, another 2 minutes or so, then stir them in with the meat.
• Following the illustrations, clear a space and drop in the fennel; let it heat up and wilt for 1 minute or more, then stir it around with the sausage and onions.
• Sprinkle on 1/4 teaspoon salt; drop the peperoncino in a hot spot and toast the flakes for 1/2 minute, then stir them in.
• Clear a good-sized hot spot in the center of the pan, plop in the tomato paste, and cook, stirring it in the spot for a good minute or more, until it is sizzling and caramelizing; then stir it in with everything else.
• Ladle 3 cups of boiling pasta water from the pot into the skillet, stir well, and bring the liquid to a boil. Adjust the heat to maintain an active simmer all over the pan.
• Drop the ziti in the boiling water in the pasta pot. Stir and bring back to the boil. Cook about 8 minutes (a minute less than what is recommended on the package), until the ziti are not quite al dente.
• Continue to simmer the sauce until the flavors have developed and the fennel is soft but not mushy, 6 minutes or more. The sauce should not get too thick: stir in another cup or two of boiling pasta water if it reduces rapidly. When the sauce is done, taste it and add more salt if you want. If the pasta is not ready, turn down the heat to keep the sauce at a very low simmer until the ziti are on their way-then turn the heat up.
• As soon as the ziti are ready by your timing, lift them out of the pot with a spider. Let excess water drip off only for an instant, and drop the wet cylinders into the simmering sauce.
• Start tossing pasta and sauce together; ladle in more water if the sauce seems too thick.
• Sprinkle over all the chopped fennel fronds, and continue to cook and toss the ziti in the skillet for 2 minutes, or until they are perfectly al dente and coated with sauce. If the pasta appears dry, ladle in more hot pasta water; if it is soupy, cook rapidly to thicken the sauce.
• Remove the skillet from the heat, sprinkle the grated cheese over the ziti, and toss it in.
• In Italian, the verb we use to describe the final dressing of the pasta with sauce is condire-translated, "to season, to flavor." And the phrase condire la pasta reminds us that the sauce should be considered a condiment, an enhancement to the pasta.
• I like to think of pasta, especially fresh egg pastas, as playing the leading role in the pasta dish. So why drown the chief protagonist before the drama has started?
• Keep these ideas in mind when you bring your pasta and sauce together in a skillet. If you see that the quantity of sauce is disproportionate to the pasta, spoon some out (and save it, of course) before tossing and finishing the dish. And if you see that the sauce is soupy and collects in the bottom of the skillet, raise the heat while tossing the pasta actively, evaporating the excess water and thickening the sauce so it adheres to the pasta.
• For 1 pound of pasta, bring 6 quarts of water to a full boil (too little water produces a gummy pasta; too much water washes away too much starch).
• Stir 1 tablespoon kosher or coarse sea salt into the water anytime before adding pasta.
• Adding pasta to the pot: Drop shaped and tubular pasta into the boiling water and stir well. Slip long pasta into the water and push the strands under gradually as they soften, bending them into the water, then stirring well to make sure the strands are separated.
• After adding pasta, cover the pot and return water to the boil over high heat.
• Be prepared to uncover the pot before the water boils over.
• Tip: if the water is boiling up and over, blow on it to settle it down.
• Start timing the pasta when the boil resumes.
• For dry pastas that will finish in the skillet, cook in the pot for 2 minutes less than the minimum time given on the package.
• Cook pasta at a rolling boil, either partly covered (you can reduce the heat and save energy) or uncovered. Stir the pasta now and then.
• Did you forget to salt the water? Better to check before the pasta is done: sip water from a wooden spoon; it should be "comfortably" salty at least.
• If you forgot to salt, add it right away: saltless pasta is redeemable while it's in the water; it will absorb some salt even in a brief boil.
• Test pasta by extracting a piece and tasting it 1 to 2 minutes before the designated time for doneness. When it is not quite done al dente, lift out with a spider, tongs, or other tool, let excess water drain into the pot, and drop the pasta with clinging water into the skillet.
• Don't discard pasta water until the dish is finished!
• Shells, rigatoni, radiatori, fettuccine