In 2020 mom and I were planning to tour Italy, but because of the pandemic and travel restrictions for obvious reasons we didn’t go. I’ve been twice, but mom has not, so we were going to visit 4 major cities, and a number of smaller towns: Venice, Florence, Rome and the Amalfi Coast. One of the joys of traveling to Italy is the delicious regional cuisine. So this week’s meal is an omage to the beautiful cities on the Amalfi Coast (Positano, Ravello, Sorrento and the island of Capri).

The lemons in Amalfi are double the size of ours, and have a special taste. The coastline is protected from the cold northern wind by the mountains, and exposed to the sea breezes and sun from that give it them the unique flavor. The juice and slices are used to flavor seafood, sorbets, limoncello. I could always picture myself having a lemon tree on the property of my Italian villa, where I pick my lemons as needed.

I found the recipe for this dish on the Milk Street Website. It was appealing primarily in the way it used the lemons differently than I have before – pasta water infused with strips of lemon zest, and then chopped up to toss with the noodles. We also briefly cooked lemon segments for the sauce. Unfortunately I don’t have access to the beautiful Italian lemons, but to mimic their flavor, we temper their tartness and acidity with a little sugar.

Overall the pasta was tasty, but an hour afterwards there was a lemony after taste in my mouth. We sprinkled Parmesan cheese on top, which added to the flavor. Mom bought some pitzells from Carlinos, so we had them for dessert, but they still didn’t remove the after taste.

When I make it again? Yes, but with some adjustments. I would not include diced peels with the pasta, and increase the garlic. Of the dishes I’ve made so far, this is my least favorite, but easy to make.

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