Summer pasta alla caprese

Pasta and macaroni Italian cuisine

My mother has always been great at "cooking by feel," and I owe her a lot of credit for any ability I possess in this domain. I remember many a warm summer night when, motivated by a strong aversion to turning on the oven, my mother would whip up a quick pasta with a no-cook sauce. One of my favorite iterations was a variation on a popular theme: pasta with raw tomatoes, garlic, olive oil, and sometimes basil. (In case you missed them, there have been countless versions of this pasta published since the 1970s, including this one from Nigella Lawson in the New York Times). This room temperature pasta -- almost a pasta salad, really -- along with a big green salad, made the perfect dinner for a balmy summer evening. My version incorporates finely chopped red onion in place of the classic garlic, but otherwise it's true to my mother's original recipe.