Haitian Spaghetti

by Hynndie Ozirus on March 09 2021

Saturday Morning, I usually wake up, look at my phone and do yoga. I saw my mother taking out pasta noodles. I stopped and asked what she was doing. She replied in making Spa-get-ti ( Haitian people say spaghetti differently). She asked me if  I wanted to make it (she will come to check on me in the kitchen to make sure I mix it correctly). I told her off, of course.

Before I started the spaghetti, I want to make sure I get the proper ingredients out. I asked, “ Mama, what are the ingredients?”, she replied with a sassy attitude ( I love and adore her attitude).

Ingredient:

1 1/2 box of the spaghetti of your choice

12 oz container of pasta sauce 

Two onions cut up 

Two small can of king oscar anchovies

12 oz Bag of shrimp ( I cleaned the shrimp with hot water and lemon)

Hillshire farm smoke beef Sausage ( sliced)

Two cloves of garlic or a scoop of minced garlic 

Matouk’s Hot pepper sauce the salsa Picante

3 BLack gloves 

Once you have the ingredients, let’s start cooking delicious spaghetti.

I first put the water to boil with a little salt, not too much. Then add the black cloves. The cloves add a bit of extra spice to the pasta. She ended up putting too much salt, so I had placed more water inside. Put some oil in the water, so the pasta doesn’t stick together. After the water boils, put in your pasta. Check on your pasta. It doesn’t have to be fully cooked because I will cook it all the way because we are going to cook it in the sauce. Strain the pasta but put aside some of the pasta water for the sauce for later. Leave the pasta on the side. My mother made fun of me because I almost dropped the noodles in the sink. “You already messing up.”

Next, I drizzled olive oil in the pan to fry (cook) the sausage. Don’t put the fire too high like I accidentally did and burned the sausage’s bottom, but it was still edible. My mom said, “ Make it nice and brown like a tall brown man .”Remove the sausage from the pan and set it aside from the plate. 

Now with the excess oil inside the pan, add the garlic, anchovies, and onions. Stir them together until the anchovies melt. You will see the anchovies turn brown; it means it has melted. My mother came in and added slices of bell pepper. She said it’s optional, but she loves it in there; even my brother will pick it out when he eats it later—Cook the shrimp with the ingredients in the pot.

Put hot pepper sauce to make it spicy, only two tablespoons if you don’t want it to be very spicy. My mom just shook it inside the pan, which made it spicy. Only my brother and I love spicy food. She sees me add hot sauce to my food, and she looks at me crazy. We used Matouk’s Hot pepper sauce, the salsa Picante one, but you can use any hot sauce that you have in your house. I like the hot pepper sauce because it has less vinegar and has spices that add extra flavor to the pasta sauce.

Pour in the pasta sauce of your choice. We used prego. After all, we didn’t have time to make our own because we were starving. Add a tablespoon of tomato paste and stir it very well. Then pour in the leftover pasta water you set aside and mix it very well. 

Finally, add the pasta noodles, stir them all together with all of the ingredients. My mother said, “ Can you believe people out here leaving the noodle naked, then put the sauce on top and not mix it.” Then taste if you are missing anything. My mom added some parmesan cheese at the end. Then all done, we made easy delicious Haitian spaghetti for brunch.

I always enjoy cooking with my mother. We always crack jokes at each other and talk about what is going on with our lives. Cooking brings us closer to each other.