Published November 1, 2001.
Our fra diavolo recipe has a seriously garlicky, spicy, winey tomato sauce studded with sweet, firm fish. To get there, we seared and flambéed the fish with cognac to caramelize it and enrich its sweetness. Then we sautéed the garlic slowly for a mellow, nutty flavor and reserved a tablespoon of raw garlic for a last-minute punch of heat and spice. Simmering diced canned tomatoes with a splash of white wine (balanced by a bit of sugar) completed our perfect fra diavolo recipe in less than 30 minutes.
Don’t be alarmed if the monkfish sticks to the pan initially; it will loosen after the cognac has been added and flamed. One teaspoon of red pepper flakes will give the sauce a little kick, but add more to suit your taste.
Dear Friend,
These days, it’s pretty easy to get free recipes on the Internet. I’m sure a search for “roast chicken recipe” will turn up thousands and thousands. But, as with so much on the web, you should tread lightly if you don’t know the source.
In America’s Test Kitchen, our motto is, “Recipes that Work,” and our mission is to be your trusted source for recipes that work every time you use them. Our test cooks spend their days obsessively testing recipes until they offer consistently great results. As we like to say here, “We make the mistakes so you don’t have to.”
CooksIllustrated.com is the only place you can find not only 20 years' worth of our foolproof recipes, but also objective ratings of cookware, and blind taste tests for hundreds of everyday supermarket ingredients (hey, without the proper ingredients and equipment you can still run into problems — no matter how good the recipe).
Let me make a simple, no-nonsense offer. Try out our website FREE for a 14-Day, No-Hassle Trial Offer. I’m pretty confident that CooksIllustrated.com will quickly become an invaluable resource for everything from quick, weeknight suppers to huge, holiday feasts for family and friends.
Thanks for your consideration,
Christopher Kimball
Founder and Publisher
