Some meals are born of inspiration; others, of having very few ingredients left in the pantry after not going grocery shopping for a long time. This was one of those meals, thrown together late one night from dried rigatoni, a jar of Rao’s arrabbiata sauce, and a can of chickpeas that had languished in my cupboard for so long that the brine had congealed into a slimy mass that I painstakingly washed off. The result was fine, elevated by copious seasoning and generous spoonfuls of Lao Gan Ma chili crisp (not pictured). Actually, the more of the pasta that I ate, the better it seemed to taste, to the point where I thought to myself, “I would gladly make this again.” Hours later, suffering on the toilet in various shades of red (interpret that how you will), I changed my mind. Maybe this recipe needed some tweaking. 2.5/5 stars.
