At sixteen-years-old, with a new skateboarding boyfriend and colorful tights to wear underneath my skirts and dresses, I was finally invited to hang out in the courtyard.
The courtyard was where all of the anti-establishment, artsy, alternative kids would hang out in between classes. For me, it was the coolest place to be. These kids wore their shirts inside out just because and listened to music that wasn't on the radio and shopped at thrift stores for vintage treasures. I packed my backpack with every book and notebook and pen and highlighter that I’d need for the day so I wouldn’t have to visit my locker in between classes. Instead, you’d find me in the courtyard, swaying from one foot to the other, my French book—cool—hugged into my chest.
As I stood quietly next to my boyfriend wondering what these creative, interesting people might be thinking about this awkward, tall, tennis player with sparkling white sneakers joining their crew, a guy approached me. The first thing I noticed was his hair: frizzy, black curls that fell below his shoulders. He wore thin, wire-framed glasses, soccer shoes, dad jeans—the kind that were too big to be considered straight-legged but not big enough to be considered fashionably baggy—and a clean cut, plain white tee-shirt. Next to the boys dressed in tattered leather jackets, skin tight jeans and various versions of Vans or Dr. Martens, I wondered how this guy fit in here.
“Who are you?” He asked aggressively.
“Uh, my name is Vanessa, I’m—”
“Yeah, I know, you’re with him. You’re a junior right?”
“Yeah.”
“What’re you reading for your big paper in Landes' class? You probably started some of your research by now, right?”
“Yeah, I was supposed to, I just don’t really care about it. It’s so stupid that we even have to read all of these outdated books, yanno?” I thought I nailed this answer. In this crew, school was dumb, a requirement of the man—whoever he was—and was just a distraction from our real, creative, cool lives.
“Ha! I mean, don’t expect riveting feedback on your analysis, but you should really read a book. And you should read Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut, you’ll love it.”
I was speechless. Maybe he could see through my backpack into the furiously scribbled notes, highlighted books, and well-organized day planner. Of course I’d already been thinking about my research paper, even though it wasn’t due for months, and now I wanted to tell him. I wanted to ask if he’d read Wuthering Heights, whether he knew much about Emily Brontë and how she was by far the most interesting of the sisters. I wanted to run to the library to check out Slaughterhouse Five because the name had deterred me from even considering it for my paper, but this confident recommendation from a stranger felt important. In a matter of seconds, he stripped away my attempt at being the girl in the courtyard.
“I’m Aaron, by the way. I'll see ya.” His long black curls trailed behind him, and from that moment on, I wanted to be like Aaron Ezratty. Not that I could ever begin to mimic his swift sense of humor or the unapologetically opinionated lens through which he saw the world. But I wanted to be self-assured like him. I wanted to walk up to strangers and know who I was, what I enjoyed, what was important to me. I wanted to trust my opinion about books so much that I might suggest them to strangers. He became a north star directing me not toward what he was doing and who he wanted to become but closer toward who I was and who I wanted to be.
Aaron—or as I and nearly everyone else would come to call him, Z or Z-man—and I were friends for the next sixteen years. For many of those years, it was as part of the courtyard crew watching obscure horror movies or singing karaoke at a bar in the Holiday Inn by my house. It was called Humpty’s, and we were there so often that DJ Fox called us his kids. We took road trips to see metal bands, to visit each other at college. Once, he invited me and my courtyard boyfriend to visit his family in New York City. His cousin, Jason, was a restaurateur and treated us like royalty at his Mexican restaurant. He ordered every kind of taco and juicy, grilled meat and charred vegetable on the menu. He brought us flights of tequila and described the way different barrels affect the flavor of the agave. Throughout the meal, we smiled and giggled to each other in disbelief at our luck, as broke college students in New York City, eating the entire menu at a hip Mexican restaurant. When we all thought our stomachs might burst open with bits of masa and spicy pork and salsa, out came this unassuming custard, topped with flecks of cotija cheese. The custard was supple and familiar, but the salty cheese woke up our tired taste buds so that even our overflowing stomachs couldn’t keep up from fighting for the last bite. We often reminisced about that flan.
Eventually, when I split from my boyfriend and started to fade from the whole courtyard crew, I waited for the day when I’d stop hearing from Z. But I never did. He invited himself to my new place with my new roommates, Emily and Chris; I offered to cook him dinner. He came to my sister’s wedding and spent the whole night on the dance floor with mostly strangers. When I finally sought treatment for my eating disorder, he asked how he could support me and checked in gently but consistently. He invited me to come meet his new girlfriend, Holly. Then he invited me to their wedding. Then to their new home to meet their giant dog, Cyrus.
Whether it was in the trenches or the epic mountain tops of life, Z showed up unapologetically himself every time. I could count on his bottomless well of wit to help me laugh in times when I didn’t think it was possible. He wasn't afraid to interrogate my motivations, always incessant with follow up questions about why I wanted to move to New York or back to Ohio or back to New York a second time. I always left times with Z a little more self-assured, a little more decisive, a little more me.
On October 13th, 2021, Z passed away. Two years ago tomorrow. He lived just long enough for me to say that we were friends for half of our lives. Now, though, my life keeps going and betrays that measure. Sometimes that makes me feel so guilty. He should be here making fun of my lackluster food photography. He should be visiting Chicago, as he did every place I ever moved. He deserved so many more years. So much more life.
I spent the day that he died making baked ziti for Holly, his wife, a friend I hope to one day say has been my friend for half of our lives. The first time I made him and Holly baked ziti, Holly messaged me that it tasted like a hug. Z, on the other hand, asked me how I kept my cast iron so well-seasoned since I baked zitis in it. I had to Google what the problem was with baking ziti in a cast iron. He was so smart it was infuriating. Somehow, he knew the acid of the tomato sauce could affect the seasoning of my pan. Somehow, he knew I was lying about not wanting to read books in high school. He knew everything, always, it seemed.
I made a ziti this week. For Z. Maybe I will every year around this time. I can't smell the geyser bursts of tomato sauce charring on a gas burner without thinking of him. While I whisked the béchamel, my mind traveled to Aaron Ezratty night, the time we threw a Z-themed party at my house. It was not for his birthday or some other achievement, it was just because we all loved him so much. We listened to Iron Maiden and ate cupcakes with his face on them and he ended up wrestling our friends in the front lawn. What I love most about that night is that he never questioned why we would throw him a party. He knew he was worthy of celebration. He knew he was one-of-a-kind. When I told Z the last time I saw him that I was a better person because of him, he didn’t question that. Instead, he said, Don’t you forget it. He already knew.
Make a ziti for Z, would you? If you’re a vegetarian, remember that Z would give you some shit for that, and then just leave the meat out of the sauce, it’s no big deal. If simmering sauce and making bechamel don’t sound like things you want to do, giving blood in honor of Z would be even better. Miss you, Z. I won’t forget it.
THE Z(ITI)
Makes one 13”x 9” pan
RED SAUCE
6 oz pancetta or thick-sliced bacon, cut into strips
½ lb ground beef
1 onion, small diced
6 cloves of garlic, grated or pressed or super smashed, almost into a paste
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1 28 oz can tomato puree
1 28 oz can crushed tomatoes
1 teaspoon Better than Bouillon*
1 teaspoon sugar
1 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 large stem of basil (with about 8 leaves)
Salt, pepper to taste**
In a large dutch oven or saucepan, brown the panetta or bacon over a medium-low heat. This will take some time, be patient. You want to render out some fat before the browning happens. Once browned on all sides, remove and set aside, preserving most of the fat.
Your beef probably came in a big mound, like a meatloaf. Season both sides generously with salt and pepper and add to the pan, bringing the temp up to a medium-high. Let one side brown very well, this will probably take 5-8 minutes. When I say brown, I mean rusty, cocoa-colored, and when you flip it, your spatula or spoon should experience friction because it’s so crispy. Flip the meat and let that side brown another five-ish minutes before you start to crumble it. Once all of the bits are pretty overall rusty brown and crispy, remove the meat from the pan. Add the diced onion and about half a teaspoon of salt and let cook on a medium heat for about 8 minutes. Stir this relatively often so that there’s even browning.
Once the onions are soft and starting to brown, add the garlic and stir in for just about a minute. Add the tomato paste and stir for about another minute or two, allowing the paste to sort of coat the bottom of the pan and start to get some color of its own, making it a brick red instead of bright tomato. Add both the can of puree and crushed tomatoes, 1 cup of water, and the bouillon (see note below about using stock). Add the sugar, basil, pepper flakes, a generous grind of black pepper, bring to a simmer and let cook over low heat, covered for about an hour. Stir this every fifteen minutes or so. While this is cooking, make your ricotta sauce.
*I love Better than Bouillon. For a person in a tiny kitchen, I don’t have the organizational wherewithal to store stock for weeks and months at a time, so Better than Bouillon is a great alternative. That said, if you do make your own stock and prefer to use that, excellent! Use 1 cup of stock instead of water. Vegetarians, rest assured! Better than Bouillon makes a veg version (not sponsored).
**I guide you generally with the salt in this recipe, but it relies heavily on you tasting as you go. You may buy different canned tomatoes than me, might not use the same bouillon, etc. So my guides are very loose. Please taste as you go.
RICOTTA SAUCE
1 tablespoon butter
1 tablespoon flour
1 ½ cups whole milk
½ teaspoon salt
4 cloves garlic, roasted & smashed*
½ teaspoon black pepper
½ cup grated parmesan cheese
1 pound whole-milk ricotta cheese
Set up a large bowl with lots of ice and a little bit of water (an ice-bath). Set a medium-size bowl in the ice-bath. Set aside.
In your medium-sized saucepan, melt the butter over medium heat. Whisk in the flour and cook for about one minute, until no flour is visible. Still whisking, add the milk gradually, in a steady stream. If you don’t have a pitcher to make streaming easy, add about ¼ cup at a time and whisk until the milk is incorporated. Add the salt, garlic, and black pepper, whisking gently but pretty constantly, still over medium heat. Cook until the mixture starts boiling and thickens—the garlic will sort of melt into the sauce. It won’t be thick like pastry cream, but it will have more body than heavy cream. It will boil for around 2 minutes to reach the right texture. Turn off the heat and whisk in the parmesan cheese.
Pour this into the empty bowl you set up in the ice bath. Whisk every few minutes until the mixture comes to room temperature or slightly cooler (for me, this takes 10-15 minutes). This is the perfect time to get water boiling for your pasta and slice your mozzarella into cubes.
Whisk the ricotta cheese into the cooled cheese sauce and set aside.
*To roast garlic, preheat an oven to 350 degrees. Place the garlic in a square of aluminum foil, add a teaspoon of oil and pinch of salt, wrap it up and leave it in the oven for around 45 minutes, depending on how big the bulb is. It should feel soft when you squeeze it, so soft that it kind of just smushes once you’re ready to use it in the ricotta sauce. If you don’t want to do this extra step, you can use regular ol’ garlic, too, but it’s a bit more subtle and special if you roast it ;)
TO ASSEMBLE:
1 pound tube-shaped pasta**
1 pound whole-milk mozzarella, cut into small cubes
¼ cup grated parmesan
Preheat your oven to 425 degrees. Spray a 13” x 9” pan with cooking spray.
Cook your pasta so that it still has a pretty aggressive bite to it. For most tube shapes, about 6 minutes is all you’ll need to get this texture. Do I need to tell you to salt your pasta water? Please do that, too. Drain and set aside once it's about ¾ cooked. Toss the pasta with about 1 cup of red sauce, just to lightly coat the noodles.
Now, to assemble. Your red sauce should have cooked for an hour, your ricotta sauce should be room temp-ish, your pasta cooked and lightly coated, your mozz cubed. Start with an even layer of sauce in your prepared pan, about 1 cup. Layer ⅓ of the pasta (this will seem sparse, that’s okay!). Dollop ⅓ of the ricotta sauce and spread gently over the noodles (this will be imperfect and messy, that’s okay!). Top this with about 1 cup of red sauce (I think using ⅓ of the sauce here is too much sauce for my taste, but you do you). Top all of this with ⅓ of the mozz cubes. Repeat this layering two more times. I usually have a cup or so of red sauce leftover, and that’s not bad news. You can freeze it and save for pasta later this month.
Top the whole thing with grated parm and stick it in the oven for 30-40 minutes, until the cheese starts to turn golden and the sauce is bubbling up around the edges. Let it rest about 15 minutes before you cut into it so it’s not soupy. Cheers your forks to Z when you sit down to eat.
**I’m calling this dish a baked Z-ti in honor of my dear friend, Z, not because of the pasta shape. If you’re a rule follower, don’t let me stop you! Use ziti here. I prefer rigatoni noodles because I like the ridges. You could get away with any of your favorite tubes.
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