The Most Important Seasoning After Salt and Pepper

What makes lemons so intoxicating to me is their tendency to both sit in the background and fundamentally (and deliciously) transform whatever they are paired with. The two key components — the skin and the juicy flesh — are responsible for that. A piece of zest added while sautéing my sofrito for ragout, say, or a chicken casserole, or a lentil soup, or anything, will linger with a fragrance that I can never miss. A squeeze of juice at the very end adds just the kind of punch that I do miss. (Today’s recipe sticks to only that zest, because tomatoes normally have enough acidity in them to give my pasta a nice sharpness. But extra juice would definitely not hurt, particularly if your tomatoes are extra sweet.)