I tend to get all over-excited at our local Epicure – if you see a strange chick muttering happily to herself in front of the semolina flour and a jar of preserved lemons, or spending fifteen minutes in a near trance examining the goats cheese, it’s probably me. What can I say, gourmet supermarkets do something to me, something deep inside… Aaaanyhoo, yesterday it was the ricotta salata and the spelt pasta getting me all hot and flushed. Normally it’d come to mind to make pasta alla norma with the ricotta (aubergines, tomato, basil), but Mr R&R isn’t a great aubergine fan (mad!) so I did a bit of research to find this simple little combination of flavours, which goes brilliantly with wholewheat or spelt pasta.
The pasta shapes I found were the wonderfully named priest-stranglers (strozzapreti), which originate from the Emilia-Romagna region of Italy. No-one’s quite sure where the name originates – perhaps the forceful motion needed to roll the pasta into the twisted shape, violent enough to strangle a priest? Or that the meaty consistency of the shape would be enough to throttle a traditionally gluttonous priest? My favourite theory is that the women of this historically anti-papist region would prepare this pasta for the priest each Sunday while their husbands, angry at their treatment by the powers-that-were, would hope the priest choked on his meal. So there you go – take a stance against the Pope and eat well, all at the same time.
One word of warning which I’m sure I’ve said before but bears repeating (I forgot last night and gained myself a bin of soggy pasta): The cooking times on packets of pasta in the USA are waaaay too long. I would start tasting at half the time they say, and be prepared with a colander in the sink so you can quickly rescue a pan that threatens to be scotta. Extra care need for wholewheat or spelt pastas, as they have less of the gluten that makes pasta chewy with that lovely al dente bite, and so go from rock hard to squishy mush in about thirty seconds flat.
This is really one of those dishes that needs all the various bits and pieces to be prepared before the pasta goes in the water, but once that’s done it’s dead easy. Grill the best cherry, grape or small vine tomatoes you can find and add to the steaming pasta with torn up rocket and basil leaves, crispy toasted breadcrumbs and coarsely grated ricotta salata. That’s it but it’s delicious – the ricotta doesn’t disappear completely but becomes soft strands that meltingly bind the ingredients together.
By the way, the original recipe suggests that you crisp up the breadcrumbs with the tomatoes under the grill, but I mostly got either soggy or cremated bits doing it this way. Better to crisp up the breadcrumbs separately in a pan with a tablespoon of olive oil I should think.
Spelt pasta with vine tomatoes, rocket and ricotta salata
Serves 2. Adapted from Italia Donna
- 200g spelt or wholewheat pasta
- 2 tbsps olive oil
- 4 tbsps breadcrumbs
- 225g small vine, cherry or grape tomatoes
- 50g rocket leaves, about one handful
- Small handful basil leaves
- 80g ricotta salata, coarsely grated
Heat the grill to maximum. Wash the tomatoes, dry them and cut them in half vertically. Place on a baking sheet, cut sides uppermost, drizzle with a tablespoon of olive oil, season with salt and pepper and grill for 15 minutes until soft.
Meanwhile put the pasta water on to boil. Heat a small pan with the other tablespoon olive oil and toast the breadcrumbs in it until coloured. Then spread them out on a plate to dry until crispy. Grate the ricotta too. Find a large serving dish or mixing bowl and tear up the rocket and basil leaves into it.
Once the water is boiling, salt it very generously with two fists of coarse grained salt and add the pasta. Cook (see note above) watching it like a hawk. Once it’s done, drain and add to the mixing bowl with the rocket and basil. Tip over the tomatoes and combine, then the breadcrumbs and finally the ricotta. Serves 2, greedily.
