The supermarket I shop at started carrying fresh pasta at reasonable prices about a year ago. This was a game changer for me. Fresh pasta cooks in no time flat. Plus my store sells different types of pasta, a couple of which I had never heard of before. I wish I could remember the name of it – it begins with an “m” and reminds me of “muffalata” but it’s not that because a muffalta is a type of pressed Italian sandwich. The “m” pasta is a small pasta with lots of ruffles and curls, making it the perfect pasta shape for retaining sauce.
But I digress, the pasta that I bought on Friday was tagliatelle, the broad flat long pasta. I didn’t have any fresh sauce or sauce waiting in the freezer, so I decided to make Cacio e Pepe, a pasta recipe that doesn’t exactly have a sauce. Cacio e Pepe means cheese and pepper (as in black pepper) in Italian. It’s a favorite of mine because I can usually make it with ingredients that I have on hand.
The key ingredients are either Parmigiano Reggiano or Grana Padano (a less expensive, milder cheese that melts more easily) and Pecorino Romano, a sheep’s milk cheese. I believe that the original modern Roman recipe leaves out the Parmigiano Reggiano and just uses Pecorino Romano, but I like to use both cheeses. If I don’t have any parm, I will go with only Pecorino Romano. You should do what you prefer.
Sometimes, like today, I have the real deal: a block of each of the two cheeses. Very deluxe. I put them in my food processor to grate them. But other days, I just have plastic bags of grated parmesan and grated pecorino, and I make do with that. Not as fancy and flavorful as the authentic cheeses, but still pretty darn delicious result.
In Italy, they usually use a thick spaghetti or a square shaped spaghetti called tonnarelli. I have my own favorites, but most often I use what I have on hand at home.
Here’s the recipe:
Ingredients
- 6 oz. of pasta, either fresh or dried: my preferred pasta for this recipe are tagiatelle, spaghetti or linguini but you can use what you like
- 2 T. butter
- 1 tsp. coarsely group black pepper
- 1/2-3/4 cup of grated parmigiano reggiano or parmesan
- 1/3 cup of grated pecorino romano
- pinch of salt to taste, if necessary
- Bring water to a boil, throw in a half tablespoon of salt.
- Add the pasta and cook it to 2 minutes short of done.
- Meanwhile, in a saute pan, melt 1 T. butter and put in the black pepper to toast it.
- Take out 3/4 cup of the starchy pasta water and add 1/2 cup of the pasta water to the butter/pepper mixture and bring to a simmer.
- Add the pasta, parmesan cheese and one more T. butter and toss till coated and cheese melts and adheres to the pasta.
- Shut off the heat and add the pecorino cheese. Toss till melted and coated. The pasta should be well coated and just a little saucy.
- If pasta is too dry, add a little more of the pasta water. It shouldn’t really need salt because the cheese is salty, but add salt if you think it needs it.
This recipe takes just a few minutes to put together. What takes the longest is getting the pasta water to boil. If you’re using dried pasta, boil the pasta for 7-9 minutes before adding the pasta to the butter/pasta water to finish cooking along with the cheese. The fresh pasta I used required only 2 minutes of boiling before I added it to the butter/pasta water.
You will laugh, but I don’t have any photos of my own to post because I didn’t plan on writing about this. So Jeff and I just ate dinner without any photography, lol.
I served a Caprese Salad (sliced tomatoes, mozzarella and basil) along with it. The whole meal was scrumptious and so easy.
Have you made Cacio e Pepe? If so, do you stick with the traditional Pecorino Romano only or do you like the cheese combo?
5 Comments
Delicious! This is one of my favorite comfort foods to make– so simple, and yet so tasty!
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Certainly one of my favorites too! I always seem to have cacio e pepe ingredients on hand 🙂
I don’t eat anything with tomato sauce so this is an ideal way of eating pasta to me. You make me want to go to the Italian market tomorrow.
It’s a great alternative to carbonara or Alfredo! Hope you’ll try it some time 🙂
I need to give this a try!