Quick But Yummy Pasta: Cacio e Pepe

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

1. Bring water to a boil, throw in a half tablespoon of salt.
2. Add the pasta and cook it to 2 minutes short of done.
3. Meanwhile, in a saute pan, melt 1 T. butter and put in the black pepper to toast it.
4. 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.
5. Add the pasta, parmesan cheese and one more T. butter and toss till coated and cheese melts and adheres to the pasta.
6. 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.
7. 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?

Today's Author

Allison Cohen

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