Mama Genevria’s secret pasta marvel!

A lot of people believe Italian food is tasty because there are a lot of ingredients. But they don't understand that the reason why it's tasty is because there are less ingredients than in any other cuisine.

Gino D'Acampo

If you’ve been following my blog for a while, you’ll know I have the most gorgeous God son! Pietro is now 11 and, living in the beautiful city of Pisa, is already turning into a proper little charmer!! He knows just how to wrap his Irish Zietta right round his finger. Sadly, I don’t get to see him and his beautiful family nearly as much as I would like to and this year – well, we’re just going to have to make do with WhatsApp!

Apart from the hugs the thing I LOVE about visiting Pisa is the food, not just eating it but, helping out in the kitchen, learning new ingredients and recipes, I especially love it when Pietro’s grandmother, Genevria, (I know, is that not the most beautiful name!!), takes me under her wing! Who knew I’d been making spaghetti Carbonara and one of my staples, risotto primavera, wrong all these years, with the risotto, I’d apparently not even got the correct rice!

So, when she’s stopped correcting my terrible Irish habits, she shares the most wonderful recipes, recipes, that have been handed down generation after generation, simple peasant recipes that simply harness the fruits of nature – just delicious! One of my favourites is something called Rigatoni Amatriciana – Roman Pasta, it’s simply a thing of enormous beauty!

In the gospel according to Mama Genevria, when it comes to classical pasta recipes, the Romans have it totally covered. They own the “cacio e pepe”, the “carbonara”, “alla gricia”, (it’s like a carbonara but without the egg). However, it wasn’t until my trip a few years ago one golden May, that I totally fell in love and became obsessed with the “Amatriciana”.

Amatriciana is a delicious rich tomato-based sauce, cooked with guanciale (pig cheek) and wine, served with generous amounts of grated salty pecorino cheese. I think I ate it at least 5 times during my first week back in London. I mean, when I say I loved it, I LOVED it, in fairness, as did everyone else I shared it with!

As today, October the 17th is National Pasta day I thought I’d share Mama Genevria’s version of the recipe with you lovely, lucky people! One of the things I love about the dish is its incredible simplicity, easy but a super delicious pasta dish.

Guanciale, or jowl bacon is hard to come by in the UK unless your local Italian deli stocks it. So, I suggest using pancetta instead, or even bacon lardons as an alternative. The same goes to a lesser extent with the pecorino. It’s not always so easy to get hold of. So, in that case use grated parmesan instead.

Rigatoni Amatriciana (4 people)

Ingredients

· Olive oil

· 1/2 onion, finely diced

· 200g pancetta or guanciale, diced

· 100ml dry white wine

· 1 x 400g peeled plum tomatoes, preferably San Marzano

· 75g pecorino Romano (or parmesan), grated

· Sea Salt

· Freshly ground pepper

· 500g Rigatoni (or fat tube pasta)

The how to bit!

· In a large wide frying pan, drizzle olive oil and add the chopped onion. season with salt and cook on a low heat; cook until the onion has softened. This will take approximately 10 minutes.

· Next, add the pancetta/guanciale to the pan. Keep cooking for another 10 minutes until the meat has rendered.

· Pour in the white wine, turn the heat up to medium and cook until the alcohol has evaporated.

· Add the tomatoes. Using the tomato tin, pour half a tin of water to the pan. MIX all the ingredients together. SEASON with salt and pepper. cover the pan with a lid and cook on a low heat for about 20-30 minutes, making sure the sauce does not dry out. ADD water if necessary. check half way during cooking time and give it a good stir.

· In the meantime, cook the rigatoni in salted boiling water. Try and time the cooking of the pasta alongside the cooking of the sauce.

· When the sauce has finished cooking, add half of the pecorino to it and give it a good STIR.

· Add the drained pasta to the sauce. mix and ensure that the pasta is coated evenly with the Amatriciana sauce.

· Serve immediately with more grated pecorino.

If you like your wine, as I do, I lovely Amarone goes perfectly with this, oh, and make a Tiramisu for afters!! Honestly, if you’ve not tried one of my recipes give this one a go, it’s really, really simple and the taste is off the scale!

What’s on this week?