Recipe
Minestra di pasta e broccoli with pecorino
Italians distinguish between a minestra, a zuppa and a vellutata, and will explain the difference to you at length whether or not the subject came up.
A zuppa has no pasta or rice in it and is traditionally poured over bread. A minestra has pasta or rice cooked directly in it. A vellutata has been blended smooth. There is also minestrone, which is a large minestra, and minestrina, which is the small sad one you are given when you are ill. English has a single word covering all of this, which Italians find as inexplicable as everybody else finds their insistence on the distinction.
This is a minestra, and specifically it is pasta e broccoli, which in Rome is traditionally made in the broth left over from boiling skate. Skate is not something most people have in the house, so this version does what most Roman households do on a weeknight anyway: cook the broccoli in the water, then cook the pasta in the same water, so nothing is thrown away and the vegetable does the work of a stock cube.
That technique is worth far more than this one recipe. Vegetable water is free flavour. Pouring it down the sink and then opening a stock cube is one of the small daily absurdities of modern cooking, and once you notice it you cannot unnotice it.
Broccoli cooked well past the point of politeness collapses into a sauce. Anchovies, garlic and chilli do the seasoning, pecorino does the rest, and pasta cooked directly in the pot releases its starch and thickens the broth until it stops being a soup and starts being dinner.
About one euro fifty a bowl.
- Prep 10 min
- Cook 25 min
- Serves 2
- Cost €
Method
- 1
Boil the broccoli in the salted water until very soft, about 12 minutes. Lift it out with a slotted spoon and keep every drop of the water.
13 min
- 2
In a separate large pot, warm the oil with the garlic and chilli over low heat, then add the anchovies and press them until they dissolve.
4 min
- 3
Add the tomato purée if using, stir for a minute, then add the broccoli and crush it roughly against the pan.
3 min
- 4
Pour in about a litre of the broccoli water and bring it to a simmer. Taste it: it should already taste of something.
3 min
- 5
Add the pasta and cook it directly in the broth, stirring, so its starch thickens the whole pot. Add more broccoli water if it gets too tight.
10 min
- 6
Off the heat, stir in half the pecorino and rest 3 minutes. Serve with the rest of the cheese, black pepper and a thread of raw oil.
4 min
Variations
Romanesco, cauliflower or cime di rapa in place of broccoli. Leave out the anchovies and cheese for a vegan version and add a spoon of capers instead. A crumbled sausage fried at the start makes it a much heavier dish. Toasted breadcrumbs on top instead of cheese, southern style. The pasta keeps drinking overnight, so hold some broccoli water back in a jar to loosen it at the desk.