Our friends in London found a recipe for “chickpea pastini” on a Waitrose recipe card, and made me this delicious, one-pot dish for me when I invited myself over for dinner and to drink all their wine last November. They served it in a bowl, with salad scattered on top (“to make us eat our greens”). Maybe it was the jet lag, or just the company of friends I hadn’t seen in a while, but both pasta and salad were elegantly simple and fantastic.
I copied down the recipe, but quickly realized it needed a few tweaks (e.g. adding salt; modifying quantities from grams to Imperial and then rounding). Since then, I’ve been exploring variations on what turns out to be an endlessly malleable theme.
Tonight we made the Pasta con Ceci recipe from Food52, with a few additions and tweaks inspired by reading the comments (recipes are basically the only time when reading comments on the internet is appropriate!), and I liked it so much I decided to write it down.
The hardest part in this whole thing, funnily enough, has been tracking down the little ditalini (as I now know they’re called) that make this dish such a fun format. I’m sure it would work with any pasta shape and size, but now that I know these tiny tubes exist, I’ve got it in my head that this is the perfect shape for the dish. Even though Waitrose sells them under the name pastini (which just means “little pasta,” the shapes of which can vary), walking into a QFC in Seattle and looking for that term will leave you empty-handed (and, more sadly, empty-bellied). I finally found two sources:
- Safeway actually carries ditalini under the name “salad macaroni.” Try to ignore the visions this term might conjure up of limp, mayonnaised, celery-and-potato creations that were a staple of church picnics of the 80’s and 90’s; all you’re buying is the pasta.
- Target carries it under its proper name. Since I already order more than I’d quite like to admit from target.com, it’s pretty trivial to toss a package or two of this stuff into an order.
The recipe below reflects the edits I’ve made to the Food52 version. My goal was to add in a bit of greenery, and also to make it a reasonable quantity for 2 people (their recipe calls for only 1/2 C of pasta, which is about 2 oz.; my husband & I usually eat 6-8 oz. of pasta between us for an average meal). Taking the quantity up to 1 C, in addition to the chickpeas, made the perfect amount for the two of us with this adorable little ramekin’s worth left over to (a) photograph and (b) feed to our toddler the next day.
I did use the Parmesan rind. The commenters were not kidding about it adding extra depth! That, all the olive oil (Food52 quotes the original author as reminding you that this is “what’ll make you think you’re on a balcony in Naples when you eat this”), and a smattering of ricotta as garnish made this nice and rich without being heavy.
PrintPasta e Ceci
This quick dish made from [mostly] pantry staples can stand up to endless variations. Here’s mine.
- Prep Time: 10 minutes
- Cook Time: 12-15 minutes
- Total Time: 22-25 minutes
- Yield: 2 servings 1x
Ingredients
- 1/4 C extra-virgin olive oil, plus more for drizzling
- 3 cloves garlic, peeled and smashed
- 3 T tomato paste
- 1 t salt
- 1 1/2 C cooked chickpeas (one 15-ounce can, drained and rinsed)
- 1 C uncooked ditalini pasta (or another small shape, like macaroni)
- 2 C boiling water
- 1 Parmesan rind
- A few good handfuls of spinach
- 1 red bell pepper
- Ricotta, to garnish
- Crushed red pepper flakes, to garnish
Instructions
- Put your water on to boil.
- In a large heavy-bottomed pot, heat the olive oil until it shimmers. Add the garlic and cook, stirring until it becomes lightly browned and fragrant. Cook until nutty-smelling and beginning to brown.
- Stir in the tomato paste and salt and fry for 30 seconds or so.
- Add the chickpeas, pasta, Parmesan rind, and boiling water. Stir to scrape up any browned bits on the bottom of the pot, lower the heat, and simmer until the pasta is cooked and most of the liquid has been absorbed or the pasta is al dente, about 12-15 minutes.
- While the pasta is cooking, cut up the red bell pepper. Sauté this in a couple tablespoons of olive oil, a healthy pinch of salt, and a good pinch of sugar. You want it cooked through but not floppy.
- Just as the pasta is done, stir the raw spinach into the pot until it wilts. Taste the pasta and adjust seasoning.
- To serve, ladle the pasta into shallow bowls. Serve the red peppers on the side, along with the crushed red pepper flakes. If you want to get extra indulgent, drizzle a bit of extra-virgin olive oil on top.
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