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The Story
There’s nothing like cooking with fresh, carefully sourced ingredients, but it’s not always that easy. Sometimes you just need a dish that you can make from tins and cans and a handful of greens. This time around, as I peeked into the cupboard, I was really in the mood for beans. I wanted something light that I could make with mostly pantry goods, using up dregs of this and that, and based around the old cannellini bean.
You’ve probably already noticed that garlic features regularly in our recipes (and in force), and this recipe is no different. I love a roasted head of garlic, and stirred through a sauce of partially creamed white beans and wine, you’re left with a mouth-wateringly velvety base to toss with a hint of crispy sausage and fresh peppery rocket.
Finally, a touch of the old vino. I’ll confess, I don’t enjoy white wine (I’m all about heavy, dry reds), and so I’m always after ways to use up the odd itinerant bottle that’s managed to find its way into the house. Toss it into the pasta sauce! That said, I did enjoy pairing the meal with a glass of the same white that it was cooked with. Yet another reason why you should only ever cook with wine that you’d like to drink!
The Sauce
Start off by gently frying your rosemary and dried chilli with little pieces of hand torn chorizo. You can dice or slice it, but you should know by now that I prefer it rough.
You’ve seen me do this roasted head of garlic thing before too, and you’ll see me do it again. You can really just throw it in the oven, let it cool, and then squeeze it in your fist for some creamy mellow goodness. Stir this in with the beans and wine, and then use your wooden spoon to break the beans up a bit as they cook.
You may need to add more wine or some water as you go, to prevent the sauce from drying out too much. Stir in the rocket at the very end, and cook just until it wilts.
This is another recipe for which I suggest keeping some of the water that you’ve cooked the pasta in, because even if it looks wet enough when you toss the pasta into the sauce, it will quickly get drier on the plate. Often a dry dish of pasta with this sort of pan sauce is just missing that final touch of pasta water.
Of course, it goes without saying that you have to toss the pasta through the sauce before serving. Pasta is not one half of a dish! There’s no opinion or preference here: everything that we do in making pasta and preparing the sauce culminates in the two meeting and melding. The entire intention and soul of the dish is realised by the starch bringing together and emulsifying the components. Pasta with sauce on the side? Fuhgeddaboudit.
One important final note. I often photograph the plated dish before I add the cheese, or with only a small amount of it grated on. This is because our family are cheese fiends, and you’d never see the pasta through the parmesan. My mother genuinely vacuum packs and hand delivers cheeses from our specialty cheese sources in Perth to us over here in Canberra (thanks Ma). So don’t forget the cheese!
Enjoy, and buon appetito!
– Al & Al.
Equipment
- Frypan
Ingredients
- 400 g can of white kidney/cannellini beans washed and drained
- 3/4 cup white wine
- 20 g of chorizo hand torn into small pieces
- 30 g baby rocket
- 3 sprigs rosemary
- 1 tsp dried chilli flakes
- 1 head garlic
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- salt pepper to season
- 1/2 cup of water retained from cooking the pasta
Instructions
- To roast the garlic, sit the whole head on a tray in the oven; cook at 200 degrees celsius on fan bake, for about 15-20 minutes. The outside should be slightly browned here and there. Once cooked, let it cool, and then squeeze each clove towards the base end to extract the garlic as a paste.
- While the garlic roasts, gently fry the rosemary, chilli flakes, and torn chorizo in the olive oil, until the fat has rendered out of the chorizo and it begins to crispen up.
- Add the beans and the white wine; season with salt and pepper. Cook on low-medium heat for 15 minutes, crushing the beans slightly as you stir. If it becomes too dry, and a little more wine or water.
- Stir in the roasted garlic paste, and then the rocket. Cook only until the rocket has wilted.
- Make sure that you retain about 1/2 cup of the water that you cook your pasta in, then add this to the sauce as you toss the cooked pasta through it in the pan.
- Serve with cheese and cracked pepper. If you're after the perfect pasta for this delicious sauce, try our farfalle with rye flour!
