Broccoli Anchovy Orecchiette
I’m not Italian so I have few preconceptions when it comes to what shape pasta with what sauce. For me, I favour orecchiette here as I like the way the ‘little ears’ cup the sauce.
Emulsifying this sauce with cubes of cooked butter at the end – along with some of the pasta cooking water – delivers a silky sauce. Make sure you do this off the heat and keep the pan moving with a swirling motion so it doesn’t split. Essentially a beurre monté, it’s a great technique to learn and use across so many applications.
The butter softens the funky anchovy flavour while the pangrattato adds a welcome crunch and replaces the oft-used parmesan which I think is superfluous to requirements in this case.
If you haven’t made pangrattato before, here’s a quick primer. In a heavy pan, add some quality olive oil and breadcrumbs, be they panko or otherwise. Stir and toss them around until they’ve got good colour then tip them out of the pan to stop them cooking. Once cool, add salt, pepper and/or herbs of choice then you’re good to go. Any leftovers will keep a few days in a sealed container and are great with pasta, in salads or on top of soup.
ingredients
- 1 head of broccoli, cut into florets
- 170g dried orecchiette
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 1 tbsp oil from anchovies
- 6 anchovy fillets (use more or less as your taste directs you)
- 1 garlic clove
- 50g cold unsalted butter, cubed
- pangrattato (fried seasoned breadcrumbs – see above note)
method
Cut away the majority of the broccoli stalk (keep for stock, pickle or if you want to use in this dish, peel and grate the middle) and remove the florets with a small paring knife. Cut the larger ones into smaller pieces so they are all around the same size.
Boil the water for the pasta in a saucepan, adding a little salt and tossing the pasta in when it’s come to the boil.
In a large frypan, pour in the olive oil and the oil from the anchovies. Over a medium heat, grate in the garlic and add the anchovy fillets. Stir these around to cook down and soften to a general mush. If using the grated stalk, add this also now.
When the pasta has five minutes left, add the broccoli florets and let them cook with the pasta. Once the pasta is cooked al dente, spoon the broccoli and pasta into the frypan along with a little of the cooking water.
Remove frypan from heat and start to add in the cold butter a few cubes at a time, swirling or stirring the pan the whole time. Keep adding butter and more pasta water if required til you have enough sauce. Check seasoning, adding pepper or salt if you feel it needs it.
Serve straight away topped with crispy pangrattato