It's Chickpeas Again! (with Jenny Rosenstrach)
Make it tonight: Pasta con Ceci
Oh, hi, it’s just me, your friendly neighborhood garbanzo collaborator, back with another episode of JUST OPEN A CAN FOR GOD’S SAKE!
I know that I don’t really need to introduce you to my beloved friend
, author of here on Substack as well as the original Dinner: A Love Story over on ye olde internette, and the excellently unfussy and appealing cookbooks Dinner: A Love Story, Dinner: The Playbook, and How to Celebrate Everything, plus the world-changing The Weekday Vegetarians, which is the one cookbook I think absolutely everyone should buy their newly adult children. The Weekday Vegetarians Get Simple is out in August, but you can do your future self a favor and preorder it now.
Speaking of newly adult children, I sent my Ben this very recipe for Pasta Con Ceci because it is so easy, and so inexpensive, and it has so blissfully few ingredients. (He responded with something cheerfully noncommittal, like, “Ooooh!” because he doesn’t really cook.)
This was not the first recipe Jenny offered when I asked her to share a chickpea recipe! She sent me this, below, which is a wonderful recipe, and which is in Weekday Vegetarians, and which I had already made—as evidenced by the underlined “Yum” up top, ha ha ha. Someone get this girl a writing job, STAT!
That recipe is also delicious and totally easy, but I was wedded to the Pasta con Ceci because it is a truly classic pantry meal. And Jenny is such a mensch in so many different ways that she was like, “Oh, of course, use whatever you like!” Also, she said this:
“Canned chickpeas were crucial in our transition from a meat-centric dinner rotation to a mostly vegetarian one. Anytime I thought I wanted to make something with chicken, I instead reached for my chickpeas, which always seemed to be in the cabinet, loyally waiting for deployment in tacos, salads, stir-fries and grain bowls.”
The Pasta Con Ceci showed up originally in Victoria Granof’s gorgeous little hand-tied chickpea booklet, which I also happen to have, because CHICKPEAS.
Jenny doubles the recipe, but because it’s just Michael and me (sob), I make the exact amount, as above. Here’s Jenny’s slightly tweaked version:
4 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, plus more for drizzling
4 cloves garlic, peeled, smashed, and sliced Goodfella’s thin
6 tablespoons good tomato paste (one 6-ounce can)
1 teaspoon kosher salt
3 cups cooked chickpeas (or two 15-ounce cans, drained and rinsed)
1 cup uncooked ditalini pasta
4 cups boiling water
For serving: crushed red pepper flakes, Pecorino (or Parm, but I prefer Pecorino)
In a large heavy-bottomed pot, heat the olive oil over medium-low heat until it shimmers. Add the garlic and cook, stirring until it becomes lightly browned and fragrant. Stir in the tomato paste and salt and fry until the color deepens slightly, about one minute.
Add the chickpeas, ditalini, and boiling water. Stir to scrape up any browned bits on the bottom of the pot, lower the heat, and simmer, stirring every now and then to make sure pasta doesn’t stick to the bottom. Simmer until the pasta is cooked and most of the liquid has been absorbed, about 20 minutes. (You want it to be kind of stewy.) To serve, ladle the pasta into shallow bowls, sprinkle with Pecorino and crushed red pepper flakes. Finish with a drizzle of olive oil.
A few notes from me, Catherine:
I use the fuller amount of olive oil: 3 tablespoons for one can of chickpeas.
I smash the garlic, then roughly chop it and, yes, cook it until golden.
I add the red pepper flakes for the last 5 seconds of the garlic frying.
If I have one, I add a parmesan rind with the water. (All my parmesan rinds used to kind of smell like the corn tortillas we store in the cheese drawer? But now we keep the corn tortillas in a glass container #problemsolved.) I top with a flurry of grated parm at the end.
The Whole Foods brand organic chickpeas are my very favorite because they’re so tender.
You have to stir this a lot, kind of like risotto, because it really wants to stick.
I cook it until the pasta is nice and soft, not al dente at all, because this whole dish is aching to remind you of SpaghettiO’s. (You might need to add a splash more water at some point.) Come to think of it, I really cook most of my pasta like that.
You can stir in a handful of baby spinach at the end if you happen to have it. It will basically melt on contact.
Thank you so much, Jenny!
It reassures my mother-heart that Ben does not really cook. The same way it did when you revealed that Ben did not like to read that much, even with a writer mother who dons a headlamp to read after dark. I need those gentle reminders that our kids will be who they’ll be, and part of it will be because of us but most of it is because that’s who they’re supposed to become.
“Don’t make me pawn Ben’s necklace” LOL! Come for the recipes, stay for the comedy.