Pasta e Fagioli
The bone left from making porchetta had been sitting in the freezer for quite some time – I’m embarrassed to say how long! And with frigid temps and so much time sitting at home, I wanted to use it in a bean soup. My memories turned to the semester I spent in Rome at the Centro (Intercollegiate Center for Classical Studies), and the pasta e fagioli soup they often served for lunch.
As is often my practice, I surveyed lots of recipes. I posted on the Centro alumni Facebook page, asking who remembered this dish, which yielded a photograph of a recipe from the Centro cookbook, which I didn’t even know existed. Typical of a recipe written by those who just know what to do, it provided some guidelines but it was not a full-fledged recipe. Eat Your Books, a website that indexes cookbooks and recipes in print, as well as recipes online (which I highly recommend for anyone with a good number of cookbooks, email me if you want more details), gave me many possibilities, both in my own cookbook library and available on the Internet.
As is also often my practice, ultimately I followed none of the recipes exactly! However I did want to use the traditional borlotti beans, and Hank, happy to have a project, tracked down an online seller that would get them here relatively quickly.
This is a wonderful, hearty soup, and while I did use both the porchetta bone and some pancetta, it can easily be a vegetarian soup, and even vegan without the Parmesan cheese on top. (I probably could have tossed a Parmesan rind in with the beans while they were cooking, but didn’t have one.)
Expectedly, this soup is much better the second day, and also expectedly the pasta gets quite soft overnight. So while I offer here what I did, I will need to try this again and make some adjustments. The most significant change I envision is that next time I should make the soup just to the point of adding the pasta. Then I would only add the pasta portion by portion. Unless, of course, I’m feeding a crowd. (Not happening these days, sadly.)
PASTA E FAGIOLI
Serves at least 8
1 lb. dried borlotti (cranberry) beans
2 small onions, 1 quartered and 1 minced
2 garlic cloves, 1 halved and 1 minced
1 bone from a previous roast (optional)
2 teaspoons kosher salt, divided, plus more to taste
2 tablespoons olive oil, plus more to drizzle before serving
1 celery stalk, chopped
1 carrot, chopped
½ thick slice pancetta, 1-2 ounces, chopped (optional)
¼ teaspoon fresh ground pepper, plus more to taste
1 tablespoon fresh rosemary, chopped
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1 cup chicken or vegetable broth, or water
8 ounces ditalini or other small pasta (about 2 cups)
Grated Parmesan for serving
Check the beans for any small pebbles or impurities. Place in a large bowl and cover will plenty of cold water. Allow the beans to soak overnight.
Drain and rinse the beans and place in a large pot. Cover with cold water by about an inch. Add the quartered onion and the halved garlic clove and the bone, if using. Bring to a boil, skim the foam if necessary, then reduce heat and simmer for 45 minutes or until the beans are tender. If the water level falls below the surface of the beans, add more water to the pot. Remove the onion, garlic, and bone from the pot and add 1 teaspoons salt.
Allow the beans to cool slightly, then remove about 1-1½ cups of beans with liquid and purée, either in a blender, in a food processor, or with an immersion blender. Set aside the purée.
In another large pot, heat the olive oil over medium-high heat until shimmering and fragrant. Add the chopped onion, celery, carrot, and pancetta (if using). Add the pepper and the remaining teaspoon of salt. Sauté until the vegetables are soft and just beginning to brown on the edges. Add the minced garlic, rosemary and tomato paste, and stir to cook for 2-3 minutes.
Add the broth or water to deglaze any bits that are stuck to the bottom of the pan. Add the beans and their liquid as well as the puréed beans to the pot and stir to combine. Cook until the mixture is hot throughout. Taste and add salt and pepper, if needed. At this point it is possible to cool the soup base and refrigerate.
When ready to use, add 2 quarts of water and bring to a boil, stirring frequently so that it doesn’t begin to stick to the bottom of the pot. Add the pasta and turn down to a vigorous simmer, and cook the pasta according to the package directions.
Alternatively, you can take as much soup base as you plan to serve at a given time, add the amount of water necessary proportionally, bring to a boil, and then toss in the requisite amount of pasta. This is a worthwhile strategy because the recipe makes a lot of soup!
Serve hot with a drizzle of olive oil and a sprinkling of Parmesan.