Pasta e Fagioli

A thick, rustic soup of borlotti beans and broken pasta: half the beans blended smooth to create a creamy base, the other half left whole for texture: finished with a slick of olive oil, a shower of Parmesan and a crack of black pepper. Pasta e fagioli is Italy's most ancient everyday dish: the cucina povera masterpiece, the pasta-and-bean combination that predates the tomato by two thousand years.

Origin: Venice & Veneto, Italy

From the journey of Wheat.

The combination of pasta (or grain) with legumes is one of the most ancient dietary strategies in the Mediterranean: the incomplete proteins of wheat and beans, when eaten together, form a complete protein equivalent to meat. Pasta e fagioli in recognisable form appears in medieval Venetian and Roman cookery texts. Before the potato, before the tomato, pasta e fagioli was one of the defining everyday dishes of the Italian peasantry. Every region makes it differently: thick like porridge in Venice (pasta e fasioi), thin like soup in Naples, with rosemary in Tuscany, with garlic and oil in Campania.

Ingredients

  • 300 g dried borlotti beans, soaked overnight
  • 200 g small pasta (ditalini or broken spaghetti)
  • 100 g pancetta or guanciale, diced
  • 2 Celery stalks, finely diced
  • 1 Carrot, finely diced
  • 1 Onion, finely diced
  • 4 Garlic cloves, sliced
  • 2 sprigs fresh rosemary
  • 2 tbsp tomato paste
  • 1.5 litres chicken or vegetable stock
  • 4 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
  • 1 piece parmesan rind (optional but important)
  • generously Salt and black pepper
  • to serve Parmesan

Method

  1. Cook the soaked beans in fresh water until tender, about 1–1.5 hours. Drain, reserving the cooking liquid.
  2. Fry pancetta in olive oil until rendered. Add celery, carrot, onion and garlic; cook gently for 15 minutes until soft. Add rosemary and tomato paste; cook 2 minutes.
  3. Add the cooked beans, stock and Parmesan rind. Simmer 20 minutes. Remove rosemary and rind.
  4. Blend half the bean mixture until smooth, return to the pot: this creates a creamy base with texture.
  5. Bring to a boil. Add pasta and cook until just al dente in the soup (it will continue cooking). The soup should be very thick.
  6. Season aggressively. Serve in deep bowls with a thread of raw olive oil, Parmesan and black pepper.
The Gastrographer

The Gastrographer

Mapping Culinary History

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Journey Point Map Key

Ingredient originTrade or transit route
Became a culinary stapleColonial / trade control
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