Top 50 recipes › No. 25
Top recipes · No. 25Cacio e pepe
Roman pasta with just three ingredients: pecorino cheese, black pepper and the starchy pasta water that turns them into a sauce.
Ingredients
- 7 oz (200 g) spaghetti or tonnarelli
- 1¼ cups (100 g) very finely grated pecorino romano
- 1½ tsp coarsely ground black pepper
- Salt for the water (use less than usual; the cheese is salty)
Method
- Cook the pasta in a small amount of lightly salted water so the water gets starchy. Save 1 cup of it before draining.
- Toast the pepper in a dry pan for 1 minute, then add ½ cup of pasta water.
- Mix the cheese with a few spoons of warm (not boiling) pasta water to a paste.
- Add the drained pasta to the pepper pan, take it off the heat, then add the cheese paste and toss hard, adding pasta water until glossy and creamy.
- Serve at once.
Tip: If the cheese clumps, the pan was too hot: always add the cheese off the heat.
Cups and spoons are US measures (1 cup = 240 ml); weights and °C are given alongside. Cook meat to a safe inside temperature.
Food marks, as on packaged food in India: vegetarian · non-vegetarian (meat, fish or egg; Indian rules count egg as non-vegetarian). Recipes with both marks can be made either way.
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