I was back at work on Monday after having had three very nice days of annual leave. I was working from home and I thought it might be nice to ‘recreate’ one of the recipes that I had eaten over the weekend.

I really quite liked the orecchiette cime di rapa. It is a classic dish from Puglia, southeastern Italy. Historically, this area was famed for producing Pugliese cucina povera. Otherwise known as ‘poor cuisine’, it was dependent on local inexpensive ingredients, and cooking skills and knowledge passed down through generations.

This dish is normally made with orecchietta “little ears” and cime di rapa (translated as turnip tops/greens). Cime di rapa is also known as broccoli raab/rabe and rapini. Tenderstem broccoli is a suitable substitute this vegetable is difficult to source outside of Italy.

I googled and found a recipe I could adapt. This one comes from Riverford and was nice because it gave me licence to use the spinach I had in the freezer and the excess macaroni I seem to have accrued. I did not have cream so I used a knob of salted butter.

It all came out rather nicely. I might be biased – I absolutely love macaroni, especially with any type of cheese! So this was always going to be a winner 🥇.

What I might add is that perhaps in this dish, the spinach did not add much except for the promise iron and vitamin C. I think this would have played much nicer in the mouth if I had used broccoli. I quite like the soft grainy texture of brocoli and I think that what this dish, the one that I just made, was missing. Just a hunch, which I might act on later in the week.

Watch this space…

Ingredients

• spinach
• macaroni
• olive oil
• 2 garlic cloves, chopped
• pinch arbo chilli flakes
• knob of butter
• 1 lemon
• Parmesan, grated to serve
• salt and pepper

Method

• Put a large pan of salted water on to boil. Wash and chop the spinach. Put the pasta into the water.
• Gently heat 2 tablespoons of olive oil in a frying pan and slowly cook the garlic fragrant but not burning. Add the spinach and a pinch of dried chilli, cooked gently until wilted. Add a knob of butter and some of the pasta cooking water.
• Seasoned with salt, pepper and a squeeze of lemon juice. Drain the pasta and fold it into the pan of spinach. Serve piled into shallow bowls and finish with plenty of grated pecorino and good olive oil.

Adapted from: https://www.riverford.co.uk/recipes/cime-di-rapa-pasta