Above: Luci’s carrot pasta, Below: Josh’s carrot pasta
Pasta Carota
Some of my favorite recipes come from vegetable farmers. Thanks to the abundance of raw materials, these dishes tend to be veggie-forward and local. And because of the circumstances under which the recipes were developed, they share some common traits. Such as limited active cooking times, with few store-bought ingredients, and the ability to satisfy the voracious bellies of hard-working, hungry crews.
Farm cuisine is the earthiest of them all. Forged by functionalities of a farmy lifestyle, and geared to seasonal rhythms. In winter, when not much is in season, a farm style dish will be geared toward preserved or stored ingredients in the freezer, pantry or root cellar.
Carrot pasta is a rare dish that is always in season, because fresh, local carrots are always available. But the recipe shines especially bright during the dark days of winter when nothing else is.
Farm cooks pass around recipes like heirloom seeds, and each kitchen is a pristine habitat in which a recipe can evolve. My friend Josh learned today’s carrot pasta recipe from our friend Luci in a very short phone conversation, and immediately went his merry way with it. Luci had learned it from her sister’s ex-husband, Ernesto, who learned it from his mom in Milan. Josh immediately changed the recipe to fit his own personality and circumstances.
He has no prep cook, but a full cleanup crew. These circumstances allow him to tornado through the kitchen, which dovetails well with the fact that he’s in more of a hurry, and tends to be less detail-oriented. And his improv game is as fluid as a jazz soloist.
Luci, meanwhile, is more of a craftsman in the kitchen, and a stickler to her methods. If she needs a chopper she’ll rope anyone within shouting range — which is quite a large area. By that time Josh, all by his lonesome with a podcast playing, will have already grated a load of carrots in a Cuisinart.
Carrot pasta — or Pasta Carota as they would say in Milan — delivers a creamy earthy sweetness inside a savory sauce that is rich but light. It’s like dinner and desert in every bite. The richness comes from a redundancy of fatty ingredients, including olive oil, milk, cream and butter, which simmering together dissolves the cheese. And the lightness comes from the airy carrot paste, which has puffy consistency, and delivers faint whiffs of summertime. This sauce is the heart of this dish, and the stovetop braised carrots are the heart of the sauce. This step takes a while, but once you have a reservoir of braised carrots on hand, it’s nothing to whip up a sauce and cook up a quick batch on the spot.
Pasta Carota
The meat and anchovy paste are optional, but the parsley at the end less so. It isn’t just a splash of green garnish. Parsley is a cousin to carrot, and the two flavors interact ethereally.
Big noodles like rigatoni are best for carrying this decadent sauce. It fills the tubular cavities and makes the noodles taste like savory, creamy stuffed cannoli.
Serves 4
Ingredients
2 pounds peeled carrots
½ cup olive oil
1 cup milk
2 tablespoons butter
1 teaspoon of thyme or Italian seasonings
a few pinches of ground nutmeg
4 large cloves garlic, pressed, minced or crushed
6 ounces grated Parmesan
1/2-1 cup heavy cream
red pepper flakes, to taste
Optional: one teaspoon anchovy paste
1/2 cup mayo or vegenaise
½ teaspoon black pepper
½ teaspoon salt
Meat option: 1 pound ground Italian sausage
1 pound rigatoni
1/2 bunch parsley, chopped
Step 1 – The carrots
Cut the carrots into coins. Add them to a heavy bottomed pan with the olive oil, and cook on low for about an hour, covered with a heavy lid. Stir occasionally to scrape the bottom and check the moisture content. Carrots release water as they cook, and they will simmer gently in the bubbling mix of olive oil and water. When the moisture inevitably runs out, add the milk and a cup of water. Bring to a boil on medium heat, and simmer for another hour on low.
Add the cheese, butter, mayo, pepper flakes, thyme, nutmeg, half of the garlic, and anchovy paste if using, and let the sauce simmer with the lid on, stirring every 20 minutes or so. If it starts to get stiff, add another cup of water and keep simmering until the cheese dissolves.
Finally, add the cream. Season with salt and black pepper and mix it — but not too much, according to Luci’s husband. “When the carrot coins have almost turned into a paste, at the very end, you add the cream. It’s like when you add milk to hot cereal but don’t totally mix it. The oil is floating on the cream, and the cream isn’t integrated.” His voice trailed off.
I have nibbled upon those unmixed, creamed, falling-apart carrot coins myself, I share his enchantment. However there is no doubt that the sauce coats the noodles better if you liquify it first with an immersion blender.
Josh is usually more pressed for time, and consequently has a quicker version of the sauce. He grates the carrots, which allows them to cook in about 45 minutes. Prepare as above, under a heavy lid, with a mix of milk and water to prevent the pan from drying out, and adding cheese, garlic, butter, mayo, spices, anchovy paste, and cream, salt and pepper to finish it off.
Step 2 — The meat option
Cook the ground Italian sausage in a pan until browned. Set aside.
Step 3 — La pasta
Bring a pot of salted water to a boil and cook the noodles. Drain and toss with 2 tablespoons olive oil and the other half of the minced garlic. In a large bowl, mix together the noodles, sauce, parsley and meat. Serve.