Orecchiette con Broccoli

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Learn how to get the best from your broccoli with this pasta recipe and how to use any leftover breadcrumbs to give some extra flavour and crispiness to your pasta! 

Usually orecchiette are made with a simple sauce, cime di rapa which is a type of broccoli leaf. This type of veg is hard to find here in the UK so we are using broccoli.

**If you are going to make your own orecchiette pasta : This type of pasta dough is made with durum wheat semolina and water and is a southern Italian speciality. Plus, because there are no eggs in the recipe, it can stay a long time in the fridge before cooking (and, it’s vegan). This dough is so simple to make and you can simply let it dry on a wooden board for a few hours to produce the perfect "al dente" consistency. Al dente means firm when bitten.

This recipe will feed around 2 to 3  person 


All you need is: 

• 250g of orecchiette, for our fresh orecchiette  recipe, click here.
• Salt
• 150g of cime di rapa or tenderstem broccoli
• 1 garlic "in camicia" (with a shirt – crushed with the skin on)
• 1 dried chilli or a few slices of fresh medium spiced chilli
• 2 anchovies
• Olive oil
• Breadcrumbs (toasted and crunchy)

The cooking process:

1. To make the broccoli sauce, add the chopped broccoli to boiling water.
2. While the broccoli are cooking, add the anchovies, garlic and red chilli to a hot frying pan.
3. Let them fry and then add the broccoli once it has cooked for about 3 minutes in the boiling water.
4. Add salt to the boiling water where you cooked the broccoli and cook the orecchiette “al dente”!
5. Add the pasta into the sauce and stir in to the broccoli sauce.
6. Serve the dish with parmesan, extra virgin olive oil and pangrattato (breadcrumbs) on top.