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05/09/2001 Archived Entry: "Paccheri with Ricotta and Tomato Sauce"

I taught Neapolitan cooking at the Culinary Institute of America yesterday. My lecture and cooking session is part of the new 15-week Italian Culture and Cuisine program now offered to graduates of the CIA courtesy of funds given by the Italian Trade Commission.

There is also a new Colavita Center for Italian cuisine on the campus in Hyde Park, New York, but that’s separate from the program in which I participate. The Colavita Center, in a new Tuscan-style building that I must say looks terribly out of place in the more Alpine atmosphere of the Hudson Valley and the red-brick architecture of the rest of the campus, is for the undergraduate class given in Italian cooking. Another story.

To get to the recipe point of this entry, one of the dishes I taught is macaroni with ricotta-enriched tomato sauce. It is from my book, Naples At Table, and features a very Neapolitan pasta shape called paccheri.

Paccheri are very large tubes. In fact, they are so large that they collapse when cooked, traping inside them whatever they have been sauced with. The name means “slaps,” because they supposedly make a noise like slaps when lifted by a fork. You’ll here it in the following recipe.

“Naples At Table” has several recipes calling for paccheri: There’s paccheri with a sauce of cherry tomatoes, shrimp and monkfish , from a restaurant called Da Gemma, which faces the cathedral in Amalfi, and there’s also a dish created by a fancy chef, a man Neapolitans would call a Monzu, where the paccheri are sauced with an incredibly rich tomato sauce enriched with butter and whipped cream. The first time I served it to guests they remembered it as a lobster sauce because it was so rich. Indeed, it would be very wonderful garnished with lobster or crab.

The following is my simplest and most typical paccheri recipe, one that is made quite often with other pastas as well, such as rigatoni or bucatini (also called perciatelli in Naples), and especially in the summer when fresh tomatoes for the sauce are abundant. I love it most with paccheri, however, since they are so much fun to eat.

When I first started writing Naples At Table in 1995, paccheri were unavailable in the United States and I would bring them back from Naples, bulky as they are to carry in a suitcase. Now they are not so difficult to find, although you certainly won’t find them in an everyday supermarket. I buy the Setaro brand, the very same brand I used to schlep home, from a truly great Italian store called Buon Italia, which is in the Chelsea Market on Ninth Ave. and 15th St. in Manhattan.

I just discovered paccheri are available by mail-order, too. A.G. Ferrari Foods of San Francisco (and other store locations in the Bay area) carries a good Neapolitan brand of paccheri made in Gragnano, a town on the Bay of Naples, near Sorrento, that is famous for pasta production.

To spread the mail-order charges over more than a pound or two of paccheri (by the way, it’s $3.95 a pound), A.G. Ferrari also carries many other products you may be interested in, including the very hard-to-find Latini Senatore Cappelli spaghetti, which is a special line of the already extraordinary, artisinally made Latini-brand pasta made with particularly flavorful hard wheat. Don’t ask. Just take my word that it is a very special pasta experience.

Paccheri con Ricotta e Salsa di Pomodoro
(Macaroni with Ricotta and Tomato Sauce)

Serves 4 to 6

2 cups smooth tomato sauce, made with onion, basil, and preferably
but not necessarily with fresh tomatoes (see Naples At Table)
1 cup whole milk ricotta
1/2 cup freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano or pecorino, or a combination
1 pound paccheri or other large tubular pasta, such as rigatoni
Freshly ground black pepper
A few leaves of finely cut or torn fresh basil
Freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano or pecorino, or a combination, for the table

Prepare the tomato sauce. Or reheat. Keep it hot, but not simmering.

Put the pasta water to boil.

In a pasta serving bowl, combine the ricotta and the grated cheese. Work them together with a spoon or fork until well blended.

Cook the pasta in plenty of salted, boiling water until al dente. Before draining it, scoop out about 1/2 cup of the pasta cooking water and reserve it.

Pour about half of the hot tomato sauce into the cheese mixture in the bowl. Stir well. Add the drained, hot pasta to the sauce, then black pepper to taste. Toss well, adding hot pasta cooking water by the tablespoon if a looser, creamier texture is desired. The sauce tends to thicken as it cools in the plate, so 2 or 3 tablespoons are usually a good idea. If using the more condensed, imported or Italian-style ricotta impastare, the more solid form of ricotta, some water will definitely be needed.)

Serve immediately, preferably in hot bowls, each portion topped with a little more tomato sauce and with additional finely cut basil, if desired. Pass grated cheese and the peppermill.