by Mark Bittman
from How to Cook Everything Vegetarian
(John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 2007)
Makes about 4 servings
A rich bread-thickened nut sauce that’s unbelievable with stuffed pasta. To make a nondairy version of this sauce, use about 1/2 cup bread crumbs with nondairy milk and omit the Parmesan.—Mark Bittman
convert Ingredients
Salt
1 thick slice Italian bread
1/2 cup milk
1 cup walnut or pecan halves
2 garlic cloves
1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese, plus more for serving
2 teaspoons fresh marjoram leaves or 1/2 teaspoon dried
1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil
Freshly ground black pepper
1 pound dried, fresh, or stuffed pasta
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Directions
1. Bring a large pot of water to a boil and salt it. Soak the bread in the milk.
2. Combine the nuts, garlic, cheese, and marjoram in a food processor and turn the machine on. With the machine running, add the oil gradually, using just enough so that the mixture forms a very thick paste. Now add the bread-and-milk mixture and enough water to make a saucy mixture. Sprinkle with salt and pepper.
3. Cook the pasta until tender but not mushy. Drain it — reserving some of the cooking water — and toss with the sauce. If the mixture appears too thick, thin it with a little of the pasta cooking water (or more olive oil). Taste and adjust the seasoning, then serve with more Parmesan.
Variations
Pasta with Walnut-Tomato Sauce: The acidity in the tomatoes lightens up the sauce a bit. Add 1 medium tomato, peeled, seeded, and roughly chopped, or 1/2 cup chopped canned tomato, blend with the nuts in step 1.
Pasta with Rich Walnut Sauce: Blend 3 to 4 tablespoons mascarpone with the nuts in step 1. Use cream cheese or heavy cream, if you don’t have mascarpone.
Recipe © 2007 by Double B Publishing. All rights reserved.
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[Chiyo Ueyama] Pasta sauce with nuts, marjoram, and . . . bread? It was a combination I probably wouldn’t think of on my own. The recipe looked simple, and I had all the ingredients at home, so I HAD TO try it. I used pecans (the recipe says “walnut or pecan halves”) and dried fettuccine (“dried, fresh, or stuffed pasta”). The pasta cooked in eight minutes, during which I prepared the sauce in my mini food processor. I tasted the sauce by itself first, and it was delicious. The sweet pecans, salty cheese, hot garlic, and, although just 2 teaspoons, very aromatic marjoram. If I weren’t testing the recipe for the web site, I would have grabbed some bread and started dunking. The sauce was creamy and substantial, and it held on to the smooth surface of the fettuccine very well. The recipe lets you adjust the thickness of the sauce to your liking with either more olive oil or the cooking water from the pasta. I recommend the cooking water as the sauce already has plenty of oil. I’ll definitely make this again.
[Susan Bingaman] Don’t let the bread scare you. The walnut sauce comes together beautifully, and you will never know that bread and milk bind together the nuts, Parmesan, marjoram, and garlic. Bittman is right, the sauce is divine over stuffed pasta, but it’s also delicious over tagliatelle as well. Since the pasta with walnut sauce is made with pantry staples, it’s a recipe I’ll rely on again and again.