Tuna Cacio e Pepe

SCRAPS #69: a tasty 25-minute weeknight dinner

5 ingredients, 25 minutes and dinner is ready! Cacio e pepe (cheese and pepper pasta) is a dish I find myself gravitating towards on busy weeknights: it has 3 ingredients, it’s quick and always hits the spot. Whenever I want to make it a bit more filling, I’ll toss in canned tuna right at the end, sometimes a whole can per serving, sometimes just half of a can. The tuna is pretty mild, so it’ll simply blend in the cheese and pepper sauce.

As simple as this dish might seem, it’s just as easy to mess up when it comes to emulsifying the cheese in the sauce. To prevent a clumpy sauce with melted, stringy cheese, I’m sharing 2 tips that will lead you to success: use a smaller than usual skillet to cook the pasta in to concentrate the starch in the water (which will later help bind the sauce) and blend the cheese and pasta water first as seen in this video, a great tip from chef Luciano Monosilio that has yet to fail me.

Happy cooking!

In other news, I’m keeping myself busy, busy, busy with all-things-cookbook, but I promise I’m working on getting back to a less sporadic posting routine on my newsletter. While I catch up, I’ll have some amazing guests share some of their own recipes that I can’t wait for you to try.

I’m so excited to finally be able to share some sneak peeks from my cookbook as well as tour dates and tickets! I can’t wait to meet you this fall!

How have you been? What have you been cooking this season?

Best,
Carolina xx

A little sneak cookbook peek:

I’m going on tour!!!

PREP TIME: 15 minutes

COOK TIME: 10 minutes

TOTAL TIME: 25 minutes

MAKES: 2 servings

Printable recipe:

Tuna Cacio E Pepe

90KB ∙ PDF file

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Ingredients

• 1 tablespoon (8g) black peppercorns

• 4.5 ounces (125g) Pecorino Romano 

• Salt 

• 7 ounces (200g) spaghetti

• 1 to 2 (7-ounce or 200g) can(s) solid albacore tuna
  

Instructions

1. Bring a 12-inch skillet filled with water to a boil. To concentrate the level of starch in the pasta water, we’re using a smaller skillet rather than a large pot.

2. While the water is coming to a boil, add the peppercorns to a mortar and pestle and crush them until coarsely ground. You can also crush the peppercorns by adding them to a zip-seal bag and crushing them with a rolling pin. 

   

3. Using a microplane or the fine side of a box grater, grate the cheese and add it to a blender or tall container you can blend in using an immersion blender.

   

4. Season the boiling water with a hefty pinch of salt. Add the spaghetti to the boiling water and cook until al dente, about 3 minutes less than what the packaging instructions call for.

   

5. Meanwhile, open the can(s) of tuna and drain the liquid. 

6. When the pasta is close to al dente, scoop out 3/4 cup pasta water. Using an immersion blender or countertop blender, start pulsing the cheese while slowly streaming 2/3 cup of pasta water in the container. The cheese will seem clumpy at first, then smooth and heavy cream-like once you added most of the water. Add the rest of the water if needed to loosen the consistency.

   

7. To a medium saucepan over medium heat, add the crushed pepper. Toast for 1 to 2 minutes, until you see a sliver of smoke. Add 1/2 cup of pasta water over the toasted pepper (careful, the water will splatter) and simmer for a minute or so, until the water turns a dark brown color.

   

8. Add the spaghetti to the saucepan and toss to coat in peppercorns. Reduce the heat to medium-low.

   

9. Pour the Pecorino Romano mixture all over the pasta. Using a flexible silicone spatula, vigorously stir the pasta to emulsify the sauce. Add the drained tuna and mix to combine. Add another splash of pasta water if needed. For some extra richness, finish the sauce with a not-very-traditional knob of butter.

   

   

10. Serve right away with more pepper on top.