Sicilian Pasta Pesto alla Trapanese

When I learned of this Sicilian recipe I really, really didn’t want to make it. I really, really wanted it to just appear in front of me immediately. A pesto made from tomatoes, almonds, basil and parmesan – there’s nothing on that list that doesn’t inspire a quick trip to the kitchen for an unscheduled bowl of tomatoey greatness. After all, it’s a great way to pasta time? Pesto alla Trapanese comes from Trapani in Sicily and is all about using the best ingredients, so you need ripe juicy tomatoes if you want to do it justice. If you’re not lucky enough to be surrounded by the type of tomatoes that mean business, then some good quality tinned tomatoes can be used. Oh, and one should always take artistic licence when equiped with a hunk of parmesan and a grater, so if one must deviate from the traditional recipe, one should simply be proud of their cheese grating skills! There’s no cooking in this dish – the pesto is just stirred through cooked linguine. It’s simple, light and the perfect summer pasta to help you out with that glass of pinot grigio!

Sicilian Pasta Pesto alla Trapanese

Cuisine: Sicilian, Italian, PastaDifficulty: Easy

Servings

2

servings

Prep time

30

minutes

Cooking time

15

minutes

Total time

45

minutes

Ingredients

• 4 Medium Sized Tomatoes (or 360g), deseeded

• 80g of Almonds, crushed

• 2 Large Garlic Cloves, sliced and lightly cooked

• About 10 Basil Leaves, chopped

• Smoked Sea Salt, amount to personal preference

• Parmesan (!-unlimited -!)

• 3 Tbsp Good Quality Olive Oil

• Juice of 1/4 of a Lemon

• 200g of Linguine Pasta

Directions

• Place the whole, unpeeled tomatoes in boiling water and leave for 10 mins.
• Add pasta to a saucepan of boiling, salted water and cook according to packaging.
• Add some oil to a moderately heated frying pan and cook the garlic very gently without browning. (optional – recipe traditionally uses raw garlic)
• Add almonds to a processor, blitz to a breadcrumb texture, add smoked salt. Set aside.
• Remove the skin from tomatoes and chop in quarters.
• Place a sieve over a bowl and with your hands, remove the seeds.
• Using the back of a spoon, help the juice to drip down into the bowl.
• Discard the seeds.
• Chop the tomatoes roughly
• To a blender, add the tomatoes, their juice, lemon juice, olive oil, garlic, salt and basil. Blend until smooth. (reserve some of the tomato pieces for garnish)
• Stir the sauce into the drained pasta
• Then stir the almonds through
• Top with grated parmesan, some tomato pieces and basil.

Notes

• For this recipe, rather than combine all of the ingredients to make a pesto first, instead the almonds and the parmesan have been added to the pasta separately to the tomatoes. This results in a better texture for this particular dish.