While I was in Sicily on holiday, way back in pre-COVID times, I came across this wonderfully different plate of pasta. It had raisins in it! And breadcrumbs instead of parmesan! Seriously! Salty and sweet, this dish is perfectly balanced and offers an alternative to the usual pasta dishes. I’ve obviously deviated slightly from the traditional recipe, making use of shortcuts such as panko breadcrumbs to achieve the end result with minimal fuss or time. Give it a try! Oh and I tried to make it measurement friendly – all you need is a spoon and your hand!

Serves: 2 main portions
Prep time: 2-3 mins
Cooking time: 15 minutes

Ingredients:

• 4 anchovy fillets and a teaspoon of their oil
• 2 heaped tablespoons of tomato puree/concentrate (“kunserva”)
• 1 handful of kalamata olives (buy them with pit and remove yourself please; they are approximately 20 times better than ready pitted ones xD)
• 1 handful of cherry tomatoes, halved
• 1 handful of golden raisins/sultanas (try to get the bigger/juicer ones for better results)
• 1 tablespoon (or a bit more if you’re feeling nutty) of pine nuts
• 1/2 handful of panko breadcrumbs (or you can make your own breadcrumbs)
• 1 large clove of garlic (finely grated or minced)
• olive oil (or garlic infused olive oil)
• 250 g of Linguine (or any other pasta of your choice)
• optional: 4 sun-dried tomatoes, quartered
• optional: a few basil leaves for garnish
• optional: some chopped chilli/chilli flakes (to taste – I usually use about a 1/2 teaspoon of finely chopped chilli per person)

Method:

1. Fill a large pot with water, season well with salt and bring to the boil.
2. While waiting for the water to boil, prepare and assemble all of your ingredients as described above.
3. Warm up a non stick frying pan with a tablespoon of olive oil over medium-high heat. Add the breadcrumbs and garlic (and a tiny sprinkle of salt) and toast for 1-4 minutes until the breadcrumbs turn nice and golden. Be sure to give it the occasional stir/ toss to ensure you don’t burn them! Transfer to a small bowl and reserve for serving.
4. Toast the pine nuts for a few minutes in the same pan until golden. Remove and reserve for later.
5. Add your pasta to the pot with the boiling water and cook as per packet instructions.
6. While your pasta is cooking add the anchovies and their oil to the frying pan and fry off for a minute over a medium high heat. If your adding chilli, now is the time.
7. Add the tomato puree/concentrate and cook for a further minute.
8. Add the cherry tomatoes and cook for 2-3 minutes.
9. Then, add the sun-dried tomatoes (if using), olives and raisins and cook for another 2-3 minutes. Remove from the heat and set aside.
10. Transfer your pasta to the frying pan using tongs, transferring some of the pasta water to help combine it with the sauce (alternatively, drain your pasta and reserve some of the starchy water, and combine the sauce with the pasta using some (eg a few tablespoons) of the reserved water to loosen it up).
11. Serve on a warm plate, and sprinkle over the pine nuts and the garlic breadcrumbs (“pangrattato“) according to your preference.
12. Finish with a drizzle of olive oil and a few basil leaves. Enjoy.

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Notes:

You can easily swap out the linguines for any other type of pasta of your preference. When I can find, I love using frilled pasta such as mafaldine/reginette as it just clings to the sauce and pangrattato.

You can swap out the regular tomato puree/concentrate for a sundried tomato equivalent for a richer, sweeter flavour.

From what I can understand, pangrattato refers to a technique (originating in Southern Italy) of using flavoured breadcrumbs as an affordable substitute for cheese to finish off and season pasta dishes. If you aren’t going to be making them yourself from stale bread, I found that using panko breadcrumbs yields a crispier and more flavourful result when compared to other regular breadcrumbs. Zero effort, brilliant result!

This recipe can easily be halved, doubled, tripled etc! 😛

NB: to all those people who have tiny hands… for the sake of this recipe… when measuring out your ingredients… imagine you’ve got a bigger hand 😛

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