This really simple dish, created with minimal cauliflower prep, is made even more delicious by ‘scarpetta’ – the delicious act of dipping crusty bread into a flavoursome sauce that’s left at the bottom of the cooking pot
When Nadine isn't busy developing delicious recipes and using her experience as a health food editor to create healthy treats, she's munching and reviewing her way around her beloved home town of Tottenham. Find out what she's cooking and eating on Instagram @n0sh.17
See more of Nadine Brown’s recipes
Nadine Brown
When Nadine isn't busy developing delicious recipes and using her experience as a health food editor to create healthy treats, she's munching and reviewing her way around her beloved home town of Tottenham. Find out what she's cooking and eating on Instagram @n0sh.17
See more of Nadine Brown’s recipes
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Ingredients
70g Pecorino Romano cheese, finely grated
6 tbsp olive oil, plus a little extra to drizzle
2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
1 garlic clove, grated
1 extra-large cauliflower, about 1.3kg
250ml hot vegetable stock (made using ½ a stock cube*)
2 tbsp full-fat crème fraîche
small handful of parsley, finely chopped
crusty bread*, to serve
salad leaves, to serve
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Preheat the oven to 220°C, fan 200°C, gas 7. Combine 50g of the grated cheese with the oil, black pepper, garlic, and a large pinch of salt. Set aside.
Remove the outer leaves of the cauliflower and set them aside in a small roasting tin. Cut a small slice from the base of the cauliflower so that it sits level, then place it in a deep lidded casserole. Pour the hot vegetable stock around the cauliflower, then spoon the Pecorino mixture over the top – it’s fine if some goes into the water below. Cover with a lid and bake for 45 minutes, or until fork tender. Meanwhile, drizzle the leaves with a little oil, season and add to the oven to cook alongside the cauliflower until crisp and slightly charred – about 15 minutes, then remove.
Remove the casserole from the oven, sprinkle half the remaining cheese over the cauliflower and return to the oven, uncovered. Bake until the cheese has melted and the surface starts to turn golden, about 5 minutes.
Lift the cauliflower out to a serving dish, if using, then whisk the crème fraîche and remaining cheese into the liquid remaining in the casserole to make a sauce. Pour the sauce around the cauliflower and scatter over the parsley. Serve with the bread to mop up the sauce, and the roast cauliflower leaves and salad on the side. Alternatively, you could return the cauliflower to the casserole and take it all to the table to serve. *Serve with gluten-free bread and check your stock is gluten-free, if required.
Waste not
Blitz any leftovers with stock or milk plus some seasoning to make a speedy pasta sauce.
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But it is extremely hard to execute well because you need to control the heat. The cheese will become stringy if you heat up your pan too much (above 70 °C or 158 °F). I tested all the methods, so you do not need to! Cacio e Pepe is rare in restaurants because it is hard to serve warm without the corn starch trick.
Cacio e pepe is traditionally made from black pepper, aged Pecorino Romano cheese, spaghetti or tonnarelli pasta, and, most importantly, pasta cooking water. Authentic cacio e pepe does not include butter or oil, but we're willing to break a few rules for flavor.
Classic versions call for just pasta, salted water, freshly ground pepper, and Pecorino Romano, a Roman sheep's milk cheese. Ours tosses a bit of Grana Padano or Parmesan into the mix for a more rounded cheese flavor that melds warmth, nuttiness, and sharpness.
Add pepper and cook ('bloom'), until fragrant and toasted. Use tongs to pull pasta into the pan (this way you are reserving all the pasta water), then add ½ cup pasta water. Using a wooden spoon, stir the pasta, using the pasta as a whisk to emulsify the butter and pasta water into a sauce.
Elbow grease. The creaminess of Italian pasta dishes is usually the result of stirring. Add your pasta to the sauce or condiment - cacio e pepe in your case - with some of the water the pasta boiled in. Stir as you never stirred before and the result will be creamy.
Spaghetti is the traditional pasta for cacio e pepe, but even Roman establishments now use popular shapes such as rigatoni, bucatini, and thick, square-cut noodles called tonnarelli.
Cacio e pepe means 'cheese and pepper' in several central Italian dialects. In keeping with its name, the dish contains grated pecorino romano and black pepper, together with tonnarelli or spaghetti.
Pecorino Romano basically makes up the whole sauce, and y'all – that cheese is SALTY. So, we need to watch how much salt we go adding into the pasta water. Just season it lightly, but not like, you know … the Great Salt Lake.
Traditionally, Cacio e Pepe depended on the starch in the pasta water to act as the emulsifier and thickener of the pasta sauce. While the cornstarch gel supplants the need for starchy pasta water, using starchy pasta water certainly helps.
(1) Make sure your cheese is grated as finely as possible, and that it is at room temperature or warmer. A microplane is perfect. (2) The water you add can't be too hot. Scoop some pasta water out halfway through the cooking process, allow it to cool, and use that to add later.
Pecorino Romano is a hard, Italian sheep's milk cheese. It has sharp, rich nutty flavor, making it the perfect cheese for this simple pasta dish. If you don't have it or can't find it Parmigiano-Reggiano is a totally acceptable alternative.
The best side dishes to serve with Cacio e Pepe are turkey meatballs, Caprese salad, shrimp scampi, grilled red snapper, grilled mushrooms, avocado salad, cornbread, Parmesan crusted walleye, chicken wings, beef tenderloin, garlic bread, bruschetta, sauteed spinach, Italian sausage, and roasted vegetables.
This foolproof method delivers the classic, crave worthy flavors and textures of cacio e pepe—strong peppery backbone (without verging towards too “hot”), earthy saltiness from the Pecorino cheese, and a luscious sauciness that will have you ready to lick the bowl.
The translation of Cacio e Pepe literally means cheese and pepper. This pasta dish is incredibly simple, but packs a lot of rich flavor with pecorino Romano cheese and freshly ground pepper. It has a very rich and strong flavor due to the Pecorino Romano sharp cheese as well as the heavy amount of pepper.
This dish is supposed to be heavy on the pepper, but if you don't like a strong peppery flavor or if you are serving to kids who are sensitive to pepper, you can reduce the amount. See the recipe notes. Cheese– Aged Pecorino Romano is a MUST when making Cacio e Pepe.
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Prep time: 20 mins
