Pasta e Ceci

This puppy is vegan, so my friend Dan informs me I’m legally obligated to refer to it as “voup.” And, let me tell you, this is some vamn vood voup.

I grew up calling chickpeas "garbanzo beans," and according to Wikipedia a chickpea can also be called a gram, a Bengal gram, an Egyptian pea, a ceci, a cece or a chana. But for today, I'm just going to call them delicious.

Whatever the name, I lived for years with the tragic misconception that canned beans were basically no different from dried, and that you could use them as a shortcut without sacrificing taste. Cut to: the first time I decided to test that theory a few years back, and couldn't believe the difference. I was straight up eating plain chickpeas for breakfast, lunch and dinner for a solid week.

In hindsight, it's a no-brainer. When you cook your beans yourself, you can add co-conspirators:

Flavor Rafts in the Chickpea Sea

PLUS IT'S CHEAPER THIS WAY. I don't know if you knew this, but spending less money on food means you have more for things like first-class vacations, diamond-encrusted bras, or Duke Energy bills.

Do I still have a can of chickpeas in my pantry at all times? Of course. I'm not a barbarian. But if you need a win for the day, if you need to feel amazed by what magic you can perform with a few simple and inexpensive ingredients, making chickpeas like this will work every time.

With tomato for acidity, caramelized shallot and carrot for sweetness, some crushed red pepper for spice and garlicky swiss chard for bitterness, this creamy-but-cream-free well-balanced soup left me wanting for nothing. (Except maybe the ability to fit more in my stomach and/or some more folks to share it with.)

In addition to also as well as, it has noodles. My body is approx.. 62.8% noodles at this point (I have this special scale that sends electronic pulses through my body to check for pasta percentages) so I may be displaying a slight bias here, but I don’t think I’m alone in that. There, I said it. It’s vegan but not gluten-free. SORRY CALIFORNIA. #sorrynotsorry

So, chickpeas and pasta: Isn’t this just hummus and crackers in soup form? And isn’t that snack so expected, so exhausted at this point that one could just fall asleep mid-bite? I’m glad you asked.

Answer: Nope.

Verdict: Try it; you'll like it.

Tagline: Go gar-bonkers for garbanzos!

Swiss Chardwick would so points me for this one.

This recipe is a long one, and it does take a few hours so it requires a bit of patience and not too ravenous of an appetite when you start cooking, but I promise nothing here is complicated.

One final note. I guess I'm feeling a little prideful right now because if you do an image search for Pasta e Ceci, this looks better than most of the slightly sad and murky pictures that come up (IMHO). So here's a fun challenge: Make it yourself, upload your pictures, and...

Pasta e Ceci

Serves at least 6
Adapted from Cal Peternell's Twelve Recipes

For the chickpeas:
2 1/2 cups dried chickpeas, covered in water and soaked overnight, then drained
1/2 yellow onion, peeled
1 small carrot, peeled
1 stalk of celery
1 clove of garlic
1 bay leaf
1 sprig of thyme

For the soup:
3 tablespoons olive oil
2 medium shallots, cut in half lengthwise and sliced

1 small carrot, peeled and sliced
2 cloves of garlic, sliced
1/2 teaspoon crushed red pepper, or to taste
1 teaspoon dried rosemary (or 1 tablespoon chopped fresh, which I'd rather have used but couldn't find any this weekend)
2 tablespoons tomato paste
2 cups of water plus vegetable broth base to taste (I used about 1/2 teaspoon vegetable broth base just to make sure the aromatics from the chickpea cooking liquid didn't get diluted)

For finishing:
1 1/2 cups dry orecchiette pasta (or other small pasta shape)
1 bunch Swiss chard, stems removed and chopped into strips about 2" by 1"
2 cloves of garlic, minced
crushed red pepper
good extra virgin olive oil
freshly ground black pepper

Cook the chickpeas:
Put the dried chickpeas in a pot and fill with water until the chickpeas are covered by about two inches. Add a big pinch of salt and the rest of the ingredients in the "For the chickpeas" section and put it on the stove on high heat. Bring it up to a boil, and skim off the weird scum that forms on the surface with a spoon. Turn down the heat to achieve a steady simmer, and let it go until the chickpeas are tender. Tonight this took me about 1 1/2 hours, but it can vary so it's best to start testing them at about an hour. When the chickpeas are finished, remove and discard the onion, garlic, carrot, celery, thyme and bay leaf, then leave the chickpeas in the liquid for use in the soup.

Make the soup:
Put olive oil in pot on medium-high heat. Add carrots and shallots and cover pot, cooking for about 10 minutes. Both will be soft and have some browning on them. Add rosemary, crushed red pepper and garlic and stir, cooking for an additional minute. Add tomato paste and stir to incorporate, cooking a few more minutes. Dump in chickpeas with their cooking liquid, and add enough water to cover the chickpeas by an inch. I added about two cups of water with a bit of vegetable broth base (just about 1/2 teaspoon), but there's probably plenty of flavor there if you just add water. Taste it and see what you think. Bring to a simmer and cook for 15 or 20 minutes.

To finish:
While the soup is simmering, bring a pot of salted water to boil and cook to al dente, then drain.

Place Swiss chard in in a bowl and cover with cold water, swishing it around. Place a saute pan on medium heat and put in a splash of olive oil, followed by your minced garlic. Cook for about one minute, not letting it burn. Pull the Swiss chard out of the water, shaking it off a bit but leaving it wet so that the water will steam the greens, and add it to the saute pan. Push it around a bit until it's nice and tender, seasoning with a pinch of salt and a pinch of crushed red pepper.

Put about 1/3 of your soup in a blender and blend until smooth, then stir back into the pot.

To serve, place a handful of pasta and a good scoop of greens in the bottom of each bowl, then ladle soup over the top. Drizzle with some good olive oil and sprinkle on some freshly ground black pepper and enjoy (seriously).