Lagane e Cicciari — Pasta with Chickpeas

Ingredients

• For the chickpeas
• 300 g dried chickpeas, soaked overnight in cold water, drained
• 4 garlic cloves, whole, unpeeled
• 2 rosemary sprigs, whole
• 1 dried peperoncino, whole
• 1.5 litres cold water
• For the lagane
• 300 g tipo 00 or semolina flour
• 150 ml water, lukewarm
• To finish
• 60 ml cold-pressed Calabrian olive oil, poured at the table

Method

1. 1
   Drain the soaked chickpeas and place them in a deep pot with the cold water, garlic, rosemary, and peperoncino. Bring to a gentle simmer over medium heat. Cook, uncovered or partly covered, until the chickpeas are completely tender — 60 to 90 minutes depending on age. The liquid should remain at roughly one litre of pale, cloudy broth; add water if it falls below that level. The chickpeas are done when they crush between thumb and finger without resistance.
2. 2
   While the chickpeas cook, make the lagane. Mound the flour on a board and work in the lukewarm water gradually, kneading firmly until the dough is smooth, firm, and no longer sticky — approximately 8 to 10 minutes. The dough is ready when it springs back slowly after being pressed with a finger.
3. 3
   Roll the dough to 2–3 mm thickness. Cut into wide, irregular strips approximately 2 cm wide and 10 cm long. Do not dust heavily; do not dry. Use immediately.
4. 4
   Remove the rosemary sprigs, peperoncino, and garlic from the chickpea pot. If the cooking water is thin, remove a ladleful of chickpeas, crush them to a rough paste, and stir back into the pot — this is where the dish lives or dies: the pasta must enter a liquid already thick enough to coat, so that starch and broth unify into a single dense sauce rather than a soup.
5. 5
   Bring the chickpea water back to a steady simmer over medium heat. Add the lagane directly to the chickpea pot — not to a separate pan of salted water. Cook, stirring occasionally to prevent sticking, until the pasta is cooked through and the liquid has thickened to a dense, porridge-like consistency. The dish is ready when a spoon drawn across the surface leaves a trail that closes slowly.
6. 6
   Remove from the heat and allow the dish to settle for two minutes. Ladle into wide, shallow bowls. Pour cold-pressed Calabrian olive oil directly and generously over each portion at the table. The oil should pool visibly on the surface before being stirred in by each diner.