Orecchiette con Cime di Rapa — Ear-Shaped Pasta with Turnip Tops

Ingredients

• For the orecchiette dough
• 300 g semola rimacinata (twice-milled durum semolina)
• 1 pinch fine salt
• 150 ml water, added gradually to make a firm dough
• For the dish
• 800 g cime di rapa (broccoli rabe, rapini), trimmed
• 12–16 anchovy fillets, salt-packed or oil-packed; 3–4 fillets per portion
• 4 cloves garlic, sliced
• 1–2 peperoncino (dried red chilli), crumbled or sliced
• 60 ml extra-virgin olive oil, DOP Pugliese; divided — for frying and for finishing

Method

1. 1
   Combine the semola rimacinata with a pinch of salt and add water gradually, mixing to a firm, cohesive dough. Knead for 10 minutes. The dough is ready when it is smooth, stiff, and no longer tacky to the touch.
2. 2
   Wrap the dough and leave it to rest. Roll portions into ropes approximately 1.5 cm in diameter. Cut across the rope at 1.5 cm intervals. Using a blunt knife, press each piece and drag it toward you with slight downward pressure — the dough curls up around the blade to form the ear shape. Invert each piece by pressing it over the thumb. The finished orecchiette should hold a distinct concave cup.
3. 3
   Bring a large pot of well-salted water to the boil. Add the cime di rapa and blanch for 3 minutes. Lift the cime di rapa out and set aside; reserve every drop of the cooking water. The water should be dark green and sharply bitter — this is the cooking medium for the pasta.
4. 4
   Warm a generous pour of olive oil in a wide pan over medium heat. Add the sliced garlic and peperoncino and cook until the garlic is pale gold. Add the anchovy fillets. This is the step on which the dish lives or dies: the anchovies must dissolve entirely into the oil, providing invisible depth with no discrete pieces remaining — if they have not dissolved, the flavour backbone of the sauce is incomplete.
5. 5
   Add the blanched cime di rapa to the pan. Sauté briefly, turning in the flavoured oil, until the greens are coated and heated through. Do not cook further at this stage — a third cooking will follow when the pasta is added.
6. 6
   Return the reserved cime di rapa water to the boil. Cook the orecchiette in this water until just tender but with resistance at the centre. Drain, retaining a ladleful of the green cooking water.
7. 7
   Transfer the orecchiette to the pan with the cime di rapa sauce, adding a splash of the retained cooking water. Toss over heat until the pasta and greens are unified and the liquid has tightened to a loose, dark green coating. Remove from the heat and finish with a drizzle of raw DOP Pugliese olive oil. The oil should visibly brighten the surface.