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1
Drain the soaked borlotti beans and cover with fresh cold water in a large pot. Bring to a simmer over medium heat and cook, uncovered, until the beans are just half-cooked — tender at the outer edge but still firm at the centre, approximately 30–40 minutes. Reserve all the cooking liquid. The beans should offer definite resistance when pressed between two fingers.
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2
In a wide, heavy-based pot, melt the lard over medium-low heat. Add the onion, celery and carrot. Cook the soffritto slowly, stirring occasionally, until the vegetables are completely soft, translucent and beginning to colour at the edges — 15 to 20 minutes. The smell should be sweet and gently caramelised, with no raw onion note remaining.
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3
Add the fresh tomatoes (or passata) to the soffritto. Raise the heat to medium and cook, stirring regularly, until the tomatoes have collapsed and reduced to a dense, cohesive sauce that pulls away from the sides of the pot — 15 to 20 minutes. The sauce should be deep red and hold its shape briefly when a spoon is drawn through it.
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4
Add the half-cooked beans to the tomato base together with enough of the reserved bean cooking liquid to produce a thick, broth-like consistency. This step is where the dish lives or dies: the beans must be only half-done so they absorb tomato flavour during the final simmer without breaking down, and the starchy cooking liquid is the body of the finished dish — discarding it is an irreversible error. Bring to a gentle simmer and cook for 10 minutes. At this point, pass one-third of the beans through a mouli or mash with a fork and stir back into the pot to produce a naturally creamy body.
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5
Make the sagne: combine the semolina and lukewarm water and work to a firm, smooth dough. Rest for 20 minutes under a cloth. Roll out to a thickness of 2–3 mm and cut by hand with a pastry cutter or knife into irregular quadrilateral shapes — broad and flat, with no two pieces identical. The irregular cut edges are deliberate; they catch the broth differently than a straight machine edge.
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6
Drop the fresh sagne directly into the barely simmering bean-tomato broth — not into separate boiling water. Cook for 12 minutes, maintaining a gentle simmer throughout, stirring to prevent the pasta from settling. The finished dish should be thick, at pasta e fagioli consistency: a spoon drawn through the surface should leave a momentary channel before the broth closes back in.
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7
Remove from heat. Finish with raw extra-virgin olive oil, torn basil and crumbled peperoncino. Allow to rest for 2 minutes before serving, during which the dish will thicken further. The surface should glisten from the raw oil and the aroma of basil should be immediate and vivid.