Our last day in Italy last spring was certainly memorable. The train back to Rome from Bari was cancelled midway through our trip due to a landslide on the tracks and, while we got eventually got there, we had a little four hour “adventure” along the way involving panicked crowds fighting to get on shuttle buses and a impromptu drive by Mount Vesuvius.

Fortunately, we got back to Rome in one piece, in time for dinner at a restaurant called Il Sorpasso, close by my niece’s place in Prati. It was easy to understand why it’s so popular among locals and non-locals alike. The convivial atmosphere was contagious, and the stresses of the day quickly melted away as we sipped on our spritzes and perused the menu…

For my main course, the tagliolini alla gricia con carciofi caught my eye. I was intrigued by this variation on one of the classic Roman pasta dishes, pasta alla gricia, a rustic dish of pasta dressed with guanciale (cured pork jowl) and pecorino romano cheese. You could call it the mother of all Roman pasta dishes. Take that basic recipe and add eggs, you get carbonara. Add tomatoes and you get amatriciana. Omit the guancial and you get cacio e pepe.

The folks at Il Sorpasso had come up with a surprisingly elegant take on la gricia made with the delicate strands of egg pasta called tagliolini instead of the usual rigatoni or tonnarelli (better known outside of Rome as spaghetti alla chitarra) and slivers of sautéed artichoke beautifully complementing the usual guanciale and cheese condimento. It was love at first bite, and I knew I had to try my hand at recreating it at home.

Fortunately it’s easy to do. And this is great time of year to do so. Often thought of as a spring vegetable, in Italy (and elsewhere in the northern hemisphere) artichokes enjoy a second season in October and November. And of course artichokes are having their first spring season Down Under. Now that’s what I call a win-win.

Ingredients

Serves 3-4

250g (8 oz)] tagliolini, tonnarelli, rigatoni or another pasta of your choice (see Notes)
150g (5oz) guanciale, cut into strips
2 small artichokes (about 150g/5 oz each untrimmed), trimmed and cut into slivers
125g (4 oz) freshly grated pecorino romano cheese
Salt and pepper
Olive oil or lard (if needed)
Lemon juice (for trimming the artichokes)

Instructions

Put a large pot of well salted water on the boil for the pasta.

Trim the artichokes of their tough outers leaves and chokes, following the instructions in this post. Then slice them into slivers. Immerse them immediately in acidulated water.

In a large sauté pan, braise or wok, gently sauté the strips of guanciale until they are golden brown and have rendered most of their fat. (If the guanciale is on the lean side, you can add some oil or lard to the pan to help things along.) Remove and reserve the guanciale.

Add the sliced artichoke the same pan. Stir and let the artichokes sauté gently in the rendered fat for a minute or two, seasoning with just a tiny pinch of salt and abundant pepper. Drizzle with water, enough to cover the bottom of the pan, and let the artichokes simmer until tender. Add more water if needed. Once the artichokes are tender, let any excess liquid in the pan evaporate almost (but not quite) completely.

When the artichokes are almost tender, throw the pasta into salted boiling water and cook until al dente.

Just before the pasta is done, mix a small ladleful of the pasta water with the grated pecorino with fork or whisk in a small mixing bowl until you have a kind of smooth cream.

Now transfer the pasta to the pan with the sautéed artichokes, along with the reserved guanciale and the pecorino cream. Toss everything together quickly over the very lowest flame you can manage until well mixed and the pecorino cream clings loosely to the pasta. (If things feel a little dry, moisten with a bit of pasta water. If they’re too loose, keep tossing over very low heat until the sauce thickens.)

NB: The pasta shouldn’t ordinarily need further seasoning as the guanciale and cheese are both quite savory, but taste it just in case.

Serve immediately, with more grated cheese and a pepper grinder at hand for those who want.

Notes

A word to the wise: When I say “serve immediately” do take it literally. Especially if you’re using fresh egg pasta, the dish loses its delightful creaminess very quickly, so eat up! (For the same reason, the photos in this post don’t really do the dish full justice.)

As mentioned at the top, that delicious plate of pasta alla gricia con carciofi I enjoyed at Il Sorpasso was made, rather unusually, with tagiolini. These are a long egg pasta like tagliatelle but much narrower, only 2-3 mm wide rather than 6mm. If you’re game, they’re fairly easy to make at home. You can also buy tagliolini at many stores that specialize in Italian food products or better supermarkets.

More classically, you can make the pasta alla gricia con carciofi with either a short pasta like rigatoni or mezze maniche, or a long pasta, typically tonnarelli, the Roman name for spaghetti alla chitarra. Tonnarelli are also fairly easy to make at home, assuming you have a pasta “guitar” as illustrated in this post. This pasta can also be store bought, usually marketed under their better known Abruzzese name of pasta alla chitarra. You can also use tagliatelle, if you’d like another fresh egg pasta, or a dry pasta like spaghetti, or the thicker spaghettoni or bucatini. Truth be told, this savory condimento lends itself to all sorts of pasta shapes.

Your choice of pasta will also determine how you cut your guanciale and artichokes. If you opt for a long pasta, especially a thin one like tagliolini, it’s best to cut both your guanciale and artichokes very thinly. For short, stubby pastas like rigatoni, you can cut them thicker.

Guanciale

If you want to make an authentically Roman pasta alla gricia, the cured pork jowl called guanciale is pretty much a must. It’s become quite popular in the US and elsewhere internationally in recent years, so I can now find it (usually) in one of the better supermarkets near me. It is also available online. It tends to be pricey but, to me, it’s worth it.

Guanciale has a more assertive taste than its better known cousin pancetta. It is fattier, too. Its rendered fat lends lusty flavor and unctuousness to many Roman pasta dishes. In fact, Romans consider guanciale a must for making carbonara and amatriciana as well.

That said, if you really must, you could use pancetta here—just don’t call it ‘gricia‘ if any Romans are in the vicinity. And since pancetta is not nearly as fatty, you’ll need to sauté it in lard or olive oil.

Artichokes

As I’ve said before I often resort to frozen artichokes given the poor quality of so many artichokes here in the US. But this is one dish where I’d recommend you use fresh artichokes for best results. Most frozen artichokes include a bit of citric acid as a preservative, which lends a rather unpleasant acidity to the dish. If you only have access to frozen, then I’d pre-soak the artichoke slices for at least a half hour in water to leach out some of that acidity.

Italian recipes for pasta alla gricia con carciofi generally call for about 1 artichoke per 100-125g of pasta. But bear in that Italian artichokes tend to quite small. I can sometimes find small artichokes where I live, packed in packages of 4 artichokes weighing about 150g (5 oz) each untrimmed and half that (or less) once trimmed. If you can find them, they’re the way to go. These smaller artichokes are tender and tasty, and are much easier to trim, with fairly tender outers leaves and a small easily removed choke.

You can adjust accordingly for the size of artichokes where you are. Here in the US, you are more likely to find very large ‘globe’ artichokes, in which case I’d use just one for 200-250g of pasta. If using larger artichokes, be aggressive in your trimming. as the outer leaves and stems tend to be quite tough and fibrous.

And bear in mind that you’re aiming for a dish where the artichoke complements the usual classic ingredients. The dish should still look and taste like a gricia, not pasta with artichokes.

Cheese

Needless to say, pecorino romano cheese is another must for an authentic Roman flavor. While I would never, ever buy pre-grated parmigiano-reggiano, I have to admit I do buy pre-grated pecorino. Unlike Parmesan, pre-grated pecorino actually retains its sharp flavor quite well. And it is, of course, super-convenient to use, especially in the quantities it gets consumed in our house!

You may have noticed that this recipe asks you to mix a bit of pasta water with the grated pecorino to make a little cream before mixing it with the pasta. I can’t remember any more where I learned this little trick, but it works like magic. I used it to make this dish, as well as for a regular gricia and, best of all, for making cacio e pepe. This method avoids the usual pitfalls of the traditional recipe, where you add grated cheese directly to a rather wet pasta, then stir it vigorously to melt it in the pan.

The old method was a lot more work. And if you didn’t stir quickly and vigorously enough, you could wind up with clumps of semi-melted cheese. This method is absolutely fool proof! Just be use to leave less (or no) liquid in the pan as there is already water in the cheese cream.

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