Pasta With Prosciutto and Whole Garlic
- Total Time
- About 30 minutes
- Rating
- Comments
- Read comments
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Ingredients
- ⅓cup olive oil or butter
- 10cloves garlic, lightly crushed
- ½cup prosciutto or other salted ham or slab bacon, cut into cubes or strips
- 6plum tomatoes, or 1½ cups drained canned tomatoes
- Salt and ground black pepper to taste
- 1pound cut pasta, such as ziti or penne
- 1cup roughly chopped fresh basil leaves
- 1cup freshly grated Pecorino Romano or Parmesan cheese, or a combination
Nutritional analysis per serving (4 servings)
803 calories; 31 grams fat; 9 grams saturated fat; 0 grams trans fat; 17 grams monounsaturated fat; 3 grams polyunsaturated fat; 95 grams carbohydrates; 8 grams dietary fiber; 8 grams sugars; 35 grams protein; 1122 milligrams sodium
Note: The information shown is Edamam’s estimate based on available ingredients and preparation. It should not be considered a substitute for a professional nutritionist’s advice.
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Preparation
- Step 1
Bring a large pot of water to a boil.
- Step 2
Combine the oil, garlic, and ham in a medium to large skillet over medium-low heat. Cook slowly, stirring occasionally, until the garlic becomes deep golden, nearly brown, all over, 10 to 15 minutes.
- Step 3
Core and chop the plum tomatoes (or crush the canned tomatoes) and add them, along with salt and pepper, to the skillet. Stir and simmer while you salt the boiling water and cook the pasta.
- Step 4
Drain the pasta when it is tender but firm, reserving a little of the cooking water and adding it to the sauce if it appears dry (quite likely if you used fresh tomatoes). Toss the pasta with the sauce and most of the basil, along with the cheese. Mince the remaining basil, garnish the pasta with it, and serve.
Private Notes
Comments
Can't really go wrong with these flavors. Didn't have prosciutto, so I used pancetta. Browned it a bit before lowering the heat and proceeding with step 2. Worked out great! Other notes:
1) Tried shaking the garlic cloves in a closed jar to get the peels off--
worked surprisingly well.
2) Threw in red pepper flakes just before adding tomatoes. I think a little heat goes a long way here.
3) Didn't add any salt (other than to pasta water); cheese and ham had enough.
Great dish!
Very good. I used the best olive oil I had on hand, and canned San Marzano tomatoes. Got some very thick slices of prosciutto that I chopped into a small dice. Let the garlic & ham cook low & slow about 20 minutes. Looking forward to trying this again in late summer, when home-grown tomatoes are available, and the garlic from my garden is ready.
This was delicious! I also added hot pepper flakes as mentioned in a previous comment, and it gave the dish a very nice heat. I would say you can definitely decrease the amount of prosciutto used and even maybe an extra tomato if you're using fresh.
I tried to replace cream with cacio, the cheese part of cacio e pepe. Just prepared the creamy cheese sauce, heated it up, but not boiled, added the peas and finally the entire mixture together with prosciutto to the pasta. Works also perfectly with linguini, bigoli and tagliatelle
Double the recipe only good for two
I have made this recipe many times, and it's always a hit. Here are my two mods: (1) I drain the tomatoes from a big can of San Marzano's, spread them on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper, and cook/caramelize for 30 minutes in a 350 oven; (2) I toss in some pitted dry-cured olives at the end.