Pasta with confit garlic, goat’s cheese and thyme

I don’t normally find much pleasure in cooking for just me. Except when it’s this dish. This is adapted from an old Nigel Slater recipe, a writer who inspired me and so many others to look beyond cookbook recipes and to cook more freely and creatively. I turn to this recipe time and again when I have some moments on my own.

Credit: Bloomsbury / Joe Woodhouse

• serves

  2

• prep

  10 minutes

• cook

  30 minutes

• difficulty

  Easy

I have been cooking it for fourteen years, but have never made it for anyone but myself before testing it for this book. Now my family (especially my mum!) love it too. In the original, crumbled goat’s cheese and confit garlic cloves are simply stirred through the pasta and it’s delicious. However, I have discovered that the confit garlic oil, goat’s cheese and pasta water can create a very mellow and comforting sauce which is also brilliant eaten on, or rather mopped up with, lettuce leaves. So we always serve lettuce leaves alongside, it’s almost the best bit! When we finish eating the pasta, we pile the leaves into our plates, add a sprinkling of salt and a touch of vinegar and mop at the remaining goat’s cheese sauce with the leaves until the plates are sparkling clean. It’s so delicious. I highly recommend you follow suit.

Ingredients

• 2 small garlic bulbs (yes, that’s correct, 1 per person)
• 100 ml good olive oil
• leaves from 4 thyme sprigs
• 200 g spaghetti or linguine
• 200 g soft goat’s cheese (logs are good)

To serve

• lettuce leaves
• good vinegar
• sea salt

Instructions

1. I haven’t yet found a garlic peeling hack that works. What I do is separate the cloves, then attempt to lightly bash on each with the heel of my hand and cut off the dry root end. The skins then slip off quite easily. If you accidentally squash some (or a lot, like I do, heavy-handedly) of the cloves, don’t worry too much, they can still be used. Put the oil into the smallest saucepan or frying pan you have, heat it gently and spoon in the garlic. The cloves should be submerged in oil and cook very gently over the lowest heat possible. Sometimes I tilt the pan carefully, helping the cloves to submerge, and stand there holding the pan. But you can always use more oil. It won’t go to waste, as the garlicky oil is so good in other recipes, or to dress boiled vegetables. The garlic will be spluttering away, its water escaping the oil. It has to soften, mellow and colour only ever so slightly. The whole process should take about 20 minutes but use your judgement. When ready, the garlic will smell very sweet and the cloves can be easily pierced with a knife. Take it off the heat and add the thyme.
2. Cook the pasta according to the packet instructions. Put the goat’s cheese into a food processor. When there are 3 minutes to go before the pasta is done, ladle 200ml of the pasta water into a measuring jug. Blitz the goat’s cheese with half of the measured pasta water and 2–3 tbsp of garlic oil. You will have a smooth and rather liquid sauce, but do not worry, it will all be good. (If it is not quite liquid, I find the pasta eats too dry.)
3. Drain the pasta and put it back into the pan in which it was cooking. Pour the sauce over the pasta and, using tongs, pick the pasta up and down, making sure to cover the pasta in the sauce. Keep agitating it like this for a minute. At this point, I take a mouthful and check if it slips down smoothly. If it feels a bit dry rather than slippery, I add another splash of pasta water and swirl it around with tongs some more.
4. Put the pasta into serving plates and pour over any goat’s cheese sauce that remained behind in the pan. Serve with the confit garlic cloves scattered over the top and a drizzle of garlic oil.
5. When you finish the pasta, pile the lettuce leaves directly into the pasta plate and add a little vinegar and salt. The remainder of the goat’s cheese sauce is so good with the leaves.

 

Recipe and image from Home Food by Olia Hercules, photography by Joe Woodhouse (Bloomsbury, HB$46.80).

Cook's Notes

Oven temperatures are for conventional; if using fan-forced (convection), reduce the temperature by 20˚C. | We use Australian tablespoons and cups: 1 teaspoon equals 5 ml; 1 tablespoon equals 20 ml; 1 cup equals 250 ml. | All herbs are fresh (unless specified) and cups are lightly packed. | All vegetables are medium size and peeled, unless specified. | All eggs are 55-60 g, unless specified.

I have been cooking it for fourteen years, but have never made it for anyone but myself before testing it for this book. Now my family (especially my mum!) love it too. In the original, crumbled goat’s cheese and confit garlic cloves are simply stirred through the pasta and it’s delicious. However, I have discovered that the confit garlic oil, goat’s cheese and pasta water can create a very mellow and comforting sauce which is also brilliant eaten on, or rather mopped up with, lettuce leaves. So we always serve lettuce leaves alongside, it’s almost the best bit! When we finish eating the pasta, we pile the leaves into our plates, add a sprinkling of salt and a touch of vinegar and mop at the remaining goat’s cheese sauce with the leaves until the plates are sparkling clean. It’s so delicious. I highly recommend you follow suit.