Sometimes sharing a recipe is like playing a game of telephone. Take, for example, this recipe for Bucatini with Swiss Chard, Raisins, and Parmesan. It’s based on a recipe that I saw on Nigella Lawson’s website; but it turns out that she got the recipe from Joshua McFadden’s Six Seasons. I’m sure Nigella changed the recipe after it got whispered into her ear, and now I’ll do the same.
The Nigella recipe has you soak raisins at the beginning in vinegar and warm water and I’m on board for that. But then she has you sauté garlic and pine nuts (I didn’t have those) before adding chiles and raisins, then the chard stems, and finally the leaves. To my mind, it made more sense to sauté the chard stems in the oil first, since they’re the toughest ingredient.
Then I added the garlic, the chili flakes, then the leaves with a ladleful of pasta water — I dropped the bucatini in salted water at this stage — then add the raisins and let everything cook down at the same time.
That mixture is sublime, even without the pine nuts. From that point onward, I’m back on the Nigella train: we add the al dente bucatini (she uses spaghetti) to the pot with the Swiss chard, let it soak up all the liquid, then off the heat we add butter and lots of Parmesan.
And that’s it. You work it all together, until it’s all emulsified, and lift it into bowls. I love this dish because it’s a true transformation: you start out with something that looks like a houseplant and wind up with a dinner that’s tangy, earthy, sweet, and packed with umami from the Parmesan cheese. Plus it’s relatively healthy (butter notwithstanding). Now let’s hope Winston gets the recipe right when he passes it on to the canine culinary community.
Bucatini with Swiss Chard, Raisins, and Parmesan
Ingredients
Method
- Soak the raisins with the splash of vinegar and a splash of warm water, enough to cover. They’ll plump up while you cook.
- Bring a large pot of water to a boil and season well with kosher salt (it should taste like flavorful stock, but not the ocean).
- In another large pot or skillet, add three tablespoons of olive oil and heat on medium. Sauté the Chard stems for 3 to 4 minutes until beginning to soften. Add the garlic and cook for one minute, until starting to color. Meanwhile, drop the pasta in the boiling water. Add the chile flakes to the pan with the garlic, then all the Chard leaves, a pinch of salt, and stir around. Add a ladleful of the pasta water, add the raisins, and cook everything down.
- When the pasta is a minute or two short of the package cooking time (so very al dente), lift it into the pot with the Swiss chard and stir it all around. If the pot is dry, add a ladleful of pasta cooking water. Keep cooking until the pasta is cooked through and the sauce has reduced. Off the heat, add the butter and the Parmesan and toss all around until emulsified. Taste here to see if it needs more cheese, then twirl into bowls and serves with more Parmesan cheese.
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