Slow and smoky is the magic to this one, explains Melbourne pasta maestro Andreas Papadakis, in this recipe from his new book.
For this, I’ve added smoked cherry tomatoes to a traditional vongole (clam) sauce. The smoke is a great element in itself, but it’s well worth taking the extra trouble to peel and then contfit the cherry tomatoes in oil, as it gives you an amazing, intense result, even if you decide to skip the smoking part.
- To purge the clams of sand and silt, leave them to soak in a bowl of lightly salted cold water for 2 hours.
- In the meantime, for the smoked cherry tomatoes, preheat the oven to 90°C fan-forced. Remove the skin of the tomatoes by blanching them in water kept at a rolling boil for 20 seconds. Drain and plunge into iced water to stop the cooking, then use your fingers or a small knife to peel off the skins. Put the peeled tomatoes into a small baking dish, pour in the olive oil and season with salt, then cook in the oven for 1½ hours — during this time, the tomatoes should shrink to half their size, get darker and become more concentrated in flavour. Remove the tomatoes from the oven to smoke them. If you have a smoking gun, inject smoke from the smoking chips directly into the dish of tomatoes, cover with foil and leave the tomatoes to absorb the smoke for 20 minutes, then repeat one more time. If you don’t have a smoking gun, light half of the smoking chips in a small metal container and, as soon the flame subsides and the chips start smoking, carefully put the metal container into the dish with the tomatoes, cover and leave to smoke for 20 minutes, then repeat with the other half of the smoking chips.
- To cook the clams, place a large frying pan over medium heat and fry the garlic and chilli in the olive oil until the garlic is translucent, about 1 minute. Add the clams and wine, cover with a lid and cook for 2–3 minutes or until the clams are just open. Add the tomatoes and half the basil and cook for 3 more minutes, then season with salt to taste.
- Cook the linguine in plenty of boiling salted water until al dente, according to the instructions on the package for dried, or about 3-4 minutes for fresh.
- Drain the pasta (reserving some of the pasta water) and add to the frying pan, then toss for 1 minute before adding the parsley and the remaining basil. Taste for salt, then toss again until the sauce thickens and coats the pasta, adding some of the reserved pasta water, if needed. Serve in warmed bowls.
Tipo 00: The Pasta Cookbook by Andreas Papadakis, $55, published by Murdoch Books
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