Bigoli in Salsa
Veneto · pasta · serves 4 · 40 min total · easy
Venice's Lenten pasta — anchovy and onion, no meat. Bigoli are thick whole-wheat spaghetti extruded through a bronze press called a bigolaro.
Ingredients
- 400 g bigoli (or whole-wheat spaghetti)
- 600 g white onions, very thinly sliced
- 10 fillets salt-packed anchovies, rinsed
- 80 ml olive oil
- 1 handful parsley
- 1 tsp black pepper
Method
- Sweat sliced onions in olive oil on the lowest heat for 25 minutes — they should melt to a pale, sweet purée.
- Add anchovies and a splash of water. Cook 5 more minutes, mashing until the anchovies dissolve into the onions.
- Boil bigoli in salted water. Pull a minute early.
- Toss in the anchovy-onion sauce with a generous splash of pasta water. The sauce should cling, brown-tan and savoury.
- Off heat, crack pepper. Shower with parsley. Never cheese — anchovy and pecorino are not friends here.