This is a truly lovely fragrant simple dish. An Italian classic.
It’s brilliant when made with fresh egg pasta for a ridiculously quick lunch or I use it as a side dish instead of potatoes or rice to eat with meat (rib eye steak, tender grilled chicken or seared marinated pork fillet).
I was happily surprised when I first gave my children this pasta dish when they were very little, I didn’t know if they would be keen on sage, but they loved it!
Miraculous ingredient: Unsalted butter, fresh sage leaves, pasta, Parmigiano Reggiano (parmesan)
Pasta with fresh sage, garlic and butter
Ingredients
25g unsalted butter
4 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
25g fresh sage leaves, finely sliced
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
400g pasta (good quality Italian pasta – I use Giuseppe Cocco)
3-4 tablespoons of pasta water
Freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano to serve
Method
Place a large pan that can hold a good 3 litres of water onto a high heat. When the water starts to boil add a teaspoon of salt and all of the pasta.
Put a dry medium size frying pan on a low heat to warm up as you get the ingredients ready. Add all the extra virgin olive oil and butter to the warm pan. As soon as the butter has melted add the garlic and sage. Keep the heat low and gently fry for a minute. As the garlic begins to change colour (from white to dark cream) turn the heat off and let the garlic and sage finish cooking in the pan’s residual heat. You don’t want to let the garlic become too brown as it will taste bitter.
When the pasta is cooked al dente (soft on the outside but slightly hard in the middle), lift it out of its water with a pasta spoon and put it directly into the pan with the sage garlic butter. Add a 3-4 tablespoons of pasta water to help create a sauce (the starch in the pasta water thickens the sauce). Serve immediately with lots of freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano.
Preparation time 5 minutes, cooking 10 minutes, 4 portions