The typical pasta dish from the South-Italian region of Puglia is orecchiette with cime di rapa. Cime di rapa is a vegetable that is also known as broccoletti or rapini. It is not the same as broccoli, although the green buds in the center certainly resemble small heads of broccoli. If you can’t find cime di rapa, you can make orecchietti with broccoli instead using the same recipe. It’s not the same dish, but good all the same. This time I used dry orecchiette, but this is even better if you use home-made orecchiette instead. Orecchiette with Cime di rapa is another example of a very simple but delicious regional Italian dish.
Ingredients
For 2 servings
150 grams (1/3 pound) orecchiette
1 bunch (450 grams/1 pound) cime di rapa
3 anchovy fillets
2 Tbsp extra virgin olive oil
1 clove garlic
salt
chilli flakes
Preparation
Wash the cime di rapa. Separate the leaves from the central stems with the buds. Peel the central stem and chop it roughly. Leave the leaves whole. Mince the garlic clove and the anchovies.
Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Add salt, cime di rapa leaves and orecchiette. The cooking time of the cime di rapa depends on how tender the leaves are, between 6 and 10 minutes. You may need to add the cime di rapa after the orecchiette instead of at the same time, also depending on the time needed to cook the orecchiette.
Add the stems and buds only for the last 5 minutes.
Meanwhile, heat the olive oil over medium heat in a large frying pan and add the garlic. Sauté the garlic for a few minutes until golden. Do not allow the garlic to turn brown!
Turn off the heat and add the anchovies. Stir to allow the anchovies to ‘melt’.
Drain the orechiette and cime di rapa once they’re cooked, and add to the pan. Toss to mix.
Serve immediately on warm plates, sprinkled with chilli flakes.
Stefan's Gourmet Blog 
Delicious!!!! I will have to use Broccoly instead here. Thanks for the idea.
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Thanks for leaving such a nice comment 🙂 Have a great weekend!
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Beutifully simple. I love using anchovies this way. Most people shy away from the idea… they don’t know what they are missing 🙂
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Thanks! The only problem with anchovies is that you have to use up a can or jar all at once, because they get an unpleasant fishy smell very soon afterwards (even when frozen).
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You can actually buy tubes of anchovy paste which is not as good as the whole fish admittedly, but it isn’t a bad substitute and has the advantage of keeping very well in the fridge once the tube is opened. Handy to have on hand sometimes!
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Absolutely! They are hard to find here, but I brought a few from Italy 🙂
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Another very authentic recipe , one of my favourites!
Have you tried using anchovies preserved in salt? They keep for a very long time, even out of the fridge. When you want to use them, soak them for a few minutes to remove the excess salt
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I have not tried that and thanks for the tip. I don’t think anchovies preserved in salt are available in the Netherlands, but I’ll remember to bring some when I go to Italy again.
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Stefan, have you tried looking at Meeuwig & Zn, Haarlemmerstraat 70 ? As far as I remember they have a lot of different varieties of Italian anchovies.
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Thanks Matteo. I do know that store, but I didn’t know they carried good anchovies. I’ll have to check it out.
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Love this dish. And even more since I started making the orecchiette from scratch (as you point out)
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I’d like to make them from scratch more often, so I’ll get faster at it 🙂
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I haven’t experienced that fishy problem with jarred anchovies, have you? Just the canned ones. Love this dish!
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Now that you mention it, it does seem to happen more quickly with the canned ones. I hardly ever buy jars because there are so many anchovies in them and I only use 3 or so at a time.
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Love the simplicity, Stefan. As always, a beautiful dish. Love it. 🙂
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Thanks, Richard 🙂
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Running far behind and trying to catch up, Stefan …
This is another great dish that you’ve shared. So easy to prepare and big on flavor. I’ve read the comments and unable to find salted anchovies, I’ve switched to jarred. There’s just too much waste — and smell — when I used the little tins.
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Thanks, John. Strange that jars are that different from cans. When the tubes run out, I’ll switch to jars.
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