charred broccoli pasta with zesty yuzu ricotta
Every once in awhile, I cook something truly amazing so completely by accident that it actually takes more time to recreate it successfully than it did to come up with the idea in the first place. I visited a good friend and longtime cooking partner recently and often these kinds of dishes happen at her house, fueled into existence by the creative chemistry of our tastes (very similar) and styles (very different). We were in the middle of having lunch and already talking about dinner when this one was born, inspired by a packet of pappardelle she was particularly excited about, some broccoli left over from a farmer’s market run, and a tube of yuzu kosho that caught my eye in the fridge earlier that morning.
The only rule: no sheet music. We only play by ear.
Both of us vaguely remembered seeing something about burnt broccoli on Instagram that week (which turned out to be this recipe), so we set out to burn the hell out of our broc, jacking the oven up to 450ºF and torching it until completely crisp. While it roasted through all of its smell phases—farty, nutty, and finally charred—we cooked those pappardelle nests. In the same warm pot, we then steamed the charred broccoli until it started to fall apart, a technique I know from testing many batches of broccoli shells and cheese. If you give a mouse a charred broccoli, he’s going to want garlic to go with it, so lots of minced garlic became the flavor base of the dish; garlic takes me to a white pizza vibe, and ricotta with a small amount of starchy water creates a reliably silky and light sauce that delivers that vibe, so we did that here. Her household is a pecorino house rather than a parm house, so that’s the cheese we used to hold everything together. While I dealt with the garlic, she zested a lemon because it was just laying there looking envious. But it was the yuzu kosho that truly brought the party, the ingredient that really shouldn’t have been invited to the party at all: zesty, salty, spicy, alive.
We ate it all, and then after that, I couldn’t figure out how to make it again.
There’s this blackout that happens during strokes of genius that is maybe more stroke than genius. The two of us created a white lamb ragù once I’ve still never recreated. My mom’s sauce is consistently transcendent and yet never the same twice. You have to wonder if maybe some things aren’t meant to be replicated, if they are truly more a product of a time and place than anything else and therefore must be left behind in the moment in which they were made to exist.
However, clearly that isn’t true because we figured it out and here we are!
A few tips
Really zhuzh the broccoli. Get in there. Take your rings off, and work that olive oil with your hands, massaging the florets that all broccoli crannies are evenly coated. This will create the most flavorful, evenly charred broccoli of your life.
Go as hot as you can stand and be patient. Broccoli roasts best on VERY high heat. 450°F (425°F if using convection, which we did) is preferred. It will look done at 20 minutes, but remember: this isn’t roasted broccoli pasta, it is charred broccoli pasta.
Undercook the pasta by 3 minutes. This is one that finishes in the sauce. To that end…
Save a LOT of pasta water. 2 full cups. I use a ladle to transfer it to a flexible, heatproof silicone measuring cup so I can work with as much as I need. This is a rare recipe where I actually used most of it, because...
Ricotta breaks unless you’re gentle with it. After cooking the garlic, you’ll want to break up the ricotta in the pan over low heat. Whisk in at least 1/2 cup of pasta water slowly until a silky sauce forms. What the first half of the recipe brings in high-heat oven aggression, the second half makes up for in softness.
RECIPE
Broccoli gets charred to within an inch of its life in a hot oven before being combined with starchy pasta water, creamy ricotta, yuzu kosho, garlic, and lots of lemon zest to create a silky spring-y sauce. Toss with pasta ribbons.
Effortful time: 10 minutes
Total time: 45 minutes
Makes enough for 12 oz. pasta (4 smaller portions)
you need
1 lb. broccoli florets, broken up with your hands into small pieces
1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil + 2 tbsp. more
3 cloves of garlic, minced
Zest from a large lemon, about 1 tbsp.
1 tsp. yuzu kosho paste; you can sub 1 tsp. chili flakes and it will be just fine but if you find this, please try it—it’s not like anything else
1 cup (approximately 6-7 oz) of the best quality ricotta cheese you can find; I love Bellwether Farms
1/4 cup grated Pecorino cheese, plus more for serving
Salt and pepper, to taste
12 oz. ribbon pasta of your choice, like tagliatelle or pappardelle
make it
Roast the broccoli. Preheat the oven to 450ºF (or 425º on convection, which I prefer). Line a half sheet pan with parchment paper and spread out your broccoli florets. Pour over 1/4 cup of oil and sprinkle with salt, then massage it all, really working in the oil and salt, for a minute. Give it love and it will love you back! Pop this in the oven and roast for 30-35 minutes, until deeply charred and falling apart. This can cool until you’re ready to use it.
While the broc chars, prep your other ingredients. Zest a lemon, making sure not to go down into the white pithy part, which is bitter and un-fun. Mince your garlic. Grate cheese if you need to. Once the broccoli passes the 15 minute mark, you can start boiling water for pasta.
Cook your pasta for 2-3 minutes under the al dente number on the package. Save 2 cups of pasta water, then drain.
Create your “sauce.” In the now-empty pasta pot, heat the final 2 tbsp. olive oil over medium-low heat. Gently sauté the garlic and lemon zest until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Stir in the yuzu kosho (or chili flakes), which will immediately smell amazing. Whisk in the ricotta, adding a little bit of pasta water as you go, until you’ve got a nice silky sauce. Dump in all the broccoli and stir a few times.
Finish the pasta. Add your very al dente pasta to the broccoli-ricotta mixture in the pot, along with 1/4 cup of grated pecorino and more splashes of pasta water as needed. Use tongs to toss this together over low heat—the water will continue absorbing into the not-quite-cooked pasta, which will take only a minute or two to finish. Top with more grated pecorino and/or a little dollop of ricotta.