It’s fava bean season, which we can use raw or cooked in numerous recipes for first courses, second courses, sauces, and sides. Cold pasta with fava beans and mackerel is a tasty and delicious unique, rich main course, versatile, to be prepared in advance, fresh, easy, where the fava beans will be used raw both whole and in cream.
If you like fava beans, at the link below you will find a collection of recipes with many other ideas on how to use this tantalizing spring legume in the kitchen.
- Difficulty: Very Easy
- Cost: Medium
- Rest time: 1 Hour
- Preparation time: 30 Minutes
- Portions: 4
- Cooking methods: Stovetop
- Cuisine: Italian
- Seasonality: Spring
Ingredients
- 9 oz short pasta (also gluten-free)
- 7 oz mackerel or tuna in oil
- 10 cherry tomatoes
- 2/3 lb fresh fava beans
- 10 sun-dried tomatoes
- 1 Tropea onion
- to taste extra virgin olive oil
- to taste fine salt
- to taste fresh or dried chili pepper
Steps
To prepare the cold pasta with mackerel and fava beans, start by bringing the water to a boil in which we will cook the short pasta (you can use any short pasta shape, gluten-free or not, that you like or have left in the pantry).
To avoid ending up with mushy pasta, it’s good to cook it very, very al dente. In my case, for example, I cooked gluten-free farfalle for exactly 6 minutes (out of 9 minutes) starting from when the water resumed boiling after adding the pasta.
Salt the pasta cooking water just enough without overdoing it, as we can adjust the salt in the preparation later on.
Soak the sun-dried tomatoes in boiling water for about ten minutes (to save time and gas/electricity, we can soak the sun-dried tomatoes in the same pasta cooking water, removing them just before adding the chosen pasta shape). After soaking, cut them into strips or chunks.
Thoroughly drain the mackerel from its preservation oil.
Wash the cherry tomatoes and cut them into cubes. Do this operation on a large flat plate; in this way, we’ll collect the tomato juice, which will serve as a dressing to add extra flavor to the pasta.
After peeling the fresh fava beans, set aside a handful (we’ll add them to the finished dish for a pleasant crunchy note) and blend the rest for a few seconds with 3-4 tablespoons of cold water. We should obtain a smooth, thick (not hard and not liquid) and homogeneous puree that we will make more fluid later, adding it to the pasta and other ingredients, including extra virgin olive oil.
Finely chop a little bit of red onion (preferably Tropea); a small amount is enough because it should accompany the flavors of the other ingredients and not overpower them.
As soon as the pasta is ready, drain it very well and transfer it to a large bowl.
Immediately add the cubes of fresh cherry tomatoes and their juice, sun-dried tomatoes, onion, mackerel, whole fresh fava beans, a pinch of chili pepper powder or fresh, if desired, and the fava bean cream. Dress with a generous drizzle of extra virgin olive oil, mix immediately to combine everything, cover with a lid or a plate, leaving a gap to prevent condensation from forming, and let cool completely at room temperature (we can then possibly transfer the well-covered bowl to the fridge).
The cold pasta with fava beans and mackerel is ready.
Bon appetit
