Vegan Chickpea Cacio e Pepe

It began with a memory. A plate of pasta, simple yet seductive, its silken sauce clinging to each strand like a whispered secret. London, Padella—a place where time slows, where the weight of the world lifts, if only for a meal. That first bite, warm and briny, the sharp kiss of pepper, the lull of melted cheese. And ever since, a quiet longing.

But summer calls for lightness, for golden afternoons and the bright tang of lemon. This version, dreamed up by the meticulous and inspired Andy Baraghani, takes the humblest of ingredients—chickpeas, rosemary, a few curls of citrus—and turns them into something extraordinary.

 

Preparation Time: 30 minutes

What You'll Need (serves 4)

• A generous pinch of sea salt
• ¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil, golden and rich
• 1 small lemon, Meyer if you’re feeling indulgent, thinly sliced, seeds plucked out like tiny pearls
• 1 can chickpeas, 400g, drained, rinsed, expectant
• 1 large shallot, finely chopped, whispering of sweetness
• 1 rosemary sprig or 4 sprigs of thyme, crushed between your fingers, their perfume rising
• Freshly ground black pepper, enough to make you dream of faraway kitchens
• 450g of tubular pasta—calamarata, paccheri, rigatoni—each shape a vessel for memory
• ¼ cup unsalted butter, cold and waiting
• ½ cup finely grated parmesan, plus a little more, for luck

How to Bring It to Life

Step One:
Set a pot of water to boil, let it roll and bubble like a song. Throw in a handful of salt, a generous offering to what comes next.

Step Two:
In another pot, warm the olive oil. Lay the lemon slices in, gently, like placing photographs into an album. Let them curl and brown, their edges crisping, their scent lifting. After six, maybe eight minutes, rescue them with tongs, set them aside. The oil, now golden with memory, remains.

Step Three:
Pour the chickpeas into the oil. They sizzle, pop, darken at the edges. Stir, watch, listen. After a few minutes, scatter in the shallot, the rosemary, crushed between your palms. A snowfall of salt, a storm of black pepper. Stir again. Time slows. Three, four, five minutes.

Step Four:
Drop the pasta into the boiling water. Not for long—two minutes less than the package says. Trust me.

Step Five:
Scoop out two cups of that starchy, salted water. Pour one and a half cups into the chickpeas, let them whisper together. Now, the butter. Piece by piece, melting, folding, vanishing into silk.

Step Six:
Lift the pasta from the water, slide it into the sauce. Stir, and as you do, let the parmesan rain in—slowly, carefully, never all at once. Keep stirring, keep watching, until the cheese softens, melts, becomes part of something greater. If it thickens too much, a spoonful or two of pasta water will loosen it, like an old story told anew.

Turn off the heat. Fold in the caramelized lemon, those ribbons of sunlight. And at the very end, just before the first bite, let black pepper fall in wild, reckless abandon. More parmesan, too. Always more.

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Eat slowly. Savor it. Some things, after all, are worth the wait.