• Lunch
  • |
  • Dinner

Ragazzi's Mafaldine with Blue Mackerel, Calabrian Chilli, Oxheart Tomato

  • 10 MINS
    • |
  • 25 MINS
    • |
  • SERVES 4
“I came up with this dish the night before we opened Ragazzi and it has been my favourite pasta on the menu ever since! I love blue mackerel in any form: lightly pickled in escabeche; smoked; kissed skin-side down on the plancha; tossed with chilli and hot pasta. This recipe is based on an Andalucian recipe I ate a lot of when I was in the south of Spain called atun encebollado, tuna cooked in onion sauce. I swapped the tuna for fresh mackerel and the onions for shallots as well as the very un-Andalucian addition of Calabrian chilli. The tomato brings a lovely freshness and cuts through the sauce but if they’re not in season it’s more than ok to omit, just up the parsley requirement and add a splash more vinegar.” — Scott McComas-Williams
Ragazzi's Mafaldine with Blue Mackerel, Calabrian Chilli, Oxheart Tomato

Ingredients

  • - 2 tbsp olive oil
  • - 2 large fillets of blue mackerel
  • - 4 shallots, sliced
  • - 2 anchovies
  • - pinch of thyme leaves, chopped
  • - 2 tsp Calabrian chilli
  • - 1 cuo shaoxing wine
  • - 500g mafaldine
  • - 1 large oxheart tomato, roughly diced
  • - 1/2 bunch flat leaf parsley, leaves roughly chopped
  • - 1 1/2 tbsp unsalted butter
  • - 1 tbsp Nadal Cava vinegar (or another sweet aged vinegar)

Steps

  1. Get a large pot of water onto the boil for your pasta.
  2. Heat up a large pan on high and once hot, add half your olive oil. When the olive oil is shimmering, add the mackerel fillets, skin side down and turn the heat down. Let the fish skin sizzle away for a minute before removing with slotted fish slice/spatula and pop aside to throw back in later. Quickly throw in the rest of the olive oil, shallots, garlic, anchovies, thyme along with a healthy whack of sea salt. Allow to sweat away over low heat until the shallots are soft and tender. Increase the heat and add the chilli. Fry the chilli off a little, add the wine and let boil.
  3. Meanwhile, throw your pasta into the boiling water. If you’re cooking from dried, cook for eight minutes, if you have lovely fresh mafaldine, cook for two.
  4. Once the wine has cooked off, add your chopped tomato and add the mackerel back to the pan. When the pasta is cooked, drain and add to the sauce along with a ladle of the pasta water. Throw the parsley and the butter in. Give the pan a nice toss, the fish will start to break up and become part of the sauce, finding itself little homes in the nooks and crannies of the mafaldine. Season with a splash of Nadal vinegar and taste. Adjust with more sea salt and/or vinegar.

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