Vicky says: “Procida, a tiny little island just off Naples, was the location for The Talented Mr Ripley film and was awarded Italy’s Capital for Culture for 2022. Despite the fame and attention, village life continues. Adriana, Antonietta, Enza, Maria and Teresa are neighbours and friends through the local choir who all share a love of cooking. Originally they demonstrated three recipes, which you can watch on Pasta Grannies, and this is the one that is brilliant for unexpected guests, or when you want to cook something really quick that tastes like a long weekend in Italy.

Adriana remembers in her childhood: ‘My mother used to make this pesto in winter, because that is when lemons are ready to be picked. We’d forage the pine cones in the summer, then come the cold weather we’d dry the pine nuts near the fireplace before using them in this pesto. We added parsley and mint, because basil is a summer herb, but of course you can use that too. And, you know, in those days we didn’t use Parmigiano – we made this pesto with pecorino cheese.’ Lemons in this part of the world are large, sweet and fragrant. These days, one can buy Amalfi lemons (which are very similar to the Procida ones) quite easily, but if you are using regular lemons, you may want to experiment with the acidity by reducing the amount of juice and adding a little more water. Meyer lemons can also be substituted.” 

Serves 4–6 (allow 90–100g) of boxed spaghetti per person

Ingredients

• 3 large organic lemons, ideally from Procida
• 50ml (3½ tablespoons) lemon juice (from about 2 lemons)
• 10g (flat-leaf parsley (or basil)
• 5g mint
• 1 garlic clove
• pinch of salt
• pinch of dried chilli flakes
• 50ml (3½ tablespoons) extra-virgin olive oil
• 50g Italian pine nuts (or walnuts)
• 100g Parmigiano Reggiano (or pecorino), grated
• 90–100g spaghetti (per person)

Method

Start by peeling the lemons; you only want the skin. A great way to remove the pith from the peel is to use a filleting knife, which has a flexible blade. Anchor the peel pith side up with a finger, then with the other hand press and slither the knife horizontally under the pith (away from your fingers, please), leaving the zesty skin.

Chop the rinds finely. Strain the lemon juice to remove pips. Rough chop the parsley, mint and garlic and blitz all these together in a food processor with a pinch of salt, the chilli flakes and the oil until smooth. Roughly chop the nuts, add them to the mix and blitz again until you have a rough paste. Add half the cheese and give it a quick zhuzh. Taste for acidity and, if needed, add tablespoons of water to adjust.

Bring a large pan of salted water to the boil and cook the spaghetti for the time indicated on the packet. In the meantime take a large salad bowl and dollop in the pesto. Dilute with a ladle of hot pasta water to make it more of a sauce. Drain your pasta, keeping some of the pasta water. Toss the pasta with the pesto, adding in the rest of the cheese and adding more hot pasta water if necessary so the sauce coats the spaghetti.

Serve immediately. This should be on your regular recipe roster!

Vicky says: “I don’t understand why you come all the way up here to film me make gnocchi; can’t you make them yourselves?” 91-year-old Pina thought we were mad not to have this life skill. Pina lives in the mountains behind Genova in Liguria, though they live about 2 hours’ drive from each other. Pina ran the village bakery and shop for many years, and still has a few shelves with emergency packets of pasta and tinned tomatoes for when her neighbours get caught short. She used to carry the provisions on her back for the last two kilometres before the road got built, and even now only three-wheeled scooters can navigate the village’s cobbled paths. Making the most of what you have is second nature to 

Pina: she uses walnuts because pine nuts are too expensive, she grows her own potatoes, and the foraged chestnuts make more costly wheat flour go further. So, in that spirit, if you don’t have chestnut flour, make these using just wheat flour.” 

Serves 4–6

Ingredients

For the gnocchi: 

• 500g fl0oury potatoes
• 150g 00 plus an extra 35–40g for the board
• 50g chestnut flour
• 5g (1 teaspoon) salt
• freshly ground pepper, to serve

For the pesto:

• 100ml extra-virgin olive oil
• 30g basil
• 50g grated Parmigiano Reggiano
• 50g thick cream

Method

First, make the gnocchi. Pina boils her potatoes with the skin on; an alternative is to bake the potatoes in a moderate oven as this gives them a nice fluffy texture. Whichever method you choose, once the spuds are soft, remove the skins and mash the flesh. Have your extra flour for the board to hand and don’t leave the mash to cool: dump it straight onto your wooden board while it’s still steaming, using a spoon. This moisture helps you to make a good dough. 

Mix the flours and salt and mush the mixture into the mash, then gently knead the mixture until you obtain a smooth non-sticky dough that does not break apart. Stop as soon as you get to this point; you don’t want to overwork the dough.

Use some of the extra flour to dust your board and roll out ropes of dough about 2 cm (¾ in) in diameter and then cut each rope into two-finger-wide pieces. Use the same two fingertips to press into each gnocco and pull it back gently across the board to flatten and curl the dough. The results are gnocchi which look like thick or rustic cavatelli. Keep them well floured and spread out.

For the pesto, put the garlic, walnuts and oil into the bowl of a food processor and blitz until you have a rough paste. Now add the basil and blend again, before adding the Parmigiano. You want a thick, smooth sauce. Use a spatula to scrap the pesto into a bowl and stir through the cream.

Bring a large saucepan of heavily salted water to the boil. Tip in the gnocchi and give them a good stir to stop them from sticking. Once the water has returned to the boil, try the gnocchi every 30 seconds or so to see if they are cooked.

When they are done, drain them through a colander.

Pesto should never be cooked, so place the gnocchi in a warm bowl and dress them as you would a salad with the pesto.

Serve with plenty of freshly ground black pepper.

Serves 4–6

Ingredients

For the pasta:

• 400g 00 flour
• 220g eggs or 4 large eggs

For the pesto:

• 1 garlic clove
• 70g Italian pine nuts, raw or lightly toasted
• 60g Genovese basil leaves
• 120ml extra-virgin olive oil (ideally soft, grassy-flavoured Ligurian oil)
• 50g Parmigiano Reggiano, grated
• 50g Pecorino Sardo, grated
• fine sea salt, to taste

Method

Make the egg pasta dough as described on page 11, then leave it to rest, covered, for a good 30 minutes.

Roll out the dough as thinly as possible; you should be able to read through it! This equates to 0.5 mm thickness. You can use a pasta machine if you think you won’t be able to manage this.

Dust flour over the pasta sheet then roll it up around your rolling pin, take a knife and slice lengthways through all the layers. The pasta will fall from the pin in rectangular strips which are magically the same width. Pile the strips one on top of the other and slice them horizontally to create squares. The exact size will depend slightly on the thickness of your rolling pin, but they should be about 15 cm (6 in) squares. Well done if they remind you of silk hankies!

To make the pesto, remove the skin from the garlic clove and halve the clove lengthways. If there’s a green shoot (or anima, as Italians call it), hoik it out and discard.

Put the clove in a mortar with the pine nuts, then pound with the pestle and grind the two together into a rough paste. Wash and dry the basil leaves thoroughly. Add a handful at a time to the mortar, with a pinch of salt, then pound and grind the leaves into the paste.

Stir through the grated cheeses and loosen the mixture with some of the extra-virgin olive oil; you may not need all of it. You now have a thick but stirrable pesto. If you want to use a stick blender or food processor, the result will be smoother and the flavour very slightly different, but not significant enough to cause face-pulling at the table.

Bring a large pan of salted water to the boil. Add the pasta squares, give them a stir and return the water to the boil. They should take about a minute to cook once they’ve returned to the boil, but test one to see. Scoop a cup of water out of the pan before draining the pasta. Return the squares to the pan and stir through the pesto, adding a little of the reserved cooking water to make it more saucy if necessary.

Serve on a beautiful platter with more grated cheese if you feel like it.

Pasta Grannies: Comfort Cooking by Vicky Bennison (£22, Hardie Grant) is out now