Pasta e Fagioli with Seafood – An Authentic Italian Recipe!

A classic that will make you feel very Italian!

⬇️⬇️ Recipe ⬇️⬇️

PRINTABLE RECIPE: https://www.laurainthekitchen.com/recipes/pasta-e-fagioli-with-seafood

PASTA E FAGIOLI RECIPE:

8oz of Dried Cannellini Beans, picked through and thoroughly washed
2 Stalks of Celery, finely chopped
2 Cloves of Garlic, smashed and peeled but not chopped
2 Roma Tomatoes or 1/4 cup of Any Tomato Sauce
Few Leaves of Fresh Basil
Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Plenty of Salt to taste
8oz of short cut pasta such as ditalini

For the Seafood:
1 lb of Mixed Seafood
2 Cloves of Garlic, smashed and peeled
Handful of Cherry Tomatoes, halved or 1 roma tomato chopped
2 Tbsp of Olive Oil
2 Tbsp of Chopped Parsley

00:00 – Intro
01:51 – Prepare the Beans
02:43 – Prep the Vegetables
05:02 – Cook the Pasta
06:09 – Cook the Seafood
10:41 – Put It All Together
12:32- Dig In
13:12 – Let’s Go Back 10 Years

We are making a Neapolitan classic that I grew 
up with, we’re making pasta fagioli with seafood,  
if you have been a longtime watcher 
here on Laura in the kitchen,  
then you remember about 10 years ago I went, I 
go to Italy every year, my family lives in Italy,  
my nonna lives in Italy, and she shared her 
recipe with you for pasta fagioli with mussels.
This is that, but with a little more 
seafood added to it, and it is one  
of the most sensational things on the planet 
Earth, and if you did not grow up eating it,  
I already know I’m going to get the people 
in the comments ‘this is not real Italian’,  
it’s a very traditional old Neapolitan recipe 
that I love, it’s one of my mother’s favorite  
things in the world, and I was talking to her 
the other day and we were just like reminiscing  
about different things, different recipes and she 
was talking about this one and I was like ‘oh I  
haven’t made it with anything more than just 
mussels in a really long time because that’s  
how my nonna makes it’, and she likes it with 
more seafood, and I’m going to show it to you.
It’s very simple, and so delicious, I’m 
starting with dry cannelloni beans that  
I have rinsed really well, I did not soak 
these, I don’t find a reason to soak them,  
but they do need to cook for a while so make sure 
you rinse them really well. You pick through them,  
I’m going to add them to my Dutch oven that’s 
been filled with water, my water is already nice  
and hot up to a little simmer and now here’s the 
thing, because I am starting this with dry beans,  
dry beans take about 3 hours to cook. I don’t 
want to add my aromatics now because if I cook  
the beans with with the aromatics for the full 
3 hours then chances are that the aromatics  
are going to lose some of their, I would say 
some of their flavor, it just gets a little  
more like one note, so what I like to do is, I’m 
going to cook these beans for about an hour and  
a half on their own on a very gentle simmer till 
they’re about, you know, halfway cooked through.
And then we’ll add our aromatics, 
and then we’ll make our seafood,  
it sounds really complicated, but it’s not, and 
if you are from Naples, you grow up in Naples,  
you have any family members from Naples, I’d 
love to hear from you down in the comments  
below if this recipe brings back any memories 
or maybe how your family made it, but I’m  
going to let this go and when they’re halfway 
cooked through we’ll move on to the next step.
Alright, my beans are about halfway cooked 
through, my timer just went off, really lovely.  
Smells already like home in here, and now we’re 
going to add some aromatics to this. Now you’re  
going to have to just sort of trust the process 
because it’s going to kind of look like that’s it,  
but trust me it just, it’s all the right things. 
You’re going to start off with a clove of garlic,  
now I did a half a pound of beans so obviously 
if you’re doing a full pound – if you’re doing  
a full pound you’re going to want to double 
it. I’m doing two stalks of celery, I’m just  
going to very finely give this a nice little 
chop, like that. Chop and dice. There we go,  
and then you need some kind of tomato product 
it can be a diced tomato, a fresh diced tomato,  
it can be a couple of spoonfuls of passata, it 
can be tomato puree it can be any tomato product  
with the exception of ketchup, which, 
I know, I don’t even have to tell you,  
but I’m going to, it can be any tomato 
product. Sometimes I’ll even do this with  
like a couple tablespoons of like marinara 
sauce from the fridge, it works fantastic.
My mom is very partial to just a couple of little 
tomatoes, like she means cherry tomatoes, which  
you could do, I’m actually, I think I’m going to 
do, let’s see how much half a tomato is cuz this  
is not our pasta fagioli is not super red, it’s 
more like a pink, it’s got more of a pink hue.
I’m going to actually go ahead 
and use 3/4 of this tomato,  
and then you just need a couple of more 
things, you need a couple of leaves of basil,  
and you’re going to need a really good drizzle 
of extra virgin olive oil. No seafood just yet,  
because now this needs to simmer for another hour 
or so until the beans are really nice and tender.
Now that all together smells like home, it 
smells like my childhood, it smells like cozy,  
just happy vibes. I don’t know how to really 
describe describe it, so I’m just going to go  
ahead and let that cook. I’m going to partially 
cover it like that, and just let that go. My beans  
are soft and tender and fantastic, I took the 
clove of garlic out, now this is the point where  
you want to add your pasta and also add your salt. 
You’re going to want to season it quite heavily  
because beans are super bland, and everything will 
be really bland if you don’t season accordingly.
Pasta shapes, I’m using what we call Pasta Misto 
which would be Pasta misto, which is mixed pastas,  
the important thing is is that they all 
require the same amount of cooking time,  
now you can actually buy pasta already mixed 
like this, but really it’s it’s insane to me  
because this idea came from basically gathering 
all the leftover bits and pieces that are broken  
at the bottom of your pasta box, and then you 
put them all in a container and it’s the best  
pasta shape for pasta fagioli, your lentil soup, 
your potato soup, your bean soup, it’s like the  
perfect shape for this and it’s going to look 
really thick but that’s kind of the whole point.
This needs to be really creamy and delicious, 
this does not need to be watery, let that  
cook. In the meantime we’re going to work on the 
seafood which is like one of the most important  
parts of this whole thing, now like I said, in 
that original video my nonna shared with you,  
how to make it with just mussels, and basically 
you just cook your mussels separately, you steam  
them, you take the meat out, and then you save 
a little bit of the liquid to add to your soup.
What my mother loves, and what I also 
love, is to add mixed seafood so it would  
be like a little cuttlefish or calamari, 
some clams, these are actually frozen,  
I buy them in my regular grocery store in little 
packs of 10 ounces a piece, and I love this mix,  
it’s actually going to say seafood mix for rice 
or spaghetti, whatever you want to call it,  
and I love this mix, like I said it’s got a little 
calamari, little tiny baby pieces of shrimp around  
there, and clams and mussels, and it blends with 
the fresh mussels really nicely, fresh mussels,  
of course you can steam them separately if you 
want, but I think everything in the same skillet  
is king because then it just develops a lot of 
really great flavor, I’ve got a skillet here,  
to it I’m going to add some garlic, I’m 
going to add two very small cloves, I’m  
going to crush them and add them in, but I’m not 
going to chop them because I’m going to retrieve  
them when I’m done with it, I want a little 
kick of heat with a little hot pepper flakes,  
not much, and then I need a little tomato 
product, remember the tomato that we diced  
earlier and I had a little bit of leftover, 
I’m going to go ahead and use some of that.
You don’t want too much, I mean it really does 
depend I guess on how much you’re you’re making,  
but you do want, you know, like a maybe 
one Roma tomato, one vine ripe tomato,  
that looks good enough and that’s 
that’s going to make a really nice  
little flavorful sauce situation. I’m also 
going to take a little bit of parsley,  
I need some for now and some for later, and 
I’m just going to give it a nice little mix,  
and the parsley and the tomatoes can just mix 
together because I’m actually going to add them  
at the same time, make sure your seafood is nice 
and clean and wait for that garlic to sizzle.
Garlic is fragrant add your parsley, and that 
already smells so good, proper, you know,  
home cooking, it’s going to be really difficult to 
accurately write the recipe for you because a lot  
of this just comes down to look and feel, how 
much of your water has reduced while the beans  
were cooking, you’re going to have to really gauge 
your by eye, but I’ll definitely have sort of a,  
you know, a ballpark idea for you in the 
written recipe because truth of the matter is,  
as I’m sure you know, anytime you make 
any kind of recipe like this, everything  
varies every time you make it, sometimes you 
need more water, sometimes you need less,  
sometimes you need more pasta sometimes you need 
less, like I said, it just it varies every time.
This looks good, add your seafood 
and pretty much almost immediately,  
now this would be great over the pasta, 
let’s be for real, but even more delicious,  
let’s just say equally a delicious. In this 
I’m just going to cook this a couple minutes,  
not much time at all, once your mussels have 
opened you’re done. Remove it from the heat,  
the seafood will continue cooking in there 
for a couple of minutes, and it’s going to  
be perfection. you’re going to get liquidy bits 
in there, all that seafood, delicious flavor that  
I’m going to call it water that comes out of the 
mussels, is going to lend such beautiful flavor  
to your soup so let that open up for just a couple 
of minutes and then I’ll show you the next step.
Seafood is ready, I’m taking some of the – I’m 
actually going to take all the mussels out,  
I’m going to save some in the shell, just 
for aesthetic purposes, on the top you know,  
I think nonna would like that, she’s an 
aesthetic queen, you know, and then most of them,  
I’m obviously going to take the meat out of the 
shell, because I want to add it to my my soup  
and I want to add it in the last just couple of 
minutes of cooking because I want everything to  
get cooked together, and all the flavors to marry 
and all the flavors to get to know each other,  
and my soup is looking really good 
nice and thick, just how I like it.
I’m just going to take these out, remember 
any mussel that has not opened throughout  
the cooking process, toss now. Look how thick 
my soup is, this is what pasta fagioli should  
be like, it is not a soup, it’s also not 
a stew, it’s somewhere in between. Okay,  
now look at all the juice that you 
have in here, you got your mussels,  
you’ve got your juice, you have a little 
bit of liquid so it’s going to loosen up,  
but then it’s all going to finish cooking 
together. It is phenomenal, absolutely phenomenal.
Let that cook until the pasta is 
pretty much fully cooked through,  
I’m actually going to move the pot closer to me 
because I have short T-Rex arms, and I can’t reach  
that easily. Turn the burner on and like I said 
just let everything cook together like the last,  
I would say maybe 2 minutes, is that gorgeous? 
That’s beautiful, get a little bit of basil,  
get a little bit of parsley on the side, um and 
get ready to plate. Look how gorgeous the perfect,  
perfect consistency, a little bit of parsley, 
just to brighten it up a little bit. I also  
like to go in with just a little bit of basil, 
just at the very very end, it’s perfection,  
and as it sits it will thicken but really 
this is just the perfect texture look here,  
look at this, that gorgeous, you cannot imagine 
how good that is, oh it’s making my mouth water.
Then very important, with lentils and beans, very 
important, freshly ground black pepper on top,  
get some of your mussels in there 
and then just one final drizzle of  
extra virgin olive oil on top and that is my 
childhood, that is what I think, you know,  
I think I find it hilarious that this kind of 
food would be known as like Poor pan’s kitchen  
because beans are really affordable, if you you 
know I grew up on the water, on the Mediterranean,  
my grandfather was a fisherman, all the men on 
my father’s side of the family were fishermen,  
and so seafood to them was super affordable, they 
would catch and they would go and they would cook,  
and so the fact that this would be considered 
poor man’s food, I mean I find pretty outrageous,  
but look at that, because I paid top dollar 
for this this, is exactly what I like.
Hot though, oh my God, the seafood is 
perfect, not too strong not fishy just  
taste of the Mediterranean, yeah 
it’s comforting it’s everything.
Laurainthekitchen.com will 
have the full recipe for you,  
hope you enjoyed spending time with 
me and I will see you in the next one.
Bye bye!