The Week of Cacio e Pepe

Last week we cooked Cacio e Pepe pasta (Pasta with Cheese and Black Pepper) three times.

While that may seem a bit obsessive, you need to understand that we have been on a search for the perfect Cacio e Pepe since we had it in Rome at a small Cafe called The Trattoria Lilli on our Grand Tour in 2000.

While we have not been to Rome many times, each time we go we make sure to eat Cacio e Pepe at the Lilli.

A couple of years ago we found Amanda Hesser's recipe for Cacio e Pepe in her book, Cooking for Mr. Latte. You can see that recipe here.

It was good, but seemed to have missed a little snap that The Lilli offered us. We made it a couple of times, and then sort of passed it by.

Then a week or so ago, Christopher Kimball had this recipe on his blog.

Now, I find Kimball a little bit fussy, but I really liked the recipe. That is the one we made twice - once where we didn't use the amount of water he specified to boil the pasta (just 2 quarts for a pound of pasta!) and we found the sauce a little thin. We then made it again to his specs and found it much better.

It was no Lilli, but it was good. We will add that to our normal cycle of pastas.