Pasta e Ceci (Chickpea) Soup
Italian Chickpea and Pasta Soup
No dairy, ready in under 30 minutes, 5 ingredients, Vegetarian, Vegan and easily a Gluten-Free dish.
Hearty and delicious, this Tuscan Chickpea soup is the perfect weeknight meal; it is easy and fast to prepare. This one ticks all the boxes plus its Vegetarian and Vegan, what’s not to like?
Easy to make
Delicious
Healthy : legumes
Lactose-free
5 ingredients or less
Is ready in less than 30 minutes
Gluten-free (if you use Gluten free pasta)
Below you’ll find
RECIPE - TIPS - TOOLS
This soup is so easy you don’t need a recipe but if you’ve never made it before, here is what I do:
Ingredients
For 4 bowls of soup (for 2-4 people depending what else you plan to eat!)
Extra Virgin Olive Oil (EVOO)
2 cloves fresh garlic
1 branch of fresh rosemary but 1/2 teaspoon dried rosemary will do in a pinch.
450-500g /16 oz drained cooked chickpeas (canned or bottled)
fresh water (at least 1.5 liters / 6 and 1/3 cups) although you might need more. See number 10 below
salt, to taste
160g /5.5 oz pasta shape of your choice - The ideal pasta shape for this dish is a short pasta shape, dry or fresh, hard wheat or egg dough, all work well. Examples: ditalini, maltagliati, farfalle, fusilli.
Method
Olive oil: Pour a glug of olive oil in a pot large enough to hold all the ingredients.
Garlic: Cut both ends of your garlic cloves and smash each clove with the flat side of a knife and add it to the pot.
Rosemary: If you have fresh rosemary, remove the needles from the branch and mince with a knife and add to pot. If you don’t have fresh rosemary add the dried needles to the pot.
Turn the heat on and softly cook the garlic, ensuring it does not burn. This will take 2-4 minutes.
Chickpeas: in the meantime, drain your chickpeas.
At this point, remove the garlic from the pot with a slotted spoon (Italians don’t eat garlic!) and add the chickpeas and stir.
Add the water and raise heat to high to quickly bring to a boil. You may also heat the water separately in a kettle to hasten this step.
Stir, taste and add salt to your taste.
Pasta: Add the pasta of your choice, see Tips below for the shapes that work best. Stir a couple of times and cook for the time recommended on the pasta package.
Keep an eye on your soup, you may need to add more water to loosen it to your taste. In order not to slow down the cooking time, make sure the water is already hot.
That’s it! Your soup is ready. Ladle soup into bowls and enjoy! Buon appetito.
Tips
When I have time, I like to make this soup with dried chickpeas because they seem to have the best flavour but that also means I must plan ahead and have soaked the chickpeas overnight before cooking them the following day. That’s not always the case, so I always have canned beans in my pantry so I can quickly prepare this soup.
This soup is by definition vegetarian. To make this soup vegan, use hard wheat pasta instead of egg pasta. To make this soup gluten-free, use gluten-free pasta: a mix of rice and corn flours is a good option.
If you don’t have a live rosemary plant nearby, air dry some rosemary branches next time you come across it and keep the dried needles in your cupboard for the next time a recipe calls for rosemary.
The ideal pasta shape for this dish is a short pasta shape, dry or fresh, hard wheat or egg dough, all work well. Examples: ditalini, maltagliati, farfalle, fusilli.
Tools
No special tools are needed!
