House Maltagliati with Fava Beans, Smoked Guanciale & Garlic Soubise

The Last Bite: Spring’s Don’t-Miss-Dish in Edible Santa Barbara Magazine 

Get the Maltagliati with Fava Beans, Smoked Guanciale & Garlic Soubise recipe here.

New roots. Spring brings them every year, along with some delicacies that can only be enjoyed during these warming days…like fresh fava beans. Spring is the time these legumes behave, and taste, more like fresh new peas than later in the year after they mature, when they firmly join the bean clan (mostly dried or canned).

New roots were also springing up for Chef Crystal DeLongpre (known as Chef Pink for her hair color preference) wen she took over the reins at root 246, the Corque Hotel’s previous restaurant in Solvang. After stints at top kitchens of Los Angeles, the Food Network and running her own restaurant, she knew she could only go where her food philosophy would be shared: hyper-local ingredients, responsible sourcing via close relationships with farmers, stewards of the land.

Update: Chef Pink rejuvenated the kitchen at root 246 in Solvang, and has since moved on to star in kitchens in larger California cities (look for her in Los Angeles).

Maltagliati with Fava Beans, Smoked Guanciale & Garlic Soubise Recipe

Want the full recipe? Get and print it here.

To make this spring comfort dish at home, remove the large outer pods from the fava beans, then take each bean and remove the thin skin covering the split bean.

Next, hard-boil an egg, cool it down, peel it and set aside (or cure it by cracking an egg in a boil over salt, then cover it with salt and plastic wrap and refrigerate for 1 week). Tear lasagna noodles roughly (or use any other “badly cut” pasta) and boil per directions in a pot with enough salt to taste like the sea.

Sauté thinly sliced and diced guanciale or bacon over medium-high heat, until it is crispy. Remove the bacon, then add 1/2 cup cut spring onion to the bacon fat and cook over low heat until translucent. Add 1 cup chicken stock and simmer until reduced by half, than add a handful of fresh fava beans to the pan, season with salt and turn down the heat. Add cooked pasta along with 1 tablespoon of butter and a healthy squeeze of lemon. After simmering for 2-3 minutes, sprinkle with bacon and grate the egg yolk over over the top. Chef Pink also adds locally foraged kombu – the “king of seaweed” used to make Dashi – which adds umami richness to the dish.