Rigatoni with ‘No-Vodka Sauce’. Credit: Matt Russell
Dried rigatoni: 360 g
Olive oil: 2 tbsp
Garlic cloves: 2 (crushed)
Tomato purée : 80 g
Hot pepper flakes: 1/2-1 tsp (depending on how hot you like it)
Double (heavy) cream: 1 cup
Basil leaves: 1/2 bunch
Parmesan or pecorino cheese: to finish
This quick and creamy rigatoni dish, from The Pasta Man, Mateo Zielonka, skips the vodka but keeps all the flavor, balancing tomato, chilli, and cream for a weeknight-friendly pasta recipe that's fast, easy, and so, so good.
(From PASTA PRONTO! by Mateo Zielonka. Copyright © 2025. Reprinted by permission of Quadrille Publishing, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC)
My friend Luigi runs a pasta factory in Brooklyn called La Trafila, where he makes several tonnes of pasta every week to sell at farmers’ markets around New York. It’s always nice to spend some time with him, mostly talking about pasta – flour types, machinery, popular shapes – we’re both obsessed. He made me this quick vodka sauce for supper one evening, only leaving out the vodka, and I really enjoyed it. This is the version I made at home.
- Heat the olive oil in a large saucepan, add the garlic and fry for a minute before adding the tomato purée and chilli flakes.
- Stir together and fry for 5–7 minutes until the tomato purée mixture darkens; it will start catching on the bottom of the pan, but that’s what you want to capture all the flavour.
- Reduce the heat to low, pour in the cream and mix well – I like to use a balloon whisk.
- Scatter over the basil leaves, mix again and season to taste with sea salt and freshly ground black pepper.
- Leave to one side while you cook the pasta.
- Bring a large pan of water to the boil before adding salt, then add the rigatoni and cook until al dente, following the instructions on the packet.
- Drain the pasta, reserving a ladleful of the starchy cooking water, then add the pasta to the sauce.
- Toss or swirl together until the pasta is well coated in the sauce, adding some of the cooking water if you think it needs loosening a little.
- Check the seasoning before serving with a generous topping of Parmesan or pecorino.
