{"id":672,"date":"2017-02-22T10:51:00","date_gmt":"2017-02-22T17:51:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/villasentieri.com\/?post_type=recipe&p=672"},"modified":"2026-09-02T10:59:21","modified_gmt":"2026-09-02T17:59:21","slug":"moms-pasta-fagioli-recipe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/villasentieri.com\/index.php\/2017\/02\/22\/moms-pasta-fagioli-recipe\/","title":{"rendered":"Mom’s Pasta e Fagioli (Mom’s Pasta and Beans)"},"content":{"rendered":"

February 22, 2017<\/span><\/p>\n

We didn\u2019t eat a lot of prepared foods growing up.\u00a0 In fact we almost never did.\u00a0 OK, there were a few times in the early 60\u2019s where I got to try out those recently-invented \u201cTV Dinners.\u201d<\/p>\n

I was well into adulthood before I had a real appreciation for the quality of the homemade food that was put on our table every day.<\/p>\n

My mother made putting great food on the table seem effortless.\u00a0 I remember many Sunday mornings when I\u2019d wake up to find her making ravioli from scratch for our big midday meal: cooking the beef and spinach filling, preparing the dough, rolling and filling the ravioli, all the while a big pot of tomato sauce bubbling away on the stove.\u00a0 It was just a family Sunday dinner!<\/p>\n

Weekday meals were usually less elaborate but no less delicious; maybe homemade sausage, pan-fried potatoes, and a vegetable or two or maybe pasta with sauce leftover from Sunday.\u00a0 It was always fun to walk into the kitchen to find her making something I\u2019d never had before; something that her mother used to make.\u00a0 Sometimes that wasn\u2019t even at a defined meal time.<\/p>\n

Now I think I understand.\u00a0 My mother died in 1993 and I bet I didn\u2019t make her version of pasta e fagioli for 20 years after her death.\u00a0 Then one day, the desire for it just struck me and there I was, in the kitchen, cooking.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s become part of my regular routine again after that long hiatus.\u00a0 Sitting down to a bowl of my mother\u2019s pasta e fagioli is comforting; almost as comforting as if she had made it for me.\u00a0 There\u2019s just something about the combination of pasta, beans and red sauce that I can\u2019t explain.\u00a0 It triggers an emotional bridge to what feels like an earlier time in my life.\u00a0 I\u2019m guessing something similar prompted my mother to occasionally whip up dishes from her youth that she hadn\u2019t made in decades, if ever.

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Mom's Pasta e Fagioli (Mom's Pasta and Beans)<\/h2>\n
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Follow the directions for Cannelini alla Toscana but use dried lima beans instead of cannellini and substitute \u00bd teaspoon of dried oregano and a sprig of fresh rosemary for the sage. There will be leftover beans that you can freeze or refrigerate for another use. You can also use two 15 ounce cans of Butter Beans in place of the home-cooked lima beans. Mom always used ditalini for this dish. These days, when you can find them (and it can be challenging) they have usually been upgraded from ditalini to ditali, though they are exactly what she used. More frequently, I use a slightly larger, but still rather small, pasta such as the mezzi rigatoni shown here.<\/div>\n
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Prep Time <\/span>15 minutes<\/span><\/span> mins<\/span><\/span><\/div>
Cook Time <\/span>1 hour<\/span><\/span> hr<\/span><\/span><\/div>
Total Time <\/span>1 hour<\/span><\/span> hr<\/span> 15 minutes<\/span><\/span> mins<\/span><\/span><\/div><\/div>\n
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Servings: <\/span>6<\/span> people<\/span><\/span><\/div><\/div><\/div>\n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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Ingredients
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