Giorgio Locatelli’s Calamarata with samphire, monkfish, chilli and lemon

Ingredients

• 4 unwaxed lemons
• 500g calamarata pasta or mezzi paccheri
• 3 cloves garlic
• small bunch flat leaf parsley
• 1 mild red chilli (finely chopped)
• 300g monkfish fillets (cut into small pieces)
• 35ml white wine
• 100g samphire
• 1 tsp salted capers (rinsed and dried)
• salt, pepper and extra virgin olive oil

Method

1. Remove peel from lemons in large strips. Simmer in 5 litres of water, cover and infuse for 2 hours
2. Pass infused water through fine sieve and return water to the pan
3. Bring a pan of salted water to the boil, add pasta and cook for 12 minutes (or 3 mins less than on the packet)
4. Crush 1 clove of garlic into a paste. Put parsley on top and chop finely so that garlic and parsley combine and release their flavours into each other
5. Finely chop the remaining garlic cloves
6. Heat a little oil in a pan and add garlic and chilli. Cook gently for 2 minutes, taking care not to burn the garlic
7. Add the monkfish and cook for a further 2 minutes, pour in the wine and let it bubble up to evaporate the alcohol, then stir in a ladleful of the cooking water
8. Drain the pasta, reserving the rest of the water. Add the pasta to the sauce with enough cooking water to almost cover it
9. Add the samphire and capers and reduce the liquid by half, until it coats the pasta
10. Finish with the parsley and garlic, and olive oil and spoon into a warm serving dish. Finish with a squeeze of lemon