THE ZEN OF PASTA

One of the nation’s best new chefs, Douglass Williams, extols the simple pleasures of a timeless culinary tradition

STORY BY AMY TRAVERSO | PHOTOS BY MICHAEL PIAZZA

The pastry and pasta station at Mida restaurant in Boston is a small, tidy, dimly lit corner carved out of a subterranean kitchen. When chef-owner Douglass Williams stands at the counter where he makes his doughs, there’s perhaps eight inches between his head and the ceiling. Across the room, the commercial dishwasher clatters; line cooks bound up and down the stairs. But this spot is a sanctuary, the calm amid the storm of a busy restaurant.

Of all the years for a chef to achieve national recognition, 2020 ended up being Williams’s. Last May, Food & Wine named him one of the country’s 10 best new chefs, calling Mida “a temple to carbohydrates.” It sang the praises of Williams’s pasta craft, which he learned at culinary school in his home state of New Jersey but mastered while working his way up through such kitchens as Boston’s award-winning Coppa and Radius restaurants. With the Food & Wine nod, a good-news-starved media phalanx beat a path to his door. And though quarantine and temporary closures hit the bottom line, Mida was lucky enough to have its neighborhood rally around it, even before the rest of the country took an interest.

Mida sits on the corner of Massachusetts Avenue and Tremont Street, which puts it between two economically and racially distinct neighborhoods: the South End and

Lower Roxbury. Since Mida opened in 2016, its dining room has stood out as one of the most diverse in the city, a frustratingly rare phenomenon in Boston. So with customers to feed, interviews to grant, and Covid precautions to devise, Williams finds his problem now is not struggling to survive as much as it is learning how to juggle it all. He is a warm person, a born nurturer, but his brain is always in fifth gear, solving logistical puzzles, putting out fires, scouting new opportunities. The pasta kitchen is where he finds his peace. Cooking, like sports or dance, is an embodied profession. Spatial awareness is critical—in how you move in a tiny kitchen, or position meat on a crowded grill. Then there’s the muscle and sense memory of working with dough. The brain downshifts. “The whole outside world beyond the table just disappears,” he says. “You’re trying to have your fingertips read the pasta and act as your eyes. All that has a meditative quality. I don’t outsource the pasta making, because the reason I opened Mida is that I wanted to teach pasta. To Chef Williams gives Amy a lesson in making gnocchi during please people and to make her visit to his restaurant, Mida, on Weekends with Yankee. people feel welcomed. It’s the need to make something that comes from my hands and from my heart.” For a recent feature in Yankee magazine, Williams shared recipes designed with both pasta newbies and experienced cooks in mind. You’ll find one of our favorites, Ricotta Gnocchi Cacio e Pepe, on page 28.

Mida chef-owner Douglass Williams took his restaurant’s name from an Italian phrase for “he/she gives me,” which he says fits the spirit of generosity that he hopes Mida embodies.

DOUGLASS WILLIAMS’S RICOTTA GNOCCHI CACIO E PEPE

Gnocchi are commonly made with potatoes, but here Williams makes the little dumplings with ricotta, Parmesan, flour, and egg, then finishes them with the classic cacio e pepe sauce. “With this dough, you’re just trying to bring it together, not kneading it,” he explains. When it’s time to roll the dough out, “you want to keep the log under your fingers. Your palms are a little too heavy for this. Your fingers are the perfect weight.”

For the pasta

4 cups whole-milk ricotta 2 cups finely grated Parmesan, divided 1 large egg, plus 2 egg yolks 1½ teaspoons kosher salt, plus more for the cooking water ½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper ½ teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg 2½ cups all-purpose flour

For the sauce

1 cup pasta water from boiling the gnocchi 2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper 1 teaspoon kosher salt 1½ tablespoons olive oil 1 tablespoon unsalted butter 2 teaspoons lemon juice Freshly grated lemon zest

First, make the gnocchi: In a large bowl, mix together the ricotta, 1 cup Parmesan, egg and yolks, salt, pepper, and nutmeg until smooth. Add half the flour to the mixture, folding it in gently with a spatula or plastic bench scraper. Add the remaining flour, gently folding until it’s almost fully incorporated. (This should take less than 5 minutes.) Turn the mixture out onto a lightly floured surface and shape into a loaf about 1 foot long. Divide crosswise into 8 equal portions. Roll each portion with your fingertips into a “rope” about ½ inch thick, then cut into individual pieces. Toss the pieces in flour to coat. Transfer to a lightly floured rimmed baking sheet, cover with a clean kitchen towel, and set aside.

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. You’ll want to make the cacio e pepe sauce while the gnocchi cooks so that everything finishes at the same time. Drop the gnocchi into the water and boil until it rises to the surface.

Meanwhile, make the sauce: Set a skillet (12 to 14 inches) over a burner, but don’t turn it on. Add 1 cup water from the pasta pot, pepper, salt, olive oil, butter, and lemon juice. Turn heat to high and wait for the mixture to come to a boil.

Now scoop the gnocchi out of the pot with a strainer or slotted spoon and add it to the pan. Cook the liquid down until it thickens into a sauce, then take the pan off the heat and sprinkle in the remaining 1 cup Parmesan, swirling and gently stirring the sauce until everything is blended. Garnish with lemon zest and serve immediately. Yields 6 servings.

Ricotta Gnocchi Cacio e Pepe

TUNE IN FOR MORE

Come along as Amy and Chef Williams go shopping, wine tasting, and cooking together on Weekends with Yankee season five.