This dish comes together quickly, so it’s your call how you prefer to go about preparing it. If you’re good at multitasking, make the pasta and sauté the prosciutto and peas simultaneously. If you aren’t a multitasker, start with the prosciutto.

Heat the olive oil into large, heavy frying pan over low to medium heat. Add the garlic.  Cook gently for about a minute. Add the prosciutto, cooking for a few minutes, letting the fat render a little. Add the peas. Cooking time depends on how starchy your peas are; this may be anywhere from three to ten minutes. Stir ingredients with a spatula and taste peas for doneness. The prosciutto is pre-cooked. We’re just heating it up.

Now get your pasta going. Fill a pot with water and add enough salt to make it really salty. Bring to a rolling boil. Add the pasta. Cook until al dente or however you like your pasta. Drain, but not before reserving a half cup of pasta cooking water; set this aside.

If you are a classy type, you can set a serving bowl in a low oven to warm. If you’re like me, you can set your pasta bowls on the counter and be done with it.

Return drained pasta to the cooking pot. Tip peas and prosciutto into the pot. Stir vigorously. Add reserved pasta water if necessary. Drizzle with more olive oil, if wished. Taste for salt and pepper.

You may now serve in your classy warmed serving bowl or less classy room temperature dishes. A tomato salad is nice on the side, or a green salad. If you aren’t petrified of carbs, good bread is wonderful here. Leftovers, if you have any–we did not–are very good the next day.

Notes:

To makes this dish vegetarian, replace the prosciutto with Parmesan cheese.

Fava beans are also delicious either added to the peas or instead of.

When fresh peas aren’t in season, use frozen.