and all that summer veg..
I have to hand it to myself, I am really rather cool. I realised this the night I spent counting all the times Pellegrino Artusi included butter in a recipe. I realised that I was at a Fonzie (US Cult TV character, not Nik Nak imposter) level of coolness when I got to 924 and decided I couldn’t risk being any cooler and should probably turn in for the night. Its not just Artusi who favours the use of butter, or indeed its slightly more delicious outlawed cousin, lard; The cruiserweight names of Italian food doyens such as Vincenzo Corrado, Bartolomeo Scappi, Marcella Hazan, Achille Spatuzzi, are just a lipid sized sample of old fashioned animal fat champions. Ask nonno and nonna what they used for fat before the “Economic Miracle” of the 50’s and 60’s when shelves were flooded with olive oil? Unless they were in a mass olive producing region of the old country, they were most likely using lard or butter for their food and oil for the lamps and occasional bribe.
This recipe, I think, came to me in the throws of a drunken dream. After a brutal night in a restaurant that once upon a time lurked round the back of Liverpool Street station, I clutched at the memory of eating tagliarini with tiny cubes of carrot, broad beans, mint, and zucchini and finished with a hint of pecorino. it was delicious, fresh, clean and sweet and my cousin (who was with me at the time) swore we didn’t eat it or anything that resembled this jumble of spring veg and carbs. The next morning I checked the menu to absolutely no avail, and knowing the chef and his lack of creativity, I assumed I had concocted the whole dish out of the stupor of 13 or 14 grappas.
Ingredients:
Serves 2
70g Buffalo Milk Butter
Splash of dry white wine
15g Fave beans (shelled)
15g Carrot
15g Zucchini
15g purple potato
Fresh mint
20g Pecorino cheese
Splash of good balsamic (I mean really good, if you don’t have good balsamic just acidulate with a little more white wine)
Cavatelli
200g Petra Pasta Flour
10 egg yolks
Dash of water
Method:
1. Make the pasta by mixing the pasta flour with the egg yolks. I try and use the Burford Brown egg yolks to give the pasta a wonderful golden colour. You can also buy Italian eggs which have a rich yolk… If you need too, add a little water to bring the dough together into a smooth paste, similar to play-dough. Rest for 30 minutes minimum in the fridge
2. Form the cavatelli. Cut the dough in half, or quarters (Whatever you are comfortable working with) and roll out to the thickness of about half an inch. Cut into strips and then centimetre squares. Push down on the pasta dough with your thumb then forward to make something like a mini cannoli.
3. Bring a pan of salted water to the boil.
4. Finely chop all your veggies. I cut them into matchstick sized pieces and then into tiny little cubes that some Gallophiles would call “Brunoise”, I think the Italians would say “Cubettini”
5. Blanch the veggies in the boiling water for 30/40 seconds and remove into ice cold water to stop the cooking process. Keep the water.
6. Place some fo the buffalo butter in a frying pan and gently heat. Place the Cavatelli into the boiling water and cook for 3/4 minutes and then add to the butter in the frying pan.
7. Add the blanched vegetables, a handful of freshly chopped mint, a tiny splash of white wine and a good amount of pecorino. Cook out until a rich emulsion forms and finish with a little more butter
8. Serve with a little more mint and pecorino, your heart may not thank you but your mood will be through the roof.