A few weeks ago I told Dave that I wanted to make some pasta. He was surprisingly unexcited about the prospect. In hindsight, I should probably have elaborated a little....
What I actually wanted to do was try my hand at stuffed pasta for the first time. And since we both love butternut squash--which has the added benefit of being 0 points on Weight Watchers, hooray!--I thought that would be a great place to start off.
So, what next? Roasting the squash was a given. It concentrates the flavour beautifully and I love the slightly smoky flavour when the edges of the cubes char. The only problem--if you can really call it that--was that roasted butternut is very sweet. So that meant pairing it with something intensely savoury. And then I remembered the proscuttio-wrapped chicken breasts that I did a little while ago. Perfect!
And since I had the best part of a bunch of sage left over from making the Stracotto di Manzo, I decided to make a sage brown butter sauce to tie the two together.
With that settled, all that was left to do was cook!
At this point, I should confess something. I've had a lovely Imperia pasta machine for oh, around about eight years and I've used it exactly three times to date. And I call myself a foodie....
Making pasta dough is hard work. Probably not on a par with digging a ditch, but it's certainly physical enough to raise a sweat on me. And I have Mum Muscles, obtained through hours of lugging Lucas around, so I'm not exactly a weakling. I certainly shan't be challenging any Italian Mamas to an arm wrestling match....
It took about half an hour of energetic kneading, interspersed with grumbling that this would give me RSI, to turn a large heap of bright yellow crumbs into a nice smooth dough.
(Apparently I fail miserably at taking pictures of dough.)
Right up until I dolloped spoonfuls of filling onto the dough I was dithering about what shape of stuffed pasta to make. Tortellini are very pretty but I thought I'd waste loads of dough trimmings if they dried out as I was shaping. Proper ravioli also involved lots of cutting and I'd probably run into problems with the dough drying out, once more. Capelletti were out as I wasn't making a meat filling and nor was I planning to cook the pasta in broth.
So, that left tortelli, which I hadn't come across before I started ploughing through Elizabeth David and Marcella Hazan's tomes. Tortelli are essentially elongated ravioli, but one edge is simply folded over and un-ruffled. It's supposed to be the simplest stuffed pasta to start off with, and I'd have to agree with that.
The tortelli were incredibly good, despite my generosity with the filling. (Or perhaps, because of.) When you cut into each one, the squash filling slowly oozed out voluptuously. The pasta itself was perfect in terms of texture--surprising considering how poorly I treated the dough--but I think I would have liked a bit more salt in the pasta dough, so next time I'll be a bit more generous.
The deep, smoky sweetness of the butternut squash did indeed work with the crisp saltiness of the proscuttio-wrapped chicken. I'm not entirely sure that the sage butter was needed to tie the flavours together, but it was pretty damn good, too. Next time I might add a splash of aged balsamic vinegar to the butter sauce as it got a bit cloying towards the end of the meal.
Now I'm really keen to try out more shapes and a huge array of fillings. Elizabeth David talks about using a beef stew (minced up, of course) as the basis for the filling, so I am sorely tempted to try that with some of the pot roast that's currently stashed in the freezer....
Roasted Butternut Squash Tortelli
Serves 2-3, depending on how generously you fill the tortelli
NB. You will have left-over pasta dough. It will happily sit in the fridge for a couple of days. Or, make a half-recipe.
400g '00' flour
4 large eggs
1 large egg yolk
1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
pinch of salt
semolina for dusting
1 large butternut squash, peeled, de-seeded and cubed
olive oil
salt and pepper
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
3 tablespoons minced shallots
3 tablespoons double cream (cream substitutes such as Elmlea work just fine here)
3-4 tablespoons grated Parmesan
freshly grated nutmeg
Start with the pasta dough as this benefits from sitting in the fridge for a few hours.
In a food processor, combine all the ingredients and pulse until it resembles coarse breadcrumbs or comes together as a ball.
Tip out onto a lightly floured surface.and knead until the mixture becomes pliable. IIn the beginning it will seem as though the dough is too dry to hold together. Persevere! And if it still doesn't seem to be working after 20 minutes then carefully add a few drops of water at a time while kneading. This should rescue the dough if you can get past the initial stickiness.
Wrap the dough in clingfilm and leave it to rest n the fridge for at 1-2 hours.
Preheat oven to 200C or equivalent.
Toss cubed squash with a little olive oil and plenty of seasoning. Spread out over a couple of rimmed baking sheets and roast for approximately 20-25 minutes, stirring occasionally. The squash should be very tender and flecked with nice crispy edges.
Weigh out 250g of the roasted quash and puree. Reserve the rest of the squash for another recipe--or you can open freeze and then bag it up.
In a frying pan, melt the butter and saute the shallots for 1 minute. Scrape in the roasted butternut squash puree and fry, stirring constantly, for 2-3 minutes until the mixture is slightly dry. This will drive off any excess water and also combine the flavours.
Season with salt and pepper, add the cream and cook, stirring, for another 2-3 minutes. Remove from the heat, scrape the mixture into a clean bowl then add the grated parmesan and grate in some nutmeg to taste. Check the seasoning carefully! The filling has to taste amazing before you make the tortelli.
Cool and then refrigerate until you're ready to make the tortelli.
Set up your pasta machine and dust the surrounding surface with semolina. Cover a few baking trays with clingfilm and dust them with semolina too. Get the filling from the fridge and set out a pastry brush, small bowl of water and pastry cutter.
Divide the ball of dough into either 4 or 8, depending on how confident you feel. Re-wrap the rest and return to the fridge.
Knead the dough lightly to take the chill off it and run it through the pasta machine--set to its widest aperture--at least 10 times, folding the dough in half each time. Once the dough feels pliable start lowering the roller settings and elongating the sheet. If it sticks, then dust it lightly with semolina before running through the machine again.
Take the pasta machine down to its thinnest setting.
Lay the dough out flat in front of you and square off the edges with a knife. Place teaspoonfuls of the filling at 3" intervals down the centre of the dough. Working quickly, brush the pasta lightly with water and fold it over so that the two long edges meet. Carefully press out the air around each blob of filling and seal the dough together. If it doesn't stick. brush on a little more water and press down firmly.
Cut between each mound of filling to produce tortelli. Lay on the prepared trays--don't let the pasta touch--while you get on with the next piece of dough.
Proscuttio-wrapped Chicken Breasts
4 slices proscuttio
2 skinless chicken breasts (preferably organic)
salt and pepper
olive oil
Season the chicken and wrap two slices of proscuttio around each breast.
Heat some olive oil in a frying pan over gentle/lowest heat. Put the chicken in the hot frying pan. Cook undisturbed over a gentle heat for 10 minutes. Turn and cook for another 5 or 10 minutes depending on the thickness of the chicken. If ready before the risotto then leave, covered to rest.
Cooking the tortelli
While the chicken is frying boil enough water to fill your biggest pasta pan/stockpot/saucepan/whatever. Generously salt the water.
Slide in half the tortelli and simmerfor about 3 minutes until al dente. You may feel more comfortable cooking a test tortelli first. While the tortelli are cooking, crack on and make the sage butter.
Sage brown butter
Knob of unsalted butter, maybe 30g
6 sage leaves, shredded
salt and pepper
In the frying pan you used for the chicken, melt the butter and cook for 2-3 minutes until starting to brown. Toss in the sage leaves, stirring, and season with S&P.
Plate up the chicken and tortelli and drizzle both with the sage brown butter.
Enjoy!
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Comments
looking forward to making this meal for new years eve.
thanks for the inspriration
1. Posted by janiebaby on December 30, 2007
Hope your dinner turned out well, Janie! Do pop back and let me know all about it :)
2. Posted by Angela![[TypeKey Profile Page]](http://www.aspoonfulofsugar.net/blog/nav-commenters.gif)
on
January 1, 2008