Almond Biscotti

The term 'biscotti' means twice cooked, and that's the secret to making these delicious Italian cookies for dipping in coffee. The cooking-drying process means they keep well too.

Ingredients

3 eggs
1 stick butter, melted
1 tsp vanilla essence
2 tsp almond extract
1/2 cup amaretto
1/2 cup whole almonds
2 cups sliced almonds
4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt

Method

Combine egg, butter, essences, amaretto and almonds. Combine flour, sugar, salt and baking powder. Add egg mixture to dry ingredients and mix to obtain a smooth dough, adding s little more  flour if sticky.

Shape dough into 4 equal, log-shaped piece. Flatten slightly and place on cookie sheets lined with baking arch net. Bake in a preheated oven at 350 F for 20-25 minutes until edges are golden. Remove and cool completely, then slice into biscotti. place upright on cookie sheets and bake again at 350 F for another 15-20 minutes until the tops turn golden. (The longer they are baked the crisper and harder they will be.) Cool on racks.

Two Pasta Sauces

I hope you've been practising your pasta-making skills since my recent post. I promised you a couple of sauce recipes, and here are two that could not be more different. The great Bolognese, hours in the making and using minced beef and bacon (chicken liver is often an ingredient too); and Pesto, vegetarian and fast. A piacere.

Bolognese Sauce

Ingredients for 4-5 servings

2 1b ground beef
4 cans of chopped tomatoes
1 pack lightly smoked bacon rashers or pancetta, diced finely
5 cloves of garlic, crushed with a little salt
Optional: a handful of dried porcini mushrooms, presoaked
1 1/2 pts beef stock
Chopped parsley, 5 sage leaves, small thyme branch, small sprig rosemary (small sprig), good handful basil
Tube of tomato puree
3 large vidalia or other sweet onion, finely chopped
2 1/2 cups carrot, finely chopped
1/2 cup celery, finely chopped
Knob of butter
4-5 tbsps olive oil
Salt, pepper

Put oil and butter in a large pan and heat. Fry bacon for 5 minutes then add onion and fry gently for 5-10 minutes until translucent, but not brown.Add half of the tube of tomato puree and fry a few minutes more, stirring. Add garlic, fry for a minute, stirring, Now turn up the heat as you add the ground beef. Keep stirring to break up the meat and brown it. There should be no lumpy clusters of meat. Add carrots and celery, and fry a few minutes, then add thyme leaves, chopped rosemary and chopped sage. Keep stirring as you cook, and turn the heat down again.

Strain the mushrooms, reserving the soaking water; chop them and add to the pan. Add 1 cup of mushroom water, taking care to avoid the dregs which may contain grit. Let this boil down. Add a little salt (just a pinch if your bacon is salty). Now empty the 4 cans of chopped tomatoes into the pan. Stir well, then pour in enough of the beef stock to cover everything plus an inch over. Don't worry that it seems watery at this stage - the long cooking process will absorb the liquid. Bring to the boil, stirring from time to time so it doesn’t stick to bottom of the pan.

Reduce heat to a very, very low simmer (a suitable pot could be placed in a very low oven instead), half cover the pan and cook for 4-5 hours. Stir occasionally, checking that the sauce is not sticking to the pan or getting dry.  The end result will be a thick sauce bubbling through a thin layer of oil and tomato juice.

Have your drained (al dente! pasta) ready in a heated serving dish, mix in a knob of butter then pour your beautiful Bolognese sauce on top. Add chopped basil and parsley. Serve with freshly grated parmesan.

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Pesto Sauce

Ingredients for 4-5 servings

1 large bunch of basil, leaves only, washed, dried and torn by hand into shreds (do this at the last moment)

3 cloves of garlic

2/3 cup raw pine nuts

1/3 cup freshly grated Parmesan
1/3 cup freshly grated Pecorino

1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil

Toast the pine nuts gently until just golden. Mash them in a pestle and mortar with the garlic and salt, gradually incorporating the olive oil and shredded basil. Stir in the Parmesan. The pesto keeps well in a jar - pour some olive oil over the top to seal before closing the jar.

When you are ready to serve, stir the pesto and toss into the hot pasta. Have your guests grate Parmesan and black pepper at the table.

My local Italian includes some crispy little fried potatoes and green beans in the mix and I can't tell you how good this is.

Pasta Fatta in Casa

If you tried my Pizza Fatta in Casa recipe, now it's time to turn your hand to pasta. Yes, the dried stuff you get in the store is great, and no, you don't need to struggle trying to roll out 3-feet long spaghetti or cutting farfalle - little bows. But the almost slimy texture of freshly made tagliatelle with a classic Italian pasta sauce is hard to beat, and it makes all the difference to lasagne too, and the only way to make ravioli and tortellini, with your own delicious fillings. So are you ready?

Ingredients for tagliatelle for 6 people:

1 lb durum wheat flour

3 eggs

1 tsp salt 

about 4 tbsps water

The late, great British cookery writer, Elizabeth David, describes the process of making the dough in her "Italian Food". Pour flour in a mound on a board, make a well in the center and break in eggs. Add the salt and water. She then devotes a paragraph to the process of kneading and stretching the dough, counselling a 10-minuter period of intense exercise. Joyous as this process can be, I tend to use my Kitchen Aid with the dough hook fitted, and sit back and watch it do all the work.

After 5-10 minutes you should have a really sleek, malleable dough. Cut the dough in half. You can do the next bit manually, with your rolling pin. Elizabeth David counsels rolling up the thinly stretched dough like a jelly roll and cutting through this multiple times to obtain the noodles, but it is much more fun and the results are more uniform if you use a little Italian pasta machine - hand cranked will do fine, though mine has 'il motore' attached. Either roll out each piece of dough thinly then cut into long, 1/3" wide strips, or put through the machine press side a few times, then through the tagliatelle cutter.

Note: after you've made the pasta a couple of times you will recognize the correct texture. If it's too dry it will be difficult to manipulate, but if it's too wet it will stick to itself. After you cut the ribbons have some polenta flour ready to dust over them to help keep the strands separate. If you are not cooking them immediately toss them up every now and then in the flour to keep them from sticking.

Cook the pasta in a very large pan full of salted water until it is 'al dente'. This will take just five minutes or so, less time than dried pasta. Watch the pan for the pasta rising to the surface and then it is cooked.

Coming soon...a couple of sauce recipes fit for your pasta fatta in casa.

Pasta with Pesto Sauce, Sauteed New Potatoes and Green Beans

I am planning on spending some time on the East Coast soon, and this recipe is taken from the repertoire of Bell's Tavern in Lambertville, NJ. Bell's has been a great neighborhood restaurant for meeting up with old friends and eating real Italian food since 1938, not that I've been going there that long of course!

This recipe doesn't have a cute title, but it is great comfort food and real easy to make. I love they way they make it at Bell's.

Ingredients
A few waxy potatoes cut into bite-size pieces (no need to peel)
8 oz green beans, trimmed and halved
8 oz pasta (shells or tubes for preference)
salt
Pesto sauce (see below)

Place potatoes in a pan of water and bring to the boil. Add salt, then pasta, and cook for 8 minutes or until the pasta is al dente, adding the green beans for the last couple of minutes. Drain, toss with pesto and place in a hot serving dish.

* left-over potatoes can be used instead, as long as they are waxy - fry little pieces in olive oil until brown and crispy then toss into the pasta just before serving

Adding beans to pot 2 minutes before pasta and potatoes are done

Pesto Sauce
3 generous handfuls of fresh basil leaves, removed from their stems
1/2 cup pignoli/pine nuts (toasted but still pale - take care not to darken or they'll give a bitter flavor)
1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan
extra virgin olive oil

1 clove garlic, minced

sea salt to taste
freshly ground black pepper

Process all pesto ingredients (except olive oil) so they are chopped but not blended - the sauce needs texture not smoothness. Stir in the best extra virgin olive oil you can get,, California Olive Ranch's Arbequina for example, and season to taste. These amounts provide four generous helpings of sauce. Scale up and store the rest in a glass jar in the refrigerator, sealed with a layer of olive oil.


Why not pair this with a glass or two of Di Majo Norante Sangiovese like they do at Bell's.

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