Here in Massachusetts, fall is staring us right in the face. This is the time of the year when New England still has warm, comfortable days, and those slightly chilly nights that make you want to cozy up under a warm blanket, pour yourself a nice glass of Barolo, and eat a nice warm plate of pasta. At least it does for me anyway.
September is an amazing month for cooks in that all of the wonderful summer harvest, the stuff that we have been waiting to taste all year, is just now starting to hit its prime. So I want to take full advantage everything our farms have to offer. I can't wait to start working with this years selection. As I've said before, this cookbook has so many great ideas for fall that I want to dive right in.
I go to the market and see some parsnips that look great so like the good honorary Italian that I am, I take them home with me, knowing that Mario has something for me to do with them.
The only real hurdle in this dish is to make the fresh pasta. Once we get that out of the way, the rest is so simple. Sure, you could substitute your favorite dried pasta for the tagliatelle, but what's the fun in that?
I start by making the pasta dough. The dough is Mario's standard pasta recipe but with some cracked black pepper added to the egg/olive oil mixture.
I knead it for about 7 minutes until it looks like this:
The dough gets wrapped in plastic wrap and is allowed to rest for 30 minutes.
Once rested, I roll out the dough to the thinnest setting on the pasta machine and cut the pasta sheets into 1/4 inch wide strips of tagliatelle.
Next, I have to prep my ingredients. I chop some fresh parsley, dice some pancetta, and cut the peeled parsnips into half moon pieces. Again, not a lot going on here.
Once that's taken care of, I bring some salted water up to a boil for the pasta.
In a sauté pan, I add the diced pancetta and brown it until the fat has rendered out. OMG does it smell good already.
Once at this stage, I use a slotted spoon to remove the pancetta, add a cube of butter, and start cooking the parsnips until golden brown and slightly crispy. Mario advises to not shake the sauté pan too much during this step so that the parsnips can develop their caramelization. Kind of like when you're grilling a steak and you just leave it instead of turning it every two minutes to make it look like you're doing something. Ya that's right I'm calling you out on that one!
At this point I drop the tagliatelle into the boiling water.
I add the pancetta back into the sauté pan and when the pasta is cooked al dente, about 2 minutes, add it to the sauté pan. Turn off the heat and add the fresh parsley and grate some Parmigiano Reggiano into the pasta goodness.
I plate it up and the smell is so overwhelming that I can't even wait for my wife to come home to try it. For such a simple recipe, this was a complex palette pleaser. You have the sweetness of the parsnips, the smokiness of the pancetta, the pepper from the tagliatelle, and the richness of the Parmesan cheese. A really nice surprise. And a great way to put me in the mood for more fall surprises.
Next up I will continue with the same harvest theme, especially now that I see some sweet 100's on my tomato vines in the garden. Until next time...
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