It was my Wife’s turn to choose the subject of this next post, the decision of which was inspired by her inner child. Literally.
Now that she is 5 months along in the pregnancy, the baby has learned that if ever she is hungry all she needs to do is kick my wife until she is fed. And the feeding better include some cheese. She is craving it fiercely. It’s our first child so of course we are going to spoil her with probably one of the cheesiest pasta recipes in the cookbook.
Tortelloni are navel-shaped stuffed pastas. They have quite a celebrated history in Emilia-Romagna where they originate. The story goes that one night Lucrezia Borgia was staying at an inn in the small town and the owner of the inn was so smitten with her that he decided to go up to her room to get a peek at her by looking thru her door’s keyhole. The room was dimly lit and the only thing that the inn owner could make out was her navel. So he did what any Italian would do in that situation. He went right into the kitchen and made a pasta shape in her honor. And the rest is history.
I remember hearing that story told on Molto Mario years ago and I looked it up. Sure enough, Wikipedia can verify.
As you can imagine, the shape of this pasta is very specific, so getting the end result to look as they should will require a little finesse on my part. This is not just a quick swipe with a ravioli stamp and you’re done. Mario gives exact instructions of their formation and it seems pretty clear, but do look up videos of the shaping on YouTube if you’re not quite sure of what to do.
I should also note that these are not to be confused with Tortellini. Those are just the smaller version of what we have here. Let’s begin.
I always look at my ingredient list first as it sometimes will include a little extra prep work and sure enough I first have to zest an orange and dry the strips out in a 200° oven for about 30 minutes.
Next I start to make the filling. In a bowl I combine milk with some quality goat’s cheese to soften. Mario recommends goat’s cheese from Coach Farm, but I went to my local market and picked up what they had. There will be plenty of other opportunities to special order the cheese for other posts, as the cheese pops up in several recipes in the book.
I then add fresh rosemary, thyme, parsley, sage, nutmeg, Parmigiano cheese, and salt and pepper. The filling is now complete.
Now to make the pasta dough. I really enjoy making it and so far it is one of my favorite things about this book.
After letting the dough rest for 30 minutes, I roll it out to the thinnest setting on my pasta roller. The sheets get cut into 4-inch squares, and a little of the goat cheese filling gets placed in the middle.
Here is where the shaping takes place. I fold two opposite corners together making a triangle and firmly seal.
The longer points of the triangle join together in a ring around your finger.
There we have the finished shape. Not too hard. I made a bunch up and put them on a sheet pan and into the freezer. Not as precise as I would have liked but I just have to shape a few hundred more to practice.
The hardest part is over and it’s almost dinner time! I bring my pot of salted water up to a boil and drop in the Tortelloni’s. They take about 5 minutes to cook thoroughly.
The pan sauce is real simple. I melt butter in a sauté pan and add a little bit of the pasta cooking water, swirling as I do to make an emulsified sauce. The orange zest and fennel fronds go in the pan along with the cooked pasta.
The pasta gets plated with a little grating of Parmigiano cheese and a dusting of fennel pollen, or finely ground fennel seeds.
To say that this was a hit is an understatement. My wife had two servings! The herbs and nutmeg flavored the goat’s cheese so well and the orange zest was perfect. This dish worked on so many levels. Both Wife and Baby are happy as am I. This will be another recipe that I make again in the future.
I should probably take a little break from the pastas even though I love making them so much. But it’s hard to decide what I want to make next. There are so many good options. The weather has definitely affected what I cook seeing how it’s been the warmest December on record here in H-town. I’m talking about not needing a jacket weather. So I may have to go with lighter options until the cold creeps in. Until next time…
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