Give me a guitar and I'll give you pasta

Regional Italian cooking class Day One focused on the Abruzzo and Marche regions of Italy. It was exactly what I wanted. Maybe a little too laid back, but I will definitely learn new techniques and become a more capable chef. We made pasta from scratch, which is surprisingly easy. Just make a well in a pile of flour and add the eggs to the well. With a fork, slowly take flour from the sides of the well and incorporate into the eggs until the dough has formed. If it is too dry, wet your hands while you knead the dough. If too wet, add flour. Knead the dough for about 10 minutes and you’re ready. We made fettuccini pasta by putting the dough through the counter mounted dough machine, turning the crank on the first setting to flatten it. Then you move up the setting, lightly flour the dough and put it through again. Fold it, flour it, then do it again, and again, and again. Now you have a long wide sheet of thin pasta. We used a device to cut the pasta into fettuccini sized strips that looks like a lyre. You put the wide strip on the strings (like guitar strings) and rub. Eventually the strings cut the dough and the pasta is ready to cook. I can’t imagine why anyone would use this when the counter mounted pasta maker would finish the job in minutes, but it was an interesting method and cool to try. Now, if I am ever without a pasta machine, or knife, I can make pasta with a guitar.

We made a tomato sauce with lamb to accompany it. Start by sautéing carrots and onion in olive oil until caramelized. Add the lamb and ground pork and sauté for several minutes then add the red wine and reduce. After a while, add a bottle of tomatoes, pureed I think, and simmer for 20 minutes or so. We finished the sauce with a little parsley and parmigiano reggiano. The fresh pasta was so wonderful. It really made a difference.

We also made lamb in white wine sauce. First, sauté rosemary and whole garlic cloves in olive oil then add the lamb. After searing the lamb, add white wine and cover. It was really delicious. When I make it at home, I will use better cuts of lamb and cook it to medium rare rather than medium well, but really a wonderful way to prepare the meat.

Finally, we made little cheese empanadas, which is not the official name, but I have lost my recipe. We made another batch of dough, this one with olive oil. Using fresh whole milk ricotta (to die for), we combined ricotta with egg yolks and then folded in the beaten whites. Using a biscuit cutter, we made little pasta circles, filled them with the egg/ricotta mixture and sealed them with egg whites. After brushing them with egg yolks, we baked them for 20 minutes or so. They all exploded, but it seems like that was inevitable since the filling was essentially a soufflé. They were a little bland, and we all agreed that bacon would have been an excellent addition to the filling, and a nice tomato dipping sauce.

After cooking everything, we all sat down to a great meal and everyone explained what they did. The amateur kitchens only have two stoves. We have our tasks to complete so we need hear what everyone else has done, but it is pretty low key and everyone usually gets a chance to do a little of everything. I will say that cooking without wine and music seems like a sin.