Tag Archives: tomato sauce

October 1, 2010 · 5:49 pm

gluten free ravioli

delicious ravioli made with gluten-free flour

There is so much good food to discover and enjoy. For this, a life is not enough. If you make good food for others, they will love you. If you make good food for people who have a serious eating problem – like gluten intolerance – they will love you more.

In fact – probably more than others – they appreciate that having good, fresh, healthy food is a privilege, something to treasure and respect every day.

I am not gluten intolerant. I made these for someone who wanted to come and see others making ravioli without being able to eat them. “No girl – I said – you also must eat”.

Love your food please, make some for others when you can, it really is the best gift.

Recipe

for ravioli

  • 100 gr (3 and 1/2 oz) gluten-free flour
  • 1 egg
  • 1 teaspoon extra virgin olive oil
  • 1 teaspoon water

for the filling

  • 120 gr. (4 oz) spinach or swiss chard
  • 60 gr (2 oz) ricotta cheese
  • 1 tablespoon grated Parmesan or pecorino

For the filling, blanch spinach or other leaf vegetables in boiling water for 3 min. Drain. Cool under cold water and squeeze very dry. Chop greens finely and transfer to a bowl. Mix in ricotta and Parmesan.

For the dough, I bought a baking GF flour made with a mixture of corn starch, potato starch and rice flour. Gluten-free products are widely available in Italian supermarkets and pharmacies.

You can make gluten-free pasta using approximately the same method of fresh regular pasta (please see pictures here and a video here).  The main difference is that the dough is soft, tears easily and dries very fast. Therefore you need to roll it quickly and keep the sheets a little thicker than those made with regular dough. When the sheets are ready, make the ravioli as soon as possible otherwise the pasta will dry and fall apart.

In a food processor blend the flour, oil and egg until the mixture just begins to form  a ball. Depending on the size of the eggs, it might be necessary to add a little water in order to obtain a soft but not sticky dough.

Set the rollers of a pasta machine on the widest setting. Cut the dough into a few fist size pieces. Flatten one  piece of dough into a square and feed through the rollers. Fold the square in three and feed through the rollers. Then fold again in half, roll and repeat  2 or 3 more times. Fold each time and dust with flour to prevent sticking

Turn dial down to next (narrower) setting, dust with flour and feed the dough through rollers without folding. Continue to feed the dough through, without folding, making the space between the rollers narrower each time, until one of narrowest settings is reached. If the pasta sheet is too thin it might tear, so you will need to stop one notch before the narrowest setting.

Cover the sheets with a cotton tea-towel to prevent drying. Arrange a sheet of pasta on a large wooden board. Place teaspoons of the spinach and ricotta filling about 5 cm (2 inches) apart on the sheet so that you can make a “parcel” by folding it over.

spoon filling on the pasta sheets, make sure to leave enough space to seal

Using a pasta cutter seal each parcel by cutting on three sides (the fourth is the fold). Dust a large tray or your worktop with flour and carefully place the ravioli on it taking care that they do not overlap.

a zig-zag cutter is essential to seal the ravioli

Cook in salted boiling water until al dente, about 2 min. Drain and toss ravioli with butter and lemon or a tomato sauce. Distribute onto 2 plates, top with grated Parmesan (or pecorino) if desired and drizzle with good fruity extra virgin olive oil.

Serves 2

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June 12, 2010 · 2:05 pm

parmigiana di melanzane

glorious eggplants, a taste of summer

EGGPLANT PARMIGIANA.

I’m biting my nails here because I have so many things to tell you and if I don’t make a selection,  I’ll probably never get to the recipe.

First of all the name. Parmigiana literally means “from Parma”. However, this  recipe has been known as a tradition in Naples and Sicily since the early XIX century. Food historians have not come up with a conclusive explanation of why an iconic Southern dish has a Northern name. Some say that preparing vegetables alla parmigiana – i.e. in the way of Parma – refers to the use of layers interspersed with cheese and baked.

In origin, the eggplant parmigiana must not have not included Parmesan cheese which is now a standard ingredient. The Southerners used pecorino, provolone, caciocavallo, or mozzarella.

Who knows, may be the people from Parma invented the method and the Southerners adapted it to local ingredients.

I have inscribed this dish in the list of the mistreated foods of Italy. Too often I see impossibly fat recipes oozing cheap cheese, heavy bread-crumb coating and drowning in industrial amounts of oil. A gastroenterologist nightmare.

On the other hand I lost count of absurd adaptations to make it “light”. I admit it, it’s not a low-cal dish but if one wants dessert one has to have some sugar, right? So what’s the sense to use all sorts of alternatives which will taste and look like something else?

The eggplant parmigiana is a dish of fried eggplants baked with a little cheese and tomato sauce.  That’s it, simple, vegetarian and fantastic if properly prepared.

Recipe

  • 2 large eggplants
  • 300 gr / 8  oz fresh mozzarella sliced
  • 1 400 gr / 12 oz  tin peeled or diced San Marzano tomatoes
  • 1 medium onion,  diced
  • 4 tablespoons grated Parmesan
  • 10-12 fresh basil leaves

Eggplants:

Prepare and fry and  eggplants as explained here . Place in a colander for a few hours or possibly overnight to get read of excess oil. Grilled eggplants are often too dry, but if you don’t want to fry blanch them before grilling to keep them moist. Here is my recipe.

Sauce:

Heat 1 tablespoon EVO oil in a pan, add the onion, cover  and saute over low heat until translucent. Stir in the tinned tomato and a sprig of basil, cover again and cook for approx. 10 min. Season lightly with salt and black pepper.

Preheat oven at 180 °C / 350 °F.

Build up the parmigiana: spread two tablespoons of the sauce on  the bottom of a ovenproof pan. Cover with a single  layer of eggplant slices. Top with mozzarella, 2-3  basil leaves, 1 tablespoons of Parmesan and 2-3 tablespoons of sauce. Continue using all ingredients and finish with a layer of eggplant, sauce and Parmesan. Bake for 30 min until golden and bubbly.  You must allow it to cool off for at least 10 min before serving but it’s best at room temperature. In the summer we have it as a main vegetarian meal with crusty bread to mop up the gorgeous juices.

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