Tagliatelle pasta with lightly spiced up hake fillet and tomato sauce

As promised last night, in today’s recipe we are going to use our home-made pasta. Obviously making pasta takes a bit of time and effort but besides that the recipe is really simple and in a hurry you can prepare an elegant, well presented dish.

Ingredients (to serve 4):

500g fresh egg pasta

4 medium sized hake fillet

½ tsp paprika

1/3 tsp turmeric

½ tsp saffron

½ tsp pepper

½ tsp salt

Oil for frying 

TOMATO SAUCE:

400 ml canned tomatoes

2 Tbsp butter

4 Tbsp cream cheese

Salt to taste

1. Wash the fish fillets and pat dry with a paper towel. Mix the dry spices together in the bowl and rub on the fish. Place prepared fillets on a tray, cover with cling film and marinate in the fridge for at least 1 hour. (We were already using this marinade to prepare filling for ravioli, remember?)
2. When hake is marinated and ready to fry, heat the oil in a medium-sized non-stick saucepan. Fry the hake fillets on low-medium heat until fully cooked. Starting from the skin side.
3. Meanwhile cook the pasta in salted boiling water according to instructions from previous post. If using different kinds of pasta follow the cooking instructions on the packet.  As a guide, per person you should allow 75g-115g/3oz-4oz dried pasta; 115g-150g/4oz-5oz fresh pasta; however it all depends on your appetite and personal preferences. Taste during the cooking process to make sure the pasta is neither too soft nor too hard. Once cooked, drain into a colander and shake well to remove all excess water. Set aside. 
4. Prepare tomato sauce by mixing canned tomatoes with butter on a heavy-based pan and fry until tomatoes are soft. Add cream cheese and mix well together. Simmer on a low heat for a few minutes to achieve smooth and thick consistency of the sauce. Salt to taste. At this stage, without using other spices sauce will taste a bit bland; however while serving with marinated hake fillets it will absorb the flavours from the fish.
5. Now place the pasta onto serving plates, top with warm tomato sauce and fry hake fillets to the centre. Garnish with fresh parsley or basil leaves. Enjoy!

Tips:

Other way of serving is to stir your pasta into the tomato sauce and top it with fish fillet. Whichever way you chose it looks really good and it’s equally tasty. 

Home-made fresh egg pasta- Tagliatelle

Pasta is a staple in traditional Italian cuisine. This food product made of unleavened dough was already known in early 12^th century and it is a principle ingredient of many dishes. Nowadays pasta comes in varieties of shapes and colours, but traditional recipe is really simple and so are the ingredients. Here is a secret formula for delicious fresh egg pasta (known in Italian as pasta fresca or pasta fatta in casa or pasta all'uovo). It tastes so much better than one bought in the shop.

Ingredients:

200g ‘00’ type flour (Farina tipo –soft Italian flour)

2 large organic eggs

Salt

(one egg for every 100 grams (3.5 oz) of flour)

Farina Tipo "OO" is the best kind of flour for making most kinds of fresh pasta. It is made with soft wheat (farina di grano tenero) that has been very finely ground and all impurities removed. Farina gives the pasta a lovely texture, somewhat firm but not nearly as firm as store-bought pasta. If you can't find this type of flour, regular 'all purpose' flour can be used.  Some people also mix all purpose flour with cake or pastry flour, trying to achieve the texture of farina. Various stores offer “fresh pasta” made with semolina flour, which is the kind of flour used to make 'industrial' pasta like spaghetti, penne, etc. However it gives the pasta a hardness that is not characteristic of fresh pasta.

Method:

1.          Place the flour and salt on a clean work surface or in a bowl. Make a hollow well in the middle and crack the eggs into it.

2.          Begin to mix around using the tips of your fingers, incorporating a little at a time, until everything is combined. At first it will look rather crumbly, but keep working in a circular motion, to bring the flour and egg together to form dough.

3.      Now knead for ten minutes or until the dough is very smooth and elastic. Use the heel of your hand and your upper body weight to push the dough out along the work surface, then fold the dough back and press down on it with your knuckles. Give it a half turn and repeat, using a rhythmic motion. This process helps develop the gluten in the flour, otherwise your pasta will be flabby and soft when you cook it, instead of springy and al dente. 

4.          When the dough is silky smooth, shape it into a ball. Wrap the dough in cling film and leave to rest in a fridge for at least 30 minutes to an hour.  Make sure the cling film covers it well or it will dry out and go crusty round the edges.

5.    Remove your pasta from the fridge and flour a rolling pin and work surface. If using a machine to roll your pasta, make sure it's clamped firmly to a clean work surface before you start (use the longest available work surface you have) Now roll out the dough to about 1/2 cm thick.

6.    Pass it through the machine set at its widest setting. Do this a couple of times, before reducing the width by one setting and passing through. Repeat the passing / reducing width process until the desired thickness of pasta is reached. 

7.       If you haven't got a pasta machine it's not the end of the world. Most of Italian housewives rolls pasta with their trusty rolling pins and they wouldn't even consider having a pasta machine in the house! When it comes to rolling, the main problem you'll have is getting the pasta thin enough to work with. It's quite difficult to get a big lump of dough rolled out in one piece, and you need a very long rolling pin to do the job properly. The way around this is to roll lots of small pieces of pasta rather than a few big ones. You'll be rolling your pasta into a more circular shape than the long rectangular shapes you'll get from a machine, but use your head and you'll be all right! 

8.      Whether you're rolling by hand or by machine you'll need to know when to stop. If you're making pasta like tagliatelle, lasagne or stracchi you'll need to roll the pasta down to between the thickness of a beer mat and a playing card; if you're making a stuffed pasta like ravioli or tortellini, you'll need to roll it down slightly thinner or to the point where you can clearly see your hand or lines of newsprint through it. 

9.          Once done cut your pasta with a knife or cutting device on your machine into the desired shapes. Pasta dries really quickly so whatever recipe you follow don’t leave it for more than a minute or two before cutting or shaping it. You can lay over a damp clean tea towel which will stop it from drying.

10.          Pasta is ready. You can now either hang it to dry or cook it right away in salted boiling water – it’ll only take a couple of minutes, unlike dried pasta, so keep an eye on it.

In the next recipe we will be using our fresh egg tagliatelle to prepare delicious pasta and hake dish with tomato sauce.

Enjoy!

Hake & soft cheese ravioli with creamy tomato sauce

Ravioli are a type of filled pasta, traditional for Italian cuisine. Small, square pasta cases are stuffed with various fillings containing meat, cheese or vegetables. Ravioli can be served as a starter or a light meal and dished up with various, flavoured pasta sauces and grated cheese or just drizzled with extra virgin olive oil and scattered with fresh herbs and parmesan shavings.

They were first mentioned in 14^th century Italian manuscripts. Nowadays their popularity spread all over the world with shops offering lots of fresh ravioli to choose from with all kinds of fillings.

They are quite time consuming to make from scratch, but believe me it’s totally worth it.  Homemade pasta and fresh fish fillets makes this a dish that is both comforting and luxurious.

Ingredients:

FOR HOME-MADE PASTA:

200g ‘00’ type flour (soft flour)

2 or 3 large organic eggs

Salt to taste

FOR FILLING:

150g hake fish fillet

100g cream cheese

4Tbsp fresh cream

2 egg whites

½ tsp paprika

¼ tsp turmeric

½ tsp saffron

Salt & pepper to taste

FOR TOMATO SAUCE:

1 medium sized onion-peeled and sliced

3 cloves of garlic- finely chopped

200 ml canned tomatoes

Fresh cream

Oil for frying

1. Mix the dry spices together in the bowl and rub on the fish. Place prepared fillets on a tray, cover with cling film and marinate in the fridge for at least 1 hour.
2. Meanwhile prepare the pasta dough. Place ingredients in a bowl and begin to mix around by hand until the mixture resembles breadcrumbs.
3. Tip the mixture out onto a clean work surface and shape into a ball. Knead for a few minute. Squash the dough with both hands, stretch it and twist until it feels smooth. Then wrap the dough in cling film and chill in the fridge for 30-50 minutes.
4. While pasta is resting in the fridge prepare filling for the ravioli and tomato sauce.

FOR FILLING: place marinated fish chunks, soft cheese, egg whites and fresh cream in the blender and blend into smooth paste.

TO MAKE TOMATO SAUCE: fry onion slices and garlic in heavy-based pan until soft and aromatic. Add canned tomatoes and simmer for a few minutes. Add cream and stir together for a smooth creamy consistency. Put aside and keep warm. 

4. To make the egg pasta layers, cut the pasta dough into quarters and, working with one piece at a time, roll out using a pasta machine, lightly dusting the dough with flour between rolls and finishing on setting number five. (If working without the pasta machine roll out the dough, using a rolling pin. Spread the dough until it is thinner than 1/8 inch. Dust the rolling pin with flour to keep the dough from sticking to it.)
5. Lay a sheet of pasta on a floured worked surface and cut into shapes using round pastry cutter or a pastry wheel.  Using a teaspoon, place spoonfuls of the fish filling in the middle of pasta squares. Brush the edges of the pasta squares with the beaten egg and then lay the second sheet of pasta on top. Press around the edges of the filling to seal, ensuring there are no air bubbles.
6.   Bring a large pan of well-salted water (one teaspoon salt per 600ml/1 pint water) to the boil. Drop the ravioli into the boiling water and cook for a total of four minutes. Drain well and tip into a large, warmed serving bowl.
7. Garnish with tomato sauce and grated cheese. Enjoy!

TIPS:

If you are not going to eat the ravioli immediately, drop them into the boiling water as you make each batch and cook for just one minute, then lift out with a slotted spoon and drop into a bowl of cold water. Drain and lay out on lightly oiled trays, cover with cling film and chill until needed. Then drop back into boiling salted water just before serving and cook for three minutes.

Lasagne- Classic & Vegetarian Recipes

We are slowly moving round the world to discover new recipes. Today I would like to share with you formula for a delicious dish that is known and appreciated all over the planet.

Lasagne is usually known as a traditional Italian dish.  However there are a few different theories about origin of this meal. Some of the theories show the connections between lasagne and several ancient Greek recipes, borrowed afterwards by Romans.

But British also claim their contribution to create world famous recipe. According to this theory Lasagne is a development of the 14th century English recipe "Loseyn" as described in The Forme of Cury, a cook book in use during the reign of Richard II. This claim has been made due to the similarities in both the method described in building the dish and the two names. Perhaps the British actually did have the good sense to layer cheese, meat, and pasta.

However the recipe couldn’t have been complete until arrival of tomatoes, which were introduced to Europe after Columbus reached America in 1492. The earliest cookbook featuring tomato recipes indeed comes form 16^th century Italy. So whether you consider the use of tomatoes to be fundamental in Lasagne or you are swayed by British arguments, you will definitely enjoy the product of this European co-operation.

Ingredients I- Classic lasagne

1 lbs minced meat (beef)

1 medium-sized onion, finely chopped

3 cloves of garlic

1 can of peeled tomatoes

2 Tbsp tomato puree

2 tsp mixed herbs or Italian herbs

Lasagne pasta sheets

Grated cheese
Breadcrumbs

Red cooking wine

(or grape juice for non-alcoholic version)

Ingredients II- Vegetarian lasagne

1 medium-sized onion- chopped

3 cloves of garlic

2 bell peppers

2 carrots, peeled and sliced

Broccoli

Mushrooms

1 can of spinach leaves

1 can of peeled tomatoes

2 Tbsp tomato puree

2 tsp mixed herbs or Italian herbs

Lasagne pasta sheets

Grated cheese

Salt & pepper to taste

For Béchamel Sauce:

40g Butter

20g Flour

425 ml milk

Grated cheese

2 bay leaves        

Onion

Cloves

1. In a large pan (ideally with a large diameter with high sides) fry for a few minutes finely chopped onions and garlic until aromatic. Add minced meat and brown it, breaking up the chunks with a wooden spoon. When cooked, drain of any excess fat.
2. Next, add the red wine and allow most of it to burn off. Add tomato paste, canned tomatoes, all of the herbs and spices.  Allow the sauce to simmer over a low heat until it reduces to a thick Bolognese sauce.  The ideal simmer time is approx. 1-1 ½ hour. Add breadcrumbs to improve texture and consistency of your Bolognese and stir together.
3. While the sauce simmers, preheat the oven to 180 degrees and prepare the béchamel sauce.  (The béchamel only takes about 10 minutes, so wait until the Bolognese is finishing off to start rouxing).

BÉCHAMEL SAUCE

In a heavy-based pan melt the butter and then whisk in the flour, energetically stirring all the time. Once combined and the mixture begins to bubble (don’t let it brown or burn), slowly add the warmed milk in a steady stream, again stirring constantly. Add grated cheese. Continue to stir until the cheese melts and mixture thickens and comes to boil. Add onion, cloves and bay leaves to taste and simmer for a few minutes, until sauce absorbs the flavour.

Now start building lasagne layer. Spread meat sauce at the bottom of baking pan. Spread Béchamel sauce and sprinkle with grated cheese. Layer the pasta sheets in the way they are slightly overlapping. Repeat until lasagne has about 3 layers. Spread remaining béchamel on top and sprinkle with more cheese.

Bake in preheated oven for 25- 30 minutes. Serve with garlic bread and salad. 

FOR VEGETARIAN LASAGNE:

1.In a large pan fry for a few minutes finely chopped onions, garlic and carrots until softened. Add the broccoli, bell peppers and mushrooms. Shallow fry for 35 mins, until vegetables are softened and lightly charred. Add tomato paste, canned tomatoes, all of the herbs and spices.  Allow the sauce to simmer for a while over a low heat.

2. Prepare the Béchamel sauce.

3. Layer the lasagne in sequence of roasted vegetables- spinach leaves- béchamel- cheese- pasta. Spread remaining béchamel on top and sprinkle with more cheese.

Bake in preheated oven for 25- 30 minutes. Serve with garlic bread and salad. 

TIPS:

If for any reason you do not consume alcohol in your diet, you can replace the red cooking wine with a grape juice. I never used to add cooking wine to my meals as I run halal kitchen at home. However browsing various websites I found tips how to replace wine while cooking. Juice is often an alternative for those who want a sweeter dish. It still helps to achieve fruitiness, acidity and adds flavour depth to a dish. If you want to get rid of a sweet flavour you can dilute it with a tablespoon of flavoured vinegar.