Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking - Marcella Hazan [96]
8. Turn the heat on to low under the mushroom sauce.
9. Drain the pasta when done to a very firm al dente, even slightly undercooked, consistency, bearing in mind that it will continue to soften during the final phase of preparation. Transfer to the serving pan containing butter and cream. Turn on the heat to low, and toss the noodles, turning them thoroughly to coat them well. Add half the mushroom sauce, tossing it with the noodles. Add the ½ cup grated Parmesan, toss again, and turn off the heat. Pour the remainder of the mushroom sauce over the pasta and serve at once, with additional grated Parmesan on the side.
Red and Yellow Bell Pepper Sauce with Sausages
THERE WAS A RESTAURANT in Bologna, Al Cantunzein, that had a standing challenge for its patrons: It would continue to bring to the table different courses of homemade pasta until the customer called a stop. Its claim was that on any day it could serve between thirty and forty different pastas, but I don’t know of anyone who succeeded in making the restaurant prove it. Al Cantunzein thrived until the late 1970s, when it was destroyed by student violence. It was rebuilt, but it was never the same again. It survives through its creations, some of which are now part of the classic homemade pasta repertory, such as scrigno di venere—and this perfect summer sauce for pappardelle.
For 6 to 8 servings
3 meaty bell peppers, 1 red, 2 yellow
4 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons chopped onion
4 sweet sausages without fennel seeds, chili pepper, or other strong seasonings, cut into ½-inch pieces, about 1½ cups
Salt
Black pepper, ground fresh from the mill
1 cup canned imported Italian plum tomatoes, drained and cut up
The fresh pappardelle suggested below OR 1½ pounds boxed dry pasta
FOR TOSSING THE PASTA
1 tablespoon butter
⅔ cup freshly grated parmigiano-reggiano cheese, plus additional cheese at the table
Recommended pasta Yellow and green broad egg noodles, pappardelle, is what this sauce was created for and no other pasta combination seems quite so perfect. Make pappardelle, using a dough made from 2 large eggs and approximately 1 cup flour for the yellow noodles, and for the green noodles, 1 large egg, ¾ to 1 cup flour, and a tiny fistful of cooked spinach. (See the instructions for pasta dough.) Cook the yellow and green pasta separately.
Although it may not be quite so sublime a match, boxed, dry, factory pasta would be delicious with this sauce. Try such shapes as rigatoni, or ruote di carro, cartwheels.
1. Split the peppers into 4 sections, discard the seeds and cores, and peel them, using a swiveling-blade peeler. Cut them into more or less square 1-inch pieces.
2. Put the olive oil and the chopped onion in a sauté pan, and turn on the heat to medium high. Cook and stir the onion until it becomes colored a pale gold. Put in the sausages, cook them for about 2 minutes, then add the peppers, and cook them for 7 or 8 minutes, turning them occasionally. Add salt and pepper, and stir well.
3. Add the tomatoes to the pan and cook them at a lively simmer for about 15 or 20 minutes, until the oil floats free of the tomatoes.
4. Empty the entire contents of the pan over cooked drained pasta and toss thoroughly. Add the butter and grated Parmesan, toss one more time, and serve at once, with additional grated cheese on the side.
Ahead-of-time note The sauce may be prepared up to this point a few hours before serving. Do not refrigerate it. Reheat gently just before tossing with pasta.
Embogoné—Cranberry Beans, Sage, and Rosemary Sauce
IN THE ANCIENT stonecutters’ town of San Giorgio, high in the hills of Valpolicella, north of Verona, the cooking skills of the Dalla Rosa family have been celebrated by townspeople and visitors for at least four generations. One of the dishes for which people now trek to their trattoria is pasta sauced with one of the fundamental elements of cooking in the Veneto, cranberry beans. Cranberry beans are essential to pasta e fagioli but no one, before