Ricotta Cavatelli

I’m becoming quite addicted to the Google Keep App, it’s a large tile of post-it like notes or lists that you can access via a web page or phone/tablet app. I find it handy for jotting down ingredients or ideas, partial and full, and the obvious shopping lists and being able to tick off as you go. This started out as one of those little post-its, “artichokes, pine-nuts and sultanas”, I had that down and wanted to do something with it. I happened to have a tub of Zany Zeus ricotta in the fridge and a desire to revisit cavatelli, so again much consternation about finding some consistency across recipes for ricotta cavatelli I ended up forming what I thought would be a good ratio and set to work.

I did happen to mention the cavatelli accompaniments to my other half, and much like any savoury with a fruit addition her nose screwed up and indignantly told me in no uncertain words that she would not be having that for dinner, so she got a garlic-bacon-tomato sauce that was whipped up.


Ricotta Cavatelli
200g Flour
200g Ricotta
1 egg
5g salt

• Mix the flour and salt together and form a well.
• Add the ricotta and egg.
• Use the back of a fork to mash the egg and ricotta together, slowly working into the flour.
• Use your hands and form into a ball.
• Knead for about 5 minutes, until nice and smooth.
• Wrap in cling-film and refrigerate for half an hour.
• Roll out the dough on a well floured bench and cut into strips ready for the cavatelli machine.
• I floured the machine, and on top of the roller so a bit of flour gets sprinkled over the dough with each turn.
• Pinch the dough and run through the machine.
• Toss in flour to keep the cavatelli separated until you’re ready to cook.
• Shake off any excess flour and cook in well salted boiling water for 3–5 minutes.

For the pictured dish:

• Soak sultanas in a hot liquid
• Toast pine-nuts
• Quarter cooked artichoke hearts
• Pick some pea-shoots
• Zest and juice lemon
• Finely chop some parsley, dill would be nice too
• Sauté the artichokes in a little olive oil and butter until they begin to caramelize.
• Toss in the lemon zest, sultanas and pine-nuts.
• Stir in some butter and toss through.
• Taste and season with lemon juice and salt (I’m totally obsessed with smoked salt at the moment).
• Add the parsley and cooked cavatelli, toss together.
• Dish up and garnish with the pea-sprouts.

Bacon-tomato sauce
2 rashers of bacon
1 can of good tomatoes
1 onion
3 big garlic cloves
cider vinegar
salt
chilli flakes

In a pot over a medium heat, sauté the chopped onion and whole garlic cloves, when soft add the chopped bacon, cook until the bacon has rendered most of the fat but not coloured too much, add a splash of cider vinegar, add the tomatoes and a pinch of chilli, cover and turn the heat down, cook for about 20 minutes. The onions and garlic should be very soft, purée the sauce with a stick blender, taste and season with salt and adjust the acidity with vinegar. Simmer until the desired consistency is reached. Toss cooked cavatelli through the sauce.

Artichokes

Before I cooked my first artichoke, they fell in to the hard much easier to avoid category. But nothing could be further from the truth, they are easy to prep and just as simple to cook.

To prep the artichoke make sure you have a lemon half handy and a bowl of cold water with lemon juice in it (this stops it oxidizing and turning brown). Trim the tough outer leaves off near the stem, wiping the cut surfaces with the lemon half, then trim the stem down so it's about 2cm long (or all the way off if it's particularly thin), wipe all cuts with the lemon. Place the artichoke in the bowl of water until ready to cook.

Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a simmer (with a squeeze of lemon). Place the artichokes in the pot and cook for 15-30 minutes. When they're done an outer leaf should pull easily away from the base.

Now the fun part, eating! First melt some butter (seasoned with whatever you like. Garlic, anchovy, lemon etc). Then pull off a leaf and dip it in the butter and scrape the flesh off the inside of the leaf. Once you've worked your way through all of the leaves, you'll get down to the choke (soft fuzzy center of the flower) scrape it out with a spoon and discard. Then you'll be left with the soft tasty heart.