Steph from Stephfood was our Daring Cooks‘ July hostess. Steph challenged us to make homemade noodles without the help of a motorized pasta machine. She provided us with recipes for Spätzle and Fresh Egg Pasta as well as a few delicious sauces to pair our noodles with! Needless to say I couldn’t have been more excited when I read about this month’s challenge! I love to make pasta from scratch!!! I make all sorts of pasta, from egg pasta to “normal” pasta to pizzoccheri to stuffed pasta… you name it, I’ve made it. And how could it be otherwise? I am Italian after all! Even if nowadays Italians usually buy ready made pasta from the supermarket, we still know our way around dough and rolling and shaping all sorts of pasta. I have a motorized pasta machine, but I never use it… I find that it takes more time to assemble and clean it than to just make the full thing by hand. Also, you cannot make certain shapes with a machine… I prefer to use a manual machine to roll sheets of dough, but I decided not to use that either… otherwise, what challenge would it be?? All you need to make this pasta is a rounded knife, a wooden board and your hands. This pasta is also healthy and so much fun to make… The pasta is called orecchiette and is typical of the southern regions of Italy, above all Puglia and Basilicata. Their name means “little ears” as they look like little ears in shape. I am posting the tutorial on “How to make orecchiette” in the Techniques page of this site, as I always do with dishes like this. As for the sauce, I decided to make a traditional vegetarian sauce that is typically eaten with this pasta. The original recipe calls for rabe, but I could not find any in the local supermarket, so I settled for bok choy and I can tell you that I was more than satisfied with the result. It is less bitter than the original sauce with a hint of “lemon” which goes great with the spiciness of the sauce and the saltiness of Pecorino. Try it and you will be hooked, just like my family and I!
Ingredients (for 4 persons):
1 kg bok choy (or rabe), wilted and cut in 2.5 cm (1 inch) pieces
2 cloves garlic, halved
4 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
¼ to ½ tsp chilli flakes
2 tbsp diced tomatoes
Salt
Pecorino Romano to serve
400 gms orecchiette
Start by cleaning and wilting the vegetables in hot salty water. They have to become soft and must cook through.
When ready, drain them but PRESERVE the cooking liquid as you can use it to cook your pasta. In this way the pasta will have much more flavour. Let them cool down and then cut them into 2.5cm pieces.
Put the halved garlic cloves in a frying pan with 2 tbsp of extra virgin olive oil and chilli flakes and let them fry on a low fire for a minute or two.
Make sure not to brown the garlic or it will taste bitter. Now add the tomatoes and let it cook for 3 to 5 minutes.
Add the cut vegetables and salt and mix well. Cook for 5 minutes, and then turn the fire off.
In the meantime, cook the orecchiette following the steps on “How to cook pasta al dente”. Only in this case you should use the water in which you cooked your vegetables and you will not have a pre set cooking time. This will vary on the thickness of your orecchiette (it should take approximately a couple of minutes). So, the best solution is to taste it! Remember, it does have to remain firm.
When the pasta is cooked, drain it, put it in the frying pan with the vegetable sauce and put the fire on a medium flame.
Add 2 tbsp of extra virgin olive oil and stir well making sure the pasta is well coated and mixed in the sauce.
Serve it hot with a generous amount of finely grated Pecorino Romano on the top and enjoy it.
On a completely different note, I have submitted the Moussaka recipe for this month’s challenge over at FoodFrenzy. This month’s ingredient is cinnamon… and mine is the only savoury dish in the contest! If you liked the recipe, please take a minute and vote for it here. The voting is on between July 15th and 24th. Thank you very much! <3
Oh, I wouldn’t have that much patience to make everything myself. I can only admire you 🙂
Another fabulous recipe from the Queen of Pasta. This looks fantastic, Manu! Love the fire in there, too.
That looks delicious! I culd lick a screen! Have to try those little ears 🙂 look lovely!
Pozdrowienia. Anula.
Making pasta from scratch is one thing I haven’t tried or would dare to try. Thumbs up to you, Manu!!! I love the recipe too…I love bok choi but I never had pasta with it!
You just never ever cease to amaze me. Now it is homemade orecchiette! You are impressive. Yes, you may be Italian but none of my friends (and I live in Italy) my age knows how to make handmade pasta, even with the help of a machine. And you make pizzoccheri too???
Manu! Your orecchiere are wonderful!! I never made them (although I have some Apulian origins)… I think it’s time! 🙂
Your photos are AMAZING!!! thanks for sharing.
Hi Manu! I’ve never know the orecchiette before but it’s quite similar to one of the popular noodle dish in SG, the hand-made noodles ‘Mee Hoon Kueh’ (pronounce in Hokkien dialect), either soupy or dry with sauce. You can find some pics of it in my post here : http://lyntrinix.blogspot.com/2011/03/my-previous-bentos.html
I’m sure I’ll like this orecchiette! 😀
I’ve voted for your Moussaka! Good luck and wish you all the best Manu! ^.^
All along I thot making pastas from scratch seems so difficult but after reading this post, it’s not really that difficult at all! Patience is what you need for that. 😀
Tks so much for sharing this! ♥♥♥
Ohh that’s amazing Lyn! 🙂 And thank you soooo much for voting for my moussaka!!!
You’re always welcome Manu! 😀
Have a wonderful weekend! 🙂
Nice tutorial loved your pastas…hopefully I will make pasta dough home one day
Looks great…very simple! I never thought of adding Bok Choy to pasta. Great idea!
Wow fantastic job on the orecchiette! This looks fantastic!! 🙂
Love the orecchiette! I am going to have to follow your tutorial and try making my own soon.
What stunning pictures – it sounds delicious! And a fantastic tutorial means I can give orchiette a go in the future – thank you for sharing.
Hi, I’m new to your blog and I would like to say how good the photo’s are. I have made orecchietti before but I didn’t have the correct flour and I think that makes a difference, so I wasn’t particularly impressed. I will try and sourse some and follow your instructions. Thanks for info.
Hi Caroline! Welcome to my blog! 🙂 Yes… when you make pasta you need to get the right flour. We usually make egg pasta with 00 flour (all purpose flour works well too) and non egg pasta with durum wheat flour… if you make non egg pasta with weaker flour, it will not cook well… it will almost melt in boiling water. 😉
I am so impressed by your orecchiette! They look so perfectly shaped – and the sauce looks and sounds so fresh and delicious. Wonderful job!
I love the orecchietti – thank you for the detailed instructions, that is page is going on my book mark list! Your vegetable sauce looks great – so simple yet so delicious.
This pasta looks so good, the spicy vegetables must be so flavoursome with your sauce. The grated pecorino romano really tops it off!
You are my pasta hero. These little ears look fantastic!! I don’t know as I’d dare try these. 🙂
You and your pasta looks perfect every time!!!!! I love orecchiette. I only just recently started messing around with this pasta couple of years ago.
SO cool that you paired bok choy with the orecchiette! I love light pasta dishes like this!
Great sauce! Sounds like a wonderful pasta dish!
I am so glad that you shared with us how to make orechiette! I always wanted to make them at home. Since you are an Italian, you must have mastered all those authentic Italian dishes! This pasta dish is just awesome. Love coming back here again and again, Manu. And yes, I voted for your Food Frenzy recipe challenge entry!
wow great pictures and great food thanks for sharing!
Wow! I would love to make my own pasta. I love this recipe and thanks for the tutorial 🙂
Great looking dish, very tasty..and you did homemade, just wonderful Manuela.. nicely done!!!
This looks fantastic, Manu! and you did homemade, nicely done!!!
This looks like a meal I can whip up happily. You know I love pasta so very much and you always share such different kind of pasta recipe.. love it!
How cool! You used Chinese veggie bok choy for the Italian pasta! I love it! Looks very delicious!