Tagliatella Fatta a Mano Al “ragù Di Carne”

DIRECTIONS

• Tagliatelle.
• The process of making fresh tagliatella is simple but at the same time it needs attention and much love. Put 200g of “00” flour on a wooden board, make a hole in the centre and break the eggs in, add a drop of olive oil and a pinch of salt and with a fork then break up the eggs slowly pulling down the flour a bit at a time. Once this step is complete we move on to the “massage” phase. Knead the dough with your hands until it becomes soft and compact and stretches when pulled, once it reaches the right consistency leave it to rest for around 30 min in a cool place.
• Now comes the most delicate phase of the making of the pasta (in the local “Cossignanese” dialect this is called the “pannella”) it is made by rolling using a long wooden pasta rolling-pin to stretch out the dough until it becomes 2mm thin. Use a little four to prevent the dough sticking to the board or rolling pin. It is important to keep all parts of the dough at a similar thickness as it thins out. Start with your hands near the centre of the rolling pin and move them to the ends of the pin as you roll so as to keep an even pressure over the whole area of the dough. Occasionally lift the dough and dust with flour underneath to ensure it does not stick. A special long thin rolling-pin is required to avoid creating flat spots on the pasta as the area of the dough increases.
• At this point the dough can lightly rolled up and cut with a knife to create thin strips 3/4m for “maccheroncino” and 7/8mm for “tagliatella” strips. The pasta is ready to use and since it is fresh it takes only a couple of minutes in boiling water to reach the “al dente” (to the tooth) stage. It can be topped with any suitable sauce: perfect is a “ragu” meat sauce but equally good is a mushroom or fish sauce.
• Ragu.
• In Cossignano the ragu is made with ground beef and pork. This is not “mince” that you might buy in a supermarket. In Italy we buy a piece of meat and ask the butcher to grind it for us so we know exactly what we are eating. Fry a finely chopped onion in a little olive oil, when it becomes soft and translucent add a diced carrot and a chopped stick of celery and cook together for a few minutes. Add 200 grams ground beef and 100 grams of minced pork, brown it with the addition of a glass of red wine. As soon as the meat is browned add salt and pepper to taste pop in a parmesan rind and pour about a quart of passata di pomodoro – pureed tomatoes. Cook for about two hours covered over low heat, stirring occasionally to prevent the sauce from sticking to the bottom.