Literally all I made today in the kitchen was a single pasta dish. It's amazing how much prep can go into making pasta. The dish I had to make was cappelletti (similar to tortellini) with a meat and ricotta stuffing tossed in a tomato cream sauce. Here's what this seemingly innocent-sounding pasta entailed...
- Make a pasta dough: this requires 10 minutes or so of kneading/mixing a very tough dough, then it took me 45 or so minutes just to roll it through a pasta roller.
- Make a filling: I had to dice pork and chicken fillets, then cook them in a frying pan and cool before essentially mincing them with my knife to minuscule crumbs.
- Fill and shape the pasta: this is what took the longest. As you can see in the first picture, I made quite a lot of the cappelletti, or "little hats." I really enjoyed forming them though once I became focused and got in the zone!
- Make a tomato sauce: I almost completely forgot to make this! Luckily I remembered with enough time for it to cook before I served my pasta. It's really simple: cook down tinned tomatoes with carrot, onion, celery, and BUTTER. SO MUCH BUTTER. What's not to like? Then I pressed it through a mouli-legume, which is similar to a sieve, and mixed in heavy cream.
- Bring it all together! By this point, I was running so far behind. Lunch was already being served by the time I was putting my cappelletti in to cook. The kitchen was such a mess too because everyone else was running behind. The third picture I took is an action shot of the final stages by the way!
- The last picture is my final product: cappelletti lightly tossed in tomato cream sauce dusted with airy parmesan. :) I thought it tasted amazing!!
So yep- today was a test of patience. Perhaps I'm too patient because I didn't get fed up with any task and did things maybe a bit too tediously, which landed me an hour later than when I should have finished up. I had to make a lot of fine dices today with all of the cooked meat and salami filling, as well as the onion, carrot, and celery for the tomato sauce! It was great practice! I wish my arm would move faster - the maximum speed I can hit seems to tire my arm out so much! I guess quick chopping skills just come with practice.
When I was able to leave the kitchen, I tasted all of the pastas and plenty of tiramisù without a hint of shame ^_^. SO GOOD. Today has brought back so many great memories - watching my mom make ravioli when I was younger (and snagging the filling when she wasn't looking :D), making tedious orecchiette ("little ears") with my sister and my boyfriend Matthew, pigging out on tiramisù with my friend Danielle multiple times at my house, at school, and in Italy, and being surprised with tiramisù that Matthew made for me on my birthday. And that's just a start. I love tiramisù! Goodness, today has been great! It sure makes me miss home.
Demo was great today! I decided not to try anything because I wanted to get my sourdough going and run as well. We learned how to make several curry dishes, which should be tasty! Rachel also demonstrated a particularly scrumptious-looking (and -tasting I'm sure!) chocolate tart. I loved the presentation of that! Someone had dusted cocoa on the plate with a spoon and fork silhouette. Another interesting dessert she made was a jelly (or jello, as I'd call it in the states). Apparently you can make just about anything into jelly as long as you have gelatin! Imagine the possibilities! You could really just turn any form of drink into a jelly! They put whole raspberries into this one, with some raspberry liqueur too.
When I was able to leave the kitchen, I tasted all of the pastas and plenty of tiramisù without a hint of shame ^_^. SO GOOD. Today has brought back so many great memories - watching my mom make ravioli when I was younger (and snagging the filling when she wasn't looking :D), making tedious orecchiette ("little ears") with my sister and my boyfriend Matthew, pigging out on tiramisù with my friend Danielle multiple times at my house, at school, and in Italy, and being surprised with tiramisù that Matthew made for me on my birthday. And that's just a start. I love tiramisù! Goodness, today has been great! It sure makes me miss home.
Demo was great today! I decided not to try anything because I wanted to get my sourdough going and run as well. We learned how to make several curry dishes, which should be tasty! Rachel also demonstrated a particularly scrumptious-looking (and -tasting I'm sure!) chocolate tart. I loved the presentation of that! Someone had dusted cocoa on the plate with a spoon and fork silhouette. Another interesting dessert she made was a jelly (or jello, as I'd call it in the states). Apparently you can make just about anything into jelly as long as you have gelatin! Imagine the possibilities! You could really just turn any form of drink into a jelly! They put whole raspberries into this one, with some raspberry liqueur too.
I'm still in the process of my next batch of sourdough. All I want to do is experiment! :D It's so much fun!!! I decided to form my dough into little rolls, so hopefully those will turn out well! :D
The rest of the evening, I've been trying to figure out classes for next semester. Ack! I have to schedule my classes on Saturday! It'll work out though, one way or another. I'm trying not to get too stressed about it.
At last, it's bed time. Man. Time is flying. It felt like I was just waking up to start the day!
I hope everyone has had a terrific Tuesday!
Love,
Livvy
The rest of the evening, I've been trying to figure out classes for next semester. Ack! I have to schedule my classes on Saturday! It'll work out though, one way or another. I'm trying not to get too stressed about it.
At last, it's bed time. Man. Time is flying. It felt like I was just waking up to start the day!
I hope everyone has had a terrific Tuesday!
Love,
Livvy