Pizzoccheri
This beautiful pasta is made with buckwheat flour and it originates in Valtellina, Northern Italy. It’s possibly one of the easiest ones to make by hand. The dough is silky smooth and all you need is a rolling pin and a knife!
The traditional recipe is made with savoy cabbage, potatoes, garlic, melted cheese and brown butter. In my opinion it’s one of the best winter dishes ever created. It’s warm, comforting and delicious.
Buckwheat has been cultivated in Valtellina since 1600 and it’s quite common in that specific Alpine area. Nowadays there is only a small local production of buckwheat left in the area. This depends mainly on the fact the the sides of the mountains are not an easy terrain to work with.
The harvest takes place in October and it’s a very long and difficult procedure that requires a lot of manual labour. The stems are cut with a sickle and gathered together in groups that are then left to dry upside down in the field. Once they have dried they are beaten with special sticks called fièl. Buckwheat was seen in the past as a very poor crop but, it has now obtained a new status and well deserved respect thanks to it’s intense nutty flavour.
Ingredients
for the pizzoccheri
400g buckwheat flour
100g 00 flour
280g water
to complete the dish
130g butter (to obtain roughly 80g or brown butter)
1 small savoy cabbage
2 potatoes
180g Casera Cheese (if you can’t find it use a semi hard cow milk cheese)
2 cloves of garlic
1 handful of parmesan
Salt
Step by step
In a bowl mix the 00 flour and buckwheat flour and add the water. Mix the ingredients well until combined
Knead the dough until it’s soft and elastic
With a rolling pin roll out the dough until it’s roughly 3mm thick
With a knife cut out little strips of roughly 8x2cm. The pizzoccheri should look like little short tagliatelle (see image below)
Set them aside on a surface sprinkled with buckwheat flour so they don’t stick
Wash you savoy cabbage and cut it in thin strips
Cut you potatoes in small cubes
Cut the cheese into small cubes and set aside
Place the butter in a deep pan with the garlic and turn the heat up to medium high. Stir the butter while it melts
Keep stirring even when it starts foaming. After a bit you’ll see the colour changing as well as the smell. It will smell nutty and delicious
Use a metallic sieve to get rid of the little dark sediments and set aside
Bring a big pot with salty water to boil. Add a bit more salt than you normally would for pasta
Add the potatoes in the boiling water and boil them for a couple of minutes
Add the savoy cabbage in the boiling water with the potatoes and boil for another couple of minutes
Now it’s time to add the Pizzoccheri in the boiling water with the cabbage and potatoes. Cook them for roughly 4mins
Strain the Pizzoccheri, Potatoes and cabbage
Put them back in the pan and add in the brown butter, parmesan and cubed cheese
Mix well and serve
Enjoy!
Tips & cheats
This recipe will work also with regular melted butter.
When you brown butter always start with a larger quantity than required by the recipe. This is because water will evaporate in the process and you’ll find yourself with less brown butter than initially weighed.
If you want some extra crispiness, once you’ve mixed all the ingredients finish the pizzoccheri in the oven for 5 at 200C
Enjoy!
