RECIPE

RECIPE

Chitarra with roasted garlic sauce

By Mateo Zielonka

Ingredients

  • For the egg dough:

    - 260g Italian flour, plus more for dusting

    - 2 whole eggs + 3 egg yolks

  • For the sauce:

    - 3 whole garlic bulbs

    - 3 tbsp olive oil

    - 80g grated Parmesan, plus more to serve

    - 1 bunch parsley, finely chopped

    - Juice of half a lemon

Method

1. Pre-heat the oven to 190°C true-fan. Slice the top off each garlic bulb and place on a baking tray lined with aluminium foil. Drizzle a spoonful of olive oil over each garlic head, sprinkle with sea salt and then wrap them all together in the foil to create a loose parcel. Place the tray into the oven and bake for 35-40 minutes until golden and soft. Take from the oven and allow to cool.

2. Next make the pasta dough. Tip the flour onto a clean worktop or board, make a well in the centre and crack the eggs into the middle of it. Break the egg yolks and start to whisk them, slowly incorporating the flour as you go. When everything starts to come together, use your hands to knead the dough and continue to work it for around 10 minutes.

3. If your dough is too moist, dust it with some extra 00 flour. If it feels too dry and crumbly, wet your hands under the kitchen tap and continue to knead. After 10 minutes your dough should be smooth and pliable. Cover the dough with an upturned bowl and leave it to rest for at least 30 minutes.

4. When the garlic is cool enough to handle, squeeze the cloves into a clean bowl, add the Parmesan and combine everything together with a spatula or large spoon. Season to taste.

5. Now roll the pasta. Take a quarter piece of your pasta dough (leave the rest covered until you’re ready to use it) and start rolling the dough with a rolling pin, until you reach the thickness of one-penny coin. Cut the sheet into rectangles that roughly match the size of your chitarra. (If you don’t have a chitarra board, then just make linguine or tagliatelle using your pasta machine cutter).

6. Place the sheet of pasta on top of the chitarra strings, dust generously with coarse semolina, then, using a rolling pin, roll back and forth across the strings so that the dough falls through them into the box below. Lift out the pasta strands, place them on a tray, and dust with more semolina. Continue to roll the rest of the pasta, using a quarter at a time.

7. Set a large pot filled with water on the hob and when the water is boiling season it generously with table salt. Add a ladle of the boiling water to the garlic and Parmesan paste and whisk it together – you are looking for the consistency of double cream. Carefully drop the pasta into the water and cook for 2 minutes.

8. Now pour half a ladleful of the pasta cooking water into a large saucepan and set it on a low heat (setting 3). Lift the cooked pasta into the pan, add the roasted garlic paste and combine everything together by tossing or mixing it with a spoon, making sure the pasta is well coated and glistening with sauce. Add the chopped parsley, lemon juice and season to taste with freshly ground black pepper and sea salt.

9. Serve straightaway on four warmed plates, with more grated Parmesan on top.