Little Straw Hats

Cappellacci di Zucca

It's Italy.  It is amazing that I have written 42 blog posts and not done one about pasta.  Let's remedy that right now!  Northern Italy loves to stuff pasta.  I was first exposed to the beauty of stuffed pasta many years ago by one of America's most famous Italian chefs, Chef Boyardee.  My, his ravioli were such a culinary complexity following spagetti-os. Who knew it could get even better?

There are loads of stuffed pastas in this region.  Some of the more readily found contain spinach and ricotto, prosciutto (parma ham) and cheese, but by far the most popular here in Ferrara is the Cappellacci di Zucca.  Cappellacci refers to the shape of the pasta.  It means "little hats".  Di Zucca refers to the filling "of pumpkin".  I know I have only written one other food blog and it was also about pumpkin...I am loyal if not terribly diverse. 

This pasta is part of the ancient and popular culinary tradition of our town of Ferrara.  Amazingly, there is record of this recipe dating back to 1584!  It didn't have the clever "hat" name back then (that took a couple extra centuries). 

If you are going to stuff pasta, you need some pasta to stuff.  So, let's get on it!

The recipe is not terribly complex.

One egg for every 100 grams of flour.  That's it!

For this demonstration, we used 400g of flour and 4 eggs.

On a solid surface, make a bowl with your flour and crack in your eggs.

Start working the eggs into the flour

until you are able to knead it.  If it is too sticky, you can add a bit more flour.

After your dough has been kneaded into a fabulous ball, cover it with a tea towel and let it rest for a while.  For reference, this is a lunch or salad sized plate, not a dinner dish.

While the pasta is resting, let's work on the filling!  The base is pumpkin.  Maestra's Mom cooked this pumpkin down for us.  She split the pumpkin and baked it in the oven.  To get the pumpkin to this point, you can also peel and dice the pumpkin and cook it over a low flame on the stove top.

Here's where the special happens:

Add three-ish teaspoons of sugar, one teaspoon of salt, and one grated nutmeg nut

Grate and add 300 grams of parmasean...or more

There seems to be some heated culinary debate over the addition of amaretto cookies.  It seems that one is either way for them or way against.  Maestra is a fan, but her sister who stopped by, is not.  We ended up adding three of these quarter sized cookies crushed to powder. 

 

The completed filling.

So the pasta has had a chance to rest and is ready to be rolled

Divide the pasta into workable sized sections.

We made a 4 egg batch and Maestra has chosen to divide the dough into four sections.

The pasta is getting worked!  Start with the setting rather thick and run the dough through several times.  If it is sticky, dust it with a bit more flour.  It will get worked in with the passes through the pasta roller.  Reduce the setting on the roller until your pasta is thin enough for cappellacci.

It is now past 11.  It's PROSECCO TIME!

 

Prosecco, there's happy in every bottle!

So how do you know when your pasta is thin enough?

The pasta on the left is still a bit thick.  The strip on the right is ready and has had the rough edges trimmed.

The rolled pasta needs to be cut into roughly two inch squares

Here is the life-cycle of rolling a cappalaci.

Put a slight teaspoon of filling in the center

Fold, then seal the pasta around the outside edges by pressing firmly with your fingertips

Pinch the ends

like so

Twist and pinch!

Voila!

Lather, rinse, repeat a few gagillion more times...

These have been placed on a screened board to dry a bit before cooking

To cook:

Bring a big old pot of water to a boil.

Toss in a reasonable amount of pasta (don't want to totally cowd those hats)

And a handful of sale grosso (big salt)

Return to a boil for at least three minutes

What sort of sauce you serve your cappellacci di zucca in is totally up to your taste.  Traditionally, they are served with butter and fresh sage.  They are also very often served with ragu.  One of my favorite restuarants serves them with a butter and orange sauce.  Another family favorite restuarant serves them in a brandy cream sauce with walnuts.  Each one, amazingly, is delish!

The butter and sage

Straight from the pot into the sauce

And onto the plate

Top with a bit more grated parmasean...

Ivy is having hers with ragu while Girl Crush remarked these are the best cappellacci she had ever tasted.

Maestra enjoys the fruits of her labor while I polish off the prosecco!

Delizioso!

Special great big thanks to Maestra for the fantastic cooking lesson as well as her Mum and Sister for helping us along.  And of course, to amazing friends that make everything a joy.