ITALIAN Shit I've Cooked Lately

[Landomatic 3813]

We have stand-alone threads for far less important food categories.  It's time this has its own.

[Landomatic 3813]

Carbonara - Used real parmigiano reggiano and probably got a little heavy-handed with it.  Still great, but a little too rich.

Red Sauce - Used italian sausage for protien.  Turned out perfect.

[Landomatic 3813]

Carbonara

Started with some fresh pancetta which ended up being really rich.  I think the stuff I bought was pretty stout and I probably used a little too much.  Might try it with guanciale next time.

Cubed that up using about half of what's pictured above.  Probably could have gone with about 1/4 or 1/3 and the cubes could have been a little smaller.  Ratios in the end were definitely a little off.  Little too heavy on the meat regardless of what kind.

Only other ingredients are EVOO, eggs, pepper, pasta and parmigiano reggiano.  Went with 2 eggs and one egg yolk.  Again, that ratio didn't end up perfect, was a little too eggy for my liking.  Whisked them together with some parmigiano reggiano and pepper to create the sauce.

Get the pancetta browning in a few tablespoons of EVOO while the pasta cooks.

Good and browned up and heat reduced.

Add pasta and toss together with the pancetta.  I used bucatini because I like it, but any long skinny noodle will do.  Again, for ratio purposes, I think this needed about double the noodles.  I used a half a package and I think it needed the whole box with the amount of egg and pancetta I had.

Turn the heat off (this is probably the most important thing I've learned so far) and add a scoop of pasta water and the egg mixture.  In the past, I've kept the heat up and ended up with somewhat of a scrambled egg mixture.  Reducing the heat makes it melt together much better for the creamy substance you're looking for.

Finished with a little more freshly grated parmigiano reggiano and pepper (more pepper wasn't necessary).

To summarize (and for my future reference), this served 2 people and should probably have served about 4.  Needed double the noodles to serve 4 or half the meat and sauce to serve 2.  End result was really rich and cutting down eggs and pancetta or increasing bucatini should have taken care of this.

[Landomatic 3813]

Pork Bolognese

Basic ingredients - 2 carrots, 2 stalks celery, half an onion, few cloves garlic...

Not pictured - olive oil, butter, ground meat (you can use anything), tomato paste, milk, white wine, pasta, parmigiano reggiano.

Get a few tablespoons EVOO and about a half a stick of butter good and hot...

Add chopped onion, celery and grated carrots and sweat that down on medium heat for 10 minutes or so or until they all start getting kind of translucent...

Brown some ground meat (I used pork) then mix in chopped garlic, couple tablespoons of tomato paste, about a cup of while milk and about a cup of white wine...

Reduce that down for about 20-30 minutes or until it's closer to a paste and less of a soup...

Add pasta - I used tagliatelle but you can really go with just about anything here...

Mix it all together to finish the pasta in the sauce with copious amounts of fresh grated parmigiano reggiano...

Serve with a little chopped fresh basil and more parmigiano reggiano because you can never have too much of that...

[Landomatic 3813]

Orecchiette with Pork Sausage and Broccoli

This one is just so damn easy and really really good...and I don't even like broccoli.  It's just one of those magical combinations of flavors that all come together perfectly for whatever reason.  Probably science or some shit?

Found some fresh orecchiette so I used that this time, but oddly, I found out I actually prefer the dry (boxed) orecchiette over the fresh which I wouldn't normally say.  Still damn good though.

Lots of variations to this, but here's what I do and it gets rave reviews every damn time.

Basic ingredients:  Orecchiette Pasta (one package), Italian Sausage (one pound), Broccoli (2 heads), Garlic (a few cloves), EVOO, Salt, Red Pepper Flakes, Parmigiano Reggiano

A few tablespoons of EVOO and start cooking that broccoli down until it starts to get a little wilty but keeps that bright green color.  I add a little salt here too.  Remember to turn your hood fan on because cooked broccoli fucking stinks.

Remove the broccoli and set it aside.  In the same pan, brown up some Italian sausage.  You can use just about anything here.  My local Italian market has ground hot or mild (I went with mild because my kid is a wimp when it comes to spicy).  You can also just remove the casing from some links and go that route.

Once that's good and brown, add back in the broccoli, a few cloves of thinly sliced (or minced) garlic and start mixing it up.  I would normally also add red pepper flakes at this point, but again, the kid.

Add cooked pasta.

Mix it all together with a scoop of the pasta water and a few tablespoons (half a cup or so) of parmigiano reggiano.

Serve and finish with a little more parmigiano reggiano (and I did the red pepper flakes at this point but it should have been in earlier).

[Landomatic 3813]

Spaghetti with Meat Sauce

According to my biggest critics, and by that I mean family, this is one of the best things I've ever made.

Ingredients: 1-2 carrots, 2-3 cloves garlic, a few sprigs thyme, a few sprigs basil, half an onion, 1 pound can of peeled tomatoes, EVOO, salt, one whole package of spaghetti pasta, and about half a package of whatever kind of ground meat you want - I went with turkey because it's really mild and I was going for a more light, fresh taste.

Little bit of prep work - grated carrots, chopped onion, thyme removed from stems (what a fucking beating - there has to be a better way than what I did), chopped basil and thinly sliced garlic (or minced - whatever you prefer).

Not pictured are the tomatoes after getting them all squished up with my hands.  I saw someone do it that way once rather than a food processor or mixer as it keeps the tomatoes a little more rustic feeling and allows you to control how big of chunks you want.

Start sweating the onions and carrots down in a few table spoons of EVOO.

Once it's looking pretty wilted, add ground meat.

Once your ground meat is about half way brown, add thyme, basil and garlic.

Get it all the way cooked to where it starts feeling like it's coming together as one cohesive concoction.

Add the canned tomatoes after squishing them up with your hands and a few tablespoons of salt and mix it all together.  It will be really saucy at this point.

Let it simmer for about 30 mins (good time to start your water boiling to cook your pasta).  It becomes much less saucy and the flavors really begin to build throughout this process.  This was almost like a paste once simmered down for 30 mins.

Add al dente pasta that you remove from salted water about a minute before the directions tell you to pull it.  Start mixing that together and if you need it a little more saucy, add a ladle or two of the pasta water.  It's magically just the right amount of starchy and salty.  I also add a few fresh leaves of basil and couple more splashes of raw EVOO to brighten it up a little at this point.

Find some big old Italian bowl that looks like it came from grandma (and that Surly is sure to bust your balls about) to serve it in.

Plate with some fresh grated parmigiano reggiano, which I now keep about a 1 pound block of on hand at all times because it takes just about everything to 11.  Enjoy.

 

[Landomatic 3813]

Shrimp Scampi

This one is so fast and easy, yet so so good.  Wife and kid rave every time.  I say this about a lot of pastas, but this one might truly have the highest ROI ratio from a skill/time needed (almost zero) to great end result standpoint.  This was made with some very run-of-the-mill ingredients from a generic local grocery store (small Tom Thumb).  Nothing fancy or super fresh and it still turned out amazing.

Start with about a pound of shrimp

Other ingredients: Minced garlic, chopped onion, chopped basil, lemon (and the zest of the lemon).  Not pictured, butter, olive oil, cheap white wine, salt, fresh pasta, red pepper flakes.

Sweat onion and garlic in some olive oil.

Add shrimp, basil and salt.

Deglaze with about a cup of cheap white wine.  Then whisk in a few pats of butter.

Once that cooks down a little and makes a nice consistent cream sauce (pictured below), squeeze a whole lemon in and add your fresh pasta.

Plate with a sprinkle of fresh basil, fresh lemon zest and red pepper flakes and a drizzle of EVOO to top it off.

Edited April 21, 2020 by Landomatic

[Landomatic 3813]

Chicken Parm - Side of Spaghetti with Red Sauce

Started with a little homemade red sauce.

Chicken came out perfect golden brown.  Tried a little different technique this time and I think I like it.  Marinated the chicken in the egg wash with some salt and pepper in the refrigerator for about 30 mins before starting.  Then dunk in flour, then back in egg, then bread crumb like normal.  I think the marinating helped everything stick a little better and ended up with a more consistent finished product.  Also seemed less messy.

Made too much sauce so my ratios were a little off.  It was one of those..."one can of tomatoes wasn't enough and two cans was too many" type situations.  Not a huge deal, though.  It's pretty easy to plate around that.

Got a little heavy handed with the cheese.  Again, just seemed like one slice wasn't enough but 2 was probably too many.  But, as Surly always says, is there really such thing as too much cheese?  Most of the excess just ran off the side anyway so no big deal.

Didn't want to waste all that runoff melted cheese so figured I might as well throw a dollop on top of the spaghetti as a topping.  And of course, in keeping with the "no such thing as too much cheese" theme, finished with some freshly grated parmigiano reggiano.  End result slammed and went and shit...

[Landomatic 3813]

Eggplant Parm

Sliced about an inch thick, brushed with olive oil both sides, sprinkle with salt.  Could have gone a little lighter on the oil.

Into the 450* oven for about 12 minutes.  Flip them over to reveal the nice caramel toasted side which should be the side that goes up when you serve.

Started a homemade red sauce reducing about an hour earlier.  Let it cook down until it gets to be a pasty consistency.

Start assembling by stacking...eggplant, tomato sauce, mozzarella slice, parmesan reggiano, repeat.  Would have also used some fresh basil here, but didn't have any and would have liked much better cheeses (delivery options were limited...coronavirus).  Into the 550* oven for about 18 minutes.

Wanted a side of spaghetti with red sauce.  Didn't have any spaghetti so went with bucatini which was way too heavy a noodle for this application, but whatever.

Said fuck it and went all in on the side of pasta.  Would normally like this to be a very light side of spaghetti with just red sauce.  But, I had some ground meat I needed to use or freeze, plus I knew there would be some leftovers and really didn't just want bucatini with red sauce, plus my kid didn't know whether she'd like the eggplant parm, so I wanted to be sure she had something with some protein in case all she ate was the pasta (she ended up eating more of the eggplant than the pasta).  Anyway, for all those reasons, went with a very heavy bucatini with meat sauce which turned out great, but it wound up being pretty much two whole meals in one.

Here are the finished eggplant parms fresh out of the oven...

Finished way too heavy side of pasta...

Here's the final product plated.  Better cheese and fresh basil would have taken it to 11, but it still slammed and went...eggplant is underrated.

I'm gonna be one fat fuck by the end of this coronavirus thing.

[Landomatic 3813]

Lasagna

Million different ways to make it...this was mine.  Made a mess of the kitchen but turned out great.

[VABuckeye 2472]

Yeah.  I'm all over this thread.  Nice dishes!!

[South Austin 52484]

Nice work, and kudos on the plating.

[Jack Straw 2954]

2 hours ago, Landomatic said:

Eggplant Parm

Here are the finished eggplant parms fresh out of the oven...

 

i would like to sex this up. 

i was thinking about it and, eggplant parmesan is a dish i really love,  and is only great maybe ~2 times out of 10 when i order it out, but have never tried at home.  not to say that the other 8/10 are bad, plenty of them are good, just not great.  i think the eggplant needs to be cooked just right (not overcooked at all) and it needs high quality ingredients esp. cheese as you mention.  and i guess when i am at a really good italian restaurant i tend to order things other than the old classics.  yours looks like it was a success, i think i need to put this on my cooking to do list.

[52-80 19151]

5 hours ago, Landomatic said:

Pork Bolognese

Add pasta - I used tagliatelle but you can really go with just about anything here...

...

 

No! Tagliatelle or pappardelle only!  We should have a pasta elitist thread (casarecce needs more love).  But anyway nice work!

[Gen. Applewhite 226]

Veal osso buco with orzo and sprouts:

[Underdog 28620]

Never had Bolognese before moving up to NY, favorite sauce now.  

[wild_turkey 3159]

Great thread topic and awesome submissions. Will be following this thread.

Sunday nights at our house are pasta night. That's not to say Monday through Saturday can't also have pasta, but Sunday is PASTA NIGHT which is a weekly ritual that includes but is not limited to: good wine, appetizers, homemade pasta, lingerie for the wife, and good TV or a movie. It's a nice way to prevent Sunday scaries and have a good stress free start to the week.

I'll submit homemade noodles, or as we like to call them, hot fresh nudes. The only ingredients are eggs and Tipo 00 flour. We learned this through a cooking class in Tuscany where the instructor was adamant that you measure out the flour based on weight and not volume. His ratio was 600 g of flour and 5 large eggs. That makes way too much pasta for 2 people and the ratio seems a little off using American eggs, so we've modified it to 300 g of flour and 3 eggs.

Combine the flour and eggs in a food processor and turn it on. You have to rock it back and forth to help mix everything for about 2-3 minutes.

The dough will then be coarse and lumpy. Make sure your counter top or working surface is clean and then dump the dough out.

Then use your hands to knead the dough into a ball. Cover it in shrink wrap and let it sit on the counter at room temperature for 1-2 hours.

From this point there are a lot of directions you can go depending on what kind of nudes you want. Our personal favorite is a type of thick spaghetti made with a combination of a KitchenAid pasta roller and a guitar string pasta cutter.

First you use a roller to flatten the ball of dough into a thick wedge that can be put through the roller. Then you sprinkle some 00 flour on the dough and on your working surface to prevent it from sticking to itself as you are rolling it out.

Then you put the thin end of the dough wedge into the KitchenAid pasta roller attachment. The mixer should be on low speed and the thickness should be set to 1 which is the widest setting.

After making the initial pass through the roller you will have a thick sheet of dough. You can then increase the number on the roller (decrease the thickness) until you get it to your desired endpoint. We usually stop around 5-6. 

This will result in a long sheet of dough that you can make into whatever noodles you prefer. As I said before, we like to do the guitar string cutter. To do this, you cut the sheet into rectangular sections that are about 8" long by 6" wide. You then lay a rectangle of dough on the guitar string cutter and start rolling it from the middle to flatten it out and push it through the strings. It helps to add more 00 or Semolina flour during this step to help prevent sticking.

I unfortunately don't have noody pictures beyond this, but the noodles are dumped out the side and then you gently jiggle them around in your hand to separate them. You then boil them about 8 minutes until they are cooked al dente. Combine with your favorite sauce and enjoy. We use a steady rotation of red sauce, carbonara, and pesto sauce, occasionally mixing in something else like scampi or bolognese.

 

[Landomatic 3813]

14 minutes ago, wild_turkey said:

Sunday nights at our house are pasta night. That's not to say Monday through Saturday can't also have pasta, but Sunday is PASTA NIGHT which is a weekly ritual that includes but is not limited to: good wine, appetizers, homemade pasta, lingerie for the wife, and good TV or a movie. It's a nice way to prevent Sunday scaries and have a good stress free start to the week.

 

 

 

 

Same at our house.  Minus the lingerie (just never been my thing).  We call it Sunday Gravy which can just mean pretty much any kind of pasta for dinner, even though that’s not technically what it really means.

Anyway, nice work on the pasta.  BTW...what are Sunday scaries?

[C-Man 27221]

Subscribed

[Underdog 28620]

On 4/21/2020 at 7:50 AM, Landomatic said:

Pork Bolognese

Basic ingredients - 2 carrots, 2 stalks celery, half an onion, few cloves garlic...

Not pictured - olive oil, butter, ground meat (you can use anything), tomato paste, milk, white wine, pasta, parmigiano reggiano.

Get a few tablespoons EVOO and about a half a stick of butter good and hot...

Add chopped onion, celery and grated carrots and sweat that down on medium heat for 10 minutes or so or until they all start getting kind of translucent...

Brown some ground meat (I used pork) then mix in chopped garlic, couple tablespoons of tomato paste, about a cup of while milk and about a cup of white wine...

Reduce that down for about 20-30 minutes or until it's closer to a paste and less of a soup...

Add pasta - I used tagliatelle but you can really go with just about anything here...

Mix it all together to finish the pasta in the sauce with copious amounts of fresh grated parmigiano reggiano...

Serve with a little chopped fresh basil and more parmigiano reggiano because you can never have too much of that...

JFC.  That looks good. 

[Wiler77 1566]

We have a bunch of William-Sonoma cook books, and my 5 year old son was looking through the Pasta book last week.  He came across Bolognese and insisted on making it.  It was really fun.  He helped at every step of he way.  Ours was more of less like Landomatic's with the exception that we used a mix of pork and beef, and we omitted any tomoato product.  he hates tomato, and since he was the chef on this one, he got to make the decisions.

The 8 year old then looked through the book and found Carbonara.  I've never made it, so I plan on pretty much copying the steps taken by Landomatic, with the changes to ratios he mentions.  Looks great.

[VABuckeye 2472]

23 hours ago, Underdog said:

Never had Bolognese before moving up to NY, favorite sauce now.  

Made many different ways in Italy depending on the region.  The one I make is almost a pure meat sauce.  Very rich and makes a fantastic meat lasagne.

[VABuckeye 2472]

22 hours ago, wild_turkey said:

Great thread topic and awesome submissions. Will be following this thread.

Sunday nights at our house are pasta night. That's not to say Monday through Saturday can't also have pasta, but Sunday is PASTA NIGHT which is a weekly ritual that includes but is not limited to: good wine, appetizers, homemade pasta, lingerie for the wife, and good TV or a movie. It's a nice way to prevent Sunday scaries and have a good stress free start to the week.

I'll submit homemade noodles, or as we like to call them, hot fresh nudes. The only ingredients are eggs and Tipo 00 flour. We learned this through a cooking class in Tuscany where the instructor was adamant that you measure out the flour based on weight and not volume. His ratio was 600 g of flour and 5 large eggs. That makes way too much pasta for 2 people and the ratio seems a little off using American eggs, so we've modified it to 300 g of flour and 3 eggs.

Combine the flour and eggs in a food processor and turn it on. You have to rock it back and forth to help mix everything for about 2-3 minutes.

The dough will then be coarse and lumpy. Make sure your counter top or working surface is clean and then dump the dough out.

Then use your hands to knead the dough into a ball. Cover it in shrink wrap and let it sit on the counter at room temperature for 1-2 hours.

From this point there are a lot of directions you can go depending on what kind of nudes you want. Our personal favorite is a type of thick spaghetti made with a combination of a KitchenAid pasta roller and a guitar string pasta cutter.

First you use a roller to flatten the ball of dough into a thick wedge that can be put through the roller. Then you sprinkle some 00 flour on the dough and on your working surface to prevent it from sticking to itself as you are rolling it out.

Then you put the thin end of the dough wedge into the KitchenAid pasta roller attachment. The mixer should be on low speed and the thickness should be set to 1 which is the widest setting.

After making the initial pass through the roller you will have a thick sheet of dough. You can then increase the number on the roller (decrease the thickness) until you get it to your desired endpoint. We usually stop around 5-6. 

This will result in a long sheet of dough that you can make into whatever noodles you prefer. As I said before, we like to do the guitar string cutter. To do this, you cut the sheet into rectangular sections that are about 8" long by 6" wide. You then lay a rectangle of dough on the guitar string cutter and start rolling it from the middle to flatten it out and push it through the strings. It helps to add more 00 or Semolina flour during this step to help prevent sticking.

I unfortunately don't have noody pictures beyond this, but the noodles are dumped out the side and then you gently jiggle them around in your hand to separate them. You then boil them about 8 minutes until they are cooked al dente. Combine with your favorite sauce and enjoy. We use a steady rotation of red sauce, carbonara, and pesto sauce, occasionally mixing in something else like scampi or bolognese.

 

The northern Italian pasta I like to make is called tajarin.  It's made with 00 flour and egg yolks only (with a pinch of salt).  Two cups of flour and 15 egg yolks.

Edited April 22, 2020 by VABuckeye

[VABuckeye 2472]

Tajarin pasta with a butter sage sauce.

[VABuckeye 2472]

Lasagne bolognese

And a dish from the Piedmonte region of Italy.  White truffles are amazing.

[Hank_Hill 18804]

On 4/21/2020 at 6:51 AM, Landomatic said:

Orecchiette with Pork Sausage and Broccoli

This one is just so damn easy and really really good...and I don't even like broccoli.  It's just one of those magical combinations of flavors that all come together perfectly for whatever reason.  Probably science or some shit?

Found some fresh orecchiette so I used that this time, but oddly, I found out I actually prefer the dry (boxed) orecchiette over the fresh which I wouldn't normally say.  Still damn good though.

Lots of variations to this, but here's what I do and it gets rave reviews every damn time.

Basic ingredients:  Orecchiette Pasta (one package), Italian Sausage (one pound), Broccoli (2 heads), Garlic (a few cloves), EVOO, Salt, Red Pepper Flakes, Parmigiano Reggiano

A few tablespoons of EVOO and start cooking that broccoli down until it starts to get a little wilty but keeps that bright green color.  I add a little salt here too.  Remember to turn your hood fan on because cooked broccoli fucking stinks.

Remove the broccoli and set it aside.  In the same pan, brown up some Italian sausage.  You can use just about anything here.  My local Italian market has ground hot or mild (I went with mild because my kid is a wimp when it comes to spicy).  You can also just remove the casing from some links and go that route.

Once that's good and brown, add back in the broccoli, a few cloves of thinly sliced (or minced) garlic and start mixing it up.  I would normally also add red pepper flakes at this point, but again, the kid.

Add cooked pasta.

Mix it all together with a scoop of the pasta water and a few tablespoons (half a cup or so) of parmigiano reggiano.

Serve and finish with a little more parmigiano reggiano (and I did the red pepper flakes at this point but it should have been in earlier).

This was good y very easy

[Biff Tannen 45678]

This thread is awesome. We did homemade pasta the other night as well. 

[Errestaurants 2570]

On 4/21/2020 at 3:17 PM, Landomatic said:

Same at our house.  Minus the lingerie (just never been my thing).  We call it Sunday Gravy which can just mean pretty much any kind of pasta for dinner, even though that’s not technically what it really means.

Anyway, nice work on the pasta.  BTW...what are Sunday scaries?

do you know Ryan Tedder and Joe Dulworth?

[Landomatic 3813]

11 hours ago, Errestaurants said:

do you know Ryan Tedder and Joe Dulworth?

Never heard of either

[T-shirt Sip 2101]

On 4/21/2020 at 6:50 AM, Landomatic said:

Pork Bolognese

Basic ingredients - 2 carrots, 2 stalks celery, half an onion, few cloves garlic...

Not pictured - olive oil, butter, ground meat (you can use anything), tomato paste, milk, white wine, pasta, parmigiano reggiano.

Get a few tablespoons EVOO and about a half a stick of butter good and hot...

Add chopped onion, celery and grated carrots and sweat that down on medium heat for 10 minutes or so or until they all start getting kind of translucent...

Brown some ground meat (I used pork) then mix in chopped garlic, couple tablespoons of tomato paste, about a cup of while milk and about a cup of white wine...

Reduce that down for about 20-30 minutes or until it's closer to a paste and less of a soup...

Add pasta - I used tagliatelle but you can really go with just about anything here...

Mix it all together to finish the pasta in the sauce with copious amounts of fresh grated parmigiano reggiano...

Serve with a little chopped fresh basil and more parmigiano reggiano because you can never have too much of that...

I made this dish yesterday and it was absolutely fantastic. I made it exactly like Lando made it above and I wouldn’t change a thing. I will add it to my rotation. 

[Errestaurants 2570]

Made the bolognese for dinner tonight. Used veal and beef. Thanks for the recipe.

Sent from my SM-G973U using Tapatalk

[VABuckeye 2472]

Herb infused three cheese raviole with (my) bolognese and red meat sauce.

It always starts the same way.

FoodSaver FTW.  Leftovers.

[Scooter Monzingo 820]

On 4/21/2020 at 7:57 AM, Landomatic said:

Shrimp Scampi

This one is so fast and easy, yet so so good.  Wife and kid rave every time.  I say this about a lot of pastas, but this one might truly have the highest ROI ratio from a skill/time needed (almost zero) to great end result standpoint.  This was made with some very run-of-the-mill ingredients from a generic local grocery store (small Tom Thumb).  Nothing fancy or super fresh and it still turned out amazing.

Start with about a pound of shrimp

Other ingredients: Minced garlic, chopped onion, chopped basil, lemon (and the zest of the lemon).  Not pictured, butter, olive oil, cheap white wine, salt, fresh pasta, red pepper flakes.

Sweat onion and garlic in some olive oil.

Add shrimp, basil and salt.

Deglaze with about a cup of cheap white wine.  Then whisk in a few pats of butter.

Once that cooks down a little and makes a nice consistent cream sauce (pictured below), squeeze a whole lemon in and add your fresh pasta.

Plate with a sprinkle of fresh basil, fresh lemon zest and red pepper flakes and a drizzle of EVOO to top it off.

You got me with this one. 

[Tailgate 3021]

This thread is making me hungry. Nice work OP.

[Landomatic 3813]

Sunday Gravy talk up-thread got me wanting to try my take on a more traditional Sunday Gravy.  Ideally would have been able to shop for it, but kind of just decided on a whim to give it a shot with what I had on hand.  Probably top 3 things I've ever made.  Apparently there's just something magical about that sauce infusing the meats over a slow cook.  Just incredible...highly recommend.  It's really easy, but kind of time-consuming.

2 large cans San Marzano peeled tomatoes.  Pour them into a bowl and smush them up with your hands to keep it a little chunky and rustic (pick out any stems or things that don't feel right as you run across them, but don't worry too much about it).

Carrots (would normally use regular carrots, but I only had baby carrots on hand), a few cloves smashed garlic, handful of parsley (I had to use cilantro - yes, I know they're totally different, but it didn't seem to matter), couple bay leaves (would have preferred fresh, but these dry ones were fine), about a half an onion, handful of fresh basil, celery (I didn't have that and couldn't find anything that I thought would substitute so it was left out).  Keep all of it pretty large and chunky.

Get the onions, carrots and celery (if you have it) cooking in some EVOO in a pretty large pot.

Once that's good and hot and starting to sizzle, add the tomatoes, garlic, basil, bay leaves and parsley.

Give it a stir and cover on low heat.

Meatballs - I used ground turkey because that's what we had, but any ground meat is fine here.  Bread crumbs (just went with something from a can...blasphemous I know), chopped garlic, basil and parsley, shredded cheese (would have liked pecorino romano but only had parmigiano reggiano), salt and pepper and one egg to bind it all up.

Meatballs and some Italian sausages (just some cheap generic Johnsonville ones we had on hand...can't imagine how great some really good ones from the Italian market would have been).  Would have also liked to do some braciole which is what I ran across in a couple of the different Sunday Gravy recipes I've seen, but I didn't have most of the stuff for that.

Separate pan with mostly cooking oil with some EVOO drizzled in for more flavor.

Get the meat in there and start browning it up.

Get both sides good and brown.  Might want to use a lid to help it cook through a little bit too.  Don't worry if it gets a little greasy, that's good flavor for the sauce.  I even drizzled a little into the sauce later at some point.

Once browned, put all the meat in the sauce and be sure it's fully submerged.  I cut the sausages in half at this point just to make them a little more manageable and to expose an end of the link, which I think helps suck up more flavor.

Cover that and let it go on low heat for a couple hours.  Some go really long like 6 hours and some I've seen for as little as 20 minutes.  I think the longer the better, but I didn't start nearly early enough for an all day type of thing, so I had to start to pull it about 1.5 hours in.

About 30 mins before you're ready to eat, start your water boiling to drop your pasta.  I used bucatini but regular spaghetti or something else would be fine.  For some reason, we just seem to have bucatini on hand a lot.  Don't forget to salt your water.

While that pasta's cooking, fish out the pieces of meat from the sauce.  Couldn't really get any pics of this, but it was kind of the only somewhat challenging part.  Really hard to see anything since it's all fully submerged in sauce.  And you don't want to poke around too much and tear the meatballs.  Sausages came out pretty easy though.  Then somehow you have to also separate the large chunks of vegetables and the bay leaves  and other stuff out too.  Once the meat and large chunks of everything else are out, the sauce is pretty pasty so a couple ladles of that starchy salty pasta water are a must.  That whole process was messy.  Once you get it where you want it, just mix what's left with the pasta.

Serve in a large serving bowl so you can get a little bit of everything...and enjoy.

Fresh grated parmigiano reggiano with some garlic toast on the side.  We ran out of everyday red wine so had to go with white, but whatever.

So damn good.

[CTXMustang 518]

I tried and failed....

[South Austin 52484]

Looks fantastic again, @Landomatic. What’s the story with your affinity for Italian cooking?  Mine came from getting married there. Feel in love with the country in 2004, and again on my ten-year anniversary trip in 2014.

[Landomatic 3813]

42 minutes ago, South Austin said:

Looks fantastic again, @Landomatic. What’s the story with your affinity for Italian cooking?

Thanks.  No clue.  Probably at the core, it's mostly because I'm part Italian if I had to guess.

It's always been my favorite food and I've always had a fascination with a lot of Italian things like the mob, cars, fashion...shit like that.  Although I've never been to Italy.

Wasn't into cooking at all until the last couple years.  My contribution to cooking at our house has always began and ended with grilling.  Well, the last 3 years we lived in a condo where we couldn't have a grill.  So I kind of just got bored and thought, "what's my favorite food...I'm gonna learn to cook it" as a substitute for grilling.  And around that time, I discovered our local Italian market and it is freakin' magical.  I can spend hours there just walking around looking at shit and talking to other people who are into it (well, used to before the covid).  So, I just started watching a ton of YouTube videos of different dishes I know I like and different chefs I know I like.  Then I just started trying things myself.

Still mostly don't know shit, but that's part of the fun.  There's always stuff to learn and it's fun to combine different things I've learned from different chefs and try new things that way.  Now that I'm out of the condo and back into a house, I'm grilling more and in the kitchen less.  But, I'm still into trying different Italian stuff a couple times a week.

[Beantown Express 2.0 6559]

This thread is awesome.  While not Italian lets just say I grew up in an “Italian Family”.  No pics but I love linguine and white clam sauce.  Easy to make as you just sauté a ton of thin sliced garlic in olive oil, add some salt and red pepper flakes for heat.  You can use fresh clams but I like it with canned baby clams or chopped clams.  Add some of the clam juice with the clams and a little of the pasta water from the linguine and let it simmer for about 5 minutes.  Toss in the linguine and coat.  Quick, easy and quite tasty.  Also, I fell in love with carbonara when I was in Italy (ate that shit every meal in Rome for days) and below is a twist on traditional carbonara with Italian sausage.  It is pretty simple and tasted really good.  Jamie Oliver did an interesting trick of rolling the sausage balls in the pepper before cooking and it really adds to the dish.

https://www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/pasta-recipes/easy-sausage-carbonara/

[NoName 16351]

On 4/21/2020 at 6:51 AM, Landomatic said:

Orecchiette with Pork Sausage and Broccoli

Spoiler

 

This one is just so damn easy and really really good...and I don't even like broccoli.  It's just one of those magical combinations of flavors that all come together perfectly for whatever reason.  Probably science or some shit?

Found some fresh orecchiette so I used that this time, but oddly, I found out I actually prefer the dry (boxed) orecchiette over the fresh which I wouldn't normally say.  Still damn good though.

Lots of variations to this, but here's what I do and it gets rave reviews every damn time.

Basic ingredients:  Orecchiette Pasta (one package), Italian Sausage (one pound), Broccoli (2 heads), Garlic (a few cloves), EVOO, Salt, Red Pepper Flakes, Parmigiano Reggiano

A few tablespoons of EVOO and start cooking that broccoli down until it starts to get a little wilty but keeps that bright green color.  I add a little salt here too.  Remember to turn your hood fan on because cooked broccoli fucking stinks.

Remove the broccoli and set it aside.  In the same pan, brown up some Italian sausage.  You can use just about anything here.  My local Italian market has ground hot or mild (I went with mild because my kid is a wimp when it comes to spicy).  You can also just remove the casing from some links and go that route.

Once that's good and brown, add back in the broccoli, a few cloves of thinly sliced (or minced) garlic and start mixing it up.  I would normally also add red pepper flakes at this point, but again, the kid.

Add cooked pasta.

Mix it all together with a scoop of the pasta water and a few tablespoons (half a cup or so) of parmigiano reggiano.

Serve and finish with a little more parmigiano reggiano (and I did the red pepper flakes at this point but it should have been in earlier).

 

made a version of this but chopped the broc smaller and went light on pepper flake for the same reason as you...this is a fantastic combo!

[DefinitelyNotHollywoodColt 12301]

14 hours ago, Beantown Express 2.0 said:

This thread is awesome.  While not Italian lets just say I grew up in an “Italian Family”.

waste management business?

[wild_turkey 3159]

Shrimp Scampi

This one is so fast and easy, yet so so good.  Wife and kid rave every time.  I say this about a lot of pastas, but this one might truly have the highest ROI ratio from a skill/time needed (almost zero) to great end result standpoint.

We made your shrimp scampi recipe this past weekend and it was great.

[SuperSport 1333]

Check out Tyler Florence on Food Network, we've bookmarked half a dozen of his recipes (scampi, carbonara, marsala, etc.) and they are all fucking amazing.  Super simple and easy as well, which is always a bonus.

[irishtexan 11518]

I’d never made pasta before. Did it tonight. Took a long time but wasn’t difficult. Don’t have a pasta roller so I just hand-rolled it out and cut it into strips. Made some pesto and tossed it all together. Came out awesome.

[Zepol87 9185]

Making pasta is something I've never done but I want that change that soon.
I attempted@Landomatic Bolognese tonight. I don't think I fucked it up too bad and it's pretty damn good. While the sauce was simmering even caught with him for a bit on the phone. Only problem was my gf went to the store to get me some good parmesan and she came back with a ton of other shit but no parmesan. I will be making this again and a few other dishes in this thread.

Sent from my SM-G986U using Tapatalk

[Landomatic 3813]

19 minutes ago, Zepol87 said:

Making pasta is something I've never done but I want that change that soon.
I attempted@Landomatic Bolognese tonight. I don't think I fucked it up too bad and it's pretty damn good. While the sauce was simmering even caught with him for a bit on the phone. Only problem was my gf went to the store to get me some good parmesan and she came back with a ton of other shit but no parmesan. I will be making this again and a few other dishes in this thread.

Sent from my SM-G986U using Tapatalk
 

Looks great to me bro.  Lmfao at GF coming home with everything BUT what she went for.  Mrs Landomatic does that shit all the time.  She might be a keeper.  Anyway, great catching up man

[Landomatic 3813]

Does this count?

Italian Nachos...

[VABuckeye 2472]

No but I would eat those nachos. 

[Hank_Hill 18804]

Shank worthy

[South Austin 52484]

Needs refried beans (not sure how to say that in Italian).