2 Easy Pasta Recipes and the Science Behind Parmesan Cheese's Signature Flavor

[Music] today on america's test kitchen bridgette and julia cook up authentic pasta h.h jack challenges julia to a tasting of parmesan dan discovers some surprising cheese science and l makes bridget perfect penne raviana right here on america's test kitchen [Music] every home cook needs to have a bowl pin of go-to recipes that can be pulled from the pantry at a moment's notice and today we're bringing you two home run pantry pastas that you can call on whenever you need to whip up a weeknight dinner first up pasta echi now pairing pasta and beans is not uncommon think of pasta fajul but pasta etchi is a lesser known italian pasta and bean dish made with chickpeas and there are millions of variations for this dish out there and we looked at them all now one of the problems that we found with a lot of recipes was lack of flavor we're going to get to fixing this right now with a star ingredient pancetta we love pancetta right we love pork we love pork and pancetta can make almost anything better but what we were looking for was a real savory flavor in her pasta etching and pancetta which is unsmoked bacon it's cured but not smoked has that really savory flavor now this is two ounces of pancetta we don't want big pieces of pancetta floating around in our pasta we want it to almost melt away so we're going to use the food processor to turn this into a really nice smooth paste that'll take about 30 seconds all right so that looks pretty good pancetta is nice and smooth now we'll go ahead and add the first batch of our vegetables this is one carrot cut into half inch pieces and one rib or stalk depending on where you're from of celery also cut into half inch pieces and four whole garlic cloves this time i'll go ahead and pulse at about eight to ten pulses i'm looking for the pieces of the vegetables to cut down into a pretty fine consistency all right that looks pretty good so now i'll go ahead and add the onions now this is one onion cut into one inch pieces and again i'll go ahead and pulse this about eight maybe ten more times until they are pretty fine as well but we don't want the onions to be as fine somewhere between a quarter to a half an inch in size that is pretty good so i'll go ahead and place this right in the dutch oven boy it really smells good too it does thank you pancetta now all i'm going to do is add one quarter cup of extra virgin olive oil i'll put this over medium heat i'm going to cook this stirring it frequently i'm not looking for any of the vegetables to really brown but we are looking for some color on the bottom of the pot that's going to be really good fun which means flavor for our pasta etchy that smells good oh yes it does that's only five minutes it took to really start to get some color on the bottom of the pot minute rendered that pancetta that's right so now we're going to continue to build more flavor especially more savory flavor with our first ingredient anchovies it's one anchovy fillet we rinsed it patted it dry and minced it very fine nobody's ever gonna know what's in there i always throw a half an anchovy into things when i want to have a meatier flavor that's a good idea we have a quarter teaspoon of red pepper flakes a little kick not too kicky but a little kick and two teaspoons of fresh minced rosemary oh that's going to be good oh that with the pancetta and weirdly it's the carrots the sweet flavor of the carrots that i'm smelling that's interesting oh yeah those are good flavors so we're gonna leave this for about a minute i'm gonna go back to the food processor dirty bowl that's more than fine because we're gonna go ahead and process our tomatoes this is one 14 ounce can of tomatoes we drained it they're whole tomatoes i'm going to break them down just with a few pulses we don't want that tomato liquid in there we really just want the tomato pulp all right relinquish the spatula back at the pot we'll go ahead and add our tomatoes right in so you didn't process them fine there's still a few chunks in there yeah we want a little bit of texture there on our tomatoes now we're going to turn this into a soup it's kind of a brothy soup stew what would you call it i don't know dinner and we're going to use canned chickpeas these are 15 ounce cans of chickpeas we're going to use the broth and alls really you're going to use the canning liquid that's exactly right so there's tons of starch in there and actually we really want that in here because it's going to give the pasta chetchie a really good body so that packing liquid it's just water right that's right yep that's exactly how these are cooked chickpeas and water they're put into the cans then the cans are processed and they're cooked right in the can this is two cups of water no vegetable broth we really want these flavors to be front and center well essentially you're making your own broth that's very true and one teaspoon of table salt so i'm going to bring this up to a boil after that i'll reduce the heat to medium low let this simmer for about 10 minutes oh yes oh that's coming along the smells are coming along we're actually quite near the end here this is pretty much all we need except for one thing pasta we're going to go ahead and add our di tolini this is eight ounces of detalini which in italian means little dita it's also one and a half cups so eight ounces more important than a cup measurement because pasta varies in size we're gonna let this cook for about 10 minutes this time until the pasta is tender and this is great we added the chickpeas first gave it a 10 minute head start on the pasta so that they could break down just a little bit more we wanted them to have a really nice tender texture that looks awesome that's all you're going to say that looks awesome it does well the pasta has absorbed a lot of that liquid in there it's going to be such a hearty dish with concentrated flavor so i'm going to turn the heat off a couple of last minute additions tablespoon of chopped fresh parsley there's the green and a little bit of lemon juice a tablespoon as well just to brighten this dish a little bit of salt and pepper i always find that pasta dishes or dishes with a lot of starch in them need quite a bit of seasoning final stir and dishes are done wow couple minutes for the aromatics 10 minutes to simmer the sauce 10 minutes for the pasta that's less than half an hour that's right good job yeah i can add for your reward you get pasta chichi oh if you'd like we have some parmesan cheese it's about a half a cup of parmesan cheese you can sprinkle it over also a little bit of olive oil to drizzle on i think that really adds something now i do want to say to anybody out there that's been watching and hearing us say pasta chechi for you in new jersey it's pasta cheech okay well this looks so good i mean how hearty now i know you just made it with water because you built all that flavor but this is so complex with the pancetta and then the aromatics the garlic the rosemary you know there wasn't a lot of liquid going into the pot at the beginning and that's why the flavors are so concentrated and i love the two textures of that chewy diddolini and then you get that creamy chickpea texture nice work bridget this is amazing on your menu now right to give this simple pantry pasta some serious flavor start by processing the pancetta into a fine paste along with some carrot celery onion and garlic when making the sauce add anchovy and rosemary to the pot along with the chickpea canning liquid for a well-rounded flavor and nicely thickened texture finally use a small pasta like diddolini and cook it right in the sauce so that it can absorb all of those flavors so there you have it from the test kitchen to your kitchen a killer pantry friendly recipe for pasta cheese custard cheech [Music] we all know those rustic uneven pieces of parmigiano-reggiano are the real deal but what if you go to the store and all you see is parmesan shrink-wrapped into those very even pieces some right here from the us bay are those any good and jack's here to tell us if they are yeah it's a really interesting taste test you know if you go to the supermarket and you see a big hunk like this you see the stenciling on the label you know that it's going to be great but if you get a little triangle like this that's shrink wrapped how can you tell well i think one of the things you can do is you can tell by looking if it looks like gruyere or cheddar that's not a good sign so not even paying attention to the label you can tell this is a high moisture cheese it's not dry and crumbly so i've given you a really big hint you're going to start digging in but dry and crumbly when it comes to parmesan is a good thing it's mostly about aging to get a dry crumbly parmigiano reggiano from italy 24 months and the cheese should have a moisture level below 32 percent we actually sent them all out to lab and analyze the moisture level many of the cheeses that we tasted came in at 34 35 38 moisture which is not parmesan that was the first test that we noticed second is that the samples were salty beyond belief especially the domestic ones and again when we did the lab work many of the cheeses were significantly saltier than others and usually salt's a good thing but this is a case where we felt like they're adding salt because there isn't any other flavors and so a lot of the domestic cheeses were just way too salty and they're bland because of the milk in italy they're using raw milk in america they're using pasteurized milk and pasteurization kills all kinds of nasty bacteria but it kills flavorful bacteria as well also how the cows live they can feed on soybeans in a lot which might be the american solution or they can be grazing in the hills of northern italy eating grass you can taste the difference you can i'm making it sound like all the domestic cheeses were awful the winner did come from italy and is 24 month age parmigiana reggiano that's shrink-wrapped but we did find one good domestic option so you've been tasting some of these samples some are from italy some are from the u.s some are quite good some are a disaster so i'd like to sort of see if you have any initial impressions about what you're tasting well you gave me a big hint right off the bat with texture this i don't know if it's parmesan or provolone it could be either it's very wet it's not crumbly at all so this was immediately out of the race okay this far and away the winner had the most flavor the most depth the flavor it was nutty it was rich it was lovely i want to marry this cheese these two were kind of middle of the pack for me they both had pluses and minuses this one has a deeper color and had a slightly deeper flavor but there was something about this cheese that i also liked it was on the stinky side you know heading toward that stinky road but i like that so this one i wouldn't throw out but this one i thought was a little bit better okay so where do you want to start with the cheese you're going to marry and do i have to tell your husband yes start with the cheese i'm going to marry you chose our favorite domestic cheese this is from wisconsin sarvecchio it didn't win but we loved it exactly what you loved which is it's aged this one 20 months so it has a lot of that crumbliness the dry texture those complex nutty buttery notes it's a delicious it really is that was a surprise to me it's 18 pounds so it's not a lot less expensive than the aged imported cheeses but if you want made in the usa this is the one to get this guy my runner up this one the tasting panel didn't like as much it was more middle of the pack it's another domestic one it's very salty and a little rubbery and it's not quite as dry as our top cheese there were worse choices but there are better choices all right this guy so this is interesting this is labeled boar's head but this is parmigiano reggiano they import from italy cut up and shrink wrap this was the winner it's aged 24 months the most expensive it's about 20 pound it tastes like the real deal it does and this one which obviously is not even parmesan yeah this was at the very bottom of the rankings it is way too moist it is very bland rubbery just the worst choice you can get at the supermarket wow so this was a real surprise to me i really enjoy this domestic cheese as an american cheese it comes very close to the real deal so that was pretty interesting the tasters all preferred the traditional pragiano reggiano by borsad but i actually preferred the american style parmigiano made by stravecchio [Music] this is a quarter wheel of real parmesan cheese a full wheel clocks in at 84 pounds now what if i told you there's a big difference between the exterior and interior pieces in a wheel this big and that that difference will change which piece you want to buy at the store we did a blind tasting here in the test kitchen and found that cheese near the rind is crumblier and more flavorful than cheese at the interior it also boasts more of those pleasant crunchy crystals which are aggregates of the amino acid tyrosine we actually counted the number of crystals in strips taken from the center and the edge the edge pieces have more than double the number of crystals what accounts for this when cheese ages the milk proteins are broken down through a process called proteolysis which produces flavorful free amino acids from the proteins proteolysis changes the cheese's texture and melting qualities cheese changes over time in much the same way that a roast heats up in the oven from the outside in so the exterior parts of a wheel this big are effectively more aged and then more flavorful than the interior you can easily see this progression in this slice of bloomy rind cheese it's very liquid around the exterior but still firm inside now if we give this cheese enough time the entire thing will turn liquid when it comes to parmesan the best flavor can be found near the rind so if you're buying real parm at the supermarket choose corner pieces they'll have rind on both the bottom and the side that is the secret to getting the best part of the wheel [Music] here's what makes me angry gridlock traffic people who talk during the movies and non-dairy creamer i mean what the heck is that stuff anyway but angry could mean a few different things an italian dish called penne a la rabiata translates to angry pasta and in this dish that means spicy sometimes a little too spicy so elle is here to show us how to make a rabiata and temper that anger we want heat but we don't want scorching heat okay and a lot of these recipes have a tendency to be thin in texture and in flavor we're going to fix that today great okay and we're going to start with tomatoes traditionally this dish is made with fresh tomatoes but we want to be able to enjoy it in the winter months too so we're going to use canned peeled whole tomatoes great we tried it with diced tomatoes they have a tendency to not really break down we tried it with crushed tomatoes and they taste a little too cooked but these work perfectly for this recipe we're just going to pulse them in the food processor with their natural juices and that's going to be the base of our sauce and is that a 28 ounce can yes it is 10 pulses should do the trick i think that looks great so let's move over to our base sauce okay so we have in here a quarter cup of extra virgin olive oil and i'm just going to put our flame on medium a lot of these sauces like i told you are kind of thin and flat today we're going to make a very robust sauce we're going to create a more complex flavor overall and so it's not going to just be angry it's going to be delicious oh we have one clove of garlic and the oil is cold at this point just starting everything off where's cold oil we're starting everything off in the cold oil we're gonna let it all cook together at the same time we have two tablespoons of tomato paste here's our secret ingredient this is anchovies it's umami rich four fillets of anchovy and it's minced into a paste so no one even know what's in there so we're adding a teaspoon of red pepper flakes pepper flakes are a traditional ingredient for this sauce that's where the fire is going to start to happen in our recipe we're also going to add half a teaspoon of sweet paprika soup paprika is made from ground peppers so it has a smoky and fruity flavor to it another great part of our sauce are these pepperoncinis we have about a quarter cup here they're not too intense on the heat but because they're packed in vinegar they're going to add a little zest to the sauce love that they're going to go into our sauce get that head of vinegar as soon as they hit the hot oil in there oh yeah we're going to end off with a half teaspoon of salt and pepper and we're going to just let this cook for about seven or eight minutes until it's a deep red so the four different kinds of peppers that went in there is the black pepper you just put in there there was the red pepper flakes you have the pepperoncini and the paprika which a lot of people don't think of as a pepper but it really is just a ground pepper so a lot of complex pepper flavor in there that's what we're going for all right bridget it's been seven or eight minutes our sauce is a nice deep red oh yeah smells great smells incredible we're going to add our whole tomatoes here in their sauce and you're right those do have a great texture they're not pureed all the way i'm just going to give it a stir just to get that all incorporated smells great right yeah finally we're going to top this with a quarter cup of pecorino it's going to give our sauce a smoky salty flavor and it's also going to add a little body to it so we're adding it right into the sauce right into the sauce i'm going to give this a little stir while this is going we can start talking pasta all right we have here four quarts of water that we're bringing to a boil you only need four quarts per pound and since we're only working with one pound of pasta today we're all set to go and that is the magic ratio a lot of people don't use enough water when they're cooking pasta but four quarts of water to one pound of pasta means the pasta is not going to stick together as a cook so remember rule number one four quarts to one pound that's right bridget our sauce is done cooking it's been 20 minutes we're just going to cover it and keep it warm until our pasta is ready we're going to move on to our pasta water it's rapidly boiling so that's an indication that it's time to move on to the next step which is adding a tablespoon of table salt and our one pound of penne pasta so we're going to just give it a little stir so that doesn't stick this is great elle seasoned the water too many people leave salt out when they are cooking pasta one tablespoon of table salt or two tablespoons of kosher salt are perfect for our four quarts of water and what you didn't add and this is key no oil went into that water do not oil the water for cooking pasta what happens it waterproofs the pasta and the sauce won't stick bridgette there's another pasta roll that i think is like a hidden pasta roll we're going to reserve half a cup of this pasta water because it's full of starch and it's going to play to our favor to use for thinning out our sauce oh that's a great idea because sometimes you have to adjust the consistency right at the end and what better than hot pasta water already has pasta starch in it that's right all right we have a half cup here would you drain that pasta for us to get started certainly well i think we're at a place where we can start to be happy about this angry pasta so we're just going to add the sauce to the pot that's so much better than a lot of times people will take the pasta just put it directly on the plate a little bit of sauce on top what's that all about it's definitely not about covering all the pasta that's for sure all right we're gonna give it a nice stir you can smell it yeah i certainly can and it's kind of thick so maybe we'll put a little bit of our pasta water in there good idea i'm gonna start with about a quarter cup and you can adjust this as you need it if you like your pasta a little thick you don't have to add the starchy water at all and what you did there was perfect too you added the water first before you seasoned it with salt and pepper because that water's already seasoned that's right so a little salt a touch of pepper i'm so ready to eat are you ready since last tuesday that is beautiful if it even tastes one quarter of good as it smells then we're not gonna be angry all right would you like a little sprinkle i would love it all right you know i've started using pecorino romano more than i do parmesan i really love that sharp tangy flavor that it has what do you think for one thing it does have some spice to it so we haven't completely tamed that beast it's still a raviotta you still want a little anger there but it is not raging it's not that full on fire in your mouth where you can't enjoy or taste any of it plus i love all that savoriness that comes out of it the anchovies pecorino romano and even that tomato paste all cooked so much so that really concentrated the flavors el this is an amazing pasta thank you so much for sharing it with us thank you well as it turns out arabiata can still be a little bit angry if balanced with hearty ingredients for complex not overwhelming heat use a trio of peppers red pepper flakes paprika and pickled pepperoncini to counter the spice with savory flavor add pecorino romano tomato paste and anchovies just a little bit right into the sauce and there you have it from our test kitchen to your kitchen an excellent recipe for penne rabiata and you can get this recipe and all the recipes from this season along with our testings tastings and selected episodes on our website americastestkitchen.com not angry at all thanks for watching america's test kitchen what'd you think well leave a comment and let us know which recipes you're excited to make or you can just say hello you can find links to today's recipes and reviews in the video description and don't forget to subscribe to our channel see you later i'll see you later

Channel: America's Test Kitchen

Views: 337,186

Keywords: pasta e ceci, pasta with chickpeas, chickpea pasta recipes, pasta ceci, pasta and chickpeas, penne arrabbiata, penne all'arrabbiata, penne arrabiata, arrabbiata, arrabiata sauce, pasta arrabiata, spicy italian pasta sauce arrabbiata, supermarket parmesan, parmesan cheese, parmesan reggiano, americas test kitchen, cooking, cooking show, recipes, how to, public television, pasta, how to cook pasta, pasta recipes, cooking tutorial, cooking instruction

Id: IS6dS3fLOu0

Length: 22min 16sec (1336 seconds)

Published: Sat Mar 24 2018