- [Babish] This episode is
sponsored by HelloFresh. I know it's not always
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65% off, plus free shipping. (classical music) Hey, what's up guys? Welcome
back to "Binging with Babish". With this week, we're taking a look at the spaghetti all'amatriciana
from "Eat Pray Love." The basic ingredients of
which you can see laid here before me. Now we're gonna make three
different versions of amatriciana starting with the most traditional. For this, we're gonna need
four ounces of guanciale, an Italian cured pork jowl. Which once we slice off
the herb-crusted exterior, we're going to cut into lardon, or what I like to think of as
very, very thick matchsticks. This will hopefully make
the meat easier to eat with the spaghete. Once that's all chopped up, the only other mise en
place we need to prepare is pre-grating one and a half ounces of pecorino romano cheese and
locating one fresh red chili. This is a Fresno chili which is decidedly not
Italian, but it will do. Now over on the stovetop, we've got a two-pot
configuration to make our pasta. First in a large cold saute pan, we're starting to cook
guanciale over medium low heat. This stuff has a lot of fat
that needs to render out first, otherwise it'll be chewy. So if it's browning too quickly, don't be afraid to add a splash of water to help things along. After about 10 minutes, once tender and beginning to turn crisp, we're adding eight ounces of
high quality tomato puree. And that's pretty much all that's in this very, very simple sauce that's gonna cook for 10
minutes except for that chili. Forgot the chili. And since our high quality
browns dye dried pasta takes about 10 minutes to cook, this is also the point at
which we can add eight ounces of spaghetti to a nearby shallow pot of boiling salted water, cooking it about one minute
shy of its intended doneness before adding it to the pan where it's gonna finish
cooking in the sauce. For that reason, it's very important to add a large splash
of pasta cooking water, about half a cup plus more as needed, both to finish cooking the pasta and help the sauce emulsify. Once it's cooked to our
desired degree of doneness, we're gonna season to taste with freshly ground black pepper. And hold off on the salt 'cause first we're gonna kill
the heat and add the cheese. Mixing with great rigor and adding splashes of
pasta water as necessary until the sauce lightens in
color and becomes almost creamy. If you got hunks of unmelted
cheese, don't worry about it. Just place the pan directly
over the simmering water and use the residual heat to
take it the rest of the way. Now you can season to
taste with kosher salt. And once you've fished
out the spicy pepper, this guy's ready to pile
into a shallow bowl. Twist it into nests using a carving fork for food styling purposes. Garnish with extra cheese, a little sprinkle of salt and some pepper. Why not? And there you have
it, traditional amatriciana. I really hope I don't get
in trouble for saying that. Now, the newest addition to our staff and associate producer named Nico has professed this to be his
very favorite pasta dish. So I wanted to get his take. He's not here to record
voiceover at the moment, but he told me that it was really good, but not spicy enough. So let's see if we can
make it gooder and spicier. First thing we gotta do,
as you might have guessed, is make our own pasta. I'm starting with 10 to 12
ounces of semolina flour, dumping that onto the table, and forming it into a very wide volcano into which I'm going to deposit
six ounces of beaten eggs. Using a fork to start beating together the eggs and the flour, trying to keep the
walls from tumbling down until I can incorporate
as much of the flour into the eggs as possible. But at a certain point, you're gonna have to
abandon the way of the fork in favor of the bench scraper and beginning to knead once
all the flour is hydrated. Now I said 10 to 12 ounces of flour, but you might wanna start with 10 because if the dough ends
up too wet, like mine did, it's much easier to add flour
than it is to add moisture during its five to seven
minutes of kneading by hand. Once the dough springs back
with enthusiasm when poked, we can wrap it in plastic wrap and let it rest for 20 minutes
before beginning to roll out. Now I have a tendency
to under-knead my dough because kneading is hard. So if your dough's feeling
a little too crumbly or rough around the edges, you can strengthen its gluten
network by laminating it, folding it over on itself like
a pamphlet and re-rolling, until it becomes smooth
and somewhat elastic. Bear in mind with semolina dough, it might be rough around the edges no matter how much you do this. So maybe only do this like three times max before rolling it out
to spaghetti thickness and passing it through your cutter. Now, under-kneaded pasta dough
is perfect for the extruder, the ultimate "I really care
about homemade pasta" accessory. The hopper in a pasta extruder beats the hell outta
little pieces of dough that you throw in there. So fully kneaded dough can
come out soft and sticky, but slightly under-kneaded
dough comes out just right. Activate spaghetti guillotine and thoroughly coat every
strand in extra semolina flour. You can't overdo this and doing
it extra thoroughly ensures that your little nests of
pasta won't stick together. You can cover and refrigerate
these guys for up to 24 hours. Any longer and the pasta's
gonna start to discolor and become gross. Now, for the sauce. In the movie, you could see
whole chunks of fresh tomato. So I got four large on-the-vine tomatoes into the bottoms of which
I'm going to cut a shallow X before dropping carefully
into some boiling water for about 15 seconds I said carefully, Andy.
Don't embarrass me. Once the shallow cuts
begin to split wide open, we're gonna plunge these guys
directly into an ice bath which is gonna make their
skins very easy to peel off, but leave their interiors uncooked. Once we're relieved of their skin, we're gonna quarter
and seed these suckers. Hang on to all those
interior seeds and juices and then chopping the tomatoes
into a medium rough dice. Making sure to press all those tomato guts through a fine mesh sieve to retain all that beautiful
tomato flavor sans seeds. Now for the meat, I'm
sticking with guanciale, but this time I'm cutting
it into very thin slices, ones that I think will be even
easier to eat with spaghetti. Then I'm gonna commit the
cardinal sin of adding onion. Which looked like it was visible
on the plate in the movie. Last up, for the spice factor, I've got some Calabrian chilies here. These things are having a moment right now and I'm very grateful for it because they taste really, really good. Once seeded and chopped,
we're ready to get started. Same procedure for the guanciale. But once all the fat is rendered out and it's nice and brown,
I'm scooping out the pork, draining it in some paper towels, and then in the resulting fat, sauteing my small half a chopped onion. About three minutes until it
starts taking on some color and softening. Then I'm adding my
chopped Calabrian chili, letting that saute for about 30 seconds. Taking off the heat if necessary 'cause guanciale fat smokes pretty easy. And then de-glazing the pan with two ounces of white
wine and another, dare I say, daring departure from the original recipe. Once that's almost entirely cooked off, I'm adding one cup of our chopped
tomatoes and their juices, along with an additional
six ounces of tomato puree. Cooking this guy once
again for about 10 minutes, but adding our fresh pasta
to the water right at the end because it only takes
about two minutes to cook. Cook your spaghetti to a state of al dente before adding straight to the sauce along with some pasta cooking water. I don't know why I'm still
using the slotted spoon. At this point, I'm committed to it. Tossing and cooking together minimally so as do not overcook the sketti. Then I'm gonna finish this guy with a good glug of high
quality Italian olive oil along with the requisite romano. Mix and emulsify those
into the sauce off-heat, and then it's ready to pile
proudly onto the plate. Put that carving for to
non-carving use once again. And just like in the movie, garnish with a big old spring of basil. And there you have it
non-traditional, from-scratch, and I hope movie-accurate
pasta all'amatriciana. If I didn't pronounce that right, I swear it's 'cause I have a cold. Now I might be biased, but
this stuff has a deeper, more complex flavor,
and to Nico's delight, it is significantly, but
not overwhelmingly spicy. And even though he tried to
abscond with the bowl of pasta, his boss was there to lend a helping hand. Now, just in case you're
watching this at 5:00 PM and Valentine's Day dinner is like now, I want to try making a quick
and easy one-pot amatriciana. We're starting with four ounces of some of that cubed pancetta that you see in the hotdog
section of the grocery store and sauteing for four to six minutes until it's beginning to crisp and brown. Then we're adding an eight
ounce can of crushed tomatoes. Making sure to scrape up any good stuff that's on the bottom of the pot. Adding a half teaspoon of
crushed red chili flakes and letting this guy
cook for about 10 minutes until liquid has reduced and the sauce is starting
to look a little dry. Then we're adding 12 ounces of water because that's roughly
how much is absorbed by a half pound of pasta. Immediately start to stir and shake it up so that it doesn't stick together. Cover in simmer over low
heat stirring frequently for a few minutes longer than the manufacturer's
specified cooking directions, adding water a quarter cup at a time if things start getting too dry. Then once the pasta is cooked al dente or to your preference, it's time to finish it same way as before. Add the ounce and a half of
grated pecorino romano cheese and another quarter cup of hot water if things start to get too gluey. And there you have it, one-pot
spaghetti all'amatriciana. The stuff only uses a few
simple key ingredients. It's on the table in less than 30 minutes and it still tastes really awesome. You could mix and match almost any aspect of these three recipes to
suit your taste or timeframe, and rediscover what you love about you without having to tour
the Italian countryside. And even this quick, easy,
non-traditional version got the Nico and Kendall
seals of approval. We've already eaten a lot of pasta today, but somehow this guy still ended
up in the Clean Plate Club. Thanks again, HelloFresh for
sponsoring today's episode. HelloFresh's pre-portioned
ingredients and recipe cards mean you get a homecooked dinner on the table quickly and easily. You can even customize select meals by swapping proteins or sides and choose the delivery
dates that work for you. They have options for
carb smart, vegetarian, family-friendly, and more. There's something for everyone. Go to hellofresh.com and use code "BABISH65" for
65% off, plus free shipping. The link is in the video description. (gentle music)
Eat Pray Love? I can do one of those.
the quick version is cool, wonder if that will make an appearance in future videos too
I didn't see the movie title portion of the video title and somehow still guessed correctly from the clip. Guess Julia was giving off Vibes. Love me some pasta with tomato and meat.