(smooth jazz music) - Ladies and gentlemen
welcome to the Pasta Al Limone video recipe. In this video I'm going
to show you, step by step how to make this sensational pasta. Stay tuned because the
recipe is about to start. Hi and welcome to Vincenzo's Plate, the place where you learn how to cook delicious Italian recipes. Today I'm showing you how
to make this incredible easy pasta, Pasta Al Limone, lemon pasta. And we use four ingredients
to make this pasta, very simple, extra virgin olive oil, lemons, the main part of the dish, pecorino cheese or Parmesan,
I'm choosing pecorino and I'll tell you why, and mint. Oh yeah, I'm using mint, stay tuned because I'll explain to
you why I am using mint. Now lemon pasta is a
kind of dish that come from the south part of Italy, especially from the Amalfi Coast, famous for the lemons, the
tasty beautiful lemons, that's why Amalfi Coast
is famous for Limoncello, that's where it's from. Also Sicily, Sicily is the
biggest producer of lemons. So this pasta comes from
both Sicily and Amalfi Coast. We're just using organic lemons, this is the most important thing. Use organic lemons because
they can give you the flavor that you're looking for. What we're going to do for
this pasta is very simple. We're starting by boiling
the pasta in a large pot. I'm going to add a nice
handful of rock salt, rock salt, sea salt is
what is going to give the flavor to your pasta. What pasta do we use for this recipe? I'm using spaghetti, the
reason why I'm using spaghetti, or linguini, or any long pasta you like, but it needs to be dried. I'm using dry spaghetti,
you can use dry linguini, you can use anything dry but long because the dry pasta absorbs less sauce then an egg pasta. So if you're using tagliatelle,
papadeli, fettuccine, okay it can turn out good but
it will absorb the sauce more. And we'll start boiling the pasta, and this spaghetti takes about
10 to 12 minutes to cook. So the pasta is cooking, my
spaghetti takes 12 minutes to cook depends on the
brand you're buying. Always read the packet okay. Now we need to make the sauce,
and it's very, very simple. The original way it's made with
extra virgin olive oil okay. If you don't want to use
extra virgin olive oil use about four spoons,
tablespoons of butter but extra virgin olive oil
is the one you have to use. And pecorino cheese will
help to make the cream, the pecorino cheese and
the oil mixing together will create the cream
that you're looking for. You can use Parmesan. So I'm grating beautiful
pecorino, and just be generous. If you ask me the amount,
the more the better. You see how you go, depends
how much pasta you are using. But all I can say to you
is that you need to be very, very generous. And now I'm going to add the lemon zest so we need one entire lemon,
and again a good organic lemon and I'm going to add the
zest in the pecorino. So mix them together. Now this recipe, like I said
it's an authentic recipe from the southern part of Italy but because we live in
different part of the worlds including in Italy, not everywhere
you go the lemon is good. We need to work the recipe out, we need to do something
that will allow you, me to enjoy this recipe at it's best okay. The reason why I'm using
extra virgin olive oil because in the old days
they didn't use butter. So I'm using about four tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil. And as you can see I am not cooking the extra virgin olive
oil because we don't want to burn the lemons, the oil. I'm adding the lemon, and this is lemon rind. Now lemon and extra virgin olive oil are two bitter ingredients
so the lemon is bitter, especially if it is not
from Sorento or from Sicily. Extra virgin olive oil it is bitter so that's why you can use butter instead of extra virgin olive oil. But I am using extra
virgin olive oil because it's healthier, and I like it more. So how am I going to balance
the two bitter ingredients? What am I going to do? Well first we're adding pecorino cheese so that pecorino cheese
is going to take over. But I'm using mint, the mint
will give the right balance and it will take this
pasta to the next level. So we're gonna break it in there, with your hands of course. And as you can see I am not
cooking the olive oil yet. The pasta is boiling, and
it will be ready soon, very, very soon. And I'm just putting a
few leafs of mint okay. You are asking yourself
what am I going to do with a lemon, well you
need to get the juice from this lemon. So we're going to cut the lemon in half, we want to cut the lemon in half, and we want to add the lemon juice, in our beautiful mix of pecorino cheese, and lemon just like that. This is what's going to give the flavor to your pasta. One in there. And we are going to add
the other half of the lemon in the sauce okay. So here we have the
other half of the lemon, and it's gonna go in the pan with the beautiful extra virgin olive
oil and lemon zest, and mint. And if you're asking
yourself is it gonna be, it's gonna have a very strong
flavor of lemon, oh yeah. We're making lemon pasta,
and if you don't like the flavor of lemon in the pasta there's no point to make it. So now it's time to put the
pasta inside this saucepan. This is the moment where
the magic begins okay. So it's time to start warming up our extra virgin olive
oil but we want this to be extremely low, very, very low. My pasta is cooked and
is nice and al dente. Now we need to get the
pasta and we do want to have a little bit of water in there because the pasta water is the starch that will help us to create the cream. Remember we're making a
cream without using cream. So the starch plays an
important role in this recipe. All right so here we have it,
so here we have the pasta, I am mixing it together, already getting the flavors. Like I say it's cooking slowly. Now, it is the point
that we add the water, the pasta water in there
and I'm adding about four spoons I would say. Because this is gonna create
the cream that we need. Four spoons in there, and
here, let's mix it up, beautiful, oh my God, the smell. Okay, now we are going to add our sauce. So the pecorino and lemon. But we need to add a little
bit of pasta water in the mix. So I will say two spoons,
no more at this point okay. Can you see it's nice and creamy okay. Maybe a fork. So here we have our cream guys. Now I'm going to put this mix in there, and there we have it. And now it's time for
us to mix up properly. You can see how it's changing color. Now we need to put the
rest of the pecorino okay, and that's why I said be generous, it's why I said don't measure how much pecorino you use. The reason why you don't wanna measure it, or Parmesan sorry, is because
you need to see how you go, and it's personal. Some people like it more cheesy, some people like it less
cheesy, this is personal. But this is what's gonna
make the cream for us, and again I'm adding more mint, and now we toss it. Now I'm gonna make the
cream that you want to see, the beautiful creamy pasta without cream. Look at that. (smooth jazz music) Is it time to serve? Oh yeah, it's time to serve. I want to show you how
I like to serve it okay. So I get a spoon in there, get a fork, and that's how you do,
you do this so you get to get the whole pasta there see. Beautiful, nice, silky, look at that. Look at this pasta. Let's top is off with
the top of the tower. But how do you finish this dish, how do you finish this dish? Important, more pecorino cheese. Lemon zest. And we need to give a little
bit of color to our dish. So again I'm going to get the mint, it is a summery pasta,
but hey I wish it was summer every day. And here it is , how you
make delicious and easy Pasta Al Limone, the
pasta that everyone needs in their belly. Let me see, see is it
moist, it is moist enough. It's the way I want it to be. The lemon is coming out. Let me try it, do you want me to try it? Okay let's try it. Yes, even though I used an entire lemon, don't forget it's not
as strong as the lemon in Amalfi or Sicily, it's not too strong. I mixed it with the
right amount of pecorino, I would say 200 grams
which is about two cups. I cooked the pasta to
perfection, I have to say. I'm glad I didn't use
butter because the pecorino made this pasta creamy
enough, more then enough. And the mint, you don't really taste it because the other flavors
are way too strong, but it's there, it's
there, it's telling you, hey I'm making this pasta more delicate. I'm the delicate part of this pasta, I am what you were looking for,
and this is it, this is it. This is it, this is how you make the best lemon pasta on the planet. I am really, really, really enjoying this. All I can say to you
guys is have it, have it because it's incredible. So thank you for watching this episode, I will see you in the next
Vincenzo's Plate video recipe. (speaking in foreign language) Vincenzo's Plate. Oh my God, the Pasta al
Limone, you guys now know how to make Pasta Al Limone.
