Hi, I'm Patrizia Corradetti,
chef in the restaurant Zenobi in Abruzzo, Colonnella. This has been
a slow food tavern for more than 20 years and here we make
traditional dishes from Abruzzo. Today, I'll show you how to make the recipe for chitarra spaghetti with
meatballs, in the United States it's known as "spaghetti meatballs". For the meatballs we're using ground meat: half is veal and half is pork meat.
Pecorino, some Parmesan, pepper, nutmeg, salt. To make the sauce we're using
some tomato sauce, celery, carrots, onions, cloves, lean veal and pork meat,
veal and pork bones, lamb ribs. Eggs and flour to make the chitarra [spaghetti]. First
we make a mirepoix with celery, carrot and onion then we're browning the meat. Once the meat is browned,
we're adding tomato sauce. And then you'll need lots of patience because in order to make
this sauce, you'll need at least a couple of hours of work, then the sauce is ready. After
the sauce, we'll be making chitarra or maccheroncini, as it's called. Let's mix the eggs and flour. Let's make the fountain, add the eggs.
I'm adding a drop of oil as oil gives it that softness that is necessary. Let's gradually start kneading
by hand. Let's mix it all and make a mass. To make this dough smooth,
you'll need around 15/20 minutes. The most important tool
in this preparation is the maccaronara, also known in Italian as
chitarra [guitar] as it's made by threads where the fillo dough is placed
and cut using a rolling pin. The dough for the chitarra should be quite soft, as softness gives us more ease in the chitarra cutting.
For the meatballs, we'll need ground meat half pork, half veal, pepper, nutmeg, Pecorino, Parmesan and eggs.
We'll make a mixture by hand and then shape some small meatballs. To cook the meatballs,
get a pan with extra virgin olive oil, heat the oil up, add the meatballs and brown them well. Add some of the sauce that is ready
in a small pot. In this pot, we'll put the meatballs, then put them back
on the flame to flavor them. We have the sauce, we have the meatballs and
the chitarra ready. Let's get a pot with salted water. As soon as it starts to boil, let's throw
the chitarra in. While it cooks, let's put a pot with the sauce
on the flame. As soon as chitarra is done, I'm taking it out
and adding it in the pan. I'll mix it and serve it
as soon as it's done, adding on top of the chitarra dish
a nice spoonful of sauce with the meatballs. This is how we make chitarra with meatballs,
that is a great tasting dish here in Abruzzo. Try it at home and just eat it! Hi everyone, I'm Luciano Monosilio,
chef patron of the restaurant Luciano Cucina Italiana in Rome.
Today we're in Abruzzo, homeland of chitarrine with meatballs sauce.
I'll humbly try to replicate spaghetti meatballs with an Italian twist.
In this recipe, we'll need vine tomatoes, celery, carrot and onion, basil and a drizzle of oil. In this tray,
there's our vine tomatoes ready and cut in 4 seasoned with basil shred in chunks, celery, carrot and onion
coarsely cut, coarse salt and a drizzle of oil. Let's put everything in the oven at 200°C for 15 minutes.
Once the tomatoes are roasted, we'll blend them. We're leaving the tomatoes
in the oven and will start making our meatballs. We'll prepare them using one type of meat only, just beef,
some stale bread, celery, carrot and onion, fine salt, ground pepper and parsley, extra virgin olive oil, an egg, milk, so we'll use a specific part of the beef,
the brisket, which is a part of the beef meat that contains the right balance
of lean part and fat part. This will compensate the flavor and
consistencies of the meat during the cooking. Let's put the meat in a big container. Let's take some stale bread and cut it into quite coarse cubes and soak it for 15 minutes into whole milk. Let's leave our bread to soak
and proceed with the meatballs mixture. So, let's add chopped onion. Unlike the traditional recipe,
we'll add it raw. Celery and carrot. Let's add fine salt and ground pepper, abundantly, obviously. Let's take our green parsley
and chop it very finely up. Once it's chopped,
we're adding it to our mixture and start working our mixture
with very clean hands. Let's knead. This kneading phase
is very important, because we're making the whole mixture homogeneous.
So, let's mix very well both the lean and fat parts of the meat together with all of the vegetables. As you
can see, the meat gets a different consistency Let's add an egg, breaking it. Once we break the egg,
it's very important to wash your hands. We can also make a procedure even before,
washing the eggs before putting them in the fridge. Let's start mixing the egg with the meat. The dough should be very soft.
In this phase, it's very important to crush everything well, maybe using
the knuckles, so that the egg is combined completely with the meat. Once you get this consistency, we'll add the bread
soaked in milk. Let's squeeze it completely as we don't need more liquid, we just need the soft inside of the bread, that'll give
a light softness to the inside of the meatballs mixture. So, let's oil our soaked bread and again, mix it until done. Our mixture is ready. Let's make one big meatball only, cover it with film
and let it rest in the fridge for 15 minutes. Let's take our tomatoes out of the oven. They're nice and roasted, as you can see.
We're blending them whole, as they are. Baking them in the oven, we're basically reducing the water part inside the
tomato. We'll get a very important umami part. At this point, we're adding fresh basil and extra virgin olive oil. Let's blend it once again. As you can see, once it's blended the mixture
is smooth and homogeneous, it's light in color as it emulsified with oil, so we have
a very bright red color, it's a coral red. Let's pour our sauce in a pot. Once the sauce is in the pot, let's add half the weight
of the tomato in water. For example, if we have 200 gr tomato sauce, we'll add
100 gr of water. So, let's add the water and start our flame.
Let's cover our sauce with a lid. Obviously the flame will be initially very low.
The sauce is done, the water for pasta is boiling, let's take our mixture
for the meatballs from the fridge. Let's remove the film
and start rolling our meatballs. We'll make a meatball
with the palm of our hand. As you can see from the mixture it's nice and homogeneous,
so the meatball will be completely smooth and firm. It's very, very important for the
meatball to be firm, otherwise when cooking it will tend to flake and break.
As you can notice in the video, there's still some quite coarse
pieces. We cut carrots, celery and onion and the soaked bread itself quite coarsely, as it will give us some
consistencies as we will eat the meatball. Our sauce is boiling a lot. Let's lower the flame on our sauce
and start adding the meatballs in the sauce. As you can notice,
meatballs aren't rolled in flour, nor browned in oil.
They're just added plain as they are in our tomato sauce. Something important
I always mention is that meatballs inside the pan or pot or whatever
need to be well apart from each other. Wide set, as this will allow
an homogeneous cooking for the meatballs. Let's move our meatballs lightly,
with a circular motion, and cover it again. Once we start cooking our meatballs and
the water is boiling, let's throw our spaghetti in. Regarding salt, it's not important. We can
also add it later, once we throw the pasta in. Let's check our meatballs. Let's lower the flame once again,
and with the help of a skimmer let's take our meatballs out, draining them
well, as at this point our meatballs will be well cooked and
the tomato sauce will finish reducing. Once we take out all the meatballs
and the sauce is well reduced we'll strain our pasta. Let's remove it
from the water slightly earlier. Let's take the tomato sauce and add it on top of
our spaghetti. As you can see, I'm generous with the sauce, as spaghetti
didn't finish cooking and will briefly cook as a risotto inside the tomato sauce of the meatballs, so that the tomato sauce,
beside being flavored from the meatballs will also be enhanced
from the starches in the pasta. Let's add some more sauce. As you can hear, the noise
is very important in the thickening. Obviously, being from Lazio, I'm also adding Pecorino when thickening. Let it stand. Let's now add
the meatballs in our sauce again heating it up again, keeping the flame low. The recipe is ready,
we're just left with the plating! So, let's start from our spaghetti,
thickened in the meatballs sauce a nice roll,
as you can see I created a nice nest. Meatballs, slightly warmed up on the flame. As you notice,
it's not a scant dish but a very generous one as a homage to our American friends. Let's finish
with a sprinkle of Roman Pecorino and here it is, done!
My homage to spaghetti meatballs!
