Heyo!
I didn’t eat out much last week, so today is a recap of the pasta I made for my weekly/bi-weekly pasta pop-up operation that runs out of apartment.
I started selling pasta dinners during the pandemic as a means to stay sane and explore creativity in the kitchen again. I stopped for a year while I worked at Mythical, but since then I’ve kept it going because the A) the extra money is nice and B) cooking for people makes me feel whole. If I’m ever in a mental or emotional rut, selling pasta forces me to have social interaction. It’s a great way for me to stay connected, especially since I spend so much time in front of this dang computer.
While I don’t serve the absolute best pasta in Los Angeles, I do fill a niche. Orecchiette is my calling card, and I don’t see many restaurant serving it. Makes sense, because orecchiette is a pain in the ass to make. The price points for takeout pasta can be rather expensive, too, so keeping things $17 and under is super important for me. Pasta for the people, I say.
So anyway, it’s good to be back running food out to people’s cars again like a delicious drug deal in the street. I’m back on my bullshit, so to recap, here’s what I served yesterday:
Orecchiette and Mini Meatballs
My favorite type of pasta and meatballs hails from Abruzzo, a mountainous region of Italy where my Grandpa is from. It’s made with tiny, miniature meatballs that are boiled and tossed with tomato sauce. That’s right — tiny meatballs! Not the large, two-per-plate polpettes we’ve all grown to love here in the U.S. For me, the best pasta and meatball dish omits spaghetti altogether. It comes from Southern Italy, and it features marble-sized meatballs and orecchiette.
Orecchiette, which means “little ears,” is my favorite pasta shape. They are small yet formidable, and deliciously chewy in a way that only semolina-rich pasta can be (because of durum wheat’s high protein content). While they are the perfect pasta to accompany ragù due to their cup-like architecture, orecchiette becomes something else entirely when paired with similarly sized meatballs. The orecchiette can be scooped by the spoonful with the mini polpettes to be enjoyed simultaneously like a stew.
The Case for Smaller Meatballs
Like the laborious preparations of meals you get at a fancy restaurant, having all the ingredients be of the same size makes for a more streamlined sensory experience. Italian American spaghetti and meatballs, while a classic, is a bit clunky in comparison. You need a fork to saw off a piece of meatball, then you must twirl some spaghetti around it. The components tend to work against each other. Here, orecchiette and meatballs work as a team.
Rolling them is time-consuming, and therefore an arduous process, but this is a dish that will wow guests. And I think you’ll find the juice is worth the squeeze — er, the ball is worth the roll.
Malloreddus with Pesto and Fresh Ricotta
Malloreddus sounds like a Marvel villain or some powerful guy with an amulet. Try shaking your fist in the air and screaming Malloreddus!!! See, you get it. They look like gnocchi, but this is actually a semolina pasta. No potato. I use my same master dough for semolina flour (500 grams durum wheat, 300 grams tepid water) to make long little ropes like orecchiette, and then thumb them out over a gnocchi board. The process is surprisingly fast. If you watch the above video, I use a different recipe. Both work, but I’m a fan of all semolina dough now. The chewiness is out of this world.
And if you’re in to making your own ricotta/farmer’s cheese, here’s what I use:
2 cups whole milk (not ultra-pasteurized)
1 cup heavy cream
2 tablespoons lemon juice
a pinch of salt
Mix the milk and cream in a sauce pot, add a pinch of salt, and then bring the mixture to a boil over medium to medium high heat, stirring frequently. As soon as the cream and milk begin to froth, turn off the heat and add the lemon juice. Stir, and you’ll begin to see the curds separating. Let the pot sit for 20 minutes, then strain over a fine mesh sieve lined with cheesecloth. I let the the mixture cool, then sit in the fridge overnight uncovered to remove as much moisture as possible. It’ll taste sweet, creamy, and well, just like ricotta.
The reason I run pesto often is because I have a small ass stove with only four burners, and pesto is always best when it’s mixed off the stove in a large bowl. Simply place your pesto in a stainless steel bowl, add the cooked pasta, a little pasta water, and then begin stirring the pesto and pasta vigorously. Cooking pesto seems wrong to me; applying direct heat robs pesto of its fresh, herby qualities. It keeps a burner open for me, too, so for workflow reasons I have to do it.
Kabocha Squash Triangoli with Brown Butter, Sage, and Walnuts
For any beginners wanting to make stuffed pasta at home, might I recommend triangoli, which is a fancy Italian word for, ugh, triangles.
Triangoli have a fun, exciting shape that you don’t see all that often, and I love how easy they are to make. Here’s a great video for beginners:
The process simply involves rolling dough through a pasta machine and trimming off the ends, then folding each sheet into multiple squares, which then become triangles. No pasta stamp needed, although a fluted pastry cutter gets those crisp, jagged edges which always pop.
Kabocha squash is firmer and has a creamier texture to butternut. It goes great with spicy things, but also can be used interchangeably with butternut squash. Walnuts, sage, and brown butter isn’t reinventing the wheel, but sometimes home cooking is best. Los Angeles has tons of posh and exciting pasta to check out, so I figure simple and cheap fills a needed space. It’s why I have a base of loyal customers, too. Sometimes people want to feel comforted, not challenged.
Next week I’ll be doing spicy, oily cavatelli, and maybe a bolognese. If you’re in Los Angeles, follow me on Instagram for the deets, which always get released on Saturday.
Ciao, buttheads
Thanks for reading! I’m back covering food in Los Angeles this week. I’m going to Gorilla Pies, which specializes in Pittsburgh-style pizza, to write an article for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.
I’ll be back with a restaurant recommendation on Thursday’s edition of The Move. As always, subscribe if you haven’t, and tell your friends!