You’d know by now that Pasta et Al is all about mindful food. We source locally and seasonally, and buy all things grass-fed, free-range, unpackaged, and covered in soil. And when we’re not making pasta, we grow things, ferment things, jar things, and spend a lot of our time talking about things like permaculture, aquaponics, silvopasture, microbiomes, and the flow of energy through the biosphere. In fact, Little Al has recently (proudly) come up with his own nifty five-year old take on cellular respiration and photosynthesis that he loves to use in explanations of how much we need trees. We’re a little bunch of food-loving nerds.
For your average consumer, conscious eating is often limited to household practices of sustainability, and our visibility of and connection to broader supply chains usually ends at the grocer. This is why I’m so excited about regenerative agriculture, and particularly delighted to introduce our new friends at Dirty Clean Food.
The Story
Regenerative agriculture is a beautifully non-linear array of connections and cycles between growers, distributors, consumers and, importantly, communities working towards not only sustainability but regeneration. Sustainability is about not making things worse, but it’s also not going to undo damage done, or change the trajectory that we’re on. Regeneration, on the other hand, might just save the planet. And it tastes really good.
Excitingly (for a secret biology and ecology nerd), at its heart regen ag is about strengthening ecosystems and increasing biodiversity. This means topsoil regeneration, carbon sequestration, and strengthening of the water cycle. When it comes to growing, artificial disturbance of the soil is limited, nurturing the natural relationships between microbes, earth, and water. Similar restrictions on (or at least precision employment of) artificial inputs encourages the return of insects and animals, producing more robust and resilient ecosystems, that thrive with an accompanying emphasis on diversity of crops (and livestock where possible), ultimately costing less and producing healthier food.
And, of course, soil is a great big carbon sink. So look after the soil, draw down carbon emissions, and cool the Earth (that’s another of Little Al’s models).
Dirty Clean Food are the people connecting conscious consumers with conscious producers. It’s delicious food, regeneratively farmed, ethically produced, and local. We’re excited to be bringing you a few brand new Pasta et Al recipes over the next few months, focused exclusively on this good stuff.
The Ingredients
Every ingredient in our pasta dough this week comes courtesy of DCF. Eggs from happy chooks, olive oil from groves across our gorgeous south-west, salt from a pristine lake in the middle of nowhere, and stoneground flour from a family farm business down in the Great Southern. When stoneground, the three main parts of the grain are ground up together. The endosperm is softest, so ends up quite fine, but the bran and germ are tougher with larger pieces giving the pasta a delicious texture and flavour.
For meat, we’ve gone with beef intercostals and bone marrow (for a fantastic hit of flavour and healthy fat), and a tray of Italian sausages (pinched in the middle and twisted into smaller lengths, just like Zia used to do).
The passata this week comes from our very own Tomato Day, the bone broth is another family staple, and the basil has been lovingly grown out the back from seeds that my Ma salvaged from my Nonna’s garden.
You can read a little bit more about each of our main ingredients, and see where they come from, by clicking around the stars marked on this map!
The Pasta
The three meat ragù is a classic dish. Typically a mix of pork and beef (or veal), we’ve upped the richness by swapping out one third of the bulk for bone marrow. The result is a simple, velvety sauce, with some deliciously slow-cooked meat on the side. It pairs perfectly with the earthy goodness of stoneground pasta, hand cut for a rustic touch.
One of our more straightforward recipes, simply brown the meat, bust out a 15 minute soffritto, and then plonk everything in the pot for 4 hours. The boys are always in charge of basil.
We use Nonna’s old trick of keeping it at a gentle simmer with the lid cracked open by the wooden spoon handle.
To make the pasta, start with the usual flour well (wet ingredients in the middle) and form it into a shaggy ball. 10 minutes of kneading, and then 30 of resting sealed in cling wrap. You’ll notice that it’s firmer and responds differently to kneading compared to other flours. In general terms, this is because stoneground flour has a higher gluten strength than regular flour (and substantially more than 00 flour), as well as one of the highest protein percentages of all wheat flours. It’s still nice and easy to roll out and shape, although take care in giving it adequate hydration at the kneading stage – just run your hands under the tap if you find it tearing/being stubborn.
To cut into pappardelle, prepare sheets of about 30cm in length. I usually just eyeball it based on the length of my knife.
Cover these well with semolina, and stack them 4-5 sheets high. If they still feel a little soft or sticking, you can let them sit for 10 minutes or so to dry out a little.
For fettuccine, we often fold the short edges into the middle before cutting across (this allows you to slide a knife underneath and shake them all loose), but for pappardelle I prefer an S shape fold.
Once cut, separate the pieces and spread them out with a little extra semolina if necessary.
To plate up, either lift the meat out of the sauce and serve it on the side, or throw it in like a heathen, as we do. Heaps of pecorino and a crack of black pepper on top, and you’re good to go!
We hope you enjoy this deceptively hearty, thoroughly comforting little dish, and very best pasta wishes to you all. Buon appetito!
– Al, Al, and El.
Ingredients
- 1 + 2 tbsp olive oil extra virgin
- 500 g beef ribs intercostal, chopped into chunks
- 500 g Italian pork sausage pinched and twisted into half-sized sausages
- 500 g beef marrow bones
- 1 onion diced
- 4 cloves garlic sliced
- 700 ml passata
- 700 ml bone broth
- 1 handful basil leaves
- Salt and pepper to taste
- 400 g stoneground flour
- 4 eggs
- 1 tsp olive oil extra virgin
- 1/2 tsp salt
- Semolina to dust
Instructions
- Heat 1 tbsp of olive oil in a large enamel cast iron pot, over medium-high heat; brown all of the meat and then transfer out of the pot.
- Add the onion and garlic, with the remaining oil, and drop to a low heat. Cook for 15 minutes, stirring regularly until the onion starts to turn translucent.
- Pour in the passata and broth, using some of the broth to swill out any tomato left in the bottle. Return the meat to the pot, add in the basil, and season to taste.
- Raise the heat and bring the ragu to a boil, before returning to a low heat and partially covering (leave only a wooden spoon sized opening). Simmer for 4 hours, stirring occasionally; after a couple of hours, use a spoon to scrape the marrow out of the bones and stir it through the sauce.
- While the ragù cooks, make the pasta by forming a well out of the flour, and adding the eggs, olive oil, and salt into the centre. Use a fork or your fingers to gradually bring the dough together into a shaggy ball, and then knead vigorously for 10 minutes. If the dough seems too dry, add water 1-2 tsp at a time; if too wet and sticking to your hands and the bench, add flour at a similar rate. Seal in cling wrap and rest somewhere cool for 30 minutes.
- Chop the dough into four pieces, and then pass through a pasta machine. Begin at the thickest setting, rolling through a few times and folding over itself in between passes, before stepping through to a medium-thin thickness. Cut the sheets into lengths of around 30 cm, and stack in two piles, dusting with plenty of semolina as you go.
- Fold each stack into an S shape, and then use a sharp knife to cut into pappardelle. We've cut ours into about 35mm widths, which is four pieces on a regular width sheet of pasta.
- Toss gently to separate the pasta, adding more semolina if necessary, and then spread out on baking paper or a wooden board until ready to cook. If not eating immediately, refrigerate uncovered for 1-2 days, or freeze.
- To serve, discard the bones from the ragù, and lift out the chunks of meat and sausages.
- Drop the pasta into a large pot of salted boiling water and cook for 3-4 minutes, until still firm but cooked through (no white dough should be visible when the pasta is cut into). Lift out and drop directly into the sauce, stirring well to emuslify. If too dry or not sticking well, add a little pasta water as you stir.
- To plate traditionally, leave the meat as a side dish, or just go ahead and toss it all in like us. Cover with finely grated pecorino and a crack of black pepper.
