Our pals at Rio Vista Olives sent us the incredible oil that we cook with in this post. Like everything that we recommend on our blog, we use and love their products, and hope that you will too!
The Story
Two of the clearest and most joyful memories that I have of my first visit to Italy, when I was four, are of me loudly pretending that I was being kidnapped as my dad tried to load me into the car across from the Colosseum, and sitting in the back seat of a cousin’s car as we hurtled through acres of olive trees in my nonna’s hometown of Melicuccà.
I’d grown up on olive oil, and loved it from a young age, so I was fascinated staring out of the window and seeing endless sloping fields of sagging nets, loaded with the olives that would be turned into that oil.
Extra virgin olive oil is still at the absolute centre of our cooking world. Not a day goes by without that familiar glug. And we truly include it as its own celebrated ingredient, not just as ‘an oil’ or something to fry other stuff in. It would therefore be an understatement to say that we were excited to receive a box of extra virgin olive oil from the lovely Rio Vista Olives. Little Al, who is currently exhibiting an enthusiastic interest in oil, was losing his mind as we unpacked them, manically yelling “oioioioioioi” (his word for “oil”) with each bottle. Fine, we were all yelling that, but he started it.
In short, this oil is incredible and Rio Vista are our kind of people. They love and care about what they make, they’re a family business, and their oil varieties read like a fine wine list. We might be a very different kind of operation, a long way away, but our passion and values are shared. So we read up, tried some oil, ate a lot of salumi, and took some notes. Introducing our current obsession, complete with entirely unqualified tasting notes.
Now, to the pasta. If there’s one person as mad about evoo as us, it’s my Ma (Little Al’s nonna). As a kid, she’d sneak out of bed to pinch a bit of bread and oil from the pantry, and she was the one that taught me to never compromise on that huge hit of oil that starts off most of our sauces (it’s the undisputed backbone of the dish). In these strange times, and living on opposite sides of the country to each other, I can’t remember the last time that I made you pasta, Ma; so this dish, with your favourite fried little fish, is dreamed up and cooked for you. Thank you for always having me by your side in the kitchen. We’ll share this together one day soon.
The Pasta
This week it’s a play on the traditional linguine-seafood pairing. We’ve turned two doughs into one pasta! Laminated together, we’ve got squid ink on one side, and lemon zest on the other. The subtle flavours of sea and citrus alongside each other are just meant to be. For the dough, the sauce, and the final plating, we’ve used Rio Vista Olives’ single variety Kalamata oil. It’s such a full, bright, impassioned flavour on its own that you’ll be sad to stir it into everything else (until you taste it shining through in the final dish).
The process to make this pasta is really the same as always, except that you’ll be forming two balls of dough (and you might want to give some extra thought to the surface that you work that squid ink on). After you’ve mixed, kneaded, rested, and rolled, take each sheet of pasta a little thinner than you want your final linguine to be (to around 6). Lay a sheet of one dough on top of a sheet of the other, crank that machine wide open again (2-3), and then step back up to a 5. Of course, if you’re working by hand, ignore all of that, and just keep rolling. Little Al and I also made a small batch entirely by hand to taste our oils with, and it was just as good!
To cut, lightly flour each sheet and fold it over itself, rolling away from you. Then chop it up to a width of about 4mm. This is the easiest method, but can result in slightly zigzagged edges. Alternatively, you can just free-hand long strips; this method is a bit tricker than with say our pappardelle, which is much wider, but you will be able to achieve straighter edges on your pasta.
The Sauce
We headed off to the markets to buy some whitebait, and were taken by these gorgeous, fresh and cleaned silver fish. They’re technically whitebait (referring to all immature edible fish), but in this case one particular variety, all cleaned up and marketed as silver fish. If you’ve never tried whitebait before, you’re missing out: they’re cheap, nutritious, delicious, and easy to cook.
Dredge them lightly but thoroughly in any left over pasta flour and then fry them up in that extra virgin olive oil. After 30 seconds or so, they should have turned white and begun to crumble. Remove them from the heat and then add the whole garlic and chillies.
I am mad about these yellow fefferoni chillies – they’re one of those flavours from my childhood – and I could have cried at the smell of all this when it hit the pan. In fact, we all cried a bit, and the rest of the family had to evacuate as the lower floor was enveloped by a cloud of stovetop pepper spray.
Next up is garum. This is a fascinating ingredient. It’s essentially Roman fish sauce (although may have been first used by the Greeks and Phoenicians as early as the 5th century BCE), rich in umami and fermented anchovy goodness. They were nuts about the stuff, and added it to all kinds of things, even wine and drinking water. Like its convergent food evolution cousins, garum was made by fermenting a mix of salted fish guts in the sun for a few months (the right amount of salt allowing a delicious flavour to develop with putrefaction). We’re splashing a touch of it in with our white wine to keep the sauce itself light, but add a little depth to the flavour.
Fun fact, while I was checking my sources I discovered that the gunky paste left behind from straining the liquid garum was called ‘allec’. So I almost share my name with a two and a half thousand year old stinky by-product of fermented fish innards. My brother’s going to love this.
Once that’s simmered for a bit, throw your cooked pasta in with the whitebait, a touch of pasta water, and a splash of lemon juice. Give it a toss, and then serve it up with finely chopped parsley, large salt crystals (we used Black Sea crystals coloured with vegetable carbon), and a crack of black pepper. Perfetto!
Love the things that you cook with, and the people that you cook for. Buon appetito!
– Al & Al.
Equipment
- Air tight container for resting
- Pasta roller and cutter (if not using a rolling pin and knife)
- Frypan
- Large pot for cooking pasta
Ingredients
Pasta
- 100 g 00 flour
- 100 g durum semolina flour
- 1 egg
- 1 egg yolk
- ½ tbsp olive oil extra virgin (we used Rio Vista Olives' single variety Kalamata)
- ½ tbsp squid ink
- Zest of one lemon
- ½ tbsp lemon juice
- Salt to add to pasta water
Sauce
- 100 g fresh whitebait/silver fish
- 1 tbsp 00 flour or whatever flour you might have left from making the pasta
- 3 tbsp olive oil+generous splash to serve extra virgin (we use Rio Vista Olives' single variety Kalamata)
- 5-6 cloves garlic peeled, left whole and lightly smashed under the side of a knife
- 2-4 fefferoni chillies whole
- 1/3 cup dry white wine
- 1/2 tsp garum substitute with fish sauce, or minced anchovy fillet
- 1 tbsp parsley very finely chopped
- ½ tsp large salt flakes here we are using Black Sea salt, coloured with vegetable carbon; if substituting with finer ground salt, ensure that you lessen the amount accordingly
- Crack of black pepper
Instructions
Pasta
- Mix the flours together, before dividing into two 100g amounts, each in its own mixing bowl. Alternatively, you can form two wells out of the flour on a flat kneading surface, but it will get messy once you start mixing in the squid ink.
- Combine the egg, egg yolk, and oil, whisking lightly. Pour half of this into one of the mixing bowls; retain the other half.
- Into the mixing bowl to which you’ve just introduced your wet ingredients, add the squid ink. Combine using a fork, until dough holds together as a ball.
- Knead vigorously for 10 minutes, then transfer to an airtight container away from direct sunlight or heat. Rest for 30 minutes.
- Add the other half of the egg and oil mix into the remaining bowl of flour, with the lemon zest and juice. Combine using a fork, until dough holds together as a ball.
- Transfer this second ball of dough to an airtight container away from direct sunlight or heat, and also rest for 30 minutes.
- To prepare your pasta for lamination, begin by rolling each dough individually through the thickest setting of the pasta machine a few times, folding over itself in between passes. This will aid in gluten development.
- Next, incrementally step both doughs through to a thickness of 6, or medium-thin. Cut into sheets of approximately 30cm as you go.
- Lay sheets of one dough type flat on a lightly floured surface; carefully lay sheets of the other dough on top of these.
- Drop the pasta machine down to a thicker setting of 2 or 3, and gradually pass the combined sheets back through, stepping up again to a medium-thin setting of 5.
- Use a knife to roll the pasta over itself and cut into strips of about 4mm wide, leave it flat on the table and cut it into strips freehand, or use a linguine or fettuccine machine cutter. Toss gently through a small amount of flour and transfer to baking paper lined trays. This pasta can be refrigerated uncovered for up to a week.
Sauce
- Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to the boil, on high heat.
- While water reaches the boil, heat 3 tbsp of olive oil in a medium sized frypan, on high heat. Dredge the whitebait in the flour, and then add to the pan, frying for 30 seconds or until the fish has turned white and begun to crumble. Remove fish from pan, and lower heat to medium.
- Add the crushed garlic cloves and whole chillies to the frypan and cook, stirring, for 3-4 minutes or until colour begins to develop. Add the white wine and garum, stir, and cook for a further 2-3 minutes.
- While the sauce reduces, drop the pasta into the boiling water and cook for 2-3 minutes, or until al dente. When you bite into the pasta it should be firm, but not show any white, raw dough in the centre. Once cooked, drain pasta, retaining half a cup of the pasta water.
- Return the frypan to high heat, and add the whitebait and pasta, with a generous splash of olive oil. Toss thoroughly, gradually adding pasta water (if required) until sauce and pasta are completely emulsified. Stir a squeeze of lemon juice in before removing from the heat.
- Serve with finely chopped parsley and a sprinkling of large salt flakes.
You inspired me to try working with squid ink! While I enjoy white bait it’s difficult to find in stores; I used crab. I enjoy your blog and it looks like you’re having a great time with your family! Thank you for the posts and lovely photos.
Hello! Thank you so much for your kind words, and I’m sorry that it’s taken me so long to see your comment. Very happy to hear that we’ve provided a little inspiration. All the best!