Pigeon Cottage Kitchen

I watched the Sicily episode of Rick Stein’s ‘Long Weekends’ programme quite some time ago and a lovely lady made this beautiful baked pasta ‘timballo’ for him on a rooftop kitchen in Palermo. I’ve always wanted to make it but there wasn’t a recipe for it in the book. Sometime later, I got Rachel Roddy’s ‘An A-Z of pasta’ for Christmas and there was a recipe in there for a timballo but not quite the same as the one in the Palermo programme. This is my version of the best of both those recipes and, dear readers, it was every bit as marvellous as I’d hoped. It looks like a lot of work to create the different components but, in practice, takes about just over an hour to prep if you’re organised and half an hour to bake plus 10 minutes resting time. For the finished standard of the dish it’s well worth the effort, especially if you have guests at the weekend! This is very lunch or supper-party worthy. Serve with a simple green salad on the side.

Ingredients

• 1 onion, peeled and finely diced
• 1 carrot, peeled and finely diced
• 1 stick of celery, trimmed and finely diced
• 8 tbsps olive oil
• 1 x 400g jar of Mutti passata
• A pinch of chilli flakes
• 1 small glass of Marsala wine
• 1 x 400g pack of veal mince (I used Waitrose Higher Welfare)
• 1 x 200g pack of sliced Fontina or Raclette cheese
• 1 x 500g pack of Rummo anelli Siciliana number 23 pasta hoops (available online from Amazon and Ocado)
• 1 large aubergine, chopped into 1cm cubes
• 120g Parmesan, finely grated
• 20g very cold butter
• 2 slices of good quality country-style bread made into fine breadcrumbs
• Salt and ground black pepper

To make…

• First, make the meat sauce. Heat 3 tbsps of the oil in a large pan and sauté the carrot, celery and onion gently on a medium heat for 20 minutes until soft and golden. Add the meat and brown. Add the Marsala wine and cook out for a few minutes. Add the passata, a pinch of salt and the chilli flakes. Simmer gently for about 40 minutes and then set aside.
• Meanwhile, prepare the baking tin. I use a round non-stick 23cm springform baking tin. Lightly butter the dish and dust carefully with breadcrumbs – about 2/3rds. Sprinkle the base with a little grated Parmesan. Set aside.
• Heat the rest of the oil in a wok or frying pan and fry the aubergine cubes until golden and brown. Set aside.
• Cook the anelli pasta for 3 minutes, as per the pack instructions, in a large pan of boiling salted water. Drain, reserve a little of the pasta water, and mix with the meat sauce, the aubergine and 2/3rds of the Parmesan. If it looks too thick, gently loosen with a little pasta water but not so it’s runny.
• Preheat the oven to 180C and start to assemble the timballo.
• Pour half the pasta mixture over the base of the baking dish. Layer the cheese slices over the pasta. Pour over the rest of the pasta. Give it a jiggle so it’s flat and even on top. Dust the surface with the rest of the breadcrumbs and the remaining Parmesan. Grate the cold butter evenly over the top.
• Place the baking dish on a metal tray and bake on the middle shelf of the oven for 30 minutes until the top has formed a golden crust. Remove from the oven and leave to stand for 10 minutes.
• To turn it out, cover with a round serving plate and invert. You should have a nice golden timballo like the one in the picture. Take it to the table and serve in generous slices with a crisp green salad on the side.

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