Rigatoni Vesuvio
Don Alfonso 1890
Chef: Alfonso y Ernesto Iaccarino
Country: Italia
City: 80064 Sant’Agata sui due Golfi (Nápoles)
Address: Corso Sant’Agata,11
(+39) 0818780026donalfonso@syrene.it
This Iaccarino family recipe, one of the flagships of this legendary restaurant, fits entirely within the products and tastes of Italy. It is a recreation of a historic recipe that preserves all of the essence of the past, adapted to modern values. Even aesthetically, it remains academic—a timbale, inspired by the countryside in charismatic Vesuvio. The pasta, cooked masterfully, retains its identity in flavor and texture, even though it is served evenly and precisely imbued with its accompaniments. Among them the tomato sauce, a wonderful, succulent ragu whose liveliness stems from a myriad of ingredients. Other typical ingredients contribute to its magical exquisiteness: mozzarella and basil sauces, basil leaves and pork meatballs inside the timbale. A harmonious and wonderful succession of familiar flavors, each of them a part of the world of pasta and universally loved. It will be difficult—indeed, almost impossible—to express the region’s popular cultural heritage with such vitality.
The Recipe
Ingredients
- 260g rigatoni
- 50g peas
- 250 mozzarella
- 60g ground pork
- 30g bread, crust removed
- 6 cl milk
- 50 basil leaves
- 5 dl extra virgin olive oil
- 15g onion
- 300g tomato ragu (*)
- 2 eggs
- 10 g garlic
- pepper
- salt
Method
Make small meatballs with the ground pork, bread soaked in milk, one egg, the finely chopped garlic, salt and pepper. Brown them in extra virgin olive oil.
Blanch 40 basil leaves and grind them with some oil to make a basil sauce.
Warm 4 cl of milk, add 70g of finely sliced mozzarella and cook in a bain-marie to make a mozzarella sauce.
Sauté the peas with the previously browned onion; thinly slice the remaining 180g of mozzarella.
Boil the other egg in water for 7 minutes, allow to cool, then finely chop.
Cook the rigatoni for 3 minutes, giving them a creamy consistency by incorporating half of the ragu and half the basil.
In a tin container 8cm in diameter lined with plastic wrap, shape a timbal with the rigatoni, mozzarella slices, peas, chopped egg, small meatballs and basil (it is a good idea to place mozzarella in the base as well as the top of the timbal to hold the ensemble together).
Bake for 14 minutes in the oven at 160ºC.
Remove from the mold and position in a dish. Finish with the tomato ragu, mozzarella sauce, basil sauce, a few basil leaves and a ribbon of extra virgin olive oil.
(*)Tomato ragu
Ingredients
- 200g pork loin
- 200g pork chops
- 80 g bread (2 slices)
- 1 dl aged red wine vinegar
- 3 garlic cloves
- 20 g finely chopped parsley
- 40g pine nuts
- 40g raisins
- 50g onion
- 1 dl extra virgin olive oil
- 0.5 dl white wine
- 2kg San Marzano tomato sauce
Method
Prepare 4 pork chops along with the loin, which should be flattened to a thickness of 3mm and rolled up with the raisins, pine nuts, finely chopped garlic and parsley and a pinch of salt. Tie the rolls with fine butcher’s string.
Dip the bread slices in vinegar, lightly drain them and brown them in extra virgin olive oil. Remove them immediately from the pan.
In the same pan, brown the pork chops, the pork rolls and a whole onion, which should be removed as soon as it starts to turn golden. Deglaze with the white wine. Next, add the San Marzano tomato sauce and simmer at constant low heat for about 2 and 1/4 hours.
The hot bread slices are delicious. In the old days, we used to draw straws and even cheat to decide who would get them.