Italian challenge: One from the vaults

[gominokouhai]

Here's one of my standards, already posted on my personal blog: Meatball Lasagne el Diablo! I've had actual live Italians tell me that it's not really Italian, but what the hell would they know. It's got pasta in it and that's good enough for me.

While we're on the subject, here's Jamie Oliver's pici con ragu, thoroughly trashed. The recipe for the latter was heavily adapted into the former.

I recently got hold of a Proper Italian recipe for marinara, so in my CFT this week I shall be giving that a stab. I'll post the results if I do.

Comments

[missdiane]

LOVE the video. I've never seen the point of making your own noodles when there's people with nice, large industrial machines and staff and huge commercial kitchens to do such things. The sauce might be worth it, though. It took a while but at least it was relatively low maintenance.

That said, I'm now tempted to go to Lucy's Ravioli Kitchen & Market in Princeton, NJ to get their Sunday deal of buy their homemade sauce and get a pound of fresh pasta for free...but then that's cheating in a food challenge community, isn't it? Phooey.

[gominokouhai]

There are so many things wrong with Jamie's sauce that I don't know where to start (and we had no idea how to list them all in a ten-minute film). There's no soffrito. He doesn't even brown the mince. The finished product was okay I suppose, but it was entirely bland and indistinguishable from stuff you can get out of a cheap jar. The version I make with peppers and chillies is far superior.

[norfolkian]

Can't believe he doesn't even brown the mince! Does he not know the basics of caramelisation?!

[gominokouhai]

Inorite? Maillard reactions are our friends.