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00:00After 25 years as a chef, cooking is still my passion.
00:05Lifting a lid, look at that.
00:08I'm constantly exploring new ways to reinvent the classics.
00:12Come on, this is Christmas in a cup.
00:15But the secret to an Italian dish
00:17always starts with the best produce.
00:20The one and only prosciutto di parma.
00:22In this series, I'm going to share my key ingredients
00:25to quintessential Italian cooking.
00:27This is the part where I get really excited.
00:30And of course, I'll show you how to make those ingredients shine
00:34with some creative and delicious recipes
00:36that will take your Italian cooking to the next level.
00:40So please stay tuned, sit, relax, and let me do the cooking.
00:49Buongiorno and welcome back to Luca's Key Ingredient.
00:53Today's Key Ingredient is one of my favorites,
00:55these beautiful amaretti biscuits.
00:58They're very, very famous in Italy,
01:00and I'm sure everybody's familiar with them.
01:02They taste delicious.
01:02They have a very unique flavor profile,
01:04and they are very versatile.
01:06The Lazzaroni family has been making these since the 1700s.
01:11So I've got three recipes.
01:12We're going to get started with an amazing pasta dish,
01:14which is filled with amaretti biscuits, of course.
01:17We're going to move to a classic pumpkin and amaretti risotto,
01:20and then we're going to wrap it up with a beautiful roasted
01:22peaches dessert with amaretti and dark chocolate.
01:25Stay tuned. Don't go anywhere.
01:28To get started this recipe, we simply need to make our fresh pasta dough.
01:33Very simple. Double of flour, as you would normally do.
01:36What I like to do in this recipe, I want to create a bit of a stronger gluten structure.
01:40So I'm adding some semolina flour, higher in protein level.
01:43And when I make some ravioli that have a filling inside,
01:46is actually quite good for me to reinforce the structure of the pasta dough,
01:51just to make sure that the filling is going to retain within the pasta without it breaking.
01:56And then I'm going in with one whole egg.
01:59The other one, I'm just going to concentrate on the egg yolk.
02:03If it doesn't really come together, I can add a little bit of the egg white,
02:07but otherwise, I'm just going to stick with that quantity of eggs.
02:10Straight in the middle, I'm going to break this up.
02:13A pinch of salt in the eggs and a little drizzle of extra virgin olive oil.
02:18That's it.
02:19As soon as I see that, you know, it's becoming kind of hard just to stir
02:22and allowing the egg to absorb all of this,
02:25I'm going to grab a little bit of flour, clean the fork.
02:30Okay.
02:31Now, changing hands.
02:33And as I see that it's all becoming a bit crumbly, like a short crust pastry,
02:37then I'm going to start making a bit of an effort in bringing this together.
02:44Okay.
02:45So the whole dough, the whole mix has come together.
02:48You're going to kind of leave a clean bowl, right?
02:50Something like that.
02:51Once this is out of the way, you move it onto your surface.
02:56And as you can tell, it's a bit of a dry dough.
02:58So you got to work a little bit harder.
03:00So now I'm just going to work the dough for a good five minutes
03:02until it becomes a little bit softer, nice and elastic.
03:04We put this to rest and we're moving on to our filling.
03:08Now, traditionally, casoncelli, the actual word comes from queso, meaning cheese.
03:14And the idea from the medieval time was to simply just utilize whatever you had in the pantry.
03:21And cheese is probably one of the biggest part.
03:23So that's where the actual names come from.
03:25I just got a fresh pork sausage, drizzle of extra virgin olive oil.
03:30So we're going to break down the pork sausage.
03:33I'm going to start already putting my beef.
03:36It's already cooked, so it doesn't really have to cook.
03:39Trying to shred it to break it even further.
03:42And then simply just breaking with a spoon the sausage.
03:46I'm going to go with a pinch of salt.
03:48I like to start adding ingredients while everything is warming up.
03:52Sultana's is going to add a lovely sweet flavor profile and a lovely texture to the casoncelli.
03:58We have a little bit of parsley.
04:00It's going straight in as well.
04:02I thought to incorporate a little bit of amaretto liquor to the recipe.
04:07It's not in the original recipe, of course, but because the original recipe asked for amaretto biscuit,
04:11I thought that putting a little splash of this is going to go a long way.
04:15So move away from it.
04:17A bit of flame.
04:18Watch out for your eyebrow.
04:19Be careful.
04:20That's it.
04:21Show's over.
04:21The amaretto liquor really just brought up the smell of amaretto biscuits.
04:26So the sausage is being cooked through.
04:29The beef has already been sort of rewarmed and seasoned.
04:32And at this stage, we've got the meat component to my casoncelli.
04:37I'm going to go with a pinch of nutmeg.
04:39A pinch of cinnamon.
04:41Definitely needed for the original recipe.
04:43Putting that aside.
04:44At this stage, I want to lose a little bit of that temperature.
04:47So to speed it up, I'm going to go in with some freshly ground breadcrumb.
04:52Put this in.
04:53Fresh breadcrumb, as you can imagine, is going to start absorbing all the moisture from the sausage
04:57and combine really well with all the other ingredients.
05:00The temperature has definitely dropped.
05:02Yep.
05:03So I'm kind of safe.
05:05I know I'm not going to have scrambled eggs in here.
05:08I'm going to crack my egg.
05:10A whole egg goes in.
05:11That's it.
05:12This goes away.
05:13Back with my spoon.
05:14And I'm just starting mixing, mixing parmigiano reggiano.
05:19And before I keep mixing, ta-da!
05:21We got the amaretti biscuit.
05:23I'm going to grab a handful.
05:24I'm going to go for this big, large amaretto.
05:27So what's really beautiful, a lot of people don't know,
05:30amaretti are actually gluten-free.
05:32They're simply made from egg white sugar and apricot kernel.
05:36I think it's a bit of an interesting fact to learn.
05:38So I'm breaking this up, mixing through this beautiful mix.
05:42And I'm going to start rolling our pasta
05:43and make our casoncelli.
05:57So my pasta is ready to go.
06:00I run it until number six.
06:03The original recipe for casoncelli asks for a beautiful round ring.
06:08So what I'm going to do, I'm going to start making my discs of pasta.
06:13So just make as many, of course, as you need.
06:16So I've got plenty here for what I need to do here today.
06:19So let me just get all my beautiful discs out.
06:23So what we need to do, brush on only half of the pasta,
06:29because the other part needs to be dry to stick properly.
06:32If you do wet and wet on both sides, of course, it will slide away rather than sticking.
06:38Then you want to go with a decent amount of filling.
06:41Not too much, because you need to be able to close it properly.
06:43But I think this should be just enough.
06:45This next part is where it becomes important.
06:47So you grab the dry part, you just go all the way across, close it down,
06:53grab it on your hands, and then, you know, do the best you can to do a classic half moon
06:58shape.
06:59Okay, make sure all the air is out, because if that blows up during the cooking process,
07:03it might make this break.
07:05Then you fold it again a little bit, and you press gently with your thumb.
07:10Okay, and this is the traditional shape of a casoncelli.
07:25Okay, so I got the beautiful casoncelli.
07:28All it's left for me to do is having, of course, boiling water for our pasta action.
07:32I'm gonna add a little bit of salt to the water.
07:35Of course, that's what we do every single time when we cook our pasta.
07:39Plenty of salted water.
07:40Drop the pasta away from you, nice and gently.
07:43Okay, just a gentle boil. Get yourself a nice nonstick frying pan.
07:48Something you can really retain the heat really well when you do a dish like that.
07:51Now we're gonna add a nice piece of butter to my beautiful frying pan.
07:55And also, we're going in with pancetta.
07:59If you can make an effort and find proper Italian pancetta, it will definitely add a lot of value.
08:04Sage and butter, as you know, we're gonna make a bit of a burnt sage and butter with pancetta.
08:08It's gonna taste delicious.
08:09Okay, I can see the milk solid turning a little bit brown, so we created that burnt butter.
08:14The sage is crisping up. The smell is amazing.
08:17I'm gonna remove these to the heat, just quickly going over my casoncelli.
08:22Very gently picking this up.
08:25Careful, it's gonna splash.
08:26There you go.
08:28And actually, I'm gonna get a little bit of the cooking water with a spoon.
08:32Straighten it.
08:33I'm gonna go on top of the casoncelli with a little bit of parmigiano reggiano.
08:38Now I'm gonna pick them all up.
08:42You see they picked up all the beautiful colors from the burnt butter.
08:47Some of the pancetta still on it.
08:49There you go.
08:49I got five.
08:50I think this is plenty.
08:51But, of course, let's go and get some of the beautiful sage.
08:54I'm just gonna place this here almost as a garnish.
08:57Now, topping it up a little bit more with parmigiano reggiano.
09:02And technically, this is it.
09:04But, again, it is an amaretti biscuits episode.
09:07So, amaretti biscuits.
09:09And this is just part of the texture of the dish and had a lot of value with the sweetness
09:13and the nuttiness of the apricot kernel.
09:16Ladies and gentlemen, it did take me a little while,
09:19but we got this amazing, amazing casoncelli.
09:22It is a special recipe.
09:23Please do give this one a go because it tastes delicious.
09:32And now it's risotto time.
09:35I always get a little excited when we are doing risotto, always.
09:38So, we went from a pretty laborious recipe to something that is quite simple in my books.
09:44And a recipe that is very close to my heart because growing up, as I always say,
09:49there's always been a very strong influence of rice in my upbringing.
09:53Being from Milan, up north, and my dad is from an area which is nearby rice field.
09:58So, we really grow with a lot of risotto.
10:00So, we're gonna cook a delicious pumpkin risotto.
10:03One knob of butter to get the patty started.
10:05A good drizzle of extra virgin olive oil.
10:08Okay.
10:08And then, very next part is to add a little bit of onion.
10:12It's always a pinch of salt from the get-go.
10:15It helps for flavoring purposes, but mainly draws moisture out of our onion,
10:20make them go a little bit softer.
10:21We're gonna go in with our Carnaroli variety rice.
10:25Now, we're toasting our rice.
10:27So, we get a nice and stir through.
10:30We're gonna go in with a dash of white wine.
10:33When I hear the sizzle, so we're gonna allow that to evaporate.
10:38Then, I got some vegetable stock.
10:40It's gonna be a completely vegetarian dish.
10:42So, the alcohol has evaporated.
10:44And now, we're gently gonna start going in with our stock.
10:47Stock is just needed to sort of cover maybe by one centimeter the top of the rice.
10:53So, as long as we've got enough liquid, give it a very good stir.
10:57And let's just leave it alone.
10:58It doesn't really need anything else.
11:00We're gonna have a couple of bubbles coming up.
11:02Turn it down.
11:03If you're using non-stick cookware, of course, helps a lot during the cooking process.
11:08If not, just make sure to get a nice, heavy bottom pan.
11:10And I always suggest low and wide for risotto.
11:13So, we don't pile up the risotto on top of each other.
11:16I'm happy to go in with my chopped up pumpkin.
11:19So, I'm gonna go straight in.
11:22Okay.
11:23All of them in.
11:24Now, this is gonna lower the temperature a little bit of my pot.
11:28So, I'm gonna crank up the heat and I'm gonna get some help by adding further vegetable stock.
11:33So, I'm gonna wait for this to probably get to the 14th minute of cooking.
11:38And then I'll show you how we're gonna finish up this beautiful dish.
11:50So, with just about the 14th minute, most of the liquid is being absorbed.
11:54I topped it out with stock.
11:56And now, that's where my sauce comes into play.
11:59Like I say, this is something I love.
12:01You can definitely do this without the sauce, right?
12:03Just to make that clear.
12:04But the idea is that you add as little or as much as you want.
12:09And this kind of goes and reinforces the flavor of the pumpkin, obviously,
12:12and the Amorati biscuits because it's already in here.
12:14But because it's a ready-made sauce, it's already a cooked product.
12:18So, you don't really need to cook it any further than a couple of minutes to bring it up to
12:22warmth.
12:22We got the texture of the pumpkin, which, you know,
12:25they're slowly softening down and letting themselves go.
12:27But now, we got almost like a creaminess to the risotto.
12:31Okay, I'm ready to go with this.
12:33I'm gonna turn this off.
12:34There's still a fair amount of moisture, but I'm gonna buy some time.
12:37When you cook risotto at home for family and friends,
12:40quite often people always, you know, stress a bit
12:42because the rice might overcook or whatnot.
12:44Always slightly undercooked because risotto is meant to be nice and al dente.
12:48You know, we like pasta al dente.
12:49We like risotto al dente.
12:50I guess it's simply about texture, but if you don't really like it, you know,
12:54with that kind of bite, please be my guest and keep cooking it as long as you like.
12:58So, while we finish this up, it's nice and creamy.
13:01I got my sauce, the pumpkin.
13:03Now, unsalted butter goes in quite a bit.
13:05Don't be scared, but a nice good risotto requires a lot of butter and a lot of parmesan cheese as
13:11well.
13:11So, we got parmigiano reggiano, of course, in here.
13:14We're gonna give these a nice stir.
13:16And while we're stirring, what I'm gonna do, it is a pumpkin and amaretti risotto.
13:21So, I'm gonna start crumbling these beautiful little amaretti biscuits.
13:24And just to remind you again, when you're using amaretti biscuit,
13:28we're basically using apricot kernels.
13:30These are made with the original recipe of using apricot kernel and gives a very nutty,
13:35unique flavor profile to your risotto into a pasta dish.
13:39Honestly, I use them in anything.
13:40As long as I can find an excuse, I use my amaretti biscuits.
13:44So, a little bit through my risotto.
13:46As you can see, the risotto is thickening up.
13:49As I always do, a little bit because it's needed and a little bit to show off,
13:53we need to give it a very good whack and allow the starch of the rice to work really well
13:59with the ingredients.
14:00Alonda, which means wavy.
14:01This is exactly the perfect texture that your risotto should have.
14:05Nice and soft and runny.
14:07Traditionally, always served on a flat surface.
14:10Also, because you don't really want to have the grain of rice sitting at the bottom of a bowl
14:14with all the liquid and will be still kind of cooking,
14:16which is not really a good thing for risotto.
14:19Straight in the middle of the plate.
14:20Look how beautiful, soft and creamy.
14:22This is exactly how a risotto should look like.
14:26I chose a nice funky black plate.
14:27Tap the bottom.
14:29And I think you know you've done a good job.
14:32When you get to the point that the actual, let's say liquid being the stock,
14:37doesn't run away from the grain of rice.
14:39Now, what I want to do, these are so small and so cute.
14:43I'm just going to put a couple of them on top.
14:45And the idea is for, you know, you at home to crumble them and make a little bit of a
14:49mess.
14:50I will still crumble a little bit on top.
14:53I don't think it's ever enough to give a little bit of color, but of course as well flavor.
14:59If you've got some nice little herbs like I do, I always love to play with a little bit of
15:03this.
15:04I think it just makes your food and your risotto looks a little bit better.
15:07So I'm scattering around these beautiful green leaves.
15:11Last, for a little bit of shine, because I do love it on risotto as well, a little drizzle of
15:16extra virgin olive oil.
15:17Just a few drops.
15:18Ladies and gentlemen, here we have it.
15:20I really feel like I'm back home with mom and my granddad as well.
15:23Granddad used to cook this, not actually grandma.
15:25No, no, no.
15:26Nonno used to cook this one.
15:27It's the beautiful, delicious risotto with pumpkin and amaretti.
15:31I hope you're going to give this a crack because it's so, so easy as you just thought.
15:48On my last recipe, we're going to utilize the amaretti biscuits in a pretty obvious way.
15:53We're going to make a dessert.
15:54Very simple dessert, something that I've been making since probably I started cooking as well,
15:59because it's such a simple dessert.
16:02Actually, I find it hard to call it a dessert, but it's a great finisher.
16:05Probably a little bit healthier than maybe, you know, a very rich, fat dessert.
16:09Because we're using beautiful peaches, any stone fruit, to be honest, will work really well.
16:14But traditionally, in the region of Piedmont, north of Italy, this is how it's made.
16:20If you get yourself a melon baller, just simply start by removing the stone.
16:25There you go.
16:26And then we try to empty this by two-thirds of every peach.
16:31Then we'll get the filling ready for it.
16:37Last one done.
16:39So I've got peaches in here.
16:41I'm going to grab the peaches and move them onto a little oven tray.
16:45This stage, we're going in with our dark chocolate.
16:50Start mixing this up.
16:52Now, the key ingredient comes into play.
16:54Beautiful amaretti biscuits.
16:56And you can imagine, the peaches are quite sweet, but not overly sweet.
17:00So they're going to need a little bit of help,
17:02and the sugar content, the sweetness, will come from the amaretti biscuit.
17:06This should be more than sufficient for me to gently break, mix through,
17:11because then I'll still want to utilize the little tiny amaretti to go on top as a garnish.
17:16So leaving these quite coarse.
17:18They don't have to be, you know, broken up any further than that.
17:21Straight into my bowl.
17:24Okay, so I'm going to just mix this through.
17:26To allow everything to soften up even further, I've got a shot of amaretto.
17:31Like I said, this is the original amaretto that the Lazzaroni family has been making for a very long time.
17:37And it simply just tastes delicious and adds a lot of value to your dishes.
17:40Of course, the alcohol will evaporate during the cooking time, so you're not going to get anyone drunk at home.
17:46Okay, we got everything mixed up.
17:47And now, I mean, it is very, very simple.
17:51You just want to fill the peach back into the peach with the delicious amaretti and the dark chocolate.
17:58So they're going to go in the oven for about 20 minutes, half an hour,
18:01really depending on the size of the peach.
18:03Check them a little bit after 20 minutes and see how you go.
18:05Now that my peaches are cooking at 180 degrees in my beautiful smeg oven,
18:10I'm going to make a chocolate sauce.
18:12It will literally take no time for this cream to warm up.
18:16Non-stick frying pan is very important, something so simple.
18:19You really don't want to have either milk or cream getting stuck to your little frying pan
18:23when you're doing something like this.
18:24You got your boiling cream all in one go, no fear.
18:29And then I'm going to give it a bit of a stir.
18:31As you can see, this is happening in no time.
18:34Okay, next, I'm going to whip some cream.
18:37So all we're going to do now, I've got some very chilled cream, icing sugar, vanilla bean.
18:43What we're doing over here, put on a chopping board, get a sharp knife,
18:46go right in the middle of it, and then gently round your blade, do the best you can.
18:51Then the back of the knife, open it up a little bit,
18:55and then gently flatten the curvature of the vanilla bean,
18:59and just scrape off all the beautiful bean.
19:01Okay, this is what we're looking for.
19:04Lastly, grab this beautiful, funky mixer.
19:07You can do it by hand, obviously, but this one makes your life much, much easier.
19:10And I'm going to start from number one, and gradually I'm going to go all the way
19:14to speed number nine until this is nice and whipped.
19:17Set it up in a piping bag, and we're ready to go.
19:24And here's my peaches. They smell unbelievable, but I've let them set for a good 10 minutes,
19:30so they're warm. Look at the juices. Can you see the juices inside? Amazing.
19:35So you can just serve them while they're hot, and that's how I would normally do at home,
19:38but I want to make it a little bit more fancier, so I give them 10 minutes to cool down.
19:42I'm going to start by putting a little bit of whipped cream at the bottom of the plate,
19:46so this will help, obviously, the peach not to slide away.
19:50Help yourself with a little spatula or go with a spoon underneath.
19:53At this stage, they're quite soft, so be careful.
19:55Straight on top. The reason, obviously, why I want to let them cool is,
19:59otherwise, you know, this would be kind of useless to use a whipped cream
20:03on top of something very hot coming out of the oven.
20:05So a little bit of whipped cream to go and cover the top.
20:08Try and do the best you can.
20:10I'm not a pastry chef. Don't judge my piping skills.
20:15I'm going to grab more of my amarete biscuits, and because we've got this cute one,
20:20this very small size one, I'm going to put that right on top.
20:24Try to push them in a little bit on an angle.
20:27That's it. I did have a little bit of mint to make this a little bit pretty and cute.
20:33Last but not least, we've got the beautiful chocolate sauce that we made earlier.
20:38So I'm just going to try to go from the height, and just to go across like that,
20:41I'm going to dirty the plate.
20:44Make sure that a little bit of dark chocolate is seen on top of the whipped cream.
20:48Okay.
20:49And very, very last, I promise, and then I'll stop.
20:52A little bit of icing sugar to make it look even prettier.
20:55The episode with amarete biscuit, it's a wrap.
20:59I hope I was able to show you how versatile they can be.
21:02We started with those beautiful casoncelli bergamaschi from north of Italy,
21:07very traditional ravioli style where crumbled amarete goes into that meat mix and plenty more.
21:12We made our simple pumpkin and amarete risotto that really brings me back to my childhood every
21:17time I make it.
21:18Very simple.
21:18Please do give it a go at home.
21:20Then we finish off with these baked peaches with chocolate and amarete.
21:23I think really is a show stopper.
21:25It's so simple to make and so rewarding.
21:27Once you cut through, you get to see the layer, the texture, this flavor.
21:31It smells amazing.
21:32Guys, get some amarete and get cooking.
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