Date I made this
recipe: December 24, 2012 (Christmas
Eve)
Sicilian Cooking by Carmelo Sammarco
Published by: ARNONE Editore – Palermo
© 1998
Recipe:
Sicilian Pasta Timbale – p. 76
Well kids, it’s time once
again for Ann and Andy’s (Rockin’) Pasta Christmas Eve and this recipe and this
cookbook did not disappoint.
As is tradition in our
family, we make a pasta dish for Christmas Eve and although I used to stick
with my grandma/Aunt Rose’s recipe for pasta and sauce and meatballs, over the
years I’ve tried to branch out.
Naturally, my collection of Italian and Sicilian cookbooks is growing so
finding a book isn’t the problem; finding a recipe is a bit more challenging.
Many Italian and
Italian-American households prepare a traditional Christmas Eve feast of the
seven fishes but finding seafood of any kind in my little hometown was next to
impossible and so we didn’t go that route when I was a kid and I don’t go that
route now. But as I was talking with a
friend the other day about why the seafood feast became popular - the church
often forbid eating meat on Christmas Eve - I wondered out loud what my mother
made during those meatless years and horror upon horror, I had a recollection
of tuna casserole.
Now, this memory is fuzzy
so it may be that I am just making it all up but it wouldn’t surprise me if we
did indeed imbibe on that before Midnight Mass.
But as much as I love, and I mean love, tuna casserole (with peas, always
with peas), the thought of this being our Christmas Eve meal gave me pause as it
was just wrong, wrong I tell you, on so many levels.
Thankfully the church did
away with that rule a long time ago (I think--except for Lent – let’s not get
crazy out there) but that doesn’t matter to me because regardless, we make
something in this household that is Italian (or Sicilian) that involves pasta
and often – oh gasp – meat! (That said, Sicily
So anyway, I’m flipping
through several Italian and Sicilian books when I came to this book and this
recipe for timbale and that, as they say, was that. And unlike a “regular” timbale, like the one
featured in the movie, Big Night,
that contains a lot of ingredients, this one was fairly simple and on Christmas
Eve (and in general), I am all about simple.
If anything, the biggest
challenge was finding caciocavallo cheese as the few stores I visited didn’t
have it. But people, thanks to the
internet, I discovered that this cheese is similar to provolone and that is a
cheese that most grocery stores and specialty shops carry. After that, the biggest challenge was not
eating all the cheese that was supposed to go into the dish; when I was
younger, my cousins and I would ask for an extra ball of mozzarella when
grandma made pizza, one for us to nibble on and one for the pizza!
Now, running a close
second to this dish was the recipe for cannoli, an oh-so-yummy dessert that is
popular in Sicily
Now, in terms of this
recipe, my one complaint, and I always have one, is that the sauce probably
could have been a little bit thinner but it was hard to ascertain a consistency
from this recipe. I could also have used
a bit more sauce to make the center of the timbale more “creamy” but overall,
this wasn’t bad. And after trying to
figure out what “minced beef” meant, I finally split the difference and used
part ground beef that I browned and part cubed beef from my leftover roast
wrapped in Reynolds Wrap that I made the week before. If there’s a way to use leftovers, I am all
over it!
So here we go an easy
version of Timbale for your meat-laden Christmas Eve. Buon Appetito a Tutti! (Happy Eating to All!)
Sicilian Pasta Timbale – serving size not given but
I’d say easily 6
For the sauce
1 carrot
1 onion
2 celery stalks
12 oz tomato puree
Water
Olive oil
For the filling
1 carrot
1 onion
2 celery stalks
24 oz “minced beef” (I
used half ground beef, half leftover beef roast)
8 oz peas
Dash of white wine
6 oz tomato puree
6 oz fresh caciocavallo
cheese (or substitute provolone)
Olive oil and breadcrumbs
to coat the pan
1 eggplant (optional)
Salt and pepper
Water
For the pasta
1 pound Anelletti pasta
(basically, large ring pasta)
Start your sauce: in a
saucepan, sauté the chopped carrot, celery and onion in the oil, and add the
tomato puree. Dilute with water, correct
the salt, add a little pepper, then cook about 15 minutes. (Ann’s Note:
Nah, 15 minutes is way too short a time.
The vegetables will not be done.
Try ½ hour to 45 minutes.)
To make the filling: in a
separate saucepan, sauté the other chopped carrot, celery and onion in the oil,
add the minced beef and peas and cook until brown. Add a few dashes of wine and then the 12
ounces of tomato puree. Dilute with
enough water to form a dense filling, add salt and pepper and cook over a
moderate heat for about 20 minutes.
If using eggplant, dice it
and fry it in a little oil. Dice the
cheese. Oil a round banking dish and
coat with the breadcrumbs.
Boil the pasta in plenty
of salted water per directions. Drain
and mix with the sauce and if desired, with grated caciocavallo cheese. Put half the pasta mixed with the sauce in
the baking dish and form a shallow, but slightly hollowed layer; evenly
distribute the carrot mixture, the eggplant and the diced cheese. Cover with the other half of the pasta, and
drizzle a little oil over and sprinkle with breadcrumbs. Bake in a preheated 300F oven for about 15
minutes. Remove the timbale from the
oven, leave to cool a little and then turn out.
Ann’s Note: In order to avoid a kitchen disaster, I did
not “turn out” the timbale but rather scooped it out of the pan because what am
I, nuts? I can assure you it would not have
ended up like the beautiful timbale from the “unveiling” scene in Big Night. Stuff like that is best left to the (movie)
professionals.
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