Homemade Tagliatelle Summer Truffles Recipe

Food + Beverage

Tagliatelle with Fresh Summer Truffles and Grilled Peppers Sauce is a perfect dish for summer. Andrea Tranchero, Executive Chef, Barilla Australia Pty Ltd, shared his recipe at HOFEX Hong Kong.

Tagliatelle, which means cut in Italian, is kind of traditional Italian pasta originating in the Emilia-Romagna and Marche regions of Italy.

The primary ingredients are four and egg. If you are going to make your own tagliatelle, the traditional ratio is one egg to 100 grams of flour.

Long and flat, they are similar to fettuccine and usually 6.5 to 10 millimeters, or 0.25 to 0.374 inches, wide.

Because of its rough and porous texture, tagliatelle goes well with thick red sauces such as Bolognese or other kinds of sauces made with beef, veal, pork, or even rabbit.

Vegetarian sauces made with breadcrumbs and nuts, eggs and cheese, and tomatoes and basil are also possible.

This recipe calls for a sauce made with garlic, grilled peppers, truffle sauce, truffle oil, and parsley. It is served with grated pecorino, a hard, salty Italian cheese made from ewe’s milk.

The dish was featured at a cooking demonstration by Andrea Tranchero, Executive Chef, Barilla Australia Pty Ltd.

The cooking demonstrations was sponsored by the Italian Trade Commission of Hong Kong during HOFEX 2017 at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre on 10 May 2017.

The cooking demonstration followed a very interesting talk by an Italian professor

on the health benefits of following a Mediterranean Diet.

Ingredients

• 750 Barilla egg tagliatelle
• 2 cloves chopped garlic
• 1 jar (1 kilogram) grilled pepper Valbona
• 2 jrs (500 grams) truffle sauce
• 1 bt truffle oil
• 1 bt Evoo extra virgin olive oil
• 1 b continental parsley
• 300 grams rock salt
• 300 grams Pecorino cheese, grated
• Salt and pepper to taste

Method

1. Bring water to a boil in a large pot
2. Once boiling, add rock salt – 7 grams per litre
3. Heat a good drizzle of extra virgin olive oil in a frying fan over medium heat, add garlic, and sauté until golden
4. Add Barilla Basilico sauce add simmer for 2 minutes
5. Drop Barilla pasta into the water and stir after 2 minutes
6. Heat the truffle sauce in a pot with a few ladles full of hot water
7. Drain the pasta one minute before the suggested time and toss it into the frying pan with the sauce
8. Finish with Pecorino cheese, truffle oil, and parsley
9. Serve on the plate with a spoon full of pepper sauce, the pasta, and finish with a fresh truffle.

Pasta Cooking Tips

Following the demonstration, I had a short chat with Chef Andrea, asking him his secrets for cooking perfect pasta.

• Al Dente – pasta should be cooked until it is firm to the bite and never overcooked. Pasta that is cooked al dente has a lower glycemic index.
• Salt – as with most chefs, Chef Andrea recommends adding salt to the water. Personally, I’ve never found this necessary.
• Not too much sauce, Chef Andrea recommends. Personally, I like LOTS of sauce with my pasta!
• After the pasta is cooked, transfer it into the pot with the sauce and mix them together for about two minutes.
• Finish the pasta with olive oil.

BTW, contrary to what you might think, it is NOT necessary and actually ill-advised to add oil to the water that pasta is cooked in as many amateur chefs think.

I actually saw Gordon Ramsey advocating the adding of olive oil to the water during a cooking tips clip I saw on BBC Live.

Not only did the celebrity chef add a large amount of olive oil to the water before throwing in the pasta, he added even more olive oil after removing the pasta from the water.

The rational is that the oil will keep the pasta from sticking together, but If you toss the oil into boiling water carefully, it should not stick together.

So what’s the problem with adding olive oil to the water? The very oil that is supposed to keep the pasta from sticking together will also prevent the pasta from absorbing the sauce.

If you want to add oil to the mixture, do it AFTER the pasta has been cooked and mixed with the sauce.

I have interviewed several Italian chefs over the years, and not one of them has ever recommended adding olive oil of the water before the pasta is put in.