Pork sausage with beans - Fasûi cul musèt

Ingredients

1 Italian "Cotechino" pork sausage (approximately 800 grams)
200 gr. of white "Borlotti" beans (dry)
40 gr. of butter
1 onion
extra virgin olive oil
salt
pepper

Procedure

Let the beans soften overnight in a bowl of water.
Drain them and pour them ina flame resistant terra cotta cooking dish, cover them with cold water and cook them without the lid.
Sauté the onion in the butter and the olive oil, and add them to the beans, at this point half cooked. Add salt and pepper to taste. Cover the terra cotta cooking dish.
After rinsing the Cotechino sausage, puncture its skin a bit with a fork or a toothpick, cover it with cold water in a cassrole dish and cook over a medium flame.
When the Cotechino sausage is cooked, add its degreased cookig juices slowly into the same pot as the beans.
When the beans are finished cooking, add the peeled Cotechino sausage cut into slices approximately 1cm thick.
Wait 5 minutes allowing the flavours to mingle and then serve directly ina warm dish.

Recommended wine:

Cabernet Franc

Rice and turnip soup

Ingredients

500g of turnips
150g of rice
30g of butter
2 small potatoes, sliced into small cubes
1 white onion
1 clove of garlic
4 tablespoons of aged Montasio cheese, grated
3 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
2 litres of vegetable broth
parsley
salt

Procedure

Finely chop the onion and sautee it in butter, then add the potatoes, cooking them until lightly browned.
Cover with the vegetable broth.
Separately, blanch the thinly sliced turnips, rinse them and add them to the boiling soup, adding salt only if needed.
Cook the rice separately, drain it and then add it to the soup, cooking it for ten minutes.
5 minutes after the soup is cooked, drizzle the olive oil, add the grated Montasio cheese and chopped parsley to taste.
Allow the flavours to mingle another 5 minutes before serving.

Recommended wine:

Sovràn
Pinot Bianco
Malvasia Istriana

Barley and beans - Uardi e fasûi

Ingredients

200 grams of dry beans,
preferably “Borlotti” variety
100 grams of pearl barley
80 grams of salted (not sugar-
cured) bacon
1 onion
1 potato
1 stalk of celery
1 bay leaf
1 clove of garlic
extra virgin olive oil
sage
parsley
basil
rosemary
salt
pepper

Procedure

Soak the beans overnight in a bowl filled with hot water, a tablespoon of coarse salt and a tablespoon of sodium bicarbonate. After they have soaked, thoroughly rinse and drain the beans. Place the beans, chopped vegetables, spices, bacon, salt, pepper and oil into an ample pot which should be two-thirds filled with fresh, cold water.
Cook slowly for an hour and a half , then remove º of the beans passing them through a food mill, re-mixing afterwards into the pot (this will make the soup more dense).
Add the barley, which has already been washed and left to soften in tepid water for an hour. Cook the soup for nearly another two hours, stirring frequently.
Serve drizzled with extra virgin olive oil and fresh milled ground pepper.

Recommended wine:

Pinot Bianco
Sovràn

Potato Gnocchi - Gnocs di patatis

Ingredients

1 kilogram of peeled potatoes
200 grams of flour
50 grams of smoked ricotta cheese
100 grams of butter
salt

Procedure

Grate the raw potatoes in the flour and mix without adding water, adding salt to taste. This pasty mixture should then be dropped by the tablespoonful into boiling water until they are cooked into a type of dumpling.
Drain these “gnocchi” and dress with melted butter and grated smoked ricotta.

Recommended wine:

Sauvignon

Springtime Gnocchi

Ingredients

500 gr. potatoes
200 gr. extra fine white flour
100 gr. nettle sprouts
2 eggs
1 small white onion
1 bunch of basil
1/2 litre of Italian tomato sauce (without spices added)
3 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil
aged Montasio cheese cut into slivers
salt

Procedure

Cook the potatoes with their skins, possibly steamed. Skin them and pass them through a potato masher and spread them out on a pastry board. When they have cooled incorporate the flour, eggs, a little salt and the cleaned nettle sprouts, which have been boiled and cleaned.
Form each gnocchi to be 3 centimetres long gnocchi (see an instructive cookbook for non-Italian chefs if you don’t know how).
In the meanwhile prepare a sauce, first sautéing the chopped onions with a little oil, then adding the tomato sauce and basil (which should be removed before blending) and salt.
Cook for a few minutes, then put into a blender and blend until smooth. Drop the gnocchi into a pot of salted boiling water. They are ready when they float. Drain, and drizzle with olive oil.
Serve with the sauce and the shaved Montasio cheese.

Recommended wine:

Spaghetti with leaves from the “Catchfly” wildflower plant

Ingredients

500 grams of spaghetti
500 grams leaves of the
“Catchfly” wildflower plant
50 grams of scallions
extra virgin olive oil
grated aged Montasio cheese
salt

Procedure

Peel, wash and dry the Catchfly leaves, chopping them coarsely, them as well as the finely chopped scallions into the olive oil, resulting in a green.
Cook the spaghetti al dente in salted water and coat it, stirring in the green sauce, then sprinkle over the grated Montasio cheese.
A little hot red pepper, peperoncino, can also be sprinkled if liked.
Note:
The catchfly leaves have a delicate flavour and aroma and should never be adulterated by ingredients which are more pronounced, for example, tomato.

Recommended wine:

Pinot Bianco

Crab risotto

Ingredients

300 grams of short-grained
Italian rice, such as Arborio
2 crabs (grancevola , or spider
crab, preferable but not necessary)
1 clove of garlic
extra virgin olive oil
parsley
salt
pepper

Procedure

Wash and brush off the crab; place in boiling water (not more than 3/4 litre of water).
After 20 minutes, remove them from the water, which should be reserved for cooking the risotto. Open and clean the crabs.
In a high rimmed, ample skillet sauté the garlic in olive oil, then add half the crab pulp and all of the rice. Brown the rice lightly in the pan while stirring with a wooden spoon for about a minute, then add enough of the reserved water to cover the rice, which needs to cook very slowly, adding more liquid as it is absorbed.
The rice should be cooked until al dente, that is firm on the outside, soft but not mushy on the inside (Italians like their rice and their pasta much less cooked than anglo-saxons, try educating your palate… its worth it!).
During the final minutes of cooking add just a bit of salt and ground pepper, then spoon the rice onto a serving dish, spreading over the rest of the crab, ready to serve.

Recommended wine:

Pinot grigio > I Feudi

Pumpkin and ricotta gnocchi

Ingredients

1 kg ripe pumpkin pulp
100 g plain flour
100 g mature ricotta cheese
30 g butter
1 egg
salt

Procedure

Peel the pumpkin and remove the seeds. Cut into pieces and bake in a hot oven covered with foil. When cooked, rub through a sieve and return to the oven or a pan to absorb any excess water. When cool add the salt, egg and flour to obtain an even mixture. Using a spoon or icing bag, drop the mixture a little at any time into slightly salted boiling water. When the gnocchi rise to the surface, drain and serve with flakes of ricotta cheese and melted butter.

Recommended wine:

Pinot Bianco

Winter risotto

Ingredients

350 g rice
300g. yellow pumpkin
200g. fresh ricotta cheese
100g. smoked ricotta cheese
1l. stock
50 g. butter
1/2 onion
salt
pepper

Procedure

Cook the pulp of the pumpkin in a little salted water. When soft, mash with a fork.
In a separate pan, fry the chopped onion in the butter. add the rice and Sauté.
When the rice has changed colour, add the mashed pumpkin and the boiling stock, a little at a time, until tender. Before removing from the heat, add the fresh ricotta cheese and mix well. Serve with grated smoked ricotta cheese.

Recommended wine:

Merlot