whine & dine

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I’ve made mention in the past of my tendency to shy away from tomato-based pasta sauces. And even though I do enjoy the occasional red meat sauce in my pasta bakes, I am almost pathologically incapable of saying ‘no’ to anything that even vaguely resembles mac & cheese.

So when I found this recipe, a couple of years ago, and in the thick of HK’s lovely winter to boot, it’s no wonder that I hopped straight into my car and sped all the way down to the grocery store. Effectively a lightish mac & cheese, only studded with miniature meatballs? It sounded divine.

Having had this recipe in my repertoire since then, and having tweaked it to my tastes in the many times I’ve made it since, I think I’ve finally settled on a few changes that make this my idea of perfection in a pasta bake. I love lamb meatballs, since the slightly gamier meat lends a depth of flavour that would take all manner of additional herbs and spices to approximate (and then still come up short), but since quite a lot of my friends aren’t huge fans of lamb or mutton, I normally do a 2:3 mix of lamb and either veal or pork in my meatballs. I also love a sprinkling of crushed red chilli flakes in the meatballs since they taste delicious when accented with a little heat, though if you’re not a fan of chilli then feel free to omit this completely.

And although Deb mentioned, when posting this recipe on Smitten Kitchen, that she could have done with “more bechamel, more cheese and more seasoning”, I actually ended up scaling back to less than Marcella Hazan’s original amount of sauce (though I did embrace Deb’s suggestion of adding in a little fresh mozzarella quite wholeheartedly). And it’s pretty darn delicious this way – every time I’ve made it for a different dinner guest, someone never fails to comment on how it seems a lot lighter and has a much less cloying mouthfeel than one would imagine when it first emerges from the oven and makes its delicious way over to the dinner table.

This pasta bake also makes for such delicious leftovers that I’ve completely given up on planning for this to serve more than 4 people, just so that I’ll have a couple of extra portions leftover for the next couple of days. It even makes a great bento lunch, since you just need to add a splash of milk or water, cover it, and microwave on high for 2-3 minutes (I’d recommend stirring it halfway through) before the pleasure is ready to be relived. Or, if – hypothetically speaking – you were to eat it straight from the fridge at 3 or 4am after a night out, it would probably – hypothetically – be just as delicious. But I wouldn’t know, since I’d never do something like that. :)

PS: Please excuse the slightly lousier-than-usual photos, I was all set to take photos of the cooking process, seeing as I had an extra pair of hands, and since I keep getting nagged by some people about how irregularly and infrequently I post, but realised – too late – that all of my camera batteries were completely flat. So I shot all of these with an iPhone 4S camera (mostly with a jury-rigged flash – my favourite way to do this is to scrim a second iPhone’s flashlight so that the lighting intensity and angles are adjustable – since I was indoors), and just resized and cropped them on my computer. If I remember (and if the batteries aren’t flat again) the next time I make this, I’ll see about replacing these photos with better ones then.

Mini Meatball Pasta Bake
Adapted from this SK recipe, which was in turn adapted from this Marcella Hazan one.

For the meatballs
2 slices white sandwich bread, crusts removed
50g full cream milk
500g minced meat (I like using a mixture of 200g minced lamb and 300g minced veal)
15g garlic, minced
5g flat-leaf parsley, finely chopped
30g parmegiano-reggiano, finely grated
1 large egg
3g salt
3g pepper
1g red pepper flakes (optional)
50g all-purpose flour
canola oil for frying

For the béchamel
60g butter
30g all-purpose flour
500ml full cream milk
pinch of salt
freshly ground black pepper
half a nutmeg

To assemble
500g dried pasta, preferably rigatoni
50g parmegiano-reggiano, finely grated
5g flat-leaf parsley, roughly chopped
50g full cream milk
1 100-150g ball of water-packed fresh mozzarella

Start by preparing the meatballs: place the two slices of sandwich bread in a shallow dish, pour the milk over. Let stand for 5 minutes, then squeeze the excess milk out, and transfer the soaked bread into a large mixing bowl. Add in the minced meat, garlic, parsley, cheese, egg, salt, pepper and chilli flakes (if using), and mix well with your hands, or a wooden spoon, kneading the mixture – sort of as you would bread dough – while you mix. This kneading action, along with the action of the salt on some of the proteins (namely myosin), will help to form that smooth, resilient texture that you want in sausages and meatballs.

Form meatballs, roughly the size of a raspberry (or, if you’re anal retentive like me, you can weigh out lumps of the meatball mixture in 7-8g blobs), and roll them tightly. I generally find that this bit of the process tends to go much faster and easier if you have a kitchen slave whose help you can enlist. Once all the meatballs are formed, roll them in the flour. Place the floured meatballs in a strainer and tap it smartly to shake off any excess flour.

Heat enough oil in a high-sided skillet to come about 1cm up the sides over medium-high heat. Once the oil is hot (you can use a meatball to test – it should bubble quite vigorously once it comes into contact with the oil), add in as many meatballs as will fit in a single layer without overcrowding. Cook until a deep golden brown crust forms, about 5-7 minutes, then transfer to a tray lined with paper towels with a slotted spoon. Repeat in as many batches as necessary (it usually takes me around 3 batches, using a 10.5″ cast iron skillet).

To make the béchamel: melt the butter over medium heat in a heavy-based saucepan. Once completely liquid, add in the flour, and mix well, using a whisk, until evenly combined. Continue to cook until the roux starts to smell slightly nutty, but before it browns, around 3-5 minutes. You just want to get rid of that floury taste. Reduce the heat to low.

Whisking continuously, add in the milk, a few tablespoons at a time, ensuring that the milk is fully absorbed by the roux between additions, and scraping the sides down. Once the mixture starts to resemble mashed potatoes, you can add in the milk in larger amounts at a time, always stirring steadily to attain a homogenous mixture. Once all of the milk has been incorporated, add a pinch of salt, a few twists of black pepper, and grate in the nutmeg, and cook, stirring frequently, until it thickens to the consistency of a thick cream.

To assemble: preheat the oven to 200ºC, and set the rack in the upper third of your oven. Cook the pasta in plenty of salted boiling water according to the manufacturer’s instructions, or until al denté. Drain, and immediately combine 2/3 of the béchamel, half the parmegiano, the meatballs, parsley, and extra milk. Gently fold together to combine. Tip the mixture into a 9×13″ casserole dish, levelling it off, and tear the mozzarella ball up, dotting it in and around the pasta. Spread the remainder of the bechamel on top, then evenly sprinkle the rest of the parmegiano over the béchamel.

Bake for about 20-25 minutes, or a golden brown crust forms on the top. Remove from the oven, allow to rest for about 5 minutes so the sauce sets a little, then serve whilst still hot.

Yield: Serves 6, and goes well with a fresh garden salad (make your dressing a little on the acidic side so as to help cut through the richness of the cream sauce)