Pancetta: The Final Product!

After over a month, my homemade pancetta was finally ready.  My first observation was that it seemed smaller since I first hung it up, but maybe that was my imagination.  Also, the outside had formed a fairly tough crust, which I cut off before cooking.  If you haven't already, go back and check the previous posts on how to cure the pancetta.  

 I started by cutting off the kitchen twine.  

 Notice the dark crust on the ends of the meat that I mentioned earlier.  

 When I cut into the pancetta, it looked exactly like it was supposed to.  The inside was firm but still malleable, and the fat almost melted in your hand.  

 Just for fun, I also bought some pancetta from a butcher in the area.  The first thing I noticed was that theirs had a good deal more fat compared to lean meat than mine did.  

 Also, when I fried them up, I thought mine was a touch too salty.  However, I easily fixed this by soaking the diced pork in cold water for about 45 minutes before I cooked it.  

 You can either cook it diced like this or sliced it into thin rounds, and cook it more like bacon.  

 Cook it in a frying pan over medium to medium high heat until crisp.  

 You don't need to add any oil to the pan.  There'll be plenty of fat that renders from the pancetta.  

And there you go!  I really hope you try this; the result was well worth it.  Also, it saves you a bunch of money.  I bought the 3 lb piece of pork belly for about 10 bucks, and I already had all the spices.  The only difficult thing to find was the pink salt, which I talked about in a previous post.  Anyway, pancetta usually costs at least 20 dollars per pound, so I'm guessing I made about 50-60 dollars worth of pancetta from only 15 dollars.  Pretty good, huh?  

Of course, you can use this in place of bacon for any recipe, or you can have it with fresh pasta, which is one of my favorites.  I'll be posting a recipe for pasta carbonara soon.  

Also, here are all the links to previous posts, so you can go back and see the whole process:

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Green Olive Pesto

You already saw me add this to the timpano, but I thought I'd make a full post about it.  Pesto doesn't always have to be made with just basil, pine nuts, parmesan, and olive oil.  You can use any herbs, cheeses, or nuts that you want or even a combination.  This pesto can be used any way that you would normally use pesto.  Also, I like this recipe because fresh basil tends to be expensive, especially out of season.

Ingredients
1 cup chopped green olives (this recipe doesn't need to be exact so don't bother measuring)
1/4 cup chopped nuts (I used a mix of almonds and walnuts)
1 orange
1 clove garlic
1/3 cup olive oil
1/4 cup chopped parsley
1 tsp butter
Several tbsp grated parmesan or pecorino
salt and pepper, obviously

 Start with the olives.  Don't use canned, it just won't taste as good.  To remove the pits, I smash them under a knife and then you can pull the pit out.  After all, they're going to get processed anyway so it doesn't matter if they look squashed.  

 Meanwhile, toast your nuts in a dry pan.  

 There are two ways to zest an orange: you can peel parts off with a vegetable peeler and then julienne it, or you can use a micro-plane, shown below.  I was feeling a little crazy, so I did both.  Also, use some of the juice.  I'd say about half of it for this recipe.  

 I didn't show it but I also roughly chopped my parsley.  

 Now you're ready for the food processor (or mortar and pestle if you have one).  Start with the nuts and olives, and pulse until coarsely ground.  Then add all the other ingredients except for the oil, and pulse a few times.  Next, slowly drizzle in the oil through the feed tube until emulsified.  

 This sauce is extremely versatile.  Have it with anything you like.  

Enjoy!

Up Next: Green Olive and Almond Pesto

Pancetta Update

I just thought I'd let you know that our pancetta experiment may be coming to an end soon!  It's been hanging in the basement for about 3 weeks now, and I plan on cooking some of it tonight.  I should have several pasta recipes up soon.

Timpano

Last weekend I was planning on cooking a lasagna but was inspired to try turning it into a timpano instead.  If you don't know already, timpano is an italian baked pasta dish.  It usually consists of many elements such as meatballs, spaghetti, various sauces, hard boiled eggs, and whatever else you can imagine all wrapped in dough which turns into a sort of crust in the oven.  The word actually comes from the italian for eardrum, because the shape of the finished dish is supposed to resemble a drum.  Anyway, this is by no means a traditional timpano; it's sort of a mix between a timpano and a lasagna (I used store bought noodles).  The other thing I should mention is this didn't turn out quite how I had hoped.  It tasted exactly how I hoped but it had some structural errors.  I think I used too much sauce and other liquid-y ingredients so when I tried to invert the dish the timpano fell apart, and I ended up scooping it onto the plate.  If you make it correctly, you should be able to cut the pasta as if you would cut a cake, and be able to see all the different layers.  Anyway, I took a lot of pictures so lets get to them.  

Finely dice some celery and onion for the meat sauce.  

Sautee the aromatics with some butter.  

Add any spices you want here: oregano, red pepper flakes, and cayenne would do nicely.  

Then add the ground beef and cook until brown.  

Next add a can of tomatoes and simmer until needed (at least 2 hours).  

For this timpano I used three sauces.  The second was a green olive/almond pesto which I will add a full post for shortly.  Here's the basic gist.  

Toast any types of nuts you want.  

Zest an orange.  

Process the olives, 1 bunch parsley, zest, nuts, and a little bit of butter (I know that sounds weird, just trust me).  Slowly drizzle in the olive oil.  

Lastly was the bechamel.  Did you know that bechamel sauce was named after the steward to King Louis XIV?  Anyway, start by melting some butter.  

Then add flour to make a roux.  

"Toast" the flour until the raw taste cooks off, then slowly pour in milk, whisking constantly.  I think using cold milk is fine but have heard others claim that you must use warm liquid to avoid lumps.  

The milk will only thicken after it comes to a simmer, so be patient.  Then add your cheeses.  

I only used some parmesan, but you could use any kind you wanted.  

Get a bowl of ice water ready.  

Boil the lasagna sheets- about 10 at a time.  I'd say you'll need about 30 sheets altogether.  

Only boil until flexible.  They still need to be very raw inside.  When cooked, transfer to the ice water to stop the cooking process.  

I lined the noodles up against the sides of a dutch oven.  The first layer is the bechamel.  

Then add a few slices of salami.  

Then add some more pasta sheets, more bechamel.  Then...

Add the pesto layer.  

Top with more grated parm.  

I think this was another layer of bechamel with cheese and salami.  

Finally do two or three layers of meat sauce (with pasta sheets in between obviously).  

For the last layer I added some ricotta cheese because I had it.  

Then tie all the ends together and "glue" them with some extra bechamel.  

The final step is to let it rest for a good 20-30 minutes.  Don't worry, it'll stay plenty hot.  Like I said, when I tried to invert it, I could tell it wasn't going to hold it's shape, so I had to turn it back right side up and scoop it out of the pot.  It tasted delicious!  I think next time I should just leave it in the form of a lasagna.  

By the way, I was inspired to make timpano by seeing this post in a blog I follow.  You can see what it should have turned out like.  

Also, I first heard about timpano from the film Big Night.  I've linked a few of the scenes from the movie below.  

Enjoy