Sundays Traditional Paccheri e Ricotta
The Sunday lunch time devouring feast has become a legendary part of folklore in the history of my small family and soon yours. Sundays usually would start like this, my mum would prepare and abundance of antipasto to start with and it usually would consist of grilled, fried, cured and pickled morsels. The centre plate would be full of grilled melenzane, prosciutto, formaggio, olives, carciofini fritti, melenzane al parmigiano, marinated mushrooms, balsamic and minted asparagus spears, grilled roasted capsicums thick sliced Italian Salsiccia, Salame or Pancetta and anchovy fillets marinated with a little garlic, chilli and parsley.
No one would sit at the table until my father or grandfather had sat and we would only start eating once everyone had gathered and ready. The antipasto was accompanied by as you normally do in a house where bread is God,one or two loaves of rustic sour dough. The antipasto would be the climatic rise toward the Maccheroni, Lasagne, Gnocchi, Pasta al Forno or whatever my mum had decided to prepare. Depending on who was invited or the occasion the Menu would accommodate palate and preference. Some members of my family would not necessarily eat what my father and I like hence my mum would cook a few different dishes to please everyone.
Once the antipasto was finished my mum would nod and my sisters, my wife or any one that had noticed, would get up and clear the empty antipasto platter and the empty plates. My father and I enjoy paccheri, extremely large tubular pasta that once cooked, even if al dente would flop and give you these amazing layers of sauced texture, we would garnish the paccheri with a large dollop of fresh Sheep’s ricotta cheese, grated parmigiano, freshly ground white pepper, a few torn leaves of basil and a drizzle of home-made extra virgin olive oil.
There was always a second choice of pasta that she would prepare and it would usually consist of Mafalde, Tagliatelle or Pappardelle with a rich meat ragout, the ragout would have cooked for 4 to 5 hours on the faintest of flames to draw all the flavour out from the Chunky cuts of meat, the Polpettone, the Cotenna and the braciolone. This meat would usually be the in between course as we would stop for 10 minutes or so, before we continued on.
The next course was usually the highlight as the tender rib-eye was grilled by my father and you were guaranteed the best medium rare steak that would melt in your mouth like butter, this course would usually be accompanied by garlic, chilli and parmigiano sautéed spinach, roasted potatoes and grilled minted zucchini. The following course was usually only enjoyed by father, myself and later brother in laws. Lightly fried whole fish seasoned with salt and pepper, usually accompanied by a salad of fresh crisp leaves with lemon and extra virgin olive oil.
Dessert was usually served later and would be accompanied by coffee, Limoncello or Amaro
