Nettle rotolo with ricotta and wilted wild greens (nettles, mallow leaves, alexanders leaves, watercress, 3 cornered garlic).
A rotolo is one of the less common Italian pasta dishes. Rotolo literally translates as a coil or scroll and this dish uses pasta sheets with a filling which is rolled up like a swiss roll. The roll is then cut into slices, fried off in a pan and served with a sauce. In this case a wild pesto.
Ingredients:
Nettle rotolo:
320gr 00 pasta flour
½ tsp salt
1 whole egg
5 egg yolks
1tsp olive oil
1 tbsp Nettle puree
Rotolo filling:
Large basket of nettles, mallow leaves, alexanders leaves, sea beet, 3 cornered garlic
1 tbsp olive oil
Salt to taste
2 cloves garlic
1 1/2 tubs ricotta
Tsp chilli flakes
3 cornered garlic pesto:
50g 3 cornered garlic leaves
30g pine nuts, toasted
30g parmesan cheese, freshly grated
85ml olive oil
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
Method
Nettle puree: Blanch a handful of nettle tops in boiling water, remove to a food processor with a tbsp of the water and blitz until it forms a smooth puree.
Pasta: Work together all the pasta ingredients and the nettle puree in a large mixing bowl until it comes together into a rough dough.
Remove to a table top and knead until it’s really smooth and shiny.
Cover the dough in cling film and rest in a fridge for at least 1 hour.
Cut 1/8th of the dough and roll it flat with a rolling pin. Use a bit of flour if sticky. Then roll it through a pasta machine on the widest setting a few times. Then fold the dough in half and keep running it through the machine folding it in half each time before you put it through.
Now roll the pasta through each setting of the machine until you get to the thinnest and final setting.
Hang each final sheet of pasta over a pole or laundry drier or the back of a chair to dry for half an hour.
Now cook the pasta in sheets in a large pan of salted boiling water for 2 minutes.
Remove from the pan and lay the sheets flat, slightly overlapping each other, on a large piece of clingfilm. You will probably lay the rotolo two sheets wide and three sheets depth so you have one large rectangular pasta sheet.
Add the filling.
Filling:
Put olive oil into a large sauté pan and heat gently; Add chopped garlic for a minute. Add washed wild greens and wilt down until cooked (10 minutes), adding the coarser leaves first. Mix the wilted wild greens with the ricotta, salt, pepper and chilli flakes.
3 cornered garlic pesto: Put the 3 cornered garlic leaves, salt, pine nuts and parmesan into a food processor. With the food processor still running add the olive oil until you reach the desired consistency
To complete the Rotolo: Spread out the filling over the whole surface of the pasta sheets as if you were making sushi or a swiss roll.
Roll up the pasta into a roll like a swiss roll wrapping the clingfilm around the roll and using the clingfilm to make the roll tight and firm.
Leave in the fridge to chill for at least an hour, preferably half a day.
Remove from fridge, cut slices, fry the slices in oil in a hot pan until brown.
To Serve:
Lay three or four slices of fried rotolo on a plate, drizzle with the 3 cornered garlic pesto and serve with a wild winter salad.