Ingredients

Serves 6-8

Sauce:
1 large, or 2 small, eggplant (aubergines)
1½ cups of jumbo green olives (stuffed or with stones – stuffed is easier)
1 heaped tablespoon of capers
70 mls olive oil
70 mls Masala (sweet fortified wine)

 

Pasta:
3 cups of Italian 00 pasta flour
4 eggs

 

Garnish:
½ cup chopped pistachio nuts (buy them with the shells on and remove the shells)

 

Equipment:
Pasta Machine
Rack to hang the pasta

 

Method

This is a dish I had in a restaurant in Sicily. Silky fresh pasta, combined with sweet eggplant and salty olives, covered in crunchy pistachio nuts.

Pasta:
Pile the flour onto a clean bench, make a well in the centre, and put the eggs in the well. With your fingers slowly incorporate the eggs into a circular motion. Take your time and incorporate the flour slowly, it will take about 5 minutes) so you only pick up as much as you need until you have a ball of dough. Once the dough is in a sticky ball you can need it in the flour and it will pick up more flour as it needs it. As you need the dough it will become firmer and stop sticking to our hands. Keep kneading the dough, without incorporating more flour (unless it becomes sticky again) until the ball of dough become smooth and elastic (about 10 minutes). Wrap the ball of dough in cling-film and let it stand while you make the sauce.

Put your biggest pot, filled with water, on the stove to cook the pasta. Salt the water.

Tear the olives lengthwise into quarters. Or, if you have olives with stones in, crush the olive, to remove the stone, and tear up the flesh. Rinse the capers (if they’ve been in brine). Slice the eggplant into thin ribbons.

Heat the oil and add the eggplant and stir, then add the olives and capers and turn down the heat. Let the sauce simmer away while you cut the pasta, if it looks dry add a splash of water.

Now you can knead the pasta another for a few minutes. Cut the dough into 4. Roll each quarter into a ball; flatten each ball to make it easier to go through the pasta machine. Roll the first ball through the machine on the widest setting. Fold it lengthwise in thirds - edge to middle. Run it through the machine again, still on the widest setting. The fold it again and run it through again. Now adjust the pasta machine to make it 1 click thinner. If the pasta is sticky give it a dusting of flour. Roll the pasta through again, each time adjusting the machine finer and finer. Hang the pasta sheet on your rack and check your sauce before repeating the steps with the other balls of dough.

When you’ve rolled all the pasta cut it into lengths, about the length of a piece of spaghetti. Then run the pasta through the wide cutter, hanging each handful of pasta on the rack so they don’t rest on top of each other - or they may stick together.

The water should be on a rolling boil. Put the pasta into the water and cook it for about 4 minutes (depending on how thick it is). The best way is to test it to make sure it’s “al dente”. Strain the cooked pasta. Add the Masala wine to the sauce and mix the sauce with the pasta. Put the pasta into a large serving bowl and sprinkle with the chopped pistachio nuts.