Prep Time: 60 minutes
Cook Time: 35 minutes
Ingredients:
- 1 1/3 pounds (600 g) fresh egg pasta, in sheets or cannelloni (manicotti) shells
- 10 ounces (250 g) ricotta
- 8 ounces (200 g) robiola, a mild soft cheese that's slightly tarter in flavor
- 1 pound (500 g) mixed greens (collard, arugola and the like)
- An egg
- A grating of fresh nutmeg (remember, a little goes a long way)
- 1/2 cup (30 g) freshly grated Parmigiano
- 4 ounces (100 g) nutmeats, half chopped and the other half whole
- 1 3/4 pounds (750 g) tomato pulp (canned or bottled will be fine)
- 3 scallions
- 2 basil leaves, minced
- Olive oil
- Sprigs of thyme and marjoram
- Butter
- Salt to taste
Preparation:
Clean the scallions, mince them, and sauté them in a quarter cup of oil; when they become translucent add the tomato and the basil and cook over a medium flame for about 15 minutes.Pick over the greens, wash them well, and steam them until tender. Drain them, squeeze most of the moisture out, mince them, and combine them with the soft cheeses (not the Parmigiano), the egg, the chopped nuts, and the nutmeg. Check seasoning and put the mixture into the refrigerator.
Blanch the sheets of pasta in salted water for a few seconds (use a broad strainer to remove them from the water) and put them on a damp cloth. Butter a round high sided 8-inch (20 cm) diameter mold, line it with oven paper that you've wet and squeezed dry, and then with about a third of the pasta, making sure that the sheets extend up past the rim of the mold. Spread a ladle of sauce over the bottom of the mold.
Preheat your oven to 360 F (180 C).
Cut the remaining sheets of pasta into 4x5-inch (10x12 cm) squares; put a sausage (for want of a better term) of the cheese mixture down one side of the first rectangle and roll it up to make the first cannellone; and continue with the next sheet, dolling out the filling so you finish the filling and the sheets simultaneously. As you make the cannelloni, put them into the mold, and when you finish each layer ladle some sauce over it and dust the layer with Parmigiano. When you finish making cannelloni, ladle the last of the sauce over them and then fold the pasta that extended over the edge of the mold over the cannelloni so as to seal the timballo.
Brush the surface of the timballo with olive oil, dust it with grated Parmigiano, and bake it for about 35 minutes. Let it cool, and unmold with the oven paper, which you will then want to peel away and discard. Garnish it with the thyme and marjoram, and serve it, using a pie cutter to transfer the slices to your plates without breaking them.
Yield: 8 servings manicotti casserole.
