“Trofie with Pesto sauce” recipe – Trofie al pesto

Instructions

• 1.

  Putting the water to boil

  • Water - 5lt
  • One 6lt saucepan with lid

  Put the saucepan with 5lt of water to boil on a high power heat. Cover with the lid to speed up the process.
  

  Note about salt and water for pasta

  If you think you might forget to salt water before adding pasta, you can salt water right after putting it on heat. This can become a safe routine, but the commonly unknown result of this is that it will require a longer time to come to the boiling temperature of 100ºC. It would be better instead to wait for the boiling to start and then carefully add the salt. The addiction of salt at this stage causes a sudden increase of the temperature of the solution for a couple of seconds during which the water increases the bubbling and risks to pour out if the pan’s sides are not sufficiently high.

  So the right pan should be taller than its diameter and capacious enough to contain a good amount of water.

  The minimum ratio between water and pasta is 1lt every 100gr. Although, for small amount of pasta it’s better to use a fairly large and deep pan which will keep the water to temperature also after dropping the pasta in. So that’s why I prefer to use 5lt of water even just to cook a single portion of pasta.

  Another important detail of which to take care, is the right quantity of salt to add to the water. It depends on the quantity of salt the condiment for pasta is going to contain and the cooking time that pasta requires; not only on your personal taste.

  A normal dose of salt is 11-12gr per litre of water and it can be increased to a maximum of 14-15gr for those who like their food to be particularly savoury. When using ingredients which are already salty themselves, like bacon or ham, the dose can be lowered to a minimum of 9-10gr per litre of water, as well as when you know that you will bind pasta with a lot of its own cooking water.

  Keep also in mind that longer cooking time require smaller doses of salt whereas quicker cooking will need a larger dose.

• 2.

  Chopping the green beans and dicing the potatoes

  • Green beans - 150gr
  • Potatoes - 240gr
  • One paring knife
  • One chef knife
  • One chopping board
  • One potato peeler

  Thoroughly wash the green beans under running water, put them on the chopping board, a bunch at a time, and cut off their ends and discard them. then chop them into 2cm long pieces and set aside (step 2 - pic. A).
  Peel the potatoes, rinse them under running water, then dice them into 1,5cm thick cubes: too small pieces would fall apart while boiling (step 2 - pic. A).
  

• 3.

  Boiling the green beans and the potatoes

  • Salt - 50gr
  • The boiling water
  • The chopped green beans
  • The diced potatoes
  • One skimmer

  When the water boils vividly, add the 50gr of salt. Let the water boil again (it needs just a few seconds), then drop in the green beans and the potatoes (step 3 - pic. A).
  The water will stop boiling, the potatoes will drop on the bottom of the pan, the green beans will float along the pan’s side, so you will need to stir from time to time with a stainer. The water will take about 6 or 7 minutes to come to a vivid boiling again (step 1 - pic. A).
  

• 4.

  Boiling the trofie with the green beans and potatoes

  • The boiling water with green beans and potatoes
  • Freshly made Trofie* - 250gr
  • *as an alternative, you can have dry trofie, or linguine or even spaghetti
  • Water - 5lt
  • One skimmer
  • The pans lid (if needed)

  As soon as the water comes to a stable boiling, drop the trofie in and stir for a few seconds with a skimmer (step 4 - pic.).
  If you are using dry pasta, consider to drop in the pasta a couple of minutes earlier, so the vegetables will still maintain their texture.
  If needed, cover loosely with a lid and let the pasta cook for about 5 or 6 minutes if trofie are freshly made, otherwise follow the instructions on the packaging.
  Keep stirring with the skimmer from time to time.
  

• 5.

  Straining and binging the trofie

  • Pesto - 150gr (see recipe here)
  • The cooked trofie with green beens and potatoes
  • One large deep bowl
  • One wooden or silicone spatula
  • One large colander

  Put the pesto into a large deep bowl.
  Strain the trofie when perfectly “al dente” using a large colander, but do not let it dry out completely: it will need to keep some humidity for lightly loosening the pesto (step 5 - pic. A).
  Add the pasta and the vegetables to the pesto into the bowl and mix them evenly moving the spatula from the bottom to the top so the potatoes will no fall apart (step 5 - pic. B).
  Serve immediately.
  

  Note about the correct cooking point "al dente”
  

  “Al dente” literally means “to the tooth”. It indicates the perfect consistency that pasta, or any other food, should have at the end of the cooking process: not too soft and not too hard at chewing. Pasta cooked “al dente” maintains a harder consistency at the centre of the dough sheet which gives the diners a pleasant feeling of “biting” rather than “mushing” something under their teeth..

• Servings : 3
• Ready in : 25
• Course : Starter
• Recipe Type : Fresh pasta making, Pasta, Regional, Vegetarian
• Ingredient : Basil, Extra Virgin Olive Oil, Green beans, Linguine, Parmigiano Cheese, Pesto, Pine Nuts, Salt, Spaghetti, Trofie, Water, White Flesh Potatoes