Читать книгу Made in Italy: Food and Stories - Giorgio Locatelli - Страница 73

Sformato is a kind of savoury pudding cooked in the oven. Traditionally it was made in a ring mould so it could be turned out and the centre filled with sauce. This one isn’t traditional at all. It is one of my mixtures of French technique and Italian ingredients. Potatoes, cheese, pancetta, these ingredients are as old as time. For me, they are the flavours of cold weather. They have been used in a million ways, but I wanted to try to find a way of my own and this idea first came to me when I was cooking in Paris at Le Laurent. One of my jobs was to prepare the potatoes for a special fish dish. I used to peel the potatoes without washing them, so that the starch stayed inside, then ‘turn’ them into perfect cylinder shapes and finally slice them into thin rounds with a mandoline. Then I had to lay them out on a tray, sprinkle them with a little salt and bake them until golden. When they came out of the oven, I would lay them out again, overlapping slightly this time, so that when they cooled down, the starch in the potatoes would stick them together in a sheet.

When the order for the fish came in, I would take a fillet, place it on top of the sheet of potatoes and cut around it. Then I would cook the fish in a frying pan, skin-side up, turn it over, skin down, lay the sheet of potato on top and put the pan in the oven, so the fish would roast with the potatoes ‘melting’ over the top.

The dish was served with crème fraîche and caviar, which was too fiddly and complicated an idea for my taste, but I loved the idea of the potato sheet and it stayed in my mind. I used to experiment with wrapping other ingredients inside, and then one day, when I had a potato sheet left over, I dropped it into a cup that happened to be nearby. After a while, I noticed it had set in the shape of the cup, and when I turned it out it stayed that way. That gave me the idea of making a container with the potatoes, which would be like a crust but also add another layer of flavour. I started trying out different fillings enclosed in potato and then fried – eventually I came up with this one.

I think of this as a winter dish, and sometimes when porcini mushrooms are in season I like to use them instead of the pancetta – just sliced and sautéed with a little chopped garlic and then mixed with the Taleggio cheese, as in the recipe that follows.

This is a little bit complicated, but the important thing is to have really starchy potatoes for this dish, so that they will stick together well. You also need some small round ovenproof flan dishes or cocottes, about 7-8cm in diameter. If you want to serve the sformati more simply, you could just make a salad instead of the sauce.

2 large starchy potatoes, such as Desiree

500ml sunflower oil, for frying

150g pancetta, cut into strips

150g Taleggio cheese, cut into small dice

20-30g butter

sea salt

For the sauce:

250ml milk

20g butter

20g plain flour

pinch of freshly grated nutmeg

60g Fontina cheese, grated

Peel the potatoes and slice them about 2mm thick, using a mandoline grater or a large, sharp knife. Put them on a baking tray and season with sea salt to draw out some of their water.

Heat the sunflower oil in a large, deep pan to about 120°C. To test, dip in one of the slices of potato; it should just fry very gently. Put the potatoes into the oil to ‘blanch’ them – ie so they soften without crisping or colouring. Cook them in batches of 3-4 slices at a time, keeping them well away from each other so that they don’t stick together. Remove them with a slotted spoon and place on kitchen paper to drain very briefly – again, keep them separate from each other. Don’t leave them longer than a few minutes or the paper will blot away all the starch, which you will need to stick the layers together.

Line each small ovenproof dish with overlapping slices of potato, covering the entire base and sides and making sure there are no gaps (this is where the starch in the potatoes will stick the slices together). The potatoes around the sides need to come about 3-4cm above the top of the dish or enough to fold over and completely enclose the filling.

Heat a dry frying pan, add the pancetta strips and fry quickly to release excess fat but not enough to colour them. Remove and drain on kitchen paper.

Mix the diced Taleggio cheese with the pancetta, and scatter over the base of each potato-lined dish. Pull the overhanging slices of potato over the top, making sure there are no gaps, and press down lightly so the potatoes seal the top completely. Put in the fridge for at least an hour or overnight to firm up.

Preheat the oven to 220°C, gas 7. Meanwhile, make the sauce. Bring the milk just to the boil and then take off the heat. Melt the butter in a pan, add the flour and cook, stirring, for a couple of minutes. Slowly pour in the milk, mixing well, then add the nutmeg. Bring to the boil, then reduce the heat and simmer for 3-4 minutes, stirring all the time, until the sauce thickens. Keep in a warm place, covered with cling film to prevent a skin forming.

Heat a film of sunflower oil in an ovenproof non-stick frying pan and turn the sformati out of the dishes into the pan (2 at a time if you have a small pan). Cook gently for 3-4 minutes, until golden (be careful not to cook too fast, in case the cheese melts too quickly and begins to bubble through the potato). Turn over carefully with a spatula, add the butter to the pan and transfer to the oven for 2-3 minutes to finish off.

Mix the grated Fontina into the sauce and spoon it on to 4 serving plates (preferably deep ones). Remove the sformati from the oven, rest each one briefly on a piece of kitchen paper to blot off any excess butter, and place on top of the sauce.