Spaghetti alla Chitarra

Square-section strands cut by pressing dough through strung wires.

Beef, Lamb, Egg. Not vegetarian — contains beef, lamb.

Ingredients

• 300 g fine semolina flour
• 100 g plain flour
• 4 eggs
• 1 teaspoon salt
• lamb or beef ragù, to dress

Method

1. Make a firm dough of both flours, the eggs and salt. Knead 15 minutes and rest it an hour. It needs to be stiffer than a tagliatelle dough to take the pressing.
2. Roll a sheet about 3 mm thick — THICKER than you would for any other egg pasta, because the strands have to come out square.
3. LAY THE SHEET ON THE CHITARRA AND PRESS IT THROUGH THE WIRES WITH THE ROLLING PIN. The frame is strung like a guitar and the wires cut as the dough is forced between them; a sharp slap of the hand on the frame drops the strands out underneath.
4. THE POINT IS THE SQUARE CROSS-SECTION. A knife or a machine gives flat ribbons; wires under pressure give four corners and a rough surface, and that is what holds a lamb ragù.
5. Puglia makes the same strands with a TROCCOLO instead — a wooden pin with deep grooves turned along it, rolled over the sheet — and calls them troccoli. Different tool, same pasta.
6. Without either, cut the thick sheet into 3 mm strips with a knife and accept a squarer-than-usual ribbon.
7. Boil 5 to 6 minutes and dress with a slow lamb ragù.

Our own recipe. This one was written for this site rather than taken from anywhere, so there is no source to point you at. The quantities and the order of the steps are choices, not the only way to do it.

Filed under Italy · All recipes