This straw and hay pie with meatballs is the first new recipe designed for Christmas 2020, Christmas dealing with Covid-19 and the great issues the pandemic has brought upon us all in one way or another!
I love cooking, it’s my greatest passion, and I will continue to publish recipes for the Christmas period even if I may prepare a not too wide menu of themed dishes.
Moving on to the recipe, this tasty and rich pie or casserole is, excuse my self-praise, DELICIOUS!
To speed up preparation, I used pre-made yellow and green fresh pasta sheets and with a small leftover of the yellow one, I made small malfatti by cutting the excess into diamonds.
What ingredients for the pie? The straw and hay in the title is given by the leftover sheets cut into roughly 1 cm wide tagliatelle, the meatballs for me are made from mixed beef and pork ground meat, but if you prefer, you can make them only with beef or only with pork, or with sausage meat, the added cheese to wrap and make the filling stringy includes, besides parmesan and béchamel, many cubes of smoked treccia, a real delicacy!
Broccoli rabe, boiled and sautéed with garlic and chili pepper, give that slightly bitter and spicy note that tempers the sweetness of the pasta and béchamel, and the combination is truly out of this world, as my sister Annacarla says!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
As you can imagine, it doesn’t take the same time as making some quick spaghetti, but the result compensates for the time, trust me!!!
I also suggest other baked first courses like: 
PASTA PIE WITH SAUCE
MINI TAGLIATELLE PIES
EMILIAN ROLL
°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°I have opened a recipe channel open to everyone and free on WhatsApp with no notifications and no sound, which you can subscribe to by clicking the link here https://whatsapp.com/channel/0029VaHbGIn9cDDig7Cw2x0F and every day you can read a sweet and a savory recipe!
°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°°
STRAW AND HAY PIE WITH MEATBALLS
ASI’s kitchen
- Difficulty: Easy
- Cost: Medium
- Preparation time: 30 Minutes
- Portions: 8-inch mold
- Cooking methods: Oven
- Cuisine: Italian
Ingredients STRAW AND HAY PIE WITH MEATBALLS
- 2 cups yellow pasta sheets
- 2 cups green pasta sheets
- 1 lbs ground meat (beef and pork for me)
- 1 egg
- 2 slices pancarré (perhaps 3 depending…)
- 2.8 oz parmesan cheese (grated)
- 1.1 lbs broccoli rabe
- 1 clove garlic
- 7 oz béchamel sauce
- 5.3 oz smoked treccia (scamorza)
- as needed butter (to place before baking on the sheets)
- as needed fresh chili pepper
- as needed extra virgin olive oil
- as needed butter
- as needed parsley (chopped)
- as needed salt
- as needed pepper
Tools STRAW AND HAY PIE WITH MEATBALLS
#ADV
- Baking Pan
- Knife
- Colander
- Saucepan
FOR THE PREPARATION OF THE STRAW AND HAY PIE WITH MEATBALLS RECIPE
Combine in a bowl the ground meat, then add the crumbled pancarré, the egg, 2 tablespoons of grated parmesan, chopped parsley, and adjust with salt and pepper.
The mixture should be soft and well combined; if it is too stiff, add a splash of milk.
Now thoroughly clean the broccoli rabe, wash them carefully and blanch them in salted boiling water.
In a saucepan, heat a drizzle of oil, then add the garlic and chili pepper.
Sauté them for a few minutes, then add the mixed beef and pork meatballs, letting them brown.
Add the chopped broccoli rabe and let the meat and vegetables absorb the flavors.
Remove the garlic and chili pepper and proceed to assemble the pie or casserole with yellow and green pasta sheets and meatballs.
Personally, I preferred to blanch for just 5 seconds each time, the yellow and green fresh pasta sheets after cutting them in half vertically.
I lined the base of the baking pan with parchment paper and greased a bit the outer edges before proceeding to line the entire perimeter with blanched sheets for 5 s in salted boiling water, alternating and slightly overlapping them.
Once blanched, you can place the sheets well arranged on a sheet of parchment paper or, as my mom did, on a clean tea towel, which absorbs the boiling water.
Cut the remaining sheets into tagliatelle and blanch them for 1 s in the same water.
Then, after draining them well, place them directly in the saucepan where we cooked the broccoli rabe and meatballs (keep a little aside to decorate the top of the casserole a.k.a. straw and hay pie with meatballs if you like).
Add also the béchamel sauce, grated cheese, and diced cheese.
Now mix the mixture and then fill the shell of yellow and green fresh pasta sheets.
Then fold the sheets that exceed the edge of the baking pan inward.
On the top, to hide the intersecting sheets, I placed 4/5 meatballs with some pieces of vegetables.
Now put some knobs of butter here and there and all that’s left is to bake this delicious baked first course at 392°F for about 25 minutes
Remove from the oven and serve this baked first course hot at the table!
P.S. And please remember to remove the parchment paper base, ha ha!
It’s good, good, good!
Enjoy your meal with the straw and hay pie with meatballs!
Annalisa
SOURCE Special Cucina Moderna ORO Meatballs, meatloafs and pies (February 2017)
