I love to make hand crafted pasta and corzetti are such fun to make.   They are pasta discs that are stamped with a design, which helps to hold a sauce.  They are a regional pasta to Liguria in Italy.   In medieval times, they were stamped with the Genovese family crests. To make them by hand, you must have a corzetti stamp.

The corzetti stamp consists of two pieces.  One piece, the base, has a hollowed out side, for cutting the pasta discs.  The other side of the base has a design and is the side on which you lay the pasta disc.  The other piece of each corzetti set is the stamp, with a handle.  This has a different design than the base.

 Cut out discs of pasta with the cutting side of the stamp. (below, left)

Place cut pasta disc on top of the corzetti base. (below, right)

Take stamp top and press onto disc. (below)

You now have a disc with two different designs, one on each side. (below)

Corzetti stamps are not easy to find.  There is a master craftsman, Franco Casoni, who lives in a small town, Chiaveri, and he hand carves these stamps and has supplied them to places like A. G. Ferrari .  They are very hard to come by right now and A.G. Ferrari are usually out of stock.  You can call them to see if they will be getting any in the future. I understand that Corti Brothers sometimes has them.  If you are lucky enough to be in that area of Italy, near Genoa, you can stop in at Signore Casoni's shop and he will actually carve you a stamp right on the spot, with whatever design you like. For some fun accounts of people doing exactly that, read this delightful post by a Slow Traveler who went to Chiaveri (she's also posted photos of Franco) and Divina Cucina's post about Franco and the stamp he made her.   

Corzetti with Parmesan, Pine Nuts and Herbs

for a printer friendly recipe, click here

It is common in Liguria to add a little wine to the pasta dough.

makes about 90 corzetti

Dough:

1 cup all purpose flour or Italian 00 flour
4 egg yolks
1/4 cup white wine

Sauce:

1/3 cup olive oil
2 cloves garlic, minced or grated
1/8 cup pine nuts, plain or toasted*
handful of chopped herbs (parsley, basil, etc.)
freshly ground black pepper, salt to taste
freshly grated parmigiano reggiano cheese 

Make pasta dough: Place flour on workspace and make a well in the center.  Place the egg yolks in the well and beat lightly with fork. Add white wine to beaten eggs and mix with the fork.   Slowly incorporate the flour with the fork until a dough forms.  Knead and add flour until the dough is not sticky any more. A pastry scraper helps a lot.  This may take a little more flour - you need to just go by the feel of the dough.  Wrap in floured plastic and let rest at room temperature for 15 - 30 minutes.  Cut in half and take each piece and run it through pasta rollers on the widest setting.  Fold in thirds and run through several more times. Adjust rollers to next thinnest setting and pass pasta through. Pass through until you get to the thickness you like - usually #4 or #5 for corzetti.  If you make the pasta thinner, using #5, you will be able to make a few more corzetti. Lay pasta sheets on floured counter and cover with towel.

Cut out discs of pasta with your corzetti base and lay on sheet of parchment paper on a baking sheet.  You can take your scraps and run them through the pasta rollers again to get the maximum number of corzetti. Repeat until all pasta has been used and you have 80 - 100 discs of pasta.  

Stamp corzetti:  Turn corzetti base so design is right side up.  Place one pasta disc on the base.  Take the corzetti stamp and press down.  Remove pasta disc to parchment.  If pasta sticks to stamp, lightly flour. Repeat until all discs are stamped.

Place corzetti in boiling, salted water and cook two minutes.  Lift with a strainer and dress with sauce.

(You can place the corzetti in the freezer on the baking sheets and then put them in plastic bags and keep in the freezer, if you like.  No need to thaw to cook them.)

Sauce:  Heat olive oil in a skillet and saute garlic for one minute.  Add pine nuts and herbs.  Add pepper and salt to taste. When corzetti are done cooking, lift them out with a strainer and place right into skillet.  Toss with sauce.  Place pasta in a serving bowl and toss with as much freshly grated parmesan cheese as you like.

* To toast pine nuts (this brings out their flavor a little more) place in a small, dry skillet and toast over medium heat until lightly golden.

 Corzetti with pine nuts, parmesan and herbs.

This is my new favorite dish.  It has to be, because I've made it every single week since I saw the recipe.

It's a luscious dish of pasta topped with tomatoes which are roasted with bread crumbs and stuffed with slivers of garlic.  Fresh herbs and crispy bits of pancetta top it off.  The flavors are perfect together.  To eat the dish, you just crush your tomato on top of your pasta and it makes this incredible sauce.  

This recipe comes from the new book, Canal House Cooking by Christopher Hirscheimer and Melissa Hamilton.   Christopher Hirscheimer is one of the founding editors of Saveur Magazine and is one of the most outstanding food photographers. Melissa Hamilton was food editor of Saveur and is a recipe developer and food stylist, having done work at Martha Stewart Living and Cooks Illustrated.   I love Hirscheimer's photography - she was the photographer for Lydia Bastiniach's book, "Lydia's Family Table" and one of my personal favorites,  "A Platter of Figs" by David Tanis.   I've loved her photography for a long time but did not know that she had written a book until I saw a post on Twitter from Colman Andrews about Canal House Cooking.  I took a look at the book and had to have it.  She and Melissa are going to publish three volumes of this cookbook (Summer, Fall and Holiday, Winter and Spring) and you can buy either one issue or subscribe to the whole set.  But that's really not a choice, is it?  Because once you see the Summer volume, you'll want them all.  And I think it's so neat that they are publishing it themselves!  So click on over there and subscribe.  You can read all about the cooking studio they have set up.

One of the only things I took the liberty of adjusting in the recipe is the addition of the pancetta. In their recipe, Canal House adds the cooked pancetta before roasting the tomatoes. For me, the pancetta almost burned in the oven.  So, after I fried up the pancetta, I set it aside and simply added it to the finished dish. 

Spaghetti with Roasted Tomatoes, Garlic, Pancetta

for a printable recipe, click here

adapted from Canal House Cooking

serves 4 (or 2 very hungry people)

3 ounces diced pancetta (if you can't find pancetta, you may substitute bacon)
6 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil, plus more for the pasta
2 anchovy fillets
1 cup coarse fresh bread crumbs*
4 tomatoes, tops sliced off, seeds scooped out
2 cloves garlic, thinly sliced 
small handful fresh thyme, parsley or basil leaves, chopped
salt & pepper
8 ounces spaghetti

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.  Fry the pancetta in a skillet over medium heat until browned and crisp around the edges.  Use a slotted spatula or spoon to lift the pancetta out of the skillet to a plate.  Leave the rendered fat in the skillet.  Add 2 tablespoons of the olive oil and the anchovies to the same skillet.  Use a wooden spoon to mash the anchovies until they dissolve.  Add the bread crumbs and cook, stirring often, until they are golden.

Put the tomatoes, cut side up, in a baking dish and slip some garlic into each tomato.  Season the tomatoes with plenty of salt and pepper.  Mound some bread crumbs onto each tomato, getting some inside the tomatoes.  Scatter herbs on top.  Drizzle 4 tablespoons of olive oil over all.  Roast the tomatoes in the oven until they have browned a bit and the interior is supple but the tomatoes have not collapsed, about one hour.

Cook the spaghetti in a large pot of boiling salted water.  Drain, but reserve 1/2 cup of the pasta water.  Return the pasta to the pot and remove the tomatoes from the baking dish and set aside.  Stir the oily tomato juices and any bits of bread crumbs from the bottom of the tomato roasting dish into the pasta.  Add a little olive oil and the reserved pasta water and toss.  

Pour the pasta into a serving bowl, place the tomatoes on top, sprinkle the pancetta over all and serve.

 * make your own fresh bread crumbs.  Just tear bread, place in your food processor and grind.  

See the long, oval spoon in the photograph above?  That spoon is an olive spoon and it works great for digging olives out of their long, narrow jars.  But what I discovered is that it is simply the best tool ever to dig out tomato seeds!  It makes the job so much easier.  I love that thing!