Our friend from Rome, Renato, that invited us for this Christmas holidays to his country house in Umbria shares with me something that goes beyond age, nationality, sex and religion. We are both Sagittarius which for those who still have an incomprehensible distrust in astrology, means that Jupiter our governor, the expansion god, leads us to appreciate better than any other sign the delights of the kitchen (with a huge advantage of the conviviality and some imprudence for the waistline).
When we have the chance to spend time together we often devote part of this time in the kitchen, preparing a dinner for our partners, children and friends.
Bickering over quantity and appropriate ingredients, we share recent events of our life that, living in two different cities (Rome in his case, Milan in mine), always require a bit of renovation, drinking half a glass of wine we will drink at the table later with the other diners.
Its a beautiful moment when we reconnect the threads of a friendship that has lasted almost thirty years. We wanted to share with you this atmosphere by showing a video in which Renato prepares for Casa Chiesi one of his family recipes: i Rotolini alla Rotoele.
As you will learn in the video Rotoele is a totally made up name that Matteo, Renato’s brother, dreamed about along with the whole recipe fifteen years ago.
The family found the name very amusing and applied it to an existing family nameless recipe that was actually derived from their Sicilian ancestors.
The main ingredients of this simple recipe such as bread crumbs, raisins and pine nuts are actually often used in the Sicilian popular cuisine and you will find them in a number of diverse first and main courses.
The dish we propose in the video is simple and very tasty; here you have the ingredients and the directions to make it for approximately five people.
Ingredients:
25 slices of pork loin
25 laurel leaves
150 gr dry bread crumbs
100 gr grated Parmesan cheese (or Pecorino if you like it very tasty)
1 onion
dry raisins
pine nuts
salt
extra virgin olive oil
tooth picks
Ask the butcher to cut the loin very thin and if necessary, carefully pound it with a meat cleaver (in our case we since we did not have one we used Saran Wrap and our hands) a bit before proceeding.
In a pan with a few tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil, fry a finely chopped onion. When it is lightly brown, add the grated bread and keep on mixing until it becomes crispy.
In a bowl pour the toasted bread and add the grated cheese, raisins and pine nuts. Season with salt if necessary and begin to fill the pork slices with a scant tablespoon of filling. Roll up each slice and close it with the toothpick making sure it does not spill the filling during the baking process.
Arrange your rolls side by side in a shallow saucepan just greased with olive oil, putting a laurel leaf between one and the other. If you still have some spare filling spread it evenly over the meat.
Bake in a preheated oven at 180 degrees for half an hour and serve it hot accompanied with vegetables and red wine.
Even if the description sounds elaborated the recipe is very simple and very tasty.
You just have to give it a try: buon appetito!
Betti
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