Beet tagliatelle with gorgonzola sauce and pine nuts

Making pasta at home, although it may seem complicated, is very easy. You only need flour and egg, and follow the steps of kneading, stretching and cutting. Simple steps that give us results in texture and flavour that are radically different from the pasta we usually buy.

Today Virginia, author of Sweet&Sour , presents us with the recipe with a different touch of color and flavor. Irresistible! A real temptation that you can't miss.

Lately I've been in total pasta mode. Trying out different types of pasta and mixes. This recipe I'm bringing you today is delicious, because of the slightly sweet note that the beet leaves in the pasta and the contrast with the cheerful note of the gorgonzola cheese. For me, it's a 10.

In addition, to reduce the fat content of the sauce in this recipe, which is already provided by the cheese, we did not want to add cream and replaced it with evaporated milk, which makes the sauce lighter, less caloric and less heavy. We must take care of our health and our figure.

Beetroot pasta is simple and, as you can see, gives the dish a beautiful colour. It is true that during cooking, some of the intense colour of the beetroot is lost, but it still results in a very colourful dish.

You can add roasted or cooked beets, and the same applies to those you find packaged in supermarkets or homemade.

I will never tire of saying it, but preparing fresh pasta is so simple that those of you who dare to make it will repeat it and even get hooked, as happens in a certain way with homemade bread. A machine from a traditional brand like Imperia is synonymous with successful results, and for an absolutely reasonable price. In addition, the taste of fresh homemade pasta is nothing like that of store-bought pasta, and it has the advantage that you can prepare all kinds of pasta to your liking.

The beetroot pasta recipe varies slightly in proportions from the traditional one, mainly because to get an intense colour we add a good amount of pureed beetroot, and what we do is remove a couple of eggs to compensate and maintain the proportion of solids and liquids. In any case, the system is the same as the one you can find in the tutorial on " How to prepare fresh pasta at home ". Let's go with the recipe.

INGREDIENTS: (For 4 servings)

For the beetroot paste:

• 300 g of "00" flour or a mixture of 210 g of flour and 70 g of semolina
• 150 gr. of beetroot puree*
• 1 egg "M"
• 1 pinch of salt
• Plenty of water and salt for cooking the pasta

*Not all flours absorb the same amount of water, so start by adding 100 gr. of beetroot puree until you get the desired texture. Remember that we are only adding one egg and therefore the dough should not be too soft, but preferably rather dry.

For the gorgonzola and pine nut sauce:

• 120 g Gorgonzola cheese
• 200 ml of evaporated milk
• 50 g of pine nuts
• Edible pansies for decorating.

PREPARATION

We begin by preparing our fresh beetroot paste: To do this, we mash the beetroot until it becomes a puree. We mix it with the egg and set aside.

If we follow the traditional method, we mix and sift the flour and salt (if we use it), placing it directly on the work surface or in a large bowl.

Make a hole in the centre and place the egg and beetroot mixture inside. Using a fork, gradually add flour from the sides to the centre. When a semi-soft dough begins to form, start kneading it more vigorously until you get an elastic and homogeneous dough. Wrap it in cling film and place in the fridge for 1 hour.

Please note that the dough should be fairly firm and not sticky to your hands, otherwise if the dough is too wet or soft it will be very difficult to roll out. Therefore, if we see that we need more beetroot because it is too hard, or more flour because it is too soft, we will add it while kneading and mixing.

If we use our Kitchen Aid , we put all the ingredients in the mixer bowl and mix slowly at speed 1 with the paddle attachment until we obtain a homogeneous dough.

We change to the dough hook and continue kneading at speed 2 for about 5-8 minutes, until the dough is elastic and homogeneous. Shape it into a ball, wrap it in cling film and put it in the fridge for 1 hour. Our dough is now ready to be rolled out and cut. It couldn't be easier.

Now we move on to rolling and cutting the dough . We take it out of the fridge and divide our ball into 4 parts. We put three of the parts in cling film and put them back in the fridge so they don't dry out.

To roll out the dough with the pasta machine : Flatten the remaining portion with your hands and pass it through the rolling pin of the pasta machine , using its largest opening. Fold it to obtain a rectangular shape and pass it through the same opening again. Repeat this operation in the same opening 3 or 4 times, until your sheet of dough is the width of the rolling pin.

We reduce the opening of the rolling pin by one number, flour our sheet of dough and roll it through the rolling pin. We repeat this operation, reducing the thickness of the rolling pin with each pass, until we finish. We will obtain a very long sheet with a thickness of 1 to 1.5 mm.

During rolling, we may need to lightly flour the pasta sheet so that it does not stick.

Once our sheet of pasta is ready, we leave it to dry hanging on the back of a clean chair, on a hanger or on the utensils that exist specifically for this purpose. We continue with the rest of the portions of dough.

To roll out the dough without a rolling pin, we must use a rolling pin . If possible, a heavy one and leave it about 1 or 2 mm thick. We take one of the 4 parts into which we have divided the dough ball and flatten it slightly with our hands. We lightly flour the surface where we are going to work and begin to stretch it, turning it 90º, until we obtain sheets of the desired thickness.

Now let's move on to cutting : Pasta machines, in addition to the base with the rolling rollers, come with a pair of heads with different types of cutting, which are attached to the base. In this way, each strip obtained is cut into strips of about 20 cm and passed through the chosen cutting roller. If necessary, lightly flour each sheet of pasta so that it does not stick to it.

We let the already cut pasta dry again hanging as we had done with the strips, while we proceed to cut the rest.

If you are going to cut the dough by hand, cut each strip into strips of about 20 cm and fold them over themselves three or four times, lightly flouring the sheet at each fold so that it does not stick. Using a sharp knife, cut 2 cm strips to make your Tagliatelle.

To cut the pasta, we can also use the pasta roller , with which you can easily make the cut evenly.

While the pasta dries, prepare the Gorgonzola and pine nut sauce : Place the evaporated milk and the cheese in pieces in a saucepan . Place over medium heat and let the cheese melt with the evaporated milk, keeping an eye on the saucepan and stirring occasionally.

Meanwhile, crush half of the pine nuts in a mortar. Toast the rest in a frying pan without oil and set aside.

When the cheese has melted, add the pine nuts and cook for a couple of minutes over medium-low heat. Remove and set aside. From this sauce, half will go into a frying pan and the rest into a sauce boat.

If the sauce is too thick, you can thin it out with a little evaporated milk.

Once our pasta and sauce are ready, we proceed to cook the pasta in plenty of boiling salted water for a couple of minutes from the moment it first boils once the pasta is added. Once ready, we remove and strain immediately.

While the pasta is cooking, put a frying pan on the heat and add half of the sauce. When the pasta is cooked and drained, pour it over the sauce and leave it for 2 or 3 minutes, stirring a few times so that the pasta is well soaked.

Serve immediately on hot plates, with a spoonful of sauce on top and some pine nuts. Decorate with edible pansies if you want to give it a more chic touch.

A simple and absolutely delicious dish, homemade from start to finish.

Enjoy.

Virginia