Part of being a Barilla Blogger Ambassador means getting to attend really fun events like this one! I mentioned in that post about Barilla cooking classes being offered at Eataly – details here – and was invited to attend one myself. Don’t mind if I do – I love cooking classes!
At each seat were two wine glasses; I love the branding on them.
Slightly different than other cooking classes I’ve posted about, this one was demonstration-driven, so it started off with Barilla’s Executive Chef Lorenzo Boni sharing some tips and tidbits on cooking pasta. For all those who wonder: final answer, don’t add oil to your pasta water (ha!). I admit that I’ve never done this, entirely because I’m lazy and when I cook pasta, washing the pot is super fast if you’ve not added oil. If you did, well, it takes an extra minute, but I’m that lazy. Hahaha.
Also at each seat was a folder containing the menu for the night and the recipes for what we were about to learn how to cook. A pen for taking notes, and a sheet with wine tasting notes as well. I appreciated this because I’m forever rooting around trying to take notes when something I’d like to remember is said – which isn’t always, but definitely a bonus to have it ready.
Beyond that… a basket of the most wonderful bread. Now, if you’ve been reading my site for a while, you may know that I adore baguettes and ciabatta, not necessarily in that order. This looked like ciabatta but instead of that chewy airiness I’m so accustomed to, this was a denser bread with a soft texture, yet still a good chew to it. Siobhan of Blondie & Brownie, who was sitting next to me, started fighting me for the last bits of the bread, which was absolutely fantastic swiped through the oil. So good! I’ve tried asking Eataly which loaf of bread they use for classes, so hopefully they will be able to answer me and I can go buy some!!! Oh, and the fight has a happy ending: the lovely woman who was serving that night – walking around and making sure everyone’s water & wine glasses were always full, serving and clearing plates, etc. – saw that we’d eaten all our bread and came over to give us more without us saying a word. Phenomenal. (I don’t think anyone else got more bread, haha, we’re just pigs.)
I want to take a moment here actually to specifically shout out this young woman. I didn’t catch her name, but she was completely on top of things, refilling water and wine glasses, making sure no one wanted for anything. She was unobtrusive, never got in the way of the demo though I sat in the back, and was just excellent at her job. Towards the end of the class, actually, I whispered to Siobhan that I wished the door – which had been closed throughout the class – would be shut again, as it’s quite noisy in Eataly, and the small classroom is directly connected to the huge Italian market, so Chef Boni was a bit drowned out when the door was open – and somehow, the woman heard me or magically read my mind and shut the door for us. It was like she predicted our needs and addressed them as quickly and quietly as possible. That’s stellar service; I’m sure they pulled her from the floor of one of Eataly’s restaurants, but honestly… with that sort of attention to detail, I think she would fit right in at one of Batali’s more upscale restaurants.
Thank you for making the experience that much better, just by being excellent at your job!
Back to the food: one of the best parts of a demonstration-driven cooking class? You get to eat much quicker, and just watch someone else make food for you to enjoy! First course: insalata di farfalle con peperoni arrostiti e mozzarella – as it sounds, a salad of farfalle (bow tie pasta) with roasted peppers and mozzarella. This was incredibly light, cooked perfectly. I liked this dish as a starter – and I learned that Chef Boni recommends that if you’re going to use onion in a pasta salad, to make sure that your entire salad doesn’t just taste like onions – a problem I’ve encountered in the past, both making and eating it – then you can sautee it for a few minutes first, which helps it retain its crunch but makes the bite a little more mild, just sweet onion taste. Very nice.
Our second course: troccoli con verdure e pecorino romano, which translates to troccoli with roasted vegetables and pecorino romano. I found myself enjoying this shape of pasta quite a lot – spaghetti-like strands, but a squared off profile – and really liked this dish for its simplicity and deliciousness. As it utilizes both zucchini and eggplant, I could definitely see making this sometime soon – my CSA veggies put to great use! Plus, though it’s clearly made with tomatoes, it wasn’t particularly heavy and didn’t sit in my belly afterwards, which, on a warm summer night, was much appreciated.
Another tip that Chef Boni shared here was the use of olive oil. Many dishes start with olive oil, but he suggests reserving some of the olive oil a recipe calls for, and drizzling it into the sauce off heat, to help it retain its flavor. Once heated, olive oil’s flavor changes, so this way, you can get some of that wonderful grassiness into the dish’s final taste. I’ve never been one much for ‘finishing oils’ though I own enough of them (I try to use them in cold applications – vinaigrettes and the like), so this was a helpful tip. Another one? Add grated cheese at the end, with the pan off-heat, or it’ll clump, burn, and stick to the bottom of the pan. I’ve definitely had the clumping issue, so this was yet another very helpful tip.
Our third and final course, trofie liguri con pesto alla genovese, was very pretty. Basically pesto pasta, though with a shape I’d not previously seen. I learned some new things about pesto: for example, a cubed potato and green beans are traditionally cooked with the pasta; the potato’s starchiness helps the sauce come together, while the green beans are just a nice addition. And pesto made with a mortar & pestle is incredible! I use my food processor, but this didn’t seem too difficult and helped the flavors of everything shine through strongly – in particular, the wonderful basil he used. Lovely – the green beans were a nice textural contrast against the softer pasta.
In addition to all this lovely food, the wine – oh yes, we were served two lovely wines: San Romano, Il Dolcetto di Dogliani, Bricco delle Lepri, 2009 and Bastianich, Adriatico Friulano 2009, which Eataly’s in-house sommelier came to explain to us – and the lovely lessons and tips delivered from Chef Boni, we each walked away with a cool rough cloth bag (burlap? canvas?) that had inside it a box of one of the three pastas we sampled. I luckily received the troccoli, to my absolute delight, since that was my favorite of the night. The bag also had some literature about Casa Barilla, and… amazingly enough… two vouchers for VIP tickets to Andrea Bocelli’s concert in September. Whoa!!! HOW AWESOME IS THAT???
It’s pretty freakin’ awesome, I’ll tell you that!
A great experience, and I have Barilla to thank for this. Thanks Barilla!
Classes appear to be sold out, but you should definitely sign up for the wait list for one of the future classes if you can.
Please note that I attended this event courtesy of Barilla. I want to thank them for their hospitality, and while I am obligated to post about this event and future Summer of Italy events, I assure you that I will continue to uphold my responsibility to my readers to always be honest and forthright about what I eat and what I like or don’t like.
hungry says
Is there a reason why oil in pasta water in bad (besides cleaning)?
Feisty Foodie says
Chef Boni said it just floats on top and is a waste of oil. He explained that the tradition originated during a time when pasta was made with more… something… and the oil was needed in the water to keep the something or other from breaking down. Hahaha, I appear to have forgotten the reasoning behind it, but he said for sure, don’t do it.