Friday 29th January 2010 Aubergine and ricotta cannelloni

Today started off early with a trip up to Middlesborough. I picked up DJP at Meadowhall Park and Ride and headed north. As it was dark, I had difficulty not falling asleep.

As we approached Teesport there was a flurry of snow in the air.

DJP's car was not working and he had been trying to call me the night before to get a lift from his house. Unfortunately we had left the phone off the hook and did not get the message. So he had had to get up early without breakfast to meet me at the other end of the city from where he lives. On arriving at destination, he therefore wanted breakfast. We bumped in to two Rotherham colleagues, also in search of sustenance and headed across the road to ASDA - which seemed to be the only option around.

There was no cafe in the ASDA but we were directed to a cafe in the complex next door. It was shut. My Rotherham comrade spotted someone inside who tried to ignore us but eventually came to the door. She told us the cafe wasn't open but she would make us a cup of tea.

The cafe was a bit basic and the floors and tables hadn't been cleaned from the previous day. We looked for the least messy table and sat down. Eventually she brought cups of lukewarm tea as "the boiler had not got going yet." It was all a bit grim, but funny in a perverse sort of way.

Anyway, enough said about that.

DJP and I made it back home earlier than expected. The A1 was clear and Sheffield wasn't too busy. So I bit the bullet and got out my pasta roller. I do this approximately every second year.

I'd chosen a Jamie Oliver recipe which required 16 sheets of fresh pasta, but decided it to make it myself. What made the difference from the times before is that I shaped the pasta into an oblong before I rolled it, and also lightly floured it before rolling. Three out of four sheets worked and I managed to get them quite thin.

Ja
Jamie recommends that you use the crumbly ricotta that you can buy in Italian delis. There aren't many Italian delis around here. The recipe wasn't that clear but I think we got there. (It seemed to miss out a crucial step.) Also I'm not keen on his habit of saying a handful of this, or a good glug of that. I like precision.

Still it tased good and encourages me to make pasta a bit more often.