Passatelli is a specialty from Romagna and Marche regions of Italy. It’s usually served in a broth (in brodo) or asciutti (dried) which means as a pasta dish and of course no broth. I grew up eating passatelli which was my mom’s favorite soup, but when you’re a kid you are not too excited eating soups. Over the years when going to Italy, I noticed they started serving passatelli asciutti (no broth) with all kinds of sauces and became ever since one of my favorite dish.

We were in Italy last month, and I got the chance to eat passatelli with seafood in the restaurant Da Tano (city of Fano) which is now my favorite restaurant ever. That was such an amazing dish, and since then I have been dreaming of Tano’s passatelli.

So after looking on the net for passatelli recipes and proportions, and getting so many different ones, I called my mom and got her recipe. I thought that would be closer to what I was used to, but I told my mom, the passatelli need to remain extra firm and not break or I will not like them (I really hate overcooked pasta to the point where I will not eat it), so you need to be precise and give me exact quantities of ingredients for extra firm passatelli.

The mixture needs to be hard otherwise the passatelli will break during the cooking process. The other tricky thing is to grate the bread and parmesan very finely in a mixer, so store bought bread crumbs will not work. You need to use stale bread (preferably country bread) and grated it extremely fine, like a powder. For the cheese it’s the same

I have another recipe of passatelli in brodo here, but this one is a little different and is perfect for this “dry” preparation.

You need this particular potato masher to make those little cylinders. I have seen it available in the US on the web.

If you are interested in some other passatelli recipe, and read Italian, here Sabrina and her blog called La creatività e i suoi colori.

Ingredients for 3-4

For the passatelli

• 3.52 oz (or 100 )g homemade very fine breadcrumbs
• 3.52 oz (or 100 g) freshly grated parmesan, very fine
• 2.82 oz (or 80 g) white flour
• 3 eggs
• nutmeg
• zest of one lemon
• salt
• 4 cups broth

For the sauce

• 2 tbs olive oil
• 1 small shallot, finely diced
• 1 tomato, peeled, seedless and diced
• 2 small fillet of sole, cubed (about 13/4 inch)
• 3/4 lb shrimps, chopped roughly
• 1 tbs fish fumet
• salt and pepper

Preparation

Heat olive oil in a pan, add shallot and let soften. Add tomato and fumet. Add shrimps and sole and let it cook until half of the water evaporates. Adjust with salt and pepper. Add extra olive oil if desired.

For the sauce

For the passatelli

Mix all ingredients together forming a thick paste. Let it rest for about 20 minutes. Bring broth (or bouillon cube) to a boil, then using a potato masher place half of the dough inside the masher and press to form long cylinder, proceed one more time using the rest of the dough, and cook in broth for a few minutes at very low heat (need to boil very slowly or the passatelli will break). Drain and carefully place the passatelli in a large plate. Pour sauce on top and mix carefully. Serve hot.