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Annie Smithers is the owner and chef of du Fermier in Trentham, Victoria. Her latest book is Recipe for a Kinder Life. She is a food editor of The Saturday Paper.
Credit: Photographed remotely by Earl Carter
“The Tortellini in Brodo that first night was a dish they would talk about for years. Oh, how it nourished them and pleased them, gave them resilience for all the unexpected moments to come,” writes my friend Sarah Winman in her book Still Life, describing a meal that her little fictitious gang ate for their first Christmas in Florence.
Since reading about it in Sarah’s book, that tiny passing reference, I have been overcome with the desire to make some. Food has that capacity. A memory from long ago can be ignited so easily and it can take you back to a different place. Much of the detail can be lost in the mists of time but a dish, a flavour, a texture fills you with a longing that must be sated.
It has been a long time since I have made such a dish. I love that it is a northern Italian speciality at Christmas, which means it suits this infernally cold weather we are having at the moment perfectly. I also love the Italian tradition that pasta-making is a family pursuit that everyone gets involved in, often three generations standing around the kitchen bench, rolling pasta and forming little tortellini.
In this recipe I have actually opted to make cappelletti. The difference being that tortellini are made from a round piece of pasta and cappelletti are made from a square. I find it so much easier to take my pizza wheel to the rolled pasta dough and cut squares rather than getting the round cutter out. And it’s so much less wasteful.
Cappelletti are also traditionally made a little larger and since I don’t have an army of willing helpers around my kitchen bench, I don’t have to make quite so many of them. The other lovely thing is that the filling traditionally uses mortadella. Mortadella seems to be going through a renaissance at the moment and is becoming one of the hip things on the deli shelf.
The “brodo” is as important as the pasta. I use a roasted chicken broth enriched with a little reduced veal stock, but a lovely robust, clear chicken broth would definitely suffice.
Time: 2.5 hours preparation + 2-3 minutes cooking
This article was first published in the print edition of The Saturday Paper on July 2, 2022 as "A square meal".
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Annie Smithers is the owner and chef of du Fermier in Trentham, Victoria. Her latest book is Recipe for a Kinder Life. She is a food editor of The Saturday Paper.
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