Original subtitles

So we always hear the dietitians bang on about the Mediterranean diet.

For good reason, Mike.

For good reason. Really? Are you sure?

I swear they just want to go on trips and chase the sun.

Oh, look, from a research perspective, it's imperative that

I visit Greece and Spain, the south of France, south of Italy.

Yeah. Hard life. I mean, come on, what's not to love?

(BOTH LAUGH)

Well, but in all truthfulness, actually,

if we look at...you've heard of the blue zones, right?

So the blue zones are the areas in the world

that have the longest-living people.

And originally...there's a few extras now, but the original five,

two of them are in the Mediterranean,

so there's something in it. Yeah. Yeah.

So I am going to make some little tartlets using my favourite

kind of pastry, which is filo.

Now, what are you making, Mike?

I'm going to do a goat's cheese and mushroom tortellini, and I'm going to

serve it with a really simple sauce of gorgeous cheese and butter sauce.

Perfect match for this pasta. I knew it.

(LAUGHS) OK, let's get cooking.

So do you make your own labneh? I do sometimes, not all the time.

Yeah. For you guys to make your labneh, it's really, really easy, honestly.

So all you do is get some good Greek yoghurt,

but, you know, choose your favourite Greek yoghurt.

Pop it into... Normally I would use a pretty muslin,

but you know, the old kitchen cloth here.

As long as it's a clean one... Still works. Still works.

..will do the trick.

Literally fill it with your Greek yoghurt, tie up the ends

and then just hang it.

I actually hang it over the sink and my tap and over a bowl,

and all that liquid comes out.

You leave it for about 24 hours, you don't put it in the fridge.

I just leave it out at room temperature.

All that fluid comes out.

And then the next day

you have this kind of really lovely thick yogurty cheese.

Anyway, that's what we're going to use in our filo parcels today.

Beautiful. Alright.

Do you want to do some chopping for me? Because you're so good at that.

You know, chef chopping.

So I have gone for...

So the capsicums, you can either buy them pre-marinated

if you want a real short cut here, or do them yourself,

you know, roast them in the oven or do them over the gas

so the skins are black,

peel the skins off and then you've got these lovely roasted capsicums.

Now, I love using filo because...

..I don't know, just because it's so light, airy.

Some people are a little intimidated by it, I suppose.

Yeah.

Because you do have to work in a specific way with it, right?

You have to go quickly.

And here's the little trick,

is just to have a damp towel.

Not too wet or you're going to make your pastry wet.

But just to stop the pastry drying out.

Because it's wafer thin,

it's really easy for it to dry out and then it all falls apart.

So yeah, the trick is just to work quite quickly. Yeah.

So brush it with your extra virgin olive oil.

And then I'm going to fold it in half.

And you know me, a little bit rustic.

So don't worry about being all particular.

Do it again and then fold it again

and then brush one more time.

And I'm also going to brush around the hole I'm going to pop it in.

And then just cut this in half

and then work your pastry into the muffin hole.

Just lining the muffin hole, making sure it comes out the sides,

and then just kind of scrunch the tops a little bit.

And so just continue like this.

You're going to use six sheets all up

until you've lined your whole muffin tray.

OK, we're ready to fill these then.

So I'm just going to get a little teaspoon.

And basically...

So I'll do the labneh.

You go with your vegies. OK.

Put in a nice spoonful and then fill with the capsicum.

You could also do... All the way to the top, or just...

Yeah, just... That's...that looks perfect.

And you know what, you could also do like chargrilled zucchini,

any kind of vegies you like, really.

I often use zucchini or eggplant. That would be another one.

Nice.

This could be chevre or fetta

or any kind of lovely soft cheese like this.

So the finishing touch though here is homemade pesto.

And if you've never made it yourself at home, it is

so easy, especially if you've got a blender, you can do it by hand.

Literally all I do, a very quick sort of tip is,

lightly toast the pine nuts in a pan.

That's what I like to do.

Blitz them up in your food processor and then it's some grated parmesan.

Nice, fine grate.

Two bunches of fresh basil and extra virgin olive oil. That's it.

Love it. Bit of salt, if you need it.

And dollop that on the top.

So I'm just going to put a little teaspoonful on each one.

OK. And then this goes into the oven for about 20 minutes, 25 minutes,

or so, until you see it going nice and golden brown.

Oh! We're ready to have a wee taste.

I just want to pop a whole one in my mouth. They look delicious.

They smell amazing.

So just tip them out.

I like to leave them maybe just a couple of minutes to firm up.

See how it's nice and crispy, that pastry?

And then pop them out onto a wire rack.

But I can tell you're dying to taste one,

so I'm going to put one in front of you.

Please!

There you go.

Looks really good.

Yeah.

So, you know, if you truly want it to be one bite in your mouth,

you can do these in, like, little mini muffin trays,

but, you know, they're a little bit more fiddly to make.

They're delicious. Yeah.

They're really delicious. Super tasty.

The pesto on the top is what just... It's the game changer for me.

It just gives it that real depth, that nutty...

I love it, absolutely love it.

At the end of the day, it's a really simple dish,

but it's those traditional Mediterranean flavours,

you know, the beautiful charred capsicums

with the cheese and the pesto and the olives.

It's just fantastic. Really good food.

Simple. Delicious. Blooming tasty.

Yum!

OK.

You're going to get fancy on me, aren't you, mate?

I am, I'm gonna go a little bit cheffy. Just a little bit.

Yeah. You're gonna out-chef me. Come on.

But do you know what? It's a labour of love.

But what a treat it is when we make some fresh pasta.

So we're using 500g of the Tipo flour. The 00.

So this is the higher protein flour, right?

Exactly. We want the gluten.

You want the gluten this time.

You want it to be really nice and elastic.

And a lot of the job of making fresh pasta

is making that gluten work for you.

OK. So, flour...

Simple recipe.

500g of flour

to either five large eggs, is how I always remember it,

or six smaller eggs.

OK? OK.

So these are slightly smaller. So we're going six.

Six eggs, 500g of flour. 500g of flour.

And if I wanted to be lazy, could I do this in like a food...

Of course you could. What was I going to say?

Like a kitchen mix? Yeah, you could do it.

You could do it in a mixer. You could even do it in like a blender

sort of like this. Yeah.

Just whisk the eggs first.

Like, I've got a dough hook on my... Absolutely.

..KitchenAid thing.

Absolutely. Dough hook attachment.

And you can leave it to combine and then to knead about 8 to 10 minutes.

Yeah. You know.

But this looks nice. Like, you know...

For me, this is pasta.

This is proper pasta. It's fun.

It's, um, it's engaging. I love to make it with my kids, you know?

But I love making it in the restaurants as well.

Like, it's just something we've always had on the menu.

It's a labour of love.

But when done well, it's the best thing in the world.

Alright. So we're just going to keep mixing this up

and then it's going to come eventually into a ball.

And then we'll start kneading it. OK.

8 to 10 minutes of this sort of process,

and it will pick up those last little bits and you just keep it working.

And you'll have a gorgeous dough,

which you then have to rest at the end.

OK? It's got to rest for minimum 20 minutes.

Ideally an hour, minimum of 20.

Your job.

(LAUGHS) I'm in.

This is like I don't need to go to the gym today if I do this.

It's like my resistance training.

I'm gonna push this over to you, and then I'm gonna get cracking.

You want me to work all this in? Yes, please.

OK. OK.

While you're kneading, I'm going to make the filling, OK?

And I'm going to do, like, a mushroom and goat's cheese filling.

OK, that does sound good.

Do you want me to budge over a little bit?

So with the mushrooms,

I'm going to do it almost... similar to like a duxelles style.

You know, where we're going to blitz them first

and then cook it out in a pan.

Then you're going to fry them? Yes, it's much easier.

Alright.

Super quick. Easy.

You don't have to spend one hour chopping.

Yeah, I've actually never done it this way.

I always think to cook the mushrooms first and then, you know,

if I'm doing, like, a mushroom sauce for steak or something.

Absolutely. You can do it like that.

This is a nice way

where basically it's going to draw out the moisture quicker...

Right. ..in the mushroom.

So I want to evaporate all that liquid

and get it really nice, almost thick basically,

because I want it to be...I want it to hold inside the tortellini.

OK. And are these shallots? Like French shallots?

Yeah. Shallots or eschalots?

Shallots. Shallots.

These are banana shallots

which we're just going to do into like little brunoise.

So, little dice.

So just a small dice of that.

And then in here we're going to go with a little bit of butter.

Of course. A little bit.

Of course you are.

We've got some incredible, unique chemicals

that you only get in mushrooms compared to other things.

And all the members of the onion family

have all sorts of health benefits.

There you go.

I can see something really, really good and healthy about this recipe.

This isn't too bad, this recipe.

And like, OK, look,

the one thing I will say about cooking the mushrooms in the butter

is you get a layer of flavour you just don't get with oil.

Like, even olive oil.

Like, you get this nutty,

caramelised, almost umami hit from cooking mushrooms in butter.

There is no better way of cooking it.

And garlic. And garlic.

That is a very classic pairing, isn't it?

And onion. Oh, it's just... it's a perfect match.

Just rough chopping the garlic for this.

But, you know, in the Mediterranean they would be using oil over butter.

Extra virgin olive oil. They would. I'm not.

(BOTH LAUGH)

No, I can see.

Alright. So we get all those mushrooms in there.

And again, you can use... you can use different...

I'm using button mushroom

because I actually want the cheese to be the star of this not the mushroom.

Yeah. And for vegetarians, pescatarians,

actually, mushrooms are a great way

of getting that sort of umami flavour, aren't they?

Absolutely. Yeah.

This is almost done.

I'm going to take it off, cool it down

before I mix it through with the cheeses.

That is looking beautiful.

We'll cover it up with some Glad Wrap,

leave it to rest for about half an hour.

OK, so this is now cold.

Our beautiful like almost mushroom duxelles.

Yeah.

If you can grate probably half of this, about 100g.

And what sort of cheese have I got here?

So this is both two different types of goats.

So this is a hard goat's... OK.

And I'm just going to add...

I love goat's cheese. I love goat's cheese.

Now, that is very, very Mediterranean.

Absolutely. They often have goat's cheese.

All of this one I'm just going to crush up and pop through as well.

And, you know, this is a fermented food.

We talk about all the fancy fermented foods

and we forget about good old yoghurt and cheese, true fermented foods.

It's one of... It's where it almost started.

Yeah.

So I'm adding in some creme fraiche into that now.

And then we're just going to season it up nicely.

Do you want this in here? Yes, please.

Generous pinch of salt.

Some pepper.

Try not to waste a second of this beautiful cheese.

And then we're just going to mix that really nicely through.

And that's just going to be the most simple, delicious

mushroom and goat's cheese filling.

Pass me a piping bag?

Do you want me to hold it while you...

Yeah. Why not? ..tip it in?

OK, so we cool this down a bit? Yeah.

Pop it back in the fridge just to reset a little bit

so it's a bit firmer.

And we're going to get to the fun part of doing our pasta sheets.

Fun! OK.

I've never done this before. Really?

I'm quite excited.

Well, I've made it in the ready made pasta machine

that does all it for you.

Yeah. And I've done it that way.

But never the hand roller. So... Oh...

But I've seen it done so many times.

I find it very therapeutic. Yeah.

Like, it really is. It's mindfulness for me.

So with this now,

I mean, you can see the difference to how when we started...

Yeah, it's a great shape. It's a really good dough.

So we're just going to cut it into four.

Put those to the side.

Give you that.

We're just going to flatten it slightly.

OK?

Now, there's a reason why when you're doing things like fresh pasta

or even pizza and stuff like that,

people then swap flours when you're dusting.

And I always use semolina at this point.

Ah, now, see, I use that when I do pizza dough.

Exactly. I always use semolina.

Yeah. Yeah.

OK. So with fresh pasta we always start at the widest setting. OK?

So go wide and put it through repeatedly, right?

Exactly. Until it's this thickness you want.

Until you stretch it.

And I always do it twice.

Oh, you fold it over?

Yeah. OK.

Because again, it's all about activating the gluten

and getting that elasticity which we want.

So, at this stage, I then drop it down one setting.

Yeah. And then feed it through again.

So basically each setting is twice.

And then you'll find that helps you keep a really nice shape as well.

And then it will start to get longer and longer and longer.

So when you're making a stuffed pasta like a tortellini...

Yeah.

..you basically want it almost, almost translucent.

OK? You don't want it thick.

So you don't have a really heavy, gluggy kind of end dish.

It shouldn't be too thick. Yeah.

You know, because obviously once you then fold over and it joins,

that's where the pasta then becomes a bit chewy.

Now, when you get like... So there's two forms of pasta, right?

One has egg in it and one doesn't. Mm-hm.

So would you always use an egg pasta

for something like a filled tortellini or a ravioli?

Absolutely. It's just more pliable. Yeah.

Eggless pastas are beautiful, but they're not as...

For more... I don't know, fusilli, or penne...

Exactly. They're not as robust. Yeah. Right.

So at this stage is when I'm going to start to get you involved.

We're at the pointy end. Am I going to...?

Yeah. (LAUGHS)

Starts to get a little bit long. OK.

So you just keep feeding it through

and then remembering to fold it over.

And then you pop it back through again.

This is food made with love, isn't it?

It's love. Look at that.

That's just beautiful.

You see how you can see your fingers through it?

Yeah. It's done. I get it.

So it's quite thin, but it's so, uh... Yeah, pliable, elastic.

If you were doing, using your filo, for example.

So if you take too long at this stage, it will dry out.

It'll dry out. OK.

So we've got to work reasonably quickly.

Reasonably quickly.

So, semolina is your friend.

So I'm just going to dust it very lightly with the semolina.

And then we can just fold it over while we do the next one.

Alright.

Next up? Next step.

I feel like this is, you know, getting to the exciting part.

Seeing it coming together. This hasn't been exciting?

No, I like that. This was...this is good.

(LAUGHS)

I'm having a good time here.

So we're just going to cut the discs.

If you continue doing that and then I'm literally just going to stuff...

I always overstuff my tortellini.

OK. I'm that person.

I try and get in too much filling.

So you don't want to go too much. Probably half a tablespoon.

Yeah. I feel like this is like when I make fajitas

and I always put too much in my fajitas and my family laughs at me.

OK. Am I pulling out the excess? Absolutely.

Now we'll see how well I cut the...

OK. So, and of course, we could reroll this dough.

We don't want to waste this thing.

So much effort and love went into that.

(LAUGHS)

Oh, how beautiful does this look? OK.

Now just use a little bit of water.

Yeah. Just on the lip.

So just one side.

And then you're going to fold. Fold over?

Yeah. I get it to that stage before I then pick it up.

I make sure all the air has popped out.

And then as you're popping it down,

you can like slightly stretch it up if you want to,

just to give yourself a little bit more surface area.

Water on one side only.

Fold it over. OK. So it's kind of like a little hat.

Exactly. OK.

And then, when I sit it down,

I actually push it back down a little bit.

Just tuck that in again.

We're going to repeat the process until we're done.

Alright. We're ready to cook.

We're finally ready to cook.

Tell you what, you know how to do a long recipe.

(LAUGHS)

I know how to do the good ones, guys.

This is my gift to you.

Now, do we have to worry about them all sticking together in that pan?

A little bit. Yeah.

So you can either do it in smaller batches, or you can just make sure

you keep it moving a little bit in the water just at the beginning.

And gentle. Gentle.

But obviously, fresh pasta, two to three minutes to cook, max.

Like, super quick. And obviously we just made it.

So the sauce now - super easy.

Butter. Rich, indulgent...

(LAUGHS)

Full of flavour.

So, pecorino. Pecorino.

Pecorino. Pecorino.

So we're just going to literally grate that.

And when these float... They're done.

Kind of means they're ready, right? Exactly.

And are we going to put some extra virgin olive oil in there too?

We're going to put a little bit of olive oil in there, just a little,

just to make you happy.

(LAUGHS)

Doesn't need to be there. (LAUGHS)

No, but lots of chefs do

always a combination of butter and extra virgin olive oil, don't they?

Always. Yeah.

One, it stops the butter from burning.

Two, obviously the flavour combination is great.

Just...just a touch.

And then I'm going to use just a little bit of the pasta water

to bring this together.

So you get a touch of the starch, I guess,

from the water and the starch? Exactly. You want the starch.

Really simple. Really delicious.

Look at that. They're all floating.

Cooked.

We're going to finish that with a generous helping of black pepper

and just a tiny touch of salt.

Lovely. Some black pepper? Yes, please.

Oh, it's the little cheffing techniques.

Make a bit of a mess.

You've called me messy a few times already.

(BOTH LAUGH)

Oh, well, I'm afraid I'm with you on that one, so it's alright.

So we both are.

Serve up now. And, like, this is for me, this is a starter.

It can be a main meal.

Like, this is enough for four as a starter

or, you know, two as a more decent main.

I would do this at the end.

Just in case there's not enough cheese.

(BOTH LAUGH)

And it does look pretty though.

A little snow on the top.

A little bit of snow on the top.

There you have it, guys.

My goat's cheese and mushroom tortellini with a pecorino sauce.

Gorgeous. Proof is in the eating.

Should we get stuck in? Definitely, definitely.

I mean, for me, there's nothing better.

Look at that filling when you cut through it.

Oozy. It's creamy.

And that's why we go through the effort

of doing the mushroom that way.

That is heaven in a ball.

No, truly, Mike, it is absolutely delicious.

But it's quite rich.

Like, that would be, for me, too big a portion for my entree.

Don't worry, Jo, I've got you. (LAUGHS)

Not too much for me.

Captions by Red Bee Media