Kneading Club #4: Doughs to Shape December
a short entry on kneading, or an invitation to craft with me this month; mushroom tortellini in brodo
A stingy walk across the bridge, from frost to freezing temperatures, the sky so low and heavy; nature preserves before the winter solstice, faster before humankind doings. Ads, yearly roundups, the pace to evaluate how successful one’s year has been quickens, quick, faster – until last Saturday, when we woke up to snow in Glasgow, untouched and cotton-like. It’s never too late to make new traditions and, in December, I cook for and with anyone who also finds the expectation of spending time with family difficult.
In December, I knead harder. I pour flour and a drizzle of olive oil, break an egg, separate white and yolk, work a dough. I’m standing before our dining table in the living room because my kitchen is shaped like a corridor, too narrow for these kinds of cooking endeavours. So I stand and I wiggle my fingers. Blood streams: I look at the playground outside of the window. A woman with hair the colour of plum stands before the gate, smoking cigarettes after cigarettes. She comes here often. Her dog runs with the kids inside the park; children move in a disarticulated manner inside their fluffy overalls, the dog is fit and furious. I look at them while I knead. I don’t know if the woman is related to any of the children inside the park. Families come sweary and happy and nasty; stepfamilies, estranged children, I simply can’t know where her family is at. But I know where I stand and, reader, would you like to join me to shape a dough? You can pick a flour of your choice; a recipe of your own. I push the dough with the palm of my hand, and it sticks to my skin. The sensation tickles me; I smile. I remember a touch. Friends become families too, and sometimes they go on to making stepfamilies of their own. The dough crumbles, so does yours, but we keep kneading so we can patch things up, and we’ll give this dough another shape if needs be. Inside the playground, there are monkey bars. A man, dressed in grey sweaters and a blue beanie hat, trains here most mornings – he throws punches in the air, a fog before his breath. I crack another egg. I know nothing else about this man, but I think that sometimes he looks at me looking at him. I enjoy this game I started with a stranger. You go at your pace with the dough business, that matters. I add semolina to my preparation because I like how it smells and how malleable it makes a dough. I love and I knead, I grieve and I knead, I think and I knead, I smile and I knead. The kitchen doesn’t indulge abstract feelings. Writing or cooking, writers and cooks must turn to the senses and revaluate what is taken for granted constantly, however the method followed. How I interpret the words I’m writing to you now, how you’ll taste the food, variants of lives, are what make our domestic political – the different costs of living (remember Derrida and the notion of différance?). This is what I mean when I say we’re going to knead and shape a dough: we draft and we dare to rewrite, so we can find connections that’d have remained unnoticed otherwise. I let the dough rest under an upside-down bowl for thirty minutes.
‘for when i look at you, even a moment, no
speaking is left in me
no: tongue breaks and thin
fire is racing under skin’
― Sappho, If Not, Winter: Fragments of Sappho (translated by Anne Carson)
This month, Kneading Club will be, in some ways, a practical follow-up to last month’s essay, so allow me to remind you of the connection between the word ‘dough’ and the words ‘figure’ and ‘fiction’. We’re going to use the recipe as a creative prompt: you may cook the recipe, or you might go your own way. This is the first in a series of three and each recipe will involve working a dough and will be paired with either a story or some crafty tips. The point is to pause, to feel and to observe, to process not to run into next year with our heads down, ourselves and as a community.
What will we be cooking? Pasta to start (you can check my list of  utensils for pasta-making here, including some alternatives you might already have at home); next week will be for a forgiving-no-utensils-needed pot of gnocchi; something sweet to wrap things up on the third week.
This week’s dish is a good introduction to what I enjoy cooking the most: it’s earthy and brothy, and the recipe feeds itself – filling was broth and broth becomes filling – mushroom tortellini in brodo. This is also a traditional Tuscan recipe to make in December (or we decided as much with my partner, Ludo?).
It’s taken us a few trials to get our heads around making these doughy buttons, so we’re going to take it slowly. Remember that you can always make the broth and buy the pasta at the supermarket or make another pasta shape – you’re the chef of your own kitchen. For now, I’d recommend you grab a drink and some snacks of your choice; it’s time for pasta-making aperitivo because dinner is about to be delayed.
for the dough
150g semolina
150g flour 00
3 eggs, 1 yolk
a drizzle of olive oil
a pinch of salt
On a wooden surface, or in a large bowl, mix the flour and semolina with your hands. Dig a small hole in the middle and add oil and salt. Crack one egg after the other, kneading in between, until you’ll reach a homogeneous dough. Make a ball and leave it to rest for 30 minutes underneath an upside-down bowl.
for the filling and broth
250g chestnut mushrooms
1 half onion
1 carrot
1 celery stick
1 handful of each sage, thyme, parsley, tied together
1 handful of chestnut, grated
30g dried porcini
2 stock cubes, 1 mushroom and 1 veggie
parmesan cheese, grated
In a large casserole, bring water to the boil with all the ingredients above (minus the parmesan). Simmer for one hour, then turn off the heat and cover the casserole with a lid. Let the broth settle for 30 minutes.
Remove the odori – herbs, onion, carrot and celery. Filter the broth through a colander and return the liquid inside the casserole. Keep the mushrooms aside and squeeze the water out with the help of a potato peeler or a fork (over the broth). Transfer the mushrooms on a chopping board and chop them thinly. In a bowl, mix the chopped mushrooms, parmesan, salt and pepper, until you’ll have a homogenous mixture.
(If the filling is too wet, add flour or parmesan cheese; if the filling is too dry, add some of the preserved egg white from the dough. The important is to be able to make little balls that holds.)
to assemble and cook the pasta:
Prepare the dough for shaping. Start with flattening the dough with a rolling pin, then pass it through a pasta machine (or keep working the dough with a rolling pin if you don’t have a pasta machine). You need the dough to be fairly thin as the tortellini are small, but make sure the pasta sheet remains robust as it’ll need to be strong enough to carry the filling inside its belly. If you have a pasta machine, I’d recommend passing the sheet at the same number a few times: we stopped at number 4, but we passed the sheet twice on that number before cutting the pasta.
To shape the tortellini, cut the dough in square shapes. I used a ruled dough cutter and measured 2.5x2.5cm squares. Remember that you can make them bigger if this is more convenient: tortelli are delicious too. Spoon a little bit of filling inside each square, fold the dough in two diagonally, seal it with your fingertips. Now point your index forward and place the pasta on top of it, the pointy bit pointing at your chin, and link the two arms together underneath your finger.
Like that..?
Alternatively, if you’re also clumsy, I find using a chopstick useful. You can roll the triangle around the handle like in the video below:
Once the tortellini are ready, bring water to the boil. Cook the tortellini until they’ll float. In the meantime, warm up the broth. With a ladle, serve some broth in a pasta bowl, and splash in some tortellini.
Let me know if you end up making the tortellini in brodo? As ever, leave a comment or email me with any questions.
À lundi prochain,
Margaux Â
* I’m compiling a list of crafty project ideas to do at home (one of my friends is building a tiny flower shop inside a box?!). Send me yours, if you’d like, and I’ll include it/them in one of this month’s newsletters.
further readings:
a tender tart, or some easy cannelés for something sweet;
Demon Copperhead by Barbara Kingslover is quite brilliant if you’re looking for a book to curl up with – epic, real, the novel;
A reminder that TOP Pantry, an index for this newsletter, exists if you’re looking for more cooking inspirations for the holidays;
My best friend and business partner, Irene, shared her recipe for the chicche della nonna via our book club. The recipe is featured in the children’s cookbook World Kitchen written by Abigail Wheatley, illustrated by Chaaya Prabhat. One for the little chefs in your lives;
Talking about our book club with Irene, if you’d like something to look forward to, the SPK is reading The House of the Spirits by Isabel Allende. We’ll meet and discuss the book online on Tuesday 9th January 2024 — join us? We send the login details nearer the time via our mailing list.
A walk to the charity shops? I found the wonderful Honey & Co. at home cookbook in one of them last Saturday, and came back home happy with tahini in coat pocket.
Thanks for being here with me! The Onion Papers is a reader-supported publication; feel free to like this post and to forward it to a pal or two. If you’re able to, please consider a paid subscription as this is the best way to support my work.
