♪ ♪ - I always say the simplest is the best.

Bitter greens, juicy, sweet sausage.

It is so good.

- The texture of the lentils is absolutely perfect.

Lots of vegetable flavors.

And the browning of that tomato paste has added a beautiful dimension to our soup.

- Look at that.

It's simple, it's elegant, and it features a no-cook, really creamy sauce.

Let's get started.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ - You know, the beauty of Italian food is the marriage of simplicity with local ingredients.

There's no fuss or fanfare.

And Umbria, which is deep in the heart of Italy, is of course known for truffles and wine, but it's also known for its rustic cuisine.

We start today with a simple Umbrian flatbread with sausage and broccoli rabe.

Then an Umbrian lentil soup with rosemary and garlic.

And we finish up with a very quick pasta dish, pasta with ricotta, tomatoes, and herbs.

Please stay tuned.

- So, a word about flatbreads.

I've said this before but, you know, in this country, we don't make-- most people don't make flatbreads.

You can do them with yeast or baking powder, like in this one.

And it takes maybe half an hour from start to finish to actually make them.

So you should all go out and make flatbreads.

It's like the easiest bread in the world, and they're great.

This comes from Silvia Buitoni from Puglia in Umbria in Italy, sort of the central Italy.

And she stuffs them with wild greens and all sorts of spicy stuff.

We're going to use sausage and greens as well.

But this basic recipe is half an hour.

- It's so easy, and you can have this entire meal done in under an hour, which I think is fabulous.

And it's all made from scratch.

So we're going to start with the dough for the flatbreads that we're going to be using.

It's a really, really, really simple dough.

As you can see, there's very few ingredients.

We're starting with all-purpose flour.

And to that, I'm just going to add the baking powder, like you mentioned.

A little bit of table salt.

I'm going to whisk that together just to combine it.

Get rid of any baking powder lumps.

Okay, so now we're going to add the other two ingredients.

I have here a good dose of extra virgin olive oil.

I'm going to add this to some water.

The olive oil adds a lot of flavor to this, but it also makes these flatbreads super tender.

Just going to drizzle this in.

And stir it, and that's basically it.

It's going to form a nice, shaggy dough.

There's really not a lot of mixing involved with this recipe like you would with, like, a pizza dough or a bread dough.

You really are just mixing it until it comes together, because, again, we want these to be nice and tender.

So once I get it to the point where most of the flour has been mixed in, going to go ahead and transfer this to the counter.

Now I'm going to go ahead and finish kneading it by hand right here on the counter.

And again, I'm not kneading extensively.

We're not going to be here for ten minutes.

Just about 30 seconds, just till it comes together in a smooth ball.

You can see, like, the oil is kind of streaking in there.

We just want it to be completely combined.

- So it may look a little shaggy to start with.

When you knead it, it starts to come together.

- Yeah, it does, definitely comes together, yeah.

As the ingredients mix together, yeah.

I mean, everything used to be done by hand, right, at one point, and now we rely on mixers so much and sometimes we forget what the dough really looks like and feels like.

- Erika is about to give you the speech about "the old ways are best."

I can hear, I can hear the... - (laughs) - Through the mists of time.

- Yep.

- Well, I do agree with you.

- Yeah.

Okay, so that's about it.

And now the last thing we're going to do, just going to go ahead and divide this in half because we're going to be making two flatbreads.

And if you want to help me roll these into little balls here.

And we're just going to put this aside.

I'm going to put a little flour down just so it doesn't stick as it sits.

I'm just going to cover these with a kitchen towel and let them sit for about 15 minutes, up to an hour, and that's it.

Okay, so these have been resting for about 15 minutes.

I'm going to go ahead and shape them and I'm just going to do this using my hands because it's a super-- remember-- nice, tender, relaxed dough.

And we're looking to shape these into rounds that are five-and-a-half inches.

I have my handy dandy ruler here just to make sure.

That looks about right.

And over here we have, as you can see, a twelve-inch cast iron skillet, which is really important to really get these nice and spotty brown and cooked all the way through.

We're heating this on medium-low, and to make sure that the pan is ready, we can just take a little bit of water and sprinkle it into the pan and it should sizzle right away.

- I'm the sizzler?

- Yeah, you're the, this is a sizzle reel.

(water sizzles) (chuckles) Ooh, it's ready.

- Just a little sizzle.

- Great.

And we want to cook this for about four minutes per side and you want to look for it to be nice and spotty golden brown.

- So we should just say this is unusual because it's kind of a low temperature for doing, cooking a bread in the skillet.

But they're thicker.

- Yes.

- So they need more time.

So if it was hot, so hot, that you'd cook it in a minute or two, you wouldn't get the center cooked.

- Exactly, you'd have-- it would be totally charred on the outside and like still doughy in the middle-- yeah, these are pretty thick 'cause we are going to be making these into sandwiches.

Just got to be a little patient.

- That's me!

That's my middle name, patience.

- (chuckles) Okay, you want to take a peek and see if it's ready to flip?

It smells great.

Yeah, ooh.

- Looks ready.

- Looks beautiful, that's perfect.

- Now you have to say, "Oh, Chris, you did a good job."

- Chris, you did such a good job, I'm really proud of you.

- That's what I was waiting for.

- (chuckles) We're going to go ahead and let this cook for another four minutes till it looks that way on the bottom, and then we're going to go ahead and cook the second flatbread.

And then while those are cooling, we're going to work on the filling.

- Okay.

- Okay so, Chris, our sausages are almost finished cooking.

We're looking for 160 degrees, we have sweet Italian sausages.

You can use spicy Italian sausages, too, in this recipe.

You can go ahead and transfer those.

And then we're going to go ahead and add... this is the broccoli rabe, which is a nice substitute for the wild foraged herbs and greens because they have a nice bitterness.

- Sure we have enough here?

I want to make sure.

- (chuckles) It's like spinach, it's going to cook down to, like... - Cook down, yeah.

- I'm just going to add a little bit of salt.

And you're just going to toss that really well in all of that delicious sausage fat.

So once you're done tossing all of the broccoli rabe till it's well-coated, we're gonna go ahead and put the lid on and continue cooking over medium-high heat till it's cooked down.

It's going to take about four to six minutes.

I think these are about ready.

We want them to just be shy of tender because we're going to go ahead and add a few more ingredients.

So if you just want to push them over to the side.

And I will add a little bit of olive oil here.

And then we're going to go ahead and add... ...garlic.

And we have a couple of anchovies.

- This is grated garlic.

- Yup, beautiful grated garlic.

Those are oil-packed anchovy fillets and then some red pepper flakes.

And if you wouldn't mind, just mashing that around a little bit, break down those anchovy fillets, cook a little garlic.

That should take about a minute.

- (takes deep breath) Ah, there we go.

- It smells good, huh?

- Feeling refreshed.

- Anchovy facial?

- Well, you know, one or two anchovies that dissolve in oil, you never know it's there.

- Right.

- It gives you that extra... - Definitely adds.

- Yeah.

Think we're just about there.

- Yeah, great.

And once that's done, you're going to go ahead and just incorporate it with the rest of the greens.

And that's it, and we're done, and then we actually want to go ahead and take those out of the hot pan because it will continue cooking.

And we don't want to overcook the greens.

Looks great.

Perfect, thank you.

Okay, and now we're going to go ahead and start preparing our flatbreads.

So if you wouldn't mind, go ahead and slice up these sausages.

- Well, just two of them, or would you like me to do more?

- Do at least three of them.

I'm going to make half of the flatbread, because it's just us.

And I'm going to go ahead and slice our beautiful flatbread in half.

And they look like a pita, but they actually are much sturdier than that.

It's going to be a nice sandwich bread, and then I'm going to go ahead and cut it in half again.

Great.

I'm ready to assemble.

I'm just going to drizzle with a little bit of olive oil.

- Kind of look like you're working in a food truck right now, right?

- (chuckles) - Quick!

- (chuckles) Yeah.

Okay, I'm going to go ahead and add the sausage, and then I'm going to top the sausage with a nice big pile of this beautiful broccoli rabe.

Oh, it smells so good.

It's all that anchovy and garlic.

And I'm just going to top them.

And you want to give it a nice press.

Makes it a little easier to eat.

And that's it-- you ready?

- I am certainly ready.

- All right, let's dig in.

- Mm!

- Mm.

- I always say the simplest is the best, and I like the fact you can make flatbreads in 30 minutes from start to finish.

- Mm-hmm, yep.

The sausages and broccoli rabe just take a few minutes to make, so.

- Yup.

- So Umbrian flatbread with sausage and broccoli rabe.

Bitter greens, juicy sweet sausage, or you could do spicy sausage, and then just enough bread to sort of set the two things apart.

It is so good.

- Mm-hmm.

♪ ♪ - So in her home kitchen in Umbria, Silvia Buitoni taught us her recipe for an Umbrian lentil soup, which is a really great classical Italian soup with a little bit of texture and a lot of vegetables and a lot of goodness.

So to get it started, we're going to preheat our pan up and dice some vegetables.

We're going to start our soup with some pretty standard soup starters of the onions, the carrots, and the celery, just to create a really nice base of flavor.

So let's get started and chop up some carrots.

I'm going to half them first.

I'm just making them a little bit shorter so it's easier for me to cut.

We're just going to cut these into little half moons.

So for my celery, I'm going to do the same thing.

I'm going to half them and then chop them up.

I'm going to try to make most of these a uniform size so they cook evenly.

All right.

So I'm going to add a couple of tablespoons of oil.

And I'm going to set this to medium-high heat and let it heat up.

My oil is ready, so I'm going to add in my onions, my carrots and my celery.

(sizzling) Don't forget to add about half a teaspoon of salt to help everything along just a little bit.

All right, we're going to let these brown up and cook for about five minutes, and then we're going to add some more ingredients.

All right, now we've got a little bit of golden color on our vegetables.

I'm going to use the small side of my grater to grate some garlic in.

All right, now that our garlic's grated in, we're going to let it cook for about 30 seconds.

All right, the garlic's gotten a gentle little cook.

Now we're going to add some tomato paste in.

And remember, if you have a little bit sticking to the bottom, that's okay, we want this to brown because browning is flavor.

All right, now that our tomato paste is in, we're going to let it cook for about two minutes just to make sure that we get some of that browning on the bottom of the pot.

Our tomato paste has gotten some good color, sticking to the bottom a little bit.

Our vegetables are softening.

I'm going to add about six cups of water and scrape up all the brown bits on the bottom of my pot.

All right, I've got my water in.

I've scraped up all the good stuff on the bottom.

I am going to let it come up to a boil so we can add our lentils.

So for this recipe, we'll be using the Umbrian Castelluccio lentils, which we can find in specialty markets or even some very well-stocked grocery stores.

But if you can't find them, don't fret.

You can use a regular brown lentil, which will cook a little bit quicker and lose its structure just a bit quicker, so you'll have to keep an eye on it.

Or the closest that we found would be the French Puy lentils.

The Puy lentils will still have that sort of bite and texture that we expect from the Castelluccio lentils, but will take a little bit longer to cook.

And then if you're out of both of those or you just happen to have masoor dal or red lentils around, you can definitely use those.

But these cook super, super quick and will end up breaking down a lot faster than our other lentils.

All right, we've got a good boil going.

I'm going to go ahead and add my lentils, some rosemary and some crushed chili flake.

I'm going to give this a quick stir.

I just want it to come up to a simmer, and then I'm going to cover it, letting it cook for about 40 minutes.

All right, so after my 40 minute cook, I went ahead and took the cover off of my lentils to let the broth become a little bit richer and thicker, which is only going to take about eight to ten minutes.

I did not season a ton at the top of the recipe, so I'm going to go ahead and taste it now and adjust for salt and pepper.

Oh, yeah, that needs seasoning.

All righty, we're ready to serve.

You still have all that beautiful vegetables, and those lentils have gotten nice and tender.

I'm going to serve this drizzled with just a little bit more olive oil.

And, of course, a little bit of cheese.

All right, it's looking pretty good, time to taste.

♪ ♪ Mmm, that's really good.

The texture of the lentils is absolutely perfect.

Lots of vegetable flavors.

And the browning of that tomato paste has added a beautiful dimension to our soup.

So that's our Umbrian lentil soup.

♪ ♪ - You'll find only on the Amalfi coast this system of cultivation, okay?

Here we grow the lemons like a baby.

We have another little bit close this system of cultivation in Sorrento, but Sorrento's cultivation is taller.

Here is on the, on the hill, on the terraces, yeah.

You see our perfect yellow... And they will be nice, because to people, the look is important too.

I want to do organic, but I have to find a compromise.

It's not easy.

And this season, they will not huge lemons.

The size, it will be small, small, medium.

This is too small for me.

Because normally they are huge like my palm, yeah.

When you cook or when you use in a pasta, cake, or for everything, the taste has to be, of course, different.

Because we give only sustainable and organic-- the taste is different.

Our history is a long history.

We start about 1700, I am sixth generation.

The first was Antonio after Salvatore.

I am the last Salvatore Aceto.

And last line, my son Gianmarco is my seventh generation He is beginning to start on the farm.

Thanks to the family, I have this, I have this and I can continue.

Lemons for us is everything.

And we... my father always say me, "Salvatore, "we don't have blood in the veins.

We have lemon juice."

Sometimes I think it's true.

Because we have too much acid.

Strong, but we have to.

We have to be because this environment is difficult if you are not strong.

♪ ♪ ♪ ♪ - Today, I'm going to show you a pasta dish that we learned at a restaurant called Felice a Testaccio in Rome.

It's simple, it's elegant, and it features a no-cook, really creamy sauce.

So you know why I like it-- let's get started.

So we're going to start with our grape tomatoes.

They need to be halved and if you know me, you know I am lazy-- or efficient, depending on how you look at it.

So I'm going to show you this really cool hack to slice grape tomatoes very quickly.

I have a deli lid here and another one there.

In this indented part, I'm going to fill it with as many grape tomatoes as it'll hold.

Now I'm going to take the other lid and sandwich the tomatoes between them.

So with a very sharp serrated knife, I'm going to slice right through the tomatoes.

And look, they are all done.

So we're going to start building the first part of this no-cook sauce.

I'm going to add to my tomatoes some oil.

Followed by some sugar, salt, and pepper.

I'm going to give that a quick stir and then I'm going to crush it gently.

So I'm going to use a potato masher and just applying gentle pressure to draw out the juices of the tomatoes.

Once I'm done doing this, I'm going to let it sit for at least 15 minutes, up to an hour so that the tomatoes kind of release their juices, and that's going to be the start of our sauce.

Okay, my tomatoes have been sitting for about 15 minutes.

You can see I've crushed them to a point where lots of juice has been released.

This is going to form the basis of our sauce.

To this, I'm going to add a lovely assortment of fresh herbs.

I have a few different things here, right?

This is kind of a choose-your-own-adventure deal with these herbs.

I have some freshly chopped basil.

I have some mint, fresh mint.

I happen to have some fresh oregano, so that's going to go in.

And I have some thyme.

Now I like to go heavier on the leafy herbs and light on the denser, woodsier herbs, like thyme, oregano, or marjoram.

Next, I'm going to add some ricotta.

I'm using fresh whole milk ricotta.

It's best that you go to your grocery store's cheese counter and not to the dairy case to get this.

You want to avoid the kind that has lots of gums and stabilizers in it.

So let's put that in.

Now, remember, this is a no-cook sauce.

So let's stir that all together.

This is looking so beautiful.

Okay, so my sauce base is ready.

I'm going to let this sit for a second, and I'm going to move on to this other portion of ricotta.

This is going to be for the topping at the end.

I'm going to add some olive oil.

A little salt and pepper.

Okay, this is my seasoned ricotta.

I'm going to set this aside and keep it for when we're ready to eat.

Let's move on to cooking our pasta-- so for this dish, I'm going to use only seven cups of water to boil the pasta.

It might seem like too little, but there's a reason.

The leftover starchy water from the pasta is going to serve as essential to the sauce of this dish.

First, some salt.

And in goes my pasta.

When this is done cooking, we'll come back and finish the dish.

Okay, my pasta has finished cooking.

I've drained it under a bowl so that I've caught the remaining water.

I'm going to use that in the sauce later.

Now, while the pasta is still hot, here's the move.

We're going to add it right into that sauce.

And then while the pasta is still hot, I want to really mix it all the way through so it starts melting the ricotta cheese into a lovely, creamy sauce.

Okay, that ricotta has started to melt really nicely.

I'm going to add a couple tablespoons of this reserved pasta cooking water to thin out the sauce until it clings to the noodles.

This is looking so fresh, so vibrant, so colorful.

And I love how that ricotta has just kind of melted into this lovely, creamy sauce.

I think this dish is ready to plate.

So just look at this.

Feast your eyes upon this dish, which is of great beauty, simplicity, and elegance.

I'm going to build myself a tasting bowl.

In goes a generous portion of that beautifully creamy pasta.

A little bit extra on the tomatoes with those herbs.

And remember we had that seasoned ricotta from earlier?

That is what comes into play now.

Dollop some of that on top.

A little bit extra Parmesan cheese.

And a final drizzle of olive oil.

Look at that.

This is our pasta with ricotta, tomatoes, and herbs from Rome, via Milk Street, straight to your kitchen-- enjoy.

You can get this recipe and all the recipes of this season of Milk Street Television at MilkStreetTV.com.

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