By Leigh O’Connor.
Alec Morris was taught how to cook fresh pasta by his Nonna as a child, spending most of his youngest years at her house learning how dough worked.
Now with his own young sons – Aldo and Elio – he is part of a new playful pasta-making team bringing their favourite Sunday traditions to your table in his debut cookbook, Pasta et Al: The Many Shapes of a Family Tradition.
With degrees in languages, international relations, history and photography, Alec called Canberra home for 15 years before returning to his hometown of Perth, where he now lives with wife Rachel and their boys.
He learnt an appreciation for life through food by spending time with his Nonna, learning you can’t rush a sugo and how loud Italians are. For him, making and sharing pasta carries the memories of a young family making a start in a new country and the history they brought with them.
Alec now carries that on with his boys every Sunday by making pasta and enjoying a family meal together.
Celebrating life’s simple pleasures, Pasta et Al features 60 classic recipes for handmade pasta, all with an irresistible blend of humour, plenty of heart and some meddling little hands. Discover how to make more than 30 pasta doughs and 42 different pasta shapes – long, short, big and flat, small and squishy and filled – with step-by-step tutorials.
From green lasagna to spiralled cappellacci and showstopping agnolotti, there is a dish in this book for everyone.
"One day, when I’m living in a whimsically decrepit villa in southern Italy, backing onto woodlands and looking down towards the ocean, I’ll grab my whittled walking stick and amble out the back door to see what mushrooms I can find,” Alec explains.
"Then, I’ll casually write a recipe about it as I sip thick double espressos and listen to Paganini. But right now, I’m 16,000 km away and an unaccomplished whittler, so little Al (his son) is charge of fungi.”
This recipe for egg yolk pappardelle with mushroom and taleggio sauce is the result, using porcini and mixed fresh mushrooms in creamy cheese and black pepper sauce.
Gnudi is what happens when you pipe out your leftover ravioli filling and leave it to dry for up to 24 hours – they are fluffy and delicate with an outer coating just firm enough to hold them together.
His recipe for gnudi, asparagus and lemon has a light and uncomplicated butter sauce with just the right amount of flavour and silkiness without drowning the pasta.
For those who don’t know, nduja is a spicy, spreadable southern salami that makes everything taste better and this dish of eggplant and pecorino tortelli with nduja and tomato is a perfect example of Italy on the plate.
The folded tortelli pasta is filled with eggplant, Romano, breadcrumbs, lemon and black pepper and served in a rich, tomato, basil and nduja sauce – a delicious and easy family meal for a Winter’s night.
Beautifully photographed and written, Pasta et Al is snapshot of old traditions and new beginnings, along with treasured Italian cooking – you’ll find old family recipes loyal to Nonna, but you’ll also find playfulness and creativity.
This cookbook will be a go-to for any pastaholic and bound to be constantly on the kitchen bench with the odd sauce stain or dusting of pasta dough!
