Casoncelli alla Bergamasca al Burro Fuso e Salvia

Ingredients

• For the pasta dough
• 300 g 00 flour
• 3 eggs, whole
• For the filling
• 250 g braised beef, cooled overnight, finely minced
• 60 g mostarda di Cremona, finely chopped
• 60 g sweet amaretti biscuits, Amaretti di Saronno type, crumbled
• 50 g Grana Padano, finely grated
• 50 g Parmigiano Reggiano, finely grated
• For the dressing
• 120 g unsalted butter
• 80 g pancetta, cut into small lardons
• 10 fresh sage leaves
• 1 tsp fine salt, for pasta water

Method

1. 1
   Braise the beef the day before service. Cool completely, then mince finely. Combine with the finely chopped mostarda di Cremona, crumbled sweet amaretti, Grana Padano, and Parmigiano. The mixture must be firm and fully cold — press it: it should hold its shape without weeping moisture.
2. 2
   Make the pasta dough by mounding the flour, forming a well, and breaking the eggs into the centre. Work from the inside out until a rough dough forms, then knead on an unfloured board for 8–10 minutes. The dough is ready when the surface is smooth and springs back slowly when pressed with a thumb.
3. 3
   Rest the dough, wrapped, for at least 30 minutes. Roll to approximately 2 mm — thin enough to be supple, thick enough to contain the moist filling without tearing. Cut into rounds of 8–10 cm diameter.
4. 4
   This is where the dish lives or dies. Place a scant teaspoon of cold filling at the centre of each round — generous but not excessive, as the filling expands during cooking. Fold into a half-moon and press the edge firmly with fingertips to exclude all air, then crimp with the tines of a fork, pressing twice along the full seam. The seal must be complete; any gap will allow the moist filling to escape into the cooking water. Place finished casoncelli on semolina-dusted trays.
5. 5
   Render the pancetta lardons in a wide sauté pan over medium heat until the fat is fully released and the lardons are crisp at the edges. Do not add butter until rendering is complete — the pancetta fat becomes the base for the butter sauce.
6. 6
   Add the butter to the pan with the rendered pancetta. Cook over medium heat, swirling, until the butter passes through foaming and reaches the noisette stage: the milk solids turn the colour of hazelnuts and the pan smells of toasted nuts. Add the sage leaves and fry until they are crisp and translucent. Remove from heat immediately — the butter continues to cook in the residual heat of the pan.
7. 7
   Cook the casoncelli in well-salted boiling water. They are done when they float and the pasta at the thickest point of the crimp offers slight resistance to a fingernail — approximately 4–5 minutes. Lift with a spider directly into the butter pan; do not drain through a colander, which risks tearing the seam.
8. 8
   Toss briefly over low heat to coat each casoncello in the noisette butter. Plate immediately. The sage leaves should shatter against the pasta when touched with a fork — if they bend, they were not sufficiently crisped in the butter.