Home-made orecchiette with cannellini, tuna & dill

Orecchiette means little ears in Italian, but sorry folks I didn't do a good job in shaping... pressed the dough way too hard; it curled up too much. Due to the poor shape I wasn't planning to post it, but after I tasted this dish, I just love every bit of it! Love that undertone sweetness from semolina pasta and cannellini, love that clean taste from tuna and dill, love that floral aroma from Novello extra virgin olive oil, so now I change my mine, and going to share this lovely recipe to you guys!

For about how to shape orecchiette: (abstract from the book of Lidia's Italian Table)

First you need to make basic pasta dough (I used the first recipe).

Lightly dust your work table with semolina flour, cut out some pasta dough and roll to a cylinder, about 3/4-inch thick (I rolled a bit too thin). Cut it into 1/4-inch-thick slices (I'm not experienced, so I cut it thicker, easier to work with). Cut side up, drag the dough round away from you while pressing down lightly (I pressed too hard). The dough will form a cup shape around your thumb. (The following step I forgot to do) Invert the cup and press down on the center of the dome to make little ears.

Recipe of orecchiette with cannellini, tuna & dill

• 2 servings of home-made orecchiette
• 1/2 to 2/3 can (15 oz/ 425 g) of cannellini *. You can cook you own if you have time
• 1 can chunk light tune in water
• 1/2 white onion, chopped
• a small handful of dill
• 2 Tbps butter
• good extra virgin olive oil
• salt & pepper to taste
• optional: Parmesan cheese *

Direction:

• Rinse the beans, drain well, set aside. Drain the tuna, set aside.
• Cooking fresh orecchiette only take 2 - 3 minutes, please plan out the timing ahead, I want the pasta and the saute (the following) done at the same time.
• Heat butter, saute onion for 2 minutes, add generous amount of ev olive oil, add beans and tuna, toss for 30 seconds or so, add salt. Use a big straining spoon to transfer the cooked pasta from the pot to the saute pan (as I want the pasta *a bit* wet), quickly toss all the ingredients (just a few seconds), scoop them on a serving plate. Sprinkle dill, salt and pepper (and cheese if used) to taste.

* My note:

• some canned beans can be very mushy, like mine - Luigi Vitelli :( Do you have any good brand to recommend?)
• In general people don't add cheese on seafood pasta, but since I used the canned tuna it didn't have much flavor, the cheese worked very well in my dish

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------