Pizzoccheri alla Valtellinese

Pizzoccheri Preparation
Start by pouring into a bowl the flour 0 and the buckwheat flour in the doses indicated, mix well the two flours and add the water at a temperature of 50°. This will make the buckwheat starches amalgamate more easily.

Start kneading the ingredients by hand in a bowl, transfer everything to a pastry board lightly floured with buckwheat flour and knead the dough vigorously. This working step is crucial: the dough should be handled with care to obtain consistency as elastic as possible.

Form a ball; the consistency should be silky, not too soft. Flatten the ball of dough sprinkled with a little buckwheat flour and start rolling out the dough with a rolling pin; you will need to obtain a disc of about 2-3 mm thick.

Now, trim the edges to even out the disc obtained, to obtain a rectangle, sprinkle the surface lightly with more buckwheat flour and cut with a knife with a sharp blade into strips about 7 cm wide.

Place 3 strips one on top of the other if necessary by sprinkling with a little buckwheat flour; with this method it will be faster to obtain the pizzoccheri in a precise way, cutting the overlapping strips into strips about 0.5-1 cm thick. Put aside the first pizzoccheri obtained, and then continue in the same way for the rest of the dough.

Dressing Preparation
Fill a pan with 6 l of water on medium heat; in the meantime, clean the cabbage, peel it, cut it in half, then into slices, remove the leathery part and reduce the cabbage into pieces.

Then go on to the potatoes: peel them and cut them into thick slices, then into rather large pieces; it will be enough to try to make pieces of uniform size for the cooking to be homogeneous. When the water boils, add 60 g of salt (10 g per litre). Put the potatoes to cook for about 2 minutes. Meanwhile thinly slice the cheese (it is preferable to use it at room temperature).

After two minutes cooking the potatoes, add the Savoy cabbage; the vegetables must cook inside the water in which the pizzoccheri will cook. After about 4 minutes you can pour half a dose of pizzoccheri slowly sprinkling them into pan; with the help of the handle of a wooden ladle, turn them gently, to prevent them from sticking, then add the rest always slowly. Stir a few more moments, then while the pizzoccheri are cooking (they will have to cook about 4 minutes). Cut the garlic cloves in half then pour the butter into a pan and melt it together with the garlic cloves; the butter will have to melt and season with garlic, and you will have to let it go on medium-low heat until you get a hazelnut colour. In the meantime, prepare a large and low pan where you will then go to drain and season the pizzoccheri once ready. You will have to heat this empty pan by balancing it on the cooking water pot of the pizzoccheri; this will allow the cheese to melt homogeneously. Then lower the heat under the pizzoccheri pot without turning it off. With the help of a skimmer, start to drain the pizzoccheri very well. Not to transfer water into the pan that you have heated, and create the first layer on the bottom of the pan. Without ever stirring in these phases, now distribute a layer of dairy cheese, continue with another layer of pizzoccheri; repeat the passage of the cheese and continue until you finish with the last layer of pizzoccheri and cheese. Season with grated Grana cheese and place the pan with the pizzoccheri on top of the one with the cooking water still hot, to keep the heat. Cover with a cloth: in this way, the heat of the pizzoccheri, cabbage and potatoes will help the cheese to melt. In the meantime, turn up the heat under the pan in which you have melted the butter with garlic. Then pour the hot butter on the pizzoccheri, remove the cloves of garlic and stir the pizzoccheri gently. Serve and enjoy the pizzoccheri hot.