Meat Cannelloni
Great happiness when I cook Italian food! These meat cannelloni were supposed to be our Friday dinner, but after making the sauce, I got lazy and put it in the fridge. So dinner ended up being arugula drizzled with Italian olive oil, prosciutto and parmesan strips... still Italian-inspired in the end, to avoid any trouble for promising one thing and doing another. But Saturday at lunch I prepared the rest of the components for the cannelloni and finished the dish. In the end I didn't regret it... meat cannelloni are better suited for lunch anyway, being so filling.
I wanted the meat sauce to be more special, different from the meat sauces I've already posted. So I chose to add chicken livers and dried porcini to the ragu. Hey... I feel I've piqued your interest 😉
Ingredients
7 cannelloni (tubular pasta)
25g grated parmesan
Meat Sauce
500g ground beef
2 chicken livers
1 large onion
20g dried porcini mushrooms (or 1 teaspoon porcini powder)
1 can tomatoes (400g)
1/2 bunch parsley
2 tablespoons oil
salt, black pepper, nutmeg
a little milk (for the livers)
Bechamel Sauce
50g butter
1 heaping tablespoon white flour
300ml hot milk
salt, pepper, 1 pinch nutmeg
Servings: 2-3
How to prepare meat cannelloni
- Cover the livers with milk at least 1/2 hour before using them. If using dried mushrooms, cover with hot water.
- Start with preparing the meat sauce: in a wider pan, saute the onion in hot oil until soft. Add the ground meat and fry until it changes color and the juice it released in the pan has evaporated. When the meat starts to brown, add the livers and continue frying until lightly browned. Crush the livers with a fork and add the drained and finely chopped mushrooms (or porcini powder) and saute everything for 2 more minutes.
- Add the tomatoes crushed with a fork (or blended, along with their juice) and mix well. Season with salt, black pepper and 1 pinch of ground nutmeg.
- Bring to a boil, then cover the pan with a lid, reduce heat to low and simmer for 45 minutes.
- When the sauce is ready, add finely chopped parsley and let it cool.
* the meat sauce can be prepared a day ahead; when using it, just warm it up slightly.
** the meat sauce is more than needed for 7 cannelloni; it would be enough for 12-13 cannelloni; what I had left, I served the next day for lunch with spaghetti and parmesan - Put a large pot of salted water on to boil. When it starts boiling, reduce heat to low and add the cannelloni (in batches, don't crowd them). Cook for 5 minutes. The pasta will only be half cooked after this time. Remove with a spatula onto a clean towel.
- Prepare the bechamel sauce according to the instructions here.
- In an oven-safe dish (23 x 15 cm), put a thin layer of bechamel sauce on the bottom. Carefully take one cannelloni at a time, stand it upright in the dish. Fill with meat sauce using a teaspoon. Lay the tube down in the dish. Repeat filling until you finish all the tubes.
- Pour the rest of the bechamel sauce over the cannelloni. Sprinkle with grated parmesan.
- Bake at 200C for 30 minutes.
- Serve warm.
Meat sauce
Boil the tubes
Filling the tubes
Filled tubes in the pan
Cover in béchamel sauce
Sprinkle with parmesan cheese
