Honeycomb Cannelloni
Designed to be a recipe to stand out but also pretty easy to make, take the traditional cannelloni di carne (or the ricotta version if you want to make it veggie) and stand it on its head… literally. Now you’ve got your vertical cannelloni, take it one step further; make it freestanding by cooking bound in twine and really push the boat out on the fact in looks like a giant honeycomb but topping with a beautiful burrata (or good quality buffalo mozzarella) that will ooze out over the crispy-cooked cannelloni, and for good measure add a decent splodge of runny honey. Now you’re talking!
Prep Time: 1 hr
Cook Time: 40 mins
Difficulty: Medium
Serves: 2
Ingredients
Cupcake
Dried or Fresh Cannelloni - 250g
Onion - 1
Garlic - 2 cloves (or 2 tsp chopped)
Butter - 50g
Minced Beed - 250g
Sausages - 250g
Passata - 600g
White (or Red) Wine - 150ml
250g ricotta
Flour - 25g
Milk - 250g
Basil - 1 bunch / handful
(Optional) Burrata or high quality buffalo mozzarella - 1
Honey - to serve
Twine - to tie up the pasta (don’t used dyed twine)
Piping bag (or Sandwich / Freezer Bag) - 1
Method
Cannelloni Step One - The HoneyComb
Take the cannelloni and securely tie it into a group using a length of twine so that it resembles a honeycomb. You can be firmer with how you tie it if you’re using dried honeycomb.
Cannelloni Step Two - brings me to tears
Finely dice the onions and add to a frying pan with half (25g) of the butter. Cook on a low heat, stirring occasionally, until they go translucent. Add the diced garlic and cook for another few minutes. take off the heat and transfer the garlic-onion mix to a cooking pot (don’t wash up the frying pan yet).
Cannelloni Step THree - Sausaged-Beef
using a sharp knife, slice the skins of the sausages and remove the meat. Add this and the minced beef to the same frying pan you just used for the onions. Cook on medium heat, stirring occasionally, until the moisture has evaporated off and they start to go a deep brown.
Pour the beef-sausage mix into the pot with the onions. Then in the frying pan turn the heat to high, and once really hot add the wine, it’ll sizzle if the pan’s hot enough. Stir the wine around to deglaze all the flavour stuck to the bottom and after a few minutes pour the wine (with all the flavour from the frying pan) into the pout with the onion-beef mix.
Add passata to the pot with the onion-beef-wine mix and heat on medium for c.30 mins to soften the meat. Then remove from heat. You can continue with the next step whilst this is happening.
Cannelloni Step Four - roux
Add the remaining butter (25g) to a pan and cook on low-medium until it starts to get frothy, turn the heat to low and stir in the flour. You should have a bubbling paste.
Add the milk a little at a time, stirring continuously until the milk is fully incorporated. Take off the heat and allow to cool - you now have a béchamel sauce.
Cannelloni Step Five - Ricotta Base
Pre-heat the oven to 160°C (180°C for non-fan ovens).
Find a tray (or loose bottomed cake tin) that’s slightly larger than your honeycomb of pasta.
Spread the ricotta across the bottom of the tray (so that’s it’s about 1cm thick) and push the honeycomb pasta onto it. It’ll act as a bung whilst cooking to stop the meat-tomato mix getting out.
Cannelloni Step Six - Piping Tubes
Chop up most of the basil (save some for serving) and stir it into the tomato-beef mix.
Transfer to a piping bag and carefully (so not to spill it down the outside) fill up each tube so they’re almost full. Leave a little (c.1cm) of room at the top for the béchamel sauce.
Cannelloni Step Seven - Béchamel Top
Top the tubes up with the béchamel sauce (again be careful not to spill over the outside of the honeycomb).
Place in the oven for c.35-45 minutes, until brown on top and the pasta’s gone crispy on the outside.
Cannelloni Step Eight - Honeycomb Cannelloni
Remove the cannelloni from the oven, top with the burrata, the honey, and the chopped basil.
And that’s it, hope you enjoy!