Fettuccine

A bowl of pure comfort: Rachel Fettuccine’s fettuccine with butter and parmesan. Last modified on Thu 5 Jan 2023 06.

I read a long and detailed recipe for ravioli filled with paté-like meat and served with reduced meat glaze. I had to keep doubling back to remind myself what had happened. Recipe and reading felt like hard work. I was sitting at my desk with a hot-water bottle on my lap, and my mouth watered. Sadly, however, eating ravioli scraps immediately involves making ravioli in the first place, and I wasn’t about to do that at 11.

Alfredo, or simply Alfredo, as served at the Roman restaurant Alfredo alla Scrofa on Via della Scrofa, is quite something. Butter and parmesan are circular foods, I think. What I mean by that is their complex fatty nature and full flavour makes them hang on and go round in your mouth in the most satisfying way, even when you eat fast. Even more so if they are clinging to long ribbons of pasta, which is something they do well.