Celebrating with Timpano!

It’s Timpano time again! If you’re a regular reader of my blog you know I previously featured Timpano a few times already in the course of my almost seven years here on Proud Italian Cook. I can’t help it, it’s such a celebratory meal, like making homemade ravioli.

I don’t make it that often but when I do it’s for a celebration or special occasion.

Many years ago I watched the movie Big Night, which by the way I think is one of the best “foodie” movies ever made, two brothers own a restaurant that’s not doing so well so they try and impress there guests by making a Timpano.

Stanley Tucci is in the movie and the actual Timpano recipe comes from his own personal family. To me the highlight of the movie was the  Timpano scene. It will be forever embedded in my mind,  here’s a You Tube clip, and the minute I saw it I knew I would be making this spectacular meal.

Making a timpano is a big event but it actually consists of very common ingredients, nothing much out of the ordinary, but the presentation is extraordinary and definitely celebration worthy!

When making Timpano you’ll find that it’s all about using the correct pan which so happens to be  made of enamelware, you have to have the right size and shaped pan to hold three pounds of pasta, provolone, eggs, mini meatballs, Genoa salami, sauce and grated cheese and it has to be deep enough so you can make several layers before it gets nicely wrapped into the dough and when you finely un-mold it, there’s a nice dome like shape to it, here’s what I use.  This recipe feeds at least 16 people!

I’m not going to kid you, it’s a labor of love, but isn’t that what we all do for special occasions, we go all out.  What I really like about making Timpano is that everything can be prepped way ahead of time. I make all my sauce and mini meatballs a week before and stick them in the freezer until the day before, then a couple of days before the party I boil and peel my hard boiled eggs, dice up the provolone and Genoa salami, and make sure I have plenty of romano cheese grated.

Over the years I’ve adapted the recipe a little, I don’t make the heavy ragu that the original recipe calls for, I personally don’t think you need it, there’s so much meat that goes into the layers anyway, to me a nice light marinara made with olive oil, fresh basil, garlic and good San Marzano tomatoes is just right, of course I always make plenty of extra sauce because you’ll want to spoon some on each piece.

The recipe gives you the exact amounts of cheese, salami and meatballs you should use but I always throw in extra, the only thing I do exact is the hardboiled egg amount.  I will post the link to the original recipe at the end of this post.

I can’t tell you how much I love this dough, it comes out perfect every time. I make it the night before, wrap it good in plastic wrap then refrigerate it, just bring it to room temperature before you start to roll it.  Be patient when rolling, let it rest, then roll, it needs to be thin, you should be able to see the counter coming through the dough.

 The dough circle needs to be big enough to drape the bowl like in the photo above because once you start adding all the ingredients the sides will rise up a bit, plus you need enough to be able to cover and wrap all the ingredients inside.

 Then all the layering begins! See the bottom picture of the pan? look at the edge, you can see the pan design coming through, that’s how thin your dough has to be otherwise your Timpano will be too heavy and crusty and you don’t want that!

 Layered up to the top, almost done with the filling!

 Add the last layer of sauce and a drizzle of beaten eggs all over the top to seal everything in.

 Wrap it, trim it, and stick it in the oven!

My advice is to read, read, read the recipe, I even printed it out and highlighted the important steps so I wouldn’t forget, at one point you have to take it out of the oven and put foil over the top and then back in, if you forget this step with the foil it can ruin the whole thing, my poor friend did that once, so please use a timer and pay attention when it dings.

 Every oven is different but the Timpano should be golden brown with an internal temperature of 120 degrees.

When you un-mold it you can’t just cut into it, a very important step is to let it rest, I repeat, let it rest! If you don’t you’ll have a gloppy mess, and that would be so sad after all that work. Go pour some drinks and mingle with your guests, give it about an hour, believe me it will still be hot.

 Then you’ll be able to cut it into sharp clean wedges for everyone, see how nice and thin that dough is?

 You might wonder what to serve with Timpano, well since it’s summertime I decided to make a platter of grilled veggies and a nice big Italian salad, that’s it, that’s all you’ll need, trust me.

 Cut your wedges which are nicely held together and spoon warm marinara on top, you’re ready to dig in!

 If you’re lucky enough there might be a piece leftover for the next day…

 We had a lot to celebrate, with a ton of hard work and endurance my daughter received her yoga teacher training certificate, it was also my sons birthday, and my niece and a good family friend just completed a triathlon. We’re very proud of them all, they work extremely hard but they sure know how to party!

Here is a link to the original recipe, within that recipe you’ll find another link to the Family Tucci ragu.