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Makes a great gift for Food and Film lovers alike

 
Film Released: 2000
Genre: Drama
Film Directed by : Bob Giraldi
Cast/Actors include : Danny Aiello, John Rothman, Frank Bongiorno
 

Most of the film is set in a popular New York Restaurant over the period of one evening sitting. The restaurant is owned by dodgy bookmaker Louis Copra, played by Danny Aiello and run by his son Udo, played by Edoardo Ballerini who is making a name for himself as nouvelle cuisine chef.

The main thread of the story centres around the fact that a rival mob from Queens trying to muscle in on Louis’ business – both the bookmaking part and the restaurant. After the recent shooting of his partner, Louis seems happy to relinquish the bookmaking part of his business, but not the restaurant.

On this particular night diners at the restaurant include a local police detective and his wife who were specially invited by Louis, two of the rival bookmaker gangsters who want to become partners in the restaurant, a food critic upon whom Udo’s future as a star chef may depend and a seemingly innocuous chap who wanders in, sits at the bar and orders drinks and some food. Louis is not only having to deal with the gangsters and their demands and his son who is pressurising him for more say in the restaurant but also the sous chef who is deep in gambling debts and needs money plus the daughter of his ex-partner who was shot….and all in the restaurant. The trials and tribulations of all of these characters help towards making the end of this film somewhat surprising.
 

Being set in a restaurant, there’s lots of food and mentions of food throughout the film, but we are going to choose one of the more simple dishes which Udo serves to the food critic to woo her.

Here’s our version of Tagliatelle with White Truffles.

Happy cooking!

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Tagliatelle with White Truffles  Veg  HT  MC  Italian  20mins

Serves 4    Hot  Vegetarian  Pasta  Main Course  Italy Europe

Ingredients
400g/14oz Tagliatelle
Salt and Pepper
2 tbsp Olive Oil
50g/2oz Butter
3 tbsp Parmesan Cheese, finely grated
freshly grated nutmeg
1 White Truffle, very thinly sliced

Instructions

1. Bring a large pan of water to the boil, add plenty of salt and the olive oil then add the pasta and cook for 8- 10 minutes until just tender.

2. Drain the pasta, leaving about 1 tablespoon of the cooking water in the pan. Return the drained pasta to the pan and add the butter, parmesan, season with a little pepper and nutmeg and toss well to coat the pasta.

3. Meanwhile, cut the truffle slices into quarters.

4. To serve - transfer to heated bowls, sprinkle with most of the truffle quarters and toss briefly. Sprinkle with the remaining truffle pieces and serve immediately.

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