quail eggs on toast; spelt spaghettone, habanada, cheese

I had these little eggs, which I knew would make a good appetizer, especially if they were slipped onto some extraordinary toast. For the main course, I thought of having something pretty simple while still a little wintry. I headed for Luca Donofrio‘s fresh pasta shop inside Eataly in the afternoon, and there I found some thick fresh spelt pasta which I knew would be delicious with only some butter, a special seasoning, and some Parmesan cheese.

  • seven quail eggs (I served 4 of the 7, seen in the picture above, to Barry) from Violet Hill Farm, remaining from a similar meal the week before fried in a little butter and carefully transferred onto toasts of an Eric Kayser thinly-sliced torsade de aux olives (organic flour, liquid levin, olive oil, black and green olives, herbs of Provence), the eggs sprinkled with maldon salt, freshly-ground Tellicherry pepper, a pinch of dried dill, and scissored fresh chives scattered over all, the toasts served with upland cress from Two Guys from Woodbridge dressed lightly with a good olive oil

The second course was actually even simpler than the antipasto.

  • fresh spelt spaghettone (made with Wild Hive Farm local whole grain spelt, durum flour, eggs, water) from Luca Donofrio‘s fresh pasta shop inside Eataly served in a sauce of melted Kerrygold Pure Irish Butter, a little crushed golden home-dried habanada pepper (acquired fresh last season from Norwich meadows Farm), some freshly-ground black pepper, the pasta tossed with Parmigiano-Reggiano Vache Rosse from Eataly