Dark greens and noodles with yoghurt

Dark greens and noodles with yoghurt

This satisfying noodle dish from Olia Hercules combines dark leafy greens with fresh pasta and yoghurt.
  • Cooking:

Ingredients

Instructions

  1. Step 1

    Pour the measured water into a large bowl and add the egg. Whisk it in well. Then add the flour, mixing it with your hand thoroughly into a soft dough. Sprinkle a work surface with more flour and knead the dough until it stops sticking to your hands and is smooth. Leave it to rest, covered, for at least 30 minutes, or up to 24 hours in the fridge overnight
  2. Step 2

    You won’t need all the onions in this recipe, only half. But there is no point doing this in smaller quantities, also the onions are so good you can use them in a myriad of other dishesSo, cut the onions in half and slice finely along the grain. Melt 30g of clarified butter, or use a knob of regular butter and a splash of oil. Add the onions and a generous pinch of salt. Cover with a lid if you have one, or with a cartouche (a round piece of baking parchment), and let them sweat over a medium-low heat for 20 minutes. Once soft and translucent, uncover, increase the heat to medium and cook for another 10 minutes, stirring from time to time. If they become dry and start catching, add splashes of water and deglaze. See what they are like after the 10 minutes, chances are you will need another 5–10 minutes of cooking. You want them to be deeply amber and caramelised
  3. Step 3

    Take half the rested dough and mould it into a flattish disc with your hands. Roll it out over a well-floured surface into a rough circle, 45cm in diameter if you can, but no need to go overboard and make it see-through or anything. Roll it up around your floured rolling pin. Slash lengthways with a knife, once, along the pin, without dragging the knife. The dough will drop to the surface in layers of dough strips 
  4. Step 4

    Cut them in half lengthways, and then on the diagonal at 6cm intervals. You will have lots of diamond-shaped pieces of pasta. Put them on a floured tray so they don’t stick together. Repeat with the other half of the dough
  5. Step 5

    If they are not to be used immediately, you can freeze them to be used another time. If you freeze them, again make sure they are well-floured so they don’t merge and form a giant pasta monster
  6. Step 6

    If you are using nettles, have a bowl with cold water and ice at the ready. Pop them into a saucepan and cover with boiling water, boil for 3 minutes, then take out with tongs or a spider and plunge into the iced water. Now that the nettles are disarmed, cut off any of the thick stalks and chop across the leaves
  7. Step 7

    Now add the nettles and sliced wild garlic and spinach to a pan and cook over a medium-low heat in the remaining clarified butter for 5–10 minutes
  8. Step 8

    If using other greens, there’s no need to blanch them, just put them into a pan sliced and raw with the remaining clarified butter. Season well with salt and pepper and cook until they look soft and wilted (kale will take longer than spinach). Mix together the yogurt and garlic in a bowl
  9. Step 9

    Cook the pasta in well-salted water for 2–3 minutes. Then drain, but not too vigorously, you want a little bit of the pasta water. Put them into the pan with the cooked greens, add half of the caramelised onions (save the rest for later) and mix them through thoroughly as well. Put everything on a platter, dot garlicky yogurt around and sprinkle over sumac and crispy breadcrumbs