Well, I had never realised that the Yorkshire Pasta Company existed until it was pointed out to me by Chris Wildman on a recent visit to Town End Farm Shop, a mecca for Yorkshire produce.
I decided to buy some Mezze Maniche Rigate and sample it at home as well as setting myself the task of finding out more about the company.
The company was formed in the summer of 2019 by Kathryn (Hardwick) Bumby with the ambition of producing a premium Yorkshire Pasta. The next months were spent fine tuning recipes and sourcing ingredients as well as creating a purpose built food production unit in Malton powered by solar power.
The owners spent hours studying high quality pasta producers in Italy and refining their traditional methods. But key to the process was sourcing Yorkshire ingredients such as locally milled wheat flour to ensure their premium pasta really was a step above your supermarket brands.
The founders mission was to use traditional techniques and a "back to basics” approach to make pasta slowly and authentically to enhance the pastas flavour and in turn increase the pastas ability to absorb sauces.
After making a dough from the flour, the Yorkshire Pasta Company use traditional bronze metal dies to create a rough surface on every single piece of pasta and then a slow drying technique is used to lock in the taste.
I really liked the packaging. 100% recyclable paper bags are used to store the pasta, each one sealed by hand. The pasta packets looked and felt great.
So now to the tasting.
Being a keen cook, I knocked up a traditional ragu for tea using beef mince, diced pork and vegetables and then dropped the Mezze Maniche Rigate into a pan of boiling water for our family tea.
The instructions suggested 13 minutes for an al dente texture – so I followed this setting my phone as a timer.
We were very impressed. The pasta was perfectly cooked and actually had way more flavour than our usual supermarket packs. The texture was excellent and once mixed with the ragu it really did hold the sauce well. My wife who prefers wholemeal pasta said it was the tastiest pasta she’d had in a while and I’m under instruction to get some more!
Needless to say there wasn’t a lot left but I like to think that my ragu had found its perfect partner!
There are 5 types of pasta on sale at present. As well as the Mezze Maniche Rigate, they produce Tortiglioni, Conchiglie Rigate, Penne Rigate and Fusilli.
