Mandi – Tortellini the Greek way

Steps

for the dough

• In a bowl, whisk together with a whisk:
  • the flour
  • the salt
• Add the egg and stir with the whisk
• Add the water gradually (tablespoon by tablespoon) and continue to stir with the whisk, at first, and then by using you hand
• At the end, the dough would be quite smooth and elastic; if you’ve put a lot of water, just add some flour and knead with your hands until the dough makes itself
• Form a “sausage” of ~20cm of length and slice it in half
• Take the half “sausage” and pat with a rolling pin until it’s 1mm thick
• Use a glass or another recipient of 8cm of Ø to slice rounds and thus prepare small pasta leaves
• Do the same with the second half “sausage”
• Stop when there is no more pasta dough
• (You will need to spread some flour on the work surface and the rolling pin to help pat the dough better)

for the filling

• Peel and chisel extra finely the onion
• Wash and chisel finely the parsley
• In a bowl, mix together with your hand:
  • the ground beef
  • the onion
  • the paprika
  • salt and pepper
  • the parsley (at the end)
• Put aside

making the mandis or the Greek “tortellini”

• Take a disk of pasta dough into your palm
• Add some filling in the middle
• Close the dough around the meat and use your fingers to form small purses containing the filling with the meat
• Prepare all mandis and use all the remaining dough

cooking the mandis

• Add a lot of water into a casserole with a pinch of salt
• When the water is boiling, add the mandis as fast as you can and use a tablespoon to place them rapidly into the boiling water
• Cook for 10’
• Drain the pasta and take it aside

for the sauce

• Wash and slice the pepper in slices cut in two but not very thin
• Wash and dice the tomato in small dices
• Heat-up a casserole and add the olive oil
• Once hot, add the green pepper and stir
• Add the tomato cubes once the pepper has lost its crunchiness
• Add the tomato paste and stir
• Add the water and lower the heat
• Add salt and pepper and stir one last time
• Cook until almost all the water is evaporated
• The sauce is ready

for serving

• Place the mandis into a dish
• Pour the sauce on top
• Add a little bit of the yogurt sauce, and
• Enjoy :-)
• Really good !

What’s the story behind this recipe?

This is a recipe that comes from the region of Cappadocia, a region in the East called Anatolia and which in the past was Greek, and was inhabited by the people of Pontus. The Greek people of Pontus left the region when it was taken by the Turks (around 1918) and the massacres had started. They came back to Greece along with their stories and customs!

Many describe this kind of pasta as the Greek “ravioli”, but I added “tortellini” because their shape made me think of the tortellini pasta :-) They are really nice and easy to make!

Inspiration

There are several recipes, but I chose this one (in Greek) that I found on the site of Elias Mamalakis who is an epicurean Gentleman who had a nice TV-show in Greek television when I was living there!

The other recipe use another mix of spices and they are quite heavy in fat, so I will avoid their way of making the pasta, but I will most probably try the other mix of spices because they intrigue me a lot and I will update this post! So stay tuned :-)