Admittedly this is a pretty unrepeatable recipe as written. Few people have arrowhead flour made from Sagittaria latifolia hanging around in their pantry. So skip that part and just make some pasta with this sauce; maybe add some fine yellow cornmeal to approximate the color. Or you could even just buy some good pasta and make the sauce -- if you do that, this recipe can come together in minutes... If you have duck fat and duck demi-glace hanging around. You can buy duck fat and duck demi online, or you can render your own duck fat and make your own duck demi. Still too much bother? Then use butter and beef stock boiled down by half.
1/2cuparrowhead flour or extra-fine yellow cornmeal
1 1/2cupsItalian "oo" flour or all-purpose flour
1teaspoonsalt
2whole eggs
3egg yolks
SAUCE
2tablespoonsduck fat or butter
1/4cupminced shallot
3/4cupduck demi-glace
Grated zest of a lemon
1/4cupchopped parsley
Salt and black pepper to taste
Grated pecorino or parmesan cheese for garnish
Instructions
To make the pasta dough, whisk together the two flours and the salt, then make a well in the center of the flour. Add the eggs and extra yolks and mix into a stiff dough. Knead for 5-10 minutes, until the dough becomes elastic. If you use wapato flour it will start out pretty sticky, then smooth out after a few minutes of kneading.
Coat the dough with a little olive oil and cover in plastic wrap for at least 30 minutes; an hour is better. Roll out the dough in a pasta maker or with a rolling pin. Cut into long pasta. I use my chitarra to make a sort of square spaghetti, but you could make fettucine, linguine or the even wider pappardelle and it would still be good. Make sure you have plenty of flour to keep the noodles from sticking to each other.
Don't make the sauce until you already have a large pot of salty water boiling. To start, saute the shallot in a large pan in the duck fat until the shallots just barely begin to brown. As soon as you see the edges start to brown, add the duck demi-glace. Now is the time to add the pasta to the boiling water.
As the pasta boils, add the lemon zest and parsley to the boiling sauce. You want it to boil down almost to a glaze, which is why you do this in a large, wide frying or saute pan. When the pasta is ready, about 2 minutes, transfer it to the pan with the sauce with tongs. You actually want some of the pasta cooking water to come along for the ride. Toss to coat, let the liquid almost boil away and serve at once, garnished with grated cheese.