Timpana (is a maltese food thanks)
callout post @ a food network fb post showing a video of “timpano” being made:
THAT’S A MALTESE FOOD. IT’S NOT NEW.
(also your version looks bad, todd.)
the video says “Chef Laurence Edelman got the idea from the film “Big Night” and I don’t know that movie but TIMPANA is maltese pasta pie, basically, with tomato and beef in the pasta and a crust over it.
the food network dish is baked pasta “in a pasta shell” which imo looks like a shitty replacement for a crust to me bc it’d get dried out.
I had timpana two and a half years ago visiting family in Malta. My uncle Edgar and aunt Berta made food for like 15 people at the table in the back garden, by the well. (maltese houses usually have a small courtyard with a garden; this one was mostly flowers and a couple lemon trees, with the walls high enough you can’t see over them at my height.) We had tomato on bread (hobz biz-zejt) and pastizzi, and TIMPANA uncle Edgar made. I remember it very distinctly because both my brother and I were vegetarians but we had to eat everything we were given to not be rude, and maltese people serve a /lot/ of food. we were not able to really eat/digest meat anymore. so we both admitted to each other later that we were feeling sick from the timpana, lmao.
go ahead and enjoy maltese food, even the bad food. please! i’m half-maltese, of course i’ll encourage you to eat! but please give credit. (and do it right.)
edit: there might be an italian dish that’s baked pasta but it’s not just that they’re taking from, bc there’s none called timpano or timpana