Archive for August, 2007
It will soon be autumn and the ubiquitous pear will be even more ever-present in Umbria. Everybody will be making pear ravioli, pear tarts, pear jams and pear things I cannot imagine.
I hate pears. I never know if I’ve cooked pear things well because I don’t like them so everything I make is nasty to me. Pears are filled with little hairs. Eating them is to me akin to licking out the bathroom sink after your guy shaves. Now that you have that image engraved on your brain, maybe you don’t feel so hot about pears, either. If it weren’t for all the pear farmers who would go broke, I’d happily spread my hatred and ruin the huge international pear market, or as I see it the huge international conspiracy to make humans eat hairs.
I do like Japanese apple pears because they are not hairy or soft, but crunchy like apples. I can easily settle for an apple, however. I don’t know whether one can buy these up and keep them for the inevitable day when someone insists you make a pear thing. Can you? I saw them this week.
August 31st, 2007
This is a dessert that was adapted from a fig tart to use those slim, blue, frosted prune plums you find at the end of summer. You can make the pastry, which here is pasta brisé, or buy it at the grocery store or a bakery.
Pastry for a tart pan, fitted into the pan, trimmed to 3/4″ larger than the pan, then folded under and fluted.
soft goat cheese– not the ripened one with crust, but the fresh one you can spread. In Italy look in the fridge for “di Capra”
grated rind of 1 lemon
fresh blue prune plums about a pound, but who’s counting– eat the ones you have leftover
sugar
heavy cream
Preheat the oven to 180°C or 375°F.
Spread the goat cheese onto the bottom of the pastry you’ve arranged in the tart pan. It will be less than 1/4″ thick.
Sprinkle the grated lemon rind over the cheese layer.
Cut the plums in half, remove the stone, and place them in a pattern on the goat cheese, cut side down.
Sprinkle lightly with sugar.
Put it into the hot oven and cook for about 25 Minutes or until the plums have softened. Cool to just warm, and before cutting pour a little fresh cream over it so that it pools a bit around the plums. Serve with a little pitcher with more fresh cream.
This is great for weight gaining diets.
August 31st, 2007
Ingredienti per 4 persone: ingredients for 4 people
-1,5 Kg. di Cozze 3 pounds of mussels
-200 gr. di pomodori tipo perini 7 ounces of peeled pear tomatoes
-50 gr. di olio extra vergine di oliva 1.75 oz extra virgin olive oil
-un bicchiere di vino bianco secco 3.5 oz. Dry white wine
-una costa di sedano one leg of celery
-una carota one carrot
-3 spicchi d’aglio 3 cloves garlic
-una cipolla one onion
-prezzemolo parsley
-un peperoncino a chili pepper
-pepe nero black pepper
-8 fette di pane casereccio del giorno prima 8 slices of rustic bread (if not using pasta)
PREPARAZIONE
Pulite e raschiate le cozze delle incrostazioni sotto l’acqua corrente, riponendole in un contenitore. Quando avrete finito, riempitelo d’acqua pulita e aiutandovi con un cucchiaio di legno, agitate le cozze nel contenitore per qualche minuto, quindi buttate l’acqua e ripetete l’operazione. Lasciatele a scolare. Bollite i pomodori in abbondante acqua salata, scolateli e spellateli. Tagliateli a pezzettini e tenete da parte. Pulite e mondate tutte le verdure, l’aglio e la cipolla. Fate un trito di finezza media e versate in una padella dove avrete fatto scaldare l’olio. Fate appassire a fiamma bassa. Versate ora le cozze nel tegame, coperchiando immediatamente. Dopo un minuto, rimestate le cozze e bagnate con il vino bianco. Ricoprite con il coperchio e aspettate che tutte le cozze siano aperte. Aggiungete i pomodori e il peperoncino intero. Proseguite la cottura, mescolando spesso, per circa 3 minuti. Nel frattempo tostate in forno le fette di pane. A fine cottura delle cozze, eliminate il peperoncino, versate le cozze in un piatto da portata e cospargetele di prezzemolo tritato e di un’abbondante macinata di pepe nero. Guarnite con le fette di pane, irrorate di un filo di olio extra vergine di oliva.
VINO CONSIGLIATO: Un bianco tipo Martina oppure un Rosato del Salento.
Clean the mussels of their beards and any loose incrustations under running water, then put them into a pot. Throw out any that are opened. When they are all cleaned, fill the pot with cold water and stir them with a wooden spoon for a few minutes. Then drain off that water and refill the pot and do it again. Pour them into a strainer and let them drain This is to get rid of sand, so if you buy cultured/farmed mussels, you may not need to do this.
Use boiling hot water to loosen the tomato peels, and then peel them. Cut them into small pieces.
Clean and peel as needed all the vegetables. Chop the vegetables medium finely—a food processor will do if you pulse it. Heat the oil in a very large pan and turn the chopped vegetables into it over a low flame. Allow to soften, but do not brown. Turn the mussels into that pot and immediately cover them. After a minute, uncover and stir the mussels and add the white wine. Recover the pot and continue to cook until all the mussels are opened. Add the tomato pieces and the whole chili and continue to cook it for about 3 minutes.
In the meantime, cook the pasta or toast/grill the slices of bread. At the end of the cooking of the mussels, remove the chili pepper and turn the mussels into a large serving bowl—which contains the cooked pasta if you are using it—then scatter chopped parsley over it and then grind abundant quantities of black pepper over it all. It takes lots and lots of pepper– more than you think is wise. There should be the perfume of pepper and a definite taste of pepper to be right.
If you do not use pasta, garnish the bowl of mussels with the slices of grilled bread which have been drizzled with great olive oil.
The wine suggested with this dish is a white similar to Martina or a rosé of Salento. We drank the rosé and it was terrific! Crisp and dry with a spicy, berryish nose and pretty, too.
August 30th, 2007
One of the ways I would prefer to be seen when cooking and serving.
But sometimes I look like this.
That is truffle sauce on me– all over me.
The consolation is this.
Buffalo mozzarella, tomatoes, basil and great olive oil.
August 28th, 2007
Are you confused yet? Tomorrow I am going to Tuscany to teach cooking to a group of travelers. They will learn to make pasta, of course, and then they will learn to make a Pugliese dish with it that has become popular all over Italy. That would be because it is really good.
Because the pasta lesson takes some real time, the other courses will be quicker recipes. My friend, Graeme, will work with me so he can learn how to teach. He already knows how to cook, as many Australian men cook, really, really well. I’m hoping for some really good photos for my website, because usually I am way too busy to be photographing lessons. You have to watch these learners to see when they’re having a problem!
If there’s any sentiment for it, I can post the recipes we learn here. They aren’t my recipes, like the rest of the recipes here, but traditional foods made the traditional way. What about it?
August 27th, 2007
I want to do a visual piece on people’s favorite clothes. I think we all have one or more pieces that we turn to when we aren’t sure, just because we know we feel good in them or look good in them. What are yours?
Here’s what I want you to do. Photograph something that serves you well, that you use over and over and that you trust. You can model it or shoot it on a hanger or lying on the bed. Email the photo to me at decobabe@googlemail.com. In a month or so I’ll write up an article about the clothing I’ve seen and post some of the photos. Tell me why you like what you send me. Please title the emails “My favorite” so I’ll know what to open — you know we’re all paranoid about unknown attachments these days. Tell me if it is OK to identify you in your email. This includes eg!
I think it’s time to get real about what people really wear, don’t you?
August 24th, 2007
Waaay long ago I said women would want to wear a look like Marc Jacobs showed last winter. It was ladylike, to use a damning phrase, but a bit edgy and beautifully colored. It’s grown up and not the least tied to former teen-aged celebrities, nor yet the heiresses who are famous for being gossip rag snatchers.
Now the New York Times says so too.
Today, The Telegraph UK chimed in.
Have a look and then read some of the print coverage. Everybody is saying it now, that we are ready to get some coverage. We are ready to wear clothes we can walk in without something falling out or popping over the neckline. We are ready to feel like women instead of bratty and slutty girls. Those of us for whom those were ludicrous aims in the first place can breathe a sigh of relief.
I have never been sure how extreme sexiness or even sluttiness crept into fashion houses who get thousands for a skirt, because there just can’t be very many girls young enough to wear the look who also have the money to buy it. Yes, it was attention getting for a while, and attention is what runway clothes are about, all the better to sell the cosmetics and perfumes that really make the profits, but somehow a lot of females took it seriously as the way they were supposed to look. After a while you hardly notice anymore that Las Vegas and the red light district seem to have gathered at the mall. Perfectly normal women were talking about where to buy boob tape. Women had to get bikini waxing to wear street clothes. Enough.
There may not be many who want to join me and Marc in hat world, but hats are suddenly news. Simple clothes are bringing on fantastic accessories. Tailoring is the great news and it is great news for you, because tailoring is how fashion uses architecture to show what’s good about you and disguise what is unfortunate.
In short, at last you have everyone’s permission to be beautiful.
August 23rd, 2007
It happens that I have a pair of my mother’s jodhpurs from the 1930s in my closet. They are the exquisitely tailored tan twill ones of that period with the lacing up the back– a detail not seen since, I think.
Could I come up with the courage to wear these on the streets of Città di Castello? Let alone Rome…
Look at this article on The Telegraph and tell me. Could you? Would you?
August 23rd, 2007
On the right side are a list of parts of the website where this blog lives. Both “About” and “Know It All” will take you to the website and an email contact. To read the blog you never have to go to the website, but from the website you can reach the blog as well as all the other parts of my Umbrian experience — well, at least the parts that are properly shared.
You know I love comments, but if you’ve something to say about other than the blog posts, contact me. I’m waiting.
August 22nd, 2007
All over Italy, millions of Italians are on their summer vacations. They are huddled on the beaches and scattered on mountaintops, in the traditional holiday that gives them a break from summer. This year, however, a cold mass moved in and they are all freezing. This meal, written up for winter, I made this week and it was just the perfect thing. No, it isn’t like January now. The windows are still open a crack, the heat isn’t on and I am not wearing twinsets and socks, but it’s gray and cool and having the oven on for a while feels pretty darned good.
I am republishing this at the request of Ruth, of Presto Pasta Night. This will be a long post, because it is about cooking one thing that you can eat in more than one way. It’s cheap, easy and some of my favorite cold weather indulgence. Remember, once a week you can go to Once upon a Feast and see pasta recipes from the world, not just Italian pasta, either, but ways to use bean thread, rice noodles and every sort of noodle that exists.
This is brasato of pork spare ribs on polenta and with grated Parmigiano Reggiano. Here is how I made three single meals of it. It can be expanded to any size you like.
1 pound of lean pork spareribs
1 large onion cut into spears and then those halved
salt
1 whole clove of garlic
a handful of flatleaf parsley
2 allspice berries
2 cloves
1/4 cup of fortified wine, like Martini and Rossi or sherry or whatever, but NOT sweet
1 large 18 ounce tin of peeled whole tomatoes.
I heated a heavy iron pan to quite hot and then seared the ribs until
they were browned. Remove the ribs to a plate, and put the onions into
the fat the ribs gave up, adding about 1/2 teaspoon of salt, and stirred
them around until they were transparent and starting to brown. Add the
garlic and stir in a bit. Add the wine. Put the ribs back in, then
the allspice, the cloves, the parsley and stir about. Add about
another 1/2 teaspoon of salt. Pour the tin of tomatoes over all.
Bring to a simmer, then put a lid on and reduce the heat the minimum
possible on your stove. You don’t have to do anything else, as the long cooking will do all the work.
Leave them alone for a couple of hours,making sure that they don’t dry out and burn on. Add a bit of water if
they seem in danger.
The polenta is made according to the directions on the package , and I use Valsugana, which takes eight minutes to cook. If you use the thirty minute kind, you may want to make extra to cool into a block that you can slice and use for other dishes. There are any number of them here on Think On It, and one memorable restaurant dish I loved consisted of a roasted quail perched on a slice of toasted polenta and surrounded by salsa verde. Go with it.
I ate that version two times, even though I don’t like leftovers, because this is one of those dishes that gets tastier after a day or so in the fridge.
Then today, when there was pretty much only the sauce left, I decided it would be a great day to make tagliatelle for the sauce. People make such a thing out of making pasta. That’s just wrong! I watch an Italian cooking show sometimes, and in the twenty minutes they have to prepare a whole meal, they can make fresh pasta, a sauce, then cook and serve it in twenty minutes. So can I, and so can you. I never buy egg pasta.
My secret is a pasta rolling machine. It is cheap and sturdy and YOU MUST NEVER WASH IT. How about that? Something you don’t have to clean up. Otherwise you have to roll it out with a rolling pin, letting it rest if it doesn’t behave, cut it by hand. Get the little roller!
Here is where it starts.
That is merely 100 grams of plain flour, an egg and a pinch of salt. I stir it around with a fork until the flour starts to soak up the egg. Then with floury hands I start to knead it until it doesn’t have lumps and graininess and looks like this.
Remember, this is a single serving if you are eating only pasta. The recipe is expandable to whatever amount of dough you can handle. Every 100 grams of flour gets an egg and a pinch of salt. That’s it! You can also see that my dough scraper gets lots of use.
The pasta roller has a wheel with numbers on it. You always start with #1. Cut that ball into two pieces and put it into the slot and turn the crank. It will roll right through and turn into a strip. Fold it to make a short piece again and roll it through again. Fold and roll about 12 times. It will become flexible and smooth and almost like damp skin. Every once in a while you may want to lay it in some flour on the counter to keep it from getting sticky.
No brushing it with basting brushes, no cutting off irregular edges, just fold and roll. I am making homemade pasta and I have no desire to have it look like factory made pasta. When it has become slick and soft, start changing the numbers to 2, then 3, etc. until you get to #6. This shot is just as I am thinning it down.
When you get to #6, it will be very long. Lay it on the floury counter and cut it in two to make it shorter. Then change the crank on the machine to the cutting part and run that through the wide noodle slot. And when you have done it all, you will have this.
Start warming the sauce you want to use. Put a big pot of water on to boil. When the water is boiling hard, throw about a heaping soup spoon of salt into it, or the amount you like if it’s more than that. Pick up these lovely tagliatelle and lay them into the boiling water, then give them a good stir or two. They will be cooked in just about one minute. Don’t wander off!
Drain them and immediately put them into the pan in which you have heated your sauce. Toss about, serve them immediately.
Not bad, eh? My sauce from the brasato is a pretty chunky sauce, so yours may look more refined, but these tasted good!
And the clean up? I brushed the flour off the pasta roller and put it back into the cupboard. I used the dough scraper to scrape up every scrap of flour from the counter. A quick swish with a damp sponge finished it off.
As always, click to see bigger photos.
August 22nd, 2007
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