Think On It

Shmecking noodles for sickos

Almost everybody here is sick. Most of them have a stomach virus and they can’t eat, but when it starts to go they have the hunger of a roaring lion, but no ability to digest what we usually eat. I was talking to Sognatrice from Bleeding Espresso the other day about what sick people can eat. We both agreed that big, pillowy Mennonite noodles that they call dumplings are one of the things to eat when you are recovering.

I remember fundraising suppers for Meals on Wheels in Hardy County, West Virginia, which were focused on those dumplings. The first time I attended, I was expecting big, fluffy biscuity dumplings, but that’s not at all what I found. One of the two suppers would be a velvet chicken soup loaded with puffy little squares, the other one was ham dumplings. I approached the crock-pot where they kept warm and saw, what? It looked like white sauce. But when it was stirred up for serving, revealed were scraps of country ham and the ubiquitous dumpling noodles. It was really, really good and we ate it with really, really good cole slaw. Hurrah for Meals on Wheels!

I decided to make them for Presto Pasta Night and dedicate the effort to all the sickos currently lying around Italy with sore tummies.

I have only made the noodles once in my life, when some of us were trapped by snow at my friend Jane’s house in Chevy Chase. It was soup weather, for sure, so we made chicken soup and homemade noodles. That must have been a decade ago, but a noodle like this is not easily forgot. In casting about the house, it was clear that no soup-worthy hen was hiding out. But there was a scrap of prosciutto crudo, so off we go.

First thing to say is that prosciutto crudo is not the right ham. You need a bit of either smoked country ham, or speck if you are in Italy. This really needs the smoke. Not having the smoke, I had to add this and that to make this good. I finally got something I would eat, but it’s a lot more and very different ingredients than the wonderful Mennonite cooks of my past would have used.

I started with the noodles. I piled 100 grams of flour on the counter top and made a well in it, dropped in an egg and a good pinch of salt and stirred it with a fork until it was dampened. Then I added a fat tablespoon of water, because these are American noodles. Using a dough scraper and two floury hands, I kneaded it a lot more than I do when I make Italian pasta. Once it was smooth, I formed a neat ball and left it on the counter to rest. Why the pasta gets to rest and cook doesn’t, I don’t know, but that’s the way it is.

I then used a rolling pin to roll it out on the floury counter. If you look at the photo below you’ll see it doesn’t resemble my Italian pasta at all. It’s floury, thicker and not stretchy. It’s almost 1/8” thick. I used a pizza wheel to cut it into the squares you see. They are a fat 1 inch. I left it to rest again.

To make the sauce, I decided that sick people need vitamins and vitamins live in vegetables. Voila! A sofritto.

My elaborated Mennonite cream/ham sauce

½ cup finely chopped celery
½ cup finely chopped carrot
¼ cup finely chopped onion
2 tablespoons butter
½ cup finely minced country style ham
2 tablespoons flour
1 cup or more milk
three splashes of Tabasco
a glug of fortified wine, such as sherry or marsala
salt to taste
generous nutmeg to taste
the juice of half a lemon

Begin by heating the butter in a heavy pan and sautéing the first three ingredients until really soft. Don’t brown them. Sick people don’t want crispy vegetables, so check the carrots, because they are the hardest one. Add the bits of ham, and stir in. Sprinkle the flour over the mixture, and cook a minute or so, stirring. Slowly add the milk, stirring it in. With all those lumpy vegetables, this will go smoother than with a plain white sauce. Bring to a simmer and cook over a very low heat for about 15 minutes, adding milk if it is too stiff. You want the liquid part to be a bit like heavy cream. Taste for salt and correct it. Your individual ham will add some, so it’s definitely a thing to taste and work at.

If it isn’t very tasty yet, add the Tabasco, wine, and then the lemon juice. I blame my porky but not smoky ham for these last two ingredients.

Bring a pot of water to a brisk boil, salt it and dump in the noodle squares. Boil them until they are fairly soft, not al dente like Italian pasta. It was hard for me to do this, but I persevered. I feared to end with flour soup, but managed to rescue them at a point where you could still chew a bit.

If your sauce thickens again, you can add a bit of the noodle water to loosen it.

Drain the pasta, then toss it with the sauce. Hmmm, pretty white! Put it on a colored plate, add a small vegetable and a bunch of white grapes (I always eat those when I am sick) and serve it steaming hot. It should feed three sort of sick people, four fairly sick people, and a crowd of really sick people. Those recovering can probably eat half each.

And now I hope everybody gets well and starts being able to eat like royalty again. Or go to Hardy County and eat the original which shmecks like crazy. Those are some very fine cooks.

7 comments December 6th, 2007

Coral: the gem of the sea

I plan to do some research on the state of coral today. I know that it is a material that has become very tightly controlled in order to protect the reefs, and I know that every scrap in Italy is accounted for and that coral workers have to have permits. I don’t really know exactly how that works or what present figures for any part of the “industry” are.

Carved coral parure of bracelet and necklace with a sculpted pendant. I would wear this with anything.

Meantime, I want to acquaint you with what I’ve been seeing based on a visit I made to a shop here in town recently. Diego Pincardini has a shop and a workroom here in Città di Castello. I first met him when he was participating in our Medieval Artisans days, sitting outside his shop in Medieval costume and working coral with traditional tools. It stopped me in my tracks. In the shop windows behind him were some of the most luxurious and gorgeous pieces I had ever seen. The workmanship went far beyond the “factory” type work I had seen in the south, where coral is a commoner material.

Then I lost him. I never seemed to find him went I went to the shop. The windows grew sparser. The lights were off and the iron gates closed. I purposely went to the next Artisan days to find him. “Why are you never here?” I asked.

“I’m here, but I am only working here. I’m away a lot to sell my work in bigger cities where work like mine sells better than it sells here. If you want to see me, you have to make an appointment.” He whipped a business card from his Medieval gown and handed it to me. So that’s what I did. I called, I went. I went for the pleasure, because he has a safe in the workroom full of treasures beyond belief, and he’s willing to open drawers and show me half-done pieces he is working on. It’s my kind of candy store.

So the other day I went to see what is on the bench. He asked me why I come to see him. I told him it’s because he works in colors. Diamonds may or may not be a girl’s best friend, but except in the case of pavé, where tiny diamonds trace a shape in gold (I don’t like pavé on white gold) I like colored stones better.

I’d inspired joy in Diego Pincardini! Out poured a treatise on the rare and the colored: turquoise, coral, ebony, amber, rubies, emeralds, sapphires and the panoply of what nature colors and hides from us. Shared joy is a wonderful thing. Heaps of colored gems are the last fillip.

This is black coral beads formed into a bracelet with gold links and a red coral cabochon clasp. I would wear it with a black cashmere sweater or a taupe linen dress.

He offered me a CD of photographs of some of his work, a CD he carries to augment what he can carry in his little black bag when he speeds around northern Italy placing his work in the great jewelry stores of the country. I took it, reduced the size of the photos and I am, with his permission, sharing a few of them with you. The original photos were enormous, so that a jeweler could see the details in scale from 200% and up.

Angel skin coral worked as a pendant and a bracelet with a clasp like the pendant. Fabulous with cream silk.

I have watched him carve the stones. Coral is so precious nowadays that even the bits carved off to make one of the major pieces are used to make beads or tiny carvings.

A bracelet of carved links and an intricately carved clasp. I would like this with a sky blue sweater or top that would call attention to the intricacy.

Antiqued brooch of silver and yellow gold, with carved coral details. This cries for something substantial behind it, such as tweed, or a textured stole, maybe a bulky oatmealy sweater. I think this could become a family heirloom piece.

He works in other materials too, and shows Italian turquoise and semiprecious stones. Yesterday he was working on carved ebony, and showed me in great detail how he would make the heavy earrings become light as air. Sigh…

These gold bracelets took my breath away. I would wear them all the time, everywhere, even to do the laundry. Unfortunately, gold bracelets form no part at all in my schemes to survive the dollar crunch and stay in Italy.

I’ll just add a series of thumbnails for more pictures, and you can decide whether to take a closer look by clicking, or not. I’d love your ideas on how you would wear any of these pieces. I need ideas for my daydreams.

I’ll post again, because I have only shrunk a small part of the pictures, and for me this is like living in a museum!

The shop is DP Coral, via della Pendinella, 06012 Città di Castello (PG) Italia. Call ahead if you’d like to visit. (39) 339 382 0718. Or you can shop the great jewelers of Rome and north to the borders and pay a lot more!

4 comments December 6th, 2007