Archive for May, 2008
When people come to visit from Australia, they are getting something like an endless summer. Right now it’s more like endless spring, however. May continues cool and wet. The roses are hanging back and the peonies have become so heavy with water that they’ve hit the ground. A thirty foot tall plum tree has bowed completely over in the kitchen garden, which will make it very easy to pick the plums should there come enough sun to ripen them.
Thursday’s cookery included:
Crostini of summer truffle
Risotto with porcini mushrooms
Scallops of turkey with asparagus and mozzarella
Fried zucchini blossoms led with mozzarella
Layered pudding of vanilla cream, chocolate and alkermes.
The recipes which are not already published here follow.
Risotto with Porcini mushrooms
45 minutes prep which includes soaking the dried mushrooms
45 minutes cooking
Ingredients for 4
350 g fresh white mushrooms, sliced very thinly or cut into thin spears
100 g of dried porcini mushrooms
350 g carnaroli rice (or vialone nero or arborio)
2.5 deciliters broth, either chicken or vegetable
I medium white onion, peeled and chopped fine
1 wineglass of dry white wine
parsley, minced very finely
150 g grated hard cheese
2 slices of meltable process cheese (we used Bel Paese, but the recipe actually asks for something like Kraft Singles)
1 piece of butter the size of a walnut
1 pinch of mint
salt
Prepare the broth ahead of time, your choice whether your risotto will be vegetarian or not. Put the dried porcini in a little hot water for 45 minutes.
Once those two items which take a bit of time are done, you are ready to prepare the risotto. Make sure your broth is simmering by the time you need it in about 15 minutes.
In a pan, non-stick is suggested (?) heat a piece of butter the size of a walnut and an equal amount of oil together. Cook the onion and the fresh mushroom slices as well as the re-hydrated mushrooms with a little of their water, until lightly golden.
Add the rice and cook it, stirring, until it is toasted, for 3-4 minutes on medium heat. The rice starts to look chalky. Then add the wine and raise the heat to maximum to evaporate the wine. Once the wine is evaporated, turn off the flame and let the rice rest for about 10 minutes. Relight the flame to medium, and start cooking the rice, adding a ladle of boiling broth, stirring until it is almost absorbed and then adding more. Stir frequently.
When the rice is cooked but al dente, remove it from the flame and add the grated cheese and the two slices of processed cheese, stirring in, then cover the pan and leave it to rest 5-7 minutes, then serve the risotto dusted with the chopped parsley.
Scaloppe di tacchino agli asparagi
Turkey scallops with asparagus
This takes about 15 minutes to prepare and 15 minutes to cook, but you can partially prepare it and then finish it at the last moment so that you aren’t separated from your guests.
Ingredients for 4
4 slices of turkey breast
4 slices of mozzarella (if you use the highest quality of mozzarella, the cheese is smaller so you need more slices.)
24 asparagus tips freshly cooked
40 g butter
½ wineglass of dry white wine
flour as needed
broth as needed
Beat the turkey slices until flat, then flour them lightly and fry them until lightly golden on both sides in the butter (or oil.)
Add the white wine and let it evaporate, Salt and pepper the dish and add a little broth.
A few minutes before serving, add a slice of mozzarella to each turkey scallop and 6 asparagus tips. Cover and hold it on a low heat until the cheese is melted, or you can run it under a grill.
Plate the scallops and serve them immediately with some of the pan juices over them.
Crema dolce ai savoiardi
Alkermes is a liqueur which is widely used in Italy, largely for its ruby red color. I have never heard of anyone drinking it, although it’s possible. Savoiardi are elongated dry cookies that are used in making Tiramisu, sort of the Italian version of a ladyfinger, except crunchy.
Make a vanilla pudding. Make a thick mixture by mixing cocoa into leftover espresso coffee. It should be almost spreadable. Make a small amount of fresh Italian coffee.
Use glass dishes to show the colored layers. Place a layer of the vanilla cream in it, then layer on the cocoa/coffee cream, then drizzle with Alkermes. Break a Savoiardo in half and dip the halves into the fresh coffee, then press them onto pudding. Repeat the layers, using a spoon to drizzle on the cocoa cream artistically this time. Stand a Savoiardo up in the layered pudding. Chill in the fridge until wanted.
May 31st, 2008
I received this in my email this morning, and since we are all gardening nowadays I thought I’d offer it up. I don’t know that it works, but it just might. I get bitten or stung a dozen times or more through gardening season, and thank goodness, that means until November!
“It might be wise to carry a penny in your pocket while working
in the yard……… BEE STINGS !
A couple of weeks ago, I was stung by both a bee and hornet while working in the garden. My arm swelled up, so I went to the doctor. The clinic gave me cream and an antihistamine. The next day the swelling was getting progressively worse, so I went to my regular doctor. The arm was Infected and needed an antibiotic.The doctor told me - ‘ The next time you get stung, put a penny on the bite for 15 minutes’.
That night, my niece was stung by two bees. I looked at the bite and it had already started to swell. So, I taped a penny to her arm for 15 minutes. The next morning, there was no sign of a bite. We decided that she just wasn’t allergic to the sting.
Soon, I was gardening outside. I got stung again, twice by a hornet on my left hand. I thought, here I go again to the doctor for another antibiotic. I promptly got my money out and taped two pennies to my bites, then sat and sulked for 15 minutes. The penny took the string out of the bite immediately.
In the meantime the hornets were attacking, and my friend was stung on the thumb. Again the penny. The next morning I could only see the spot where the hornet had stung me. No redness, no swelling. My friend’s sting was the same; couldn’t even tell where she had been stung. She got stung again a few days later upon her back—cutting the grass! And the penny worked once again.
Wanted to share this marvelous information in case you experience the same problem. We need to keep a stock of pennies on hand.
The doctor said that the copper in the penny counteracts the bite. It definitely works! “
May 23rd, 2008
Slurp! I am right behind Judy Witts’ every word in this post.
Yes, that’s a different picture. Those are my Buffalo Wings that I ate fpr Sunday dinner! They were really good, too.
May 23rd, 2008
The signora who sells me wine gave me two of these seedpods and told me they are slow to sprout and they are multicolored. But she didn’t have a name for the plant at all. Does anyone recognize this odd pod?
Two days later and someone has found me the answer. A gardening pall from this gardening forum gave this link. Scary plant!
May 22nd, 2008
This is the second rainiest May I have known here. It’s also pretty cold for May, cold enough to provoke aches and pains not caused by hard gardening work. I’ve made fires in both the stove and the fireplace at different times, something I don’t recall having done before, but then we’ve only had a few days you can dry laundry outside.
So this is a photographic report on what I have been doing. I reassure myself constantly that there will be a payoff starting in just a few weeks. These photos were taken when there was neither sun nor rain. If you click on them they grow, but not many are worth the effort.
Yesterday I worked my right arm into crisis by sawing down most of two trees. After years of saying that I just can’t saw, I decided that sawing is something one can learn to do just like anything else. It’s true, but it isn’t good for you!
The result is that today I will translate recipes Alberta wants to use for the cooking school. I always thought Americans were too wedded to the recipe, but it turns out a lot of Italians are pretty faithful to it as well. “One needs to have the right proportions,” I am told, and that’s true, but sometimes it seems as easy to decide while doing it just how much is enough.
Even in the rain, I take my coffee out under the gazebo and I am grateful that winter is over. Then I prepare warm, wet food for the kittens and sometimes I sit and play with them for a while, but it often makes my pyjamas wet. It took them only a couple of days out of their little “nest” to run to the human, because they’ve been stroked every single day since their birth.
May 22nd, 2008
You know that blog I recommended last week? Well they’ve got something different for you today.
Rice pie. Bet your mom didn’t make that often.
May 21st, 2008
I think this collection is worth looking at for several reasons. First, it’s Oscar de la Renta without Oscar, although it isn’t the first collection without him. Second, it may be helpful in terms of making sure what we buy for summer 2008 will still be current in 2009. Third, the resort collections are always interesting because unlike the two big runway collections, resort wear is intended to be bought and worn. It’s designed to be wearable by real customers because the people who tend to need summer clothes in the dead of winter can afford the real thing.
I like these clothes. They are pretty, colorful and wearable by a wide variety of women, and not just anorexic Russian adolescents. I liked these clothes last year when Marc Jacobs presented them… or am I all wrong there? Could I have mistaken that hat?
May 17th, 2008
I come from a place where the doughnut is king. I even have my own joke about it that goes: the reason why New Englanders don’t make good fried chicken is because when we see that much hot fat we make doughnuts.
When my sisters and brothers and I came home from school in the cold afternoons, we were as likely to be greeted with fresh, hot doughnuts as other kids were greeted by peanut butter and jam sandwiches. It is supposed that policemen especially like doughnuts, and I always thought that were I to have a jewelry shop I would put it next to a doughnut shop to be sure I was protected well by the policemen.
To a great degree that day is over. Factory made doughnuts, not one of which is worth one crumb from a freshly homemade or even shop made doughnut, have all but withered away the once common practice of creative doughnutry. What does it matter that you can buy a maple glazed doughnut rolled in chopped nuts if the doughnut itself is heavy, dense, cold and tasteless? Although it should not be saved in my personal kitchen, doughnut making should be revived and saved. Perhaps the Italians who have managed to maintain a recipe for making noodles out of breadcrumbs for 550 years will taste these and decide to save doughnuts as well?
The truth is, these are really easy to make. They are too easy to make. I feel like Pandora opening this box for you. You can whip these up in minutes. They can disappear in seconds. They are delicious just as they come out of the pan or rolled in sugar and you really only need to learn about glazes and various things they can be rolled in if you open a shop near the Piazza di Spagna, where I will be your occasional client for one plain and one sugared.
It probably leaps to your mind that we do not have doughnut cutters in Italy, and that is true. That’s why mine are doughnut sticks. If you have a sharp biscuit cutter, you could use that and then something tiny to remove the center, or you can order a doughnut cutter and let the dogana figure it out, but ALWAYS claim that it is a cultural object. It’s true; doughnuts are definitely a cultural object. Do not try to wrestle these into a circle like a bagel; this dough is way too delicate. Or go ahead and try anything, and if it works please tell me.
This recipe, which is half a recipe, works. It is from a 1960 edition of Better Homes and Gardens Cookbook and is a recipe from New England. To make a lot of them, double it—if you run a B&B or have six children or are married to a policeman?
Doughnuts
2 egg yolks
½ cup sugar
1 tablespoon seed oil
3/8 cup milk
1 ¾ cup sifted flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
¼ teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon cinnamon
Oil for frying
Beat the egg yolks well, and then beat in the sugar and oil. Stir in the milk. Sift together the dry ingredients and then beat them into the liquids until smooth. Turn the dough out onto a generously floured board, turning it to lightly cover all of it in flour. It is quite sticky, so use plenty of flour. Gently roll it out to 1/3” thick. (I actually patted it out with a floury palm.)
Heat the cooking oil or fat 3 to 4” deep in a heavy kettle or a fryer. Heat it to 370-380° F (a cube of bread will brown in 60 seconds).
Cut dough with a floured cutter, which should be sharp. The dough is delicate and must not be over handled. Take the cutting board near the oil when you are ready to fry the doughnuts. Using a metal spatula, lift the shapes off the board and slide them into the oil. Don’t crowd them. Fry as many at a time as can easily be turned. Turn the doughnuts as they rise to the surface and show a little color. This allows the center to break the crust as it swells, making the outsides much crispier. Fry a few at a time for just 2 to 3 minutes, until just browned on both sides. Lift the finished doughnuts from the fat with a long fork, but do not prick them. Drain them on paper towels in a warm spot. You can then roll them in sugar, cinnamon and sugar or glaze them. Makes 12 doughnuts.
You can re-use frying fat several times by merely frying potatoes in it, then cooling, straining and storing it in a clean bottle. Whether you eat the potatoes is up to you. The flavors of what you’ve been cooking go into them, and therefore leave the fat ready to use for a different recipe.
In italiano
Questo dolce della vera cucina americana è comune a prima colazione, ma anche è fatto della mamma per la merenda dopo scuola. Ho tanti ricordi dei doughnuts tra la mia gioventù. Sono cresciuta in uno stato dove faceva un freddo polare tra l’inverno, e il doughnut è perfetto quando una bambina entra la casa, con il profumo un po’ speziato, un po’ zuccherato e c’è anche che dove sono i doughnuts, diciamo che c’è anch il poliziotto. I poliziotti vanno pazzi per i doughnuts. Come mai non fate almeno una volta un dolce che porta felicità e anche securità? Come si pronuncia questa parola? DO-naht.
Doughnuts
2 tuorli
115 g zucchero
1 cucchiaio olio di semi
100 ml latte
240 g farina 00
2 cucchiaini di té di lievita in polvere (quella chimica)
1 g sale
pizzico noce moscato
pizzico canella
Olio per friggere
In una ciottola, battete bene i tuorli, e poi aggiungete lo zucchero e battete bene, bene per sciolgiere lo zucchero. Aggiungete il latte e l’olio e mescolatela.
Mescolate gli ingredienti asciutti e aggiungetegli alla pasta, battendola bene. Disperdete generosamente qualche farina sul un piano di lavoro. Fate girare per infarinarla bene la pasta che sarà morbidissima a delicata. Distendete la pasta a un centimetro. Usando un coltello ben farinato, tagliate la pasta in bastoncini circa 2 cm larghi per 7 cm lunghi.
Riscaldate l’olio per friggere fino a 187 – 193°C. Un dado di pane sarebbe arosolato in un minuto.
Quando l’olio è caldo, alzate le strisce di pasta con una spatula al’olio bollente. Si può cucinare 3 o 4 alla volta, ma dovete lasciare lo spazio a girarle. Vanno subito al fondo, e poi vengono alla superficie, leggermente arosolate di sotto. Girare le strisce fino a tutte sono gonfiate e arosolate e dorate. Togietele a qualche carta da cucina. Continuate fino a tutti sono cotti. Si può spargere lo zucchero come mostrato, o anche un misto di zucchero e canella.
Sono buonissimi tiepidi, ma anche a temperatura ambiente. Possono essere congelati senza lo zucchero, poi riscaldati a quel punto anche zuccherati se volete.
Fa un piatto di circa 24 stecche, o colazione per 8-10 persone normali o 3 poliziotti.
May 16th, 2008
I’ve added a small script that allows me to respond to comments both here and via email all from one page. It’s pleasant and easy, so if you’ve left a real email, you don’t have to come back to get an answer– unless you want to, which would make me very happy.
May 15th, 2008
It happens every spring. I garden too hard and too long– the window of opportunity is short– and mess up my back, arms and shoulders. Typing hurts.
I will, as planned, be posting another American recipe on Friday, however.
May 13th, 2008
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