Recipes - Sarasota Soundings

Indian Potato Salad

Holly and Skip — Sun, 03 Jul 2011 22:02:01 +0000

It’s Independence Day weekend 2011 and your fridge is full. It’s 118° F. in Phoenix, in the 90’s in the mid-Atlantic states, and at least that hot in Florida, where thunderstorms will probably trip the breaker on your air-conditioner at least once during the holiday. You’re having people come over for a cook-out or taking food to a picnic, and you’ve already run twice to the bait shop or CVS for extra ice…

Well, here’s one dish that you can make ahead and that you don’t have to chill—Potato Salad.

“Potato salad!? Are you kidding?” you say, remembering decades of horror stories of mayo-dressed salads that sickened entire First Communion parties or sent picnicking beachcombers to the ER.

Yes, potato salad. But one made without mayonnaise.

Today’s recipe takes a cue from a democracy as raucous as our own—India, where millions of vegetarians don’t eat eggs, but where cooks have devised myriad ways to elevate spuds to nirvana. Speaking of elevation, during the British Raj, gardeners developed local varieties for their hill-stations, their cooler summer residences. Sixteenth-century Portuguese traders first introduced the potato to India, but local laborers and English colonizers were the ones who struggled through droughts and monsoons to establish the crop in the Subcontinent. The named Indian cultivars of Solanum tuberosum are the stuff of Masterpiece Theatre: Magnum Bonum, Royal Kidney, Great Scot, and (our favorite) Craig’s Defiance. The Brits were homesick for their chips and shepherd’s pies, but what the spice masters of India learned to do with this New World tuber took things to another level. As a vehicle for other flavors, nothing beats the potato.

The potato also gives us an opportunity to champion a once-common American kitchen fixture that Indians continue to use with ease and flair. Though most American cooks don’t think of it as a hot-weather heat-saver, the pressure cooker is a miserly consumer of BTU’s and, thus, easy on the cook as well as the planet. (Of all the freedoms Americans enjoy and celebrate this weekend, for most of us, liberation from the power-grid is not one of them.) Because it cooks foods so much faster than a typical, lidded pot, we use our pressure cooker throughout the hot weather, to cut down on kitchen heat.

In particular, we love ours because it cooks whole potatoes in their skins so quickly and evenly. Just the energy saved in making your summertime potato salads could justify getting one. We promise you’ll find the pressure cooker to be, as one of us likes to say when he is feeling stentorian, “a trusted and valuable member of the culinary armamentarium.” The fact is that today’s pressure cookers are simple, efficient, and safe. (So, now you can relegate any urban legends about exploding pressure-cookers to the trash, right along with those bad mayonnaise memories.)

We offer our fear-free Indian Potato Salad. Whether you make it with—or without—a pressure cooker, do so at least an hour (and up to 12 hours) ahead of serving and remember that the flavors need a little time to meld. The salad is best at room temperature. You can refrigerate any leftovers, but we rarely have any.

Indian Potato Salad

Ingredients:

2 lbs. Waxy potatoes (we like Klondike Rose & Yukon Gold)
2 tsp. Whole mustard seeds (brown or yellow)
1 Tbs. Canola or other neutral oil
1/4 tsp. Salt
1/2 tsp. Hot red pepper flakes (optional)
4 Tbs. Vinegar (we like white wine or cider vinegar)
1/2 Cup Fresh cilantro or spearmint leaves, snipped with scissors
Freshly ground black pepper & salt, to taste.

Fresh lime wedges for garnish

Preparation:

To cook the potatoes:

Boil whole, scrubbed potatoes in their skins. Cook them until there is slight resistance when you try to pierce one to the center with the point of a sharp knife. Turn off the burner and leave them, covered in the hot water, until you are ready to use them. They will continue to cook.

If you are using a pressure cooker, follow the product directions for whole potatoes, or save even more energy and do it our way:

Fill the cooker half-way with water and unpeeled potatoes. Seal the cooker and bring it up to pressure on high heat. When it begins to hiss, reduce heat to medium and let the potatoes cook for 5 minutes. Turn the burner off and let the cooker sit, undisturbed, for at least 30 minutes. (Longer is OK. The residual heat will not overcook the potatoes.) This formula will cook two or three pounds of potatoes (even if they are mixed sizes) to perfection.

When you are ready to make the salad, release any remaining pressure from the pot and open the pressure cooker.

No matter how you have boiled your potatoes, the directions are now the same:

Drain the potatoes and put them cut them into large (1 1/2-inch / 4 cm) chunks, leaving the skins on the pieces. Put the pieces in a large mixing bowl and set aside.

Place the mustard seeds, oil, and 1/4 tsp. salt in a very small sauce pan with a lid. (Because you will have it on very high heat, do not use a pan with a synthetic non-stick coating, like Teflon. However, anodized aluminum is okay.)

Stir the seeds to coat them with the oil and cover the pan. Heat a small burner to high. With the lid securely on, place the pan on the hot burner and reduce the heat to medium. You will soon begin to hear the mustard seeds pop in the hot oil. When the popping stops (in about one minute or less), turn off the burner. Keeping the lid on, remove the pan from the heat and set aside to cool slightly for 1 minute. Keep it covered as a few more seeds may pop.

After a minute has passed, and if you are using the hot pepper flakes, stir them into the hot oil and seeds.

Have the vinegar at hand.

With a spoon, scrape all the toasted seeds and oil from the pan into the potatoes. Carefully pour the vinegar into the sauce pan to rinse out any remaining seeds and oil and then pour that over the potatoes. With a large spatula or wooden spoon, gently stir the potatoes until the seeds are evenly distributed.

If the potatoes are still hot, wait 10 minutes until they have cooled slightly and then add the snipped cilantro or mint and freshly ground black pepper. Stir to distribute evenly. Taste for salt. You may add a little more vinegar, to taste; the potatoes will absorb it.

Serves 4 – 6, depending on your other side dishes

Feel free to vary the fresh herbs. For Indians, neither basil nor tarragon is a salad herb, but either is lovely with mustard seeds. To amplify the Indian aspect, we like to add freshly grated ginger and the rind of a grated lime. If you need more fireworks, judiciously add a few chopped chilies (fresh, pickled, or dried).

As our founding fathers demonstrated, the Fourth of July is an auspicious date for grand experiments!

The post Indian Potato Salad first appeared on Sarasota Soundings.

Turkish Loquat Kebab

Holly Chase — Sun, 11 Apr 2010 13:56:04 +0000

Editor’s Note: For more Turkish Recipes, visit Holly Chase dot Com.

If you live anywhere in Florida, as far to the north as US Dept of Agriculture Zone 7, you can see Eriobtrya japonica, loquat trees, beautiful broad-leafed evergreens native to Japan and China. If you are in the Carolinas, your loquats may be purely decorative shade specimens that rarely bear fruit. But here in Florida, we are especially lucky this year; even after some serious freezes, the 2010 loquat “crop,” at its peak right now, is the best we’ve seen in years. The small, oval fruits range from pale green to the color of apricots, when they are ripe.

To the unfamiliar, ripe loquats look a lot like queen palm fruits, which are falling to the ground now. But once you see loquats against their tree’s distinctively veined and fuzzy leaves, there’s not chance of confusion. Palm trees look nothing like loquats!

People in my part of the world, the Mediterranean and the Middle East, love loquats, which are often misidentified by tourists as medlars, a different, northern fruit that is rarely cultivated in North America. Nonetheless, medlars and loquats are both members of Rosaceae, the Rose family—along with all the stone-fruits, quinces, apples, and pears. (Known as nespre and nespoli in France and Italy, the Turkish names for loquats translate as “Malta plums” or simply “New World,” odd tags for fruit from the Far East.)

Turks cannot enjoy loquats quite so early as Floridians. They come into the Istanbul and Ankara markets in May, along with strawberries. Restaurants will offer diners platters of fresh strawberries and loquats, and one could certainly do that here in Florida this year. Although mature loquats shade yards and streets throughout older Florida neighborhoods, very few residents seem to realize that loquats are edible. We continue to be amazed that so many delicacies go unharvested here. Perhaps we should call this post Florida Foraging 202…

Human ignorance is the birds’ and squirrels’ gain. Many a fruit will have a tiny peck from a jay or mocking-bird. (That’s one way to be sure they’re ripe! They are still safe to eat.) And if the fruit have already fallen to the ground and are a bit bruised, but intact, don’t discard them. Fruit soft enough to bruise will be sweet.) Just rinse them off and pit them; most have one or two shiny brown seeds that you can quickly and easily remove with your fingers. Enjoy loquats fresh, in salads, or—as the Turks do—briefly cooked in meat dishes.

This is hardly nouvelle cuisine. The combination of fruit with meat has roots in the pre-Islamic cooking of ancient Iran. When Islam came to Iran in the seventh century AD, it quickly appropriated the sophisticated cuisine of the Persian elite, who had long cultivated fruits indigenous to Mesopotamia and more distant regions of Asia. The spread of Islam and its willingness to incorporate non-Arab customs meant that, within a few centuries, Persian cooking styles were known from Central Asia and Northern India to the entire Mediterranean and beyond–as far as the Atlantic shores of Portugal and Morocco. Today, many of Morocco’s complex dishes of meat slowly cooked with tart fruit (whose acidity acts to tenderize the meat) are strikingly similar to creations that would have been served in ancient Persia.

The juncture of agricultural richness and continued cultural interchanges between northern Syria and southeastern Turkey have helped maintain many unique regional dishes that still whisper the influence of Persia.

In the Turkish province of Gaziantep along the Syrian border, loquats and lamb come together in an easily made dish with flavors as complex and beguiling as the region itself. Here is one version of the regional treat known as Yeni Dünya Kebabi.

Turkish Loquat Kebab (YENI DÜNYA KEBABI)

NOTE: In Turkish, kebab merely means “cooked red meat.” Readers should know that a sis (sheesh) is a skewer. Thus, Turks are bewildered when American magazines provide recipes for things like Pineapple-Marshmallow Kebabs or Fish Kebabs with Green Peppers. In other words, we’ve confused the word for skewer with the thing skewered! In Turkish, Chicken Kebab makes no sense, but you can order Tavuk Sis, which is skewered, grilled chicken pieces.

Such entertaining confusion just seems to be an everyday seasoning in this part of the world, as highlighted by the old song, It’s Istanbul, not Constantinople.

Ingredients:

6 ounces brown or green lentils
8 ounces ground lamb (leg or shoulder meat)
1 medium yellow onion
2 cloves of garlic
2 tsp minced fresh ginger
Italian flat-leaf parsley (enough to yield at least 1/2 cup when minced)

1 tsp freshly ground black pepper
1 tsp freshly ground allspice
1 tsp cinnamon
2 tsp dried oregano
2 tsp sweet paprika
1-2 tsp red chili flakes, to taste*

1 Egg, beaten

1/3 to 1/2 cup fine, dry bread breadcrumbs (commercial are OK)

Salt to taste
At least 20 loquats, as many as 40

1 Tablespoon pomegranate concentrate (nar pekmez in Turkish)
or ordinary balsamic vinegar

Fresh spearmint– chopped & sprigs for garnish

*(or Turkish Antep, Urfa or (Syrian) Aleppo pepper– any sweet-hot pepper you like)

Preparation:

Inspect the lentils, removing any debris. Rinse and bring them to a rapid boil in 1 1/2 cups of water in a small saucepan. Turn off the heat and cover the pan. Set it aside.

Pit the loquats and break or cut each into 2-3 pieces. Refrigerate.

Organize all the other ingredients.

In a food processor, mince the ginger, garlic, and onion. Scrape them all into a 2-quart mixing bowl.

Mince the parsley (stems and all) and add to the bowl, along with the ground lamb, egg, and all the seasonings. With a spoon or spatula stir them to combine.

Check the lentils; they will have absorbed most of the water and should be almost done, with some resistance when you bite one. Drain them, reserving any liquid.

Pulse lentils in the food processor a few times, to break them up.

Stir the lentils into the meat mixture. Add the bread crumbs, more or less, depending on how wet or dry the mixture seems to be. You want to be able to form 16-20 oval meat patties (köfte, in Turkish), each about 2 inches long. Köfte may be made up to 24 hours before finishing the dish.

In a large non-stick skillet, 12-14 inches, sauté the köfte over medium heat. Allow them to brown for 5-7 minutes on one side before turning them (this parcooks them and makes them easier to turn. Turn the köfte, and as you are browning them, add the reserved loquats to the pan. If anything begins to stick, add any of the reserved lentil broth or a little water. When the meat is browned and the loquats have started to soften, drizzle the pomegranate concentrate or balsamic vinegar over the köfte.

Serve the köfte and any pan juices with white rice or bulgur pilav. Sprinkle each portion with freshly snipped mint and garnish with a sprig of mint.

For details on loquat cultivation see the excellent botanical website: http://www.floridata.com/ref/e/eriobot.cfm

The post Turkish Loquat Kebab first appeared on Sarasota Soundings.

Salads of Morocco 101

Holly Chase — Fri, 13 Mar 2009 18:49:21 +0000

Of all the combinations of flavor and texture that one may experience around the Mediterranean rim, the salads of Morocco are among the brightest surprises. There are scores these side dishes, which vary by region and season—indeed, from house to house. Moroccan salads may include any or all of these: sugar, distilled orange-blossom water, cinnamon, cumin, caraway, saffron, cilantro, parsley, mint, red onions, chillies, or a few drops of argan oil (expressed from pits of the fruit of Argania spinosa, a desert tree indigenous to Morocco.)

Backyard Mineola Orange
Copyright © 2009, Skip Lombardi

Beets and oranges are a favorite pairing; depending on a cook’s whim, the two might also be combined with other vegetables (carrots, cucumbers, peppers, or turnips).

Interesting and delicious as these North African permutations are, we think Florida’s late winter citrus and local beets are best appreciated with just a few adornments. (Whoever said that flavorful greens and root-crops can’t be grown in the sandy soils of the Sunshine State has not sought out the beets of Florida’s farmer’s markets. Our source says that his are harvested in the area around Lake Okeechobee.)

Dressed simply with olive oil and lemon juice, this gorgeous salad is easy to prepare and complements grilled fish, poultry, or meat equally well. Try to use an orange cultivar that has few seeds and is easy to peel. For maximum color contrast, crimson beets are our choice. (Be sure to save the greens and stems to stir-fry or add to soups).

The spirit of Morocco and the taste of our our local produce both come through in this dish.

Beet and Orange Salad

Ingredients:

1 lb Crimson beets (Skins left on; tops removed & saved for another use)
1 lb Sweet oranges (Mineola, Honeybell, Temple, and tangelo work well)

Juice of 1/2 lemon or lime
2 Tbsp Olive oil
Black pepper, freshly and coarsely ground
1/2 Tbsp Sweet-hot paprika, or to taste (see note)
1/2 tsp coarse salt

2-3 Tbsp snipped spearmint leaves, plus a sprig for garnish

Note: Hungarian sweet-hot paprika and Turkish Antep and Urfa peppers have smokey notes that suit the earthy taste of beets. If you do not have any of these, a tiny bit of cayenne and more sweet paprika will also work. Whatever red pepper form you choose, be sure you know its strength so that you season to your own taste.

Preparation:

Cook the beets, in their skins, until you can pierce one with a sharp knife blade. (We like a little resistance at the center.) Allow to cool and slip off the skins. Slice in rounds, 1/4 inch thick, and set aside.

Peel the oranges carefully, trying not to separate the segments. Remove as much of the membrane as you can. On a large plate (to catch the juice), cut the oranges across the segments into slices 1/2 — 1/4 inch thick. (Some slice more easily than others; save any “broken” segments.) Pick out any seeds. Reserve the juice to pour over the salad later.

On a clean platter, place any less-than-perfect pieces of orange and cover them with overlapping slices of beets and orange. Pour the excess orange juice over the beets.

20 minutes before serving, squeeze the juice of the lemon (or lime) over all. Drizzle on the oil and then sprinkle with salt, black peper, and the paprika (see note). Finely snip the mint over the entire platter. Garnish with a full sprig of mint.

Serves 2 — 4

Sihhateyin! Bon appetit!

The post Salads of Morocco 101 first appeared on Sarasota Soundings.

Pasta with Caviar

Holly and Skip — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 15:48:23 +0000

Whether or not you have already enjoyed Pasta ai Caviale along on the Italian Riviera, you’ll find that the dish will bring a little warmth to a mid-winter evening anywhere. Though light enough for a late-night summer supper, at this time of year it’s a favorite pasta course in a more substantial meal. Ligurians typically use black lumpfish caviar.

For Valentine’s Day, we find the reddish-pink of salmon roe to be a more festive, and equally affordable, touch. The translucent orange beads of trout roe and Japanese tobiko (flying fish roe) are comparably priced. They, too, impart a bright, briny flavor and pleasant crunch.

A well-chilled Verdicchio, Prosecco, or Portuguese vinho verde would complement the dish and still leave you enough cash for fresh flowers.

Happy Valentine’s Day!

Pasta ai Caviale

Ingredients:

3 Tbs. Unsalted butter
2 Scallions, including green tops, finely chopped
3 or 4 Grinds of the pepper mill
1/2 Cup mascarpone or sour cream
4 Tbs. Flat-leaf Italian parsley, finely chopped
4 oz. Salmon or other red “caviar”

1 Lb.Fettucine or linguine

Garnish:

1 Lemon, quartered
4 sprigs of parsley

Preparation:

Bring a large pot of salted water to the boil.

Heat a large sauté pan over medium heat, then add the butter. When the butter has foamed and the foam begins to subside, add the scallions and a few grinds of pepper. Sauté until the scallions are wilted, about one minute. Add the mascarpone or sour cream and reduce heat. Simmer for a minute or two.

When the water comes to the boil, add the pasta.

As the pasta cooks, simmer the sauce for another minute, then remove from the heat. Stir in the parsley and set the sauce aside until the pasta finishes cooking.

When the pasta has reached the al dente state, drain in a colander, reserving approximately one cup of the cooking water. Add the drained pasta to the sauce and toss gently to combine. If the sauce seems too thick, add some of the cooking water, 1/4 cup at a time.

To serve:

Divide pasta and sauce equally among four plates. Let the pasta cool for one minute on the plates before garnishing with the caviar. (If the pasta is too hot, it will “cook” the roe).

Top each portion with a tablespoon or two of the caviar.

Garnish each plate with a lemon wedge and a parsley sprig. Let each diner squeeze on his own lemon juice, to taste.

Serves four.

The post Pasta with Caviar first appeared on Sarasota Soundings.

Archeology Begins at Home

Skip — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 14:17:27 +0000

Actually, at our house, archeology usually begins in the refrigerator. But yesterday, we were exploring the back of a few cupboards and chanced upon a glass jar containing approximately half a pound of very large ivory-colored beans. Even a perfunctory examination told us these were no ordinary dried pulses. Turns out they were Turkish fasulye, similar to what are known as gigantes in Spanish. While their size (about 3/4 inch in length) is more than twice the size of dried Italian cannellini, the most remarkable thing about these beans was that they were more than ten years old. Apologies for not taking a photo before we cooked them, but they were probably a cultivar of Phasoleus coccineus.

Photo by Skip Lombardi

Holly had bought them at an Istanbul street market with many Bulgarian-Turkish vendors… that was all she remembered about this batch, left from a larger stash. But, needless to say, she did remember how to cook them, even though we were not sure what the outcome would be! Nonetheless, we thought we’d see what ten year-old beans tasted like. And the truth is, they were delicious, none the worse for their vintage.

We used our standard method for cooking dried beans—our pressure-cooker. But as the beans were at least twice the size of, say, kidney beans, we gave them twice the cooking time: 20 minutes under pressure, then a three hour rest in the sealed heat of the pressure-cooker.

Since the beans came from Turkey, it seemed appropriate to turn them into a Turkish bean salad, Fasulye Pilaki, which is served alone as a light lunch or as part of an evening spread of meze.

Fasulye Pilaki
Turkish Bean Salad

Ingredients:

Olive Oil
1 Medium Onion, sliced thinly
1 Medium Carrot, sliced thinly
2 – 3 Cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 Tbs. Fresh marjoram, finely chopped (or half that amount, if using dried)
Antep pepper (Turkish chili pepper flakes which are moderately hot & sweet. Substitute Italian dried peperoncini)
1 Bay leaf
1/8 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 Cup crushed tomatoes (canned or fresh)
1/2 Lb. dry white beans, cooked as above
Water
Salt & freshly ground black pepper
Additional olive oil
1 Scallion—green & white parts—minced
4 Tbs. Fresh mint, finely chopped

Preparation:

Heat a sauce pan (at least 1 quart) over medium-high heat. Add enough olive oil to cover the bottom of the pan, then sauté the onion, carrot, garlic, marjoram, Antep pepper, bay leaf, and cinnamon until the onion begins to wilt and the seasonings are very fragrant.

Add the crushed tomatoes, cooked beans, and enough water to barely cover the beans. Simmer the mixture, leaving the lid on the pan but slightly ajar to let steam escape. When the carrots are nearly done to your taste (we like them al dente), turn off the heat, remove the lid and let the mixture cool. Season with salt and pepper as necessary.

Serve warm or at room temperature with a splash of fruity olive oil and a sprinkling of scallions and mint. Have some good crusty bread at hand to soak up the sauce.

Serves two for lunch. More if served as one of several meze.

The post Archeology Begins at Home first appeared on Sarasota Soundings.

Peposo alla Fornicina

Skip — Fri, 07 Dec 2007 16:47:41 +0000

We’re in the midst of reviewing a new book on the history of the spice trade, The Taste of Conquest. Author Michael Krondl’s entertaining scholarship highlights pepper—once such a precious commodity that it was used as actual currency. This brings to mind the history of a Tuscan stew, Peposo. Numerous sources attribute its origins to the 1430’s, when the architect Filipo Brunelleschi was supervising construction of his dome on La Chiesa Santa Maria della Fiore, the famous Duomo in Florence.

The recipe is unremarkable. Then and now, it epitomizes Tuscan cuisine—local ingredients simply prepared: beef, garlic, red wine, and salt. However, one ingredient was anything but local. Giving the dish its name and distinctive bite is an unusually generous quantity of black pepper. Even more than the quantity of meat (Tuscany is famous for its Chianina beef-cattle), it was the pepper that would have made this dish deluxe in the 15^th century. It is quite likely that Cosimo de Medici, art patron and the Duomo’s financier, was paying a portion of Brunelleschi’s (and perhaps even the workers’) wages in spice. The fact that medieval medicine deemed black pepper to be a “hot” and invigorating element would have been yet another reason to include it in the workers’ meals.

At the end of the work day on the Duomo, the ingredients for Peposo were sealed in a clay vessel and placed in the kiln which, during the day, had fired the terra cotta tiles for the dome. Overnight, the residual heat cooked the stew, hence its colloquial name, Peposo Notturno, Nocturnal Peposo. The following day, runners would shuttle bowls of stew up to the tile-workers on the dome. The roofers seemed to like the stew well enough, but the notion of spending their lunch hour on the dome—depriving them of the chance to play a few friendly hands of Scopa and quaff some vino on the ground—didn’t go over well at all, causing a small rebellion that may have amounted to Italy’s first labor strike.

Credit for the original Peposo recipe is claimed by nearly every town near Florence that had tile-making operations. Among those are Pistoia, Impruneta, and even La Spezia, in the province of Liguria. All these towns also insist that Dottore Brunelleschi visited each of them to select his tiles.

Over time, cooks have embellished the dish with tomatoes, mushrooms, and onions. One thing is certain: Brunelleschi’s stew could not have included tomatoes. That New World oddity didn’t appear in Italy until the mid-16^th century.

By tradition, Tuscans serve Peposo over polenta or crostini, toasted bread. Contemporary Tuscans also serve peposo over mashed potatoes—another post-Columbus ingredient.

Peposo alla Fornicina
Beef Stew, Kiln-Worker’s Style

Ingredients:

2 Lb. Beef stew meat, cut into bite-sized chunks
10 Cloves garlic, peeled, but left whole
1 – 2 Tbs. Crushed black peppercorns
3 – 4 Cups dry red wine
Salt
4 Slices rustic bread (at least 1″ thick)
1 Clove garlic, peeled and halved

Preparation:

Pre-heat the oven to 250° F.

Place the meat and garlic in an ovenproof casserole. Sprinkle the crushed peppercorns over all. Add enough red wine to cover the meat by approximately one inch.

Bring the casserole to a simmer on the stove, then cover, and place the casserole in the center of the pre-heated oven. Cook, adjusting the heat so the stew barely bubbles, for approximately 6 hours. If the liquid reduces too much while the stew cooks, add hot water to compensate.

At the end of cooking, the sauce should be thick enough to coat a spoon, and the meat should be falling apart. If necessary, simmer the stew, uncovered on the stovetop, to reduce the sauce further. Taste, adding salt, as necessary.

At serving time, toast the bread slices, and rub them with the garlic halves.

To Serve:

Place one slice of the toasted bread in each of four soup bowls, then divide the stew equally among them.

Serves four.

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The post Peposo alla Fornicina first appeared on Sarasota Soundings.

No Small Potatoes

Skip — Sun, 25 Nov 2007 16:08:58 +0000

Photograph by Skip Lombardi

University of Florida sports fans, like their large reptile mascots, never hibernate. Wildlife behaviorists confirm that Gators and their supporters are active year ’round, which means they need to eat.

While we eschew artificial food coloring, we admit to a fascination with fruits and vegetables whose unusual but natural hues might scare off the the bench-warmers and Junior Varsity.

Anthocyanins, responsible for the color of hydrangeas and red autumn leaves, also give the blues to foods like heirloom varieties of corn and potatoes. And though they’ve been available for years, in farmers’ markets and as blue potato chips, antioxidant-laden blue potatoes have not been promoted with the fervor of red wine and pomegranates.

It’s a mystery to us how Gators fans have overlooked blue potatoes’ potential to boost not only their immune systems but also the profile of pre-game provender. Pairing the orange carotinoids of sweet potatoes or yams with blue potatoes makes a salad guaranteed to light-up up any tailgate party, if not the entire parking-lot.

Cooks of the Gator Nation, flaunt your colors!

Gator-Tator ® Salad

Ingredients:

1 lb Small blue potatoes (about 4 potatoes)
1 lb Small red-skin potatoes (about 4 potatoes)
1 Medium sweet potato or yam (5-6 oz.)
2 Tablespoons olive oil
1 Lime (rind and juice)
3 Tbs coarsely chopped Italian flat-leaf parsley
1/2 tsp coarsely ground black pepper
1/4 tsp Salt

1 Scallion (including green top), finely chopped

Preparation:

Wash the potatoes and yam. Place in a 3 quart saucepan and fill with enough water to just cover them. Bring to a boil and reduce to simmer for about 10 minutes.

Test a potato with the point of a sharp paring knife. The potato should feel slightly harder at the center. Drain the potatoes and set aside until they are cool enough to handle.

Meanwhile, make the dressing. Rinse the lime; grate its rind and reserve. Juice the lime into a 2-quart non-reactive bowl. Add the olive oil, parsley, salt, and pepper to the bowl. (Start with this small amount of salt so as not to obscure the delicate flavor of the sweet potato.)

You may leave the blue potatoes in their skins, but for optimum color contrast, slip the skins from the sweet potato and red potatoes. Cut potatoes into 1-inch chunks and gently combine them in the bowl with the dressing.

Just before serving, gently stir the chopped scallion into the potatoes. Taste for salt.

Serves 4-6 (recipe may be scaled up)

Because we recognize that Gainesville and the far-flung communities of the Gator Nation are multicultural, we offer the following variations.

Gator-Tator ®Salad goes ethnic…

Use the recipe above as your guideline for:

Italian: Substitute lemon rind and juice for the lime. Add 2 Tbs capers and 1 small clove of minced garlic.

German: Omit the lime; substitute 2-3 Tbs cider vinegar. Add 2 strips of cooked, crumbled bacon, 1 medium onion ( sliced and sautéed), and 2-3 Tbs freshly snipped dill.)

French: Substitute lemon rind and juice for the lime. Add 1 Tbs prepared Dijon mustard. 2 tsp snipped fresh tarragon, 1 Tbs freshly snipped chives.

Greek / Middle Eastern: Substitute lemon rind and juice for the lime. Add 2 Tbs freshly snipped mint, 1/2 cup pitted olives, & 1/2 cup crumbled feta cheese)

Indian: In addition to the lime rind and juice, add 3/4 cup yogurt, 2 Tbs freshly grated ginger, 1 minced garlic clove, 1 seeded & minced green jalapeno pepper, 2 Tbs. coarsely chopped cilantro. Adjust salt.

Latino: In addition to the lime rind and juice, add 1 tsp toasted & ground cumin, 1 minced garlic clove 1 seeded & minced green jalapeno pepper, 2 Tbs coarsely chopped cilantro. Add Tabasco or other hot sauce to taste; adjust salt.

Floridian Fusion: In addition to the lime rind and juice, add 1 cup of seeded, halved tangerine slices, 1 tsp freshly ground allspice, and several dashes of hot sauce (Pickapeppa would be terrific!)

Celebrate diversity and invent your own!

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The post No Small Potatoes first appeared on Sarasota Soundings.

Pasta con le Regaglie

Skip — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 13:00:05 +0000

I recently came into possession of some turkey giblets. The whole deal had an undercover quality I loved. A chef friend was preparing Turkey Divan and had no use for them. But she extended the offer, sotto voce, perhaps because she wasn’t sure if I even liked turkey giblets. Her referring to them as “body parts” added to the intrigue. I confess: this wasn’t the first time I’d been involved in a deal like this.

Years before, when I lived in Boston, my upstairs neighbor had been a cook at Jasper’s on Commercial Street. Jasper White had created a culinary niche cooking upscale versions of classic New England dishes. From time to time, my neighbor called me at work, and in a conspiratorial tone, informed me that Jasper would be making his lobster rolls that evening. I’d then make a beeline to Jasper’s at the end of my workday, sit at his small bar, and make short work of at least one of those lobster rolls, which were well worth being part of any kind of conspiracy, real or imagined. But I digress…

Though few would place turkey giblets in the same class as lobster, they too have limited availability. They are not the kind of foodstuff readily available at the local supermarket unless they come packaged in a turkey. So my little “score” was a particular treat. And for me anyway, the destiny of poultry giblets is always preordained: Pasta con le Regaglie. (reh-GAHL-yay)

In the interest of full disclosure, I confess that, for many years, my attempts at Pasta con le Regaglie have ranged from dismal failure to merely mediocre. In fact, for a long time I felt like Charlie Brown kicking that football. Each time I tried it, I knew in my heart that it was going to be great. Each time, I wound up on my back.

The problem with giblets is their inherently gristly texture—about as appealing as elastic bands. It seemed that no matter how thoroughly I dissected the giblets, or how diligent I was in removing connective tissue, I couldn’t lose the gristle.

So I spent some time studying Italian recipes; it seemed my problems related to the length of time I cooked the giblets. It turns out, this dish wants to be cooked for a long time. And my love for Pasta con le Regaglie gave me the courage to give it one more try.

The dish captivated me decades ago at a trattoria in Rome and has haunted me since. But I believe that finally, with this recipe, I’ve captured it. The giblets create an intense, rustic and earthy tomato sauce, while the livers add creamy and sophisticated depth.

Despite the fact that Caterina de’ Medici—who spent some quality time as Queen of France—is said to have enjoyed a giblet ragù with cockscombs now and then, this dish is a supreme example of la cucina dei poveri, the cooking of the poor.

Pasta con le Regaglie
Pasta with Giblets

Ingredients:

1 1/2 Lbs. Giblets (chicken or turkey)
2 Cloves garlic, peeled
1 Medium carrot, peeled and cut into chunks
1 Stalk celery, peeled and cut into chunks
1 Medium yellow onion, quartered
3 Tbs. Italian flat-leaf parsley, including stems
2 Oz. Pancetta, roughly chopped
2 Tbs. Extra-virgin olive oil
1 Cup dry white wine
1 28 Oz. Can crushed or diced Italian plum tomatoes (preferably San Marzano)
1/2 tsp. Crushed red pepper flakes
Salt & freshly ground black pepper
1 Lb. Rigatoni, or other large tubular pasta (cavatappi, penne, mostaccioli)
4 Tbs. Flat-leaf Italian parsley, finely chopped
Freshly grated Pecorino-Romano

Preparation:

Remove all connective tissue, visible fat, and silverskin from the hearts, gizzards, and livers. Chop into very fine dice and reserve.

Place the garlic, carrot, celery, onion, parsley with stems, and pancetta in the bowl of a food processor and pulse ten or more times for about one second for each pulse. The resulting mixture is known as a batutto.

Heat a four quart pot over medium heat, then add the oil. Add the batutto and cook for approximately ten minutes, until the vegetables have softened and the pancetta has rendered its fat. Lower the heat if the vegetables begin to color.

Add the giblets to the pot, and continue cooking, shaking the pot from time to time, until the giblets have lost their pinkish color.

Raise the heat to high and add the wine. Continue cooking over high heat until the wine is reduced by half.

Reduce the heat to medium-low and add the tomatoes and the red pepper flakes. Adjust heat so the sauce simmers gently; season with salt and pepper. Simmer, with the pot-lid slightly ajar, for approximately one hour, or until the sauce has thickened and any clear liquid has cooked off.

Approximately fifteen minutes before serving time, bring a large pot with salted water (at least six quarts) to the boil. Add the pasta and cook until it has just reached the al dente state. Remove from the heat and drain in a colander.

To Serve:

Divide the pasta equally among four plates and pour a ladle or two of sauce over each portion. Garnish with the remaining parsley and pass the Pecorino-Romano separately at the table.

The post Pasta con le Regaglie first appeared on Sarasota Soundings.

Pasta al Sugo Finto

Skip — Tue, 16 Oct 2007 17:01:50 +0000

I‘ve been jonesing for Sugo Finto, literally, fake sauce, since I read the most recent menu of Mario Batali’s flagship restaurant, Babbo. Apparently Mario’s latest Tasting Menu features transcendent Duck Tortelli with Sugo Finto.

Duck is an iffy proposition at the mega-stores here on the Sun Coast of Florida, but the ingredients for Sugo Finto are available everywhere. Besides, Sugo Finto also tastes pretty good on pasta gnudi, plain pasta.

The common translation for Sugo Finto is ‘meatless ragù,’ probably derived from the fact that it’s a tomato sauce cooked for nearly as long as a traditional meat sauce. Sugo Finto begins with a batutto of garlic, carrot, celery, onion, and parsley. But unlike traditional batutto, this mixture is cooked to the point at which it caramelizes. The pot then gets deglazed with red wine and tomatoes. Herbs go in, and the sauce simmers gently for approximately an hour. The result is rich, intense, and could easily hold its own in the presence of a duck. But as I said, it’s pretty good on plain pasta, too.

Note: When Tuscans cook Sugo Finto, they use una manciatta di odore stagionale, a handful of fresh, seasonal herbs. These are likely to include parsley, basil, rosemary, sage, and perhaps thyme and nepitella—wild mint. When I use rosemary, sage, or nepitella, I do so with restraint, as they can easily overpower the tomatoes.

Pasta al Sugo Finto
Pasta with ‘meatless’ meat sauce

Ingredients:

For the Batutto

2 – 4 Cloves garlic, peeled
1 Medium carrot, peeled and roughly chopped
1 Medium stalk celery, roughly chopped
1 Medium onion, peeled and quartered
1/2 Cup flat-leaf Italian parsley, leaves and stems

For the Sauce

Extra-virgin olive oil
1 Cup dry red wine
2 28 Oz. cans Italian plum tomatoes, preferably San Marzano
Approximately 1 cup loosely packed chopped herbs: parsley, basil, rosemary, sage, thyme, nepitella, etc.
Salt & freshly ground black pepper
1 Lb. Spaghetti
4 Tbs. Flat-leaf Italian parsley, finely chopped
Freshly grated Parmigiano

Preparation:

Place the garlic, carrot, celery, onion, and parsley in the bowl of a food processor. Pulse approximately ten times at one second per pulse. Scrape down the sides of the bowl if necessary, and pulse once or twice more.

Heat a 4 quart pot over medium-high heat, then add enough olive oil to lightly the bottom. Add the batutto and stir to distribute evenly in the pot. Lower the heat to medium, and cook, stirring occasionally, until the mixture begins to caramelize.

Raise the heat to high, and add the wine. Cook for three or four minutes over high heat to evaporate the alcohol and to reduce the wine by approximately twenty percent.

Lower the heat to medium-low, then add the tomatoes, breaking them up with the back of a fork as they go in. Add half the herbs, season with salt and pepper, and allow the sauce to simmer gently for approximately an hour. Stir in the remaining herbs, and remove from the heat.

In the meantime, as the sauce nears completion, bring a large pot of water—at least six quarts—to the boil. Add the spaghetti, and cook just to the al dente state. Remove from the stove and drain in a colander.

To Serve:

Serve family style by pouring the pasta on a platter, ladle sauce over the top, and garnish with the parsley. To serve individually, divide the pasta equally among four plates, ladle a dollop of sauce on top, and garnish with the parsley.

Pass the Parmigiano separately at the table.

Note: Save any leftover sauce for another use, like Melanzane alla Parmigiana.

The post Pasta al Sugo Finto first appeared on Sarasota Soundings.

Celebrating Christopher Columbus

Skip — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 19:23:12 +0000

Our celebration of Columbus Day took place at home rather than at the mall. No big-box stores or car dealerships. No “On Sale! 50% off!” for us. We paid tribute to the Genoese origins of that “big Italian fellow,” as Calvin Trillin has called him. For dinner last night we made Linguine al Pesto.

Cheap local ingredients—foraged pine-nuts, and what might have been one’s own cheese, olive oil and garden basil—gave the cooks of Genoa all they needed to make Pesto alla Genovese, the sauce for their signature dish, Linguine al Pesto con Patate e Fagiolini. Note the inclusion of boiled potatoes and string beans…

Potatoes were not there in Columbus’s time, and indeed, did not really make it into mainstream Italian cooking until the 19th century. When they did spread, from the Peruvian Andes to the botanical gardens of Mediterranean aristocrats and finally out into wider cultivation, they were looked upon more as a vegetable to serve with pasta than as a starch to replace it. But one might argue that without Columbus, the potatoes might never have been there at all, so the dish is a subtle nod to some fortuitous fusion—a once-exotic New World vegetable meeting up with Old World frugality.

As for the delicate young string beans? Hard to pin down dates for that; beans were found in both hemispheres long before the Age of Exploration. Regardless of how this particular dish evolved, the combination of those beans with new potatoes, basil pesto and pasta is sublime.

Myriad permutations are to be found—pumpkin seed pesto, arugula pesto, cilantro and citrus pesto… pesto soy burgers… But none surpass the Ligurian original. (By now, you may be wondering why we’re posting this pesto article here on Sarasota Soundings and not on our blog devoted to Italian-American food. The reason is that the recipe which follows is not Almost Italian, but really is Italian.)

Here in America the ingredients for the classic pesto are no longer cheap, but you’ll find that a little pesto goes a long way.

Linguine al Pesto con Patate e Fagiolini
Linguine with Pesto, Potatoes, and Young Green Beans

Ingredients:

4 Medium thin-skinned potatoes (such as Red Bliss )
1/2 Lb. Fresh string beans (as small as possible)
1 Lb. Linguine
3 Cups large basil leaves, loosely packed
2 Cloves garlic, peeled
2/3 Cup pignoli (pine nuts), plus 3 Tbs. for the final garnish
1/2 Cup freshly grated Parmigiano
3/4 – 1 Cup extra virgin olive oil

Preparation:

Bring a large pot of salted water to the boil. Add the potatoes and green beans, and cook until all are tender. Note: the beans will be done in only a few minutes, so remove them with tongs or a slotted spoon when they are done to your taste. Refresh beans under cold water (so they will retain their vivid green hue) and set them aside. When the potatoes can be easily pierced with a sharp knife, remove them and reserve.

If needed, add more water to the pot and bring it back to the boil. Add the linguine to the pot, stirring until the strands are submerged. Cook until it reaches the al dente state.

Meanwhile, place all the pesto ingredients, except the olive oil, in the bowl of a food processor. Pulse ten times for approximately one second each pulse, until the ingredients are finely minced. Scrape down the sides of the work bowl, then—with the machine running steadily—add the olive oil in a slow stream, pausing to scrape down the sides of the bowl if necessary.

Continue adding olive oil until the mixture develops the consistency of a thick sauce.

When the linguine is cooked, remove the pot from the burner and drain pasta in a colander.

To Serve:

Cut the potatoes into wedges. Add them along with the green beans, and approximately two tablespoons of the pesto, to a large bowl. Toss to coat the potatoes and beans. Add the pasta and the remainder of the pesto. Toss again to combine all. Using tongs, or two large forks, divide the mixture equally among four plates.

Garnish each serving with a sprinkling of the reserved pignoli.

Serves four.

The post Celebrating Christopher Columbus first appeared on Sarasota Soundings.