Category — Cooking Tips

Saturday was cold and snowy — a perfect day for cooking.  Our friends from New Jersey were not going to make it through the storm to our home, so I was free to make whatever  I pleased, my favorite way to cook.  No recipes, no limits.

I took a survey of the contents of the refrigerator and found a large piece of Tufino, a semi-firm cheese made from a blend of cow and sheep’s milk studded with nuggets of black truffles.  We had enjoyed slicing and eating it, but now I decided to try it cooked and an omelet seemed like the perfect test.

Truffled Cow and Sheep's Milk Cheese from Le Marche

I whisked 2 eggs with a spoonful of milk and some salt and poured them into a hot skillet where a puddle of sweet butter was sizzling.  Once the eggs had firmed up a little, I placed a row of thinly sliced Tufino down the center and folded the two sides over the cheese.  A minute or so later, the cheese was oozing out the ends.  Tufino is a fine melter!  I rolled  the omelet onto the plate, buttered some ciabatta toast, and dug in.  Butter, eggs, cheese, truffles and crunch — who cares if it snows all day!

Lunchtime came and the Tufino was still on my mind.  I knew it would make a fantastic toasted sandwich, but maybe it needed something else.

I had just received a gift of several packages of pre-sliced Prosciutto di San Daniele.  The innovative packaging kept the perfectly sliced prosciutto tender and flavorful and easy to separate.  When opened, the sweet, mellow and meaty aroma of prosciutto filled the air.  I tasted a slice.  It melted in my mouth with a mild, nutty, and sweet salty flavor.  I had to make the sandwiches fast before I ate up the whole contents of the package of prosciutto.

I spread some white bread with softened butter on one side as my reliable old Happy Day Griddle Grill heated on the stove.  I sandwiched  the cheese and prosciutto between two slices of bread and placed them on the grill side with a heavy pot cover on top.  They were toasted and ready to flip in just a few minutes.  I turned them and gave them a a couple of minutes more until I saw the cheese beginning to seep out the sides.  A few pieces of giardiniera to garnish the plate, and we were ready to eat.   The panini tasted as good as they look, which is awfully good!   I could see serving them cut into quarters at a party with some chilled prosecco.

Prosciutto di San Daniele

Grana Padano Pizza at Keste

While waiting in the dentist’s office last week, I had a chance to browse through some of the latest magazines.  Every one had an article about what to buy for last minute Christmas gifts.  They recommended everything from a paperweight (uh, no, thanks) to a whole wardrobe (doesn’t that take a lifetime of shopping?).  I don’t consider myself the most creative gift giver, but I didn’t like any of the ideas.  I can’t imagine anyone buying me a whole wardrobe and when it comes to paperweights, well, let’s just say I have enough!  Instead, I like to give gifts that I like to receive, things that I can eat or drink.  So here are my ideas for great gifts for last minute shoppers:

Averna — Not too sweet, not too bitter, this Sicilian digestivo has subtle flavors of herbs, chocolate and menthol.  Smooth and soothing after a holiday dinner and warming any time.

Panettone – Beautifully wrapped, it makes a perfect ready to give gift.  Ignore the cheap ones which may be made in places other than Italy.  Top producers include Le Tre Marie or Bauli and they are available at many retail shops.  Or you can order one by mail from my friends at Gustiamo.com.  For Christmas breakfast or brunch, I love sliced panetttone toasted, slathered with good butter or mascarpone, and served with a chilled moscato or Asti Spumante.

Prosecco — Sparkling white wine from the Veneto.  We serve it with appetizers or throughout the meal.  Great with fish and seafood for Christmas Eve dinner.  Good producers include Alice, Mionetto, Bisol and Nino Franco.

Grana Padano or Parmigiano Reggiano — I use both for eating and grating.  Try Grana Padano shaved on a pizza with arugula and prosciutto, as I did recently at Keste.  Troppo buono!  Or serve with fresh pears and grapes, or nuts and dried fruit for dessert.   Both cheeses keep well in the refrigerator so I always have them handy.   Other cheese choices would include aged Montasio,  Piave or Asiago.

Kusmi Christmas Tea —  Of Russian origin, this 140-year old tea company is very popular in Paris, where I first discovered it.  The Christmas tea is a blend of black tea with vanilla, orange and spice scents and the beautiful tin makes it ideal for gift-giving.

Extra Virgin Olive Oil — Always in good taste and so useful.  If you are not sure which one to buy, go to a good store like Di Palo on Grand Street where you can sample a variety of oils before you buy.

Chestnut Honey — Drizzle some on gorgonzola, or on that toasted panettone.  Heavenly!  The best come from Piedmont and Umbria in Italy.

Coluccio DOP San Marzano Tomatoes – Something akin to a diamond bracelet for a cook like me, I use these tomatoes all the time.  They are meaty and full of flavor and make terrific ragu.

When in doubt, get a gift basket from D. Coluccio and Sons, Di Palo Selects, or Gustiamo.com.  There’s still time!

“The discovery of a new dish confers more happiness on humanity than the discovery of a new star,” wrote the philosopher and cook, Brillat-Savarin. I hate to disagree, but for me it is the discovery of a new pasta.

While dried pastas don’t vary much in flavor, their contours and proportions determine how the sauce and pasta will go together and how the finished dish will taste.  A heavy, meaty ragu can turn thin, delicate pasta strands to mush while chunky rigatoni can overwhelm the flavor of a light, delicate sauce.  In addition to the shape, the ingredients, how the pasta is manufactured, and the drying method used are important, too.  And no matter how good the pasta is, it has to be cooked and served the right way.

Last week, a cellophane bag of Don Bruno fusilloni, or giant fusilli, arrived in a package from Roland Foods.  According to the label, Don Bruno pasta is made from 100% durum semolina from Puglia that is shaped with bronze dies for the best texture, then dried slowly under controlled heat and humidity for perfect “al dente” results.

While I have eaten corkscrew-shaped fusilli all my life, the giant Don Bruno fusilloni were new to me and looked like just the thing to go with the Macaroni with Tomatoes and Spicy Sausage I was planning to make.  The recipe is from The Bistro Laurent Tourondel Cookbook that I co-authored a couple of years ago with the famous chef.  It has mouth-watering recipes and gorgeous photos from Laurent’s BLT restaurants around the country.

A quick check of my refrigerator revealed 2 cups of my favorite canned Bella di San Marzano brand tomatoes and some sweet Italian sausages left from a recipe testing project, a package of Satur Farms wild arugula and an open bottle of white wine.  Laurent’s recipe calls for fresh tomatoes and hot sausages, but the canned tomatoes were a reasonable substitute and I could add some crushed red pepper to compensate for the mildness of the sausages, though I preferred not to.  The ridges and twists of the fusilloni seemed like they would be even better than the rigatoni Laurent called for.   I always have pecorino Romano and Parmigiano Reggiano on hand, so the rest was easy.

One of the questions I am asked most frequently is how to prevent pasta from sticking.  Here is my mantra–use a big pot with plenty of boiling water and salt; stir often; don’t overcook; drain, sauce and serve immediately.  Here is how I do it:

I started the sauce and put up a 6-quart pot filled with 5 quarts of water on high heat.  When it came to a rolling boil, in went the fusilloni and a generous amount of coarse salt.  Stirring the pasta frequently, I finished making the sauce just as the pasta became tender yet firm to the bite — in short, al dente. Don’t rely on package cooking times and taste it to be sure.  Allow a little for the residual cooking that occurs between the time you remove the pasta from the heat and start eating.  Remember — when the pasta is ready, it is is not the time to make a phone call, set the table, or have a drink.  The sauce has to be finished before the pasta, and you can’t hesitate with the cooked pasta or it will overcook and get sticky.  I drained the fusilloni, reserving a cupful of the cooking water just in case, and quickly mixed them with the hot sauce.  I added the cheese and a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil and tossed again.  (The hot water wasn’t necessary this time.  If the pasta had been dry, I would have added a little to loosen it up.)  Meanwhile,  Charles opened a bottle of Pallagrello, an unusual, red wine from Italy and we sat down to eat.

The  fusilloni had good wheaty flavor and held their texture and shape beautifully.  The ridges in the pasta captured the bits of sausage and basil and tangled around the long arugula leaves.  The pasta was a perfect match for the rich sauce, freshened with grassy flavor of the arugula.   As I savored the pasta and the rustic, pleasantly bitter wine, I thought of all the ways I might use fusilloni again.  It would go well with all kinds of meaty ragus or sauces containing bits of cauliflower or broccoli, or strands of zucchini or carrots.  If by chance you cant find Don Bruno fusilloni, use regular fusilli, gemelli or rotelle.

MACARONI/TOMATOES/SPICY SAUSAGE

Adapted from The Bistro Laurent Tourondel Cookbook by Laurent Tourondel and Michele Scicolone (John Wiley & Sons 2008)

Serves 4

2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, plus more for finishing

12 ounces hot or sweet Italian sausage, casings removed

1 small onion, finely chopped

3 garlic cloves, finely chopped

1/2 cup dry white wine

4 medium-ripe tomatoes, cored and cut into large dice

Coarse sea salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

8 ounces fusilloni

1 bunch arugula, tough stems removed and coarsely chopped (1 cup)

2 tablespoons chopped fresh basil

1/2 cup freshly grated Pecorino Romano or Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese

Cook the Sausage In a skillet large enough to hold all of the ingredients, heat the oil over medium heat.  Add the sausage meat and cook until lightly browned, stirring the meat to break up the lumps.   With a slotted spoon, transfer the meat to a bowl.

Add the onion and garlic to the pan.  Sauté until the onion is tender, about 5 minutes.  Add the wine and bring to a simmer.  Cook 1 minute more, scraping the bottom of the pan.

Add the tomatoes and season with salt and pepper.  Simmer for 20 minutes, or until thickened.  Stir in the sausage meat and cook until heated through, about 1 minute more.

Cook the Fusilloni Meanwhile, bring a large pot of water to a boil.  Add the fusilloni and plenty of salt.   Cook, stirring frequently, until the fusilloni is al dente, tender yet still firm.   Drain the pasta and add it to the skillet with the sauce.

Finish the Pasta Add the arugula and basil and toss well.  Drizzle with a little extra-virgin olive oil.  Sprinkle with the cheese and toss again.  Serve immediately.

Pear Tree

It hasn’t been a great summer as far as the weather goes, but it seems like the pear tree on my terrace doesn’t mind.  The pears are growing big and fat and the ones at the top of the tree  have a beautiful red blush.  I’m not sure what variety of pear it is.  The tree was here when we moved in and it just gets bigger and more fruitful every year.  They are still a couple of weeks away from being ripe, but I know that if this year’s crop is like last year’s, they will all ripen at the same moment.  When that happens, we’ll have lots of fresh pears and pear tarts and I plan to make a batch of pear conserve like I did last year.  I froze it in small batches and we enjoyed it all winter.

Blueberries in Bloom

The blueberries came in big and fat and juicy in late June and July, but they did not have a lot of flavor.  Still, I enjoyed going out every morning and picking a cupful for breakfast.  I ordered two more blueberry bushes this spring to add to the two I already had, but they won’t bear fruit this year.  Blueberries don’t seem to mind the harsh winters and hot dry summers we get on the 20th floor.  They are also gorgeous plants and very decorative.  The bright green leaves turn bright red in the fall and last all winter.

I plan to make blueberry jam again this summer, but I will have to rely on berries from the Greenmarket.  I’ll post the recipe when I make it.

First Tomato!

Here it is!  My first tomato of the season.  It’s really tiny, about the size of a quarter size right now. But we got a late start this year and, of course, there is the weather.  Just the sight of it makes me happy.  I have visions of homegrown tomato sandwiches like those my friend Miriam Rubin wrote about last year in the Pittsburgh Post Gazette.  www.post-gazette.com/pg/08255/911041-34.stm

Basil from Palermo

The basil is thriving.  I picked the seeds that these plants come from off the tops of a huge plant I came across growing in the garden of a baronessa in Palermo.  Lucky I came along when I did!  Those plants would just have gone to seed if I had not nipped off the tops and tucked them into a pocket pack of tissues to dry.  The seeds really like living the high life here in Manhattan!

Need some inspiration this Valentine’s Day? Have a look at the newsletter I wrote for Amore Brands.   Amore Newsletter

To the Chinese, 2009 is the year of the Ox, but to me it is shaping up to be the Year of the Pizza.   Maybe it is the economy, or maybe we all just need something delicious, familiar, hot, and comforting, but it seems like everywhere I go here in New York, there is a new pizzeria just opening.  And the good news is, there is some pretty good pizza around!

Of course, when people talk about pizza, you have to first understand what their idea of a perfect pizza is.  There are those who define it as the one they remember from the slice-eria that used to stand on the corner of the old neighborhood where they grew up.  Others will site the latest trendy place to open where the pizzaiolo has the most tattoos, the place has the least atmosphere, and the service is the surliest.

In my case, the perfect pie resembles those I have eaten in and around Naples in Italy, like the Margherita pictured to the left that I ate in Capri.  You will note that the crust is irregular in shape, blistered, and toasty in spots.  The edge, called the cornicione, is raised and seems thicker than the center.  The crust is crisp, yet still chewy, neither thin and cracker-like or thick and dense.  It should be flexible enough to fold without cracking and have a flavor so delicious that you eat every last bite.  There is not a lot of topping and the tomato is not flavored with spices.  That includes garlic, which has its place on some types of pizza, but not on a Margherita.  Best of all, each person is served an individual pie that is made fresh to order, never reheated.

If you would like to find out more about my take on pizza, or learn how to make a great pizza at home, take a look at my cookbook, Pizza Anyway You Slice It!, co-authored with my husband Charles.  It was recently reprinted with the title Pizza– Easy Recipes for Great Homemade Pizza, Focaccia and Calzones.

When I am not making pizza at home, I like to go to La Pizza Fresca, located at 31 East 20th Street.  The place is cozy and friendly, and the pizza never disappoints me.  I have 3 favorites there:  the Margherita, of course, or the Margherita with prosciutto and arugula, or the Puttanesca, a spicy pie with sliced garlic, peperoncino, black olives and anchovies.  There salads and pasta are terrific too.

Recently, Charles and I went to try Artichoke Basile on 14th Street, a fairly new slice-eria on 14th Steet between 2nd and 3rd Avemues.  They are famous for their Artichoke Pizza, which i found to be inedible.  It had a thick gloppy topping that tasted like bottled salad dressing, and a few thin, flavorless, slices of artichoke.  The Margherita was much better, though since it was reheated, it had gotten overdone and burnt around the edge.

Over the holidays, my cousin Mike treated me to lunch at his favorite pizzeria, Salvatore of Soho, on Hylan Boulevard on Staten Island.  It’s a fun place with lots of families, checked table cloths, antiques (check out the bathrooms), really big guys chowing down on the enormous portions, and rock and roll music from the ’60′s.   I’d go back there often not only for their toasty New York style pies baked in a coal fired oven, but also for their outstanding cooked dishes, like fried calamari and mussels in spicy tomato sauce.

The latest new pizzeria that I tried is Co., pronounced Company, Jim Lahey’s (of Sullivan Street Bakery fame) new restaurant on 9th Avenue at 24th Street.  I think Jim makes some of the best bread in New York City, which says a lot since we have so many excellent bakeries now, so I was anxious to try his pizza.  There were four of us and we ordered four pies:  a Margherita; an Amalfi with green olives anchovies and chili; a Flambe, with bechamel, parmesan, bufala mozzarella, caramelized onions and lardons; and a Boscaiola with sausage and mushrooms.  Except for the Amalfi which was bland, we really enjoyed the pizzas which had a delicious crust that was both crisp and chewy, and flavorful toppings.  We started with a cheese and salumi plate that was not very good.  The wine list and the service both need improvement, but I would definitely go back again.

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PIZZA CLASS — Charles and I will be teaching a Pizza and Vino class on January 22 at 6:30 at Cooking by the Book at 13 Worth Street, New York City.  For more information, phone 212-966-9799 or go to www.CookingbytheBook.com.

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