Gilding the lilly and celebrating Wednesday: stuffed veal chops

The careful reader will note that the Guyman and I seem to eat a lot of veal chops. It is true. In absolute terms, it's probably not a lot, but I would say we have them once a month. And in relative terms, that's a lot. Most people do not make them at home, and you very rarely see them on menus in restaurants. Veal chops are expensive: I think the least you can fairly see them for on a menu, is 38 dollars or so. They are big, meaty, delicious, but that kind of cost is not going to sit well with many people. And it probably shouldn't. When Annalena has eaten veal chops in restaurants, she has inevitably been disappointed. Either the fat/meat ratio has been skewed way too far in the favor of the fat, or the kitchen has decided that a veal chop is a steak and has cooked it that way. Quite wrong.

But we love them. So we eat them at home. In Annalena's mind, the way to cook a veal chop is to treat it almost like pork. And, indeed, this recipe could very easily be converted to one using thick pork chops. It works with chicken, and there is a recipe for such on this blog. But let's look at this special occasion meal (and you define "special occasion." I think most people interpret it too strictly).

You need good quality chops, which seems like a contradiction in terms, but make sure you're getting stuff that is more meat than bone and fat. Buy them from someone reputable. They will be probably at least a half inch, perhaps 3/4 inch thick, and that's how you want them. Any thicker and they will be difficult to cook properly. As with all proteins, Annalena suggests that you salt them the night before you cook them.

The day of, when the chops are coming to room temperature, preheat your oven to 350. While it preheats, prepare yourself a stuffing of fontina cheese (about an ounce per chop) and prosciutto (about half an ounce, or one slice, per chop. Incidentally, Annalena recommends that you look for La Quercia prosciutto, which is made here in the good old USA and is terrific). Cut the cheese into very small cubes, and cut the ham up nice and small. Mix it together.

Take each chop and find the thickest portion, away from the bone. With a small knife, cut a pocket into the center of the meat. Work carefully, but there is no need to slice it open like an envelope. Once you have an "in," you can even do this with your fingers. Get it deep enough so that you can force the filling in without it falling out of the side of the chop. Try to avoid needing to close them, with a toothpick or something like that.

When that's done, heat about two tablespoons each of butter and olive oil in a pan, and when it's hot, drop in the chops, and let them sear for about four minutes to each side. Then move them to the oven, and let them cook at 350 for ten minutes. This should cook them through, to medium rare, and melt the cheese nicely.

When this comes out of the oven, move the chops to a plate, and pour off the fat. Off the heat, pour in about a quarter cup of dry marsala, or some other fortified wine. Heat it (keep your face away to avoid the potential of flaming alcohol) until it's reduced by about half, and put the chops in. Turn them in the sauce, and...

you are celebrating. Again, what you are celebrating is up to you. I thought we should celebrate Wednesday, and why not?

The process at work: okra and pepper stew (is it Turkish)

Annalena gets asked, with some frequency, a variation of "how do you plan your meals?" Well, "plan" may be far too kind and organized a word for what goes on when Annalena cooks. This entry is dedicated to what is definitely a "process," but is far from planning.

You all know the situations when you know what you SHOULD be thinking about, and what you SHOULD be doing, but for whatever reason, you aren't doing it. It does not indicate a failing on your part (certainly not on Annalena's), it just "is." And so it has been this week.

And it was against that background that today, at 3, I realized that I have very little idea of what I was going to serve for dinner. I knew what the protein was going to be, because I had defrosted some very expensive, beautiful veal chops. But for the rest... I had begun to think Israeli couscous - and then realized there was corn on the cob in the fridge. Then, for vegetables, I knew I had braised a bunch of artichokes over the weekend, and artichokes go beautifully with veal.

Which probably explains why I bought peppers at the farmers market today, and then thought "OH SHIT. The artichokes."

And, of course, I had forgotten the okra that was also in the fridge, sitting there since Sunday.

Now, the ORIGINAL plan had been to take the corn off the cob and make creamy okra corn saute'. Nothing wrong with that, except I planned to make it the same night I was serving pasta with flounder sauce.

OK, plan "B." Put them in the refirgerator and forget about them. I COULD have made them on Tuesday, when we had spicy lamb chops, except I forgot and made fregola.

So, here we were, with corn on the cob and okra, already in the house, and gorgeous red and yellow peppers coming home with me. And heirloom tomatoes, in addition to the ones that were already at home that I forgot about. And a package of La Quercia prosciutto, that had cost a queen's ransom and would go bad, soon.

And I had no idea what to make. And then, little by little, it came to me, literally between 3pm, and entering the apartment, at 6:30. I would cut a pocket in the veal chops and fill them with prosciutto and fontina cheese, and reduce marsala to make a sauce. Tomatoes: yes, tomato salad. With basil. Now to the vegetable. SHIT. Still no ideas. Peppers, yes.... with basil.

Oh, wait. Basil in the salad already. What else goes with peppers? Hmmm. Maybe oregano. I could taste it. Yes... But what of the okra.

I convinced myself that there is a Turkish dish that involves peppers and okra, although after the fact, I find that there is absolutely no such thing. But you know what? If I'm the first person to make this, I will take credit for it. It was good. It went well with the simple boiled corn on the cob (at this time of year, all you need to do is boil it in salted water), the stuffed chops, and the tomato salad. This is maybe the most difficult dish I made tonight, and it ain't too hard. And now I want you to make it. And I want you to play with different vegetables and seasonings.

You start with four medium sized peppers. Try to vary the colors, which should be a snap this time of year. Cut them into inch sized strips and put them aside, while you prepare about 3/4 pound of okra. Remember, you do it very easily: just cut the tip off: the end that looks like the top of an acorn, and leave them whole. If you happen to be able to get purple and green okra, go ahead. Three whole cloves of garlic, smashed, and a nice hefty handful of fresh oregano, still on the stem.

Coat the bottom of a pan with olive oil, and add everything at once. Put a nice amount of salt in, because peppers tend to need a lot of it. Bring the heat to medium high. When the veggies begin to sizzle, turn them once or twice, and then lower the heat, and turn the heat to medium low.

Both the peppers and okra will give up water, and you will be "smothering" the vegetables just like you did with the peppers and onions. You may find the peppers picking up some carmelization and there's nothing wrong with that. Nothing wrong if they don't either. Look at them every few minutes and give them a stir. Then, after ten minutes, take the pot off the heat, and let it sit, covered for five minutes.

The veggies will continue to cook when they're off the heat, getting nice and soft. I found that the garlic really disappeared into the vegetables, and the oregano softened to the point where there were really very few tough stems in the dish.

It was, simply , delicious. And I'm thinking that those eggplants in the fridge that aren't gonna cook themselves, might very well get used in something along these lines. Perhaps then, the basil will go in, because I won't make a tomato salad this time.

Folks, if I haven't convinced you to give okra another try yet, there ain't too much more I can do other than to say, Annalena WANTS you to try it, and whatever Annalena wants....

For the crust phobic: plum almond tart

I believe I have written, in the past, of how as the seasons move along, the "color" of the season changes. When it is early spring, it seems to Annalena that all is pink (strawberries, rhubarb), and light green (asparagus). As we move through the summer, the colors become more varied, but still pale until we get to late summer/early fall, when the colors are very intense, and now, in late August, the dominant colors are dark red (peppers; some peaches and necatrines) and purple (eggplant, peppers again, and plums). Indeed, the year is moving along. There are no more cherries, the abundance of apricots is slowing down, and the first grapes are here (nimrods. One of my favorites). And plums are at their peak. You could eat a different plum every day for two weeks. And perhaps you should. Get to know the differences. During the course of a year, you will eat different types of peaches, but probably not know it. With plums, you know. Green ones. Blue ones. Purple ones with red flesh. Purple ones with green flesh. And so on, and so forth.

Annalena had a large bowl of plums begging to be used for something. They were the "Italian plum" variety. Slightly dry, dark purple skin, and green flesh. They are ideal for baking, because unlike many plums, it is very easy to cut them and remove them from their pits. And the baking process makes them unbelievably sweet.

This is arecipe from one of David Lebovitz's books. I like it because it is ideal for the baker/cook who wants a pie, but fears pie crust.

Believe me, I understand that one. Even though my pies are now good, I still believe that every good pie crust is a gift from beyond. But this one, well, it's very easy, and it's not really a pie crust: it's a "tart" crust, and you know what's so great about it? You don't have to roll it out.

Ok, let's start. You need a tart pan. Nine inches. Let's not get into size arguments, bring a tape measure with you to the store and measure the removable bottom (and again, let's not get into the question of whether all bottoms should be removable, shall we?).

Once you have your pan, we can make the crust. Now, if you have a food processor, use the sliced nuts I call for in the following. If you don't, then get some almond flour, which is very readily available. And if you are allergic to nuts, substitute more flour.

To make the crust in the food processor, dump in a cup of flour, a half cup of skinned almonds, whatever cut you have, a quarter cup of granulated sugar and a pinch of salt. Pulse that together, and then cut up a stick of cold, unsalted butter, add that and pulse some more until it's all incorporated. Now, add an egg yolk and process until a ball forms.

Remember the substitutions above if you need. And if you don't have skinless almonds, hell use the whole ones. Or use hazelnuts. In any event, you will have a soft dough. This is sort of what we call a "cookie crust." Instead of rolling it out, you're going to take that ball of dough, put it into your tart pan, and push it around with your hands and fingers, up the side of the pan, and all the way through the bottom.

This is actually fun, and don't get frustrated if you find that you're doing this unevenly. Everyone does. The way to perhaps overcome that frustration, is to push the dough up the sides of the pan first, and then pat it all around to make it as even as possible. You can do this. It will take less than five minutes.

Now, the patience part. This is very soft, and if you were to bake this crust now, it would collapse into a pile and you would not be happy. So, put it into your fridge for about three hours.

When you're read, preheat your oven to 400, and take the tart out of the fridge. Prick it all over with a fork, and then put it in the oven, and after nine minutes, go in with a spatula, and push it down to flatten it.

When I read these instructions I didn't understand why you did that, and then when I saw it puff up... So, yes, do it. And then bake for another nine minutes.

While this is happening, cut up a pound and a half of plums. I cut them in halves which was a good choice. And mix them with a hefty tablespoon of corn starch, and a quarter cup of sugar.

When the tart crust is out of the oven, let it cool for about five minutes, and then put your plums in. I put them in, cut side down, so that we could have the lovely purple color showing.

IF you like - and trust me, you do - make a crumb topping. Do this by mixing half a cup of flour, 1/3 cup of brown sugar, 1/3 cup of almond paste, about a quarter cup of almonds, and half a stick of butter in your food processor, and pulse it to a fine grain. Again, if you don't care for nuts, leave them out and increase the flour. And if you don't have a food processor, use the nut flour we already talked about.

Change the temperature of your oven to 375, and then put the crumbs over the fruit. Put the thing on a baking sheet so that if any fall, you don't get clouds of smoke from your oven. Get it back in the oven for thirty minutes. The plums will bubble and give off a very thick juice and your home will smell of toasted nuts, if you use them. And then... the prettiest tart you can imagine comes out of your oven.. Look above.

Ice cream, anyone?

Smother em ... with pork: smothered pork chops

Ciao tutti. Annalena took a brief vacation from writing, because she has been busy with many tasks, including preparing a birthday dinner for thirteen (or was it fourteen? After her sixth drink, things got a little confusing). This, however, is a dish she made last week, and it is one that is good anytime.

For reasons that are unclear to me, "smothered" dishes seem to be associated with southern cooking, and usually they involve chicken. In brief, you put the protein, somewhat precooked, in with vegetables, and then cover the pan and cook, with no added liquid, until the vegetables are soft and you have a bit of juice. And that's "smothered" cooking.

Other cultures have similar dishes. Italian cooking, for example, Annalena's strong suit, has "guazetto," which is a name for a category of stews. Cooking "in umido" means sweating the food, and again, that's one where the stewing happens. The ingredients here are quintessentially American cooking , however. You would not see pork chops in classical Italian cooking, but there's nothing wrong with good food.

Again, I made this in late summer, but you could make this any time of year. You would vary the vegetables if you cook seasonally, but now, we are in the midst of the primacy of peppers, so, go for it.

You will need four, large pork chops. I prefer them to be boneless, but if you like them with the bone, by all means. And, to review, we salt our proteins the night before we cook them, remember? Hmmmm?

The night of dinner, slice up three large red peppers, into thick pieces, and also thinly slice four, medium sized, white onions. You want about a pound of onions. Put those veggies to the side, and put a few tablespoons of olive oil into a big pan which you can cover. When the oil is hot, add the pork chops, and brown them well, on both sides. It will probably take about 8 minutes in all for you to do this.

You may be questioning the use of oil with pork, which is of course a very fatty meat, and indeed ,this is a fair question. You use the fat because even the fattiest of meat does not immediately give off its fat, so if you put the pork into a dry pan, you will burn it. The same will happen with bacon. The exceptions of which Annalena is aware are duck breasts, and foie gras, which both can be cooked in a dry pan, and should be.

After your chops have browned, you will have way more fat than you need. Now, you can pour off all but about three tablespoons. If you are uncertain how to know there are three tablespoons left, well, spoon out three tablespoons, get rid of the rest, and add the fat back to the pan.

Easy, huh? Now add your peppers and onions and stir them in the fat. They will begin to cook, but will not get very soft immediately.

They WILL soften, however, when you do what follows. Put the chops back in the pan, on top of the vegetables, lower the heat, and cover the pan tightly. You want everything to cook for about ten minutes. When you come back to the pan, the onions will have cooked to almost nothing, and the peppers will be ridiculously soft.

Now, what Annalena likes to do at this point, is to turn it into a sweet and sour dish. She does this by adding half a cup of cider vinegar and a quarter cup of honey, mixed together, to the pan, and turning up the heat, until the vinegar has evaporated. The acidity and the sweetness will remain, and they will be in the vegetables for the most part.

Switch it up a little. Use some other vegetables, add some herbs, like rosemary, for example, and let Annalena know if it works for you.

You know it's Sicilian when: Swordfish, Sicilian style

This is dedicated to my Italian teacher Jonathan, who is (or was) in Sicily and lamented to me a few days ago that he had eaten more eggplant in 4 days than he had eaten in 30 years.
Yes, young man, welcome to Sicilian cooking, where in summer, eggplant rules.
I've written before how certain names of dishes are "signifiers" (that's for you too, Jonathan): veronique and florentine are the examples I always use, so test your recall to see if you remember what they mean.
But there are also other combinations of ingredients that are evocative of, or signify, a place. While it has lost some of that "significance," think of corned beef and cabbage. Being more elaborate by adding a time, franks and beans with brown bread, on Saturday night (New England). Crepes with sour cherries. And so on and so forth.
When you see sweet and savory mixed together, in a main dish, you are looking at the area of the world where Sicily and the Middle East converge. You can get into loud, long arguments over who influenced whom, but the bottom line, is that in Sicilian cooking, in Syrian cooking, etc, you will see combinations of strong spices, and sweet elements. I see more honey in Syrian food, and more dried fruit in Sicilian, but they are always there. Think of the national pasta dish of Sicily (which I try to forget since I hate it: sardines, fennel, pine nuts, and currants). Within that combination, you have the markings of a Sicilian dish: pignoli. Dried fruit. An herb. And fish.
Now, there's something that will separate Sicilian cuisine from the other regions I've mentioned. I am not very much aware of a seafood cuisine from the Middle East, although I know it exists. Sicily, however, is known for its seafood dishes. And before you say to me "DUH. It's an island," that is not a guarantee. Sardinia is an island as well, but its seafood cusine is limited, because much of the island is covered with swamps, filled with malarial mosquitoes. So, you will get Sardinian style rabbit (it's GOOD), but you will probably not get Sardinian style swordfish. But you will get Sicilian style swordfish, and that is to where we now turn.

Traditionally, this dish is prepared "rollatino" style. The fish is cut in a very thin slice, filled with the mixture I will discuss below, rolled up, tied or secured with toothpicks or some other element, pan fried, and served, usually with something like salmoriglio sauce. Look it up. It's in this blog.

If you try to get your fish monger to slice swordfish thin enough to do the preparation that way, he will hate you and you will wonder why you did it, because regardless of how thin the slice is, swordfish is fragile, and the slices will break up. You will hate me if I tell you to do it that way. So, here's how Annalena did it. You should do it, too, especially now, when local swordfish is at its peak.

Many people do not like fennel, and if you are one of them, use oregano, fresh if you can, please. The amount of oregano is up to you, as are the other ingredients: pine nuts, raisins or currants (I use the golden raisins. Currants would be more traditional, but the raisins are fine, and I like the golden ones here), pine nuts, and dried bread crumbs. Also, olive oil. And salt.

Chop up the fresh oregano until it's fairly fine, but don't go for green paste. Put a couple of tablespoons of olive oil in a frying pan, and add the raisins and the pine nuts, and the oregano. Stir the stuff over medium heat, and when the pignoli begin to brown, add some bread crumbs and a pinch of salt. Mix it all together. The olive oil will all get absorbed, so add some more. Taste and if you want more salt, go right ahead. Add oil until you have a paste of your desired consistency. Annalena prefers this fairly thick, so she doesn't use much olive oil, but this is one of the hallmarks of Sicilian cooking: you work within a basic framework, and elaborate as you go on.

For the swordfish. I use steaks that are about half an inch thick. Use either a second frying pan OR if you are lucky enough to have a ridged, stovetop grill pan, use that. Brush some olive oil over the pan, and get it REALLY REALLY hot. In fact, I would say you should wait until it smokes. While it's heating up, pat dry your fish, salt it, and then lay it on the surface of your pan. Leave it alone (I'm serious about this), for a solid five minutes. Fish has a different composition than meat and it is much more likely to stick than the others. If you are really squeamish about that possibility, use a nonstick pan, but you won't get the lovely lines.

After five minutes carefully flip the fish, and cook the other side, until it, too gets those wonderful grill marks, or browns.

Now, have your oven preheated to 350, and put the whole pan in for ten minutes. Unlike its cousin, tuna, swordfish does not fare real well if it is undercooked. It CAN be overcooked, but it's hard to do so at ten minutes.

Bring it out of the oven, being careful, and then spread some of that wonderful glop over it.

You basically have "srollatino", or "UNrolled" swordfish. And a fairly simple, somewhat exotic dish at that.

Try it. Expand your horizons. Go south. Eat more fish.

The remains of the dough: apricot pie

Those of you who know Annalena well, know of her struggles with pie crust. Well, as I have written here, once I had Rose Levy Birnbaum's book, pie crust was no longer a mystery or a source of never ending frustration. Whilst the expression "easy as pie" still lacks meaning to me, "pie in the sky" is no longer the ruling expression in the pastry kitchen.

Some time ago, I made a double crust blueberry pie for a dinner. It was a very bigt success, and part of this was in fact the crust. Flaky, buttery, it was absolutely terrific.

When you roll out pie crust, inevitably you have extra. You cut away the excess on the edges, and then you do SOMETHING with it. I remember folks putting sugar on it and making "pie crust cookies," and I've done that too. And thrown away the cookies. So, now, I gather up the crust and save it. I had done that for the blueberry pie, with full intentions of making a quiche.

Well... we sort of got waylaid along the way, and the apricot pie resulted. See, I had another pie planned, and I just figured a double crust pie, so I would be making more crust. EVERY SOURCE I looked at asked the question: "why are you covering the gorgeous apricots with crust?" OK, so we turn to Rose and find a winner. The picture above is the pie that followed, using her book and making a few changes. Here we go.

First, the crust, which makes enough for THREE single crusts. You need 2.25 cups of all purpose flour, and half a teaspoon of salt, which you "fluff" up, either by hand, or with your food processor, using a few pulses. Next, you need fourteen tablespoons of unsalted butter. This is two sticks, less two tablespoons. Use six of them , cut into cubes, and pulse to a very fine meal (or work your fingers to get the same result). Then, the final 8 go in, and this time, go for things that are about the size of small peas. Add a tablespoon of cider vinegar, and then add ice cold water . This is important. When I make pie crust, I start by putting water in a cup with some cubes, for this stage. Add four tablespoons, and stir everything together with a fork, or pulse it. Then keep on adding water, by the tablespoon, until the dough just begins to get cohesive. Gather it together with your hands, and divide it into three equal masses. Flatten it, and either refrigerate it, or freeze it. IF you freeze it, just make sure you thaw it before you're ready to bake.

To bake this pie, you're going to do a "blind" crust. That means you're going to bake the crust, empty, with a "cover" on it, to keep it crispy. Since you don't see it baking, it's "blind." When the crust dough is somewhat soft, but not TRULY soft, it's ready to roll out. I use lots of flour and then brush it off at the end. Use a very firm stroke, and keep on rotating the crust to keep it as circular as possible. Don't kill yourself though. DO have your pie pan handy so that you can see if you have enough dough. You want it to spread out over the pan by about an inch. When you're there, press it down into the pan, and run your rolling pin over the edges, to smooth it out and get rid of excess. Then, prick little holes all over it, cover the bottom with some parchment paper, and either pile in pie weights if you have them, or dried beans, or rice, and bake this at 425 for eight minutes. While it's baking, separate an egg. Save the yolk for making ice cream, you'll be using the white here.

Protect your hands and move the crust out of the oven. Keep it at 425 and let it cool for three minutes. Then, brush the egg white all over the pie. It will "cook" immediately, and then get your filling together.

It's hard to set up these posts, so "per favore." While the crust has been baking, you set up your apricots by cutting about a pound and a half of them into segments: small ones into fours, big ones into sixes, REALLY big ones into eights. Mix them with 1/3 cup of sugar, and a couple of tablespoons of corn starch. Apricots don't put off much liquid, so you don't need much thickener. And, because their skins are soft, you don't need to peel them (some do. More power to them).

Be creative in how you layer the slices in the crust. See what I did above? But use your imagination, and if, as Ms. Birnbaum does, you prefer halves, use that (that's better, though, with smaller apricots. There's a gorgeous picture of a pie done this way in her book). Put the pie back in the oven, and bake it for about 50 minutes. The tips of the apricots will brown, and the pie will thicken some.

When you bring it out of the oven, get about half a cup of good quality apricot jam. Heat it gently, and then put it through a colander . I thought this step was not necessary, but it really is. It will make you a nice, smooth glaze, which you dab on the fruit until you've touched all of the surface.

And when you're done: VOILA. See what you've got above?

Yes, it's a lot of work, but the result is impressive. Apricots are not in season forever, and in NY they are at their peak now. So, roll up your sleeves, and get the pie going. I think you'll be happy you committed to this one.

How to brown bag, the Annalena way

I would like to have a show of hands, especially from my readers here in NYC. How many of you have said, more than once "DAMN, buying lunch is EXPENSIVE" (use any variations on that you would like). Now, how many of you have said "you know, those lunches are FATTENING." (again, variations). Bet it's a lot of you. Now, let me see another show of hands: how many of you have done anything to break out of the cycle of expensive, fattening lunches? Hmmmmm.

I thought so. Well, Annalena is going to try to inspire you to do some of this at home.

Everyone is interested in the quality of lunches children get at school: even people who do not have children. And there are programs all over which are designed to make sure that our kids get a decent meal. Again, my NYC readers will remember the recent stir caused when GASP apple slices were being offered as part of a Happy Meal. We argue we fight, we take positions, on lunch for our kids.

Uh, hello. Don't we owe an obligation to our kids, ourselves, our loved ones, to stay healthy too? How many of you don't eat enough fruit in a day? Bring some to work. How about vegetables? Get yourself a container of cherry tomatoes. You've got a good two servings right there, and you didn't have to cook.

Ah, but the cooking part. THAT's where people get testy "Yeah, I'd bring my lunch but I don't have time to cook."

B******T. You do. You make dinner? You read the papers? You watch tv. Yeah, you do. I'm going to tell you about our lunches, and maybe you can do something similar.

For health reasons, the Guyman and I eat chicken for lunch, at least four times a week. That does not mean we eat the SAME chicken. We alternate between boneless chicken breast, and chicken sausages. And within the sausages, we have different ones every week. And then we alternate breads. So, for the nerds among you, if you get two different kinds of bread, and one kind of sausage (and the chicken breast), you need not eat the same sandwich in a week. Play with vegetables and fruits, and you're solidly in a camp of variety.

And you will save money. It may not seem like it, but bear with me. Yesterday, at the farmers market, Annalena bought 2 pounds of chicken sausage, and two large packages of chicken breasts. It cost her 44.00. Sounds like a lot? Nope. That amount of chicken will serve for 12 lunches. So, the protein portion is about 3.75 a sandwich. Even if you buy a ridiculously artisanal loaf of bread, your sandwich is going to cost less than buying one, and you can put whatever you like on it, and... you don't have to wait on line.

Here's how I make my chicken breasts for sandwiches, and I'm going to go through timing with you. The night before I cook them, I marinate the breasts in "something." There are always fresh herbs of some kind, and then sometimes garlic, sometimes not. The "liquid" might be yogurt (a big favorite), or some olive oil, or some fruit juice (not that often). Put about two pounds of boneles, skinless chicken breasts in about a half cup of some liquid, and add the flavors you like. Put it all in a bag, toss it in the fridge, and let it sit overnight.

The next day, preheat your oven to 375. Take out the chicken, and take off most of what's stuck to it. Heat up a pan (or, if you have a stovetop grill, that), and rub a little oil on it. When it's hot, add the chicken and don't move it for five minutes. You will get a miraculous crust on it. Then, turn it over and cook it for three minutes, and then move the whole thing into the oven for another ten.

How long did it take you to cook that chicken? Was it twenty minutes? How long the night before setting it up? Five? When it cools, you slice it, and make sandwiches.

We eat big ones (watch it, gang), and two pounds of the chicken breasts will make four sandwiches. Four GENEROUS sandwiches. Go leaner if you like, use turkey if you like, but do something like this.

Like I say, it doesn't take long, and you will be much happier with what's in your lunchbag. Put in the cherry tomatoes and the peaches you bought at the farmers market, or the broccoli and berries, get a container of yogurt, and you will be a MUCH happier camper than if you're standing at the salad bar, wondering who sneezed on the chick peas, or groaning at the mayonnaise in the tuna salad on your sandwich, or wondering "isn't that the same mark in the tabbouleh that was there three days ago?"

C'mon, let me see some of you brown bag it. If you already do, gimme your ideas. I'm really interested in what people do for lunches. Let's chat. And better yet, let's do lunch.

Making the fake, real: yogurt onion herb bread

Last week, Annalena wrote to you of her hiatus from bread baking, and her new approach. I made a loaf of sun dried tomato/olive bread that was amazing, if I say so myself (and I do). I ate the last piece of it with cheese on Friday and was very pleased.
So, as last week, progressed, I began to look for another bread, for this week, and I found something called "buttermilk onion bread." I read the description, which said that it really worked well as a sandwich roll. The Guyman and I eat either chicken sausage, or chicken breast for lunch every single day of the work week, so something that makes appealing rolls is, well, appealing to Annalena. I knew that the buttermilk would be switched to yogurt, no big deal there, and I didn't look further into the recipe. Today, I did.

UGH. Here are some of the ingredients in the original recipe:

sugar
dried minced oinon
dried parsley
onion powder
dried dill.

With the exception of sugar, Annalena has none of those ingredients in her home, and she never will. You have read her rants about dried green herbs: they are, essentially, green confetti. Dried minced onion is ok, and in some applications, is actually better than the real thing but they are few and far between.

Onion powder is salt flavored with onion juice, and stabilizers.

This was not going to do; however, the idea of yogurt, onion, and herbs is really something that sounds good, isn't it? So, Annalena got to work. And now ,the digression.

Annalena knows that not all of you out there are bread bakers, and that it scares many of you. PLEASE get over it. Get a GOOD bread book (I can make recommendations), and make them. And as you get experienced, you can do things like Annalena does here, and change the recipes. That comes with experience, but if you do the basics, you will still have a really good loaf of bread and you will feel very good about yourself, too.

So, here's how I changed the recipe. First, I diced up a small onion, very fine. Then I went to our rooftop and collected fresh herbs: chives mostly, but also thyme, parsley, and dill. If you look at this, it's the fresh version of what the original recipe called for. I chopped the herbs, until I had a generous half cup of them (incidentally, you can use whatever herbs you like. For an onion bread, though, use mostly scallion and chives).

Now, in a bowl, combine 1.5 cups of yogurt with milk to bring it to just over 2 cups. There's your buttermilk. Add two tablespoons of butter (it can come out of the fridge), 2 cups of white flour (unbleached), and 2 of whole wheat, the onion and herbs, and a tablespoon of yeast. Either start mixing this up with your hands, or use your mixer, with the paddle, to get it combined together. When it's uniform (it won't take long, add another two cups of flour.

Here, you will have to play with liquids. Start adding cold water, a tablespoon at a time, and add it until you have a dough that is just starting to get sticky. When you have that, either use your dough hook, and go for 8 minutes, or use the letter folding technique I write about in other entries, to get the smooth type of loaf described.

Put this in a bowl, covered, for an hour and a half. Then, punch it down and form, either 8 large round rolls, or two round loaves, or as I did, four and one. Put them on a parchment paper lined baking sheet, cover them, and go away for an hour, while you preheat the oven to 350.

Get these into the oven, and bake, for about 30 minutes. The smell that emanates from your kitchen will make you want bread... NOW. Patience. As they cool, the house will continue to smell wonderful, and you can be very proud of yourself.

No synthetics, and a bread that is actually pretty good for you. Can't beat that.

It's not salade nicoise, but it's good: tuna, bean, potato and beet salad

Way back in 2008, Annalena wrote a short series of notes on the "canon," and wrote a bit about French canonical dishes. One of them was salade nicoise. If you go back to that one (and you're gonna have to go back to a few notes to finish this recipe), you'll see her concerns about getting into battles about proper French cooking. And with good reason. This is NOT an area of cooking on which Annalena feels she is on secure ground.

I bring that up because, when I told the Guyman what we were eating for dinner, his first response was "Oh. GOOD. We're having salade nicoise." My response was "well, not sure I'd call it that. You can if you want, but I'm just going to list the ingredients in the salad." Indeed, if you go back and look at the original post on nicoise, you'll see mention of how black olives and hard boiled eggs seem to be required ingredients in the salad, and anchovies in the dressing. None of that is here. Rather, there are a lot of good things that make it LOOK like it COULD be a salad nicoise, but it's not. SO, here we go.

First, let's look at tuna. If you go back on this blog, you will find a recipe for tuna confit. You're going to need to make that. If you don't want to (but you really should make it once), then get a couple of cans of GOOD quality tuna in olive oil. Get an Italian brand, but try not to be fooled into buying bluefin. Do not get me wrong: that tuna, as I remember it, is wonderful, but bluefin tuna is on the edge of extinction. Let's not help it along.

You are also going to need to go WAY back on the blog, for how Annalena steam roasts her beets. I like to use different colors, but if you only have one, use one. And if you are only going to use one color, I would suggest using the yellow ones, so that you don't have "bleed." Now, go back a little bit, and find the entry on dragon's tongue beans. Make that one too. And if you don't have dragon tongues, use any green bean you have.

Sounds like a lot of work , doesn't it? It really isn't. Go through them all. You'll see what I mean.

Now, what quantity of each vegetable? Per person, I would say two medium, or three small beets, either quartered or halved, depending on the size of the beet. And about 1/3 of a pound of beans. When they're done, and cool, cut them into bite sized pieces. Finally, a pound of potatoes. I used fingerlings, which I almost never do, but they worked fine. A note on them, though. Fingerlings are the freshest of potatoes, even fresher than "new" potatoes, which aren't new. So if you have fingerlings, refrigerate them. Or else, you will find that some of your taties have gone bad and gotten very soft, and very smelly, and there is little that smells worse than a rotten potato. Cook them in boiling salt water, until they are just firm. It will probably take about fifteen minutes, and if you are so inclined, as I was, when they are cool, slice them lengthwise.

Now you have all your ingredients. I tossed all the vegetable components together, and then crumbled a pound of tuna confit over the top of it.

The key element to this dish, I think, is the dressing, and it's somewhat of an unusual one for Annalena. It's very sharp. And it has no vinegar; rather, it is the juice of one very large lemon (about 1/4 cup), and two tablespoons of dijon mustard, with a pinch of salt, and half a cup of olive oil, all of this shaken up.

This is a much more tart, much more stinging dressing than you will usually find, but it's really necessary for these ingredients. Pour it all over the salad, give it a light toss, and know what... you have a great fairly light Sunday dinner.

The Guyman and I positively devoured this. I thought there would be some left over today for the legendary French "Pan bagnat" sandwich, but alas, I had to make do with simple cheddar cheese on sun dried tomato bread. C'est la vie.

When the mushroom man doesn't show up: pot roast with white herb gravy

The Farmers Market is filled with characters, Annalena included. So, too, with the farmers. In fact, one of the more enjoyable features of the market is getting to know the various farmers, and either "bonding," or not. It's a good way of determining where you'll shop. For example, if I need "perfect" white peaches, I know where I'm going and the farmers are not warm and fuzzy. On the other hand, if I need "good" white peaches, there are three or four farmers with whom Annalena has good relationships, and I'll go to them.

And then there are some vendors who are "sui generis." They are the only ones who supply a particular item. Either you deal with them, or you go without. One such vendor is Michael, who is a forager, and sells wild mushrooms in season. At this time of year, he is selling tons and tons of Annalena's favorite mushroom, the chanterelle.

Except when he's not. See, Michael only comes on Wednesday, and he only comes when he has product, and he only comes if he feels like it. Sometimes he doesn't feel like it because of what he has drunk the night before. Sometimes his truck breaks down, and sometimes, well, he's just not there.

So, if, as was the case with Annalena, you were planning on making a chanterelle gravy to serve with your pasta, and there are no chanterelles, you have to do some quick thinking. This is the story of that quick thinking, and I want you to get into this habit.

Annalena had made a pot roast over the weekend: a small one of about 3 pounds. You can find the recipe by searching "stracotto" on this blog. Pot roast NEEDS a gravy. The meat has been cooked for a very, VERY long time, and it is chewy and delicious, but it IS dry. Traditionally, there's a brown gravy on pot roast, but not always.

Italians are not big on gravy or sauces. "Gravy" to Italians is what you other folks call tomato sauce. We usually serve our meat with just its juices. So gravy making is not inherent in our blood, the way it may be for some other people. So, every time Annalena makes a gravy, it's a new effort. This one, much to my delight was wonderful. And easy. SOOOOO easy. And so good. Here's what ya do.

You start with 6 tablespoons of unsalted butter, 1/3 cup of flour (which is just about the same quantity of butter), and milk. At least two cups. You will probably need more. And about two tablespoons of your favorite herbs, soft ones, chopped. I used oregano, thyme, a bit of spicy basil.

Melt the butter in a big pot. Try not to brown it, but you may wind up with soem browning anyway. That's ok. Now, add the flour and whisk it. COok it for a few minutes. You won't need more than five. You'll get bubbling and a thickening.

Now, get your milk. Start with two cups and add it gradually. It will sizzle and bubble, and everything will clump. You will be convinced you have done something wrong. You have not. This is how it works. And after the two cups of milk have been poured in, carefully, you will see a smoothing out. It will probably be thick, and at this point, you will want to add some more milk, and half the herbs. Also, season this, because you have no salt in the mix at all. Taste it, but be careful. It is WICKED hot . You may also wish to add some pepper, but that will destroy the white color of the gravy. Just know that ahead of time.

If your gravy is still too thick for you, you can add more milk, but I added a slug of white wine, and stirred it until I had the consistency I wanted. This was a good move, as it added an acidic "zing" to the gravy which lemon could have done, but really wasn't an option because it would have curdled the milk.

When your gravy is at the thickness you like, add the remaining herbs, stir them in, take the gravy off the heat and, after slicing your pot roast, just put it in the pot.

This is GOOD. There are other gravies that will go with this. My little brother Gatto is proud of his red eye gravy, and most of the other ones that are known are thick, brown sauces, sometimes with mushrooms (if you can find them). This one is a bit lighter than the mushroom versions. Give it a try. Try it on something else too. And let Annalena know how you like it and if you use it for something else.

More on salad: read on, too many ingredients

Most of think of cool, light salads when the weather gets hot. You think of those cool lettuces, with other things mixed in, and a nice light dressing, perhaps with some cold protein like chicken or shrimp on it, and it's a meal.

Just one thing: in the hot weather, lettuce, spinach and all those nice light greens we're used to in salads, simply do not grow well. In hot weather, spinach disappears. Lettuces grow, but they "bolt," that is, they sort of spring up, form flowers and seed heads and just become "tough" if you can believe that. There have been times when I have bitten into leaves of a summer salad, and felt like I was chewing leather (not that that is necessarily a BAD thing, but if you're expecting lettuce...).

So, what does one do in a situation like this? The solution is: you get creative.

You CAN get lettuce, but it may be difficult to get plenty of it, or frustrating to find the ones you want. Or, it's become expensive to the point where you're saying "They want WHAT for lettuce?"

Of course, you may, simply, not be a fan of lettuce in your salads, and that's fine too. The salad that follows is one where you can in fact leave the lettuce out. It's designed for someone who wants an ample, interesting salad, where you can move things around. It is a reconstruction of a salad Annalena ate at her beloved Barbuto and made for her beloved Ken, Keith and Vince, as well as the Guyman. It is good.

Let's start with the dressing, which is yogurt based. I think one of the reasons why people do not like yogurt dressings is that they are not complex enough. Salt, pepper and yogurt do not a dressing make. Mine involves dill weed - the seed heads, rather than the leaves. I pull them off of "crown dill," which is exactly what it sounds like. This is the dill that has "gone to seed," so to speak. You will need about a tablespoon of that stuff, which is a good handful of plants. When you have it, pour about three tablespoons of white vinegar over it, and let it steep for fifteen minutes.

Now, add about a third the volume of vinegar, of mustard, and then double the volume of olive oil. Also add salt. Shake this all up and then add one container of yogurt. I used full fat sheep's milk yogurt. This is one where (don't y'all faint), you probably could use non fat yogurt, but do Annalena a favor: use one that does not have stabilizers in it (read the label). Stabilizers in yogurt make it seem almost like jello. You don't want that, do you?

Shake that all up, taste it, and correct it for seasoning. Put it aside. The mustard, as you know from Annalena's blogs, acts as an emulsifier, and your dressing will not separate.

Let us now address the salad itself. We start with beets. Again, there are prior blog entries, teaching you how to steam roast beets. Annalena does so every two weeks, which is about how long beets last in her refrigerator. She likes to use yellow and red ones, and counts on two small to medium sized beets per person. Cut them in half, or quarter them, as you see fit. Then, chop up the equivalent of half a kirby cucumber a person, into small dice, and add it to the beets. Now, for every four people, one ripe avocado, sliced thinly (if you have a sharp knife, you can make the cuts right through the skin of the avocado, and then drop the flesh right into your salad bowl.

Ok, now some more fun. When you buy stone fruit, like peaches and nectarines, there's always one or two that just doesn't ripen. This is where you use it. Slice circular cuts off of the fruit. It's not hard, and when you get to the pit, just do the best you can with slicing around it. The fruit is an add in, it's not the main thing. Now, some young, semi firm cheese: young pecorino, or fontina, or something like that. Cube up about an ounce per person.

We've got an interesting salad going now, don't we? You could stop here, but if you happen to have a head of a loose, or butter leaf lettuce available, use it. Wash it, tear it into bits, and toss it into the bowl with the other ingredients. Mix everything up and then pour the dressing over it.

If you're feeling exuberant, how about some more dill, snipped on top, and a handful of toasted nuts?

This was the salad for the end of our meal last night. The bowl was empty, and the plates were clean- AFTER some duck breast , israeli couscous, and pole beans.

I guess they liked it.

Summer reading leads to: prosciutto wrapped roasted flounder

Ok, is there anyone out there who doesn't like a trash book every now and then? You know the type I mean: I'm not talking about bodice rippers, or graphic novels, or what have you. When Annalena says "trash book," she means something that is, shall we say, a bit ahem "below" the standard you usually use when reading a book.

I didn't think so. Annalena, too, has her share of "simple" reads, and she just went back to one that, frankly, was unendurable the first time around. This time, perhaps taken by the spirit of "whatever," Annalena read it all the way through.

The work in question is entitled "I loved, I lost, I made spaghetti." It is, essentially, the tale of a lady's frustrating love life, interspersed with recipes for what she cooked along the way.

Annalena can relate. She, too, can remember, almost down to the peppercorn, what she cooked for various "boyfriends," and so forth. If Annalena was as insufferable as this woman was, however, she apologizes to all. I found myself speeding along saying "ABBASTANZA. ANDIAMO ALLE RICETTE," because these were, without question, the best part of the book, and I shall return to them. They were the best part not only because of the content of the recipes, but they serve as inspiration. They are all fairly simple, but I could hear myself thinking "well, yes, but this would be better if..." Annalena has already made a pot roast from inspiration in the book (90 plus degrees out and Annalena is making pot roast. Draw your conclusions...), and also, a variation on a dish which our writer called "Orthopedic cod."

The titles of the recipes are one of the things that DID bother Annalena about the book; however, again, if we skip past the titles, we get to something fundamentally good. You just need to know a few things.

First, you can use any white fish to make this recipe. Also, if you look at her recipe, it calls for two slices of prosciutto per portion of fish.

Remember how Annalena tells you not to get hooked up on proportions? Such is the case here. Perhaps her prosciutto was cut from a thicker portion of the leg. Annalena's was not. She used a lot more of the stuff to wrap her fish. Also, the recipe calls for about a third more butter than does Annalena. And, finally, the issue with fish, always: if you like your fish more underdone than cooked completely, lower the time. I am giving you a timing for a just barely cooked fish, using a standard, thick slice of flounder. If your fish is thin, cut the time down. If you have a REALLY thick piece of, say , halibut or cod, increase it. In any event, make this.

I did like the fact that the author's portions are generous. She calls for 12-16 ounces of fish for two people, so let's start with a pound of flounder. Salt and pepper both sides of it, while you preheat the oven, to 375. Then, melt two tablespoons of unsalted butter, and when it's melted, brush the fish, on both sides, with the stuff. Now, get your prosciutto and wrap. It is very possible, indeed, likely, that the slices will not be long enough to encase your fish fully. That's fine. Just make sure that you treat the side that IS covered, as presentation.

Now, get a small baking dish, or a baking sheet, and brush some butter over that. Put the fish, presentation side UP on the sheet, and brush the rest of the butter over it. Get it into the oven, and bake for 15 minutes or so.

You do have to do some guessing here, because the fish is covered with that lovely ham. When you're done, you will have what you have up at the top of this blog.

You will need a knife and fork to eat this, because the ham will have crisped up and defied your fork.

Now, for those of you who treat fish as the healthful alternative, I suggest you think of chicken for another meal during the week, or perhaps serve LOTS of green vegetables, as the butter and prosciutto have clearly destroyed the health benefits.

Oh well... I loved... I cooked... I gained weight. Yes, that's Annalena's working title.

A "fruit" upside down cake: tomato upside down cake

Ragazzi, Annalena is coming into the modern age more and more. ECCOLA as we say back home.


Now is this a first, or what? Annalena, actually the Guyman, figured out how to put a picture into these posts.

It is NOT easy. Oi. Deo grazia he is around.

Anyway, here's the story. You have seen many, perhaps too many, upside down cakes, on this blog. But this one was too, TOO good to not put up. It is, as the header says, a TOMATO upside down cake.

I can see the noses wrinkling, and I can see people saying "HUH?" And now I can hear the statements: "Ah. It's a SAVORY cake. Like a quiche."

Not so, carissimi. This is a sweet cake, with a fruit because tomatoes, botanically, are a fruit.

A little science here for those who will not be put off: most of what we eat and call vegetables, are fruits. If the seeds of the edible portion of the plant are completely enclosed, the plant is a fruit. So, tomatoes, eggplants, beans, squash, and so many other things we call vegetables, are fruits, botanically.

For tomatoes, there is much confusion, caused in large part by a Supreme Court decision. In Nix v Hedden, the Supreme Court declared a tomato a vegetable. It was a case involving tariffs, and rather than go into the details, let us just say that this is what the "law" is. The science is, to the contrary.

As a youngster, Annalena was taught that, if you put sugar on it (as many did and do, especially in the South), a tomato was a fruit. If you put salt on it, it was a vegetable.

Ultimately, who cares? Do we love it? Do we eat it? If it's a vegetable, or a fruit, it's in high season, use it.

So, to the cake. One of the cooks/chefs I most admire is Joanne Weir, who operates out of San Francisco. It was a sad day when NY TV stopped carrying her TV show. She is one of those chefs for whom I would love to cook, and this is her recipe, modified slightly by Annalena herself.

Chef Weir recently posted a list of her ten favorite tomato recipes, and indeed, this is appropriate give the time of year, and given how DAMN GOOD they are. Annalena looked at some of them and smiled. She looked at others and said "good idea," and moved on. Two caught her attention: a bacon lettuce and tomato salad, which will come, later, and this cake. A tomato cake. Hmmm.

At first, I thought of doing it with cherry tomatoes; however, the thought of slicing that many tomatoes open left Annalena thinking "not this time." Rather, she picked up some beefsteak tomatoes, in yellow and red. Heirlooms would be a waste here. You should not cook heirloom tomatoes, enjoy them as they are. And she made this cake. In fact, she made two of them and, as you will see, it is a beautiful cake. Make it.

It's sort of like a gingerbread with tomatoes, and what's wrong with that? Absolutely nothing.

Okay, let's start by prepping the tomatoes. You need two beefsteak tomatoes, about half a pound each. Try to get a yellow one and a red one. Make an "x" in the bottom end of each, and drop them in boiling water for thirty seconds. Pull them out, drop them in ice water and, when they're cool, you will find the skin pulls off so easily it's amazing. Then, slice them. You should be able to get six-seven slices from each tomato. Put them aside for now.

Meanwhile, melt half a stick of butter with a quarter cup of brown sugar in a small pan, and add a bit of fresh ginger to that. When the butter has melted, swirl everything around, and put it in a 9 inch baking pan. It will look like you have too much butter. You don't. Now, place the slices of tomato on the sugar, and overlap them. If you find that you are running out of tomatoes, use less of an overlap, and if you find that you have a little extra space, feel free to put in cherry tomatoes, halves or, as I did, basil leaves.

Put this aside while you prep the cake. Let's get the dry stuff together. You need 1.5 cups of flour, with 2 teaspoons of bakign powder. You also need ginger, cloves, cinnamon and mace (Now, aren't you glad you bought mace for the rose geranium pound cake?). You should vary the spices as you like. The standard ratio is ginger: cloves: cinnamon: mace of 4:2:1:1, with 4 being a teaspoon. If, howevery, you like cinnamon a lot and don't like ginger, play with this. Mix the spices with the flour and the baking powder, and add a pinch of salt. Put that aside.

Now, cream a stick of unsalted butter, with 3/4 cup of white sugar, and beat it REALLY well, to the point where it's almost white. Now, add 1/2 cup of molasses (it's a winter ingredient, but keep with me here). Add 2 egg yolks, one at a time. Have a half cup of milk ready and now start adding the flour mixture and the milk in alternative steps, until you use up each. (Many recipes say "ending with flour." I've never found it to matter). When it looks smooth and even, you're ready.

If you are sitting there thinking "this looks like gingerbread," you're right, it does.

Remember you had those two egg yolks? Well, I hope you didn't throw out the egg whites. You didn't right? GOOD. Now, whip them to stiff peaks, and fold them into the cake batter, and pour the whole thing over the tomatoes.

Put this into the oven and bake at 350 for at least 45 minutes. Your kitchen will send out very interesting and good aromas: tomatoes, basil if you used it, and the ginger spices.

When the cake has finished baking, give it a good half hour to sit. Then, run a knife around the edges, and turn it over. It will pop out with ease, and you will have a wonderful cake, looking like the one depicted in this blog.

I did not have the forethought, but I would have LOVED to have prepared basil ice cream to go with this cake. If you do think it out (now that you have a hint), do so. Some other ideas: Claudia Fleming in her wonderful book "The Last Course," has a recipe for a plum and tomato compote. Well, who's stopping you? Classic vanilla sounds good and , to be honest, what is more of a compliment to tomatoes than mozzarella. There are recipes out there for mozzarella ice cream. So, too, bacon ice cream. So play around, make some history, expand your dessert repertoire.

Ascolta, ragazzi, it is hard to think of getting tired of tomato salads, or soups, or sandwiches, but if you do, try a cake. I think you will be pleased, and you will certainly be the talk of your circle.

Her head backi in the oven: sundried tomato and olive bread

ARGGGH. I got a message saying "conflicting edits" and then this post disappeared, so I shall try again.

You have all read of my adventures in bread baking. Well, Annalena took a 3 month rest from bread baking. Why? Who knows. Probably a combination of boredom, business, and the realization that "you know, it is now possible to get REALLY good bread from bakeries and the farmers market," something that was not possible when Annalena started baking bread. The awful breads of twenty years ago are still around, but you have choices.

And, so yourself a favor: if you are willing to spend money on other things, spend some money on bread.

The three months away have given Annalena some focus. She may never be the mad baker she was again, but if a recipe catches her eye, as this one did...

Except it was designed for a bread machine. AGGGGGG. Annalena views the bread machine as a manifestation of the Antichrist, and testimonials in their favor as akin to statements that "skim milk tastes the same as cream." IT doesn't, and Annalena will not permit a bread machine in her house. Fortunately, she knows how to undo these recipes and turn them into "real" recipes and when you see how easy they are, you will not bemoan your lack of a machine.

Here we go. You need ten sun dried tomatoes, NOT packed in oil. Chop them fine. Now, calamata olives, black ones. Pit them by lining them up, pressing the back of a knife on them, hard, and then picking away the meat. Do this until you have a cup of them. It won't take long. Took me ten minutes.

You will also need a package, or two teaspoons of yeast, 1.5 cups of water, 3 tablespoons of olive oil. Put those in a bowl. Now add the sun dried tomatoes, and the olives. Stir it around and add 4.5 cups of flour, all purpose, and whole wheat, mixed, as you see fit. Up to 1/3 can be whole wheat. Put a teaspoon of salt in too.

Knead with your hands, if you are inclined, until you have a soft mass, and then move it to a table top and use the "Business envelope" technique I have written about, until you have a smooth, satiny, wonderful looking loaf. This will take about 12 minutes of easy work. The oil and the oil released from the olives makes a VERY soft dough. If you use the big mixer, use the paddle to blend, and then the dough hook, for about eight minutes. Cover the bowl, and let it rest for an hour and a half.

Now, how much work was that? Maybe 15 minutes? After an hour and a half, shape the dough into a long, oblong loaf, cover it, and let it rest for forty five minutes, while your oven comes up to 400.

Put the loaf in, and let it bake for half an hour or so. Check with a toothpick in the center to see if it's dry. If it is, you are done. If not, let it bake another fifteen minutes or so.

And you're done, and you have a lovely loaf of bread that you probably will NOT be able to find, even at a good bakery.

According to my recipe, this loaf makes 20 slices, at 132 calories a slice.
RIGHT. I think not . So if you count the calories from your bread, this loaf has 2640 calories in it. Divide accordingly, as you slice it.

But ragazzi, don't worry about the calories, if you please. Think instead of how good it is, how good you feel, and all the nasties you are not eating.

If you make this bread with variations, say, by putting in some chopped basil or rosemary, or garlic, or if you change the flours, please let us all know. Cooks are generous people, but bakers are the most generous of all. So, y'all, let's share. Oh, and tell me what you use your bread with. Sandwiches? Croutons? Salads? CMON. Let's get some discussion going gang!

"Pasta Diva": Pasta alla Norma

Casta Diva, che inargenti
queste sacre antiche piante,
a noi volgi il bel sembiante
senza nube e senza vel...
Tempra, o Diva,
tempra tu de’ cori ardenti
tempra ancora lo zelo audace,
spargi in terra quella pace
che regnar tu fai nel ciel...


Ah, my OQ friends will recognize those lyrics won't you? The opening lines for the title character in the opera "Norma." A moment that we all wait for, with the range set high, and difficult. Waiting for the diva herself to sing

And so often we are disappointed. And we return to the recordings of Callas (Annalena's favorite), or Sutherland, or whomever (OQs, please chime in: who is your favorite Norma? No, Gattopardo, you may NOT answer "my favorite Norma is Rae.") The character is so hard to pull off, so difficult, and the role so taxing.

And ultimately it has nothing to do with the recipe at hand: pasta alla Norma, except maybe it does. The story goes that the pasta was around before the opera was; however, when the composer, Vincenzo Bellini, was served it, he said "this pasta is a Norma. It is perfect." And so it is now called, "pasta alla Norma."

I want to believe that this is how it got its name. And I want every performance of the opera to be as perfect as the recordings of Maria Callas singing the aria are. (Go to youtube and find one, per favore). It is inspiring, when I make this dish which is truly a marker of summer. Just as a mezzo should not attempt the role (and too many have), one should not make this with winter produce. Remember it is a Sicilian dish in origin, think of Sicily geographically, and then proceed.

As with many canonical dishes, you will have various "rules" about this dish. Some will say the eggplant MUST be fried. Others will roast it. Some will say it MUST be done with maccheroni. Others insist on strozzapreti. And so on, and so forth. I shall offer you my version, but of course, if the combination of ingredients intrigue you, please venture forth and make some variations. Here we go.

You need a pound of eggplant. Look for the smaller ones. I used four, small ones, that were light purple. When eggplant are small, the skin has not toughened yet, and you do not have to peel them. That is a consideration in this dish, because you want color. I cut the eggplant lengthwise, and then cube them about an inch long. I salt these with about a teaspoon and a half of salt, because I want the eggplant to be firmer and, I find, that salting them reduced their ability to soak up oil like a sponge.

You will also need a pound and a half or so of tomatoes. As with the eggplant, if they are ripe and savory, you will not need to peel them. If you can, use red and yellow ones. Simply core out that green thing in the center, and then cut them into pieces about the size of the eggplant. I do not bother seeding them either, but if you feel so inclined, do not let Annalena stop you.

When you are ready to cook, take the eggplant in handfuls, and squeeze out as much of the water as you can. Put the squeezed eggplant in a separate bowl, and get a good quantity of olive oil hot, in a big pan. Three tablespoons is the minimum I would use, but four is probably better. If you use a measuring cup, that's a quarter cup. When it's hot, add the eggplant, and LEAVE IT ALONE for about three minutes. This lets the stuff get some color. Then, turn it, so that it cooks through thoroughly. After about another three minutes, add the tomatoes, and cook, over medium heat, until the tomatoes begin to collapse and you have a "saucy" pan of vegetables.

While this is happening, bring a big pot of water to a boil, salt it, and cook a pound of pasta. The smaller shapes are better here. As mentioned above ,maccheroni and strozzapretti are traditional. I used a pound of orecchiete made with "burned flour", an ingredient I had not seen before, and it was delicious. Use what you are comfortable with, and cook the stuff to al dente.

While it is cooking, let's turn to the issue of the cheese. The traditional version calls for ricotta salata, and it is truly delicious with such. If you do not have ricotta salata, as was my case, use feta, or some other firm, dry, salted cheese. Tradition says that you grate the cheese. I like it better by breaking it into cubes of different sizes: some very small, almost particulate, others larger. I stir the cheese into the warm sauce, off the heat , and when the pasta is done, stir it in. The heat of the pasta melts some of the cheese, but not all of it, and brings the sauce to the correct temperature. I use 3/4 pound of cheese for the other ingredients

Again, going to tradition, you now add a cup of torn, fresh basil leaves. I have seen this with mint leaves (basis IS a mint, you know), but I like it without the herbs. As with the other steps, proceed as you like.

And you are done. If this sounds like an extravagant dish, think again. Go look back at the ingredient list, think of a farmer's family, making a special dish, and...

See what I mean?

Annalena would like to dedicate this one to her beloved Italian teacher, in Italy, who should cook this immediately and think of her.

Baci, caro.

Back to the Bunny Trail: Rabbit Milanese

Annalena believes she has commented on this before, but isn't really sure, so she'll say it again.
There are certain names that show up in cooking, that is, names of dishes, that "signify" certain things. If an item is described as "Florentine," for example, there will be spinach in the dish. If you see "Veronique," which you almost never do these days, it means there will be white grapes, probably peeled. (DO NOT ATTEMPT THIS AT HOME. YOU WILL CURSE, HURT YOURSELF AND NEVER EAT A GRAPE AGAIN. By the way, there is no reason to peel white grapes). There are others, but those are the ones that come to mind, besides "ala mode," but that's not a geographical term.

We turn to "Milanese." If a dish is described as Milanese, it means it's going to be breaded, fried, and served with a warm salad of tomatoes and arugula. That is classic Milanese.

What does it have to do with Milan? You think I know? Why is spinach "Florentine," or white grapes "Veronique?" And who's "Veronique," or is Verona? Again, you think I know?

The only thing that I can imagine links "milanese" with Milan is that there is butter in the preparation. Annalena sometimes forgets that Milan is considered NORTHERN Italy, above the so-called "olive oil" belt. But.. it's close enough so that there is also olive oil in this dish.

I didn't say it was dietetic.

The classic form of "Milanese" is with a veal chop: HUGE, flat, covering the pan. There was a restaurant in Annalena's neighborhood when she moved here, that did mediocre to ok food, except for the Milanese veal chop. I ordered it every time. In fact, one time when I was sitting there and ordered it, and they told me they were out of it for the night, I left. The Guyman was somewhat shocked, but he rolled with it.

Lately, I have seen many other milanese preparations. Pork. Turkey. Chicken. They all seem to be white type meats, don't they? And that's where tonight's recipe came from. I had some boneless rabbit loin in the refrigerator, and I spent the better part of the day wondering "what am I going to do with them?"

Well, in the process by which Annalena comes up with her meals (be frightened. Be VERY frightened), I was reminded that we are in PEAK tomato season. Annalena cannot come home from a market without tomatoes that taste of the sun. So, tomatoes were in the picture. And the connections just happened: why not? It should be good.

And it was. So here we go.

You need a pound of boneless rabbit. If by some chance you have a very talented butcher who will do rabbit double chops for you, by all means, use them. Rabbits have a very fine bone structure though, and removing them is not a task for the impatient, or those without premedical training (I have done it. Once. NEver again). You will also need two large eggs, a quantity of seasoned bread crumbs, and then two tablespoons each of butter and olive oil. Also, two cups of cherry tomatoes, mixed colors and sizes if you can, and about four cups of arugula. There's no reason to use the baby arugula here, and in fact, the more mature variety is better.

If you can, as always, salt the rabbit the night before, or the morning of. When you're ready to cook, beat two eggs in a plate and put the bread crumbs on a second one. Dip each piece of rabbit into the egg, and then the crumbs, to coat them completely. As you work, move each one to a tray. I had six "cutlets" of rabbit in my pound.

When they're all coated, heated the butter and oil until the butter melts, but don't wait for it to start bubbling. Add as many cutlets as will fit the pan, and cook them gently: a medium heat at best. Check them frequently. You want a light golden color (or maybe you don't. I've had Milanese dark and light. They're both good). When you have the color you want, flip them and do the other side.

You may have to replenish the fat during the cooking process . If you do, stick to olive oil. The hot pan will burn any added butter right away. When you're done, keep the meat warm by either stashing it into a low oven, or cover it.

Raise the heat of the pan, and add the cherry tomatoes. Don't cut them, you don't need to. Cover the pan, and let them cook for a few minutes, say 3-4. They will begin to collapse, and split. While that's happening, cut off the tough stems of the arugula and when the tomatoes have collapsed, add the greens, and cook them for another minute or so.

Now, the kicker: add some balsamic vinegar to the hot vegetables. Keep your face out of the way so you don't get burned, and stir the veggies together.

Plate the rabbit, and spoon out some of the vegetables on each portion. And there you go.

Will it make you think of Milan? Who knows? Is it Milanese? I don't know that either. This is what I do know: it's good. REAL good.

"International Velvet" or Annalena cooks Chinese style: Velvet lamb

I wonder how many of Annalena's readers will have gotten the allusion to "International Velvet." For those of you in your formative years, or the two heterosexual men who are reading this blog, Elizabeth Taylor's very first movie was "National Velvet," about a young girl, and her horse. Annalena saw the movie when she was rather young, in glorious black and white. Those eyes, that face, that hair: Miss Taylor was beautiful, nay GORGEOUS, from day 1 (and how many of you got the pun on "nay." Ms. Nora did. Sure you did, girl. Fess up). And all of you should in some way manner or form see that movie to see how, literally, "A Star is Born."

Now, that all came up because the word "velvet" was on Annalena's mind, as she tried a new technique last night. How was it? Well, it was better than "meh," but I don't think it's going to go down as a favorite. I will have to play with the technique a bit.

I had been reading several articles on a Chinese cooking technique called "velveting." What I read, was that the technique was a way to keep proteins from overcooking and keeping them moist. Although just about all of the recipes that I saw spoke of doing it to chicken, there were a handful that used beef as the protein sauce. Annalena had lamb on the menu last night, and decided to "velvet" it.

According to what I read, to "velvet" something is to let it marinate in a mixture of cornstarch and eggwhite for a short period of time. After that, you fry it. Theoretically, the marinating tenderizes the meat, and also prevents the drying out that happens when you cook protein at high heat.

I can understand how the technique prevents drying out. Both egg white and corn starch cook to crusts that would keep juices in. How the marinade tenderizes meat vexes Annalena, because there is nothing she knows of, either in egg white, or corn starch, that would act to break down proteins (if any of you know: Frank, one of the two heterosexual men out there reading this: if you could check with Crystal to check with her mom? Hmmmm?). Annalena suspects that the tenderizing actually comes later on in the cooking, when acid is added. But the more you know about the subject of cooking, the more you realize how little you know.

I am quite convinced that I did certain things wrong in making this dish. I will probably try it again, because it does seem intriguing. Here we go.

For a pound of meat - and I will reiterate that almost all sources refer ONLY to boneless chicken - you need a tablespoon of cornstarch, and one egg white. As your quantities go up, you increase both. Two egg whites, two tablespoons of cornstarch, etc. Pour the starch into the egg white, stir it into a slurry, and then add the protein. Turn it to coat it , cover it, and leave it alone for half an hour.

When I did this, I came back to meat that was pretty much stuck to my bowl. Not surprising, corn starch will do that. What I did next may have been the issue with my "so so" results. Since I was cooking lamb, I did not want to deep fry and just put a few tablespoons of oil into my pan. When it was hot, I added the meat (which, incidentally, had been salted the night before and was lamb tenderloin. You should use what you like, but do salt it). I cooked it for the requisite five minutes that I always use for meat and tried to turn it.

No luck. The meat had fairly vulcanized to the pan. Well, since I was planning to use the last of my blueberry gastrique with the lamb (or pomegranate molasses), I jsut added some of it to the pan, and that succeeded in releasing the meat. I then went on to brown it, but had a difficulty with the meat sticking as I went through the process. When it was done, it WAS good, but I'm not sure what the velveting added to it. The Guyman liked it, so did I, so we will come back to it.

In reading through internet information on the technique, it seems that many people use a LOT of oil to cook velveted meat, and also cook it twice. One recipe, for example, had chunks of chicken cook in two inches of oil, at 275, and then stir fried it with vegetables, and some flavoring agent (the flavoring agent, incidentally, is key here: you need a very strong liquid, something like soy sauce, or fish sauce, or as I used, the gastrique, or vinegar, SOMETHING, because egg white and corn starch are, essentially, tasteless).

Not everything works as perfectly as you would like in the kitchen. I am posting this to let you know about the workings of Annalena's kitchen, and how sometimes, it isn't the most perfect thing in the world.

Now, the eggplant tian on the other hand? Heavens, carissimi, you all MUST make it.

Ophra's gone, but okra's on! Corn, lima beans and okra

I know, I know. I play with that soundalike a lot.
Know what? Annalena never saw a single episode of Ophra during the entire run. Given the number of commercials, and excerpts, it might be like "Grease" or "Saturday Night Fever," which Annalena has never seen, start to finish, but has probably seen four or five times.
You probably have similar situations in your viewing history.
Anyway, anytime I work with okra, I think of Ophra. What can I do? So, now, let's get to okra, and the combination of the moment: okra, lima beans, and corn. This is another example of my newest favorite concept: cooking by accretion.

About two weeks ago, the assistant to Nevia, the goddess of vegetables, was all excited. She was showing me Christmas lima beans. These are beautiful, red and white mottled beans, that are, in fact, lima beans. Or, butter beans, if you like.

Annalena is NOT a fan of lima beans. She's tried. Probably, a childhood of having to eat them, at least once a week, with salt pork and other nasties, in a soup that made her gag. It was a favorite of her stepfather, nicknamed Colonel Klink. Annalena and her sisters used to laugh every time Klink would say "what's wrong with that soup? I grew up on that soup," and whisper "so that's why you never smile."

With the days of Klink long behind her, Annalena decided to give lima beans a try again. They MUST be a favorite to someone, because the farmers market is jammed with them in season. So a few years ago, she brought home a few pounds.

And nearly went nuts trying to get them out of the pod. See, lima beans are WORK. If you aren't ready for fresh fava beans, don't even THINK about limas. They're not as bad as fresh chickpeas (Oh, GEEZ, does Annalena feel sorry for the sous chefs who get the job of peeling fresh chickpeas in restaurants), but they are, or WERE pretty awful.

It was against that backdrop that when Nevia's assistant offered me the beans I smiled and said no thank you. A week later, Nevia wanted to know why I wasn't buying her "new experiment," the Christmas lima beans. I told her I found them too hard to open.

Well, Nevia must have been having a bad day. She picked one up, snapped it and said "THIS is too hard for you?" She did another one. And another one. And then had me try.

Ok, ok, I guess it's like wringing a chicken's neck. It's actually very easy to do once someone shows you how. And rather than tick off the lady who makes all of my vegetables taste so good, I went home with a pound. Then on Saturday morning, I sat there, peeling them and, yes, they opened very easily, and I had a heaping cup of lima beans. Bright red and white.

They would not stay that way. Nevia had told me that, but she said they'd cook to a "dull purple." (Keep in mind , folks, that dull purple, in fabric, is gray). What to do with them?

Well, I also had about a half pound of okra. Not the teeniest ones, and not the biggest ones, but medium sized okras. I didn't know what I was going to do with them, but not another macque choux like we had earlier this month. Annalena's mind began to think "we haven't had SUCCOTASH in a long time." It's peak corn season, the okra and the lima beans were there, and BANG, out came Annalena's version of succotash.

This probably isn't succotash to a lot of people, so just think of it as a corn , lima bean and okra stew. And it WILL get you to eat two vegetables you probably don't eat a lot of, if at all. Here we go.

You need four ears of corn. Shuck the corn, and with a sharp knife, cut the kernels from the ears. THen, take the dull back end of the knife, and rub it hard against the cobs. Look at all the white stuff. Taste it. That's where the good stuff in corn is. Put it together with your kernels.

Meanwhile, bring a pot of salted water to boil, and add fresh lima beans. A cup and a half was what I had. Let them cook until they are as tender as you like. For me, this was 15-20 minutes, and yes, the Christmas limas faded to dull purple... or gray. Drain them.

Let's address the okra. I have written about this before, but it bears repeating. If the thing about okra that dissuades you from eating it is the sliminess, there is a way to avoid it. Look at an okra pod. To Annalena, it is somewhat like an acorn, with a little cap, and then the actual okra pod. The cap is not edible, and if you cut it from the okra, and then leave the rest of the vegetable whole, it will not start sliming. Okra only slimes when you cut into the pod, and the saponins react with air.

Like that word? Saponin? Look up the word "saponification." No, I'll tell you. It means soap making. The molecules in okra, and cactus paddles, and which surround quinoa, are called "saponins" because they feel slippery and slimy, like soap (if you've ever encountered the soap that sat in a soap dish with water, you know what I mean). Saponins, by the way, are very important in medicine: they are used as immune boosters in vaccines, and while no one has done any work...

Back to cooking. You have your lima beans, your corn, your okra, and now, it's all going to come together. Melt about three tablespoons of unsalted butter in a big wide pan, and add the corn. Stir it to coat it with the butter, and add some salt. COok it for, oh, about five minutes, and then add the beans. Stir them together, for another five minutes.

Finally, add the okra, and cover the pot. Lower the heat and let this cook for five minutes. The okra will keep its color, get tender crisp, and will not get slimy.

Now..... Off with the cover, and in goes half a cup of heavy cream. DON'T USE MILK. Stir it around until the cream evaporates and the vegetables are nice and coated. If you like it hot, add some chopped chili peppers at this point.

And you are done. With more than enough for four people.

I find that this goes REALLY well with simple, pan fried or grilled fish.

Variations? Well, I would keep the corn and okra, but if you really don't want lima beans, put in some other green vegetable that you do like. Maybe shell beans? Or green beans? Or favas.

Let me know what you make if you change this around.