Brought to you by the letter Q: quince and bleu cheese salad

Ragazzi, Annalena LOVES quinces.  To her, they are one of the joys of the fall and winter.  They do not make their appearance until just about now, and they are at their best, for about six weeks.   At times, they bedevil her, as you will learn in this recipe.  When they work, they are wonderful.

You may have to go and google for pictures of quinces.  They are somewhat deceiving in appearance.  Take a look:




Looks like a big yellow apple doesn't it?  But if you bite into it, expecting that crisp apple flesh and that burst of sweet and sour juice, you will get bitterness, graininess, and probably a broken tooth.   Like lobsters, foie gras, and other wonderful things,  a prize should be given to whomever figured out how to deal with them. 

They say that quinces originated in Persia , but without question, if you want to know how to deal with them, ask an Armenian.  Indeed, that is just what Annalena did.  Well, sort of.  See, she had a stack of backed up copies of one of her favorite "foodie" magazines, and there was a longish article on quinces.  She read it while visiting with her friends Kevin and Chuck during her annual sojourn to South Hampton.  In the course of that article, she learned of a book written by an Armenian woman, who also had much to say about the quince in the article.  Now, Annalena has a stray recipe here and there for these kittens (they are also a darling of Ms. Waters, so they show up here and there), Peter Hoffman loves them,  and in  Annalena's extensive cookbook collection, she has a book she picked up in Switzerland on them  (incidentally, the word for quince in German is Kwitten.  Cotagna in Italian.  See how smart you'll get?)   She searched for the woman's book, found it in an on line used bookstore, and secured it.

The work is wonderful.  More ideas than you can shake a stick at for using these guys.l  They will be on Annalena's menu this fall and winter, and of course, you lucky readers will get them too.

The book gave as a "seminal" recipe, one for poaching quinces.  Indeed, in Annalena's experience, it is vital that you cook quinces for a while before you do anything else with them.  And the recipe seemed to accord with everything Annalena knew about cooking them:  peel, core, cut into half inch slices, get into a big pot of water , cook slow, and for a long, long time.  The recipe said 45 minutes, and commented that "even then, the quinces will be firm. 

Annalena thought nothing of this, because of her own experiences. So last weekend, after the busywork of  Saturday cooking was done , she did in fact take her two pounds of ripe quinces (sidebar:  when buying quinces, SMELL them.  They should have an exotic, fruity odor.  LOOK at them.  See that color above? You're looking for that bright yellow.  Green quinces, will never ripen. NEVER.  They will rot on your cabinet and leave very ugly marks on the wood from their acid. They will piss you off. You will vow never to use them again).

Yes, she writes from experience.  Ok, now, let's get our quinces peeled.  They peel like an apple, but now, the hard stuff begins, because quinces are... hard.   The smaller knife you use for an apple will not work here.  Get a big one.  Get ready to be strong, and cut them down the middle, lengthwise.  Now, put the cut sides down, and slice the halves into half inch slices or so.  Get a smaller knife and cut out the seedy core.

Work quickly here, ragazzi, they brown.  And now, get them in a pot with ample water.   Squeeze in half a lemon  (Annalena tosses the lemon peel in too), and add a stick of cinnamon.  No sugar for doing this.  Bring the pot to a boil, and let it then simmer slowly.

Remember all that stuff up above about long cooking? Well, Annalena must have wound up with some really tender quinces.  At 45 minutes, she went to check.  Her quinces had turned a light salmon color.  And they were falling apart tender.  Good with a stew, NOT good with quinces. So, rather than let them sit in the hot bath to cool, as directed, she fished them out.  Not exactly beautiful slices, but they would suffice. 

Undeterred, she peeled her remaining quinces, and repeated, but checked at 30 minutes.  This time, she had pale ecru slices that were falling apart.

Do not ask this woman to explain.  It happened.  She expects fully that the next time around, at an hour, the quinces will feel like rocks.  So, ragazzi, the lesson here, is CHECK.  Check frequently.    The thirty minute slices have more body to them, but they do not have the pink color.   Still , they are delicious.  Save the liquid if you like but take the cinnamon stick out (this makes a wicked cocktail when combined with wicked spirits.  You can also add a cup of sugar and boil it down into a ridiculously wonderful syrup).

So we have our quince slices.  Here's the first thing we're going to do with them.  We are going to make salad.  A really GOOD salad.  And we're going to do it by taking well washed, soft lettuce leaves.  Green leaf, red leaf, boston,  anything of the type.  Stay away from romaine, and arugula, etc, for this application (we will be revisiting arugula and fruit next time around).  Tear the lettuces up, and put them in a big bowl.  Now, get those quinces, be they slices, or fall apart slices.  If they  haven't fallen apart, tear them into small bits and put them on top of the lettuce.  And... now for some bleu cheese.  Whatever kind you like, but get something sharp tasting.  Annalena chose mountain gorgonzola.  Again, break off little bits of it, strew it over the salad like the quinces.  Finally, your dressing. To Annalena's taste, this requires a mustard seed based dressing, so use whole grain mustard.  Combine equal amounts of the mustard and a white wine or champagne vinegar, with a healthy teaspoon of salt.  Annalena cannot tell you how much of each to use:  how wet do you like your salads?  Finally, combine two to three times the amount of olive oil, as the vinegar.  Shake this all up,  and pour it IMMEDIATELY over the salad.  You do this because the seeds in the whole grain mustard will settle out and then, when  you pour the dressing, you'll get one large PLOP of seeds in one place. 

And, serve it forth.  If you are so inclined, add some almonds, macrona almonds in particular, to the dish. But there's no need to.

And you have a wonderful autumn salad that is different from anything you've ever had (unless, of course, you're Armenian and your mom made this every day during the fall. ).

Enjoy, ragazzi.  And Annalena shall send you more quince recipes as they come up.

Next time around, figs get the salad treatment.

Ti auguro un buon fin di settimana, i miei ragazzi!