Impress your friends: "Gateau Breton" with aromatic plums

 Ciao, ragazzi.  Today, we're making dessert.  We're making it with plums, which are still aplenty in the market.  As the weather turns closer to freezing,  it's good to know, though, that we can make this ultimately, very easy cake, with many things.

The cake we are making today, is a variation on a classic dessert called a "gateau breton".  The crust we use, is essentially what is used in that cake.  Traditionally, the filling is a mix of dried, spiced fruit.   Those of you who have had the fortune to eat Basque food, will recognize elements of gateau basque, where a custard is sandwiched between two layers of rich dough.  Use dried fruit, or apples, or pears, or if you want, get some of the wonderful products American Spoon makes, and do this.  It is really not that hard.

When Annalena read the recipe, the instructions were "you can make the components ahead of time, but make the cake the day you wish to eat it.  "YESSIR YESMAAM."  In fact, leftovers kept well for a day.  They didn't last beyond that.  Annlena does see, however, that this is a wet filling, and it will make your pastry soggy.  With that in mind, lets make the components when we have time, and then make the cake.   Here we go.

First, the filling.  You will need 3 pounds of plums.  Any variety will do.  Wash them if you must, and then cut them into slices.  No surgical precision needed.  You will add these to a pot, and add a few ingredients, some which are a bit unusual.  First, add a teaspoon of cinnamon (not so odd.  If you have cinnamon sticks, use one of those), then add 2 teaspoons of honey  (not so odd, but not common).  Here's the odd one:  a big stalk of fresh rosemary.  And, if you have it, a bit of grated fresh ginger doesn't hurt.  Put that all in a big, heavy pot, and add 1-3 tablespoons of sugar, depending on how sweet you like things (Annalena used 1).

You will cook this, at very low heat, for 20-30 minutes.  You're looking for something jammy, and thick.  Please read what Annalena says about this, below.   Here is what things look like after 15 minutes:

And then, after 30:

That doesn't look particularly jammy, does it?  Well, as it cools, the magic happens.  So pluck out the rosemary, pluck out the cinnamon stick, if the cooking released any plum pits, pull those out, and store this stuff until it's cold.  Now, we're going to make the dough.  We start with a cup of sugar.  You put this in  your food processor, and pulse to make it fine (DO NOT take a "short cut" and use confectioner's.  Annalena would rather you not do the step than make that change)

 You then add to this, 2.5 cups of flour, more cinnamon (a teaspoon of ground this time), and a bit of salt.  Pulse this, and you'll get what we have above.  

Now, we add our rich ingredients.   We need half a pound of unsalted butter, and 5 eggs:

Separate one of those eggs, so you're adding four eggs, and one egg yolk.  See how Annalena cut the butter in cubes?  Yup.  Do that.  Add the butter first, and pulse until  you get really granular stuff:

Add the eggs and egg yolk to this.  First, pulse.  You'll get what looks like a hopeless mess:

Pazienza.  You'll eventually get:

Dump that out, form a ball, and then cut that ball into halves:

Wrap each half, and let it chill.  You want this to be at the same temperature as your filling. 

The wonderful thing about this dough, is that it remains very soft.  So, while you CAN use a rolling pin, what will follow is something  you can do with your fingers. 

Get a springform pan: 8 inches is better, but 9 inches is just fine.  Seal it up, and put it on a baking sheet.  Grease it, perhaps with the butter from the paper of the butter used in the dough.  Start pressing the first piece on the bottom.  You'll be amazed how easy it is to do.  Don't get fancy, it's not important.  It IS important that you cover the whole bottom.  Then dump the filling in.   Then, you have to press out the rest of the dough.  Use the plastic or foil you just used to wrap the stuff.  Not sure if you have a big enough piece?  Put the pan over it.  You want something just a little bit bigger, and if it's not right, then just keep pressing with your fingers.  YOU CAN DO THIS.

Put that on top of the filling, get a fork, and seal the layers.  Don't worry about plum juice escaping.  It's all good.  

Finally, get one more egg, and beat it with a tablespoon of water.  Make a little pattern on the top, brush it with egg, and get it in the oven .  Your temperature is 350, and your baking time is an hour.   And....

Let this cool, and run a knife around the edge to break the carmelized layer, which you can see.  Leave it at room temperature, and serve it with something on the sweet side, because the tart will be rich, but not that sweet.  Annalena used raspberry ice cream, sort of as a homage to late summer.  Whipped cream is fine.

So, there we are ragazzi.  Annalena  hopes you like the two recipes this week.  She has no idea what the week will bring, but she'll be back with something new.  Until then,  INTO THE KITCHEN WITH ALL OF YOU!!!!

Use it while you have it: yellow squash soup with spinach

 Ciao ragazzi.   Remember that Annalena told you she would be gone last week, and wouldn't be able to post?  Well, she hopes you missed her, and that you had plenty to consider with the recipes she left.  We're back in session this week, and we're working with end of summer produce.  First, we are going to make a vegetarian (but not vegan) soup.

All summer long, we have had "zucchini".    Some of you may think  "at times, that's ALL we had," and yes, they CAN take over a garden, can't they.  But now, we are at the point where, sadly, we will be saying "ciao" to them for about 8 months.
As the careful reader of Annalena's blog knows, "zucchini" just means "small squash."  One of them, is a zucchino.  And while it is more correct to use zucchino/i to refer ONLY to the long, green ones, we have in fact started using the word for all of the summer squashes.  Annalena is not sure how she feels about that.  It is true that, flavor wise, most of the summer squashes taste pretty much the same (in Annalena's mind, cucuzza does not); however, the textures are really different.  We are working today with one of the pattypan/sunburst squashes.  You can get them in green or yellow.  Annalena favors the yellow ones, again for reasons she cannot fathom.  But she does.  So if you have only green, or a mix of yellow or green, use that.  You will also find white ones available, and you can use those too.   You will need 2 pounds for this recipe, but you CAN cut that in half if you are not cooking for an army.   "Size matters" here.  Try to get your squash at the size where about 3 of them weigh a pound.  (You should not need your calculator to figure out:  that's  6):

 You are going to need an equal quantity of potatoes.  We thus, will need 2 pounds, unless you are cutting the recipe in half.  Here, size does not really matter, nor does the type of potato.  Annalena had yukon golds (her favorites) and some Peruvian blues.  You can use a mix, but try not to use ALL blue potatoes, unless you are inordinately fond of blue colored food.  Peel the potatoes, and cut them into chunks.

 You will also need one large (about 12 ounces) white onion.  Again, you can choose a red one if you have it, but don't turn to Vidalia's or any of the sweet ones.  Go smaller, if you're making less soup.  Peel and roughly chop that onion:

 Now, we can begin cooking.  You will want from 1/2-3/4 of a stick of butter, unsalted please, in a big pan.  Melt it, and saute' the onion in it, until it begins to turn white and translucent.  It will happen quickly.  Annalena is weird, but she loves when this happens:

 While that onion is cooking, we are going to make our "stock. " Our stock is a mixture of water and milk.  Your ratio is 3 parts water, to 1 part milk.  The milk should be whole, or 2%.  We will be using 2 cups of milk, and 6 cups of water:

 If Annalena told you most of your work were done, would you believe her?  Well... please cut those squash into chunks, and add them, with the potatoes, to the sauteed onions, and add the milk/water mixture.  You'll cook this, for about 20 minutes.  Milk DOES bubble up, so keep the heat low, and do not cover the pot.  You'll know you're ready for the next step, when the squash and potatoes are so tender that a knife goes right through them:

 How did she get a green soup from those ingredients?  AH.  Now we find out.  You will need 8 ounces of baby spinach.  It is almost impossible to find an 8 ounce portion of baby spinach, unless you wish to take a detour and cook some yourself.  Annalena wishes you well in that case.  She took a package of 10 ounces of baby spinach:

 And then she added them directly to the hot liquid.  The spinach will collapse almost immediately.

 NOW, all you have to do is wait for the soup to cool, and puree it in your blender:

There is sentiment to cook a couple of cups of soup pasta (like pastina, stelline, or ditalini), and add it to the finished soup.  Annalena sees no reason for this, given the quantity of potatoes. She does like to add some dried tomato pesto to it, if she has it.    One thing you MUST do at this point, is taste the soup for salt, because we haven't added any.  We saved it to the end because our flavors here are not strong.  Also, we have just made approximately four quarts of soup.  Your salt preference will be different from the people with whom you will share it.

Soups based on potato and milk do not freeze well, so please plan to share this with friends.  Or have a big dinner party, based on this soup and some pizza, or a quiche, or something along those lines.

We get jaded during the squash season (like during corn season, or tomato season, or peach season, etc).  This is the tale end, ragazzi, and we will be switching to winter squash soon. So, make this while you can.  You will enjoy it.  And if you have picky eaters, they will, too.

Late summer vegetable soup, or okra soup, or gumbo soup. You decide

Ciao ragazzi.  As Annalena promised, she is giving you four recipes today.  Here is the finale.  It's a good one too.
Years ago, when Annalena was a vegetarian (the late 70s, through the early 90s), it was not that easy to find sources for cooking GOOD vegetarian cooking.  And if you keep in mind that GOOD is a relative term, one book that we all used, was "Laurel's Kitchen."  This book came out of the time when books of this type included very heartfelt, well written essays on why the writers had become vegetarian, what their philosophy was, etc.  You could take all of it, or part of it,  and you always had the recipes.
For Annalena,  the book was somewhat sanctimonious about the sacred nature of the home, and how women should consider giving up careers for something much more important:  sustaining their families.  Indeed, many of Laurel's recipes involved agonizing amounts of time.  For heaven's sake, she made her own FUCKING PHYLLO.  And she thought nothing about searching for an hour, two hours, etc, to get whole wheat pasta.  SHE MADE HER OWN FUCKING FIG NEWTONS.    Now, again, this could get very intimidating and scary for the beginning chef, but there is an honesty, and a "heart" to the recipes,  which led you back, time and time again.  Ok, so maybe you did NOT want to make the Indian "desam" starter which took three weeks of daily care, and maybe the tin foil did melt on the fruit cake which aged for four months, but there were other recipes that were either starters to more adventuresome cooking, or were end points with very good dishes.  For example, Annalena learned how to make "chilaquiles" from this book.  When she ate chilaquiles in an authentic Mexican restaurant, Annalena learned that the ones she made, were related as second or third cousins of the real thing, but at least there was a leg up in learning how to make them.
And there WERE recipes which did NOT involve tremendous amounts of time.  And Annalena goes back to Laurel, over and over.  This soup is based on one in the book, called "gumbo soup."  It mentions, early on, that some may not consider this "gumbo."  Indeed, Annalena does not.  There is some sentiment that says any dish which has okra in it, is "gumbo."  Others feel that naming any dish other than the complex creole "file' gumbo" as gumbo, is sacrilege.  So Annalena  gives you several names for this dish.
Also, because many of you will turn  your nose up to okra, Annalena suggests two things.  First, get to know okra better.  Annalena knows why you avoid it.  It's slimy.  And indeed, it CAN be.  It does not HAVE to be.  There are tricks, which Annalena will outline in this recipe.    Or, if you like the idea of this soup, make changes.  Substitute the okra with something else.  Annalena did that with a vegetable which revolts her:  lima beans.  Soup making is very much like that.  As Laurel says  "all you really need is vegetables, an onion and water."    We'll use water and onion, but we will use much more than that.  And here we go. 

There IS a somewhat intimidating list of ingredients, but when  you go through them, you probably have most of them, or can get them very easily.  Here's pics of all of them:

In the first photo, you will see a large onion, chopped,  three gloves of garlic, also chopped, five peeled and chopped plum tomatoes, and a serrano chili , cut in half lengthwise. 

The tomatoes are fresh.  If all you have are canned, use them.  Drain the liquid and use it for your stock, and chop up the tomatoes until you get a good two cups.  The serrano is optional. Don't use it, use a jalapeno, or use nothing.

The second photo contains the kernels from two ears of fresh corn, a chopped green  pepper, and two cups of peeled fava beans.  Those fava beans were supposed to be lima beans.  Nope.  Not on Annalena's watch.  She had favas, and in they went.  If you don't have favas or lima beans, think about the two options and find something similar.  You can do it.  (maybe canellini beans?)

And finally:

This soup was actually motivated by Annalena finding some beautiful organic okra and bringing it home, thinking she'd do something with it.  

Now, we start cooking.  We begin by sauteeing the onion, in two tablespoons of oil - any kind.  Annalena added half a teaspoon of cayenne pepper.  You don't have to:

After two minutes, toss in the garlic, and cook it for another two minutes.  Now, add the green pepper, the serrano if you are using it,

,  and the tomatoes

You want to add a teaspoon or so of salt, and cook these at low heat, for about five minutes.  You'll see the tomatoes begin to disintegrate into a small amount of juice.

NOW, and ONLY NOW, cut the okra into circles.  Start by getting rid of the blossom end at the top, and cut small circles.  You don't need the point either.  You want about two cups of the stuff:

While you are slicing the okra, you may feel a bit of the sliminess.  You won't get too much of it  (By the way, that sliminess is something called a "saponin."  These molecules are in the same family as are soaps). 

So after the five minutes of the pepper/tomato mixture cooking, you add the corn, the beans, and the okra:

That looks good, doesn't it?  We add another teaspoon of salt, and cook this gently, for about ten minutes.  All of these vegetables contain a great deal of water, and we're releasing it. 

Now, we add six cups of plain old water to the mix:

If you can lower your heat even more, do so, and let the stuff cook for another 10-15 minutes.    At that point, your soup is ready:

What you will find is that that "sliminess you expect from okra, has instead transformed this soup into something thicker, and silky.  You can eat this now, or you can let it sit, and it will thicken even more, to form almost a stew. 

Annalena will serve this with popovers. If you want to do that, check your search engine on this blog. Annalena gave you a recipe.  Popovers are rich, but go back and review:  there are two tablespoons of oil in this recipe, which produced three quarts of soup for Annalena.  She thinks you can have a rich side dish with this. 

Annalena will see you in two weeks, maybe with more recipes.  Hopefully so.  Now, she asks you all to go out, and cook.  And let her know how it goes. 

Looks harder than it is: fish poached in coconut milk

Ciao ragazzi.  Annalena realized today that she will not be around next week, so she's trying to get her recipes out now, so you are not deprived of them.  (Some of you, by the way, would do well to bookmark this page if you like the recipes, as Annalena is doing a facebook purge in honor of her birthday).
Can we have a show of hands:  how many of you don't cook fish because it's too hard?  Hmmm.  How about the rest of you who are lying?
AHA.  Annalena knew it.  Truth to be told, some fish IS harder to cook than other proteins, but it does not have to be.  Annalena cooks fish at least one day a week.  She does not spend much time in the kitchen doing it: no more than about half an hour.  And with this recipe, you are going to find that you spend just about that length of time, and you get a product which, well, JUST LOOK AT IT!!!!

So, ragazzi, let's begin.  You need to prep your aromatics:

What we have there, is one large jalapeno pepper, sliced (don't leave it out.  This is not a spicy dish and the pepper gives it bass notes), up at top. To the left, we have the sliced greens of a small bunch of scallions.  In the middle, a two inch slice of ginger, peeled and cut into strips.  To the right of the ginger,  we have two sliced cloves of garlic.  Finally, to the right of the ginger, we have a sliced shallot. 

Take everything but the scallions, and toss them into a big pot, with two tablespoons of vegetable oil, and saute until they begin to color:

When that happens, add two, 13 ounce containers of FULL FAT coconut milk.  Ragazzi, when you make this dish, you are working with very few calories.  Even full fat coconut milk, is not that fattening, and you need that richness for the fish you are going to use.  You will also want to add about 2 tablespoons of fish sauce.  (Annalena did not take pictures of this, and she apologizes). 

Bring this to medium heat, and let it come to a simmer.  While that is happening, prep your fish.  This is a pound of beautiful codfish, salted lightly, on both sides:

Put this in the coconut milk and aromatics, and lower the heat a bit.  Poach it for about 7 minutes.  Get a paddle, and pull it out of the milk, and if you have some rice  ready:

Now for some greens.  Annalena used bok choi.  Her recipe called for baby bok choi, which Annalena could not find.  So she used a mammoth bunch.  Since the leaves of bok choi cook faster than the stems, make a nice vertical cut, as such:

Take the white stems, and put them into the hot coconut milk.  After three minutes, add the leaves.  After another two minutes, fish them all out, together with the aromatic vegetables.  Add the scallion grens. Put everything over your fish and then, get a big spoon, and add the flavored coconut milk:

This really is not very difficult, is it ragazzi?  Do yourself a favor,  try this recipe.  You will NOT be disappointed. 

Saving what's good from the past: pumpkin loaf cake

Well, ragazzi, you didn't think Annalena would be content with giving you ONE recipe for the weekend, did you?  Nah, not when she has a few that are ready to share.  This one is not difficult, but it takes a bit of time, because you have to do it in steps.  And you have to read  Annalena's short essay on food history.

Annalena is interested in many things, two of which come together in this tale.  One is :  how do people adapt, foodwise, when a situation is stressful?  Now, when Annalena writes "stressful," she does not mean famine, or pestilence.  Perhaps it's best to rephrase it as:  what do people do in times of shortage?  Do they adapt to new foods, go hungry, or what. 
A second area that catches Annalena's interest, is what the "unmentioned" portion of a People did during a war.  To elaborate:  when Annalena grew up, she watched (not by choice), many movies about wars:  WWI..  WWII.  The Korean War.  The Civil War.  And so forth.   She never saw a person of color in these movies, and rarely, if ever, did she see women.  They were peripheral. 

Well, we now know that women and people of color had very important roles in "modern" warfare:  read "Code Girls"  or "Rise of the Rocket Girls," or of course,  "Hidden Figures" to learn more.  Annalena will not even speak to the growing literature on food in wartime.  Rather, she will speak to the area of desserts in war time.

Americans have sweet tooths.  We are not alone in that regard.  Indeed, we are far from the greatest per capita consumers of sugar (although we do our share).  Sugar, as we all know, is used in cakes, pies, cookies, etc.  Who hasn't had a fruit pie, or a cake with a sugary frosting, etc?  These products all, inevitably, use sugar, butter, and sometimes, eggs.  And in the case of many of them, fruit.

Well, during wartime, all of these items, were rationed.  Try telling a sweet tooth that "I have no more ration cards we can't have desserts."  American ingenuity responded, with what Annalena calls "the vegetable cakes."  Zucchini bread, carrot cake,  even beet cake, and so forth.  As a general rule, if you see a cake or "bread"  (the only difference in these seems to be the pan in which they were baked), based on what is not a fruit that you associate with "out of hand" eating, and if that cake or bread uses oil as its fat base, you have a war time cake.  It was too difficult to save up cards for butter and fruit, and they were frequently not available.  Oil was plentiful, and while eggs were rationed, if you knew someone who had a chicken, well... you were good to go.  All you had to do was save your sugar rations.  NOT the easiest thing to do, but much easier than securing all of  the traditional ingredients for a cake.  And so, a family of recipes, including this one, was born.  Pumpkin cake, out of a craving and a need.  And here comes Annalena's take on it.

First of all, when you make a "pumpkin" bread or cake, do keep in mind that all of the hard, orange and yellow squashes, are considered "pumpkin" by the FDA.   When you buy a can of pumpkin puree, or pumpkin pie filling, there is a good chance you are NOT getting jack o'lantern puree.  If you have a very discriminating taste, you may be able to tell them apart.  Annalena cannot tell the difference in FLAVOR.  She can tell the difference in TEXTURE.  So, while canned pumpkin is wonderful, if you can, work with freshly made pumpkin puree.

And it's easy to make.  You should work with pumpkins that weigh no more than 4 pounds each.   More than that, and you are not getting good value, carini.  Those larger specimens are awesome, but they are mostly shell, seed, and water. And they are a nightmare to work with.  If you can get two, 2 pound pumpkins instead of one, 4 pound pumpkin, even better.  For the recipe at hand, Annalena used:

See the jar in the background?  That is an empty, 8 ounce jam jar.  That will give you an idea of size.  

Ok, so now you preheat your oven to 425, and line a baking sheet with parchment.  Turn each pumpkin on its side, and make a horizontal cut, right down the middle.  Scoop out the seeds.  And then put the pumpkin halves, cut side down , on the paper.  Do nothing else.  Put them in the oven, and bake.  And bake.  You will know when they are done, when the thick shell collapses when you touch it.  At that point, you should let the pumpkin cool.  Hot pumpkin burns badly.   Trust Annalena on this.  Then, when cool, use a spoon to separate the pumpkin flesh from the skin.  It will happen easily.  Give the skin remnants to your friend who has a compost pile, and run the puree through a food processor.  As a rough estimate, a pound of raw pumpkin will give you one cup of puree.  Indeed,  Annalena got four cups , shared two with her pal Ravioli the pit bull, and used two for the cake we are making. 

Those two cups of  pumpkin are combined with the ingredients you see below:

What you see are four eggs,  1 cup of vegetable oil,  2.5 cups of sugar (if you like things really sweet, you can add another .25 cups),  and 3.5 cups of flour, to which Annalena has added  1/2 teaspoon of baking powder, 2 teaspoons of baking soda, 1.5 teaspoons of salt, and  a tablespoon of fresh ginger.  You can vary this spice:  use cinnamon if you like, nutmeg, allspice, cardamom, anything you like.  

What you do not see is the half cup of water, with a teaspoon of vanilla extract added to it (you could also use vanilla sugar), nor do you see the cup of toasted chopped walnuts (350 for five minutes, cool and rough chop).  And of course, you see two cups of cooked pumpkin.  

Now, you do not have to use the walnuts.  You can substitute them by 1.5 cups of chocolate chips, or you can use them both, or you can use raisins, or chopped dried prunes or figs, etc.    Or, you could just go  "nekkid" and add nothing. 

The first step in this recipe  befuddles many people, because it looks, well, gross.  You take the sugar and the oil, and put them in a mixer bowl, and churn, churn, churn.  When you use butter,  you get a nice, pretty , creamy product.  When you use oil, well, you get wet sand:

And that's fine.  That's what you want.  Now, you add the pumpkin, the eggs, and the water.  The resulting batter will be very light, and very wet:

Stop your mixer, and gently move in the flour mixture.  Mix it with the blender, at low speed, and only until you don't see flour anymore (Annalena prefers to do this by hand, with a spatula.  It is up to you). 

Now,  you are ready to pour.  Get two, 9x5 baking pans (these are called quickbread pans, by the way), and grease them really, really well.  Annalena uses a cooking spray.  Divide the batter between them:

See how much thicker it got?   Slide these into a 350 oven, and get set to wait.  These take a while (that's why you make two).  You will need at least an hour.  Maybe more.  Use the "straw test" to see if it's done:  insert a straw into the crest of cake (you'll see it in the next picture), and see  what adheres.  You want either a clean straw, or one with fairly dry crumbs attached.  No unbaked batter:

The cakes WILL crack. It's part of their charm.  Let them cool for about 15 minutes, and then turn them out. 

These cakes are dense.  Pumpkin has very little intrinsic flavor, so the only way to tap into that "pumpkin essence," which is the REAL flavor of pumpkin , rather than the coffee sold everywhere, is to make a dense cake:

The advantages and disadvantages of this cake stem from the same factor:  they are very, VERY moist.  Such a moist cake, does not have to be refrigerated.  Just place it in a bag when it is cool, and leave it on a counter.  The disadvantage, is that such a moist cake will mold,  in about 5 days.  So if you are not going to eat them both, pronto,  freeze one, or give it away.  

And there you have it.  These are great as they are, with cream cheese, with butter, and when toasted, you may get a marriage proposal.  If you do, Annalena will send you her recipe for carrot wedding cake. 

And that is all for now, ragazzi.  Next week, we will make a coconut milk poached fish, and a vegetable soup, based on okra

"Try it you like it" Pasta with brussels sprouts and pancetta (or, shiitakes)

Ciao ragazzi.  As we move into autumn - and it DOES seem  at times that we are moving into it at breakneck speed - we confront veggies which we either have not seen for a while, or which we've seen, and ignored.  And so it goes, with a veggie that Annalena REALLY does not like very much:  brussels sprouts.

Now, you must understand that, in classic Italian cooking, there are no brussels sprouts.  Indeed, when Italians confronted them, they had no word for them.  So, ingenious as Annalena's people are, they are called "cavolini":  little cabbages.   So, growing up, Annalena did not experience them.  As a  young thing, she did have them at school:  overcooked, stinky versions:  the lot of many veggies and many students.

As she grew older,  Annalena DID find one way she liked these buggers:  shredded, mixed with granny smith apples, pecans, butter, and maple syrup.  As one person put it  "Oh.  You like brussels sprouts brittle.  "  Indeed, they had a point.  Well, Annalena tried.  And she keeps trying. If you are a seasonal cook, and you live in the Northeast, come October, you will have to deal with them, one way or the other.  At dinner last night, Annalena dealt with them by ignoring them on her plate, even though they were clearly cooked perfectly (bright green, firm but not too firm, a nice char on their cut surfaces).  The Guyman likes them much more, and rescued Annalena, as he often does. 

Well, a few weeks ago, a recipe surfaced that used brussels sprouts in combination with many things Annalena likes:  pancetta.  pasta.  cheese.  chili peppers.  rosemary.  Hmmm.  And she made it .  And it's good.  So, ragazzi, if you are looking for a new way to try these cavolini, this is for you.

Here's how we begin.  Note well, that the proportions given, are for two portions.  Scale up if you need to.    Here are the majority of our ingredients:

What you see is a half pound of busiate pasta.  Annalena's Sicilian amici will recognize this immediately.  She suggests that the rest of you look it up, together with Sicily's heirloom wheat.  It's fascinating.  What you also see is half of a red serrano pepper, sliced, six whole cloves of garlic, 8 ounces of sliced brussels sprouts, some pancetta, and pecorino romano cheese.  You MAY see the sprig of rosemary as well.  You will see it  further on.  Promesso.

You start by cutting that little brown edge of the sprout away, and then slicing them thinly, lengthwise.  As noted above, half a pound of these.  It won't take as long as you think it will.

If you are one who eats meat,  you now need 4 ounces of diced pancetta:

Annalena's pancetta was thinly sliced, in circles, but you will usually get pancetta in one slab.  And that's fine.  Small cubes work as well.   If you are avoiding meat, you can substitute 6-8 ounces of fresh shitake mushroom heads .  Save the stems to make a stock.

You are also going to want to peel six nice cloves of garlic (and you may not want to scale this up).  You will also need a large sprig of rosemary, some olive oil, a sliced hot pepper (Annalena used serrano.  Use a jalapeno if that's what you have.  If you have none, use half a teaspoon of red pepper flakes.

You begin by putting two tablespoons of olive oil in a big wide pot, and adding the pancetta, and the rosemary sprig.  Many people work under the assumption that, because the pancetta is fatty, you do not need to add any oil.  That will burn your bacon, every time ragazzi.  The olive oil will draw off more fat, and you can drain it if you like.  

In any event, as you cook this, you will see the white fat on the pancetta begin to go translucent.  When that happens, add the hot pepper, and the cloves of garlic

What you see here, is the pancetta and rosemary as the pancetta has crisped and the fat has come off.   That took about two minutes.  After you add the garlic and pepper, the pancetta will begin to brown, after about another two minutes. 

At this point, start bringing a pot of rapidly boiling, salted water, because you will be ready to add the pasta soon. 

Ok, so after you've cooked the garlic and the pepper for a while, add those slices brussels sprouts and about a quarter cup of water.  Press the slices of cavolini down on the metal to brown them a little.  Cook that way for a minute, stir them, and repeat.   You're looking for something like this:

And after about 5 minutes, you will have:

Cook your pasta, whatever type it may be, to just a little underdone.  While that pasta is cooking, you really should take the garlic cloves out.  You're not going to eat them, unless you're a true alium lover. 

When the pasta is ready, toss it into that pan, without the garlic.  Taste the pasta to see if it is at the texture you like, and when you're done, plate it up, and grate pecorino over it:

Annalena liked this so much,  she wanted to make it again.  And she will. 

Now, she made this before she sat to dinner last night and shunned plain brussels sprouts, so she's not there yet.  But progress is made in small steps.   So, make some progress ragazzi, and make some pasta while you're at it.  The season is nigh.