the joke goes something like this: when it’s summer in nashville you need to lock your car doors when you go anywhere otherwise when you come back there will be a bushel of zucchini on your passenger seat.

and THEN what would you do? because sometimes zucchinis and yellow squash can be a little perplexing, if only due to the lack of excitement they tend to cause.

i was reading ruhlman’s last post and decided that a version of his sauteed zucchini recipe would be a perfect jumping off point for a pasta dinner with friends. it’s hot as hell out and i’m eating very lightly right now – paying for some recent past indulgences. i knew i owed you all a pasta dish and although there’s really no recipe here, i urge you to do what i did with ruhlman’s post and just get inspired and use up a few zucchini and squash from your csa haul or garden or local farmers market.

oh, so there’s that and i need to tell you about a gadget… because i use them on occasion and this one is kind of fun, as gadgets go…

enter: the saladacco spiral slicer…

photo from the sur la table web site…

i’ve never hidden the fact that my knife skills are pretty lame if not dangerous. i get by, barely, so i tend to rely heavily on my mandoline, food processor slicer attachment and the kindness of others. and on occasion, this nifty little device which does two things. it makes long curly ribbons out of firm vegetables and it also makes an angel hair like strand. fun with vegetables. good times.

2 minced shallots and about 6 minced garlic cloves got sweated in some olive oil

and then added to that was a bit of salt and red pepper flakes.

next in went the zucchini, yellow squash and carrots and a good amount of fresh thyme. after about 3 minutes i added some butter and hit it with a good squeeze of lemon juice. it was tossed with some spaghettini and you can tell by the color that i used one of those multi grain omega 3 high protein pastas – but in a perfect world where i didn’t have to think about fiber and protein – OR if you were coming to dinner, i would have just used white pasta because it’s just better.

the dish was finished with some lightly toasted mediterranean pine nuts which are both hard to find and expensive. since, you’ve come to expect that from me, i didn’t want to let you down.

oh and tomatoes. it is august after all…

the scallops arrived at my door on a dreary winter’s morning, overnighted from catalina seafood in san diego. they were the huge dry diver scallops – 6 to a lb. and just as beautiful as i’d ever seen. i had decided upon another sardinian recipe by my new bff chef efisio farris (i’m currently on a roll). you see, i’ve been in a bit of a scallop rut. i buy them. i sear them. and then usually just throw them on top of a salad. if i’m feeling semi ambitious i might puree a well steamed head of cauliflower with some fresh thyme and olive oil and plop a few scallops on that. because to me, scallops usually mean a cook-free, no fuss dinner. they are just SO EASY. and the best ones are perfectly delicious with just a good sear.

but this recipe spoke to me. i had both fregola, a small toasted pasta and some saffron in the cupboard along with some freshly made chicken stock in the fridge, so all i had to do was make a quick produce run.

if you want to know how to perfectly sear a scallop, the secret is to begin with some of these beauties… never frozen, firm and plump and HUGE. just get the pan very hot, add some butter or olive oil – or both, and sear away until nicely caramelized. if they look white as snow and ooze liquid, chances are they’ve been soaked in phosphates making it nearly impossible for them to brown without overcooking. they’ll also shrink up and not have much flavor. something to perhaps ask your fishmonger before you buy. of course here in nashville the closest thing we have to a fishmonger is the guy behind the counter at whole foods. oh, the cost of living landlocked…

it’s a beautiful presentation. the sear of the scallops with the saffron and bits of tomato and arugula. pretty food. but the sweetness of the honey against the salt of the scallops and the peppery arugula are what will make you fall…

pan-seared scallops with fregula and roasted vegetables
adapted from sweet myrtle and bitter honey by efisio farris

1 cup chicken stock
1 cup fregola (you could substitute israeli couscous if you had to)
1 bay leaf
1 pinch saffron
5 tablespoons olive oil
2 pinches sea salt
2 green onions, chopped
1 shallot, chopped
1 stalk celery, diced
1 zucchini, diced
1 yellow squash, diced
1 roma tomato, seeded and diced
12 diver scallops
1 bunch of arugula, chopped
1 tablespoon abbamele (i used honey)

 in a medium saucepan, bring the stock to a boil. add fregula, bay leaf, saffron, 1 tablespoon of olive oil and a pinch of salt. cook covered for 8 to 10 minutes. all liquid should be absorbed by the fregula.

heat 2 tablespoons olive oil in a medium skillet over medium heat. saute green onions, shallot and celery for 2 to 3 minutes. add zucchini, squash and tomato and cook for another 2 to 3 minutes. combine fregula and vegetables and cook on low heat for another minute. add additional stock or hot water if it seems too dry.

in another skillet heat remaing 2 tablesppons of oil and cook scallops until golden and sprinkle with a pinch of salt. turn and brown the other side.

divide fregola mixture among 4 plates and top with the arugula, or you can use the arugula as a bed for the fregula. top each with 3 scallops.

finish by drizzling honey and some good olive oil.

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again, it’s the ingredients. everything that went into this dish was at its best. the scallops from catalina ocean products were truly beyond wonderful.

and you see? it’s a 20 minute dinner. just add some good bread and a bottle of wine, and you’re amazing!

but i knew that already… 

sea urchin. i’m enamored. and i have been for quite some time although it’s usually called uni and served to me over a slab of rice. well ok, not necessarily – at least not anymore. not since i had it served on a piece of lightly toasted bread, draped with the thinnest, barely warmed slice of lardo at marea in nyc. thank you chef michael white. because that right there was a most memorable bite, one that set the tone for one of my top 3 meals of ’09.

and sure, there have been a few pastas with sea urchin ordered at various restaurants (a voce, esca and marea come to mind…). and then there was that whole bourdain/ripert food porn spectacle at le bernardin… i watched that and yearned… deeply… (for both tony and the taglietelle.)

but just 3 days ago i was lucky enough to find myself in possession of two 80 gram trays of the freshest most lovely sea urchin that one might ever come across – overnighted via fedex from san diego. i nearly made that eric ripert version which is pretty much a butter sauce fortified with pureed sea urchin and then embellished with chives, espelette, parmigiano and a touch of lemon – not to mention the generous dollop of osetra… but it just seemed TOO rich. TOO heavy. not that i’m knocking it. i’m quite sure that it’s an experience unto itself and one that i plan on having at some point, but right now i’m trying to keep it light – so i begrudgingly shied away from that.

and then i found it. right in the ny times. the perfect dish…

a close up for you of one of the most wonderful things i’ve made perhaps ever… but then again i’d not eaten any pasta for nearly a solid month so it’s hard to know. regardless, i highly – but highly recommend this dish.

it blew me away.

spicy spaghettini with sea urchin and tomatoes
adapted from chef beatrice tosti of il posto accanto in nyc

makes 4 small plates

8 ounces dry spaghettini
sea salt
3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil, more for drizzling
6 cloves garlic, peeled
a scant 1/2 teaspoon crushed red chili flakes
12 ounces grape or cherry tomatoes, preferably organic, halved
about 2 1/2 ounces sea urchin – one standard tray
freshly grated zest of an organic lemon
small handful flat-leaf parsley leaves, freshly chopped.

bring a medium pot of well salted water to a boil over high heat. meanwhile, in a skillet large enough to later hold all the pasta, heat the olive oil over medium heat. add garlic, reduce heat to low, and slowly cook on all sides, turning often, until cloves are lightly browned and caramelized, about 10 minutes.

raise heat under skillet to medium, add chili flakes and cook, stirring, until toasted, about 2 minutes. add tomatoes and cook, turning gently, just until wilted.

when water boils, add the pasta. stir well. when pasta is cooked through but still firm, drain, reserving 1 cup cooking water.

turn heat under skillet to low. add about 3/4 of the sea urchin to skillet with a splash of pasta cooking water. add pasta to skillet and toss thoroughly but gently over low heat, adding pasta cooking water and more oil to taste if mixture is dry. taste for salt and toss in lemon zest and parsley.

serve hot, decorating each serving with remaining sea urchin.

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a huge shout out to catalina offshore products for supplying me with this incredible seafood. they dive for the sea urchin when the weather permits and then ship it directly to your door. it was just excellent and as fresh as it gets.

it arrives in this small, slim box surrounded by ice packs

and this right here is the beautiful golden sea urchin.
which by the way is not actually roe, they’re the gonads of both the males and females..

as in testicles and ovaries.

and dear readers after all we’ve meant to each other
i wouldn’t kid you about a thing like this…

in my ongoing hunt for new ways to prepare bottarga, by far one of my most favorite things to eat, i googled ‘bottarga and cream’ wondering what i might find. after all, one eats good caviar with creme fraiche so i felt i might be on to something. and once again the interwebs provided me with what was just yesterday completely unknown, and now will never be forgotten. thank you al gore.

the martha. you come for the guests (she has the best) and you leave – well, often because of martha. case in point. enter eficio farris. a dallas based chef from sardinia and writer of ‘sweet myrtle and bitter honey – flavors of sardinia‘. i’d never heard of him and now he’s my latest italian chef crush. move over michael white (of alto, convivio and my new most favorite restaurant marea)… because i’ve got sardinia to explore and eficio is taking me there.

yes, i love bottarga. it’s rich and deep and sings of the ocean at its sexiest, you know, the one below the rocky cliffs of any given country on the mediterranean sea. or in this case just off the coast of tampa where my dear friend RK catches these mullet each autumn, carefully packs the roes in salt and lets the floridian sun do the rest. in another preparation, he also gently smokes the roes, rendering them ever so slightly crisp on the outside and soft and smoky beyond measure on the inside, but that’s for another time…

when i saw the dish being put together on this video, it reminded me of burrata and how the cream fortifies the fresh mozzarella transforming it into something other worldly. i knew that i wanted to use sheep’s milk ricotta – impossible to procure in nashville, so it was back to pastacheese.com, once again flying in 3 lbs, which comes to them directly from italy. being a highly perishable product it becomes an exercise in timing and willingness to pay the price. dare i say it’s the most exercise i’ve had all year…

i did the sheep’s milk ricotta shuffle once before when i made the uovo raviolo’s, a specialty of the then san domenico’s chef odette fada. odette moved with the owners of san domenico’s to the new and wonderful restaurant SD26 off madison ave in nyc. when i was there a few months ago they brought me one of these raviolo’s, and really they’re a revelation…

this pasta is everything i love about italian cooking. it’s got but a few flawless ingredients.

so find them. and make this.

malloreddus with sheep’s milk ricotta and bottarga
adapted from eficio farris ‘sweet myrtle and bitter honey – flavors of sardinia’

chef farris uses dry bottarga in the video. i’m not nearly as much of a fan of that powdery substance. i think the fresh is a much better product and worked wonderfully in the dish.

1 pound short tubular pasta, such as malloreddus
1 cup heavy cream
1 cup sheep’s milk ricotta cheese
about half a cup of grated bottarga – i used the fresh on the large side of a box grater
freshly ground black pepper
1 bunch fresh flat-leaf parsley, finely chopped
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

bring a large pot of salted water to a boil; add pasta
meanwhile, heat heavy cream in a large saucepan over medium heat.
add ricotta and stir until well combined.
cook, stirring constantly, until thickened and well combined, about 5 minutes.
stir in about 2/3′s of the bottarga and season with freshly ground black pepper.
drain pasta and add to ricotta mixture.
add parsley and toss until well combined
stir in olive oil.
transfer pasta to a serving dish and sprinkle with the remaining bottarga.
serve immediately.

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the sardinians say that malloreddus pasta is shaped like a tear but really that is nothing but delusional. they look very much like larvae. but regardless, they fill up beautifully with this creamy sauce which has been somehow infused with the ocean.

again, if you are willing to track down the ingredients, you’ll be thrilled and delighted.

and if you think that sounds ordinary, then boy are you wrong. you’re even so wrong that you’ve got no idea just how wrong you really are. because this is scott conant’s recipe from scarpetta – and it is beyond wonderful. this plate of food along with a glass of something very worthwhile – and i am telling you, there could be nothing better. different? perhaps. but better? impossible.

the entire dish consists of 9 ingredients. including the pasta, oil, salt and pepper… the other 5 are tomatoes, basil leaves, crushed red pepper, a bit of parmigiano – and a bit of butter. but it’s the way it’s done – the simple technique that makes it superior. of course, at the end of the day it’s all in the excellence of the ingredients along with impeccable execution. thank you and good night.

and then i did something that i never do. something i’ve steadily refused to do. but i went ahead and i did it. because scott said to – and i knew there was no way around it…

i know. CRAZY right? i skinned those fuckers. despite all past declarations i went there. and i must tell you that for this dish there is just no getting around it. boil the damn water that you’ll later use for the pasta, blanch your tomatoes and then plunge them into a waiting bowl of ice water. it’s not even a deal breaker. who knew?

scarpetta’s tomato and basil spaghetti
by scott conant via ‘good morning america’

about 20 ripe plum tomatoes
about 1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil, plus more to finish the dish
a pinch of crushed red pepper
# Kosher salt
black pepper, freshly ground
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1 ounce parmigiano, freshly grated (about 1/2 cup)
about 7 fresh basil leaves, well washed and dried, stacked and rolled into a cylinder and cut thinly crosswise into a chiffonade
1 pound spaghetti, either high-quality dry or homemade

to peel the tomatoes: bring a large pot of water to a boil. have a large bowl of ice water nearby. cut a small x on the bottom of each tomato. ease about five tomatoes in the pot and cook, let boil for about 15 seconds, and then promptly move them to the waiting ice water. (do this with the remaining tomatoes.) pull off the skin with the tip of a paring knife. if the skin sticks, try a vegetable peeler using a gentle sawing motion. cut the tomatoes in half and use your finger to flick out the seeds.

to cook the tomatoes: In a wide pan, heat the 1/3 cup of olive oil over medium-high heat until quite hot. add the tomatoes, red pepper flakes, and season lightly with the salt and pepper. (i always start with a light hand with the salt and pepper because as the tomatoes reduce, the salt will become concentrated.) Let the tomatoes cook for a few minutes to soften. then, using a potato masher, chop the tomatoes finely. cook the tomatoes for 20 to 25 minutes, until the tomatoes are tender and the sauce has thickened. (you can make the sauce, which yields about 3 cups, ahead of time. refrigerate it for up to 2 days or freeze it for longer storage.)

to serve: bring a large pot of amply salted water to a boil. cook the spaghetti until just shy of al dente. reserve a little of the pasta cooking water. add the pasta to the sauce and cook over medium-high heat, gently tossing the pasta and the sauce together with a couple of wooden spoons and a lot of exaggerated movement (you can even shake the pan) until the pasta is just tender and the sauce, if any oil had separated from it, now looks cohesive. (if the sauce seems too thick, add a little pasta cooking liquid to adjust it.) take the pan off of the heat and toss the butter, basil, and cheese with the pasta in the same manner (the pasta should take on an orange hue) and serve immediately.

do not adapt. do not adjust. can i ask you to just follow this one AS IS? the reason being that it is simply and truly exceptional. because i know you. YES YOU. so do not omit the pepper flakes or even think of adding garlic. just let it be, people. just let it be…

scott says that ‘the key is in the finish’ so just do what the man says and you will be loved by the masses. trust me on this one. when you can make something so incredibly simple taste SO MUCH BETTER than the next guy’s tomato sauce on pasta…

that right there is totally cool. i don’t care who you are…

as an afterthought, i thought i’d share with you the dorkiest of food blogger photos that i took with my own two hands.

and then i woke up and got a life.

i mean, is that precious or what?

when you make something that has only 4 ingredients, that all get crushed together, with no heat applied whatsoever, what can possibly make your dish stand apart?

using pesto in your cooking, if only on occasion – is pretty much obligatory. it’s a flavor bomb. a crowd pleaser. pesto works on nearly everything one might imagine. we all like it. we all make it.

and i am here to tell you why mine is better…

1. olive oil – use ligurian. why? ligurian olive oil is not looking to overpower. it is light and fruity, unlike the more powerful tuscan and sicilian oils – and if you use a stronger, heavier, spicier oil, it’ll kill the flavor of your pesto. better to buy the light bertolli from your supermarket that tastes neutral. come to think of it, a spanish oil might work well here due to the gentler, buttery nature of those olives. regardless – think light. or just pick up some ligurian oil.

2. basil – fresh from the garden, picked minutes before using and soaked in water for a few minutes – otherwise it is too strong.

3. pine nuts – mediterranean. not chinese. these are long and slender. not the squat triangular version. they are lower in fat and higher in flavor. and they’re hard to find. and wildly expensive. but then, you’ve come to expect this of me…

4. cheese – i use mostly parmigiano, sometimes mixed with a little pecorino

this time around, i didn’t use a mortar and pestle, but i wish i had, if only to get the creamier texture. and i added some garlic – although not too much – that this saturday when i make it again, i won’t. and the pasta, the shape is called casareccia – a curving twisted tube that holds the pesto beautifully. although it’s a stellar italian dried pasta, this will be replaced with freshly home-rolled thin sheets made with a blend of ap flour, 00 flour, seriously farm fresh eggs and white wine.

the black tomatoes bought at my local farmers market the day before, were roughly chopped and thrown in raw, right on top. the pesto was thinned with some of the hot pasta water and then it all got tossed together. i regret not taking an ‘after’ shot. this dish is my kind of rustic, beautiful food.

all in all it was a perfect lunch on a sunday summer afternoon, accompanied by a wonderful bastianich rosé.

but this coming saturday night’s pesto? it might just kick this one’s proverbial ass.

stay tuned…

(the perfect pesto) <— for your viewing pleasure

ok. this was good. as in very good. as in i won’t go all yoplait ad on you, but this was another definite do-over. and the sooner the better.

i take very little credit as this plate of pasta was nothing more than a blend of: the latest post from rachel eats‘ blog, along with the addition of some murray’s cheese mail-ordered burrata. i’ve since found out – and to my surprise, that trader joe’s carries "burrata", but my obvious thoughts on that were although it’d most likely do in a pinch, there’s no way it could be even close to the same quality as these delicate cream filled mozzarella balls made in italy on monday, and at my door on wednesday…

because you deserve a closer look…

it’s hot as hell in nashville. we’re on day 10 of 90+ degrees with the usual humidity issue, and well, cooking is only so appealing. the ovens are off limits but i will boil a pot of water and saute some onions – and happily.

but here’s what i won’t do. although i preach high quality ingredients and authentic preparation, here’s another ceF ruling to go along with the whole ”i don’t do pastry crusts" thing. so now you can just go on ahead and add to that – "i don’t slip the skins off tomatoes". because honestly, it just seems SILLY. yet despite this blatant admission, i still struggle with the fact (if only ever so slightly) that this conscious oversight would be sneered upon by better cooks than me. i mean the italian nonas do things for GOOD REASON. but then i quickly rationalize the whole thing – i honestly don’t think it changes the experience. and i’m at peace with tomato skins – though i have succumbed to certain other kitchen practices such as always trussing my chickens.

adding to the list of ‘do’s', i also have claimed the red onion as my personal onion of choice for nearly all cooking purposes. i just like them better. and they look beautiful on my counter.

an important component of this dish is that you barely cook the tomatoes. for the record, mine were not home grown, as those are not quite yet available in nashville, but joyously coming soon. still, what i’d picked up at TJ’s were juicy and tomatoey. i used a fair amount of chopped basil from my herb pots, adding it the same time i added the chopped tomatoes to my pan of slowly sauteed onions, thinly sliced into half moons. you salt, you pepper and you’re done in 15 minutes. if that.

and then i strayed away from the recipe because I AM A REBEL and cut a creamy burrata ball in half and plopped it on top along with some more fresh basil. it’s a perfect dish. it just is. even with the aforementioned skins still thinly present…

but by far, the best part of dinner was the company. we had new friends over – emily and kevin. they brought extra tomatoes (in case), bread (i had none), wine (2 bottles of pino grigio) and a glazed lemon almond poppyseed cake that was quite good and tangy. and while we all sat there happily digging in to our respective slices, emily took her first bite and i watched as she sat there wrestling the flavors and consistency in her brain, thinking out loud about all of the things she perhaps could have done for it to have been better – and how she could improve upon it the next time.

and i thought to myself, i’m going to love this chick…

update  – with 3 reports now in on trader joe’s burrata, i am strongly recommending that you stay far away. my good friend heidi robb who i trust implicitly says, "Take a big hearty PASS. Their Mandara buffalo mozzarella is more burrata like than this insipid stuff."

every now and then a dish comes along that knocks me out. and i don’t even mean anything complicated. just a simple plate of food that satisfies you on some primal level – food that is almost soulful. like this ‘pasta. to. die. for’. it’s barely even cooking, yet it blows my mind every time i make it. and now, this pasta ceci. i mean, where have you been all my life? all those trips to italy – all those italian dinners and piles of books – somehow i’ve missed you. but now i know, and it’s all with thanks to rachel, an english woman living in rome who authors the beautiful blog, ‘rachel eats‘.

rarely do i ever cook things twice. perhaps mostly because my cooking tends to be experimental or often just a curiosity – or i don’t remember what i even did to ever redo it. but this pasta ceci? this will be made often. after all, we’re talking both pasta AND (rancho gordo) beans…

pasta ceci
from rachel eats

first and foremost, i doubled this recipe and i’m glad to have had the foresight to do so. i highly recommend doing this and freezing some. i used red onions, extra tomato paste and i used my chicken stock to supplement the liquid.

serves 4

250g dried chickpeas soaked overnight and then simmered for 2 hours until tender or 450g tinned chickpeas
6 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
medium carrot peeled and finely diced
stick of celery finely diced
mild onion peeled and finely diced
2 tbsp tomato concentrate
small sprig of rosemary
500ml vegetable or chicken stock or water the chickpeas were cooked in with more plain water added to make up the 500ml if necessary.
optional – 500ml extra water or stock for if you cook the pasta in the soup.
parmesan rind
salt and freshly ground black pepper
225g small dried tubular pasta
your nicest oil for on top

prepare your soffrito of finely chopped onion, carrot and celery, sauteing them gently and slowly in the oil in a large heavy based pan until soft and floppy and translucent.
then you add the tomato concentrate and a sprig of rosemary, stir, and then add 2/3 of your cooked chickpeas.
stir again and then cover everything with stock or water, throw in a parmesan rind. bring the pan to a happy boil, reduce to a simmer and then leave the pan to bubble away gently for about 20 minutes.
now remove the rind and rosemary and pass everything through the mouli or give it a blast with the hand blender to create a smooth gloopy soup.
now you add the rest of the cooked chickpeas and season to taste with salt and freshly ground black pepper.
now the two choices:
1. you can either add some more water or stock to the soup, bring it to the boil and cook your pasta directly in the soup
or
2. you can cook your pasta separately in some fast boiling salted water and then add it to the soup, then let things rest for about 5 minutes so the flavours mingle.

serve dribbled with more extra virgin olive oil and some freshly grated parmesan..

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everything i needed was already in my refrigerator, freezer and pantry except for the ditalini pasta which i could have substituted with any number of the other pastas that are currently shelved…

but i never said i was completely cured, now did i?

or maybe it’s not a pesto. i’m really not quite sure as there’s no cheese or nuts in this first version although in the second dish, both of those are added in a non-classical way. but regardless, i came home one afternoon last week and once again decided to cook by what needed ‘to go’. a very large container of baby spinach was still looking good, but 8 days after purchase, needed to be used. so that was the basis for what then became 2 fabulous dinners.

i’m on a mission to make a dent in what currently exists in my kitchen, as i’m wondering if the over abundance of food is acting as a sort of psychological stronghold, protecting everything from my safety to my image. so it’s time to lighten the freezer load, use some of the pricey condiments i’ve collected – and take cues from my voluptuous pantry. it’s springtime after all… and there’s nothing like a good purge.

i just find this to be beyond gorgeous…

the day before, i’d taken all of 15 minutes out of my life to reorganize my sizable freezer. seriously, it took only a mere 15 minutes and it shed a lot of light on what we’ll be eating these coming weeks. but for this dish i grabbed the 1/3 of a bag of frozen peas, a little ziplock of my fresh breadcrumbs and the very last bit of chris’s guanciale.

from the fridge came basil leaves – also needing an immediate purpose, peeled garlic cloves (thank you bittman) and the expensive bottle of verjus that was bought 2 years ago and barely used. luckily, it keeps…

into the processor went the spinach, peas (still frozen) and garlic. i used some ligurian olive oil but tried to keep it light, drizzling in the verjus for both a brightness aspect and the needed liquid. salt and pepper were added, the breadcrumbs were folded in by hand and salted water was put on to boil.

i diced up the little piece of guanciale, threw it in a pan until it rendered its fat and browned slightly. the "pesto" was then added along with some pasta water to loosen. the pasta was cooked and drained. simple.

but can we talk about these noodles? because for those of you that missed it – you need to have a look here. in a blind taste test, new york magazine had three top italian chefs and one ‘eater’ judge 8 brands of spaghetti. trader joe’s pasta, the inexpensive underdog came in first among some pretty surprising contenders. the very close second is the brand that i mail order on a regular basis and is 8x the price. and now i think we all know what i’ll be buying from here on in. the pasta pictured above is tj’s and it was just excellent in every way. who knew?

and then there was this dish…

lesley came for dinner the next night. she’s one of those incorruptible vegetarians. no pork for lesley. so out came the little grape tomatoes i’d bought that day, pignoli’s from the freezer and what was left of some 2 week old fontina cheese. the pasta, lazzaroli’s red pepper linguine, had been in my freezer for easily 6 months (and still in excellent condition) and would fit in just perfectly. while the water heated, pignoli’s were thrown in a pan until they took on a bit of color, the spinach pesto base was added along with the tomatoes, now sliced in half. when the pasta was cooked i took some of the liquid and added that to the pan, the linguine went in and everything was tossed together. fontina was added and – dinner.

pesto, schmesto – whatever it was, it was all wonderful…

because that’s what was in my pantry – and fridge – and freezer. friends were coming by on short notice and i needed to shop from my ever abundant kitchen. anything to appease some of the guilt from being perpetually overstocked and avoid a trip to the market. so although this was pretty much a throw together kind of dinner, there was a lot of to choose from. i try and do better in this regard, but i am a serial food buyer – forever curious.

it may soon be time for another month or so of "eating down the house". it could use happening…

but i had a box of beautiful saffron pasta that had been waiting patiently to be used, and some pinky orangey skinned snapper fillets that had been bought on a whim and thrown in the freezer nearly too long ago, plus the tail end of a bag of medium frozen shrimp bought for my sweet old kitty and used as treats. he’s been gone 4 months now and it was time to finish them up. pancetta is always a staple in my freezer, and i had an onion, some garlic, the remains of a still fresh bunch of parsley, a bottle of pinot grigio and a little glass vial of saffron that i’d been hanging on to…

there’s not much here in the way of a recipe. i could get specific but it’s really unnecessary and quite frankly, i couldn’t even begin to remember. feel free to use shallots instead of onions. for the pork – you can use chorizo, bacon or italian sausage instead of pancetta. or try some dry vermouth instead of white wine. add mussels, lobster, clams… it’s all going to work together – and it’s going to be delicious.

the onion gets cooked for a few minutes in olive oil, then add some diced pancetta, followed by a few minced garlic cloves. next the wine – i used about half a bottle, then add the saffron. throw the pasta into the water and add it into the pan when it’s just barely done – al dente to the max. i cooked the fish in a smoking hot cast iron skillet, crisping the skin really well. the shrimp were thrown in at some point but i can’t recall exactly when.

regarding the saffron, i used a full half gram of hand harvested d.o. from la mancha.. a big fat pinch. i’m a more is more kinda gal. and it was wonderful. and i’d do it again. and soon.

like many of you, this is the way i cook nearly all the time. i wing it. i change things. i substitute. i was inspired by a post i saw a few weeks back and it got me thinking.

and that’s really all it ever takes…

bittman made this. and then i did too. and now you should. because it’s both fast and easy and well, quite perfect. besides the 4 ingredients in the title there’s only red chili flakes, olive oil and a bit of cheese on top – that’s it.

this is a humble dish. a weeknight dish. although it’s also a perfect primi for a bigger dinner. to be quite honest, this pasta opened for the pompano. but on a different day it would have been very respectable all on its own.

so yes, these are the kinds of dishes you need to know about. and really, any green will do. you could add some fresh oven roasted tomatoes, some grilled baby eggplant slices – or hey, use zucchini. because you know that’s coming in droves. you csa members out there? soon enough it will be Zucchini Forever. so you are very welcome in advance. because i know you. come august? you’ll be begging for a fresh take on a zucchini dish… so toasted garlic and fresh breadcrumbs are now IMPORTANT. because together they make nearly everything better.

a sharper close up because i thought you might be pining for a better look at this…

oh, and as you might imagine, the process is a total cinch. just get some well salted water to a rolling boil. in the meantime heat some olive oil in a pan and toast some sliced garlic until it’s a light brown. reserve off to the side. then do the same for your fresh breadcrumbs. and listen, there’ll be no panko or store bought crumbs allowed here, ok? just dice up some good leftover fresh bread or give it a quick whirl in the old fo-pro. bag and freeze. then use with abandon whenever…

the broccoli rabe goes into the boiling water first and after 3 or 4 minutes, it’s removed with tongs and placed in a bowl of very cold water. drain and roughly chop the greens and set aside. then the pasta goes into the water to cook. when it’s done, add the noodles to a very warm pan along with the greens. add the chili flakes to taste and then toss well with perhaps a bit more olive oil – only if needed. plate the pasta, adding the toasted breadcrumbs, then some of the garlic slices and a bit of cheese – parmigiano or pecorino. use whatever you have on hand. you don’t need much.

i love this kind of dish. every ingredient pops. and it’s just so basic – but somehow it’s also so damn good. so good that really, i could eat this over and over again, reincarnating it into something a bit different each time. or not.

you see that bowl right there? it’s my kind of food…

(bittman’s version with a video – i just love this guy)

as i’ve been going on and on about – ad nauseam, i’m 5 weeks into a pretty serious diet shift. but in the name of sanity and well, umm, cosmc fairness i felt the need to make my own pasta. so the other day i ate lightly, preparing for a higher calorie dinner – and then yesterday i really watched the calories, keeping my average daily intake to where it needed to be. was i hungry? a little. did i live? well, here i am to tell the tale…

my daughter is 27. and although we met when she was already 12, i made it a point to raise her on very good quality food. i baked all our bread, made all our pizzas, cookies, cakes – and shopped almost exclusively at the local health food market. it mattered to me that she would grow up knowing the difference between what i considered to be good food – and what was readily available to a teenager in nashville. so these days, when she shows up at the house i love nothing more than to cook her the food she craves, dishes she’d never make for herself. also now that there’s a 6 year old in tow, i really enjoy having the opportunity to turn my sweet boy on to new taste sensations and hear him exclaim "wow, grand claud – i really like this!".

but i’ve been being careful. oh so painfully careful. making the right choices. keeping it lean. counting. weighing. doing the weight loss math. but here’s the deal. because we all have our limits, right? diet or no diet. there will be pasta. and the only thing better than pasta is homemade pasta. and my girl is a pasta fiend. really she’s a fool for gnocchi… and i need to get on that. but pasta always makes her very happy which in turn satisfies me to no end. see? pasta. it’s the quintessential win/win. of this i am quite sure.

the italian dish had written about a batali pasta that she’d made not long ago, and after lusting after it i filed it away in my non existent memory and promptly forgot all about it. but a few days ago when flipping through the ‘babbo cookbook’ for ideas, my eyes fell upon a recipe that immediately appealed to me and also seemed vaguely familiar. sure enough it was that very same one. destiny at play, no doubt. so i caught a ride to the market (still carless) and bought parsnips. i also managed to lay my hands on some marigold yolked farm fresh eggs and i defrosted the hunk of pancetta that tom from lazzaroli’s had sold me a few months back.

the recipe called for black pepper pasta and with all my pasta making to date, i’ve yet to add in anything to the flour besides some eggs and a touch of oil and water. i used mostly 00 flour and added about 20% semolina bringing it to about 4 cups of flour total. this batch took 4 eggs, 2 yolks, about a teaspoon or so of olive oil and maybe 2 tablespoons of water. i barely measured anything and well, it came out wonderfully. the miracle of pasta making never ceases to amaze me. the next time i will be sure and grind the pepper finer as i noticed the pasta tore in a few places from the bigger pieces of peppercorn dragging through the roller. while the pasta strips dried out a bit, i decided instead of making fettuccine with my cutters, i’d just roughly cut the pasta into thick rectangular strips. i’ve no idea the exact name for this shape but it’s like a maltagliati.

the pancetta gets browned and then removed from the pan. in goes about one tablespoon of butter and two of olive oil. the 4 parsnips were peeled and chopped into coins and browned until crisp, next went the leeks. i used 3, sliced into quarters and when wilted and a bit caramelized, i added some salt, deglazed the pan with an italian red and in went chopped parsley and the pancetta. the pasta was drained and added to the pan along with about 1/4 cup of the pasta water. finito. serve with grated parmegiano.

the red wine was kind of a no-brainer. i can’t imagine mario not wanting you to deglaze that pan – but well, he didn’t mention it and i just had to. after all, i had just fried a BACONlike substance in that pan which is a rarity around here so there was no way i wasn’t going to get all that flavor back. really mario. wtf?

and the leeks were an afterthought. i had bought them for no particular reason and when grabbing the parsnips from the refrigerator, i thought it all made sense. and for those of you suspicious about parsnips (and yes, lauren – i am looking at you, honey) it’s high time you saw this vegetable as versatile. it’s delicious. and nutritious. any other applicable words ending in -cious, please let me know.

but hey… dear readers, i just needed to bring attention to my batali guilt. after all, i defiled his recipe. certain chefs have no real impact on me. i’ll substitute. i’ll mess with the best. but mario is brilliant. mario is in my top five. and i overrode his good judgment without any second thought,

my god. what have i become?

no no, not the economic kind although that is being taken into consideration around here too. but i’m talking calories… i’m budgeting my calories. big time.

after playing with a few different methods of how to make this whole weight loss thing happen in my world, i finally decided that i had to go back to counting calories. there is just no other way. for me. i’m too much of an eater. too devious with my rationale. so this keeps me painfully honest. and with a nutritional computer program i can enter all the details of my food and – voilà – it’s been this many fat grams today, that much fiber… and since i have decided to stick to 1000 (yes 1000) calories a day, while making it all pretty nutritious – as in none of the "100 calorie snack packs", of for instance, oreo mini cakesters or those minuscule weight watchers cakes – every thing i eat matters. luckily, i like a challenge. 1000 is low but if you don’t crap it up with empty calories, it’s amazing what you can cram in there.

wait.. was that just the sound of every male reader clicking away from this post and ceF forever?

i won’t bore you with the specifics of what i eat most of the time… well maybe i will, but not right now. it’s all fairly plain. all close to the earth with the exception of some boca burgers and protein shakes. and then i cook. and then i think… is this even blogable? i mean i’ve made about 3 pots of soup since i last posted. most of them are all variations of this lentil soup. and i highly, but highly recommend this soup. and lately, i’ve been on a kale kick so that’s the green that gets tossed into the pot. a bag of my rancho gordo cannellini’s mingled quite nicely with some french green lentils, and for the non-weight-conscious i grated a bunch of parmegiano into the bowls. everyone loved it with big hunks of bread. but i was happy with this soup all on its own. i mean, my life is good. and i can eat baguettes and cheese again one day. just not today. or tomorrow. or february, march. or april. and you know what? i will LIVE! and come spring i will feel and look better. it’s the big cheese/baguette trade-off of ’09..

so the other night i had to use up a big beautiful pristine looking head of cauliflower. i sliced an onion and put it, along with the florets onto a baking sheet and then sprayed it with a misting of olive oil and a sprinkling of sea salt. the vegetables roasted for awhile on high heat and required some moving around every 15 minutes or so for a total of about 45 minutes. i also threw some walnuts into a pie tin and toasted them until they turned deep golden brown. god, i love toasted walnuts…

i put a pot of water onto boil and took out some whole wheat spaghetti. when the pasta was cooked i tossed it into a bowl with the roasted cauliflower and onion and hit it with a touch of olive oil, thyme, meyer lemon juice, a drizzle of reduced balsamic vinegar and red pepper flakes. it’s crowning glory was a sparse sprinkling of the toasted walnuts. my portion was 2 ounces of spaghetti which alone was 180 calories. and yes, dear readers, 2 ounces is not much. it’s even kind of amusing. but i loaded on the roasted cauliflower and when it was said and done, i was pretty full.

i know i know… multi textured very beige food…

it’s a version of this recipe from alice waters that i made last april, sans cheese and the oil was cut to probably about 1/8 the amount i’d have normally used. and we loved it. and yes, there was no salty, richness of the ricotta salata. no extra virgin olive oil to coat each strand of pasta that would have made it taste the way it would in a perfect world… but i can eat these things again one day. just not today. maybe in may… and you know what? at the risk of being redundant, i will LIVE! and i will fit into all my very cool summer clothes again. and my jeans. i miss my jeans. i miss my other body… it’s under the extra poundage though… it’s there waiting to be freed…

and it’s a one day at a time thing. it’s all in the consistent chipping away at the extra blobules of fat on my body that has taken not only my good health and energy, but even some of my joy. and like, that’s totally crazy…

no pasta, pork or pudding is ever going to be worth that…

in the name of full disclosure:

dear readers, i am fully aware that this is a touchy subject for many of you. our culture demands women to be model thin and it is has made us into a gender plagued with eating disorders and deprivation. this country is getting fatter by the year, juvenile obesity is on the rise. commercials tell us to eat crap food, desserts at many of the national chains check-in at 1000 calories alone – and a fine dinner out is usually about 1500+ calories - EASY, not to mention the wine… and then we all go and sit in front of our computers. it’s confusing. but in the end we must all find our way.

i’m not the thin girl. i never have been – ever in all my life. but at 5’9" with a medium frame i look pretty damn good at 140 (better at 135 – but i just can’t get there so i’ve given up) and can still pull it off at 150. but i let the black stretchy pants assure me i was ok. and the next thing i knew i weighed as much as cary, who at 6’2" is 165. i am posting this for the world to see. i am 47 1/2 years old. i have limited mobility due to an injury that happened when i was 18. i use a wheelchair. and this is no excuse for anything. we all have our shit. i’m lazy and should get my ass to the Y every day to swim. i’m a strong swimmer. in the spring and fall i bike, but that’s a seasonal thing….

like you, food is a strong passion for me. i know great food and have been fortunate enough to be around it much of my life. i’ve traveled to eat for years, i’ve thrown my hands up in despair of the local restaurants and taken to my own kitchen. i. love. to. eat. i’m a plate cleaner from way back.

it sure would be really nice to be naturally thin, to have the metabolism of a hummingbird… but it was not to happen for me in this lifetime. my family fights fat. my brother eats out nearly every night – lavishly. and also hits the treadmill hard every single day. it’s the only way he can maintain. my dad used to eat light all week, come home from work every evening and do his floor exercises followed by a healthy dinner – and then he’d let loose on the weekends, whereas my mom smoked a lot of cigarettes and drank a lot of coffee to stay svelte… her parents were both obese.

and so it goes.

since there is no magic pill. i count calories. and i hope for some enlightenment that will lead me to a way of better balance once i get back down. god knows i’ve danced this dance before… and, i apologize. i know i have changed the tone here at ceF with a focus on the FRET. but i need to stop the madness.nothing tastes as good as being thin feels. you can quote me on that. it’s (ahem) totally original!

i appreciate having the forum to share this all with you. i hope my food will still turn you on…

ps – we adopted a puppy. meet grace. 9 weeks old. australian shepherd/lab mix. she is a very sweet girl…

welcome to the family…

maybe the only thing better than eating bottarga, is eating gifted bottarga that was domestically caught in tampa bay and cared for by a man with a generous heart, the soul of a true food lover and the mind of a meticulous craftsman, .

you see, i have this friend…

last year he sent me a box that contained a smoked mullet fillet which was just plain excellent, along with some of his smoked mullet roe which was beyond divine. if you can somehow imagine… the roe sacks were still a bit soft, all yolky and smoky and well, it’s a flavor pop that i can’t bestow proper justice on with only a few words – but dear readers, i will try. think insanely good. as in memorable. one of those foods… and – it is unavailable for purchase. anywhere.

this year i got a bit more of the same – plus, through tedious research and tenacity my friend decided to salt and sun-dry a fair few of his precious roe in the florida air. and he nailed it with his technique. the bottarga he created was as good as the italian stuff, if not better, because it was just so fresh.

when you pay $70 for a double lobed mullet sac, you tend to use it a bit sparingly. but still, that amount could easily serve 10, which if you do the math is not really all that crazy especially, if served over spaghetti. but when it shows up at your door with no credit card receipt, a pure gift, sent only to be enjoyed wholeheartedly – well, then you can go just a little bottarga crazy. so the one full size double lobe was grated into my very best olive oil and the pound of pasta was divided between 5 of us and garnished with this precious gold, the only other additions being finely minced garlic, meyer lemon zest and juice, chopped parsley and a cherry pepper that added just the slightest kick.

my bowl of pasta, pre tossed… we all loved it. truly and passionately.

so, to recap - please note that there is no heat involved in the making of this sauce. there was the warming of the bowls in the oven – and of course the cooking of the pasta, which when done got quickly tossed with all the aforementioned ingredients. i’ve used other methods, but this way really works as well as you could wish for…

this was our first course, the smoked mullet fillet on toasted millet bread. or as i like to refer to the dish, "mullet on millet", (chef keller – please feel free to use this) with just some olive oil and thinly sliced meyer lemon. the meyer lemons are so mild that the rind is really easy to eat and i’m a lemon rind eating kinda gal from way back. and yes, granted, i could have cut the slices thinner but my knife skills are not that impressive and this is one of those things that makes me a total lightweight/hack/novice when it comes to cooking… but i can live with this fact and that’s why the culinary gods created mandolines for when i feel the need to impress…

a huge thank you, RK… one day we shall feast on bottarga together!

bottarga post #1 - fail…

bottarga post #2 - faith restored…

bottarga post #3 - the friend appears in my life… changing the way i look at bottarga entirely

bottarga post #4 - experimenting still, but now becoming the norm…

and hopefully a post #6 will be in my immediate future.

oh, how i love this stuff…

weatherwise, nashville autumns can be a mixed bag. last week it was in the mid 70′s going down to the low 40′s at night – and today it was 83 and glorious. during this schizophrenic transition into cool weather and comfort foods, sometimes it can be hard to get a handle on ‘seasonal’ eating. but i had some d’artagnan buffalo short ribs burning a hole in my freezer, and awhile back i’d run across this recipe, somehow, somewhere, on someone’s blog - perhaps even a year ago - and i bookmarked it.

so when i was clicking through my favorites - the recipes all meticulously categorized, and fell across this one, i thought – perfect. and then when i saw that it was a giada/food network dish, i threw up a little in my mouth. ok not really, it was more of a gag – ok, maybe not even that. but i definitely cringed. i mean, i was hoping for batali, even emeril would do, but when i saw who it was i realized that i’d have to actually tell you, my dear readers,that: i would be making a ‘giada everyday italian’ dish. i mean, it’s not like it was that yummo chick or that woman who resides in my own personal version of hell – but still… i don’t do giada. well, i didn’t.

this dish was a homerun. it was earthy and complex, and even surprised me just how well and how fast it came together. but best of all, it was not only all those thinga but  it was pasta…

the bittersweet chocolate shavings at the very end send an already excellent dish to another dimension. i’ve done this for years on pumpkin ravioli’s with browned butter and sage…

buffalo short ribs with tagliarelle
adapted from giata de laurentiis everyday italian

3 tablespoons olive oil
4 ounces chopped pancetta
2 pounds short ribs
salt
black pepper
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 medium onion, chopped
1 carrot, chopped
1/2 cup fresh parsley leaves
2 cloves garlic
1 (14-ounce) can tomatoes (whole or diced)
1 tablespoon tomato paste
1 teaspoon chopped fresh rosemary leaves
1 teaspoon dried thyme
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
1 bay leaf
2 1/2 cups veal stock
1 cup red wine
1 pound fresh or dried tagliarelle 
about 3 tablespoons shaved bittersweet chocolate
 
place the olive oil in a large heavy soup pot over medium heat. cook the pancetta until golden and crisp, about 4 minutes. meanwhile, season the short ribs with salt and pepper, and dredge in the flour. using a slotted spoon, remove the pancetta from the pan and set aside. add the short ribs to the pan and brown on all sides, about 7 minutes total.
meanwhile, combine the onion, carrot, parsley and garlic in a food processor and blend until finely minced. then add the tomatoes and tomato paste and pulse.

once the short ribs are browned, carefully add the mixture from the food processor to the pot. return the pancetta to the pot and stir. add the rosemary, thyme, oregano, bay leaf, beef broth, and wine. bring the mixture to a boil. reduce the heat and simmer, covered, for 1 hour and 15 minutes. remove the lid and simmer for another hour and a half, stirring occasionally. remove the meat and bones from the pot. discard the bones. shred the meat and return it to the pot. season with 1/2 teaspoon salt and 3/4 teaspoon pepper, or to taste.

bring a large pot of salted water to a boil over high heat. add the pasta and cook until tender but still firm to the bite, stirring occasionally, about 8 to 10 minutes for dried pasta and 2 to 3 minutes for fresh. drain pasta, reserving 1 cup of cooking liquid. add pasta to the pot and stir to combine. add reserved pasta liquid 1/4 cup at a time, if needed, to moisten the pasta. transfer to serving bowls, top each bowl with about 2 teaspoons of chocolate shavings. serve immediately.

so ok, i’m having issues with the heritage of this dish. but giada is ok. really. totally not offensive. and the woman can actually cook…

it’s just well, ok, nevermind.

              

my rss feeder broke.  and i didn’t realize it for 3 months.  mostly because i (still) don’t even understand what exactly an rss feeder is, or what it does – talk about being oh so techno savvy… but my stat’s were dropping off and well, try as i might to just ignore the cold hard numbers, i started to take it personally.  was it something i said?  something i cooked?  where did so many of my bleaders go and why would they leave me after all we have meant to each other? 

but before i called my therapist, i called mark from simpler computing! and he quickly came to my rescue – again.  thank you mark.  you solved the mystery and now once again you are so totally my blero. 

so listen up – all you techno losers out there that just like to cook and write and take a little photo here and there, but do not want to bother your pretty little heads with html and templates and embedding and wordpress editors that suck and the like, call mark.  today.  he can tweak your blog into submission.  AND he likes to cook… (btw – ceF is still under construction as i type so please bear with…)

speaking of liking to cook… here’s the deal.  i cook a lot.  but sometimes it’s just dinner.  and sometimes it’s not my idea of a blog worthy post.  and usually it’s just that i’m too lazy to write.  but it’s totally me, not you.  you, i adore.  you make my life better, adding an entirely new fangled dimension that did not exist just 16 months ago. but still, i am often unmotivated, or perhaps even more often than that, i’m just reading OPB’s…

so what happens is that some of these dishes fall by the blogosphere’s wayside.  but i thought since we were dealing with feeds and feeding, i’d show you what gets fed around here to my immediate world.  so i’m going to hit you with a fair few of what i’ve not bothered to bother you with until now, along with some pictures. take a deep breath – here goes…

look familiar?  this one was made with the half and half, as per ripert’s recipe.  was it better?  yes.  did i LOVE it?  not so much.  it’s ok.  kinda brunchy, not desserty.  i like custard.  life is good.  and eric, you’re totally cool and sexy and hot and all those things.  but my tony still has you beat, big time. i hope you can understand…

ok so i realize i am blogger #4721 to make jim lahey’s no knead bread.  but i did it.  quietly.  and it was a good and crusty loaf of bread that if nothing else looked very, very impressive. 

i baked it in my romertopf that i dug out and dusted off.  although it stays unused and because it looks so beautiful – i keep it.  i’m sure you understand such things.  so, i soaked the terracotta in water and then baked the bread as per the direction for a dutch oven.  i felt my dutch oven was too big and i didn’t want a 2" high bread.  somehow, this worked out quite nicely.  so take a chance, dear readers – bake no knead bread.  oh, and have i made this again since?  nope.  will i?  maybe, probably not.

this was made quite awhile ago.  it was panko encrusted chicken livers served over what i think was swiss chard and finely sliced ‘delightful tiny purple potatoes’ and shallots sautéed with pimm’s and port.  what?  you think they may not have been tiny and delightful?  you are sooooo wrong….

i present to you… delightful. tiny. purple. potatoes.  i only wish i could have been in the room when the marketing team thought of that.  can you imagine what the discussion would have sounded like?  i only know they were republicans with bad haircuts.  after that, i know nothing.

so now you ask, what the hell is that?  that, my dear readers is a watermelon salad with mint leaves, chili oil and feta – topped with a very anti-locavore piece of barramundi from costco via australia.  in a previous life i lived down under (husband #1) and ate this fish regularly.  perhaps i didn’t need to sit the barramundi on top of the watermelon, but it seemed like a good idea at the time… and it was our dinner that night and we were happy enough.  so stop smirking.  thank you.

i made this last weekend and it was good and rich and saucy and chicken thighey – all that with trofie pasta thrown in for very good measure.  it’s what patricia wells eats when she’s at home in provence, a recipe that i picked up from feeding groom.  oh and it’s got sherry vinegar and garlic cloves and dijon mustard and lots of tarragon and minced sundried tomatoes… it’s more wintry than it is septembery in nashville, but i had 4 chicken thighs in the freezer and suddenly this just happened…

ok are you ready to hear what this was supposed to be?  what it almost was… what i wished it might have been and what it could be if i ever decide to take it on again?  salted butterscotch pudding with chocolate covered bacon.  thank you and goodnight.  the end.  by claudia. 

except it never really thickened properly.  and benton’s bacon is crazy salty.  so salty that i forgot just how salty it was therefore making it an out and out wrong bacon choice.  because it seems that is actually possible.  to make a wrong bacon choice.  you’d think not, but what this dessert needed was a thin cut good bacon that crisps up in a curly, artsy strip, and only then could it be dipped into lindt chocolate and put into a pudding recipe that WORKS.  because this recipe did not.  and another blogger tried it and it didn’t work for her either.  so. oh well,  we all drank our pudding and chucked the wayyy too salty pork.  seemed sinful but we got over it.  we lived and learned, moving onwards and upwards – with the comforting knowledge that bacon rarely ever lets you down…

so not even a little pretty.  AND the wrong color bowl.  but it was just a simple dinner of fresh crowder peas with bacon.  the bacon did just as it should, redeeming itself from the previous mishap.  there was something else served with this but really, i have no idea… i think it was grilled tilapia.  unexciting, quick and easy and not exactly memorable – but hey, not every night can be foie gras…

OK – EVERYBODY STAND UP AND STRETCH.  NO REALLY.  BECAUSE I AM NOT DONE.  BATHROOM BREAK?  GO ON.  I’LL WAIT….

oh, hi, you’re back.  wonderful, because i was worried… ok, just a few more…

this was lazzaroli’s sweet potato and ricotta ravioli.  i dressed it up with a side of kale, done in a sauce of olive oil, cream, honey and sage, and then dusted the pasta with nutmeg and parmegiano.  again – super fast and easy.  (tommy noodles, you are a nashville godsend… thank you for giving me an option that is first rate and still allows me to get creative.)

yes, i too jumped on the bandwagon thanks to michelle from thursday night smackdown and all the rest of you that grilled the hell outa a bunch of pizzas…  except michelle was the one who took my call on a saturday night so i could get very specific information about the whole pizza grilling process.  this particular pizza was taken from her post and it was damn fine.  i cooked down some swiss chard in a bit of olive oil, salt and pepper, and used copious amounts of minced garlic and ricotta.  i also sliced up a big ripe yellow tomato with red stripes running through it (we will miss you beautiful heirloom tomatoes),

awesomeness, no?  well yes – but… from here on in i’ll stick to the pizza stone with my oven set to broil and 550f… because grilled pizza is too damn white on top.  and flipping it before the toppings go on doesn’t allow the cheese and sauce to bake into the dough and well, my grill runs hot (it’s infrared) so even on the lowest setting it never got the top brown and i kept having to turn the flame on and off so as not to scorch the bottom and was nervously moving it to the top rack and well, i like my pizza stone in my oven.  so if i had a real charcoal grill which i don’t and do not plan on getting because it’s too much work and i am not willing (go on – think of me what you will but there are extenuating circumstances… like a boyfriend who is also happy with oven baked pizza’s), maybe that would be better.  but as it stands, and i repeat – i am a pizza in the oven kinda gal – set to broil on super high heat with the stone on the very bottom rack.  but i made the obligatory grilled pizza.  yes i did.

i present to you… voodoo mac and cheese

do you read gild the (voodoo)lily?  if not, you need to read gild the (voodoo)lily…  heather is very smart and very funny and this bitch can cook.  and i mean that in a good way.  heather is another one of those foodcentric people that seriously knows how to put ingredients together.  like if you turned your pantry over to her, she’d blow your mind.  and you’d be thinking all, why didn’t i think of that?… and the answer is because she KNOWS MORE THAN YOU DO.  plus she’s a botanist.  a freakin’ botanist... so she’s always growing and foraging and well, it’s a little bit intimidating.  heather could totally kick your ass and never even touch you…

anyway, back in july she made something called garden mac.  for her it was merely a ‘clean your fridge out’ kinda dinner, and i’m thinking – mac and cheese with roasted tomatoes in a bechamel base?  sign me the hell up. 

the ingredients i used were as follows; mostaccioli pasta, the 4 cheeses were – asiago, parmigiano reggiano, st jerome and fontal.  and for the garden part – fresh thyme and heirloom tomatoes, kale, onion, squash and zucchini.  i drove all the ingredients about an hour south, down to my friend shannon’s house and we spent the day cooking and drinking wine and talking and laughing and then we sat out on the porch overlooking her farm and had a late lunch…

and for the grand finale i give to you an extremely abbreviated version of my veal stock mission…

bones arrive from snook’s.  i tried for weeks to find a local source.  nada.

20 lbs.

because i am awesome…

i made brown and white stock.  i followed the ruhlman way.  it is the only way. (great version here)

otherwise when you die, you go to culinary hell where you are forced to live on nothing but shoney’s buffets. (please click on the shoney’s link.  there are no words…)

and hey, thanks so much for reading.  i realize this post was a commitment. 

you can go now…

so… perhaps fresh linguine is ‘wrong’ for this dish,  i mean there are so many pastas and so little time to figure out exactly what goes with what or even more importantly – what doesn’t…. and perhaps the italian food gods are looking down on me and wondering what the hell i was thinking because spaghetti would have been sooooo much of a better choice…  but honestly, i don’t really know or care – because dear readers, this pasta dish was truly one of my most favorite things of all time that i have ever made.  (do i say that a lot?  i may say that a lot.)

but it’s always TRUE!

this afternoon i stopped by to see tom at his store, lazzaroli’s.  it’s a great little italian food market that sits just over on the other side of town from me, so i don’t go as often as i should.  but it’s a nashville oasis – a jewel of a little store stocked by an all american-italian guy from philly who knows what the hell he’s doing.  fregola, farro, baccala, volpi pancetta and salumis and tons of first rate oils and vinegars and much more.  and they make pasta – all day, every day.  and i bought some.  because, sometimes you just don’t wanna roll your own.  and on those days, tom is your man…

with no real plan in mind, i picked up a box of fresh linguine for tonight, some amazing looking local garlic (huge cloves), housemade ricotta and well, i left there with 2 big bags and now i have ravioli’s in my freezer for a rainy day to the tune of: roasted kale and pancetta (he let me sample the filling – unreal), spiced pumpkin with marscarpone, sweet potato with balsamic vinegar, parmigiano and a hint of grand marnier and goat cheese and pear sauteed in white wine.  each of tom’s fillings are all serious recipes unto themselves. 

one of the things i love about tom – besides that he uses the name ‘tommy noodles’ to comment on this blog – is his take on selling the pasta he makes.  you either buy tom’s sauce and his pasta.  or you buy his pasta and make your own sauce.  but he would rather not even sell you a lb. of his fresh fettucine if you’re going to buy the ‘contadina alfredo light’ sauce from the supermarket.  tom, i hear you man.  and if only you’d been here tonight i think you would have been proud…

i grew up eating a lot of italian food in some of the best restaurants in nyc – mostly northern italian.  my dad especially loved ‘filetto di pomodoro’ sauce and even if it wasn’t on the menu, the chef would always make it for him.  as tends to happen to me while writing these posts, out of curiosity and an endless quest for any and all food knowledge, i googled the term ‘filetto di pomodoro’ and not much came up.  which surprised the hell out of me until i found, arthur schwartz – the food maven.  why, he’s a ny jew.  and i’m a ny jew.  he’s big into food – namely italian.  i’m big into food – namely italian.   and arthur?  he knew just what i was talking about:

In the United States, the expression "filetto di pomodoro" has come to mean, through its use in stylish, supposedly "northern Italian" restaurants, a quickly cooked fresh tomato sauce. It should mean exactly what it says, a sauce made with discernible strips of tomato pulp, cooked so quickly they don’t turn to sauce. And it is certainly a southern Italian notion, not "northern.". One doesn’t hear or see the expression "filetto di pomodoro" used much these days in Campania, although most people know what it is, and at the height of summer one is likely to eat it. Instead, it might be called sciuè sciuè, sauce in a hurry, or just tomato sauce, sugo di pomodoro. I’ve also been told that filetto di pomodoro is a bit old-fashioned, that the vine-type cherry tomatoes, which are much easier to handle and even more delicious (certainly sweeter) to many, are being used where tomato fillets used to be.

By the way, good canned tomatoes can taste almost fresh when cooked as these are, in only five minutes in a wide pan that promotes evaporation. Keep that in mind some January when you see "fresh" filetto di pomodoro on the menu of a "northern Italian" restaurant.

arthur the food maven, that was awesome.  you both vindicated my childhood experience and set me straight – in 200 words.  i will never forget you.

anyway, this garlic was unlike any i’d ever seen.  it was big, with a long neck and only had about 7 cloves in all, but they were fresh milky white megacloves.  i peeled them without smashing and browned them slowly in olive oil. i roughly chopped whatever tomatoes i had, one big local bradley and some pretty good sized grape tomatoes and added them to the garlic. that got seasoned with salt and pepper and some dried sicilian oregano. i cooked it until the tomatoes released some of their juice and then took it off the heat.

the linguine was thrown into a big pot of salted water and after 3 minutes it was quickly drained, hit with some of the better olive oil, the tomato sauce and dressed with the fresh ricotta and some lemon lime basil from my friends garden, which gave it an interesting flavor that was a surprisingly good match for the dish.

it was really quite simple.

 just like the best italian food should be…  

exhibit A

10 months ago i was introduced to bottarga and initially it didn’t go well.  but really what i had gotten my hands on was bottarga’s ugly step cousin – some dried powdered tuna roe.  it was, in my opinion – overpriced and somewhat pointless.  wanting to understand the hype, from there the bottarga experience went from here (bad) to here (heavenly) to here (domestic, smoked and yes, heavenly).  and now i am enamored with the stuff…  because dear readers, listen to me,

IT’S THE BACON OF FISH…

that’s right.  it is that good.  stupidly good.  it is absolute comfort food and it kicks mac and cheese’s ass from here to sardinia.  i’ve had it three times in two days.  and i could easily have it again tonight.  but i am saving it.  because otherwise it would be all gone and that would be just too sad.

the first night i decided to do it with bread crumbs and i used panko which was cheating and i have regrets.  for what i would want in a breadcrumb, it’s a little too uniform, a little too crunchy – without having true substance.  it’s meant to be used as a filler, or a coating for pan frying.  really, it’s just a far cry from being italian and i know that neither mario nor lidia would have ever used panko.  the italian gods knew that i’d thrown them an asian curve and well, next time i swear i will use a proper bread.  because we’re talking bottarga here, folks.  and it’s best to keep it all as it should be, if you know what i mean… and if you’re reading, i think you do.

exhibit A – i browned the panko in some olive oil with a touch of butter, then added salt and pepper and thinly sliced garlic.  i grated about 1/4 cup of bottarga, zested a lemon and used some of the juice, chopped parsley and some minced chile pepper.  i tossed it all with the pasta and grated some more bottarga on top.

and to all you egg fans out there, listen to this.  the leftover breadcrumb bottarga mixture?  i had saved about 2 tablespoons of it and the next morning i had it with a quickly fried egg – and it was outstanding.  but truly outstanding.  it was a gabrielle hamilton dish, a wannabe prune brunch menu item.  but hers would have been served on a perfectly grilled slice of peasant bread with chopped cherry tomatoes. 

gabrielle are you listening? 

exhibit b

exhibit B – no bread crumbs, but everything else was pretty much the same.  except no heat was used, just a raw mix of olive oil, bottarga, lemon zest, parsley and chile - tossed with the hot pasta.  equally good if not better, and lighter for a warm august night in nashville.

and now can we please talk about the pasta?  i know it looks like spaghetti, but dear readers, no… this is chitarra which entails an entirely different pasta making process. shaped like guitar strings, this square edged noodle is made by pressing sheets of semolina dough through tight rows of metal strings.  and if you want the low down, i suggest you get the big picture from francois over at fx cuisine, because i just buy chitarra. but francois… well he is an insanely obsessive gastronome.  i love this guy.

if you’ve not tried bottarga, then i suggest that you do.  it’s very orderable and your $70 investment will make ten very generous portions. it comes in two lobes and one can be vacuum sealed and placed in the refrigerator for another time.

bottarga.  i ‘m telling you…

i’ve been seeing this dish around.  and then i spotted it on ruhlman’s blog .  and that was pretty much it for me.  call it a defining moment - but i’d already been tempted, and now this pasta had to happen in my kitchen – and soon. 

i immediately began mentally preping the raviolo’s by going through the ‘mise’ in my mind.  first came the cheese situation.  because if i was going to make these beauties, i was going to have to use sheep’s milk ricotta, with a much more compelling flavor than the sweeter and widely available cows milk version.  and it’s hard enough to procure this ricotta in a major metropolis – but in middle tn?  fuhgeddaboudit.  and believe me when i tell you that i gave it all i had.  n/a.

so as i am wont to do, i clicked my way to ricotta heaven by simply relinquishing my amex # – yet again – for a pricey foodstuff.  but i’ve got to tell you that tony at pastacheese.com came through for me.  i love this guy.  he’s like the italian uncle you always wanted.  sooooo nice.  sooooo willing to do whatever it took, working with my schedule, packing it extra cold, calling me back after checking with his supplier.  all that for 3 measley pounds of ricotta.  it’s flown in from italy, and then it flies out, right to your doorstep – still as fresh as if you were sitting in sardinia sipping a limoncino waiting for your raviolo to arrive.  and yes, shipping kills.  but damn if it wasn’t worth the airfare…

final talley?  $60.  and i’d do it again. 

so, on a martha re-run (that freakin’ woman gets on my very last nerve – but has undeniably the best guests) odette fada, chef at san domenico’s, whipped up a more wintry version of her raviolo’s using spinach, ricotta, parmigiano and nutmeg, and about $500 (not kidding) of white truffles from alba.  so be sure to run and get yourself some this autumn.  mmmk?  oh, and while you’re getting that, get this – martha actually had the audacity to say "we save up for this one dinner…" and i literally felt myself seethe.  it was a very unzen moment for me and i’m not proud…  BUT REALLY MARTHA… please spare us the bullcrap as we all know you can shit white truffles from alba, ok?

i stuck with ruhlman all the way.  i wasn’t able to get any espellete on the quick, but next time i’ll have it in my pantry (it’s on order).  i made do with a sprinkle of cayenne, some organic valencia orange zest, finely minced shallot and chive and salt.  my eggs were bought the day before from the amish at the nashville farmers’ market and the pasta was made with ap flour, whole eggs and a touch of water.  we rolled it thin and here’s how it all came together…

after about 2 minutes at a slow but steady boil in salted water, the raviolo’s are carefully removed and browned butter is spooned over the top.

if ever there were a pasta that i look forward to perfecting, this would be it.  the first try came out nicely but i’m going to try and get some fluted edged round dough cutters and perhaps let the raviolo’s cook an extra minute next time – just to tighten up the yolk a bit more.  but don’t get me wrong, it’s a damn sexy dish and everyone was collectively swooning. but this one is absolutely worth getting as close to perfect as you can.

i feel that the ruhlman version is the much better warmer weather option, the orange zest really brightening everything right up.  but this winter i’ll definitely try odette’s, with spinach and nutmeg, although depending on the price of truffles, i may be relegated to using just the truffled butter.

and i can totally live with that.

i think…

or more accurately, peanut butter noodles. but the dish is still much better known as "noodles in sesame sauce" and usually ‘cold’, at that.  at least in nyc where i lived on it for the better part of my early 20′s. and even though i’ve seen a few versions that use roasted tahini, the peanut butter version just works so well on every level that it’s what i do, because it is quite frankly – an absolute and total winner. and everybody loves a winner… yessiree.

anyway, this dish had been on my mind since i saw it over at smitten kitchen and then recently again at kalyn’s, where she used whole wheat noodles. i think the earthiness of the ww pasta lends itself perfectly to this dish.  my version is an adaption of both of those, leaning more towards the ‘gourmet’ recipe from june 2002

peanut sesame noodles
adapted from gourmet, june 2002

i totally blanked on the sesame seeds, which is too bad because i have the black ones sitting right in my kitchen and they’re both a great looking garnish and tasty.  so try to use your imagination, ok? 

1/2 cup smooth organic peanut butter
1/4 cup soy sauce
1/3 cup warm water
2 tablespoon chopped peeled fresh ginger
2 medium garlic cloves, chopped
2 tablespoons rice vinegar
2 tablespoons toasted sesame oil
2 tablespoon brown sugar or honey or agave
1 tablespoon sriracha chili sauce – or to taste

1 lb whole wheat thin spaghetti
1 orange or red bell pepper, cut into 1/8-inch-thick strips
1 yellow bell pepper, cut into 1/8-inch-thick strips
1 cucumber, seeded and cut into 1/8-inch-thick strips
1 cup of snow peas
4 scallions, thinly sliced
chopped cilantro
3 tablespoons sesame seeds, toasted
1 lb of shrimp or chicken or beef or pork belly! or tofu

mix all the ingredients for the sauce in a strong blender, set aside
put water on to boil for noodles
slice the cucumbers and bell peppers into long thin strips
slice the scallions and chop the cilantro

if you’re using shrimp, skewer and grill.  if you’re using another protein, i trust that you will figure it all out just fine…

one minute before the pasta is ready, throw the snow peas into the pasta water.
drain and toss with the sauce, serve immediately garnished with the vegetables and make it all look pretty,
  

because you’re good enough, you’re smart enough and doggone it people like you…

and if i wanted to sleep with you, it’d be ’torcetti con salsa di noci e funghi’.  but being that we’re all platonic here, i thought i’d keep it to the english since i hit you so hard in my last post with my γαλακτομπο?ρεκο. 

i’m forever browsing blogs, looking for inspiration – and this dish caught my eye while catching up with the folks from ‘we are never full’.  it’s a site full of exuberance and passion – they take their food very seriously and it shows.  the pasta sauce, from genoa, is a recreation of yet another wonderful dish from their extensive travels through italy.

again, i’m a big fan of simplicity and so that’s where my sensibilities tend to lead me.  this was the primi course for a small dinner party, followed by a secundo of grass-fed grilled to perfection ribeye, along with a basic green salad of romaine and arugula with grape tomatoes.  so yes, perhaps simple, but a wonderful dinner.

the pasta dish suffers somewhat from the innocousness of its beige colorway.  but apart from that, it’s quite good.  having said this, let me share my initial resistance, which was that the walnut texture in the sauce, was for me a minor distraction. but it seems i was alone in this assessment.  and everyone else was raving.

but you see, the thing is (and here’s a dirty little secret), in my mind, my opinion – when it comes to food – outweighs any number of other opinions at the table.  so i’m not sure if this pasta is a do-over for me.  my gauge is this: if i were in a very good restaurant, would i flip over this?  and then i know…

soak two pieces of crustless, white bread in some of the cream so it soaks it all up.

put the salted pasta water on to boil

in a pan, add your sliced mushrooms along with some olive oil or a pat of butter and sauté until firm-soft.

process the walnuts until fine, then add and blend all the rest of the ingredients together : the milk-soaked bread, the cheese and cream, along with a pinch of salt to taste.

add your pasta to the boiling water and cook till al dente.

here it is…the epitome of springtime…  could this not be a more restaurant worthy presentation?  i mean, if this was put down in front of you, wouldn’t you have high expectations?  a yolky fettuccine dressed with creme fraiche… the waft of truffle hitting your nose… yes, this is going to be just incredibly….

awful

dear readers, let’s just make this clear… it pretty much sucked.  it just did.  and it was altogether my own fault.  because each ingredient on it’s own was perfectly lovely.  i just didn’t know when to leave well enough alone…  and my pasta – as you might imagine – was freshly homemade, making it sting just a touch more. ..

pretty pasta (that you should never make)
anonymous

a container of creme fraiche
2 entire ounces of very expensive white truffle oil
fresh chives
fresh parsley
black pepper

ok, had i stopped here, i’d have had my usual winner of a simple pasta dish…
but nooooo..

toasted pine nuts (borderline error)
about a solid cup of grated parmigiano (first major mistake)
very young broccolini, chopped and left raw (second major mistake)
lemon infused olive oil (i must have been on crack – seriously)
broccolini flowers to garnish (whateva)

toss, eat, gag, toss
mourn over your beautiful wasted fettuccine, truffle oil and creme fraiche  

so like, this is me failing miserably. 
i am humbled in the face of fine cuisine.
i repent to the god of all things culinary.

final note: i served this to 4 people at a business meeting. 

one was a chef.

hee.

so what was your biggest flop?
 

this pasta is everything that is wonderful about italian cooking.  a short ingredient list with a big result - and all in about 15 minutes, including the 2 or 3 that it takes to boil the fresh pasta.  of course, being that i am now an ace pasta maker, i am forcing the stuff down the throat of everyone i know, and so far no one is complaining – although it’s bound to happen soon.  but not with this particular dish.  this one is all mario and as one might expect, he knocks it out of the park.

the pasta dough took about 1 lb. of flour and 5 eggs.  i can’t stress emphatically enough how much i love these 3 kitchenaid rollers.  i am making my own freakin’ pasta and it is so very not hard to do.  i even really kinda get off on the whole process.  it feels good.  it’s meditative, even cathartic.  if you regularly make pasta – and why wouldn’t you, you can then cancel your weekly therapist appointment.  and that right there will save you a ton of cash that you can now put towards buying the KA  rollers, working out your ‘issues’ by kneading the dough, with feeling – elongating not only the gluten fibers, but possibly your very own existence.  so, just make pasta.  it will improve your life in more ways then you could ever imagine.  just look at all it has done for me.

and then when your pasta is rolled and ready - then make this recipe right away.  because it is a smashing dish that will surprise the hell out of you, and whoever’s expecting dinner that night.

fettuccine with oyster mushrooms, sweet garlic and arugula
lightly adapted from mario batali’s molte italiano

1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
15 cloves garlic
2/3 cup cinzano rossi or any sweet red vermouth
10 ounces oyster mushrooms = trimmed
4 T unsalted butter
salt and freshly ground black pepper
1 bunch arugula, stemmed, washed and dried
1/3 cup freshly grated pecorino cheese

bring 6 qts of water and 2 T salt to a boil in a large pot

meanwhile, in a 10 – 12" sauté pan, heat the olive oil over medium heat until almost smoking.  add the garlic and sauté until lightly browned on all sides.  remove from heat and add the vermouth.  replace the pan onto the burner, add the mushrooms and butter, and bring to a boil.  reduce by half then remove from the heat and keep warm.

cook the pasta until tender and then drain. add to the mushrooms and stir gently over medium heat for about 1 minute to coat the noodles.  add the arugula and toss until wilted. transfer to serving dish and toss with the cheese.

this is one of those dishes where everyone will think you are a brilliant and talented cook.  but in reality it really wasn’t you at all…

it was my boy, mario…

the people over at ‘serious eats’ may have their own version of this (and in multi-parts), which i do find amusing, but so you know, i simply can not STAND this woman - her food will never touch my culinary radar, the mere thought of possibly cooking any of her unappealing southern fat-bomb recipes repels me beyond belief – which unfortunately conjures up her tv persona, which then immediately throws me into apoplexy, causing me to try and scratch my eyes out…  but hey, that’s just me.

pd on crack while her followers drink the lard laced kool-aid

but back to reality.  thomas, i love.  especially after my ‘per se’ experience and watching both his charlierose interviews.  the man is a brilliant chef and well, i applaud everything he stands for.  and i am absolutely sure that tk is voting democratic – hoping for obama and that he’s a james taylor fan and loves puppies. 

but still as wonderful as i know keller must be, if you make his pasta with white clam sauce, you could possibly die of a heart attack – on the spot.  but dear readers, know this – you will die happy. and well, not everyone can say that. but then again, who could really gauge this, as you’d be having to poll dead people, and that right there would be seemingly one hell of an unpleasant task. 

for the record, i made this dish two nights in a row.  but i have long history with tempting fate…

awhile back i read french laundry at home’s post about this dish and i knew i’d be making this one recipe from that beautiful book - if only this one.  because if you follow carol’s cooking adventures you will plainly see that tk’s food is a 10 on the difficulty scale - and well,  i can’t do 10′s.  way too many pots and pans to clean up which goes against my personal at-home-cooking principles.  but carol promised me this was easy and i had 3 lbs of clams in my refrigerator because i had been to costco on a friday and it was their ‘SEAFOOD ROAD SHOW’ weekend which always, but always cracks me up – as costco’s ‘seafood road show’ is not much of a ‘show on the road’ at all, and more of a dead crustaceans on ice kinda thing.

so… back to the pasta.  and not just any pasta – but the king of all pastas… this pasta is to die from – i mean, for.  and it is quite simply – 8 ounces (1 3/4 cup) of flour, 1 egg, 6 yolks, 1 T milk, 1.5 t olive oil.  wait… what’s that you say?  7 egg yolks for 8 ounces of flour?  am i kidding, you ask?  well, thomas says so.  and thomas knows.  so stop asking questions and slowly incorporate your flour into the egg mixture, forming the dough into a ball, lightly flour your workspace - and then knead and knead some more – about 20 solid minutes worth.  then wrap the dough tightly in plastic and let it rest for an hour.  by the way, michael ruhlman suggests that you do this in a bowl – and so do i.  because then there is no worry of the inevitable "egg breaking through the flour dam" fiasco, with the entire sticky mess spilling out onto your black suede puma’s which would be a total drag.  anyway, i happen to have a big flat bottomed glass bowl and it is now for pasta making. 

and then just make your pasta.  see how i threw that out so flippantly?  here, let me say it again.  then just make your pasta.  cause hey, i now make pasta.  often.  and it is so fun.  so satisfying.  so beautiful and oh so very amazing and even more than any of that – it tastes freakin’ great.  it is so very worth the effort.  and you get to burn tens of calories kneading the dough.  so the first bite of whatever you’re making?  it doesn’t count.  and if you stop there, you will be even.  just one bite and then push away from the table.  that’s the secret,  you’re welcome.

this was for a double batch…

on my want list?  a pasta rack…

a tangle of yolky pasta goodness…

oh, and one small thing.  i bought the kitchen aid pasta rollers and they totally ROCK.  i refuse to clamp and crank and i am willing to shell out the bucks in the name of fresh pasta.  $135+ at your retail dealer - i paid $81 on ebay including shipping.  now i’ve got 3 options and 9 thicknesses (coincidentally, the same as the shimano gears on my bike), the sheets, spaghetti and fettuccine.  i am so loving my kitchen aid mixer these days more than ever…

and then you make the clam sauce.  if you like white clam sauce then all i can say is that this is the quintessential recipe.  throw away the others.  embrace the butter and have yourself a culinary orgasm.

spaghetti with white clam sauce
dared to be adapted from ‘the french laundry cookbook’ by thomas keller

keller makes this into pretty twirly things in a clam shell atop a bed of heated rock salt.  i, on the other hand, do not.  i double the recipe and then make a trough of it and you stick your face into the bowl and eat.  or… just serve in individual bowls and use a fork.  either way.  i am honestly not here to judge you…

1 head of garlic
2 t butter
a sprinkle of sea salt

36 little neck clams – soaked in water for several hours changing the water a few times
4 cloves of garlic, unpeeled and slightly crushed
2 large shallots – roughly chopped
4 sprigs of thyme
4 bay leaves
1 cup of crisp dry white wine such as sauvignon blanc or muscadet

roasted garlic puree (from recipe above)
reserved clam broth (from recipe above)
24 T (12 oz) of butter cut into small pieces (fyi – i used 9 oz)
1 T of white wine vinegar

1/4 cup chopped parsley
1 T fresh thyme leaves
black pepper

heat your oven to 300 f.  take a sheet of tin foil and double it and place the butter on the bottom, flattening to act as a base for the garlic.  put the entire head of garlic unpeeled onto the butter and sprinkle with sea salt.  fold the foil into a tight bundle and bake for 90 minutes.

while that’s happening, put the clams, garlic, shallots, thyme, bay leaves and wine into a stainless pan that can hold the clams in one layer.  cover and bring to boil over medium heat, moving the clams around to ensure even cooking.  remove the clams as they open which should be within about 5 minutes.  discard any clams that do not open.  allow broth to cool slightly and strain through a chinois.  put the broth into a saucepan.

remove clams from their shells and set aside.

when the roasted garlic is out of the oven and has cooled, remove the garlic from it’s skin and puree. i got great results by using my garlic press.  it shot out the roasted garlic perfectly and i’d just throw out the skin and do it again until all the cloves were gone.  this left me with about 2 T of the most amazing roasted garlic…

with the clam broth on medium heat, whisk the roasted garlic into the broth and then whisk in the butter piece by piece, adding the next piece only when the last piece is incorporated.  season with the white vinegar and add clams back to the clam sauce.  check to see if it needs any salt.  (mine didn’t.)

if your pasta is freshly made, cook it for 2 or 3 minutes in boiling salted water.  drain, reserving a cup of the pasta water (just in case).  put the pasta in a big bowl and toss with the sauce adding the parsley and thyme leaves and black pepper.  toss and serve adding any pasta water if needed.

as carol said to me, "it’s a dish that’s sooo easy and makes me very happy and there is no way you can eat this and not smile with every bite". and that right there dear readers, is what really good food is all about.  

that and the fact that cooking this dish for your significant lover could totally get you laid…

people, i know what you’re thinking. but i’m telling you – do not fear the whole wheat pasta. i totally understand that it’s not for everyday, and that it’s not a substitution from hereon in. it is quite simply, an entity unto itself… and this dish really is a whole wheat pasta kinda dish. and quite honestly, when alice waters talks? this pasta lover listens… and yes, there are brands and there are brands… and dear readers, if it wasn’t a rainy day i would so go out and buy 9 different kinds of ww pasta and boil them all up separately and do a ww pasta taste test for you. but i know you wouldn’t want all that high humidity and precipitation to ruin my perfect coiffe and makeup. so you’ll have to go it on your own. but anyway, for the record i used ‘de cecco’s penne rigate’ and we liked it just fine.

(a fine ww pasta, if i do say…)

i had read deb’s post over at smitten kitchen and then ordered alice’s book, chez panisse vegetables. since spring is about to bust forth from mother earth and once again i will dealing with the over abundance of locally grown produce, this would be a good time for some of alice’s inspiration on the vegetable front. when i got to cooking, i used just one large head of cauliflower and half the pasta and it served 4 easily.

whole wheat pasta with cauliflower, walnuts and ricotta salata
chez panisse vegetables by the one and only alice waters

2 heads cauliflower
1 medium onion
4 cloves garlic
1 pound whole-wheat pasta
extra-virgin olive oil
salt and pepper
1 pinch red pepper flakes
white wine vinegar
1/2 lemon
1/2 cup toasted walnuts
grated or crumbled ricotta salata

put a large pot of water on to boil. cut the cauliflower into small flowerets. peel the onion and slice it very thin. peel and finely chop the garlic. put the pasta on to cook. saute the cauliflower in olive oil in a large saute pan. when the cauliflower begins to soften, season with salt and pepper and add the sliced onion and red pepper flakes. saute over medium to high heat until the vegetables are brown and tender. the cauliflower should still be slightly crunchy and should not taste steamed. add the garlic and remove from the heat, tossing and stirring so the garlic doesn t burn; if it starts to brown, add a splash of water. add a few drops each of vinegar and lemon juice and the toasted walnuts. taste and correct the seasoning. when the pasta is done, drain and add to the cauliflower, adding enough extra-virgin olive oil to coat the pasta thoroughly, toss together and serve, with the cheese crumbled over the dish.

every single ingredient in this dish shines unusually brightly. it is somehow the classic example of the whole being better than the sum of its parts. i’ll be making this again.

a rarity when you’re a food blogger…