Pontormo

Just got back from the major farmer's market in Washington, D.C. that specializes in local (and primarily organic) foods. There's one farmer known as The Greens Lady by regulars. Her stall has a series of galvanized steel buckets filled to the brim with gorgeous stir-fry greens, mesclun, baby arugula, purslane, etc., etc. Beets, herbs and edible flowers line up in a row at the feet so to speak of the bins. You point out what you want, whether half or a full pound and then go on your way. Sure enough, there was no spinach. Cinda told me she actually brought it to the area market where she sells on Saturdays, but people were too scared to buy, so she didn't even bother today. Are people afraid of mutant spinach? Bio-terrorism? Something that happened to all spinach throughout the United States alone simultaneously and not to the iceberg lettuce or arugula? Better throw away the stuff you're growing in your garden in the back, too. Just in case.

I don't know if all NPR listeners are getting the same short message during the At the Top of the Hour briefings, but the stations seem to be raising a bit of a ridiculous alarm. They're not saying "Do not eat bagged spinach..." or "Do not eat spinach from California..." in case there are problems at other locations. They're saying "Do Not eat spinach." No one ever said "Do not eat beef" (except Oprah, perhaps) when there were e-coli problems with hamburger chains. Meat gets recalled more frequently than vegetables, no?

John, I kept coming back to this thread disappointed that no one else was posting and then gave up without noticing your new contributions. I'm so pleased you made the meatballs. I admit, I ate two servings at each sitting myself. This past week I also prepared the Pimientos al ajo y vinagre de Jerez. Loved it. As a fan of meaty Italian roasted peppers as I imagine you are as well, I have to say the "silky" texture as described on page 98 was a verrrrry nice change. If you look at my regional forum, under "Where Can I Get Stuff?" you'll see that another eG member clued me in to an excellent local source for Spanish supplies. I'll be making more.

I went yesterday !! I could not BElieve what I've been missing ! I'd write a longer paen to the place were it not time to run to the farmer's market. However, I also bought serrano ham, a bottle of Spanish EVOO for a decent price, Cabrales. I showed the latter to my favorite cheesemonger at WF who was impressed; he stopped trying to carry the stuff since his distributor always gave him over-ripe cheeses. The two men behind the counter said they've been there for twenty years. Friendly, helpful, proud of their Spanish culinary traditions...and very knowledgeable. Tiny little place, virtually obscured behind two large trucks and the bustle of the crab house next door. If you've never been there, go!!! P.S. The chorizo is the one Spanish brand imported to this country accoriding to the Tapas cooking thread. No preservatives. I got Hot. The other choice is Not hot.

Yes!

Everything seems too familiar for me to plunge into Campania's great food since I have decided two Ishian rabbits are enough and I just do not have a craving for a very meaty dish...or lasagna with sausages AND meatballs. I don't have the guts to make the chocolate eggplant thing for a dinner of nine tomorrow. However, I would like to thank John for the description of the spaghetti sciue sciue. The pomodorini from the market were absolutely perfect for the dish. I've made something similar from Hazan that calls for LONG simmering of lots of garlic and basil (c. 25 minutes) with chopped tomatoes. And we've all had the raw version with mozzarella before, I'm sure. This quick sauce with the addition of red chile flakes was a welcome medium between those two. The preparation emphasized the sweetness of this type of tomato. FYI "alla genovese" according to Fred Plotkin also refers to a pasta sauce that has LOTS of carrot, onion and celery as opposed to the T or two in a number of recipes. Also, Plotkin describes one meal in Sorrento composed of plate after plate of the city's famous lemons which sounds interesting. Finally, a reminder, sigh. Our much missed Alberto is from this region. Here's a beautiful entry from Il Forno this past summer inspired by a vacation in Campania. The subject is the market at Gaeta.

One,, two, Three.... Brisket with onions? What's not to love?

Heather, thanks so much for all the details. I called. They have a brand whose name I recognized at $4.95 apiece. Open until 7 PM Fridays. Saturdays 9:30 until 6:30 PM. Natashia, thanks, too! I enjoy visiting new places, but Balducci's is even more convenient for me, so I will keep that in mind as I make my way through more of Andres's Tapas.

Just checked back (I'm cloaked since all I was going to do was read a message), but, yes. Rodgers is always into salting meats, usually dry a day or two in advance. For this, she asks, instead for brining in rock salt for an hour, room temp. Then rinse each piece under cold water, quickly, but removing ALL kernels of salt (I guess that's why she calls for rock). Drain. Place in new dish and cover with milk for 1 1/4 hour to de-salt further, room temp. Stir a few times to make sure salt's coming off the rabbit. Drain, but you don't have to rinse again. For some preps, she rec's adding 1 t coarse-cracked black pepper and a couple bruised branches of fresh thyme to the milk. Fried rabbit? Just lift pieces out of milk, remaining soggy. If you have spare money in your book allowance, Andrew, I'd consider investing at one point. After a girlhood experience in Lyons, and college, she went back to Florence to learn more of her eventual trade. Yes, not Rome, but I am sure she did the sandwich thing. Writes brilliantly and teaches very well, indeed. Book's not for the impatient, but it is more generous with the wisdoms really good cooks pick up than are certain rushed, restaurant-generated counterparts. ETA after the next two posts by Docsconz & AF: Since I came back to revise a phrase, I will add, yes, John, actually my dinner guest this week lives close to Berkeley and had eaten our chicken at the source. Her family really likes the restaurant, too. P.S. I do intend to cook Neapolitan food shortly myself. Thus the reading about rabbits and thoughts of ragu.

Those look really good, Hathor! FYI: In the Zuni Cafe Cookbook, Rodgers has a very long discussion of butchering and preparing rabbit for cooking, calling for an unorthodox treatment since the classic method requires: Says they're impossible to cook properly since thy're composed of different muscle types that don't cook at same rate. So she produces four different cuts from each half of the bunny plus innards and carcass for stock. As I said, the discussion is long. If you have the book, cf. pp. 411 ff.

How did you learn about the antibiotics? Just what WF told you? Is there anyone here with the scientific knowledge or experience raising animals who can speak on this subject? Or anyone else who sells Italian prosciutto? Edited to completely revise content: The following statement appears on the web site of La Quercia: This statement resembles what one hears from Niman Ranch and other suppliers of the meat that WF sells. There is an interesting dynamic going on here between the traditional, authentic European product and the artisanal producer who learned at the foot of the master, yet, being American, improves upon the original.

How about a nice big pot of ragu instead?

Sigh. Apparently, it's not just us, Fab.

Clifford Wright's peppers, Whole Food's mussels, and finally, About's collection.

Since lending libraries around here don't have any cookbooks devoted specifically to Naples, I collected the usual links at the beginning of the month without posting them. FYI for those interested: Delicious, Rustico, This looks really good, I zanzari, Tango!, and a couple more in a second...

My point is not to say that prosciutto is hard to get now that Whole Foods never seems to have any. Those of us in large cities or areas whose demographics cater to our culinary tastes are lucky and have lots of options. I therefore think Ludja makes an extremely important point when she refers to the blessing that WF represents to cities where there are not lots of different speciality stores. (You should see the pitiful little Asian grocery store in Boulder, CO, for example, though Denver is not far away.) What is of great interest to me is finding out more about a new (?) policy and the decisions behind it. If the dried-up supply of La Quercia is a fluke, and the store intends to carry it again, then is this part of a response to Michael Pollan and Go Local? Or is it simply reflective of an antipathy to any food product that has been cured, processed, etc., and one that seems hypocritical since compromise is struck? Whole Foods has ALWAYS carried imported proscuitto, unpackaged, not sliced and in a new store in Alexandria, Virginia, there were workshops boasting about a new, snazzy traditional prosciutto slicer (machine, vs. the knife technique you'll find even in supermarkets in some places in Italy); San Daniele vs. Parma is relatively new to WF. However, now that there is La Quercia, and some guys easy to visit in Iowa are looking very artisanal and natural to WF, willing to conform to the corporation's philosophical principles, WF doesn't need to deal with Italians too pig-headed to change centuries of practice to meet WF's standards. True? Or do you offer bacon in its more healthful, uncured WF-sanctioned forms because too many customers want it and you are offering what you think is a better product? Ditto, hot dogs, pre-mixed ingredients for meatloaf or marinated chops, et al. Same with prepared foods, which I consider processed; they just don't have preserves. These are All-Natural and Good for You, but prosciutto is not? It's not a hard sell, but it is a weird one. WF wants to be your Food Co-op grown up, your place to go several times a week for a quick meal after a busy day that you don't have to cook AND your gourmet food emporium.

Having mangled excerpts from the posts of HJShorter & TA Price, I've deleted the citations altogether. Let me just say this is in reference to Post #14: Plagiarism? Maybe not enough to end a career, however, in this case I find Heather's more than valid in suspecting that she was not given credit for something that appeared shortly after her post in the Post. Occam's Razor, okay, pace. But, the journalist seems to have been looking for inspiration before contributing to a regular feature in The Washington Post and found it in a detailed account in the local, regional forum that eGullet devotes to Washington, D.C., Delaware, Virginia & Maryland. What makes me suspicious here is that without clever posturing, HJS nonetheless stressed the multicultural character of Rockville and its food. The point seems to be that in as mundane a place as a strip mall, you find signs of cultural significance. The same observation is implicit in the published inventory. In fact, the new order given to the various places and the additional refererence to gelato indicate a desire to paraphrase rather than steal from the source brazenly. Come on! That's how we wrote our first reports in elementary school back when there was no internet: you open up the encyclopedia and if you're really conscientious, you open two different ones. You repeat the information there, but use your own language to make your text "original." Of course one of the ways we get ideas is by reading about a topic of interest. Something catches your eye. Now, for something as inconsequential as a little write-up for The Weekend Section, it's not the reporter's job to conduct a whole lot of research and come up with a thesis to defend, BUT I think it's a shame that footnotes are not common outside of scholarship. It's so easy to be nice....and to give credit where credit is due.

I am perplexed by the vitriol. The short piece that runs at the time that the author's new book is being released is not to your liking. You find Ephron's litany of complaints whiny and trivial, yet a thread is devoted to complaining how insubstantial it is?

Hathor, I already praised you in the Dinner thread. Andwew, you are hystewical! ( Don't take the etymology sewiously.) ETA: Have to agree on eggplant parmigiana. I've had good luck with Marcella Hazan's recipe, with minor changes. The egg doesn't sound appealing, agreed.

Still haven't checked out D & D, but WF definitely doesn't carry it. I was there yesterday, and a customer told me there's a small Spanish store in Betheseda close to the Barnes & Noble and the Mercedes dealership that carries the real thing. Anyone been there & know the name of the place?

You had to bring the poor quality of bread into it, didn't you? You should check out the new lay-out in Tenleytown and the huge amount of space given over to mediocre chocolates!!! Cautionary remark is in order. Good point. But, they DO sell ham for sandwiches and a couple of types of salami. (Their pate just never looked worth buying.) And until now, they could always be counted on for Italian prosciutto. But how come fancy cheeses, walnuts suspended in honey, olive oil, sherry vinegar, olives and what not can come from France, Spain, Italy, New Zealand et al yet meats....?

This is interesting, Shalmanese! I am not sure what it means to single out the importer vs. the product. The distributor? I don't quite understand what that means. The person I spoke with was not someone involved in decision-making, so he was not the most reliable source when he started rattling on about Italian stuff not being organic, etc. That's kind of where I got flabbergasted about the American company judging a traditional Italian product. Yes, I would like to know more about the standards, too, and to ascertain whether there is something going on now with Italian prosciutto that WF knows about that I don't....or if the company is objecting to the product it has carried all along. Good to know about La Quercia, too. None of the stores had any either, though I probably was too hasty to accuse the person at my regular store of lying. Maybe there are intentions of selling only the domestic product now and supplies are limited?

References to Rachael Ray and EVOO imply she is a chef. She is not.

Doc, that does look really good and I have cherry tomatoes at home, if the larger type that some of us used for a Pugliese focaccia. Judging from the photo, the skin is kept on the tomatoes, no?

I would like to be clear here that I consider Whole Foods my principal source of food, especially dairy products and meat. I shop at the farmer's market, go to Asian grocers, a little Italian place and other specialty stores and hit Safeway with my coupons for weekly deals. I may have cheered on Michael Pollan in this summer's exchange of open letters, but I am grateful there are three WFs within walking distance in my city. However, this summer I have been scratching my head over the fact that no store in Washington, D.C. had prosciutto whenever I visited. First there was La Quercia's domestic product that I got to try once. I went back a few weeks later and it was on sale. Big notice chalked up in the Deli department. Great. "But we don't got it," I am told when I place my order. I point to the sign. Shrug. Same thing other places, including my main store, when I ask for Prosciutto di Parma. Just this past weekend the guy behind the counter told me it was there yesterday, but they sold out. I speak to others more senior on the team. "We keep running out. It goes quick," they tell me. Tonight, I go to the third store for something completely different, the largest and newest in D.C. and see "Prosciutto di San Daniele" up on the board. "Yeah," I think. I heard WF was starting to carry this nearby in Virginia. I inquire. This time, the Man leveled with me: "We're not carrying it anymore." I ask why and am told it doesn't meet Whole Food's standards. Since I am interested in you all and your responses, I am not going to tell you much about the rest of the conversation or what I said about this. Let's just say one of his words was "organic." Some of my words were "American," "imperialism" and "lobster." I was given a card with email addresses in Austin and an 800 number. I thank this employee for at least speaking frankly with me and not lying like the folk at my regular store. I would like your help in pursuing this issue further, not just your reactions. Please, do me a favor the next time you shop at Whole Foods. Could you please see if prosciutto is still up on the board in the deli? Find out what happens if you order prosciutto. Be prepared to say, "Never mind," just in case there are some stores or regions that still carry this, though it might be interesting to learn if they're planning to restock. If they don't have the item in stock, find out why. Don't tell them this story yet. Of course, word of this thread may spread to some stores and employees, but not all and not right away. See what they tell you and please post what you discover here. Thanks.