A year of Italian cooking

[Kevin72]

Antipasto: Fried olives

Primo: Vincigrassi

Secondo: Sausage-stuffed quail braised in cognac

The olives are a specialty of the city of Ascoli Piceno. They are stuffed with finely minced salami and breadcrumbs, rolled in egg, then flour, egg again, and finally breadcrumbs, and deep fried. Perfect party food, and an excellent match for the Jesi white wine we were drinking (I’m surprised at the availability of Marchese wines here).

Vincigrassi is a type of lasagne. The pasta is made with semolina and regular flour and flavored with vin santo (I used Marsala—vin santo is not so readily available here with our funky liquor laws). The pasta is then layered with béchamel and a ragu made of mushrooms, pancetta, and chicken livers, then baked.

The quail were stuffed with sausage and breadcrumbs again, seared in butter and olive oil, then topped off with cognac and white wine and braised. I love quail, and thankfully I’ve gotten my wife aboard on it as well. For a contorno it was cabbage with fennel seeds, used as a bed for the quail to be served on.

[ludja]

Antipasto: Fried olives

Primo: Vincigrassi

Secondo: Sausage-stuffed quail braised in cognac

The olives are a specialty of the city of Ascoli Piceno.  They are stuffed with finely minced salami and breadcrumbs, rolled in egg, then flour, egg again, and finally breadcrumbs, and deep fried.  Perfect party food, and an excellent match for the Jesi white wine we were drinking (I’m surprised at the availability of Marchese wines here).

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I love fried olives... but haven't tried making them at home yet. The ones I've tasted had anchovies and/or anchovy paste in them which also results in an incredibly savory snack--and which as you say, are perfect as a starter with drinks. (Thought this originated from the area of Venice) I'm glad to also find out about this version with salami.

Any tips to share on removing the olive pit while keeping the olive intact enough to stuff?

[Kevin72]

Normally olives that size come already stuffed. These had garlic in them, which I removed and then soaked the olives to get rid of the overtly garlicky flavors. In fact I'd gravitate to the pre-stuffed kinds (there are some even with anchovies in them) and my olive pitter can't handle olives that size and I'm not dexterous enough to do it by hand.

[ludja]

Normally olives that size come already stuffed.  These had garlic in them, which I removed and then soaked the olives to get rid of the overtly garlicky flavors.  In fact I'd gravitate to the pre-stuffed kinds (there are some even with anchovies in them) and my olive pitter can't handle olives that size and I'm not dexterous enough to do it by hand.

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I haven't been as thrilled sometimes with the taste of olives I've found that come already stuffed, and so I'd hoped to be able to de-pit them myself. I've seen some suggestions for cutting a spiral in the olive to remove the pit, and then to reform the olive around the stuffing before breading it. As you say, I'm not sure I have the dexterity to do this...

I like your idea re: soaking the olives before stuffing them, and I am more likely to do this if I start with already depitted olives...

Not sure if you mentioned this recently, but what areas of Italy are left for your next three months?

Edited September 19, 2005 by ludja (log)

[Kevin72]

Ah the joy (and power) of keeping others in suspense . . .

Why say what regions are left now when I can enjoy the outcry at the left out regions at the end of the year?

[ludja]

Ah the joy (and power) of keeping others in suspense . . .

Why say what regions are left now when I can enjoy the outcry at the left out regions at the end of the year? 

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Fair enough...

[anzu]

I haven't been as thrilled sometimes with the taste of olives I've found that come already stuffed, and so I'd hoped to be able to de-pit them myself.  I've seen some suggestions for cutting a spiral in the olive to remove the pit, and then to reform the olive around the stuffing before breading it.  As you say, I'm not sure I have the dexterity to do this...

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I've tried this spiral technique. It's not nearly as bad as it sounds (and I'm not that dextrous). It does help to start off with more olives than you'll need, though, so that any failures can be kept aside for some other use.

Kevin, your thread has managed to radically increase the amount of Italian food I am cooking at home. It's utterly inspiring.

[albiston]

I haven't been as thrilled sometimes with the taste of olives I've found that come already stuffed, and so I'd hoped to be able to de-pit them myself.  I've seen some suggestions for cutting a spiral in the olive to remove the pit, and then to reform the olive around the stuffing before breading it.  As you say, I'm not sure I have the dexterity to do this...

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I've tried this spiral technique. It's not nearly as bad as it sounds (and I'm not that dextrous). It does help to start off with more olives than you'll need, though, so that any failures can be kept aside for some other use.

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I've never had the patience to make olive all'Ascolana myself but the few times I've seen someone prepare them they always used to carve the pit out with a small pairing knife, with a technique slightly different from the spiral technique. At the end you get a sort of olive pocket looking like a folded up pita bread (can't think of a better example). Then the olives would be filled with enough meat stuffing to give them their original shape back, breaded and fried. Real tedious work IMO. That's why I prefer eating the little buggers only if someone else has prepared them for me. My admiration for Kevin's efforts just increased by a whole bunch after this .

[Behemoth]

What, what, what! No skin on USA pork WTF is that about? Sausage I can deal with, I like sausage and it sounds like a good idea. But no terracotta coloured crisp crackling, busting with crunchy piggy deliciousness is plain wrong - not matter what Noel Coward has to say about it

You're going to make me google Noel Coward quotes at 8am?

I don't know if it's the butchers' fault. Once I managed to get hold of a slab o'pig with the skin still on (I have a good butcher ) and the dinner guests ate around it I dare not serve proper lamb because the pinkness would freak them out. At what point did people become such sissies?

Do I really need to mention how great all the food looks again? 'Cause it does.

Edited September 20, 2005 by Behemoth (log)

[hathor]

Kevin, those quail look fantastic! I adore quail!!!

Sorry about the fish soup disappointment, brodettos just make my heart pound....I love a good fish soup. Its comfort food for me.

And you MADE olive ascolana??? THAT is impressive!!

Found any Umbrian wines??

[Kevin72]

Kevin, those quail look fantastic! I adore quail!!!

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Same here. Have you had any of the other game birds that abound there: thrush, wild pigeon, etc?

Sorry about the fish soup disappointment, brodettos just make my heart pound....I love a good fish soup. Its comfort food for me.

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Don't get me wrong, it was still good, perfectly acceptable fare. I have to make fish soup at least once, usually twice, a year, and often have very limited seafood to go by. Just for all the ingredients in there I'd want a more pronounced, distinctive flavor. One of my great regrets of my trips over there is that I've yet to sit down to one of their regional seafood soups, though, and taste it done right.

And you MADE olive ascolana??? THAT is impressive!!

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Well, before the opinion on me gets too great around here, I must again stress that I used pre-pitted olives, the real work in that item.

Found any Umbrian wines??

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Yin and yang. Seems like Umbrian reds were easy to come by a few years ago, now they're nowhere to be found and the Marchese wines are much easier to find. I forget, is Orvieto Umbrian? For some reason I haven't gotten a bottle of that yet.

I did get an "Umbrian" red by Vitiano but that stuff is mass-produced and tastes the same for whatever region they're doing (they also do Primitivo from Puglia and a merlot from the Veneto). It's good but lacks that peppery kick to other Umbrian reds (sangiovese) that go so well with their full-flavored food. I did manage to track down a red from Umbria I've enjoyed before; has a rabbit on the label? Guess I should've had that last weekend but I'm saving it for the big Umbrian send-off feast next Sunday. Where did the month go?

Edited September 20, 2005 by Kevin72 (log)

[hathor]

...mmmm....game birds.

Have I ever mentioned Carla, our sexy gas station lady to you? Carla is beautiful, inside and out, and runs our town's gas station. You know how you get a windshield wash with a fill-up (or used to), well, we get fresh eggs, potatoes, zucchini's etc. Whatever she has an abudance of. The other day, we got 2 fresh pigeons! I roasted them with some prunes and we were very, very happy. Pigeon is actualy pretty common fare.

And yes, we have had thrush, in a restaurant. There has been debate as to the actual variety of these tasty little birds that came on a spit. My husband and our friend ate the heads, I drew the line.

Yes, Orvieto is Umbrian. Hope you can track down some of the better reds.... Most of the Orvieto whites are pretty underwhelming in my opinion. Not that there aren't some great ones out there, but they are ususally pretty small producers that don't make it out of the country.

[kanljung]

A great umbrian red that I can recommend is Fobiano from an Orvieto producer named "La Carraia". It is a blend of merlot and cabernet sauvignon. It may be hard to track down, but for a wine that regularly gets the three glasses award, I find it rather priceworthy.

[kellytree]

"This is one dish I wouldn't even think of trying at home. You NEED a whole pig, you NEED the grasso and the magro, you NEED that dead awful salt free bread roll to soak up the juices"

My xhusband makes porchetta a few times a year. He spreads the word and people come a runnin' to buy it - it's really really good ( even better than the trucks along the road on the way to Rome).

As for the olives - the summer during one of my wild weekends in San Benedetto we had olives san benedetto style --- instead of a meat filling it's a fish filling.

mammamiaaaaaa- amazing. I've been badgering my friend to give me his (mothers) recipe.

The lentil soup- reminded me to go out and buy some - looks great.

If you ever come to this area I'll get one of my friends mothers to make a fish brodetto. Seriously.

[Behemoth]

Dessert was watermelon granita, one of the most refreshing things you can ask for in summer.

http://forums.egullet.org/uploads/1124700984/gallery_19696_582_35890.jpg

Hi Kevin,

Can I ask you a question about regions past? I tried to make the watermelon pudding in Clifford Wright's Sicily book but the thing never set up. I mean it is straight liquid. I see what you have above is granita, but I was wondering if you (or anyone else here) have tried the pudding and can tell me where I am going wrong.

[Kevin72]

Oooh, I'm upset Behemoth. You didn't follow my Sicily cooking very closely, did you?

The recipe I used was from Victoria Granof's Sweet Sicily, and the thickening agent was cornstarch. I want to say I added more than the recipe called for and "cooked" it longer as well. You may need to reheat it and stir in more cornstarch.

[Behemoth]

Oooh, I'm upset Behemoth.  You didn't follow my Sicily cooking very closely, did you?

I did so!! I knew I'd seen you make at some point it but the google search turned up only the ice.

Even more cornstarch, huh? Might try that, will definitely try cooking it down more first. Thanks!

[Kevin72]

Not so much cook it down first but cook the watermelon and the cornstarch together to get it to set up.

[Behemoth]

I knew I'd seen you make at some point it but the google search turned up only the ice.

Dear God, I really am turning into Yoda.

Boil watermelon and cornstarch together. Right. That's what I meant.

[Kevin72]

As I recently noted on another thread, I’ve finally acquired Waverly Root’s seminal Italian regional cooking tome, The Foods of Italy, and immediately read the Umbria and Le Marche chapters.  (FYI Adam they do credit Le March as the place of origin for porchetta).

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Oops! Actually, upon closer inspection, and after reading the Rome chapter, he only really states that Le Marche claims to have originated porchetta, but he leans more towards it being of Roman orgins; as in, somewhere in Lazio.

[Kevin72]

As promised earlier, a pic of our newly-painted dining room. Any compliments should be directed to my wife, the overseer of the project, patience of a saint when I stomped out numerous times, and eye for detail that brought everything together. Oh, and she did probably 70% of the work, too.

[Kevin72]

Saturday was supposed to herald the arrival of cooler weather with hurricane Rita passing by, but it went further east, resulting in howling winds and overcast skies but no break in our month-long drought. Sunday it was 98F! How sad is that that we have to rely on a hurricane to bring us rain, and even then it doesn’t work out?

Nevertheless, I can’t wait around forever for soup weather to get here, so Saturday night I made another batch of soup, this time using another famous Umbrian product, spelt. We actually bought this on our trip to Italy last spring. This was a spelt, pumpkin, and escarole soup from Julia della Croce’s Umbria.

Served it with some crusty homemade rolls, a nice bottle of Orvieto, and a salad, and watched some sorta creepy movies while the wind rattled outside.

Seriously though. Needs to get cooler soon.

[Kevin72]

Truffle fest!

No single item represents the reverence for terroir and localized cooking that the Umbrians are famed for than their black truffles. Waverly Root even gives Umbria’s truffles the nod over the white truffles of Piemonte.

I ordered a small jar off of Amazon’s new gourmet website after being clued into it by a link from Adam several months back. Quite an amazing selection. I got four in a jar; I’d say they’d been soaked or preserved somehow initially but there was no liquid in the jar itself. They tasted fairly salty right out of the jar; I had to give them a good rinse. Unfortunately afterwards they didn’t taste like too much to me. Our Central Market here does, occasionally, break out fresh truffles resting in rice, but not until much later in the fall, if in fact they do that at all. To amplify the flavors, I also had a jar of truffle “salsa” my parents brought back with them from their own Italy trip. It contained truffles, regular white mushrooms, black olives, and garlic, but kicked up an amazing and unmistakable truffle aroma when heated.

Antipasto: Truffles with scrambled eggs.

Primo: Spaghetti with the aforementioned truffle “salsa”, along with more garlic, anchovies, and a whole truffle pounded into a paste in a mortar.

Secondo: Trout stuffed with truffles and baked.

Dolce: Chocolate truffle gelato.

Comments on all the dishes were that the truffles made everything seem more elegant and yet earthy and comforting all at once. With the exception of the fish, you couldn’t necessarily point to the truffles’ flavor on their own, but they did lend something more to the dishes than the sum of their parts.

[mrbigjas]

Nevertheless, I can’t wait around forever for soup weather to get here, so Saturday night I made another batch of soup, this time using another famous Umbrian product, spelt.  We actually bought this on our trip to Italy last spring.  This was a spelt, pumpkin, and escarole soup from Julia della Croce’s Umbria.

that looks great, kevin. what more is involved besides the three main ingredients? just the usual garlic/onion and chicken stock, or is there anything else going on there? any cheese?

(yes, in a roundabout way i'm asking for a recipe, but nothing specific--i can fake it if i know the basics.)

[Kevin72]

Onion and pancetta simmered together for the base. I used some homemade broth/stock for the liquid. A nice dusting of parm and olive oil to serve. As della Croce notes, the escarole and the sweet pumpkin (red kuri) play very nicely off each other and the farro adds a great earthy depth to the whole thing.