“I eat my candy with pork and beans.
Excuse my manners if I make a scene.”
-Pork and Beans, by Weezer

I could begin this post with a rose-tinted anecdote about how, during the run-up to our wedding in Italy, as Amy and I were lingering romantically over a typically rustic Tuscan dinner one warm June evening against the background of a bucolic, rolling landscape with honey-colored buildings dotted sparingly among neat rows of vines and olives — our eyes locked together over a tablescape of starched cloth, antique silver and leaded crystal — the air, heavy with the scent of lavender and the hum of cicadas, seemed to stir momentarily, as if a gust of breeze from we knew not where had suddenly, and unintentionally, loosed itself, darkening our moods and furrowing our brows with its unwelcome interruption.

I could conclude such an anecdote in lyrical fashion thus: as the sun’s dipping parabola cast its final, limpid rays upon the radiant skin of my betrothed’s temples, she recoiled in anguish, reeling like a punch-drunk prize-fighter, at the rancid bouquet now squalling through her nostrils.

I could also proceed with a lengthy explanation of why it is that fagioli e salsiccie is the quintessential Tuscan peasant dish, having sustained generations in that part of Italy, and how it sits proudly among the best of pan-European cucina povera alongside fabada and ollo podrida.

Instead, I could just as easily explain that during said nuptials we enjoyed many of the delicious bean dishes for which Tuscany is famous and, consequently, experienced the oh-so familiar sensation of, ahem, flatulence.

These days many people are aware of the wonders of Tuscan cuisine; the saltless bread, the magnificent steaks, the peppery, fruity olive oil, the tangy Pecorino, the bread and tomato soups, as well as the widespread use of beans that has earned Tuscans the moniker “mangiafagioli” or bean-eaters. What still mystifies most people though, is if beans always give us wretched and disgusting gas, why do we continue eating them?

Before you start clicking away, tut-tutting about the sheer childishness… the puerile subject matter… they should know better, etc., you might consider the anthropological significance of the humble bean. Not only are beans among the world’s super foods, being packed with protein (containing more than twice the protein of most meats), fiber, and complex carbohydrates, the simple act of growing them fixes nitrogen to poor soils enabling land to remain fertile without requiring artificial fertilizers (meaning they are not just good for you, they are also good the Earth), but, in addition to being nutritionally complete, beans are easy to grow, and, as a result, have been (pun intended) essential to human societies since way before bread was even conceived of. Thus, the histories of the bean, the fart, and the very survival of humanity are inextricably connected.

Not that our survival this past weekend was predicated on eating beans, but as we struggled back up to our fourth floor walk-up apartment wet and cold from chilly April showers, it certainly felt that way for a few moments. The idea of the silken texture of perfectly cooked cannellini beans bathed lovingly in a tomato, garlic and bay-scented broth, and complemented by fennel or hot pepper-spiked pork sausage hung like an apparition in front of us as we stuffed our shoes with newspaper and festooned every available hanging place with damp clothes.

Sadly, we hadn’t had the foresight to soak our dried beans overnight (we only had four hours to soak them), so we tried the oft-mooted, but untested, option of using the pressure cooker to make amends. Various online sources suggested pressure-cooking them for anything between 12 and 25 minutes, neither of which we found to be nearly enough. After three abortive de-pressurizations, and a total of around 40 minutes cooking, the beans had achieved the smooth, toothsome texture we were looking for. Having browned the sausages in the pot before adding the beans, onion, garlic, bay, vegetable stock and tomato paste, all they required was an additional five minutes simmering among the beans for the dish to be ready.

Settling into our meal, we were astounded by the restorative qualities of simple pork and beans, washing the warming combo down with something red and Portuguese and in the $8 range. The following morning, we were similarly astounded by the metabolic reaction of human intestines and beans. Happily, our marriage, having begun with flatulence, and now securely founded on a mutual understanding of the universality of these kinds of things, was able to accommodate such seismic eruptions. Our day proceeded with a long walk in the park, having left our apartment, windows open, to air out.

It might be generational, or, perhaps, philosophical, but there are, on the one hand, those who enjoy and appreciate handmade things, and the art and craft they require to make, and, on the other, those who prefer their things machine-made, reliable, and standard. The ‘things’ here could be quite literally anything. My father, who, to me, is the quintessential scientist and pragmatist, believes that most, if not all, advances for the betterment of mankind have come as a result of the increased use and application of machines, technology and science. In fact, he would argue, I’m sure, that this blog is evidence of the fact that even something as Luddite as cooking can be improved through the application of technology, though regular readers – with good reason – may not agree.

My mother was cut from very different cloth however, and, though a nurse who believed sincerely in the power of modern medicine, sanitation and inoculation, she was a true amateuse of a hand-turned chair-leg, a cut-glass goblet, and, much to the detriment of my appearance during my tender years, a hand-knitted sweater.  She was also a great lover of gardening, baking bread and, despite the fact that it rarely worked, yogurt-making. I think it’s from her that I get most of my culinary instincts, as the very notion of spending three or four hours in the kitchen doing anything would horrify my dad.

Pasta-rollers, like all machines, were invented for three main reasons: (1) to produce more quickly what used to take a long time (2) as a uniform-quality product, and (3) so that the resulting free time could be spent either more enjoyably or industriously. The assumption behind it seems to be that it makes it easier to make something that is typically quite tricky, and that the making of it by hand was a laborious pain in the ass. Those who have used a pasta roller, whether the hand-crank variety or the KitchenAid attachment, know, as we do, that it is a fabulous invention and enables even the busiest gastronome to home-make great fresh pasta in a relatively short time. They might also have found that it is actually fun to use because it combines the joy of mixing a dough by hand with the ease and convenience of not having to roll it out and cut it yourself.

Taking this notion of fun to its logical extreme this past weekend, I decided to devote my entire Sunday to doing the whole thing – the mixing, the rolling and the cutting – by hand. In spite of the recipe book’s warning that it was a painstaking exercise, I had little idea of what I was getting into. I now have a profound appreciation both for labor-saving machines, and the unique taste, texture and satisfaction derived from hand-rolled pasta.

But it is more than that. I learned something about myself on Sunday. In some ways, it was a revelation. I had always thought that I appreciated handmade things, particularly food and wine, with the all patience, care and skills that their creation implies, but I had never actually tested myself to see if I could enjoy hand-making something that required real patience and physical effort.  And, while there certainly were moments in which I did not enjoy being patient or the physical effort, on the whole, I really did find the process to be incredibly rewarding – relaxing almost. Not only did I (eventually, and with several abortive attempts) make some absolutely first-class pasta, but I learned a new technique and was, in the end, able to enjoy the fruits of my labor in a way I never have before.

Pici Keen

Famous for the lavish displays of wealth and the beautiful arts of the Renaissance found in Florence, Siena, Lucca and Pisa, Tuscans are, by contrast, rather austere in their culinary inclinations with their love of simple grilled meats, stewed beans and saltless bread. Such austerity requires the freshest and best ingredients in order to be delicious, and, fortuitously, Tuscany offers these up in great bounty. Similarly, it often requires great effort and technique.

So it is with Pici (also known as pinci — hand-rolled, eggless Tuscan thick spaghetti — perhaps the best example of this cucina povera (poor man’s cuisine) — utilizing only 00 flour, water, green Tuscan olive oil and a lot of time and effort. Indeed, it is my belief that what the poor, historically, lacked in wealth they more than make up for in patience, and disposable time. Originating from the Val d’Orcia region (the area between Montalcino and Montepulciano), pici are usually eaten with a rich meat sauce, often containing porcini mushrooms, but any hearty meat or game ragu would be a good choice.

The duck ragu recipe below is typical of the region of Arezzo which is the area where we got married in June 2007, and making it engendered all those kinds of warm feelings one gets from a house filled with delicious smells and the wonderful memories of the time of our lives.

Learning a new skill, and in this case, a new recipe, is a matter of managing to overcome self-doubt. Before you attempt making pici, I would highly recommend you try making a regular long pasta with an egg dough, so that you understand how it should feel and look. It will also allow you to develop a sense about the right elasticity of a good dough which will be useful even though Pici dough is a very different creature altogether.

If you follow the exact instructions below, you’ll probably find that your dough feels too dry and too heavy. Do not be afraid to add more water and more oil as you see fit because eggless doughs can easily become brittle when allowed to be too dry. However, do not abandon hope. I urge you to stick with the basis of the recipe (allowing for various seasonal, regional, altitudinal and indoor-outdoor climactic conditions) and overcome your fears of impending culinary disaster, as they will not materialize. If it feels too dry, add more water. Too wet, add flour until it feels right. One word of caution, though: be sparing in any additions of liquid or lipids because at the hand-rolling stage you will be adding extra olive oil to reduce friction and facilitate the rolling process, and you don’t want to find at that stage that you have to start all over again.

Also, do give yourself plenty of time. An otherwise lazy Sunday afternoon is perfect for this, as not only does the pasta make a perfect Sunday night dinner, but, more importantly, it gives you time to rest as you go along. Making enough pici for four people can be a tiring business, even if there are two of you on the job. One final proviso, do not treat pici like regular fresh pasta — i.e. sprinkle it liberally with flour and allow to set-up and dry for a while prior to cooking. I refer to my earlier comments when I say that pici can dry out and become brittle very quickly, so when you make them, plan to eat them within, at most, a couple of hours. This might appear like a disadvantage but it’s not because once cooked they are probably more robust than regular pastas and even reheat remarkably well.

So, please try making this dish. The sauce is easy and indescribably good (I know everyone says that about their food, but, really, this is very special), and the pasta is a great reward for some hard graft both corporeally and in that it offers a real sense of achievement. By the time you’re done, you’ll have sore shoulders but will have mastered the rolling technique perfectly. As a result, pasta-making will have transcended the bland uniformity of the machine-age and become what all good food should be: absolutely unique and deeply personal.

Those with even a basic understanding of food history probably know that the hamburger as we know it today is an American adaptation of the “Hamburger-style steak” which originated in the now-German city of Hamburg, and was brought to this country by immigrants from Schleswig-Holstein. Demonstrating typical cunning and salemanship, all the Americans did was make this dish portable, and, having done so, they set out to make the world obese and diabetic by drowning these wildly popular sandwiches in hydrogenated fat and salt, and selling them for $1 each.

A marginally less successful, but somewhat healthier, tactic was adopted by Italian immigrants in Argentina, who, when they found that chicken was viewed with only slightly less disdain than fish in their new country, modified their recipe for pollo alla Milanese to include the ubiquitous Argentine beef. Like shooting fish in a barrel, once launched these new breaded and fried beef cutlets quickly became a hugely popular alternative to a steak across Argentina – a country that, since it, statistically, eats more beef per head than anywhere else on Earth, was likely crying out for alternative ways to serve their national dish.

Known as milanesas, they can be found in one form or another on menus and in grocery stores throughout Buenos Aires: most are beef, though chicken and veal (de ternera) are also typical, and they come in a variety of arrangements, the most common of which seems to be alla Napolitana.  This latter dish consists of a breaded cutlet topped with prosciutto (or cooked ham), melted cheese [cuartirola (sic) [Quartirola Lombarda] or Port Salut] and a splash of chunky, crimson tomato sauce, and is often served with fries (papas fritas). Not many people know this, but it is not, in fact, named for Neapolitan-style pizza, or the way the dish is served in Naples, rather it is so-called because it was first served in Jose Napoli’s, now-defunct, Buenos Aires Pizzeria Napoli establishment in the 1930s.

Indeed, this dish, remarkably similar to the French poulet cordon bleu, can be found throughout much of South America, and, in Chile, an almost identical dish is served as Milanesa Kaiser, or simply Escalopa, reflecting, perhaps, more the original central European roots of the dish in the Austrian Wiener Schnitzel, than its later variant the Lombardian cotoletta alla Milanese. In fact, such is the popularity of this technique of breading pounded meat and then shallow frying it, that you can find similar dishes throughout much of the western hemisphere with the wonderfully decadent Southern dish of chicken fried steak being perhaps the best known in this country.

And, resembling the frankly magnificent “chicken parm” sandwiches found in almost every pizza joint in the north-east US, the milanesa also sometimes appears in sandwiches in Argentina. As we had recently received some delicious samples from Napa, Ca., company GL Mezzetta, from their new (to the north-east US) Napa Valley Bistro line, including a jar of tomato sauce and one of peperoncini (pickled hot peppers), with the challenge of using them to create a contest-winning sandwich, we decided to use them to build ourselves a delicious, gut-busting torta de milanesa alla Napolitana.

An hour later, full and sporting messy red-sauce mustaches, we began to wonder how come milanesas do not seem to have had quite the same bloating effect on the Argentine population as the hamburger has in America…

Mezzetta Napa Valley Bistro Products
Tomato Basil Pasta Sauce
Altogether this is an excellent jarred sauce and beats the pants off its competition. It’s pleasantly chunky; the wine provides a nice rounded flavor and doesn’t overpower the tomatoes with too much acid; and the small pool of olive oil that had settled on the top of the sauce was a good sign, showing both that it included olive oil and that it wasn’t fully emulsified with stabilizers or other preservatives. Other bonuses for a jarred sauce include the clear listing of “fresh” ingredients on the label, rather than their dried or powdered counterparts commonly found in regular, generic bottled pasta sauce. Our only complaint, and this is a matter of personal taste, is that it was slightly too heavy on the oregano. If you’re a fan of oregano in your pasta sauces though, this is probably the finest jarred sauce you can find.

Make That Sandwich
If you’d like to enter your sandwich to the GL Mezzetta Make That Sandwich Contest, click here and read the guidelines and other small print, and submit your entry. The grand prize is $25,000!! Good luck, happy sandwich-making and buen provecho!

Such was my mood then upon reading the latest issue of the magazine that is quickly overtaking Rachel Ray as WANFs bête noire. You see, the January edition of Bon Appetit focuses on what is calls “the new trend” of everything a cheval, or mounted by an egg, as it were, and quite apart from having spent a good part of our 2007-2008 oeuvre (pun intended) posting recipes and photos of various foods dressed in this way, we, quite pathetically perhaps, like to think of ourselves as in the comparative culinary vanguard and hate to be thought of as simply following a BA trend. So, before we go on, I would like to state, in no uncertain terms, that we not only made the subject of this post dish in October (towards the end of our self-indulgent egg sluttishness), but that our posting this now is influenced in no way by the food magazine zeitgeist.

With that off my chest, allow me to introduce to you one of the most wonderful ways of cooking eggs – uova in ragú, or eggs in a Bolognese sauce. Not to be confused with the well-known Tex-Mex breakfast staple of eggs in hell, this is essentially a Bolognese sauce version of the Tuscan classic Uova e Spinaci Cotti alla Fiorentina which we posted during aforementioned egg-focused period. And, not only does it allow one to indulge a fetish for eggs and meat, but the visual contrast on your plate of the white and yellow of the egg against a reddish-brown background of ragú is one to please children of all ages, even those in their 30s.

Less research than we typically do suggests that this is not an authentic Bolognese dish, and in fact, our inspiration came from a menu item - Uova al Pomodoro (eggs baked in a marina sauce) - at a small local trattoria called Apertivo. Nevertheless, we feel that it should definitely sit among the greats in the canon of Emilia-Romagna cuisine, utilising as it does the king of sauces, the ragú.

The main key to success, then, in this stupidly simple dish, apart from some (forgive the pun) good eggs, is clearly the quality of your ragú, so we strongly encourage you to read at least some of the marathon post that is A Tale of Two Sauces: It’s A Traditional Ragú Bolognese Deathmatch from last year to get a sense of the time, effort and joy involved in creating this wonderful thing. Then, once made (and you will have plenty leftover), simply add sauce to a large saucepan, heat until simmering, and crack in as many eggs as you like (two per person seems about right). Then, either cover with pan lid and reduce heat to medium-low, or slap the whole thing into a 350F (180C) oven and bake until eggs are firm, about fifteen minutes. It can be served over pasta (think pappardelle or tagliatelle) or simply as a main course with some bread and salad on the side. Come to think of it, I wouldn’t be upset if I was served this for breakfast either.

It’s widely known that humble ingredients prepared with simple techniques often produce the best dishes, and it’s becoming more widely known that this philosophy lies at the very heart of Spanish cooking – a cuisine that has, in the last five or so years, become one of the most celebrated “new finds” of foodies everywhere. As a result of this, there has been a great deal of interest in tapas and the cuisine and culture surrounding these small plates/finger foods. All of which, in my view, can only be a good thing, even if many of these new “tapas restaurants” (itself, again in my view, an oxymoron) serve few, if any, authentic Spanish dishes.

Indeed, and here lies the rub, in their rush to capitalize on the latest food trend, it seems everyone is trying to outdo everyone else on the cleverness factor. Expanding their menus to include all sorts of dishes resembling “tapas” only in the fact that they are served in small quantities. It’s almost as if the tasting menus of high-falutin’ restaurants have become conflated with “tapas” so that you get tiny dishes and are charged through the nose for them.

Now, we here at WeAreNeverFull.com, perhaps contrary to popular opinion, are not against experimentation or new dishes in the slightest. Quite the contrary, in fact, we are always ready to try new things. However, and again, this may just be our view, so feel free to comment disagreeing, we feel that developing all these new and complicated dishes and calling them tapas is fundamentally against the spirit of tapas as a style of eating, outlined above.

The term tapas, as I’m sure many of you know, is derived from the Spanish word tapa, meaning a lid, and originally connoted a slice of bread or cheese that certain tavern owners used to serve across the top of the drinking vessel, perhaps as a way of keeping out unwanted bugs. Over the centuries this has developed into a wondrous variety of small dishes, now commonly on plates and cocktail sticks, as well as on rounds of bread, that are served to accompany su caña – whatever you are drinking at the bar. Indeed, it has become so refined a practice that many bars, while they might serve a lot of different tapas, are famous for one in particular, a signature tapa, that those in the know only eat at that one bar. So, as you can see, tapas has come a long way from its beginnings as a humble drink lid. That said, the original ethos of simple but tasty accompaniments remains.

We’ve traveled extensively in Spain and eaten, it must be said, an obscene amount of tapas over the past several years, and the consistent theme has been that the ingredients and the simple, time-honored preparations and take center stage, not the ego of the preparer. And this has never been more true than in the case of patatas a la Riojana. So, so simple, unbelieveably good. Really. Potatoes, chorizo, onions, garlic, sweet paprika and water, combine to create a dish that is without a doubt my favorite tapa. And, if I may name-drop shamelessly, I am not in bad company when I say that. Legendary chef and father of nouvelle cuisine Paul Bocuse, no less, while at a culinary convention in Spain in the late 1970s, described patatas a la Riojana as among the “greatest dishes created by man.”

And here is the interesting thing. If Bocuse, a man whose entire reputation was built on small, artfully-plated dishes, found this humble and rustic dish such a revelation, why is it that so many lesser chefs of today are trying so hard, and in many cases failing, to improve upon these time-honored preparations?

Nearly everyone knows that La Rioja is Spain’s most famous wine appellation, but it is also known, mostly inside Spain, as being the origin of many good things to eat. Piquillo peppers are the regions’ second best known export, and together with wild mushrooms, chorizo, river crabs, bream and trout they combine to make many dishes synonymous in the Spanish stomach with La Rioja. In fact, it is the inclusion of a typical Riojan dry chorizo that makes this preparation “a la Riojana” or Rioja-style.

Personally, I would eat this dish three times a week, but if my recommendation that you try making it isn’t good enough for you, then I’m sure you’ll pay attention to the wise words of Monsieur Bocuse.

Ingredients: (serves 4)

• 3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• 2 cloves garlic, chopped roughly
• 1 small onion (or half a large one) finely sliced
• 7 ounces (or 2-3 links) chorizo, sliced into rounds
• 1/2 pound floury potatoes (idaho or similar), peeled and cubed
• 1 tsp pimenton dulce (sweet paprika)
• 1 tsp kosher salt, or more, to taste
• 1/2 – 1pint (1/2 liter) cold tap water

Recipe: (adapted slightly from Jose Andres’ Tapas: A Taste of Spain in America

• Warm olive oil over medium heat and add garlic.
• Cook for about a minute until golden before adding onions, and sauteing them gently for 20 minutes or so, until light brown.
• Add chorizo and cook until this also is browned, about 2 minutes.
• Place the potatoes in the pan and stir to coat with oil. Cook for 10 minutes.
• Now sprinkle over the pimenton and pour in enough water to almost cover potatoes and chorizo. Put lid on pan and bring to a boil, then lower heat and simmer for about 20 minutes or until liquid is reduced by half.
• Serve immediately with lots of crusty bread and a hearty red Rioja. Unbelieveably delicious. Trust me.
• Unsurprisingly, this is quite a filling dish, but fear not, as left-overs, eaten either cold or reheated the next day are even better as the flavors continue to meld together.

So on a very, very humid 90-degree day (and subsequently, humid 85 degree night) which happened to be our 1st anniversary, we decided to bring old Bugs Bunny out of hiding. As Jonny and I whined and moaned about the fact that “one year ago today we were in Tuscany about to start our two week trek around Northern Italy” we also thought back to some of the simple and fabulous meals we ate around the small towns of Bucine and Ambra in Arrezo near to where our wedding was held. One of those meals was at a small little hole-in-the-wall place on the side of the road called Osteria dei Conti Guidi. This was one of those places that in America would fail because it’s not trendy enough, not flash, not hip. They had plastic tables and chairs outside with colorful, non-matching plastic tablecloths on top. The tables weren’t very steady because they were sat on the grass which sloped slightly. You walk into the nearly empty restaurant because there is no hot-looking hostess waiting at the front to greet you and take you to your table. Instead, you kind of look around for anyone who can even tell you that the place is open – inside it’s brightly lit with a small TV in the corner blasting the news or a sporting match and a few older men finishing up their digestivo and smoking a cigarette. And then, she appears…. the “mama”. The owner, hostess, waitress, part-time cook and busboy. That “all-in-one” kind of restaurateur who you end up falling in love with because of their speed and passion. I am forgetting her name but that night she was like our best friend. She handed us the menus and we laughed at the loose Italian to English translations on the menu – I have pictures somewhere which I’ll attempt to locate and upload them here. As you eat, the owners many cats would come over and rub past your legs hoping you would accidentally drop some of your prociutto on the grass.

That night Jonny ordered the Hare Ragu with Juniper Berries over homemade pappardelle. I just remember him making many happy noises and eating it up in record speed. It was a dish that should normally be eaten in the colder months, but he was enjoying the complex flavors immensely as we sat outside on the plastic chairs. If you can locate juniper berries at your closest gourmet shop, you will be blown away by the taste – it’s as if you are putting a drop of gin on your tongue. Juniper berries are the seed cone produced by the female juniper plant and it’s actually not a berry, it’s just shaped like one. When they are young they are green in color but turn into a purple-red color once they are over 18 months mature. They are a natural diuretic and, back in the day, were used to treat arthritis and were thought to stimulate the appetite (think they tried to smoke it?). Obviously, the most famous things juniper berries are used for is flavoring gin. You have just got to try them, they are absolutely delicious and are used in many dishes, especially those using game. It is understandable why this spice is such a wonderful paring with our “Open” Raviolo with Hare and Juniper Berry Ragu.

Instead of making normal ravioli’s, we used big sheets of pasta to ‘cover’ spoonfulls of the ragu. The only differences between a normal ravioli and our ‘open’ raviolo’s are the size (ravioli is usually much smaller than raviolo) and the fact that they are not pressed together so that the stuffing is enclosed within the pasta sheets. It’s an interesting way to use pasta and you also get that same feeling of ‘cutting into’ the pasta like you would normally do with ravioli’s. Give this a try. Do not be intimidated by the use of game or the juniper berry spice – yes, it is one of those meals to make with a nice bottle of wine (and, in our case, a very strong air conditioner!) because it is not a quick meal to make. Once you buy the juniper berries you can use them in a variety of meals! ***Note: The Bottle of wine up to the right is from the small vineyard where we were married in Tuscany (Tenuta di Lupinari). The picture of the castle is where I changed into my dress (and drank copious amounts of Prosecco) and where were were married (in the gardens in front of the castle). Ahhhh, memories.

‘OPEN’ RAVIOLO WITH HARE AND JUNIPER BERRY RAGU (serves 4 as main and 6 as an appetizer)

Ingredients:

• 1/2 pound to 1 pound of Lidia’s Poor Man’s Pasta Recipe (for Raviolo’s)
• 1/2 rabbit, cut up into chunks using a cleaver/heavy knife
• 1/2 cup flour
• 4 cloves of garlic, smashed with back of knife
• 1 onion, finely diced
• 1 teaspoon dried juniper berries
• 1/4 cup or 4 tablespoons white wine
• 2 sprigs (each) of rosemary and thyme, bruised with the back of a knife
• 1 cup passata or crushed tomatoes
• 1 cup of chicken or rabbit stock
• 3 tablespoons good extra virgin olive oil
• salt and freshly ground black pepper

What to do:

1. Dredge rabbit pieces in flour and saute in olive oil in a deep saute pan or dutch oven until all sides are well browned.
2. With a slotted spoon, remove rabbit to a plate and add the onions to the oil and, on medium-low, allow them to sweat for at least 5-8 minutes until translucent. Add the garlic and cook for another 3 to 4 minutes.
3. Add the reserved rabbit pieces back to the pan and then deglaze with white wine. Scrape up any bits that accumulated on the bottom of the pan. When the wine is reduced by half, add juniper berries and the herbs.
4. When the pot is almost completely dry (all liquid has been absorbed), add the passata/tomatoes and the chicken stock. Stir well and bring to a simmer. When it comes to a simmer, put lid on and cook for 45 minutes to 1 hour.
5. While rabbit is simmering, make your pasta. Allow the strips of pasta to dry on a well-floured surface until the rabbit is ready.
6. After 45 minutes , remove the lid off your ragu and simmer uncovered for another 30 minutes or until the sauce has become thick.
7. Turn off the stove and remove the rabbit pieces with a slotted spoon and allow to cool in a bowl. While that is cooling, bring salted water to a boil in order to cook your pasta.
8. Once the rabbit is cool, you will use your fingers (instead of the 1st way we tried with two forks which is not easy) to remove any pieces of bones that are on the rabbit meat. Because it has been cooked for so long, it should come off very, very easily. Make sure you get ALL the bones! You don’t want your guests choking or their mouths being cut up, unless, of course, you do.
9. Stir your meat back into the ragu. Remove the rosemary twigs. Add some salt to taste and freshly ground black pepper.
10. Slice your pasta sheets into 6-inch squares and cook in the boiling water until they come to the surface (about 2 minutes). Drain.
11. Time to plate – add a pasta square on the bottom, top with a big spoonful of the rabbit ragu and a drizzle of olive oil. Top with another pasta square and a smaller spoonfull of the the ragu. Again, drizzle a bit of olive oil on top along with some ground pepper and anything green (chives, parsley, basil, thyme, etc.). Serve with a delicious vino and settle into a satisfying meal. ***NOTE: Feel free to use another thick and hearty pasta with this dish like pappardelle or tagliatelle.

Check out some other posts you may enjoy:

• Vermut (Vermouth): Rediscovering an Old Classic
• Remaking a Tuscan Restaurant Meal (From Florence)
• Striking Over Pasta?
• BEET AND RICOTTA FILLED RAVIOLI WITH BROWN BUTTER AND POPPY SEEDS
• SPANISH (AUSTURIAN) OXTAIL WITH FRIED POTATOES
• GROUND LAMB KABOBS (Lamb Kubideh)

In Florence, and other parts of Tuscany, eggs florentine are not typically eaten at breakfast time, the Tuscans preferring the simplicity of coffee and a pastry or perhaps a grilled slice of saltless Tuscan bread, rubbed with garlic and olive oil. However, the basic notion of eggs and spinach is authentically Tuscan, and instead of poached eggs over wilted spinach, they are often baked together in a creamy, nutmeggy sauce and eaten as a side dish to a grilled or roasted meat.

And, with a lot of things we do on our blog, we feel the authentic version is better than the knock-offs and happily spinach is in season right now, so it’s both authentic and seasonal.

Initially, I was skeptical that this dish would be any good because spinach dishes are usually not that flavorful – with the spinach not offering much in the way of an identifiable taste. Not in this case though, where the spinach actually provides all the flavor and, surprisingly, a lot of almost crunchy texture, and the cream, eggs and butter provide the richness.

This, as an accompaniment to a great, rare bistecca alla fiorentina, would make for a delicious and decadent dinner, not dissimilar to the traditional American steakhouse classic of steak with a side of creamed spinach, but the addition of the eggs to this dish really puts it over the edge. You really can’t go wrong.

Baked Spinach with Eggs

Ingredients

1lb (500g) spinach, washed, but with stems on
1/2 cup heavy cream
3-4 medium eggs
1tbsp unsalted butter1tbsp grated parmigiano-reggiano cheese1tsp freshly grated nutmegsalt and black pepper to taste

Recipe

Pre-heat your oven to 350F / 175C.In a large saute pan, wilt the spinach gently in the butter. Three to four minutes is all it should really take.Then strain-off the spinach juices and reserve. Place spinach to a buttered oven-proof baking dish and distribute evenly.Add spinach juices and half the cream back in your pan and over low heat allow to reduce a little – until the cream is a pale green and starting to thicken. Then add nutmeg, salt and pepper to taste.Pour the rest of the cream over the spinach and make indentations in the spinach for your eggs. Crack eggs into indentations, then pour over the cream and spinach juice mixture before sprinkling the whole thing with parmesan cheese and some extra black pepper.Bake for 15-20 minutes or until bubbling and eggs are firm. Allow to come to room temperature before serving with your favorite cut of steak.

Thanks to Maxine Clark, The Flavors of Tuscany: Recipes from the Heart of Italy, from which this recipe was adapted.

Check out these other posts you may enjoy:

• PAPPA AL POMODORO (Tuscan Tomato and Bread Soup)
• TORTILLA ESPANOLA (Spanish Potato Omelet)
• PASTA (BUCATINI) WITH PISTACHIO SAUCE
• WHOLE FRIED SNAPPER WITH GARLIC AND PARSLEY SAUCE
• FETTUCCINE FRA’DIAVOLO WITH CRAB AND SHRIMP
• ROASTED PORK SHOULDER (Pernil) – The Quicker Version

Jeffrey Steingarten famously declares in It Must Have Been Something I Ate that every time he is bored, he roasts a chicken. Calculating that he gets bored approximately once a week, this translates into 52 roast chickens a year and more than one thousand since he began as food critic at Vogue. That’s a lot of chicken, but it’s also a lot of practice in the art of roasting. Now, Steingarten goes on to say that roasting a chicken in the oven is little more than baking it, and that real roasting can only be done on a spit over a flame, which is perhaps true, but in the absence of a spit and fire, I think oven-roasting (baking) can produce a perfectly delicious roast chicken, and would refer you to the recent post “How to Spatchcock a Chicken” for a quick step-by-step.

Indeed, to my mind, (and to disagree with Mr. Steingarten, for once) there is one distinct advantage to oven-roasting vs. spit-roasting, namely, drippings, and drippings, like the crumbles in the corner of a bag of chips (crisps), are where the flavor is at. These drippings, you see, can be made into one of the most sublime of all cooking by-products, the gravy.

So, after washing and patting dry my bird, I stuffed its cavity with carrots, celery, onions, garlic, thyme, and lemon, before giving it a good rub all over with olive oil and a healthy sprinkling of salt. I then placed said bird in a dutch oven (le creuset) and leaving the lid off, put it in a 420F oven for forty minutes. After forty minutes, and with the bird looking perfectly golden and crispy, I turned the heat down to more placid 350F and let it roast for another hour before removing it and letting it rest a while out of the oven.

Before carving it, I removed the bird from the pot and took out the stuffing from the cavity, then drained all the juices out of the cavity into the pot where they mixed with roasting juices. Adding the cavity stuffing to the juices, along with about a pint of tap water, I turned up the heat and scraped the burnt bits off the bottom of the pan. I let the liquid reduce by about a third, stirring occasionally and crushing some of the vegetables a bit with my wooden spoon.

Nicely brown and beautifully redolent of chicken, thyme, lemon and the sweetness of roasted carrots, I strained the gravy and then pushed the solids through a sieve to add some body and flavor back in to it. Seasoning only slightly with salt and fresh pepper, I was proud to have made an absolutely fantastic, honest-to-goodness chicken gravy without recourse to stock, bouillon cubes or thickeners like corn starch. It was a moment in which I realized that just by following my instincts I had recreated the kind of gravy you’d commonly find at a good English restaurant or pub, or indeed, a good country French restaurant.

It was really quite an ordinary dinner – roast chicken, dauphinoise potatoes and a warm asparagus salad with fennel and celery tops, but with this gravy it became extraordinary — exactly the kind of restorative elixir that my body needed. “They” say that chicken soup contains something that makes you better when you’re sick, and I am sure that this chicken gravy had some of that goodness in it too. It was freshly made, flavorful and, well, chicken-y in a way that only chicken can really taste like chicken, and it made me feel wholesome without resorting to wheat germ, lentils and colonic irrigation.

Another interesting by-product of this dinner was a rather toothsome recipe for a potato and fennel gratin that I’m also inordinately proud of, perhaps because I didn’t work from a recipe, perhaps because I’m an asshole. Anyway, here’s how to do it:

Potato & Fennel Gratin
Ingredients

• 2 large or 3 medium waxy potatoes (yukon gold are best here) peeled, but left whole
• 1 large fennel bulb with tops trimmed and reserved for fennel salad
• 1/2 to 2/3 cup milk
• 2-3oz low moisture mozzarella, sliced thinly
• salt & pepper to taste

Recipe

• Preheat oven to 350F.
• Using a mandolin on the middle thickness setting, slice your potatoes and fennel.
• Lay out potatoes overlapping one another by about 3/4 slice (see photo below) in a layer in a baking dish.
• Then do the same thing with your fennel slices. This second layer will probably not be as neat as the first one, but that doesn’t really matter.
• Pour the milk over the vegetables but make sure milk does not cover them. Depending on the size of your dish, you may need a bit more or a bit less milk, but it should only come up to the bottom of the upper-most layer of vegetables.
• Season with salt and pepper.

• Cover dish with foil and place in oven for about half an hour.
• After this time, remove from oven and lay your mozzarella slices on top. Do not add too much cheese – be a little sparing.
• Return to oven and allow to bake for another twenty minutes or so, until cheese begins to puff and brown.
• Remove and allow to cool a bit before serving (cutting is easier when vegetables and cheese have firmed up a little).
• Serve with roast chicken on a Sunday night and calm the weekly apprehension at your impending return to work.

Check out these other posts you may enjoy:

• BRAISED PORK CHOPS WITH LIME AND OLIVES
• ENSALADA DE CABRALES (Thin Sliced Apple and Cabrales Cheese Salad w/ Vinaigrette)
• AUTHENTIC THIN-CRUST PIZZA
• BLACK, RED OR PINTO BEANS WITH CHORIZO AND CUMIN
• VEAL KIDNEYS WITH MUSHROOMS AND COGNAC
• CREAMY LEMON PASTA
• LIDIA’S LAMB CHOPS (Lamb Chops with A Mustard Anchovy Sauce)

Alessandra Spisni’s Ragu w/ Red Wine (w/ Homemade Garganelli)

We spent two separate short trips to Bologna in the Emilia Romagna region of Northern Italy – the first in late 2006 and the second last summer (2007). Within the first few minutes of arriving in the city, I instantly fell in love. Now, don’t get me wrong, I love Rome, but I fell in deep, passionate love with Bologna. Besides being one of the most influential culinary cities in Italy (and the world), it is also beautiful, rich in culture and very livable – plus, they know how awesome they are without having ego. To make us fall in love even harder, my husband’s favorite author, Umberto Eco, is a professor of semiotics at University of Bologna. And even though we recently received a $322 ticket from the City of Bologna for supposedly driving in a ‘locals only’ zone last July (oh, we’re fighting this one HARD), I still have much love for the place.

There are probably two things that come to mind when one thinks about Bologna, whether or not you have visited it – Pasta Bolognese (or Ragu alla Bolognese) and bologna (sing it with me if you know it, my bologna has a first name it’s O-S-C-A-R), sometimes written “baloney” in American-speak (which gives me a shiver up and down my spine). We could write a whole post (which, come to think about it would be a good idea… I’ll add it to the list) on REAL, AUTHENTIC bologna, called mortadella, not the crap that’s sold with the O-S-C-A-R/ M-E-Y-E-R label on it. But we’ll save that lesson for another day. This post is going to be an ode to the hearty, fabulous and traditional sauce – the Ragu alla Bolognese.

Ragu w/ Chicken Livers and Milk (with Homemade Tagliatelle)

Many people may mistake a Ragu alla Bolognese sauce for a ‘meat sauce’ which is right to a certain extent. But most Bolognese people would die if they heard it described as just a meat sauce because it is so much more to them. The problem is, like many other authentic Italian dishes, Pasta con Ragu alla Bolognese has been reinvented into an over simplified meal (read: finding faster, cheaper and grosser ways to cook it) by other countries (ie: “Spag Bol” in England or “Ragu – It’s IN There!” jarred American red sauces) and has also become a sort of tourist-trap meal. I remember even while in Spain seeing Spaghetti Bolognese on a tourist menu – in SPAIN. You know what I’m talking about – those gross tourist restaurants that have the large sign in the front begging you to come eat there with pictures of each menu item they serve. People, if you don’t know how to translate Spaghetti Bolognese into English and you need a picture to show you what it is, PLEASE, do yourself a favor, keep walking! Not to mention that the picture usually resembles a bit of overcooked noodles with a can of red dog food plopped on top. Narsty.

What is important for you, dear-readers-on-the-search-for-the-authentic-and-traditional, to know and understand is if you are ever in Bologna/Northern Italy and they try to serve you Spaghetti alla Bolognese do not, I repeat, do not order it and immediately leave that restaurant. The Bolognese would never pair their traditional ragu with spaghetti since it is not a local type of pasta – it is local to the south, specifically Napoli. Tagliatelle would be a very traditional pairing, even tortellini, two types of egg pasta created in Bologna. Although I jest, you can choose to eat Bolognese with Spaghetti in Bologna if you so choose, I’m just trying to help you ‘spot the tourist trap’. It’s very important when traveling (wink, wink).

Today we’re going to talk about making the real, the traditional and the authentic Ragu alla Bolognese sauce. It’s a regional specialty that has many different ways to make it depending on family recipes and methods. All the recipes include soffritto (carrots, onion and celery), meat and wine. Some include a few other ingredients including some sort of cured meat like pancetta and others add sausage. Other recipes are a bit bolder and more complicated, adding milk or cream (a source of controversy with the Bolognese), some add nutmeg and white wine, while others use a mixture of meats. But, the one thing all Ragu recipes have in common is that they are all to be made with love and patience because it should always simmer away for hours for the flavors to build. This ain’t no 30-minute meal.

Back when the sauce was created, old cuts of beef were used which were very tough – long simmering was necessary and was known to create flavor. Oh, and you know what else is often missing from a traditional Bolognese sauce? TOMATO. Yup, that’s right folks, I know you don’t want to believe it but it’s true. At best, most authentic Ragu alla Bolognese recipes will only have a bit of tomato paste or some whole, peeled tomatoes. But, then again, that may depend on which Bolognese ‘mama’ you talk to. As Anna Nonni, owner of a restaurant outside of Bologna, says in the latest issue of Saveur, “[Ask] ten women, you’ll get ten different recipes, all of them traditional.” I like the idea that each recipe has been passed down through the years by family members. In fact, this is still a hotly debated issue in the area – will the real Ragu please stand up, please stand up?

On a lazy Saturday, Jonny and I were inspired by the latest issue of the wonderful Saveur (#110) magazine to create two different types of Ragu alla Bolognese. That issue of Saveur contained six different recipes for ragu. We had the time to spare and we were curious to do side-by-side comparisons of two very different, but traditional recipes. I chose the most simple recipe (Alessandra Spisni’s Ragu alla Bolognese) and a more complicated and richer recipe containing chicken livers and milk (Ragu Enriched with Chicken Livers). If we had time and stovetop space to cook all six, we would’ve! Bottom line, both sauces were absolutely, ridiculously delicious and I would recommend anyone who wants to impress family and friends to choose to make either. There was something so unbelievably satisfying about the Spisni’s Ragu. It was so simple to make, I felt like I barely cooked. I just let the gas stove do the work. To me, it was the quintessential Italian meal – simple and hearty with flavors coming together with time to blend perfectly. It tasted like the Bolognese I ate in Bologna. Spisni’s Ragu is almost exactly the same as the Ragu recipe that is in the “La Cucina Bolognese della Tradizione” (Traditional Bolognese Cooking) cookbook I bought at the famous Tamburini food store (Via Caprarie 1, Bologna, TEL: 051234726), so I feel like I tested three Ragu recipes!

On the other hand, the Ragu Enriched with Chicken Livers recipe blew my socks off, probably because it had those other elements of flavor that just made it stand apart from the Spisni’s Ragu. For instance, this recipe used milk, cloves, nutmeg and white wine. There were also more steps involved than Spisni’s (ie: making a tomato-paste broth and simmering milk with cloves) and the use of three types of meat, pork, beef and chicken livers, was slightly flavor-changing. I’ve always been a big fan of cloves and nutmeg in cooking and these spices, combined with the use of milk, created a beautiful ragu.

Because of the hotly debated topic of ‘what is authentic ragu’ in Bologna, in 1982, the Bologna chapter of the Accademia Italiana della Cucina researched and investigated what should be the official recipe of Ragu. This academic society whose aim is to preserve Italian food and techniques created the “Classic Ragu alla Bolognese”. We didn’t choose to test this one because it was more similar to the Ragu with Chicken Livers recipe and we wanted to distinct and different flavors to compare. But check out the recipe here.

I am copying these recipes virtually word for word from Saveur magazine because I followed this recipe word for word (except I added just a touch more tomato paste in both). I really hope you will trade in your store-bought meat sauce for one of these recipes. At least, I hope you give a big F-You to people like Sandra Lee and Rachel Ray by screwing the ‘semi-homemade’ or ’30-minute meal’ rule and taking the time to try these long-simmering sauces just once. I promise, you won’t be disappointed. Better yet, make a huge batch, then ‘Rachel Ray’ your little heart out by grabbing some leftovers from the freezer for a delicious and authentic 30-minute meal! If you can’t go to Bologna, bring Bologna to you!

ALESSANDRA SPISNI’S RAGU ALLA BOLOGNESE (makes alot – about 8 cups)

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup lard (butter works)
• 3 small yellow onions, finely chopped
• 2 medium carrots, finely chopped
• 2 ribs of celery, finely chopped
• 2 lbs. ground beef chuck
• 1/2 cup dry red wine
• 2 3/4 cups canned tomato puree
• water
• Salt and fresh ground pepper

What to do:

1. Heat lard in heavy-bottomed pot over medium heat. Add onions, carrots and celery and cook, stirring frequently, until vegetables are somewhat softened, about 8 minutes.
2. Raise heat to medium-high, add beef, and cook, stirring constantly, until meat is broken up and just cooked through, 6-8 minutes. Add the wine and cook, stirring occasionally until evaporated, about 4 minutes.
3. Stir in tomato puree and 1 1/2 cups water and bring to a boil over high heat.
4. Reduce the heat to low and simmer, partially covered, stirring occasionally until the sauce is thick – about 2 to 2 1/2 hours. Season with salt and pepper and serve over pasta.

RAGU DI FEGATO DI POLLO (Ragu with Chicken Livers) – makes 4 cups – double recipe to match one above

Ingredients:

• 4 cups beef broth
• 2 tbsp. tomato paste (I added a bit more, maybe one more tablespoon)
• 1 cup milk
• 3 whole cloves
• 1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
• 2 tbsp. unsalted butter
• 1 2-oz. piece of pancetta, finely chopped (I went to my deli and asked for a 2 inch round that I cut up)
• 2 medium carrots, finely chopped
• 2 ribs celery, finely chopped
• 1 medium size yellow onion, finely chopped
• 3/4 lb. ground beef chuck
• 1/4 lb. ground pork shoulder (I used regular ground pork)
• 1 cup dry white wine
• 1/8 tsp. freshly ground nutmeg
• 2 chicken livers (about 2 oz.)

What to do:

1. In a small saucepan, bring broth to a simmer over medium heat. Put tomato paste into a small bowl and pour in 1 cup broth; stir to dissolve. Set tomato-infused broth aside (Keep remaining broth hot.)
2. In another saucepan, bring milk to a simmer over medium heat. Add cloves, remove from heat and let steep, covered, for one hour.
3. Meanwhile, heat olive oil and butter in a large heavy-bottomed pot over medium-low heat. Add pancetta and cook until fat has rendered, stirring occasionally. Add carrots, celery and onions and cook, stirring occasionally until soft and caramelized (about 30 minutes). Stir in beef and pork, cook, breaking meat apart with wooden spoon, until browned. Season with salt and pepper. Increase heat to medium-high and add wine and cook until wine is evaporated.
4. Lower heat to mediu, stir in nutmeg, and reserved tomato broth and cook, stirring occasionally until liquid is absorbed, about 5 minutes.
5. Lower heat to medium, low and add 1/2 cup reserved hot broth and cook until liquid is absorbed, stirring occasionally. Repeat 1/2 cup at a time until all broth has been used (kind of like risotto) – this can take some time. ***NOTE: Although this may seem very time consuming, don’t take it too seriously. You can walk away and do other things during this ‘liquid absorbing’ part. Don’t go stir crazy – this does not have to be perfect!
6. Add chicken livers to the sauce and cook for 8 minutes until soft. Using a fork, mash livers on the side of the pot (or remove and do it on a plate) with a tablespoon into the sauce. Add the milk and simmer until thick and velvety – another 15 to 20 minutes. Season with salt and pepper and serve with pasta.

Check out some other posts you may enjoy:

• LIDIA’S LAMB CHOPS (Lamb Chops with A Mustard Anchovy Sauce)
• GNOCCHI DI PATATE WITH A BROWN BUTTER, SAGE, BREADCRUMB SAUCE
• ORECCHIETTE WITH SAUSAGE AND KALE
• ITALIAN-STYLE SLOW ROASTED PORK SHOULDER WITH SALSA VERDE
• LIVORNESE FISH STEW
• PAPPA AL POMODORO (Tuscan Tomato and Bread Soup)
• SWEET ANISE-FLAVORED SALMON IN A POUCH (SALMON EN PAPILLOTE)
• SPATCHCOCK CHICKEN (A TUTORIAL)

BMI, or body mass index, is the standard way that doctors calculate a person’s total amount of body fat vs. the ideal weight for their height. It’s quite a simple calculation of weight divided by height, but its outcome has great importance for ones’ health. Apparently, the ideal BMI is 21 which, I suspect, was the age at which my BMI was last at that number, and at which age I accurately resembled the hollow-cheeked, lank-haired student that I was. A BMI above 28 means, among other things embarrassment & shame at the beach, in clothes stores, and when faced with stairs, but more sinisterly, a greater likelihood of heart disease, strokes, kidney and liver disease, diabetes, and therefore, premature death. Chilling stuff, eh? Well, here’s the interesting thing, a BMI of 31 will have you officially categorized as obese, meaning that you can be some way shy of obesity and still be destined to cark it at an early age, which actually sucks quite badly when you think about it.

Anyway, if that hasn’t scared the sh!t out of you, and you still wish to put yourself through the frankly terrifying ordeal of calculating your BMI, the first thing you have to do is weigh yourself — something I hadn’t done in at least four years, owing to the absence of a set of scales in my home, you see, not because I didn’t want to know how much heavier I had become. I want to be clear on this point.

So, on Monday of last week – after a reasonably active weekend, fortunately – I weighed myself in the locker room at the gym sporting nothing but a towel and a furrowed brow as I tinkered fruitlessly with the slider thingy to shave off a couple of extra ounces. 194lbs. Exactly nine pounds heavier than the last time I was weighed, showing an average weight gain of 2lbs per year.

I wasn’t exactly overjoyed with this, but decided to proceed with the BMI experiment all the same. Here’s how it’s done:

• Take your weight in pounds and multiply it by 703.
• Divide the result by your height in inches.
• Then, divide the result again by your height in inches.

For example:

• My weight in pounds: 194 x 703
• The result: 136,382 / 73 (my height in inches)
• The 2nd result: 1,868.25 / 73 inches = My BMI is25.

Yes, it was anticlimactic in the end, I’ll admit. But, as with anything to do with health, it’s a great relief to find out that you’re not about to drop dead like you might have feared – at least, it seems, not from being overweight… yet. That said, there are a lot of scientists who dispute the usefulness of BMI in indicating a person’s ideal weight because it makes no consideration of an individual’s build. For instance, a heavily-muscled, yet ripped, man of medium height might have a BMI exceeding 30 but is unlikely to be at as great a risk of a heart attack as a taller person with only light muscle mass and a large gut.

And, here is the point, or at least I think so, because four years ago when I last checked, I weighed in at 185lbs. At that time, I was pretty skinny – it’s true, just ask my wife, but using the method above, my BMI would still have been 24.5. To achieve the ideal BMI of 21, I would have to weigh 165lbs or less. I stand six feet and one inch tall and am of medium-build (typical British build, if you will). So, I ask you, is 165lbs an ideal weight for someone of my height? I’d be nothing but skin and bones at that weight, some thirty pounds lighter than I am currently, and 20lbs less than when I was actually skinny. It all kind of sounds insane to me. What do you think? Should I attempt to lose those 30lbs? Should I even care about my BMI? Or, is it, in fact, just another potential source of paranoia in a world where everything you eat has some sort of warning or health risk? Being alive is starting to seem like a recipe for a sticky end…