I was recently introduced to an Australian with whom I had a number of interesting discussions (that is not meant as a joke). The first, an hour-long discussion of the age-old cricketing rivalry between England and his native land is of no concern here, but the second, a frank exchange of views about the quality of sausages to be found in the United States has rather more relevance to the subject matter of these here web pages. His view, that American sausages simply aren’t up to snuff compared to the quality and variety of those available in Australia – a country in which the mystery bag has achieved almost legendary status for its role in the great Aussie barbecue – is not one I share, even if there were no other examples of fine forcemeat here than the glorious boudin of Louisiana, although, in his defense, he was careful to exclude American-made Italian style sausages from this otherwise careless dismissal.

Two men arguing about the merits of their sausage could be opening line of a grubby joke, but in fact, it’s a highly meaningful topic. Pork sausage, as it’s widely-known, is the world’s greatest food. I can think of no other food stuff which provides a comparable level of variety and satisfaction. The range of flavorings to be added to the basic mixture of pork shoulder and fat is almost limitless and the unctuousness of pork seems to be the perfect canvas for sausage-makers around the world to demonstrate their flair. All of which means that unless one is sufficiently motivated, like my Antipodean chum, to make one’s own sausage from scratch, one can take one’s pick from the myriad sausages available to us these days.

However, if you’re either deliberately bloody-minded or just feel like gilding the lily, you can augment your local sausage-maker’s offerings with flavorings of your own, which is what I did. Taking inspiration, once again, from Maxine Clark’s “Flavors of Tuscany”, I embarked with six fennel-scented Italian “sweet” sausage, adding some hot pepper flakes, a finger-nail or so of sweet pimenton, a pinch each of fennel pollen and black pepper, plus a generous teaspoon of just-cracked fennel seeds to the sausage meat after extracting it from its casings. Between two moistened palms, I rolled myself some micro-meatballs so-seasoned, browned them off in olive oil and paired them with a risotto bianco, garnished generously with fennel seeds, and washed it all down with an unpretentious Chianti.

As a speedy weeknight meal, it had the twin virtues for the ambitious home-cook of being easy and delicious while making me feel like I’d embellished the store-bought ingredients rather more than I had, which together with the great potential for sausage-based school-boy puns almost justifies posting about it.

Roll out the red carpet, blow the shiny, loud horns, wear your fanciest dress (you too, men) – guess who’s back? Yes, I am still alive. Yes, Jonny has been keeping this blog afloat for a year now. And yes, I am ready to try to blog again. After a year of figuring out how to be a parent (and how to be comfortable being a mom and finally coming to terms with the fact that my life will never, ever be the same again) and learning to balance everything that comes with this new, crazy world, I finally feel like I want to write again. And what could be better to write about than the grapevine that not only GREW in the soil of our Brooklyn, NY, yard but even FLOURISHED and provided over 20 lbs of sweet, delicious Catawba grapes?

Many of you may have never heard of Catawba grapes before and until researching how to use the grapes for jam, neither had I. One factoid I did learn is that it is a native grape, discovered in 1802, mostly an east coast varietal and is used to produce some wine. I was amazed at how incredibly sweet the grapes were and figured the wine made from them would probably be some sort of dessert wine. In fact, the Catawba grape is responsible for the first American sparkling wine. I thought it was pretty cool to know that little old USA has native wine-growing grapes (in fact, there are about four types of native grapes). In the mid 1800′s, Catawba sparkling wine was even lauded by many experts in Europe (one person shockingly wrote it was better than anything that came from the Rhine!). The Finger Lakes region in upstate New York still uses this varietal to make much of the wine produced there.

As you’ve probably read in earlier posts, our garden bounty has been enormous this year and our two grapevines growing against a beautiful Brooklyn chain-link fence did not disappoint. Never having worked with home-grown grapes before, I realized that they could be used to make delicious jam. After de-skinning (by hand!) 4 pounds of them and making 5 jars of delicious grape jam, I needed something else. We found this wonderful recipe for a sweet flatbread in a Tuscan cookbook and I knew that I had to have it. It was incredibly easy to make and worked well with our morning espresso.

In the very infancy of this blog, back when we had no appreciation for plating, lighting or anything else remotely aesthetic, my wife wrote about the first course of a truly memorable dinner we shared in the famous Florentine trattoria, Coco Lezzone. What she didn’t mention was that even though we were getting towards the end of our nearly month long sojourn in Italy that encompassed our wedding and honeymoon, by the time we wound up in that jewel of the Renaissance, we were feeling rather sorry for ourselves.

Two days earlier, we had arrived in Genoa after a magnificent and occasionally hair-raising drive through the rugged terrain of the lower reaches of Piemonte and Liguria, to find that the guest-house we had booked was expecting us the day before. Twenty-four hours off schedule, and with a large shipping conference dominating Genoa’s hotels for the rest of the week to complicate matters, we were unceremoniously turfed out of said accommodation the following morning. While I, who have been invited to leave much less salubrious establishments than this, met the news with a certain equanimity, without a roof under which to shelter, and quite literally no room at the inn, the combined strain of having single-handedly planned a wedding and honeymoon from New York suddenly hit my poor wife like a tidal wave, and gushing tears of frustration and exhaustion ensued. Where comforting nuzzles from Tim the hotel dog weren’t enough, a liter carafe of white wine and two dozen fried anchovies seemed to have a medicinal effect, but, as calming as that lunch was, in a fit of pique we still decided to put Genoa in our rearview mirror and hit the E80 autostrada down the coast into Tuscany.

After a magnificent drive, framed on our right by the sparkling Mediterranean and on our left by the often white, marble-rich mountains of the Ligurian Apennines, we rolled in to Florence just as the westering sun was painting the city’s monuments the luminous color of dried apricots. Spirits partially restored, and safe in the knowledge that our reservation for the night was kosher, we immediately set out to find something delicious as a salve for our emotional wounds.

Among the several traditional Tuscan comestibles we over-indulged in that evening was a rabbit roll, or involtino di coniglio, stuffed with prosciutto, boiled egg and sage. Dressed very simply with Luccan olive oil and aged balsamic vinegar, it screamed the Spartan simplicity for which Tuscan fare is best-known. In some ways, it also exemplified the ethos of our trip. I suspect some of the wedding guests may quibble, but in our opinion, both wedding and honeymoon, had a pared-down, no frills sense about them. Only a hard core of essential people attended the wedding, and there was little time for luxuriating on a honeymoon in which we banjoed our way around 10 northern Italian cities in a tiny, canary yellow motor.

On our gentle post-prandial stroll, feeling all rosy and content from food, wine and warm night air, we encountered a pair of English honeymooners who asked us in charming pidgin Italian, “por favore, it’s nostra luni da miel…!” to photograph them in front of Santa Maria del Fiore. We were then playfully accosted by a group of tipsy Sicilian students from Catania who made us sing football songs with them and insisted we all shake hands in the traditional, forearm-grasping Roman-style before they would let us depart. This memorable meal and displays of unprovoked goodwill sent us to bed marveling at how such basic pleasures can make ones mind transcend apparent troubles. An important lesson.

In truth, we are fully aware that this was just another sybaritic moment in a month of indulgence, and not worthy of anyone’s sympathy, but I was reminded of this experience and its underlying moral recently when the trepidation induced by the impending arrival of our first-born began to get the better of me. I suspect we shall be leaning heavily on these twin crutches of simple dishes and human kindness very soon.

“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.

I feel kinda cheesy. I admit it, I feel cool about using a butcher. I understand this is lame and that butchers have been around for ages, but, truthfully, in the recent year, we’ve really gotten to know our neighborhood butchers. Growing up in the ‘burbs, meat was only bought pre-cut and pre-packaged. Yes, every once in awhile you’d see the grocery store’s butcher come out from behind those weird black, plastic doors with the small square window. You’d wonder what rock he/she crawled out from because, more often than not (now I mean NO disrespect) those grocery store workers who came out from the back had a few less teeth than me and looked as though “meth” could’ve been their middle name.

After our first attempt at making homemade sausage, I realized how invaluable a butcher is. We live in a country where many people don’t know what kind of animal their meat comes from. Hold up an eggplant to a 10-year old and good chance they may not even know what the hell it is. It’s sad that the neighborhood butcher is starting to become a thing of the past. Hell, I live in Brooklyn, NY, one of the most multicultural places on earth and, in my hood alone we only have a few butchers left. I’m talking about the neighborhood butcher, not that gourmet food store up the street. You know the place – the guy/gal behind the counter has butchers hands and fingers, you know his/her name and he/she knows your name, they don’t switch employees as quickly as McDonald’s and they can easily ask you if you want “the regular”. Word is that the decline in these gems is because young people aren’t interested in carrying on the family trade. Maybe with this economic downward spiral Americans will be more willing to work with their hands again and see the beauty how happy meat/poultry can make people.

Jonny and I have wanted to try and make a dish that we ate in Florence, Italy at the awesome Coco Lezzone since the last time we recreated their Pappa al Pomodoro. It was one of those meals from start to finish that will forever stay etched in my mind. Saveur did a cover story on their Herb-Stuffed Pork Loin in their April, 2006 issue. We tweaked the recipe just a bit (lavender wasn’t a part of the original recipe) and, thanks to our awesome butcher, the dish turned out phenomenally. We’re going to do a version of this for Christmas Day dinner because it’s pretty inexpensive and extremely delicious. I highly recommend you go give your butcher a big hug tomorrow.

COCO LEZZONE’S HERB AND LAVENDER-STUFFED PORK LOIN RIB ROAST – Serves 6

Ingredients:

• 1 6-rib center-cut pork loin roast (about 4-5 lbs)
• 6 cloves of garlic, peeled and ground to a paste
• 2 tablespoons of chopped rosemary
• 3 tablespoons of chopped sage
• 2 tablespoons of thyme
• 1 tablespoon dried lavender
• 2 tablespoons + 1/4 (or so) cup olive oil
• salt and pepper

What to do:

1. Preheat over to 475 degrees. In a small bowl, add together the garlic, all the herbs and lavender with a pinch of salt and pepper and 2 tablespoons olive oil. Use a fork to make sure it’s all incorporated together.
2. Push the handle of a long wooden spoon through the center of one end of the pork roast allowing it to poke through the other end’s center. Do this again, moving the handle back and forth and in a circular motion to allow the hole to get bigger. It will end up being about 3/4 of an inch wide.
3. Reserve about 3/4 of a tablespoon of the herb mixture to be use in a moment. Using your fingers, push some of the herb/garlic mixture into the center hole starting on one side and the finishing on the other. Put roast in a roasting pan.
4. Pour about 1/4 cup or so of olive oil over the roast. Rub it in a bit. Using the reserved herb mixture, rub all around the top and sides of the rib roast. Season generously with salt and pepper and roast the pork in the oven until golden brown – about 25 to 30 minutes. Reduce the oven to 350 degrees and continue to roast for an hour longer or until the internal temperature is 160 degrees.
5. Allow pork to rest about 10 minutes and then carve into individual chops. Serve with the pan drippings (which are DEEE-LISH, by the way!).

Have you ever eaten something so fabulous, so lucious, so decadent that you almost felt the need to run to confession (to confess your indulgent food “sins”), say three Hail Mary’s (that’s for you Catholics out there) and pray really hard that you can zip your jeans up again? Ok, a bit exaggerated, but looking back, this is a bit how my first real taste of lardo made me feel.

Now many of you may be scratching your head wondering, “Lardo? Wait, did she mean to write that? Maybe she mean Lardons? Surely she’s not talking about Lard?” Well, kids, hold on to your Spanx-controlled muffin-top, I am talking about lard. But lardo ain’t just any old lard… it’s special lard. Very, very, very special lard.

In our few trips to Italy over the past couple of years, lardo graced our palates a few times, but only in very small quantites (as it should!). The first time we ate it – in Modena, Italy – we were, sadly, so fiercely hungover that we couldn’t really appreciate it. However, this saved us from eating what was an obscene amount of it – slathered in thin ribbons over a beautiful 12 inch thin-crust pizza and topped with the town’s famous aged balsamic.

Apologies for the awful, 1970s plate. I’m blaming the in-laws.

Pearly-white inside and darker and grainy at the edges, lardo, which is basically salt-cured pig fat flavored with rosemary (and occasionally other herbs), is made throughout Italy, though the most famous – lardo di Colonata – is produced only in Colonata, a small, isolated Tuscan town, where the pigs are fed on a steady diet of acorns to better flavor their fat.

In some areas of northern Italy, lardo is used as the cooking fat in which soffrito is sauteed in the preparation of a sugo or ragu, but like other salume, it is often eaten in thin, bite-sized pieces and allowed to melt on the tongue, before being washed down with an effervescent white wine. Which is how, if you can find yourself some, you should try it for the first time. Yes, that’s right, cured pigs’ fat straight-up. No crackers, no bread, no olives. Just fat and your tongue in perfect harmony. It really does melt.

It’s unlikely that we ate lardo di Colonata that day, as the real thing is almost as expensive as the most highly-prized prosciutto, but what we had was still beautifully perfumed of bacon & rosemary, and incredibly rich & luscious tasting, and probably quite pricey in its own right. With the crackle of the pizza crust underneath and the honey sweetness of an ancient balsamic, it was one of the most texturally amazing things I’ve ever put in my mouth, sober, drunk or hungover.

Occasionally, in the intervening year, we’ve complained of a lack of lardo in our lives, but we were completely shocked to find it at a local specialty foods store over the summer – and it was cheap too! They had about half a pound left, and we bought the whole thing, fearing that we might not find it ever again outside of Italy. Fortunately, because it’s cured, it has a good long shelf-life, so we’re taking it easy to make sure we don’t drop dead from cholesterol-related disease before we’re done eating it.

I think we need to do more research into recipes that call for lardo, because apart from taking it neat, so far we’ve only recreated that decadent pizza from Modena. There’s a recipe below, but the sad thing is, if you don’t have any lardo or anywhere that sells it, and you don’t have a 25 year old balsamic vinegar to top it with, that recipe might not be much use. Still, you can aspire to collect these ingredients, and trust me, when you find them, make this pizza and you’ll be glad you waited for it. It might be the most incredible pizza that ever passes your lips.

Lardo Pizza with Wilted Radicchio & Onion

For an absolutely tried & tested, nailed-on recipe for the perfect thin-crust pizza dough read this previous post: Remembering Italy with Thin-Crust Pizza. To get the finest aged balsamic vinegar available in North American delivered to your door, click here, or if you don’t want to buy the good stuff, you can reduce the ordinary kind in a saucepan until consistency resembles molasses.

Unfortunately, Italian lardo is not exported to America. The American Department of Agriculture wants it heated to 156 F (69 C) before it is sold to consumers, but at that point, the fat would start melting, and it would no longer be lardo. However, we found some domestically produced lardo completely by chance in a local store, so you may get lucky somewhere along the line. And while it is widely thought that Italian lardo is greatly superior to any made domestically because it is aged for so much longer, we found US lardo to be very acceptable indeed. Your best bet if you don’t have any awesome gourmet food stores nearby, and this may be even trickier, is to get friendly with your local organic hog farmer and have him save you some back fat from best fed pig on his farm, then cure your own pig fat! Why not? Good luck!

Ingredients & Recipe

1lb fresh pizza dough

1/2 head of radicchio di Chioggia (regular round, red radicchio), shredded finely

1/2 spanish (yellow) onion, finely sliced

2tbsp good olive oil

1 pinch kosher salt

- Sweat radicchio and onion until soft and decorate your pizza with it.

- Then, place thinly-sliced lardo on top and fire pizza in the oven. Remove and dress immediately with balsamic vinegar.

- Savor every mouthful.

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

Tradition
Now, it’s very common — almost traditional, some would say — for the British, when visiting another European country, to buy a bottle or more of the local tipple as a souvenir. This tends to the eaux-de-vie / grappa-type firewater, often distilled with herbs from the surrounding hills, that the locals swear has health-restoring powers, but in fact is the cause of the blindness and insanity in endemic communities. And, just as commonly, once back in the UK, said bottle is placed in a dark recess of ones’ liquor cabinet and only ever reached for if, say England win something, anything, at football (soccer), and everything else in the house has already been drunk in the course of celebrating. Such was my thinking when we bought this curiously slim bottle of vin santo.

Even when I learned that it was in fact a dessert wine and not a paint-stripper, I remained cautious. After all, during the 1990s and the early years of this century, dessert wines had consistently been given a bad rap. People looked down their noses at sweeter wines as dry, crisp wines like chardonnay were all the rage. My theory (based on no research at all) is that skinny southern Californians are to blame for this. You see, the 90s power lunch diet of a “dinner salad” sans bread, expensive mineral water, and glass of something dry and white seems to have persuaded the rest of us that not only was dry white wine somehow sophisticated, but it was also lower in calories than a sweeter wine, and therefore better for us.

Research, Kinda
However, some recent actual research on the shelves of Gary’s Wines and Liquors (Flatbush Ave. and Sixth Ave., Brooklyn, NY) confirmed that wine stores which had previously been stocked almost exclusively with chardonnay, chenin blanc, and sauvignon blanc, are now burgeoning with viognier, gewurztraminer, albarino, riesling and several others whose names I forget. Clearly, there is some of sort of change in tastes afoot.

Taking this research a step further, I also noticed sweeter dessert wines are appearing on menus in my neighborhood and amongst them, in at least one restaurant, I found vin santo. All of which convinced me to find out more about this unusual beverage and, hell, give it a try!

Some Facts
Literally “holy wine”, vin santo is made from malvasia and trebbiano grapes that are left on the vine late to develop their sugars. The derivation of name vin santo is subject to some controversy since some believe that it had miraculous properties that cured plague in the 14th century. Others attribute it to a certain Greek Bishop who in the 15th century proclaimed upon drinking it “This is the wine of Xanthos!” — a pressed raisin wine from Santorini, which his fellow diners mistook for “santos”, i.e. “this is the wine of the saints”. Dismally though, it’s thought that the most likely derivation is its sometime use in Tuscany as a sacramental wine during mass.

The third most planted grape in the world by area, trebbiano grapes have usually received a bad reputation because they (when unblended) tend to produce very rough and ready wines (mostly white, some red) that have usually only been drunk young as table wines. Some chianti producers use them as a blend with sangiovese grapes, but again due to their inherent instability, they are being phased out in favor of 100% sangiovese these days.

Similarly, malvasia grapes are mostly used to make young and fairly rough white table wines, and are widely planted across the world too — most famously on the Portuguese island of Madeira where they are used to create the eponymous sweet wine. And, it is when trebbiano and malvasia are allowed to age that they become spectacular and display their real talents – both are commonly used as the base for other fortified wines like sherry, brandy and port.

Once picked, vin santo makers allow their grapes to dry and develop even more sweetness as they hang from rafters in well-ventilated rooms until they are pressed. Then the sweet juice is extracted and placed into small, cigar-shaped barrels called caratelli. After an initial open-barrel fermentation, and in a similar method to aging balsamic vinegars, these barrels are sealed and then stored in garrets or attic spaces and left to age, the best for as long as ten years.

It is because of this extended aging and sweetening process, as well as the deliciousness of the final product, that vin santo is so highly prized (and priced). It’s comparatively low yield per kilo of grapes picked and long production time means that not only is it a scarce commodity but it requires a lot of patience and care before it is ready.

So, erm, what does it taste like? 

At the end of this 10 year period, the wine is a beautiful golden amber color with a slightly nutty flavor. It is certainly sweet but not in a honeyed or saccharine way. Rather, it has a perfectly balanced flavor that works wonderfully well at the end of a savory meal without completely coating the palate with sugar.

Vin santo is typically served with almond or hazelnut biscotti-type biscuits/cookies (“cantucci e vin santo”) which are often dipped into the wine to soften them and accentuate their taste as a dessert combo, but it may be drunk as an accompaniment to other desserts or by itself as a digestive. However, and probably because of its sweetness, it is never served with cheese.

Since first trying it and realizing that, like so many of my typically English preconceived notions about all things “foreign”, it’s actually very good and those “foreigners” know much better than the English when it comes to food, we’ve drunk it mostly by itself without biscotti. But you should get yourself some and drink it any which way you choose. Sadly, after squeezing as many small nips from it as we could manage to prolong its life, we have just finished the bottle we bought in Italy. Like many of the best things in life, you have to be sparing and savor it in order to get your money’s worth.

Now, depending on where you live vin santo may be harder to find, but it’s easy to get hold of online, if a little expensive. So I encourage you to give it a try, perhaps at a restaurant first so your initial investment is limited, but I’m sure you’ll find, as I did, that re-evaluating ones prejudices towards sweet wines is a rewarding exercise.