Category Archives: Recipes

Traditional recipes for foods and beverages from around the world.

Recipes

Chicken Braised with Lemon, Sage and Olives

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June 20, 2018

When we’re in Palm Springs in the winter, surrounded by an abundance of citrus trees, I feel like citrus ought to be featured in every meal.

Being able to walk out the door and pick lemons, limes, oranges, grapefruit and tangerines, and NOT doing it, seems like such a grand missed opportunity.  Even if the ingredients for the rest of the meal don’t come from within a few feet of my door, the citrus fruits and herbs can.

With that in mind, and the prospect of cooking a multi-course dinner for 15 people in a kitchen that’s about 8’ x 10’ got me to thinking.  Individually lemons, sage, and olives pair well with chicken so why not all of them together in the same dish?

Looking up into a lemon tree in Palm Springs

Next came the method.  With fifteen people I needed at least 15 pieces of chicken.  I was pretty sure that with all the other courses, one piece of chicken per person would be enough.  I added a few more for good measure.

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Braising 18 pieces of chicken on the stove top would have consumed a good deal of space so I opted for the oven and a “hotel pan,” sometimes called a steam table tray.  You know, those cafeteria-style rectangular pans.  I have a mess of them in an array of sizes.  Made of stainless steel, they’re non-reactive.  You can cook and store food in them, simplifying the preparation process.  Shallow roasting pans are a good substitute.  Don’t use aluminum pans or other reactive materials due to the lemon juice in this dish.

To keep it simple, I decided not to brown the chicken first, but rather to do it at the end by turning up the oven.  I made a marinade by buzzing the ingredients in a blender, so even that is super-easy.

A hotel pan is a great way to prepare large quantities of food

Which part of the chicken to use was never in question.  I like what happens to chicken thighs with long, slow braising.  Keeping the bone in adds flavor and structure so I suggest avoiding boneless thighs.

If you keep the skin on you’ll have to remove it before browning and serving the chicken because it will be rubbery from the moist heat.  I usually prefer to keep the skin on as it helps keep the meat moist but the combination of low and slow cooking and a tight cover meant the effect of the skin would be marginal.  Removing the skin in the beginning makes the dish even simpler to prepare.  Besides, the skin is a great addition to the stock pot when making chicken stock or broth.

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I keep a zipper lock bag in my freezer into which I put chicken skin and other bits that I trim off chicken then add the contents to the stock pot with backs and wings.  Skin contains a lot of fat but since it will be skimmed off at the end it’s not really a concern.  The collagen in the skin, however, will greatly improve the mouthfeel of the broth.  In the “old days” adding chicken feet to the stock pot served the same purpose but finding chicken feet is challenging.

A Palm Springs orange tree, in the distance, full of ripe oranges

While this dish was created in the Palm Springs winter, it works well year-round thanks to the non-stop availability of lemons.  The next time you’re cooking for a crowd, give it a try and let me know what you think.

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 Chicken Braised with Lemon, Sage and Olives
I created this recipe for my father-in-law’s birthday, January 2018. The lemons came from the trees outside of our house in Palm Springs. Though not essential, I prefer to put a sheet of baking parchment over the chicken before covering with aluminum foil to keep the reactive aluminum completely out of contact with the acid in the lemon juice.
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Course Mains, Poultry
Cuisine Italian
Prep Time 30 minutes
Cook Time 2 hours
Servings
people
Ingredients
Course Mains, Poultry
Cuisine Italian
Prep Time 30 minutes
Cook Time 2 hours
Servings
people
Ingredients
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Instructions
  1. Make marinade by pureeing the olive oil, lemon juice, 6 cloves garlic, rosemary, salt, and pepper in a blender.
  2. Pour the marinade over the chicken thighs and mix well.
  3. Marinate chicken thighs overnight in the refrigerator.
  4. Lightly oil a non-reactive hotel pan or shallow roasting pan.
  5. Arrange lemon slices on the bottom of the pan.
  6. Put a sage leaf on each lemon slice.
  7. Put a chicken thigh on each sage-topped lemon slice, reserving the marinade.
  8. Scatter olives around the chicken.
  9. Smash the remaining 8 garlic cloves and scatter around the chicken.
  10. Pour the marinade over the chicken. Cover the pan tightly with foil. (If possible, cover the pan with a sheet of parchment before the aluminum foil.)
  11. Put the chicken into a preheated 350°F oven. Cook until the chicken is nearly fall-apart tender, 90-120 minutes.
  12. Using a turkey baster, remove most of the liquid from the pan. Put the liquid into a fat separator.
  13. Turn the heat as high as the oven goes. Put the pan of chicken on the top rack until it takes on some color, approximately 10-15 minutes. You can also use the broiler for this, though many broilers do not have enough heated surface area to brown the contents of a large pan.
  14. While the chicken is browning, skim the fat from the pan juices.
  15. Carefully move the chicken thighs, with lemon slices intact, to a serving platter or individual plates.
  16. Scatter the olives over the chicken.
  17. Pour some of the defatted pan juices over the chicken.
  18. Pass the remaining defatted pan juices at the table.
Recipe Notes

Copyright © 2018 by Villa Sentieri, LLC. All rights reserved.

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Recipes

Gary’s Barbecue Rub

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June 15, 2018

As summer approaches, my thoughts of cooking turn to the outside.  Luckily, at 8000 feet, it’s not a problem to use the stove or the oven inside, even for extended periods of time, as the outdoor temperature is usually quite moderate and the house doesn’t really heat up.

Even so, summer instigates a more leisurely style of cooking for me.

I like using my smoker, or grill, or wood-burning oven.

My smoker  has an adjustment for the heat output but not temperature, per se. If the wind or external temperature change, the internal smoker temperature changes, too.

There is no doubt that I have more of an Italian palate: more savory, less sweet.  In contrast, an American palate generally accepts much more sweetness in an array of foods.

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Once, when my husband’s Great Uncle Duilio (born and raised in Italy but then residing in Argentina) was visiting, we made an American breakfast of pancakes and bacon.  He totally got into using maple syrup on the pancakes, and loved the bacon, but couldn’t understand the concept of allowing the sweet syrup to touch his bacon.  It just wasn’t right.

By European standards, American barbecue is sweet.  Even when we, as Americans, think it isn’t.

My wood-burning oven can also run on natural gas. It is great for pizza.

I guess I’ve developed an appreciation for a sweeter, more American approach to certain foods…barbecue, baked beans, bacon with maple syrup, and so forth.  Definitely, though, I still prefer foods less sweet than many of my friends would find acceptable.

Today’s recipe is quite simple.  It’s a barbecue rub.  I developed it and have successfully used it on chicken, turkey, pork and beef.

In an upcoming post, I will describe my method for preparing skin-on, bone-in chicken thighs with both barbecue rub and barbecue sauce.

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My DCS grill has a wood chip container with its own flame for precisely controlled smoking, whether low temperature or high temperature

If you’re at all interested and, like me, want to be able to replicate you cooking over and over again, you need to develop your own barbecue rub rather than relying on a pre-mixed, store-bought version.  This recipe is as good a starting point as I can think of.  Honestly, it only takes a few minutes to mix enough for a summer of barbecuing!

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 Gary's Barbecue Rub
If you can’t find dried New Mexican chile molido, substitute a mixture of cayenne and paprika, half and half or to taste. Chile molido is pure ground dried red chile. There are no additional herbs or spices. It is NOT chili powder!! There aren’t really any pictures for this recipe. All they would show is measuring out dry ingredients. Enjoy the simplicity.
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Course Spice Mixtures and Rubs
Cuisine American
Prep Time 10 minutes
Servings
cups
Ingredients
Course Spice Mixtures and Rubs
Cuisine American
Prep Time 10 minutes
Servings
cups
Ingredients
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Instructions
  1. Combine chile, paprika, garlic powder, onion powder, salt, and celery seed in a jar.
  2. Grind black pepper in a coffee grinder.
  3. Add oregano to black pepper and grind again.
  4. Add pepper-oregano mixture to the contents of the jar.
  5. Pulverize the brown sugar in the coffee grinder.
  6. Add the brown sugar to the other ingredients. Mix well.
Recipe Notes

Copyright © 2018 by Villa Sentieri, LLC. All rights reserved.

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Recipes

Salsa Friulana di Marisa (Marisa’s Friulan Tomato Sauce)

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June 11, 2018

Ma’s spaghetti sauce.  That’s what my husband calls it.

That’s pretty similar to what most of us of Italian heritage who grew up in the United States called the sauce that our mothers (yes, it was almost always the mothers) made most frequently.

It isn’t as if there aren’t more pasta sauces than one can count.  It’s just that for everyone I know of Italian heritage, there’s one that stands out above the rest.

For my husband’s family, this is the one.

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It’s actually quite similar to Ivana’s sauce.  Ivana is married to my mother-in-law’s cousin Olvino.  Ivana grew up in Friuli but in a different town.  There are subtle differences in her sauce and my mother-in-law’s sauce, but if you read both recipes you’ll certainly see the similarities.

My mother-in-law doesn’t remember when she learned to make this sauce, or even if she learned from her mother or her aunt.  She does remember, however, that her father asked her how she could get married (she was engaged to my father-in-law) without knowing how to cook.

My mother- and father-in-law on their wedding day (apparently before she knew how to cook)

She got married, ultimately learned to cook, and then headed up the kitchen in Castleview, the restaurant that she and my father-in-law owned in Fox River Grove, Illinois.  The restaurant was named Castleview because it had a view of an adjacent…you guessed it…castle…well, sort of a castle.   For more information on the castle, you can look here.

The Bettendorf Castle in Fox River Grove, Illinois

By the time I came on the scene, it was difficult to catch more than a glimpse of the castle from the restaurant due to the growth of trees and other vegetation.

Another view of the Bettendorf Castle

My mother-in-law thought my version of her sauce was “pretty good.”  She did note that it was thicker than hers; probably because I cook it longer but also potentially due to a different brand of tomatoes.  If you want it thinner, cook it less or (my preference) just add more water or put a splash of pasta-cooking water in the bowl with the pasta and the sauce.  (Just between you and me, when I’m putting dinner on the table using my mother-in-law’s sauce, I usually boil it down a bit because it seems a little thin to me!)

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In a few weeks I’ll be posting a recipe for Friulan Risotto that incorporates this sauce.  Stay tuned.

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 Salsa Friulana di Marisa (Marisa's Friulan Tomato Sauce)
The amount of water needed will vary based on how thick the tomato puree is, how much liquid evaporates during cooking, and how thick or thin you like your sauce. Feel free to add more water during cooking if the mixture is becoming too thick. If the sauce is too thin uncover near the end of cooking and increase the heat to cook off more water.
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Course Pasta, Noodles, and Sauces
Cuisine Italian
Prep Time 20 minutes
Cook Time 3 hours
Servings
quarts
Ingredients
Course Pasta, Noodles, and Sauces
Cuisine Italian
Prep Time 20 minutes
Cook Time 3 hours
Servings
quarts
Ingredients
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Instructions
  1. Finely chop the parsley, carrots, celery, onion, and garlic in food processor.
  2. There should be a bit of texture to the mixture, not a puree. Reserve.
  3. Puree the crushed tomatoes in the food processor.
  4. Rinse the cans out with some of the water. Add the water to the pureed tomatoes. Reserve.
  5. Sauté the beef in the olive oil on high heat until no pink remains.
  7. Add the chopped vegetables.
  8. Sauté on high heat until all the liquid evaporates and then continue to sauté until the mixture darkens slightly and smells cooked.
  9. Add the wine and continue to cook until the wine has evaporated.
  10. Add the allspice, nutmeg, and cinnamon. Stir well.
  11. Add the tomato paste and sauté until it begins to smell sweet, approximately 5 minutes at medium-high heat.
  12. Meanwhile, rinse tomato paste can out with some of the water and add it to the pureed tomatoes.
  13. Add pureed tomatoes, bay leaf, oregano, basil and remaining water.
  15. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer, partially covered for about 2 ½ hours, stirring every 20 minutes.
  16. After about an hour of cooking, begin to taste and adjust seasoning.
  17. Serve with the pasta of your choice.
Recipe Notes

Copyright © 2018 by Villa Sentieri, LLC. All rights reserved.

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Recipes

Guyanese Barbecue Sauce

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June 6, 2018

In a prior blog post, I talked about Jamaican New Sugar, also known as Wet Sugar.  New Sugar is difficult to obtain outside of Jamaica and even in Jamaica it is becoming harder to get.

Just as New Sugar relates to Jamaica, Demerara Brown sugar relates to Guyana.  Demerara Brown sugar is much easier to find, however.

The typical brown sugars available in the United States are made from refined white sugar with the addition of molasses.

New sugar, Demerara Brown sugar, and Turbinado sugar all represent stages in sugar refining.  Rather than adding molasses back into white sugar, it hasn’t been completely refined out of any of these sugars.

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Of all of these, the one that I’ve used the most is Demerara Brown.  Even within this very distinct category, there are differences in refinement and moisture content.  Some Demerara Brown sugars are darker than others, though I’ve never seen a “grade” attached to these differences.  The Demerara Brown sugar that I used to buy in Guyana always seemed to have more moisture in it than that which is available in American markets.

I’ve found several sugars that are good substitutes for Demerara Brown sugar.  One came from Ecuador and, admittedly, isn’t much easier to source than Demerara Brown sugar.

The other is a brown sugar made for the Korean market that I found in an Asian grocery store.

Korean and Ecuadorean brown sugars are good substitutes for Demerara Brown Sugar

I prefer both of them over Turbinado sugar as substitutes for Demerara Brown sugar as they are both less refined than Turbinado and have more of the flavor of true Demerara Brown.  For this barbecue sauce, however, since sugar is not a big component (as it might be in baked goods, for example) the ordinary American style brown sugar from the supermarket would work just fine.

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I’ve been making this barbecue sauce since I was in college when I purchased a cookbook on a trip to Guyana.  (I might have mentioned this before, but I have thousands upon thousands of cookbooks.  I’ve actually run out of shelf space for them and have them stacked in boxes which is far from ideal.  I’m trying to figure out where to install additional library shelving so I can get the books out of the boxes and make them accessible.)

Turbinado sugar, which is lighter in color than Demerara Brown sugar, is not a good substitute for the flavor

What’s Cooking in Guyana is representative of a style of cookbook published decades ago in countries around the world, well at least in Anglophone countries with which I am most familiar!  It is based on recipes from Home Economics professionals and contains traditional recipes, some (modified) international recipes as well as a quantity of what I call “made up” recipes.  That is, recipes with no particular cultural history to them that were developed by professional cooks.  Admittedly, some of these recipes enter the cannon of locally prepared dishes and, if they survive long enough, can become “traditional.”

Never once in all my time in Guyana was I served anything that contained barbecue sauce.  Barbecue, and anything resembling barbecue, just wasn’t part of the country’s culinary heritage.  So, the presence of barbecue sauce in this Guyanese cookbook is curious.  If you look at the ingredients, you’ll notice a resemblance to the ketchup-based barbecue sauces of the United States but a closer look at the ingredients will demonstrate the use of a number of specifically West Indian ingredients.

The first Guyanese cookbook I ever purchased

I classify this recipe as a “made up” one.  And a very good one at that!  It is my go-to barbecue sauce (when I’m not being lazy and reaching for a bottle of the purchased stuff, which, admittedly, I do from time to time.)  Many years ago, I  changed the proportions of ingredients in this barbecue sauce to suit my taste.  I feel that it is now truly mine.

In the coming weeks, I’m going to post my recipe for barbecue rub and then after that my recipe for smoked chicken thighs that makes use of both the rub and the barbecue sauce.  Stay tuned!

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 Guyanese Barbecue Sauce
Wiri wiri peppers are nearly impossible to obtain outside of Guyana. Habanero or Scotch Bonnet peppers can be substituted. Demerara brown sugar can be difficult to find. Any coarse grained brown sugar can be used, such as Turbinado. Regular American-style brown sugar would work too. Lea and Perrins Steak Sauce can be substituted for the Pickapeppa Sauce. This recipe is modified from “what’s cooking in Guyana” published in 1973 by the Guyanese Ministry of National Development & Agriculture and the Carnegie School of Home Economics.
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Course Savory Sauces and Marinades
Cuisine West Indian
Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 15 minutes
Servings
cups
Ingredients
Course Savory Sauces and Marinades
Cuisine West Indian
Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 15 minutes
Servings
cups
Ingredients
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Instructions
  1. Combine all ingredients in a small non-reactive saucepan.
  2. Bring to a boil over medium heat.
  3. Reduce heat and simmer 10 minutes, stirring frequently.
  4. Thin with a few tablespoons of water, if necessary.
  5. The sauce may be refrigerated for up to one week.
Recipe Notes

Despite its name, Pickapeppa sauce is not spicy.  It is very similar to a good steak sauce, such as A-1

Wiri wiri peppers are almost impossible to obtain, and the small amount needed does not justify a strenuous search.  Habanero or Scotch Bonnet peppers, to taste, can be substituted.

Copyright © 2018 by Villa Sentieri, LLC. All rights reserved.

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Recipes

Smoky Baked Beans

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June 1, 2018

In my first year of medical school (I know that only because of the apartment that I was living in at the time) my parents and my Aunt Ann came to visit for a weekend.  I’ve talked about Aunt Ann in previous blog posts, like this one that includes her recipe for Pineapple Cream Cheese Pie.  She was married to my father’s brother, Jano.

As often happened with my mother, the conversations frequently veered to food.  On this occasion, for some reason, my Aunt Mary’s baked beans.

Aunt Mary was really my mother’s Aunt Mary by marriage.  She was my Great Aunt Mary.  Actually, by the time I knew her, she wasn’t really my aunt, great or otherwise, because she and my mother’s Uncle Derp had gotten divorced.  Nonetheless, we all still called her Aunt Mary.  Well, really, due to some bizarre twist, we called her Aunt Mary Derp if we were referring to her in a conversation and it wasn’t otherwise clear which of the several Aunt Marys in the family was the one we meant.  Why we appended the name of her ex-husband to hers rather than using her last name, I’ll never know!!

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In any case, my parents both talked about Aunt Mary’s baked beans.  They recalled that she baked them overnight.  My mother came up with a reasonable facsimile of what went into the beans.

We tried to do the initial boiling of the beans in a slow cooker while we went out for the day.  That was a failure.  On the low setting, the beans were still hard after hours and hours of cooking.  That got remedied by a quick boil on the stove.

My smoker has an adjustment for the heat output but not temperature, per se. If the wind or external temperature change, the internal smoker temperature changes, too.

We took the par-boiled beans and mixed them with all the other ingredients and put them in the oven overnight.  That was failure number two, but one we couldn’t recover from.  The long cooking period created a burnt taste in the beans given the high sugar content.  The beans hadn’t actually dried out but they must have gotten hot enough to start caramelizing the sugar.  The road from caramel to burnt isn’t long.  Unless one doesn’t get more than six hours sleep, we discovered that it wasn’t ideal to bake the beans overnight!

Eventually, I figured it out.  The recipe for my version of Aunt Mary’s Baked Beans now sits proudly on the hard drive of my computer along with two recipes of my own development.  I also have this great hack for doctoring canned baked beans that I learned from my cousin Shirley (it always generates requests for the recipe that I artfully dodge) but that isn’t actually written down anywhere.

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Today, we’re going to focus on my recipe for baked beans cooked in a smoker.  I’ll also share a trick for making these in the oven if you don’t have a smoker.

When I make these, I put them on the bottom rack of my smoker, uncovered, with meat on the racks above.  Meat juices drip into the beans making them extra tasty!  The high humidity in the smoker keeps the uncovered beans from drying out.

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 Smoky Baked Beans
Adding salt to the bean-soaking liquid is optional. It seasons them and also decreases the cooking time. I find it especially useful where I live as water boils at less than 198°F and beans take much longer to cook. If you don’t have a smoker, add 1 teaspoon of Liquid Smoke seasoning and cook the beans in the oven with a cover. As a reality check, if you’re paying close attention to the photos, you’ll notice that these are “adult” lima beans not baby lima beans. There must have been a run on baby lima beans when I went shopping for the ingredients for this recipe as none of the markets had them.
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Course Beans, Nuts and Legumes, Sides
Cuisine American
Prep Time 30 minutes
Cook Time 8 hours
Passive Time 12 hours
Servings
people
Ingredients
Course Beans, Nuts and Legumes, Sides
Cuisine American
Prep Time 30 minutes
Cook Time 8 hours
Passive Time 12 hours
Servings
people
Ingredients
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Instructions
  1. Wash and pick over the beans.
  2. Dissolve 1 ½ tablespoons salt, if using, in 2 quarts of water. Add the beans.
  3. Soak the beans for about 12 hours in the refrigerator.
  4. Drain and rinse the beans.
  5. Coarsely chop the red Bell pepper.
  6. In a blender jar, combine the Bell pepper with some of the 6 cups of water.
  7. Puree the Bell pepper.
  8. Add the chipotle pepper, if using, and puree again. Reserve the pepper puree.
  9. Sauté the bacon until golden.
  10. Add the onion and sauté until soft.
  11. Add the garlic and sauté until fragrant.
  12. Add the drained beans, pepper puree, remaining water, and bay leaves.
  13. Gently boil, partially covered until almost tender (1 to 2 hours). Add water from time to time if needed. The beans should be just barely covered with liquid at the end.
  14. Combine the ketchup, white wine, brown sugar, Worcestershire sauce, mustard, salt and black pepper.
  15. Stir the ketchup mixture into the cooked beans.
  16. Return to a simmer on the stovetop then bake (uncovered if using a smoker or covered if using the oven) at 225°F for six hours, stirring once or twice.
Recipe Notes

Copyright © 2018 by Villa Sentieri, LLC. All rights reserved.

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Recipes, Technique

Italian Roasted Peppers

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May 28, 2018

I wish I had a pithy story to tell about roasted peppers.

I don’t really, except to say that after reviewing a dozen, or so, recipes to see how they compare with my method, I’ve discovered that NONE of them does it right.  (I know.  That sounds pretty narcissistic, doesn’t it?)

In a nutshell, you want to turn the skin jet black and you want to do it as quickly as possible.  Then you want to put them in a covered non-reactive container for about 10 minutes before peeling them.

The recipes that I found included the following (erroneous) steps:

1.      Roasting them in the oven.

2.      Cutting them before cooking.

3.      Cooking them too long.

4.      Not sufficiently blackening and blistering the skin.

5.      Putting them in a paper bag after roasting.

And don’t even get me started about putting oil on them before roasting!

Here’s the skinny…

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The longer you cook them, the softer the flesh of the pepper becomes.  If you really want any structure at all, you want to get the blackening of the skin done quickly.

You really want the skin to be completely black.  First, this will cause the skin to peel off easily.  Second, it will add the smokiness that you want in a good roasted pepper.  No, they won’t taste burnt.  You will notice, if you give this recipe a try, that the places where the skin isn’t burnt won’t peel off very easily.

The main goals of cooking them fast and completely blackening the skin mean you really can’t roast them in the oven.  You need direct heat.

You don’t want to cut them because you won’t be able to rotate them sufficiently to blacken the skin all over.  They’re harder to handle if cut.  Besides, they’ll dry out.

Sometimes juice will leak out while the peppers are cooling.  If you put them in a paper bag, the bag will absorb the flavorful juice, and that would be a shame!

If I’m roasting one or two peppers, I’ll do it directly over the burner on a gas stove.  Oh, and for that one writer who suggested lining the burners with aluminum foil, get a life!  Not that much juice comes out of the peppers and what does is likely to get vaporized on the cast iron grate.  If a drop or two lands anywhere else on the stove, it’s just as likely to land in a spot that you can’t cover with aluminum foil as it is to land on the foil itself.

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If I’m roasting more than a couple of peppers, I’ll do it on my gas grill.

You can use a broiler if you don’t have a gas stove or a gas grill, though I find the broiler a little less friendly to use.

As for heat, crank it up:  medium high on a burner, high on a gas grill.  The goal is to blacken the skin as quickly and as evenly as possible.  The longer it takes to do this (that is, the lower the heat) the more the flesh of the pepper will soften.  The pepper should hold its shape after roasting, not collapse.

I use roasted peppers in lots of dishes.  Auntie Helen’s Lentil Salad is a good example.

The simplest way to use roasted peppers is to cut them in strips after peeling off the skin and toss them with a little extra virgin olive oil and salt.  They make an excellent side dish.  Since they’re served at room temperature they can be made in advance.  Using different colored peppers makes it festive.

If you like peppers, and you’ve never roasted your own, please give this recipe a try.  I think you’ll be surprised at how easy it is and how much better the peppers taste that the ones in the jar!

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 Italian Roasted Peppers
Roast the peppers using direct heat, set as high as possible. For one or two peppers, I use the burners on my gas stove. For more, I use my gas grill. A broiler (gas or electric) works too. The directions below are for a gas burner but the same technique works for a gas grill and a gas or electric broiler. The pepper won’t obviously touch the heat source if using a grill or a broiler.
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Course Sides, Vegetables
Cuisine Italian
Prep Time 10 minutes
Cook Time 10 minutes
Passive Time 10 minutes
Servings
or more
Ingredients
Course Sides, Vegetables
Cuisine Italian
Prep Time 10 minutes
Cook Time 10 minutes
Passive Time 10 minutes
Servings
or more
Ingredients
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Instructions
  1. If using a gas burner, set the burner to medium high.
  2. Using long-handled tongs, put the pepper directly on the grate above the flame (where you would ordinarily set the pot).
  3. As the skin begins to blacken, move and rotate the pepper to get the skin evenly black.
  6. When the skin is evenly blackened, put the pepper in a non-reactive heat-proof bowl with a lid, such as one made from glass or enamel.
  7. Cover and allow to cool for 10 minutes.
  8. Rub off the skin. It helps to keep a bowl of water nearby to dip your fingers into to remove the skin that will inevitably stick to your fingers.
  10. Catch any juice that runs out of the peppers to add back once the peppers are peeled, cleaned, and cut.
  11. Cut the peppers in half from top to bottom. Remove the stem, ribs, and seeds.
  12. Use as directed in the recipe.
Recipe Notes

Copyright © 2018 by Villa Sentieri, LLC. All rights reserved.

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Recipes

Chinese Hot and Sour Soup

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May 23, 2018

It is amazing how the culinary landscape of America has changed since I started cooking.  That was brought home to me in a very real way when I was getting ready to cook a multi-course Asian meal for Lunar New Year a few months ago.

In the early 1970s supermarkets carried only the barest minimum of “ethnic” ingredients.  I was attending the University of Pennsylvania and lived in West Philadelphia at the time.

For most Asian ingredients I would go to Philadelphia’s Chinatown.

For Japanese ingredients, I would go to a small Japanese-owned market in West Philly, a few blocks from the western edge of the main University campus.  I don’t remember a specific source for Indian or South Asian ingredients but I was able to cobble together what I needed from an array of stores.

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There were also a few Asian stores in the Ninth Street Market.  Ninth Street is/was often referred to as the “Italian Market,” a name that was not in favor with locals at the time.  There was one store run by a Korean couple on Ninth Street where I could source an array of Asian ingredients.  It’s also where I went when I once needed a large quantity of fresh ginger root to make West Indian Ginger Beer.  After a few shopping trips where I bought enough ginger to supply a Chinese Restaurant for a week, one of the owners asked me, every time I went to the store, if I needed ginger!

When I got serious about cooking, starting junior year in college, I made weekly trips to Ninth Street and to the Pathmark Supermarket in suburban Broomall, PA.  Shopping in West Philly was an experience.  Except for the University, West Philadelphia, at the time, was an impoverished area.

I learned quickly how supermarkets adjust what they stock to the clientele.  Many items that I could easily find in a suburban supermarket were not readily available in West Philadelphia.  What was stocked was often of lesser quality, too.  Meat is a good example.  Some cuts were simply not available in the inner city and the quality of what was available was often inferior.

On the other hand, I could easily find some items in West Philly that were hard to come by in suburban markets in the 1970s.  Smoked ham hocks, pig tails, and turkey necks are good examples.

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A background flavor note in many West Indian dishes is smoked meat; and I cooked a lot of West Indian food in college.  Most often I would use ham hocks, but some recipes specify other cuts.  I remember a peanut soup that I made that called for smoked pig tail.  Sourcing it was a breeze in West Philly.

Mainstream supermarkets now carry a much larger variety of “ethnic” ingredients, including fresh produce, than was the case in the 1970s.  I can even find smoked ham hocks and turkey necks in supermarkets in Santa Fe, though smoked pig tails are still hard to come by.  But if a whole pig’s head is needed, say, for example, to make head cheese, it is readily available in Hispanic markets.

While the array of food stuffs has improved dramatically since I started cooking.  Some things have deteriorated.

I had an incredible butcher on Ninth Street.  I’ve never been able to replace the personal service, quality, and variety of what I could get there.  I was just 19 when I started going to Ninth Street regularly.  When I needed goat for Jamaican Curried Goat, the butcher not only had the goat but cubed it to my specifications while I watched.

Down the block was a shop that sold poultry.  I once needed a Guinea Hen for dinner.  I selected the one I wanted from the pen.  She was taken in the back, and came back cleaned and wrapped in butcher paper.

Shopping for this year’s Lunar New Year Dinner was an education.  While I could get many basic ingredients in the supermarket, unlike the situation in the 1970s, I was unable to shop in a major city.  This put me at a distinct disadvantage for more esoteric ingredients.  Nonetheless, one can now make a respectable Chinese meal from ingredients available in the supermarket.  This is an amazing change from 45 years ago!

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 Chinese Hot and Sour Soup
Make a rich chicken stock for this soup without any extraneous flavoring ingredients, though adding a few slices of ginger, to be strained out afterward, are welcome. If you have a ham bone or a piece of smoked ham, by all means add it. Though Westerners rarely seem to make stock from pork bones, you can add some when making the stock for a traditional Chinese touch.
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Course Soups and Stews
Cuisine Chinese
Prep Time 20 minutes
Cook Time 20 minutes
Servings
people
Ingredients
Course Soups and Stews
Cuisine Chinese
Prep Time 20 minutes
Cook Time 20 minutes
Servings
people
Ingredients
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Instructions
  1. Cover the mushrooms with hot water.
  2. Allow to soak for approximately 15 minutes, until soft.
  3. Meanwhile, bring the stock to a boil.
  4. When the mushrooms are softened, squeeze out excess water and remove the tough stem. Slice the mushroom caps into strips ¼ inch wide.
  5. Combine the vinegar, soy sauce, sugar and hot sauce.
  6. Add the vinegar mixture to the boiling stock. Boil 1 minute.
  7. Add salt to taste.
  8. Combine cornstarch and water. Mix thoroughly.
  9. Add cornstarch mixture to the boiling soup.
  10. After boiling 1 minute, add scallions, bean curd and mushrooms.
  11. Reduce heat and simmer 1-2 minutes.
  12. Add sesame oil.
  13. Gently beat the eggs with salt to taste.
  14. Slowly pour in the beaten eggs into the simmering soup while stirring gently.
  15. Serve immediately.
Recipe Notes

Copyright © 2018 by VillaSentieri.com. All rights reserved.

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Recipes

Auntie Helen’s Lentil Salad

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May 18, 2018

Auntie Helen had a way with lentils.

In addition to making lentil salad for summer cook-outs, she taught me that cooked lentils, topped with homemade tomato sauce, make a great main (or side) dish for a cold winter’s day.

Auntie Helen liked her scotch.  On the rocks.  And she was not shy about quantity.

Auntie Louise liked gin.  Also on the rocks.  Also not shy about quantity.

It was mostly under their tutelage that I went from drinking Bourbon Manhattans (Old Grand Dad at the time) to Bourbon, also on the rocks.  This was somewhere around the age of 19.

Auntie Helen in 1976

I soon made the jump from Old Grand Dad to Jack Daniels, which remained my tipple of choice for decades.  Now I’ve branched out to a wide array of bourbons but always on the rocks and in respectable quantities.

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Auntie Helen and Auntie Louise were born, shortly after the turn of the 20th century, in a palazzo in Rome, now part of the American Embassy.  After their parents lost everything for the second time (there was talk that the first time it happened, they were bailed out by one of the Stroganoffs) the family emigrated from Italy to America.  Their father, a Count in Italy, worked delivering bread in Trenton, NJ.

Auntie Helen and Auntie Louise both became schoolteachers.  Neither married.  They lived together their entire lives.

They had a sweet little house on Yardley Road, just steps from the Yardley town line, in Morrisville, New Jersey.  I spent many weekends at their house, a little over an hour from where I lived in Philadelphia.

Auntie Helen did the cooking.  Auntie Louise made drinks and helped to clean up.

Auntie Louise in 1976

Though they came from a background that was more privileged than most immigrants of the time, they had little by the time the family got to the United States.  They did what many immigrants did, they assimilated and became almost “hyper” American.  I never heard either of them speak a word of Italian.  And, while Auntie Helen cooked an array of Roman specialties, she also cooked a lot of American food, including Impossible Pies, more the savory ones than the sweet ones; homemade Pumpkin Chiffon Pie (the only thing she cooked that I didn’t like); and cheese and egg strata for brunch (with lots of bacon on the side!).

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I recently found a series of Impossible Pie recipes that Auntie Helen wrote out for me.  I can’t promise that I’ll make each of them, but I will post the recipes, in her own handwriting.  If nothing else, they’ll be a bit of a time capsule.

Meanwhile, please enjoy my take on Auntie Helen’s lentil salad.

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 Auntie Helen's Lentil Salad
Auntie Helen’s lentil salad was more of a general concept that a definitive recipe. Feel free to add other ingredients to this, like a handful of chopped black oil-cured olives, some sliced scallions, or a sprinkling of dry oregano. You can replace some of the olive oil with the oil from a can of anchovies or add a teaspoon of anchovy paste if you’d like. It will add an umami touch without tasting fishy.
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Course Beans, Nuts and Legumes, Sides
Cuisine Italian
Prep Time 30 minutes
Cook Time 30 minutes
Passive Time 8 hours
Servings
people
Ingredients
Course Beans, Nuts and Legumes, Sides
Cuisine Italian
Prep Time 30 minutes
Cook Time 30 minutes
Passive Time 8 hours
Servings
people
Ingredients
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Instructions
  1. Wash and pick over the lentils but do not soak them.
  2. Drain the lentils.
  3. Combine the lentils and water.
  4. Bring the lentils to a boil and gently boil until just tender, 10-15 minutes, or maybe a little more based on your elevation.
  5. Drain the lentils.
  6. Mix the hot lentils with the diced onion, oil, and rosemary. Stir well.
  7. Bury the bruised garlic clove in lentils.
  10. Loosely cover the lentils and cool at room temperature.
  11. When the lentils are cool, they can be refrigerated for up to three days before proceeding.
  12. To finish the lentil salad, remove the garlic clove and discard.
  13. Dice the roasted red pepper.
  14. Add the diced roasted red pepper, vinegar, salt and pepper. Mix well and chill thoroughly.
  15. Remove the lentil salad from the refrigerator approximately one hour before serving.
  16. Adjust salt and pepper before serving. Add more olive oil if the lentils seem dry.
Recipe Notes

Copyright © 2018 by VillaSentieri.com. All rights reserved.

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Recipes

Penne with Roasted Garlic Cream Sauce

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May 14, 2018

I apologize!

In my inaugural messages, I clearly stated that I would publish traditional recipes, many (though not all) of them Italian, but with the emphasis on traditional.

I get really stoked by the idea of preserving traditional recipes in written form (even if it’s a bunch of zeroes and ones on a cloud server somewhere)!

I also truly appreciate new and innovative dishes…especially cakes, for some reason.  But my very strong preference if I’m going to work on perfecting and publishing a recipe is to focus on traditional recipes.  (I’m happy to eat good food of any type, traditional or not, that someone wants to serve me, however.)

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My editorial calendar for this blog, including what I’ve published and what I currently have planned to publish, numbers 212 recipes.  The number keeps growing.  Most of these recipes are ones I listed (off the top of my head, so to speak) when I was planning the launch of the blog in late 2016.  The list came from simply thinking about my favorite recipes.  As I trawl through my recipe archive periodically, looking for recipes for particular events, or even just dinner, I usually come upon at least a few more recipes that get added to the list.

Two hotel pans hold a double batch, 4 pounds of penne, for a summer dinner party for the family from Tuscany

Windows says I have 4133 recipes saved in my recipe directory.  That does not count the hundreds of hand-written ones that I’ve not scanned in yet.

But I have to admit, not EVERYTHING I make is traditional.  I have this killer salmon recipe that I got from the New York Times that is now a regular on our table.  Almost any vegetable recipe by David Tanis is a winner in my book, well really ANY recipe by David Tanis, but he has a way with vegetables.  He has many make-ahead-and-heat-up-in-the-oven options that remove a lot of last minute work when putting dinner on the table, whether it be for 2 or 20!

In my defense, these are recipes that I think will become classics in a few decades just as many of the recipes that I started cooking 45 years ago in college have become classics for me.  I think if a recipe still tastes good after half a century it can be considered a classic…which is getting pretty close to traditional.

This is just a portion of the antipasto for the dinner for our Tuscan relatives

Think about all the things you ate 50 years ago that you don’t make any more, like fried bologna simmered in ketchup!  That actually is something that my very traditional mother put on the table in the 1960s!  Granted, it was a main course (and I use the term lightly) that could be whipped up in under half an hour after a day’s work.  The truth is, I actually liked it at the time.

I differentiate the fried bologna category of foods that I don’t make any more from the fried salami category of foods that I still love but that just have fallen off my rotation.  Have you ever had a sandwich of pan-fried salami?  If not, give it a try.  (Thinly slice the salami.  Make a cut from the middle to one edge, like the first cut of a pie, to reduce puckering.  Cook in a skillet over medium heat till lightly browned on each side.  No oil needed.  Pile on bread.  Enjoy…dripping fat and all!)

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So why the apologia?

Today’s recipe isn’t traditional.  I developed it about four years ago for dinner for a large group of people.  It was such a hit, that I kept making it.  I even made it last summer for a dinner party for the family from Tuscany!  So, while it’s not really traditional (which I take to mean something with a cultural history, something that individuals from a particular culture and location make or made on a regular basis), it has a very traditional FLAVOR.

I made this penne for my father-in-law’s birthday party this past January. Everyone had clean plates!

In my mind it’s not a REAL (i.e. traditional) dish because I made it up.  On the other hand, the flavor profile makes it fit into an established canon of northern Italian food.  Italians would recognize it as Italian food, just not traditional Italian food.

Because it isn’t traditional, I hadn’t planned on publishing it.  I got a number of requests for the recipe after I mentioned it in one of my emails and decided that I should reconsider my initial decision.  There aren’t many photographs but the steps are not really complicated.  I know you can do it without all the usual photos.

Who knows, maybe in another 45 years it’ll become a classic!

Print Recipe
 Penne with Roasted Garlic Cream Sauce
This takes some time to put together but once it’s assembled you can spend time with your guests while it cooks. The sauce has a luxurious amount of butter, about twice what would typically be used based on the amount of flour. This improves the flavor and mouth-feel of the sauce. Because I originally created this dish for an event in Alamogordo, New Mexico, I topped it with pistachios which are grown there. Chopped walnuts or whole pine nuts could be substituted. If you want to prepare the dish in advance, be sure to cool the pasta in a bowl of ice water. Mix the cooled pasta with cold white sauce and the other ingredients. Pour into a baking dish, cover tightly, and refrigerate. Allow the covered dish to sit at room temperature 60-90 minutes before baking.
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Course Pasta, Noodles, and Sauces
Cuisine Italian
Prep Time 2 hours
Cook Time 2 hours
Passive Time 2 hours
Servings
people
Ingredients
Balsamella (White Sauce)
Final Assembly
Course Pasta, Noodles, and Sauces
Cuisine Italian
Prep Time 2 hours
Cook Time 2 hours
Passive Time 2 hours
Servings
people
Ingredients
Balsamella (White Sauce)
Final Assembly
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Instructions
Balsamella (White Sauce)
  1. Put the garlic in a single layer in a small oven-proof dish with a tight-fitting lid. Alternatively, put the garlic on a sheet of heavy-duty aluminum foil.
  2. Sprinkle the garlic with olive oil.
  3. Put the lid on the dish, or fold up and seal the aluminum foil.
  4. Roast the garlic at 300°F until soft and golden brown, approximately 45 minutes, stirring occasionally.
  5. Put the garlic and any olive oil you can scrape out of the dish into a blender jar.
  6. Add 1 cup of the milk.
  7. Puree the garlic and milk. Reserve.
  8. Warm the remaining milk in a heavy-bottomed saucepan.
  9. Melt the butter in another heavy-bottomed saucepan over medium heat. Stir the flour into the butter.
  10. Cook for a few minutes on medium heat but do not allow flour to color.
  11. Stir in the warm milk, one ladleful at a time, incorporating well after each addition to avoid lumps.
  12. After about half the warm milk has been incorporated, add the pureed garlic mixture.
  13. Use some of the warm milk to rinse out the blender jar and add it to the pot. Stir well.
  14. Add the remaining milk to the pot along with the bay leaves, rosemary sprigs, and lemon zest.
  15. Bring to a boil over medium high heat stirring (nearly) constantly and cook until the sauce reaches the thickness of heavy cream, approximately 5 minutes.
  16. Strain the white sauce through a fine-mesh sieve.
  17. If not using the sauce immediately, cover it with plastic wrap, putting the plastic directly on the surface to prevent the formation of a skin, and refrigerate. [If you are going to prepare the casserole in advance, make sure the balsamella is cold before combining with the other ingredients.]
Final Assembly
  1. Put the frozen peas in a large sieve. Rinse with cool water to thaw the peas. Allow the peas to drain and completely thaw while proceeding with the recipe.
  2. Heat the olive oil in a large sauté pan over high heat.
  3. When the oil is hot, but not smoking, add the diced mushroom caps. Toss well.
  4. When the mushrooms have absorbed the oil, add 1 teaspoon of fine salt. Mix well.
  5. Turn the heat to medium low until the mushrooms begin to sweat.
  6. Turn the heat to high and continue sautéing until the liquid evaporates.
  7. Continue to cook until the mushroom pieces are browned in places.
  8. Season with black pepper. Add ham and cook 2-3 minutes.
  9. Remove from the heat and reserve.
  10. Bring a large pot of heavily salted water to a rolling boil. Add the pasta.
  11. Boil until the pasta is partially cooked. It should still be a little crunchy on the inside.
  12. If you are going to cook the casserole immediately, drain the pasta but do not rinse. If you are going to assemble the casserole in advance, drain the pasta and chill it in a bowl of ice water. When cold, drain well.
  13. Combine pasta, peas, mushroom and ham mixture, and balsamella. Mix well.
  14. Pour into a large buttered casserole. For this quantity, I use a full-size steam-table tray, also called a “hotel pan.”
  15. Put a sheet of parchment on top then cover the pan tightly with heavy-duty aluminum foil. You can skip the parchment if you are going to cook the casserole immediately. Food should not stay in extended contact with aluminum, hence the parchment paper if the dish is being assembled in advance.
  16. Either refrigerate or bake at 350°F until bubbly. Baking time will depend on whether the ingredients are hot or previously refrigerated and brought to room temperature, 1 ½ to 2 hours.
  17. Remove the foil and parchment. Sprinkle the top with Parmesan cheese and nuts.
  18. Place under the broiler, or on the top rack of an oven heated to 500°F, until the top is golden brown.
  19. Allow the casserole to rest at least 15 minutes before serving.
Recipe Notes

Copyright © 2018 by VillaSentieri.com. All rights reserved.

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Stir-Fried Chicken with Cashews and Snow Peas

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May 9, 2018

This is the year of the Dog.

It may be old news, but Lunar New Year was Friday, February 16, 2018.  We celebrated with close friends and a dinner menu with an extensive array of Asian dishes.  There are many traditional dishes for Lunar New Year depending on the country.  I chose to do a pan-Asian menu rather than focus on strictly traditional recipes from a single country.

Kifune Shrine, Kyoto, Japan (Photo by Avishek Kumar)

We were in Palm Springs for Lunar New Year.  The plan was to escape winter weather in Santa Fe which, as it turned out, was not very wintery after all, unlike what the East Coast experienced.

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Sourcing Asian ingredients has become a real issue for me now that I don’t live in a major city.  The only Asian grocery store in Santa Fe, Talin Market, closed a few months ago though the original location is still open in Albuquerque.

Palm Springs only has two Asian markets that I can find.  Both are Filipino-owned and, although they stock an array of Asian goods, they really focus on Filipino foods.

Honen-in Temple, Kyoto, Japan (Photo by Avishek Kumar)

Amazon came to the rescue.  While I’d rather stand in the aisles of an Asian market reading and comparing packages of honest-to-goodness product, Amazon was a lifesaver.

There were eight of us for the Lunar New Year dinner.

The kitchen in our Palm Springs house is small, approximately 9 feet by 11 feet.  Turning out a multi-course meal requires a lot of planning and organization.   I divided the main part of the meal into four courses.  Each course included a complementary array of foods and different cooking methods.

We started with hors d’oeuvres and cocktails.  We ended with a simple, non-traditional dessert of gelato and fortune cookies, which I purchased.  I assumed nobody was going to be too into dessert after all the other food.

Fushimi Inari Shrine, Kyoto, Japan (Photo by Avishek Kumar)

Here’s the menu:

Hors d ’Oeuvres
Vegetable Dumplings with Soy-Vinegar Dipping Sauce
Steamed Edamame with Coarse Salt

First Course
Stir-Fried Chicken with Cashews and Snow Peas
Eggplant Hunan Style
Cambodian Fish with Bean Thread

Second Course
Korean Bulgogi
Indonesian Sweet Corn Patties
Szechuan Garlic Noodles

Third Course
Hot and Sour Soup

Fourth Course
Chinese Roast Pork
Japanese Carrot Salad
Mapo Tofu
Caramelized Tomatoes with Ginger and Vinegar

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I recently published my recipe for Chinese Roast Pork.  Hot and Sour Soup is coming up in a couple of weeks.  Today, however, we’re focusing on a Cantonese classic, Stir-Fried Chicken with Nuts and Vegetables, specifically cashews and snow peas.

This is a recipe that I started making during junior year in college.  It got tweaked a lot over that year.  By then I was comfortable with the end product and didn’t really do much with it… until this year.

I didn’t really change the recipe, though.  I changed the pan!

Shrine in Gion District, Kyoto, Japan (Photo by Avishek Kumar)

You’ve probably figured out that I’m prone to excess where kitchen equipment comes in.  I have four woks:  two carbon steel ones that date back to college and two that are a decade or so younger, one aluminum and one carbon steel.  Both of these are larger than the ones from my college days.

I always cook my stir-fries in a wok but this particular dish is always a problem due to the “velvet” coating on the chicken.  The coating always sticks to the wok.  I suspect I could eliminate that problem by using enough oil to deep fry the chicken but that wasn’t supposed to be the way to cook it.  So, I always just accepted the “sticking-chicken” problem.

Until now.

I used a large, non-stick skillet.

It worked like a charm!!!

I don’t think I’ll give up my woks any time soon but for this particular dish, non-stick is definitely the way to go.

Afterthought:  This recipe calls for MSG, though, of course, you can leave it out if you wish.  If you’re at all interested in the hype about the health effects of MSG, I suggest you read this article.

Print Recipe
 Stir-Fried Chicken with Cashews and Snow Peas
Walnuts and either broccoli or green beans can be used instead of cashews and snow peas. The chicken can be marinated several hours in advance and refrigerated, tightly covered. If you wish, you can reduce or eliminate the MSG.
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Course Mains, Poultry
Cuisine Chinese
Prep Time 20 minutes
Cook Time 15 minutes
Servings
people as part of a Chinese meal
Ingredients
Velvet Chicken
Sauce
Assembly
Course Mains, Poultry
Cuisine Chinese
Prep Time 20 minutes
Cook Time 15 minutes
Servings
people as part of a Chinese meal
Ingredients
Velvet Chicken
Sauce
Assembly
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Instructions
Velvet Chicken
  1. Cut the chicken into ½ inch cubes.
  2. Put the chicken in a non-reactive dish.
  3. Sprinkle the chicken with salt, pepper, five spice powder and MSG. Mix well then let stand 20 minutes.
  4. Sprinkle the chicken with cornstarch and 4 teaspoons of oil. Mix well and let stand 20 minutes.
  6. Fold the egg white into the chicken. Let stand 30 minutes. If not using immediately, the chicken can be refrigerated, covered, for several hours at this point.
Sauce
  1. Combine all sauce ingredients, stir well and reserve.
Assembly
  1. Deep fry the nuts until golden. Once they start to color, they will cook rapidly. Careful attention is required to avoid burning them.
  2. When golden, remove the nuts from the oil and spread them on a paper towel to drain.
  3. Cut the tips off the snow peas.
  4. Using a large non-stick skillet, stir-fry the snow peas in 3 tablespoons of vegetable oil over high heat for about 30 seconds, until bright green. (You can use some of the oil used to fry the nuts if you wish.)
  5. Transfer the cooked snow peas to a plate to cool.
  6. In the same non-stick skillet, stir-fry the garlic and ginger over high heat, until fragrant, approximately 30 seconds, adding a few tablespoons more oil if needed.
  7. Add the chicken and stir-fry over high heat until just cooked through, approximately 2-3 minutes.
  8. Stir the sauce mixture to combine and add it to the chicken.
  9. Bring to a boil and cook until thickened, stirring constantly, approximately 1 minute.
  10. Stir in the cooked cashews and snow peas.
  11. Remove the pan from the heat and stir in the sesame oil.
  12. Serve immediately with steamed rice.
Recipe Notes

Copyright © 2018 by VillaSentieri.com. All rights reserved.

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