As someone who likes to call herself a cook, I am always interested in how two people can make the same dish, even to the same recipe, and yet there will be subtle differences in the result. With regard to pastry, this can depend on ambient temperature, how cool your hands are or even how stressed you are feeling on that particular day. Anyway, just as I am doing well for Sunday lunch invitations, I am doing well for donations of cotognata and I have quite a stash now. Here is the "McGina" version; it is slightly sweeter and, as you see, darker than Chiara's, but oh, both are lovely!
Cuts of meat and the size of them can also alter the outcome of a recipe. In Britain if I asked for beef to be cubed I would usually get pieces about 1 inch square. Here, even if I ask for the cubes to be small, this is what I end up with [second picture]. I just go with it now: Italian butchers like to put in un po' di muscolo, which they think adds to the flavour, and they are right; they know what they are doing. So the beef dish in the third picture - my "Prague Casserole" because I found the recipe and first tried it out in that beautiful city - has evolved in taste from when I made it there, then in Britain and now here. It has proved popular with my Sicilian friends and I think the larger cubes of meat improve it. The wonderful origano and strattù [tomato paste] available here help it along!
9 comments:
Stop it! You're making me hungry! I'll bet you're a wonderful cook.
I'm making Christmas lunch for the people I work with. That is, it's in my house and I'm making a large dish of something and everyone else will bring bits to go with, before and after it.
Any suggestions for a simple quick casserole-type dish? That I can adapt for about 15 of us.
...With regard to pastry, this can depend on ambient temperature, how cool your hands are or even how stressed you are feeling on that particular day...
My girlfriend's mother said that it was even the way one person kneaded the dough and how much air was let in. Don't know how true that is.
It looks very good, but I am not fond of fatty meat. I Need to trim it off before I cook. I know it adds flavor, but its a quirk of mine.
What's the first dish pictured here, Welshcakes?
Liz - while living in Colorado, I made mussels in basil cream sauce for the crew I worked for. Since there are no mussel producing bodies of water nearby, most of the people had never had mussels and though I tried to catch any that might have been bad, I warned them not to eat any that hadn't opened. Guess who got sick as a dog? Me. They had to take me home and put me to bed.
We have seen lots of meat, but what about fish? I had a comment on my ethical eating post about Italian prawns, or was it scampi. I wondered if you knew the person.
James, yes, it is important to let air into the dough, kneaded with cool hands,to make good pastry. But this is not my speciality.
Hi, SW. I try!
Liz, gosh, I'm flattered to be asked! Here is my all-time favourite, stand-by dish. If I don't cook it for a couple of weeks, I get withdrawal symptoms! It's also extremely versatile, will take all sorts of abuse, such as leaving it in the oven longer than stated, you can make it in advance and reheat and it freezes like a dream. - CHICKEN WITH OLIVES AND CAPERS: For 4 people, you need 4 chicken quarters or in Britain I used to use the part-boned breasts with the skin on that you can get at M&S. Here you can't get these, so I use skinless breasts [not those flattened things] cut into chunks. [That would make the dish go further for you.] A pack of pancetta cubetti [or some chopped bacon], 1 large, chopped onion, 1 - 2 chopped garlic cloves, 14 oz. can chopped tomatoes, 1 small can tomato paste [the Greek kind you get in delis there], some sliced black olives, drained, 1 tablesp or so of salted capers, rinsed and drained, a few chopped mushrooms, 5 fl oz red wine, salt and pepper, parsley and basil to garnish. Heat 2 tablesp olive oil and fry the pancetta. Add garlic and onions and fry. Add tomatoes and paste and mix around a few minutes. Put in the capers,mushrooms, olives, and wine and bring to boil. Season. Chuck it all over the chicken in a baking dish with a lid. Cover and cook at 200C for about 1 hour 10 mins. If you increase the quantities, you don't need to increase the amount of wine accordingly. As long as the liquid skims the top of the meat it will be fine. Once I didn't have any bacon so I fried some ham for the dish and it was just as good. The beef dish in the pic is also a possibility but it would be expensive for 15 people, I'm thinking! But let me know if you would like the recipe.
James, your girlfriend's mother is right. Air is important. Here some people still believe that a menstruating woman can't make good pastry! Also in the full heat of summer here it can be very tempermental. Ellee, I'm allergic to fish, sadly, so that's why I don't show it. I don't know the person who made the comment on prawns. You are sure getting some interesting ones there!
Mmm, that sounds yummy. I'll give it a go, thank you! Yes, you're right, beef would be quite expensive!
Glad you like the sound of it, Liz.
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