THE HAPPIEST COLOUR

I received this beautiful gift of oranges and mandarins from a friend's garden, presented in a traditional, hand-made Sicilian basket, yesterday.

To quote a certain Mr Sinatra whose father was from Lercara Friddi in Palermo Province, or maybe, as the singer himself once claimed, Catania,

"ORANGE IS THE HAPPIEST COLOR."

Yes, siree!

A GOOD YEAR FOR CHAMPIONSHIPS

Italy, as you may have noticed, is having a very good year for championships but you may not have heard about one that has nothing to do with sport, namely the World Pastrycook Championship - La Coupe du Monde de la Pâtisserie, which the country won, for the third time, in Lyon on Saturday.

Chefs Massimo Pica, a chocolate specialist, Lorenzo Puca, who specialises in sugarwork and Andrea Restuccia, a gelato specialist, were given ten hours to produce a chocolate dessert for sharing, an ice cream cake and a restaurant dessert plus a chocolate sculpture and a sugar sculpture, both 165 cm high. The team executed all these tasks impeccably and I am delighted to say that the chocolate sharing dessert contained the Sicilian ingredient of Tarocco oranges. 

"Nothing to do with sport", I said - except that I imagine the training and preparation must have been just as rigorous for, as a cook, I am exhausted just thinking about having to produce all that in the time allotted! Anyone who watches Bakeoff programmes will have some idea of how difficut it is. Many congratulations, then, to the Italian team and also to their trainer Alessandro Dalmasso. 

The runners-up were Japan, France was placed third and the UK a respectable fourth.

I cannot reproduce the pictures but you can view some here.

MORNING GOLD

It is supposed to have been a Sicilian who said,

"Al mattino le arance sono d'oro, a pranzo d'argento e alla sera di piombo."  ("Oranges are gold in the morning, silver at lunchtime and lead in the evening.")

Whilst there seems to be some evidence that they can slow down the digestion the later in the day they are eaten, I have to admit that for me, they are always "gold"! In particular, my spremuta of fresh Sicilian orange juice in the morning, from November to February when the oranges are at their best, sets me up for the day. No self-respecting Sicilian bar owner would allow less than the finest spremuta to be served in his establishment, so  I bid a fond farewell to the juice at the end of February or, at the latest, mid-March. (This is why, when you visit Sicilian tourist sites in summer and see stalls offering spremuta, you won't see any Sicilian drinking it, because he or she will know that the oranges have either been imported or frozen.)

Imagine my surprise then, when this morning the local bar owner greeted me with,"This morning we have spremuta! They brought me oranges from Noto and they're good, so we are serving spremuta this week! But of course, when they offer me oranges from Spain, I don't take them."  There we have it: Oranges from Noto are OK but if they come with more food miles than that, they are rejected. And that is why this morning's spremuta tasted so good!

Whilst on the subject of fruit juice, if any of you have been to Sicily recently you may have noticed pomegranate juice on sale at tourist sites. The properties of the pomegranate have been rediscovered recently and there are companies producing excellent organic juice. But the fruit is out of season in summer so the juice, despite a few pomegrantes being on display, is unlikely to be freshly squeezed on the premises. Think about it - how much juice do you get out of a pomegranate if you try to squeeze one at home? There is nothing wrong with the commercial versions and they are very refreshing. They also make a passable, though non-traditional, granita.

But I'll stick to my "morning gold" while it lasts, thanks!

(SLIGHTLY SICILIAN) CHOCOLATE REFRIGERATOR CAKE

Every cook, I imagine, has a favourite chocolate refrigerator cake recipe and this one, which I came across a few weeks ago, has now become mine. I did add glacé cherries and I "Sicilianised" it by using three different flavours of Modican chocolate (lemon, Zibibbo wine and cinnamon last time). As it is the season, I also added six chopped sticks of the candied orange peel so lovingly made at home or by hand in the pasticcerie here. Go on, try it!

A CIVILISED STOP

A civilised stop as Bertie and I were on our walk the other day. I didn't ask for such a big slice, honestly, but it would have been churlish to refuse it once it was served, wouldn't it? And when you start to see borage in Sicily, you know that spring and the ice cream season are on their way!

MORNING GLORY

There are, in my opinion, two ways of seeting yourself up for the day: one is a full British breakfast [without egg, for me] and the other is a freshly squeezed Sicilian orange juice.  On the right you see the first of the season:

As I've mentioned before, no self-respecting Sicilian barman will squeeze a non-Sicilian, out-of-season orange and, even though the orange season started a month ago, our local bar did not deem the fruit good enough for juice until this week. And long may things continue thus!

LONZA WITH CRANBERRY SAUCE AND CAMPARI

Here is yet another variation on a whole piece of lonza [pork loin]! This time I had decided I needed to use up the cranberry sauce I'd made just after Christmas, and had the idea of using it with lonza. I knew it needed a kick of something but couldn't think quite what. Then, in the middle of the night, I thought of campari. I didn't have any in the house but the owner of the bar opposite was happy to give me some in an espresso cup! Here's what I did:

Ask your butcher to make a few incisions in a 1.5 kg piece of lonza so that you can insert slices of orange in them. [This time you don't want the lonza in butcher's netting.] When you get the meat home, insert half an orange slice in each incision, along with a leaf of fresh sage and a couple of rosemary needles. Rub over some coarse seasalt [I used pink Himalayan salt] and a couple of grindings of mixed peppercorns and tie the lonza at intervals with kitchen string. Put it in a dish and pour over the juice of an orange and 200 ml white wine. Marinate in the fridge for 2 hours or so, turning once.

When you are ready to cook, turn the lonza back over and place it in a smallish roasting pan lined first with foil and then with baking parchment. Pour the marinade over it and cook for 1 hour at 180 C.  [Italian ovens tend to be fast so I turned mine down to 160 C half way through cooking.]  Baste the lonza after half an hour.

Just before the cooking time is up, mix about 200 gr cranberry sauce with the juice of another orange and half an espresso cup of campari. Place in a shallow pan on the hob and cook, stirring. When the mixture bubbles, turn the heat down and keep stirring for another 2 mins. Pour this over the pork and give it another 5 mins in the oven.

Cut off the string, carve the pork and serve with the sauce.

Serves 6 - buon appetito!

SIMPLE PLEASURES

As I've mentioned before, 2013 has not been a good year for me and I'll be jolly glad to see the back of it. For various reasons, there are a lot of things I can neither do nor have at the moment and in such circumstances, one sometimes loses sight of the things that are possible. So yesterday I reminded myself that a week before Christmas I can sit in the sun on a café terrace and enjoy the juice of a Sicilian orange and some handmade biscuits.

I still love you, Italy!

EASTER ORANGE

Well, it's not quite egg-shaped but about as near as an orange can get! As I've written before, I love the way that, here, imperfectly-shaped fruit is still sold, if it is good. I'm looking forward to my orange salad this evening:

WINTER TREAT

If not exactly warm in Catania on Saturday afternoon, it was not too cold to sit on a café terrace and as it's just impossible to visit that fair city without having a gelato, whatever the weather, my friend and I gave in gracefully. Refreshing Tarocco orange juice completed our treat:

Gianduia and pistacchio flavours for me

and coffee and chocolate ice cream for my friend.

ORANGIER AND ORANGIER

Orange salad is one of my favourite Sicilian dishes and it is so simple! For those of you who have not seen my previous posts on this, all you do is segment however many [cold] oranges you wish to serve and drizzle them with olive oil. You can season it if you wish and you can add onion, too - sometimes I do and sometimes I don't.  Last night my orange salad tasted even zingier and orangier thanks to the addition of some of the orange-flavoured olive oil I'd found in the salumeria - once I'd worked out how to open the container, that is:

CHICKEN WITH CUMIN SEEDS & PEPPERS

This is my take on a recipe in the February edition of UK Good Housekeeping magazine.  The use of cumin seeds was what had attracted me to it as I miss using them!  I was going to cook the dish just as it said in the recipe - well, inasmuch as I ever do - but I forgot to get the carrots, you see.  I did have some red and green peppers in the fridge, although I wasn't quite sure these would go well with the orange used but "What the hell?" I thought - nothing ventured, nothing new created.  As this Italianised the dish somewhat, I decided to cook it on top of the stove rather than in the oven, which is the more usual method of cooking here.

You need:

3 tablesp olive oil

3 small red onions, cut into wedges [which will probably fall apart into rings but no matter]

1 red and 2 green elongated peppers, sliced

half tablesp cumin seeds

100 gr dried apricots, chopped

6 boned & skinned chicken thighs, halved by the butcher

juice and rind of 1 large orange

seasalt & black pepper

Heat the olive oil in a wide pan and soften the onion in it.  Add the peppers and soften for about 10 mins.  Add cumin seeds and give everything a good stir.  Now add the chicken and brown on all sides.  Add the apricots and seasoning to taste and stir well. Add the rind and juice of an orange and 150 ml water.  Bring to the boil, stirring, cover  and simmer for about 30 mins.

Enjoy.

ORANGE CHICKEN

The simplest recipes are the best and this one for pollo all'arancia, from a regional cookbook that came with a newspaper, is fantastic!  Unusually, for a Sicilian recipe, it used butter instead of olive oil and the other ingredients are orange juice and rind, lemon juice, sage, garlic, a little flour and white wine.  The sprigs of rosemary are added at the end of cooking.

Naturally, I am of the opinion that it's the taste of Sicilian oranges that makes the dish so delicious!

SICILY BURSTS THE BUBBLE

Some soft drinks companies, particularly those whose sales mainly consist of sweetened and fizzy products, have had their bubble burst by an amendment to a new agricultural development law which has been passed by the Sicilian Regional Government:  Under this ruling, the only soft drinks that vending machines in Sicily's schools are now allowed to sell are freshly squeezed orange juice and the juice of citrus fruits grown on the island.

The purposes of the initiative are to improve the health of Sicilian children and combat obesity but members of the Italian soft drinks manufacturers' association Assobibe are not happy with the implied link between the consumption of fizzy drinks and poor health.  Staff at the Italian Ministry of Education are not bubbling over with enthusiasm at the measure either and a spokesperson said that the the initiative, though encouraging, is not enough as children need to do more exercise in order to avoid becoming obese.

I say, "Well done, Sicily!"

CHICKEN WITH ORANGES AND COURGETTES

This dish, from the June edition of Vero Cucina, turned out to be delicious: the chicken joints and orange slices are marinated in olive oil, ginger and saffron and then cooked slowly with the zucchini and, later, the olives in a mixture of brodo and honey:

I'm looking forward to making it again during the Sicilian orange season when it will, I am sure, taste even better!

AN IMPROMPTU LUNCH

Like all Sicilians, my friend Marco never visits without bringing a gift so when he unexpectedly rang my doorbell just now, he presented me with freshly made focaccia and pasticcio from a local rosticceria and some oranges from his garden:

The pasticcio is filled with broccoli and onion.

What a pleasant lunch I am about to have!

CITRUS FRUIT RISOTTO

Cold, rainy days in Sicily - yes, there are some - can, paradoxically, be more depressing than cold, rainy days in the UK., perhaps because the sky is still light, making it all seem somehow out of place and perhaps because everyone who is able to do so stays indoors, thus making the streets seem strangely deserted.  In addition, some householders regard it as "giving in" to put the heating on, preferring to wear Michelin-man-style padded jackets in their own homes and, when you do meet people as you go about your errands, there is no British "spirit of the blitz - we're all in this weather together" defiance to draw upon.

On such days, reader, the only sensible thing to do is to go home and make yourself a citrus fruit risotto:

First, chop a white onion finely and cook it gently in 2 tablesp olive oil until transparent.  Now add 350 gr risotto rice and let this cook in the oil for a few minutes too.  Now add 8 tablesp of juice from the freshest Sicilian oranges and grapefruit to the mixture and bring it to simmering point, stirring all the time.  Now start gradually adding 750 ml hot water and stir every now and then.  You need to add a little more of the water every time the rice absorbs the last lot.  This should take about 15 minutes altogether.  Once all the water has been absorbed, add 100 gr grated caciocavallo cheese and stir well.  Add salt and pepper to taste.

Garnish with segments of peeled orange and grapefruit, their grated zest and some chopped parsley.

The cooked rice will comfort you and the zing of the citrus fruit will lift your spirits.

A SLICE OF LIFE ON SATURDAY

There is no better way to start Saturday or any day than with a glass of freshly squeezed Sicilian blood orange juice

and, it being the weekend, a slice of orange tart:

Meanwhile, down in Modica Bassa, the farmers' market is in full swing

and even the town's buildings seem to be enjoying the sunny morning:

Lunchtime and back at Bar Cicara a friend and I share a plate of antipasti:

And now it's siesta time!

SIX-FLAVOURED VEAL

I liked the idea of this beef dish a sei profumi [with six flavours] from the Cucchiaio d'Argento.  The beef  or veal is marinated with garlic, basil, parsley, fresh lemon and orange juice plus the grated peel of a lime and some cumin seeds before being cooked.  At the end of cooking, the marinade is poured back over the meat. 

It is not always easy to find limes in Sicily but when I do this is a pleasant way of using them.

NEW YEAR'S EVE LUNCH WITH IRMA

Irma is another friend who is a wonderful cook and this is what we ate for a long lunch today:

There were home dried tomatoes with a piquant dressing

followed by this elegant pasta dish of ham and chiodini mushrooms, invented by Irma

and served on a basil purée:

Then there was roast pork

prettily served with a fennel and orange salad and apple purée:

Now, I have to say I'm proud of this.  I had invented a semifreddo of white torrone to take along as a dessert.  I got the idea from a magazine but the recipe seemed unnecessarily complicated to me, so I adapted the semifreddo of marrons glacés recipe from Il Cucchiaio d'Argento and it worked very well.  I found the chocolate letters and numbers in the supermarket.  [They are by paneangeli, if you're in Italy.]

After that, there was Irma's cobaita [or giuggiulena in dialect]

plus mustaccioli biscuits filled with nuts and fig paste and nucatoli honey biscuits.

Now I have to find room for a dish of lentils, to bring myself good fortune in the New Year!

Happy 2011, everybody, from Simi and me! xx woof!