5.2.10
photos by george billard
So remember that incredible lo mein with ramps and trout roe I mentioned eating at Momofuku Ssam Bar last week? I just couldn’t wait to have it again—and I wanted you to be able to try it at home while ramps are still in season—so I made my own version of it. For those of you asking what is a ramp?, it’s a wild leek that is foraged at this time of year. Whole Foods carries them in some locations, but they’re all over the farmers markets right now. And enthusiastic locavores are charging about the countryside on a rampage, filling their reusable cloth bags with them by the armload. With a flavor somewhere between scallion and garlic, they’ve got a slim white bulb at the end of a stalk that’s often a bit purple, and flat leaves that are a brilliant green. You can eat these leaves, too, sauteed with oil in a hot pan. Rich in selenium and sulfur, the ramp has been the subject of intense study in the areas of cancer prevention and treatment. But, really, it’s just plain delicious, and goes so well with the other foraged delicacies of spring: fiddleheads, morels and asparagus.
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4.12.10
all photos by george billard
It’s so wonderful to be able to celebrate with friends. Nothing makes me happier than sitting down to a delicious meal with a group of pals in high spirits. If I have made the meal, so much the better. It’s a way for me to express my love, to share a little bit of myself. We had three weekend guests at our tiny cottage, and two more drove over from Stone Ridge for the evening. Because Stephanie is still watching her fat intake (like a hawk), I had to come up with a menu that was virtually fat-free yet could still satisfy all these gourmands. I don’t think anyone left the table feeling deprived.
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3.4.10
I never met her, nor dined at her restaurant, but I could tell from her food, and the joie de vivre that radiated from her face, that Rose Gray was a glutton for life. We lost another great one to cancer today. She was only 71. Co-owner and co-chef of London’s River Café, opened in 1987 in a converted warehouse on the Thames, she was a self-taught cook who fell in love with the cucina rustica of Northern Italy while living in Lucca. After her friend Nell Campbell invited her to run the kitchen at Nell’s, a New York hot spot in the 80s, Ms. Gray caught the bug and decided to open her own place, along with her friend Ruth Rogers (seen above), another self-taught chef.
In honor of this great lady, I include here one of her pristine recipes, a classic Sicilian pasta dish comprised of just a few ingredients. It was in simplicity that she found much of the pleasure and excitement in cooking. I hope you will, too. Eat well and raise a glass to Rose. Read the rest of this entry »
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2.28.10
Have you been to Txikito yet? As its name indicates (a Basque version of the Spanish “chiquito,” which means tiny), this Chelsea restaurant has only a few tables, and you’d be lucky to grab one on any night (or at lunch). Chefs and owners Eder Montero and Alexandra Raij turn out some wonderful regional Spanish food that takes me back to the years I spent in that beautiful country. My father was a professor of Spanish literature and, every seven years, would take his sabbatical there. I attended the 4th and 10th grades in Madrid, and went back for two semesters off when I was in college. I fell in love with the place, the people, the food, the language. Some of the dishes at Txikito work upon my memory in the way that Proust’s madeleine did his: the fat, silky white asparagus of Navarra; the crisp croquetas with their centers oozing creamed cod or chicken; the boquerones, subtly saline white anchovies; but, most of all, the ensaladilla rusa. (Little Russian salad, supposedly invented by a Russian in the late 19th century.) I used to eat this delightful version of potato salad, a classic Spanish tapa, almost every Sunday morning when I lived in Madrid in my twenties. They served it at a little café right on the edge of el rastro, the big flea market. The most outrageous punks would go there, flaunting their sky-high mohawks, tight leathers and scary piercings. I remember feeling super cool, kicking the sawdust on the floor, smoking my Marlboro reds and taking leisurely bites of this rich, creamy salad. Txiquito’s version—potatoes, peas, carrots and bits of green olive bound together with homemade mayonnaise and mounded atop a salty layer of oil-cured tuna—takes me right back there. Read the rest of this entry »
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2.18.10
photo by george billard
I learned about colatura di alici—an amber elixir of anchovy made around Italy’s Amalfi coast for the last 2,000 years—on Alexis Stewart’s blog, Whatever. I enjoy her posts, many of them showcasing her baking prowess (white-flour-and-sugar-laden recipes I will never use) but some filled with delicious-looking vegetarian dishes. She mentioned colatura in passing and, curious, I ordered a bottle online here. When anchovies are salted for curing, they’re layered in wooden barrels, then pressed and weighted down. From small holes in the barrels drips this salty, funky syrup—thus the word colatura, from colare, “to drip” in Italian. Somehow, although more concentrated, it’s a bit less overtly fishy than anchovies. And it’s not quite as rank or muddy as Asian fish sauce (an essential pantry item, by the way). It’s the modern version of garum, a fermented fish liquid (sometimes made from just their blood and guts) that was a sort of salt substitute in ancient Rome. The process was so smelly that production was apparently limited to outside the city walls! Like many fermented products, colatura is rich in amino acids, and of course I’ve droned on before about the benefits of fish oil. One of the easiest uses for colatura is as a simple sauce. Mix a couple of teaspoons of the stuff with a few tablespoons of extra-virgin olive oil and a clove or two of crushed garlic, and use this to flavor swiss chard, broccoli rabe, escarole or potatoes. Or toss it with roasted cauliflower, raisins and pinenuts; or with a few red chile flakes and some cooked pasta, as in the recipe below. Another great way to use it is in a dressing for Caesar salad. I don’t think you’ll ever go back to mere anchovies or anchovy paste once you try this heady brew.
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