Artichokes “alla Romana”

Two weekends ago we took advantage of the first real spring days and we enjoyed some grilling and cooking with close friends. Marketa, asked me for a typical recipe to cook some fresh artichokes she brought along (they are starting to be in season). For me it has been a real treat: i love artichokes, i come from an island where they are a very important part of our culinary tradition and, since they are not that easy to find, we regularly organize dinners in a typical Italian trattoria where we know they cook them perfectly. 

Ingredients:

8 artichokes


1 lemon


1/4 cup parsley, chopped


1/4 cup mint, chopped


3 cloves garlic, minced


3/4 spoons olive oil plus extra for finishing


¼ cup of breadcrumbs

Method:

1. Discard the tough outer leaves and chop the stems of the artichokes off just below the bases. Firmly press each artichoke upside down on the counter to make it “bloom.” Scoop out the choke (the hairy white part) and place the cleaned artichokes in a bowl of water with the juice of 1 lemon squeezed in. This prevents the inside of the artichokes from becoming an unappetizing greyish-brown when exposed to the air.

2. Mix together garlic, lemon, herbs, bread crumbs and olive oil. Take artichokes out of lemon bath, rub the mixture inside, spooning any extra inside. Salt and pepper liberally on surface.

3. Place artichokes side by side, like soldiers at attention, upside in a heavy-bottomed pot with 1 inch of hot oil and a bit of chopped garlic. You want the artichokes close enough together so that they can’t tip over and float around. Cook for 2/3 minutes. Add boiling water up to the junction of the stem.

4. Cover the top of the pot ( you can eventually seal with a damp paper towel and place a tight-fitting lid over that – this is to prevent any steam from escaping). Cook on medium for 30-35 minutes. The artichokes are ready when a fork pierces them easily. Remove the artichokes from the pot and set on a plate to cool. Once they are lukewarm, drizzle olive oil over them and decorate with some fresh mint leaves. You want to wait to add the oil until the artichokes have cooled a bit so that they don’t immediately suck it up and become soggy.

Note: The thinner, violet “Roman” artichokes are traditionally used but the dish will be delicious with the squatter globe artichokes as well. Carciofi alla romana makes a perfect side for a mild fish or chicken dish. Or serve it before the meal with good, crusty bread as an antipasto. They are excellent with an aioli dip.

Sea bass and sea bream sous-vide (and what to do with leftovers)

In the last year i have been exploring ways to cook food in the healthiest (and yet tasty!!!) possible way. When you have a great piece of bio-farm grown lamb meat or a very fresh fish, or again beautiful asparagus or carrots, the last thing you want to do is to spoil it all by overcooking and, in the process, losing all the benefits of such high quality ingredients. One of the tecniques i have been reading about (and then tasting...lucky me!) is the so called sous-vide. "Cooking sous-vide is easier than its fancy name might suggest. You simply seal the ingredients in a plastic bag (you can also use a canning jar) and place them in a water bath, a combi oven, or any other cooker that can set and hold a target temperature to within a degree or two. When the food reaches your target temperature or time, you take it out, give it a quick sear or other finish, and serve it. That’s it." So Modernist Cuisine describes it.

The truth is that meat, fish, vegetables taste like never before... The structure of the meat has a tenderness which is impossible to achieve with traditional ways of cooking, the flavor is full and sharp. Vegetables are tender but yet crunchy. And the fish preserves a moisture which keeps the meat juicy and delicious.

So i finally got myself the Sous-Vide Supreme and, when we invited over some of our best friends for the first spring BBQ, i got, among other things, some very fresh sea bream and sea bass and i took the chance to get started on some sous-vide cooking.

Ingredients:

Sea bream from sustainable sources about 900 g

Sea bass from sustainable sources  about  900 g

1 bio lemon

0,1 lt extra virgin olive oil

a pinch of Maldon smoked sea salt flakes

a pinch of fresh ground red, white and green pepper

 fresh rosemary

fresh sage

fresh oregano

fresh thyme

fresh mint

one clove of garlic

Method:

In a mixer put the olive oil, the freshly ground pepper, the juice of half lemon, a garlic clove and 1/2 cl of water and pulse to create an emulsion. Pour it in a form to create ice cubes and put it in the freezer.

Clean the fish properly, removing stomach and washing it under cold running water.

Pat to dry with kitchen paper and stuff the belly of the fish with all the herbs.

Bring the temperature of the Sous-Vide Supreme to 60 degrees.

Place the fish in the plastic bag, add the emulsion ice cubes and vacuum and seal it.

Place it in the Sous-Vide Supreme for 24/25 minutes.

In the meantime bring the temperature of the oven to 190 degrees and prepare a tray with baking paper on.

Toss a bit of salt on the baking paper and keep some more on the side.

When the time's up, remove the fish from the Sous-Vide Supreme, open carefully the bags and place them onto the tray, adding the juices which are left in the bag.

Sprinkle with salt and put it in the oven for 1 to 1 1/2 minute, just enough to make the skin of the fish crispy and easy to remove.

Sprinkle with extra virgin olive oil and serve.

TIP! What to do with leftovers:

It happens, when you organize a BBQ with friends, to get carried on and cook too much food. This time around we had some sea bream left and it would have been a real crime to throw it away, so i cleaned carefully the fish, removing all the bones, i put the flesh in a mixer with a dizzle of lemon juice, a pinch of salt, couple of teaspoons of soy milk and couple of teaspoons of extra virgin olive oil and pulse to create a creamy spread. It can be kept in the fridge (in a canning jar) for up to 72 hours, making sure that the spread is covered with oil. Serve adding few leaves of fresh mint to spark up the flavor.

Scallops ceviche

The first time I made ceviche, I was amazed. I could actually see the lemon and lime juice turning the color of the fish from translucent pink to opaque white. The acid from the limes and lemons change the structure of the proteins in the fish, essentially “cooking” the fish without using heat. So if you can get hold of really fresh scallops this is a easy and yet incredibly tasty way to enjoy them: a real explosion of flavors (the herbs, the citrus, the chilly, the red onion) which will still allow you, though, to appreciate the taste of the scallops and their delicate texture.

Ingredients:

1 pound bay scallops, quartered

1 cup (about 12 whole) cherry tomatoes or 2-3 Roma tomatoes, roughly chopped 

2 green or red Serrano chilies, seeded and minced (about 1/2 teaspoon) 

3/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro, plus additional for garnish

1 cup finely diced red onion (1/2 medium red onion)

3/4 cup finely chopped fresh oregano

1/2 cup fresh lemon juice

1/2 cup fresh lime juice

Salt to taste

Method:

1. Combine all the ingredients in a nonreactive bowl and stir to mix well. Cover and refrigerate for at least 2 hours, and up to 16. 

2. Spoon the ceviche into small (4-ounce) glasses and garnish with cilantro. Serve with chips if desired.

Sea salt seared shrimps

When you have top quality ingredients the best thing to do is to let them express their qualities by not messing around with them. I got this fantastic shrimps from Argentina, wild shrimps frozen on board... With just some sea salt to conduct the heat it's possible to work magics: the shrimps retain all their flavor and they are still juicy and fragrant and it takes no more than 15 minutes to within preparation and cooking: simple and tasty.

Ingredients:

12 large shrimps

1,5 kg sea cooking salt

3/4 spoons Extra virgin olive oil

2 teaspoons of rice vinegar

Juice of 2 lemons

1 clove of garlic

1 cup of water

5 gr green tea

Method:

In a kettle bring water to boil, add the green tea and let cool. When the tea is about 25/27 degrees put the shrimps in a tray, add the tea and cover with film. Let the shrimps soak the aroma for 10/12 min.

In the meantime, in a marble mortar, crush the clove of garlic to create a soft paste. Then add it to oil, some green tea, lemon juice and rice vinegar in a blender and pulse to create and emulsion. Let it cool in the fridge.

In a cast iron skillet or, even better if you have one, on a stone barbecue, place the salt evenly to create a 1,5 cm layer. Wait till it gets very hot and then place the unpeeled shrimps on top, searing each side for about 3/4 minutes. It is very important to keep the shells on so that the shrimps are going to be moist and tender.

Before serving pour the emulsion on the shrimps

Tip: what to do with leftovers

Some shrimps were left after searing them on the sea salt. So i put them in a pochette, vacuumed it and placed them in fridge over night. The next morning i removed the heads and the shells and i made a shrimp stock enriched with port wine. In the meantime i put the peeled tails to marinate in the emulsion i kept from the previous day. When the stock was ready i've filtered it, put it on a fry pan, added some more port wine, some orange juice and some cane sugar and reduced it.

I have quickly stir fried the tails and then served them with the  reduction and some fresh mint leaves. It made a nice appetizer to enjoy with a glass of Torbato.

Thanks to Marketa Pavleye for the beautiful pics

Spring BBQ or the importance of family, friends and good food

When i was a kid one of my favorite moments during springtime were the saturdays and sundays' family (or friends) reunions. Spring begins early in Sardinia, the nature wakes up with amazing strenght and the whole island turn into a fragrant and colorful garden: herbs, flowers, trees... everything concurs to create a symphony which celebrates the miracle of life repeating itself over and over. In those reunions, which were taking place usually in the countryside and sometimes by the seaside, the plot was pretty much the same: women would cook, guys would take care of barbequeing and kids would run around getting messy and stuff. What was changing constantly was the number of the members of the family: every year there was the addiction of a new cousin or someone's new girlfriend to widen the circle of the family. The "clou", of course, was the lunch... and those lunches, they were something: the freshest, tastiest ingredients you can think of and all the "family cooks" competing to make the best possible meals. It was a real feast, and the keyword of all this was Love. Those reunions were a way,  through the celebration of food, to celebrate and reinvigorate the bounding of the family and our friends,  to pass on knowledge to the new generations, initiate them to the importance of conviviality, sharing and, last but not least, good food prepared with love.
Back then, as a boy, i took all those things for granted, they just seemed normal. Now that i became a father, and i live in a different country, i appreciate the importance of those kind of reunions. 
During the first spring weekend we had few friends over, some with kids, some planning to have kids... The feeling was just the same i had during those reunions back in Sardinia: we talked about raising our little ones, about ways of cooking healthier food (and when you have among those friends Marketa Pavleye the discussion gets very interesting) and, when few bottles of wine were opened, how to make this world a better place... and the keyword, once again, was Love.

By the way, if you are wondering what we cooked that day, here's a list with links for the recipes:

Linguine with olives Taggiasche, capers and breadcrumbs

Rack of lamb with herbs sous-vide

Sea salt seared shrimps

Sea bass and sea bream sous-vide

Thank you Marketa Pavleye for the great pics

Linguine with olives "taggiasche", capers and breadcrumbs

As i mentioned in a previous post, it is a great joy to sit with friends, look at kids running in the garden and mull over the miracle of life repeating itself over and over. Speaking of miracles, there are fruits of the earth which are real miracles of taste, shape, color...

The recipe that follows is a combination of some of the best things that Italy can offer. Simplicity which turns into an amazing concert of flavors. It is actually a bit of a culinary trip across the country: olives Taggiasche from the Riviera Ligure, capers from the deep south of Pantelleria, linguine from Gragnano near Naples, extra virgin olive oil from Tuscany and thyme which is one of the herbs that turns Sardinia  during spring in a overwhelming bouquet of fragrances.

The result is the quintessential of Italian gastronomy: few excellent ingredients, family and friends, smiles and the pleasure to share.

Ingredients:

500 gr linguine

30 g olives Taggiasche

30 gr capers from Pantelleria

10 gr fresh thyme

1 baguette

4 spoons Extra virgin olive oil

2/3 cloves of garlic unpeeled

Method:

Cut the baguette in dices and put it in a preheated oven (200 degrees). When the bread is tosted with a nice golden color, take the tray out of the oven, let cool for few minutes, then put the croutons in a mixed with the thyme leaves and pulse to create small even breadcrumbs.

In a large casserole bring water to boil, add salt and then shove in the linguine.

In the meantime, in a deep pan (ideally something similar to a wok), bring the oil to heat, add the garlic cloves and when it begins to turn golden incorporate olives and capers. turn down the heat a bit, let simmer for few minutes. When the linguine are halfway their cooking time, using tongs, remove the linguine from the boiling water and add them to the pan where olives and capers are simmering. Add some water where the pasta was cooking (which is now rich of starch), turn the heat up and keep cooking the linguine stirring frequently. The water, mixing up with the oil will create an emulsion which will keep the linguine nice and juicy and will allow them to suck up the flavor of olives and capers.

When the pasta is "al dente" put it in a large bowl and add the breadcrumbs.

Serve immediatly.

Special thanks to Marketa Pavleye for the beautiful pics