Last Night’s Dinner

You’ve probably figured out by now that my Big Food Project for this week was to make homemade pasta. Now, this isn’t entirely new for me - in another time and place, I made pasta from scratch often, using a hand-crank pasta roller (one of the first kitchen gadgets I ever bought for myself). But as I got older, developed some issues with my hand and arm strength, and moved into a series of progressively tinier kitchens, that old hand-crank pasta roller did little more than gather dust. At our last apartment, there wasn’t a single patch of countertop or piece of furniture we could have attached it to to use it, so we ended up donating it in one of our mass culls before the move.

But I missed making pasta from scratch. I read with envy as bloggers near and far worked with varying proportions of flour and eggs and sometimes other things added to the mix, and kneaded and rolled and made gorgeous, silken sheets of dough. I missed the smell of it, the texture, and the satisfying feeling of sitting down to a meal that was truly a labor of love.

I yearned to make fresh pasta again, and my parents knew this, so a few years ago they gifted me with a shiny red Kitchen Aid mixer, my first ever, complete with pasta making attachments. I was so thrilled to receive yet another thoughtful gift from them, but there was one problem: we had nowhere. to. put. it. We had nowhere near enough counter space for it, but even worse, adding another box of stuff to our already cluttered apartment was just too much. So “Big Red,” as we had dubbed her, sat, unopened, under my desk at my old job until my last week there. As I neared my last day, I made arrangements to have her shipped, and she was waiting at our new place when we arrived. Big Red was the very first appliance I unpacked and set up in our new kitchen.

So I was here, and Big Red was here with her lovely attachments, and why it has taken me this long to get to the pasta making I have NO idea, but I finally did it, and the first batch was so quick, so easy, and so satisfying that I immediately made a second batch, varying the recipe just a bit.

There are probably as many ways to make fresh pasta as there are Italian grandmothers, but I decided to keep things straightforward to start, consulting my trusted Marcella Hazan for guidance. The proportions were simple: 1.5 cups flour (I did veer from her recipe by using “00″ flour rather than unbleached all-purpose) plus 2 whole eggs. That’s it. No salt, no milk, no olive oil, no water, just flour and eggs and 8 minutes of kneading before I would have my dough.

This first batch didn’t take the whole amount of flour, but it still looked and felt right as I kneaded it, shaped it into a disc, wrapped it in plastic and left it to rest for a bit. I divided it into six pieces, removed one, wrapped the remainder tightly and held my breath as I turned on Big Red and began to roll out my dough. And in just minutes I had this:

Hello, lovely.

I rolled out my remaining pieces of dough, amazed at the speed and ease of which it was all happening, and after they dried just a bit, I cut them by hand into wide, pappardelle-like ribbons. They were, shall we say, “rustic.” But I was so pleased.

We had them for dinner that very night, dressed with an earthy chicken liver ragu. They cooked up beautifully, the pasta tender and delicate but still with a nice bite.

For my second batch of dough, I varied the recipe by using two whole eggs plus two egg yolks, to 1.5 cups of my “00″ flour. This did take the entire amount of flour as I kneaded, and at 8 minutes the dough was definitely tighter than my first batch. Again, I let it rest for a bit before rolling it out into sheets, and I decided to break out the spaghetti cutter attachment. I let the ribbons of spaghetti dry before placing them into a zip-top bag and placing them into the freezer, where they remained until they became part of last night’s dinner.

The sauce was inspired by the linguine with sardines and fennel we love so much, a mixture of caramelized fennel and onions, lemon juice and zest, a few chile flakes for heat, and some beautiful marinated anchovies we picked up at Venda Ravioli recently. The finished dish got a sprinkling of fennel fronds, toasted breadcrumbs and more lemon zest. I was a bit worried about how the thin strands of spaghetti would do when they hit the boiling water - they looked so delicate - but they cooked up beautifully, and they had this great springiness to them which made them really fun to twirl around our forks and bite into.

Mike and I both agreed that this first foray into pasta making with the help of our turbocharged assistant was a big success. I can’t wait to do it again.

(You can view my Flickr photoset here.)

Life is flying by right now, with plans being finalized, dates being nailed down, reservations made and notices given. It’s a really exciting time for us, and looking at the photos of what will be our new home, thinking about furnishing it, decorating it, and taking our new kitchen for a spin puts the biggest smile on my face, but I have to admit that at times, it’s a bit overwhelming. I mean, there’s still our life here to consider – work and errands and keeping up with friends, trying to cull and pack and still find time to do the things we want to do before we say goodbye to New York City for a while. I’ve fallen behind on email and blog reading, and this week I have even had a heck of a time getting up the energy to deal with dinner. I mean, we shopped, I wrote up a meal plan, it’s all mapped out but honestly, what I’ve wanted to do more than anything is to just sit out on the stoop or in the back yard with a glass of wine, breathing in the early spring air, absorbing the sights and sounds and smells of what has been our home for the last three and a half years.

The March issue of Gourmet sat unread on the sofa for days before I finally tossed it into my tote bag in frustration, vowing that I would make time to crack it open on my commute home from work. When I finally did I found about 15 things that I wanted to cook pretty much immediately, but the recipe I couldn’t wait to show Mike was for an Onion Tart With Mustard and Fennel.

Teamwork meals have been working well for us lately, and this was no exception. Mike prepared the tart dough according to the recipe and I riffed on the filling, caramelizing three baseball-sized red onions and one large bulb of fennel, all sliced thinly, in a mixture of butter and olive oil. I added some fennel seeds that I had ground in a mortar and pestle, as well as a teaspoon of dried Herbes de Provence. I did spread a layer of Dijon mustard over the tart dough as in the Gourmet recipe, and when the tart came out of the oven after baking for half an hour I sprinkled some fennel fronds on top.

The crust was spectacular – it cooked beautifully and evenly, and it was light and buttery. Mike was delighted at how well it turned out and how easy it was to put together, and he’s already thinking of variations on the theme. I was pleased with the filling, too. I loved the bite of mustard under the caramelized onion and fennel mixture, though I think I might use a soft goat cheese next time instead of the parmesan – the flavor got a little buried under the layers of fennel-y goodness. But overall, this was a win, and the crust is definitely something we’ll pull out again and use with whatever is in season.

We usually have wine with dinner, and when I’m planning out the pairings, the food usually comes first. But as I was putting together a grocery order last week and browsing the bottles available through Best Cellars, I was surprised to see a white wine listed among their “Big” selections. The bottle in question was a 2004 Oriel “Dylan” Russian River Valley Chardonnay, and while I’m not usually a fan of big Chardonnays, and the bottle was a bit more spendy than we usually go for weeknight dinners, the description of the wine had me intrigued. I added it to our cart and began thinking about building a meal around it.

I like pairing scallops with Chardonnay, so I decided on that as my protein – simply seared, with a little vermouth-enriched brown butter. The side was a bit more challenging; since scallops are so mild, I tend to match them with something more aggressively flavored or seasoned, but I didn’t want to make anything overpowering. As luck or serendipity would have it, I happened upon a few recipes for celery root remoulade over the weekend, and decided to go with a variation on that theme. I added fennel and apple to the mix, and ended up with a wonderful combination of crunchy, creamy, tart, sweet and tangy – a great foil for both the scallops and our delicious bottle of wine.

Celeriac, Fennel and Apple Remoulade

1 teaspoon kosher salt
Juice of one lemon
1 teaspoon extra-hot Dijon mustard
2 tablespoons mayonnaise
4 oz. crème fraiche
2 tablespoons chopped fresh tarragon
1 not-too-tart green apple
1 small bulb fennel
1 small celery root (celeriac)

Place kosher salt in a bowl, add lemon juice and whisk until salt is dissolved. Add mustard, mayo, crème fraiche and tarragon, and whisk again until well combined.

Core the apple, slice into matchsticks and add to dressing. Core the fennel bulb and slice as thinly as possible. Peel celery root and slice into matchsticks. Blanch the fennel and celery root briefly in unsalted water. Remove the vegetables using a spider or slotted spoon and shock them in an ice bath. Drain them well, pat dry, and add to the dressing. Toss until the mixture is well-combined, cover, and chill before serving.

I spun out another one of our old standbys last night - crispy fillets of white fleshed fish (this time, black sea bass) over tomato-fennel broth. This is so easy to prepare, and I love how well it works in the heat of summer or on a chilly fall evening.

Wine Pairing: Our friends at Thirst recommended the 2005 Olivier Savary Chablis Vieilles Vignes to go with this dish, and we both agreed it was a really gorgeous wine - a beautiful gold color, very crisp and flinty, with an almost toasted-buttery aroma.

As I feared might happen, I caught Mike’s cold. It hit me hard on the commute home yesterday, and by the time I got home I wasn’t sure I’d be able to get it together to make dinner. But we had clams, fresh beautiful local littlenecks, and they wouldn’t keep, so when Mike got home we worked on dinner together.

This is my adaptation of a recipe I found on epicurious.com. We both love the combination of pork and clams, and I am always looking for new ways to prepare them together. This recipe was a breeze to put together, used just one pot, and had us both happily slurping up every last bit of the savory broth from our bowls.

Clams with Hot Italian Sausage and Fennel
(adapted from a recipe in Cooking Light via epicurious.com)

1 tablespoon olive oil
1 large fennel bulb, cored and thinly sliced
2 tablespoons chopped fennel fronds
Kosher salt
1/2 pound hot Italian sausage, removed from casings and crumbled
2 teaspoons crushed fennel seeds
1 tablespoon tomato paste
8 oz. white wine
2 dozen small clams (we used littlenecks, but you can substitute Manilas or other small clams)

Heat the oil in a large, heavy-bottomed pot with a lid. Add the sliced fennel, salt, sausage and fennel seeds and sauté until sausage is brown and fennel is tender, about 10 minutes. Make a hot spot and add the tomato paste, allowing to cook for a couple of minutes before stirring it through. Add the wine and bring to boil. Add the clams and half of the fennel fronds, cover the pot and cook over medium heat until the clams open, about 5-10 minutes. Spoon into deep bowls, discarding any unopened clams, and sprinkle additional fennel fronds on top. Serve with toasted crusty bread to soak up the broth.

“Snacking on sardines.”

It was an innocent little text message, sent out over Twitter by my husband, but it got me craving those savory little fish in the worst way. Though some of you probably can’t imagine sardines being a crave-worthy food, I’ve been completely smitten with them since my first taste (Prune restaurant, birthday dinner, sardines with Triscuits, mustard and cornichons – simply perfect). I knew we had a couple of tins in the pantry at home, and we had one bunch of baby fennel lingering in the crisper, so I scrapped my previous plan for dinner and put together one of my favorite fall-back pasta dishes – linguine with sardines, fennel and tomato, also known as “Linguine con Sarde.”

The last time I made this dish I was sort of going through the motions, so I did a few things differently this time. While my pasta water came to a boil, I sautéed garlic in olive oil, then added my sliced fennel bulb and a bit of salt and let it soften and begin to caramelize. I added a pinch of red chile flakes, one tin of sardines (minus the oil they were packed in), and a pint of tiny Super Sweet 100 tomatoes, gently stirring everything together. I added a hefty splash of white vermouth, the juice of one lemon, and a handful of chopped fennel fronds and let the sauce bubble away while I cooked a pound of linguine. When it was just short of al dente, I added about 3/4 of the pasta to the sauce along with a couple of small ladles of the starchy pasta water and gently tossed everything through. When the pasta had finished cooking in the sauce, I plated it, adding a sprinkling of toasted bread crumbs, a grating of lemon zest and a few more fennel fronds to each bowl.

While I think last night’s version of this dish could have used a touch more salt, Mike and I both agreed it was really good – the lemon was a great substitute for the sherry vinegar in my original dish, and the addition of the fennel fronds and zest at the end really brought all the flavors together. Think you don’t like sardines? This simple pasta dish just might make you change your mind.

This is one of my favorite preparations for firm white fish fillets, and it’s a breeze to prepare. The base is a super simple tomato-fennel broth – just a couple of cups of chopped fennel seasoned with salt and sautéed in a bit of olive oil, then dolled up with a splash of booze and some tomatoes. I usually use pastis or white vermouth, but last night I mixed it up a bit, adding an ounce of Lucid, which had a nice complexity. For the tomato component, I used a combination of the puree of fresh San Marzanos I made over the weekend along with a few crushed canned ones.

I’ve done versions of this dish using blackfish and black sea bass, but last night Mike brought home some super fresh wild striped bass, and I think it was the best yet – lightly flouring the skinless filets and giving them a quick fry in the cast iron skillet gave them a crisp, golden exterior and kept the flesh incredibly moist. I finished the broth with some chopped fennel fronds and the juice of half a lemon, then spooned it into bowls and topped it with the fish. I sprinkled a few more fennel fronds on top and finished each bowl with a bit of lemon zest.

I was absolutely delighted to get Mike’s email yesterday morning detailing his Greenmarket haul: “CHERVIL, cherry tomatoes, rainbow trout, garlic scapes, snap peas, shell peas” it read, and I knew immediately what I wanted to do with the bulk of it. I was home from work yesterday and had spent some time in the afternoon cleaning and blanching the peas and favas we had left over from Monday’s shopping, so I was already halfway there.

My thought was that I would slice up some baby fennel bulbs we had in the fridge and sauté them with some of the garlic scapes Mike brought home, and then add a splash of white vermouth, some lemon juice, a pinch of salt and the peas and favas. I’d stuff some chervil inside each of the trout, and chop a bit more of the chervil up along with tarragon, chives and parsley from our garden to finish the veggies.

Mike grilled the trout over indirect heat for about 5 minutes per side, and the veggies took just a few minutes to sauté. I stirred in the fines herbes off the heat just before I plated the veggies up, and then placed a whole trout on top. The rich flavor of the trout was a lovely match for the tender, aromatic veggie/herb blend.

A note about the trout: We get our trout from Max Creek Hatchery at the Union Square Greenmarket, and when Mike was there Wednesday morning, Dave Harris, the owner, told him that the only fresh trout he had available was his farmed rainbow trout because he had lost 600 brook trout to mink this week. This is obviously a big dent in his livelihood, so if you’re a fan of trout or would like to give it a try, please go see Dave at the Greenmarket next Wednesday and buy some of his excellent fresh or smoked trout.

It has really been one of those weeks. We’ve had lots of stressful stuff going on, not the least of which is trying to find homes for our resident kittens, and the weather this week has been completely out of whack. The stress and weather have made my health problems flare up, and unfortunately, the meals I had sketched out for the week after our usual weekend food safari have ended up getting postponed or scrapped altogether.

Our intention was to skewer these dayboat scallops on some rosemary branches and grill them for dinner on Tuesday night. If you were in the New York Metro area on Tuesday night, you probably know why that didn’t happen - buckets and buckets of rain, not to mention temperatures more suited to mid-April than mid-June. It was great for the garden, not so great for my joints, and definitely not the kind of weather you want to linger outside in.

Nothing we had on hand was inspiring me, and I was bone tired anyway, so I tossed a salad, plated up some cured meats, cheeses and olives, and we had an indoor picnic. This is a fine meal in a pinch, but all of the good fresh ingredients we had in the fridge were haunting me. I didn’t want them to go bad before we could use them.

Tuesday was still chilly and overcast, but I was determined to do something with those scallops. I decided that if we couldn’t grill them, I’d sear them indoors with herbs and a little tomato butter. The chill in the air proved to be a plus as far as our side dish went. I sliced up some baby fennel and greenhouse-grown red bell peppers, zucchini, yellow squash, and a variety of tomatoes and layered them in a lightly-oiled baking dish, seasoning each layer with a generous sprinkling of salt and Herbes de Provence. I splashed about a quarter cup of white vermouth over the veggies, sprinkled some dry breadcrumbs on top, and added a light drizzle of olive oil, then baked the veggies in a 400 degree oven for about half an hour.

I was incredibly pleased with the texture of the vegetables - they were soft but not mushy, and their flavors were sweet and concentrated, accented nicely by the aromatic herbs. As well as we liked this as a side dish, I think it would also make for a great meatless entree.

Crazy time at the office is over for the moment, but I have a new distraction… the kittens are back, and they are as adorable as ever. As you can imagine, I have spent most of my free time over the last few days hanging out in the yard watching the kittens frolic and play rather than writing about what we ate, but here’s a quick recap.

Tuesday night’s meal was blackfish with white beans in a fennel-herb broth, inspired by the fish dish I had at Marlow and Sons the last time we ate there.

I sliced up a fennel bulb and sautéed it in olive oil with a few smashed garlic cloves, and then added a cup each of white wine and water to the pan. I seasoned it with salt and pepper, and added a cup of chopped mixed herbs (I used a combination of fennel fronds, chives, tarragon and flat leaf parsley; sadly the chervil I planted in our garden this year died a swift death). Once the broth came to a boil I added one can of small white beans (drained and rinsed) and reduced the heat. I laid two blackfish fillets, seasoned with salt and pepper, in the pan skin side up, covered the pan, and let the fish poach until just cooked through.

It was easy as can be to put this together, and while it was not as good as the original, I was very pleased with the result.

Last night I put together a classic Cobb Salad, with fresh greens and grape tomatoes from the Greenmarket, lemony grilled chicken, some of Mike’s delicious bacon, ripe avocado, one of our favorite blues, and a chive-spiked vinaigrette. In my distracted state, I actually spaced on the hard boiled eggs I was making and ruined them, but we had one left in the fridge from a batch I made earlier in the week, so dinner was saved. (Call me a perfectionist, but a Cobb isn’t a Cobb without the hard boiled egg!)

These were two light, quick dinners which I’m sure will become go-to meals for us on warm summer evenings.