Xmas lunch/2

The second and last part of my Xmas lunch :)

Please please please do me a favour, especially if you are having a hard day, or if you think you owe a reward, as soon as you finish reading this post grab some sage and deep-fry it in a batter made with flour and sparkling water, it will blow your mind! 

TUNA OF BOILED MEAT AND ROASTED CAULIFLOWERS

This is also borrowed from a recipe of north Italy (Piemonte), but the original version is made with rabbit. Now, I like rabbits either alive jumping in the fields or already cooked in pieces, when they have lost all the cuteness embedded in their original shape. So, I replaced the rabbit with mixed meat (beef and chicken), letting them cook very slowly in a pot with water, celery, onion, carrots and mixed herbs (rosemary, sage, juniper, laurel, thyme). I let the meat cool down in its own broth and then cut them in little stripes with the hands. I took a jar and made layers of meat, black pepper grains, laurel, garlic and oil EVO. I let the jar rest in the fridge for one night and served it the day after at room temperature.

The side dish is made by boiling the florets of the cauliflower, roasting them in the oven for 20 mins with 2 spoons of oil EVO and breadcrumbs and then serving them on a tahini bed.

DEEP FRIED LAMB CHOPS AND SAGE

Ohhhhh…. fried sage! Please, try it, it is an unbelievably tasty and unbelievably easy: just melt some flour in sparkling cold water, dip the sage leaves in the batter and deep-fry them in oil. This was the side of the lamb chops dipped in eggs and rolled in breadcrumbs (by my mom… ok I cheated I made only 9 out of 10 dishes!)

PEA BALLS WITH TZATZIKI AND BAKED POTATO SLICES

The pea balls are taken from here, while the side this is made with thin slices of potatoes and sweet potatoes baked in the oven for few minutes with rosemary, coarse salt and oil EVO

HONEY, BRIE CHEESE & PEARS PASTRY

This dessert also falls in the category of quick-easy-but-unbelievably-tasty, as it is made by thin sheets of puff pastry cooked in the over for few minutes, slices of pears and slices of brie cheese, baked again in the oven until the brie starts melting. Before serving, some (biological) honey on top and that's it :)

Xmas lunch/1

True that xmas has been now over for more than two weeks, but the silver nail polish I am wearing gives me all the rights to still feel the festive mood and talk you through my xmas lunch :)

To my super-nerd mind, Xmas is like a function that multiplies everything by ten, which means it increases the happiness content of the happy moments but also increases the pain in case the mood is not that happy. This year I felt my family needed a change, thus I decided to divert the lunch from a regular, traditional smooth periodic function, made of tortellini and mixed boiled beef, to a more eclectic collection of delta functions (the steepest and shortest function on earth), ten of them for the sake of precision, ten tiny dishes cute for the eye and tasty in the mouth :D 

CAPRESE FINGERFOOD

this is taken almost exactly from here. I have to say the result was very cute but "meaningless" taste-wise (according to my brother, who instead loved everything else)

RAVIOLI DEL PLIN

I had this amazing ravioli in Torino, and I felt in love with them. The filling is made with mixed pork and beef meat cooked with celery-onion-carrot, blended with spinach and scarola salad, one egg and parmigiano. The sauce is made by overcooking the celery-onion-carrot left in the meat juice and blending them, adding some flour to make it more dense. 

TORTELLONI SPINACH AND BUFFALO MOZZARELLA

These were my winners ;). I made the filling simply cooking fresh spinach in a pan sealed with a lid and a spoon of olive oil for few minutes. When ready, I let them cool down and added cubes of very VERY good buffalo mozzarella, one egg and some parmigiano. Then I made the giant tortelli, boiled them and served with a plain cherry tomato sauce (I made it by first peeling the tomatoes dipping them in boiling water for 30 seconds, and then cutting them into cubes and cooking the sauce for 5 minutes) and some thyme leafs to decorate.

BARLEY WITH HAZELNUTS AND FENNEL IN CASTELMAGNO FONDUE

The taste of barley, hazelnuts, fennel seeds and cheese fondue all together is absolutely stunning. I borrowed the idea from my chef friend, and every time I make them I am surprised by the pair fennel/hazelnut. It is indeed very simple: I boiled the barley, added grated hazelnuts, oil EVO and fennel seeds. I used a round pasta cutter to make nice towers of barley and served with a fondue of cream fresh, milk and castelmagno (a strong cheese from the north of italy).

Xmas in the holy land

My non existent attitude towards religion doesn't stop me from celebrating religious holidays as any chance is good to cook, have friends around and eating an insane amount of crisps (why the hell am I running my ass off otherwise?). Ok, next year we will be more prepared about what we are actually celebrating and won't spread false news about the 20 days pregnancy of mary, but quoting a friend of us, perfect is the enemy of good :)

SALMON AND BROCCOLI PIE

Prepare the besciamella sauce melting 50 gr of butter and 50 grams of flower in a pan, then add up to one litre of milk and stir until it boils. When it is ready, add nutmeg and salt. Boil the broccoli in water for few minutes and then add them to the besciamella. Take one sheet of puff pastry and place it in a baking tray, add the broccoli besciamella and the smoked salmon in thin strips to decorate. Cook in the oven for 30 mins @180 degrees.

 

SPICE BRAD STICKS

Evergreen. Taken from here.

PASTA SCEMA

As the chef (that wasn't me) defined it :). A very nice pasta with roasted breadcrumbs, sundried tomatoes and tuna.

Ribollita im pita

Winter in Tel Aviv means a week with some rain and some 7 degrees. Ok, readers from abroad, no room for complaining but please understand that the apartments here are damn cold and the only way of heating them is either rivers of cava (and yes, we VERY reluctantly did it) or a hot soup. 

And now that the winter is already gone, the sun shines high in the sky and the parka coat can rest in peace into the closet until I move to Maastricht, Silviot are left with ribollita soup for the whole week and for the whole building :) 

But ribollita without bread is like peas without carrots, like AS Roma without Totti, like, to come back to the main point, TLV without sun. I had mini pitot in the kitchen and no will to go fetch more suitable bread, so here we go:

RIBOLLITA IN THE PITA POCKET

I started with the celery-onion-carrot mix chopped and fried in a big pot with two spoons of oil evo. I then added cannellini white beans, a whole peeled potato, one can of crushed tomatoes, mixed herbs and filled the pot with water. I let it cook for a lot doing a bit of catch up with my online spanish classes, until the potato was soft. I mashed the potato, took out some of the beans (40%) and blended them, hence added everything back into the soup. I also added a package of unknown green vegetables (I dreamed about finding black kale, then hoped to be surprised by regular kale, sincerely wished to find a cabbage but eventually settled for this weird 7 shekels dark lettuce). I served it with the vegetables inside a pita pocket and the soupy part outside, and I will serve it again, and again, and again….

A siculoisraeli salad

One of the most heart-warming rituals I take part since I am living in the holy land is the pomelo break: during the pomelo season, my boss comes in the morning with this giant heavy orange and we all gather after lunch to have a piece of the holy citrus, amen. As passionate as he is for italian cousin, the idea of exporting pomelo (unknown to most of Europe, as far as I know) into italian food came naturally, so hey, challenge accepted :)

POMELO, FENNEL AND SYRIAN OLIVES SALAD

I peeled the pomelo (which is already quite a challenge, as this obese orange has a very thick skin :) ), squeezed half of it and cut the rest into pieces. I sliced the fennels keeping the small leaves for decorating the salad. I took the seeds out of a bunch of green bitterish olives (yes, sometimes I buy food only because it has a fancy packaging!) and mixed them with the pomelo pieces and the fennels. I made an emulsion with half lemon, oil, the squeezed pomelo, salt and pepper to season the salad. Nice :)

SICILIAN LINGUINE WITH CARAMELISED CHERRY TOMATOES

As refreshing and patriotic as it was, a salad is not enough to have two young and sporty people still in their 20ies satisfied (me and A), so I stayed on the track of Sicilianness and made this linguine with breadcrumbs, anchovies and caramelised tomatoes. 

I cut the tomatoes in halves and place them in a baking tray with some caster sugar, salt, oregano and oil EVO. They need to dry in the oven @ 150 for about one hour. I boiled the linguine; in the meanwhile, I took a large pan and add oil EVO, two garlic cloves and the anchovies. When the anchovies were melted, I take the garlic cloves out and add breadcrumbs (a shame I didn't have real bread!). I fried the breadcrumbs in the pan for a couple of minutes and seasoned the linguine with this mix and the cherry tomatoes. 

Finger food contest AKA pick the right glass!

After a few days in which my italianhousewifeness gave its best, I restored the cosmic balance of poshness with a finger food night, that was a very enjoyable rehearsal for a very special event yet to come ^__^

5 judges tasted 6 different dishes, all arranged into small cups. Cups are horrible, I know, but the german el-al security is the one to blame for this as they spotted a possible threaten for Israel in my pink Vivienne Westwood shoes and shipped them separately, delaying all my afternoon schedule. (BTW, the only threaten that those shoes might have is that Israeli girls will understand that in Israel they don't know how to make shoes and book a flight to Heathrow)

Back on track: the judges were extremely helpful with their suggestions, but hey, I hope the people attending the event will be a wee bit easier to please or I will have to take a month off only to study the presentation! :D :D :D

DE-STRUCTURED CAPRESE

Tomato cream at the bottom is made by blending a few red tomatoes with salt, oil EVO and fish gelatine. The white layer is mozzarella and the quenelle on top is made with basil and courgettes pesto (basil, parmigiano, oil EVO, pine nuts and pan-fired courgettes). Sort-of-borrowed from www.giallozafferano.it.

ROASTED CAULIFLOWER IN TEHINA DIPPING

This is very similar to what I made here (but with no crunchy quinoa and no chicken)

BARLEY AND ROASTED PEPPER FLOWERS

I boiled the barley until tender and seasoned it with thyme leaves and oil EVO. I roasted the peppers in the over for 45 minutes and then peeled them, seasoned with salt and cut them in stripes to make the shape of the flower.

AUBERGINES WITH FETA AND TEHINA

Aubergines are grilled in the oven for 45 minutes, then peeled and seasoned with chilli, basil, mint, salt and oil EVO. Feta is cut in small cubes and seasoned with chilli too.

PEA BALLS WITH SESAME SEEDS AND TZATIKI

I cooked the peas in a pan with a spoon of oil EVO. When ready, I blended them with one egg, parmigiano and cubes of bread from the day before. I made small balls and covered them with sesame seeds. The tzatziki is explained here.

BRIE, PEAR AND HONEY

Superfast but super tasty…. this is nothing more than pear and brie cubes with honey on top

RTD or UTD?

Ohhhhhh, cooking. That sweet relaxing and satisfying thing you can do when you have gas and you cannot do when, instead, the gas tank is empty and the gas guy keeps standing you up like the worst of the boyfriends :D

I came back on scene with a great show at my friend O's place. The menu was discussed on Saturday morning at around 5:30 AM in front of a succulent burger with chips that made its job in giving me the strength and the lucidity to get back home, plus to put together a respectful menu. These dinners always give me the opportunity to make some masterpieces of italian cousin without feeling the moral need to decrease the amount of saturated fat and increase the lavishness of the dish name. One example is the notorious RTD aka Ridicolously Tasty dish aka Parmigiana di melanzane (layers of fried aubergines, tomato, mozzarella and parmigiano) that by now I give for granted in every italian dinner. But something else made its way into the olympus of italian dishes that cannot be missing in such events: the UTD, aka unbelievably tasty dish:

UNBELIEVABLY TASTY DISH

Boil some milk and add rice, stirring from time to time and adding more milk if needed as if it was a risotto. When it is ready, add nutmeg and parmigiano. Cook spinach leaves for some minutes in boiling water and dry very well the leaves. Oil a baking tray and add breadcrumbs; then place layers of rice, layers of spinach and layers of smoked salmon. Cook in the oven @ 180 for ~30 minutes.

        

The breadsticks in the first picture are another big classic of my italian dinners, aka puff pastry with one egg on top, parmigiano and poppy seeds.

For this, as usual all the credits go to S1 that is becoming amazingly in both taste and aspect of her cupcakes ^__^