The Best Buttermilk Biscuits. Ever.

Sometimes I really surprise myself. I can't believe these actually came out of my oven. So buttery, so soft, so crisp, so flaky... So... so PERFECT!And actually pretty easy! Please make them! Eat them hot with honey and butter. Or add more sugar and top a cobbler with them. But please do make them, you'll never regret it.


Buttermilk Biscuits
2 c (260 g) flour plus more for work surface
2 teaspoons (10 g) baking powder
1/2 (2 g) teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon (15 g) sugar*
4 tablespoons (50 g) butter, cut into small chunks and chilled
3/4 c plus 1 tablespoon (200 g) buttermilk
5 cm round cookie-cutter or small glass

Preheat oven to 500°F (260°C). Whisk together the 2 c flour, baking powder, baking soda, sugar and salt. Rub and mix in butter with your finger tips until mixture resembles coarse crumbs of varying sizes, but none larger than a pea. (Or pulse in with food processor, just make sure not to over process). Stir in buttermilk until dough comes together in a ball.

Turn dough mixture out onto floured work surface. With floured hands, lightly knead dough only a few times. Gently pat out into a circle about 1 inch (25 mm) thick. Dip cutter or glass into flour and push straight down into the dough but do not twist the cutter. Form the dough scraps into an extra biscuit with your hands. Place biscuits together on a parchment-lined baking sheet so that the sides are touching. Brush tops with melted butter, if desired.

Bake for 5 minutes at 500°F (260°C) then lower oven temp to 450°F (230°C) and continue to bake until they are golden brown, about another 5 minutes.

*For sweeter, scone-like biscuits that make a mouth-watering cobbler topping, use 1/4 c (50 g) of sugar here.

Chicken and Andouille Gumbo

Here's another sneak peek at what's to come in the book. Neither okra or file powder are easy to come by in Italy, but the good news is that not all gumbos require either of these ingredients. The trick to any good gumbo is a thick, hearty roux... which is a tedious process of ceaseless stirring, best accompanied by a good book and a glass (make that a bottle) of wine. The whole recipe takes a good 4 hours, but a lot of it (after the roux) is hands-off, and you can abandon your bubbling brew and attend to more pressing matters. It's a great rainy-weekend recipe, and definitely worth the trouble. 

• 1 cup vegetable oil (230 ml)
  
• 1 1/4 c flour (150 g)
  
• 1 medium onion, chopped fine
  
• 1 green bell pepper, chopped fine
  
• 1 large celery stalks, chopped fine
  
• 8 c water
  
• 1 cup dry white wine
  
• 2 bay leaves
  
• 2 large garlic cloves, finely diced
  
• 2 Tbsp worcestershire sauce
  
• 1 can whole peeled tomatoes
  
• 1 roasted chicken*, about 4 lbs (180-200g)
  
• 2 teaspoons salt
  
• 1/2 lb (250 g) andouille sausage, cut into 6 mm slices
  
• 3 chopped green onions
  
• 1 handful chopped fresh parsley
  
• 2 tablespoons Cajun seasoning (see recipe, below)
  

First make a chicken broth, if you wish to skip this step you can use boullion instead, but you’ll lose some flavor. Separate the cooked chicken meat from the bones and chop into large chunks, set aside. Put the bones, skin and carcass in a pot and cover with about 2 liters of water. Add the scraps from your vegetables (onion skins, celery greens, etc) and boil for about 20 minutes to make a broth. Strain, discard carcass, and set broth aside.
In a large heavy Dutch oven, combine the oil & flour over medium heat stirring constantly for about 25-30 minutes, to make a dark brown roux. Be very careful not to burn, you must stir constantly.
Add the onion, bellpepper & celery and cook, stirring often, for about 10 minutes or until soft. Stir in the tomatoes, wine, and about 2 liters of broth. Add the bay leaves, garlic & thyme. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer, partially covered for 1 1/2 hours. Stir occasionally.
Add sausage and a tablespoon of Cajun seasoning, continue to simmer for about 30 minutes.
Season the chicken with Worchestershire sauce, Cajun seasoning, and salt and pepper to taste Add chicken and cook on low heat for another 30 minutes, stirring occasionally.
Check seasonings. Add more salt & cayenne if necessary. Add the green onion & parsley. Serve immediately in soup bowls over steamed rice.

*You can buy a pre-roasted chicken to save time but it’s very easy to do yourself. Just rub a chicken with oil, salt and pepper, and bake at 165°C for 45-60 minutes, or until juices run clear when poked with a knife

Cajun Spice Blend

• 1 Tbsp salt
  
• 1 Tbsp garlic powder
  
• 1 Tbsp paprika
  
• 1/2 Tbsp ground black pepper
  
• 1 tsp onion powder
  
• 1 tsp red pepper
  
• 1 tsp dried thyme
  
• 1 tsp dried basil
  
• 1 tsp dried oregano

Mix all spices together, adjusting to taste. Store in an airtight container.

New England Clam Chowder

I'm neither from New England nor particularly fond of clams, but I made this soup strictly in the interests of "research," and was very impressed. It's quite simply delicious. So here's a little sneak peak of the many American recipes to come!
New England Clam Chowder:
Serves 4
2 kg medium clams (5-7 lbs, the more the merrier)
100 g (3 oz/ 4 slices) bacon, cut into chunks*
30 g (1/4 c) flour
3 medium red-skinned potatoes (about 650 g), rinced and diced medium
1 large yellow onion, small dice, peel and scraps reserved
1 medium celery stalk, small dice, peel and scraps reserved
1 medium carrot, small dice, peel and scraps reserved
1 large garlic clove, minced
3 cups water
1 large bay leaf
1 teaspoon fresh thyme or 1/4 teaspoon dried thyme1/2 c cup heavy cream or half and half
2 tablespoons minced fresh parsley leaves
Table salt and ground black pepper

Rinse the clams and place in a large soup pot over high heat with 3 cups water and the vegetable scraps. Cook, covered, until clams open, about 5 minutes. Discard any clams that remain closed.
Remove clams from shells and finely dice, discarding the shells and vegetable scraps. Strain broth to remove any sediment and set aside.
Rinse out soup pot and return to medium heat; cook the bacon until lightly crisp, about 8 minutes.

Add the bay leaf, onion, celery and carrot, and cook, stirring occasionally for about 7-10 minutes. Add the flour and cook over low heat, stirring with a wooden spoon, for 2-3 minutes. Slowly add the reserved broth, whisking constantly. 
Add potatoes and thyme; simmer until potatoes are tender, about 10-15 minutes. Add clams, cream, parsley, and salt (if necessary) and ground pepper to taste; bring to simmer. If soup is too thick, slowly whisk in some boiling water until reaching desired consistency.

* If you have non-bacon-eaters in the crowd, cook bacon separately and serve at the end only to who desires the extra flavor.

Sformatino di Zucca: Silky, Savory, Butternut Flan

There is certain cooking jargon that can immediately repel me from recipe. These are terms that intimidate and mock me, terms and techniques that spotlight my deepest weaknesses and shortcomings in the kitchen. These are silly little words that will prompt me to toss an otherwise completely-conquerable recipe. 

One such nasty expression is "... and then bake in a water bath..."

The pure nonchalance with which it is presented is irritating in itself, the author should at least prime you for the looming intimidation, but no. You're contentedly scanning a perfectly decent and straightforward recipe, taking mental note of the ingredients you'll need, when WHAM!!
"water bath."
First off, my mind goes straight to "bath water" which I don't find very appetizing, especially when it is post-bath. But even when interpreted correctly, it calls up apocalyptic visions of rapidly boiling water in precarious pans capsizing in a scorching oven, pools of runny egg liquid seeping out leaky cracks, third-degree-burns and horrified dinner guests.

Next recipe please.

But I wanted to make a sformatino, which basically means "a-cute-little-something-cooked-in-a-mould-and-then-turned-out-of-it." I had cream on hand, and eggs, and some frozen roasted squash puree' leftover from this soup recipe. I searched online for recipe but kept butting up against the dreaded term everywhere I turned. Over and over again, every recipe I found contained varying amounts of cream and eggs, and the inevitable bath water. Uffa!

So obviously, I decided to get over myself and face my fear, which, like most phobias, turned out to be completely unfounded.
You only need about an inch of water and it hardly even boils, it only serves to keep the temperature low and even so the little custard doesn't curdle. No biggie. Nothing leaked, my dinner guests were not traumatized by the evening and I survived unscathed. When asked for the recipe, I confidently listed ingredients and measurements, saving the best for last as I nonchalantly continued "... and then bake in a water bath for about an hour..."

Savory Butternut Flan

 

Ingredients:
One large butternut squash, peeled, seeded and cut into cubes
1 red onion, peeled and quartered
3 cloves garlic, peeled
4 eggs
1 cup half-and-half
4 tablespoons Parmigiano-Reggiano
6-8 ramekins (I used the disposable aluminum kind)

Instructions:
Put oven rack in middle position and preheat oven to 400°F (200°C). Grease and flour your ramekins, set aside.
Combine squash, onion and garlic in a large baking tray and toss to coat with some olive oil, salt and pepper.
Roast for about 30 minutes or until squash starts to brown and is really soft when poked with fork. Remove from oven and let cool slightly.
Reduce oven temp to 325°F (165°C).
Purée the roasted veggies in a food processor until smooth. Put 2 cups purée in a bowl, then whisk in eggs, half-and-half, cheese, a pinch of salt, and ground black pepper until combined.
Pour the mixture into the prepared ramekins, filling about 3/4 the way up.
Here comes the terrifying part, the dreaded water bath!
Set the ramekins in a large roasting pan with sides at least 2 inches high. Fill a measuring cup with water and slowly fill the pan until the water comes about half way up the sides of the ramekins. Set the pan in the oven and bake until a toothpick comes out clean, about 45 minutes to an hour. Remove ramekins from water bath and let cool about 5-10 minutes. Invert the flan directly on to serving dishes and eat immediately!

Note: I served these with some sage-seared shrimp, a delicious combination. You could also different vegetables, the possibilities are endless!

Sagra del Tartufo

It's October again already and Emilio and I felt drawn back to the Sagra del Tartufo in the Langhe area of Piedmonte. We had enjoyed the same festival last fall in the tiny town of Mombercelli, and decided to do a little follow up "research" this year.

For those of you unfamiliar with the concept of the sagra, allow me to introduce you to these local festivals in Italy that celebrate a rural area’s gastronomic specialty. They resemble small-town’s county fairs, but are dedicated to the area’s favorite food, and usually involve an inexpensive or free mass meal. There is the Sagra della Rana (frogs), Sagra del Porcino (porcini mushrooms), Sagra della Lumaca (snails), Sagra del Pesto, Sagra del Pane (bread), the list is endless. If Italians eat it, you can bet there’s a sagra for it, probably several.

We rolled up our typical one hour late, so only briefly bumbled about the morning market, tasting wines and chatting with various trifolau (truffle hunters) about their work and listening to their trifolau gossip:

"Ahhhh si. I see you've been talking to Giuseppe. Si si.. Giuseppe's great at getting truffles... But only when he BUYS them... Hahahhahaha!"

When the clock struck one o'clock we headed toward the community center gym... We've practically become locals after visiting the village just once before, and we felt we knew are way around. We were seated in the same room as last year, served by the same waitress who remembered the strange foreign girl who didn't eat meat (read: poor me, only eating half of the 7 courses!).

After several glasses of delicious piedmont wine, I was feeling right at home and decided to go check out the kitchen. I just had to see it. This is a 7 course, seated lunch for 460 people, all prepared and served by volunteers, no food service professionals involved. Now that I was a local, I figured

 they'd let me right in and check out the scene. And of course they did, not because I was a local but because they thought I was a big shot journalist from America and Milan. They'll be talking about this for years. I dragged Emilio with me and put him right to work tripping over the town's grannies as they slaved over the stoves, asking them to pose for various shots.

Back at the table, the menu continued:

- Salumi and toasted bread with Lardo

- Beef tartare with truffle flakes

- Roasted bell peppers in a tuna sauce

- Chick pea soup

- Veal roast with spinach

- Fried egg with truffle

- Peaches with melted chocolate

- Grappa

By the time we reached the grappa, things were getting really friendly. By now we were best friends with the waitress and I decided the only thing missing was a bit of music. Last year the local marching band (composed of 5 old men) played in our dining room, but I hadn't spotted them yet this year. I excused myself momentarily and sloshed down to the courtyard, where they happened to be passing by at that very moment. I introduced myself and was feeling even more of a celebrity when the trombone player burst out, "Hey! I remember you! Last year you were blonde."

They had been headed toward the main piazza for their next "gig," but with an ounce of pleading I dragged them to our dining room to play us one song as an end to the meal. They cheerfully piped out a jaunty Italian folk number that accompanied us all the way home.

All photos by Emi, of course.

Roasted Red Pepper Chipotle Soup with Mint Crème Fraîche and Golden Cornbread

Not to toot my own horn, but I made one hell of a dinner the other night. And I have yoga to thank for it.

I was having friends over and I wanted to make something reminiscently American, though revisited. Now that I'm supposed to be some "authority" on American cuisine, folks expect to have a cross-cultural and authentic dining experience at my house. So I can't serve pasta anymore. At least for a while. 

I wanted to serve various courses... not a very American tradition, so I was shaking things up right off the bat. So I thought soup. And I thought chipotle. Chipotle is a flavor they just don't have over here in Italy, so when used in the right dosage, it's always a big hit and somewhat exotic. I needed a southwestern vehicle for my chipotle though, and the obvious answer was roasted peppers and tomatoes. 

After making the soup I felt like it needed to be dressed up and cooled down a bit. The firey flavor was delicious but needed to be balanced out. I found myself wishing for sour cream (another hard-to-find-in-Italy ingredient), but remembered I had a tub of Crème Fraîche in the fridge. Perfect. It sounds better than "sour cream" but it's basically the same thing, just fattier and a bit less tangy. So I whipped it up with some mint (what's more cooling than mint?) and had my perfect dollop. 

I wanted to make a light second course, simple but not boring. "Fish Wrapped in Romaine Leaves" a Mark Bittman recipe, totally enthralled me (check out the video here, or the recipe here). The side dish needed to be downplayed, since the fish was getting a little fancy, so some pan fried potato slices brought it all back home. 

So my meal was complete, but something was missing. It wasn't quite American enough, there was nothing THAT particular about it all. So I took a break and did some yoga, something I do when I realize I'm sweating over silly things like side dishes. I was in downward dog, taking mental note of the dust under my bed, when a clear voice from deep inside me declared...      "CORNBREAD." 

That was it, corn- the most American of vegetables. Cornbread, the most comforting of comfort foods. It married the soup in a lavish yet humble ceremony and tied the whole meal together with southern grace. Hallelujah.

For dessert, personal chocolate lava cakes with raspberries and little American flag toothpicks.

Betsy Ross would have been so proud, not to mention Barbara Bush. My God, what has become of me?

Roasted Red Pepper Chipotle Soup:

8 red bell peppers, cored and quartered

8 tomatoes, cored and cut in half

1 red onion, peeled and quartered

5 cloves garlic, peeled

1 chipotle pepper in abodo sauce (diced with seeds removed)

1 bouillon cube

1 glug of heavy cream or milk

1 avocado (in small cubes, for garnish)

For the dollop:

1 cup Crème Fraîche or sour cream

1 handful mint leaves

First, blend up the mint leaves with the Crème Fraîche, cover and refrigerate.

Arrange peppers, tomatoes (cut side up), onion and garlic in large baking trays. Drizzle with olive oil, salt and pepper and roast at 400°F (200°C) for about 30 minutes, or until everything looks real roasted. Transfer to a soup pot with a bouillon cube, chipotle pepper, and a little water and let simmer for about 15 minutes, stirring often. 

Blend soup with your preferred blending appliance, adding water to arrive at the desired consistency. Transfer back to soup pot and cover until ready to serve. 

Right before serving, stir in your glug of cream or milk (this helps cut the acidic flavor of the tomatoes and creates a velvety texture.) Spoon into bowls and top with the mint cream dollop, garnish with a mint leaf and small cubes of avocado if desired.

It is absolutely obligatory to serve with cornbread. 

All-Purpose Cornbread (adapted from Cook's Illustrated recipe):

1 1/2 cups (212 g) flour

1 cup (150 g) yellow cornmeal

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

2 tablespoons light brown sugar

3/4 cup (100g) corn kernels (they recommended frozen kernels, thawed. I used canned and it was fine)

1 cup buttermilk (I used my faithful substitute, 1 cup milk with 1 tablespoon lemon juice set aside for 10 minutes to thicken)

2 large eggs

1 stick (110 g) unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly

Preheat oven to 400°F (200°C). Grease 8 inch square baking dish (if you have a cast iron skillet, use it! By all means!). Whisk first 5 ingredients in a medium bowl, set aside.

In a food processor, blend brown sugar, corn kernels and buttermilk. Add eggs and blend until well combined; some corn lumps will remain. 

Make well in center of dry ingredients and pour wet ingredients into well. Fold gently with rubber spatula and add melted butter. Gently and quickly fold mixture together until dry ingredients are just moistened. DO NOT OVER MIX. Mixture will remain lumpy.

Pour into prepared pan and smooth surface with spatula. Bake until deep golden brown, about 25 to 30 minutes, or until a toothpick stuck in to the center comes out clean. Let cool in pan for about 10 minutes before serving.

A lunch in Piedmont

While my parents were visiting us recently in Italy, we treated them to an experience few foreigners have ever encountered, a traditional lunch in a down-home country trattoria in the Piedmont wine country. 
We wound our way through country roads to Carrù, a town definitely off the turist map, best known for it’s beef meat and the following delicacies: carne cruda (raw chopped beef) and il carello dei bolliti (the cart of various boiled meats, and when I say “various,” I mean just about every part of the cow, from the tongue to the tail). We ended up a family-run Trattoria that had been in business for 107 years and was frequented by loyal locals- it’s the kind of place that doesn’t even have a menu, they just bring out the food. We started with a dizzying array of mouth-watering antipasti: roasted bell peppers with crumbled hazlenuts, carpione (fried, tempura-like vegetables dressed with vinegar), insalata russa (“russian salad” of tuna, egg and vegetables), sweet, marinated chestnuts, home-made salami, and of course, raw, chopped beef of which Emilio ate roughly 2 pounds. After all this time, I am now very used to seeing all sorts of strange meat dishes in Italy, and Emilio’s enthusiam for all of them has created a sort of indifferent appreciation in me, notwithstanding my vegetarianism. It was fun for me to witness my parents’ reactions, however, as they were presented with a large plate of what was essentially raw hamburger meat. They did partake, however, and hesitantly admitted it was tasty though unnerving.
After another course of beef ravioli in floating in broth, they finally rolled out the Cart of Boiled Meats, to Emilio’s joy and my parents’ absolute horror. We’re not used to seeing meat that looks like it came from real animals in the US, nor are we used to eating different parts of the animal. So the Cart of Boiled Meats is not very appetizing to Americans, especially the whole boiled chicken with it’s bald head and limp neck, and the dubious-looking boiled cow tail. Emilio was overjoyed, however, and his enthusiasm spilled over to all, helped by the copious, delicious regional wine.

Carrello di Bollito Misto

Sauces for the Bollito Misto

Dessert was hazlenut cake, proudly baked by our waitress, served with zabaglione (an Italian custard-like sauce made with marsala). Then came the much-needed coffee, and the not-so-much needed (though delicious) grappa. We politely asked if they had a Cart of Boiled Customers to wheel us out on, but alas we had to use our own feet to drag ourselves out the door and back to the abandoned twighlight-zone of a town with its creepy, empty amusement park in the main piazza.

The chef and the grappa

Swiss Bread

Emilio and I adventured on a quick, overnight jaunt to the German side of Switzerland a couple days ago. The drive was heart-breakingly beautiful: the dizzying heights and careening waterfalls of the alps, the ubiquitous soft-eyed cows and the sentimental clanging of their bells, the sweetness of the velvety green foothills and impeccably manicured apple-orchards in the slanted evening light. We were breath-taken, and vowed to wake up at the crack of dawn to take advantage of the endless photographic opportunities. 
Well, the crack of dawn ended up turning in to 9 a.m., but it didn't matter anyway since the glittering landscape of the evening before had transformed in to a foggy, drenching, gray, rainy mud festival. So we snapped a few shots and headed straight for the local bakery where we stocked up on an embarrassing amount of bread, yogurt and pastries, and started winding our way back to sunny Italy, snacking and chatting all the way home.

Malakopf Ceviche

Many of you may recall fondly the killer ceviche that Tonio brought to the Malakopf potluck for our last night in Texas. I, for one, was a member of that shifty-eyed crowd of sharks hovering jealously over the frosty bowl of flavorful fish most of the evening, corn chip poised ever-ready between my fingers. I immediately solicited Tonio for the recipe, which he provided me almost instantly. Thank you Tonio!

Ceviche (A party-size recipe via Diana Kennedy)

Marinate in a glass or ceramic bowl for 4-6 hours, turning occasionally if you remember:

• 1 lb scallops
• 1 lb shelled deveined shrimp
• 1 lb skinned deboned redfish, cubed
• Or any mix of fish and/or shellfish you fancy
• 1 pint fresh lime juice – freshly squeezed at Central Market is too easy to pass up

Add:

• kosher salt
• fresh black pepper
• ¾ cup olive oil
• dried greek oregano
• 12 deveined and deseeded jalapenos or serranos, thinly sliced, salmonella be damned…the lime juice should kill it…
• 1 red onion, finely diced
• 2 avocados, cubed
• 6 tomatoes, cubed
• bunch cilantro, chopped

Wednesday Night Steak Nite at Waring General Store

For those of you in the Hill Country area, I highly recommend you stop by Waring some slow Wednesday night. The food may not be the best in the region, but the atmosphere certainly merits the trip. Good music, buckets of beer, and cowboys abound in this funky old gas station and general store. Make the short trip out there, you won't be disappointed and the fellas that run the place will make you feel right at home.