About pasta

Pasta starts with the same basic elements flour and water as bread: only the proportions differ, bread is 60% water, pasta 40%. It originated in two countries, China and Italy that used the different characteristics of their wheat production to best advantage. Italians manufacture dry, long conservation products capitalizing on the high-gluten durum of their wheat, whereas China uses its soft low-gluten wheat for fresh last-minute pasta and wrappers. Now is as good a time as any to refute the story of Marco Polo bringing back from his travels the art of making pasta. Chinese noodles and dumpling production date back as far as the 3rd century before Christ. Around the Mediterranean Sea, pasta presence is documented as early as the 6th century after Christ. Couscous merits a special mention, as knead-free pasta invented by the Berber people around the 11th century. Due to its dry climate, Naples became the center of the Italian pasta industry: in the 18th century ambulatory pasta vendors crowded the streets of the city. Many clients preferring their food cooked rapidly, the al dente pasta (an expression used after WWI) was born. Shanghai’s noodles are still a tourists’ show. Chinese cooks start with a thick rope of dough they tease acrobatically into a thinner longer thread before folding it together to obtain two lengths. They repeat the process 11 times to end with the magic number: 4096 noodles.
To cook pasta, a large quantity of boiling water is needed to insure both the absorption of liquid by the dough and the dissolution of the excess starch. Because tap water tends to be alkaline, the addition of a little lemon juice will reduce the stickiness of pasta, as will a tablespoon of olive oil. Stir the pasta to coat them with the oil. Once cooked the pasta will once again stick together because of the starch rising to the surface. To prevent this phenomenon, you either rinse the pasta, or coat them with sauce and continue the cooking in this new medium. It will have the added advantage to maintain their temperature longer: according to the first principle of thermodynamics, two bodies put in contact tend to reach the same temperature!
Making lasagna from scratch can seem daunting at first and if you don’t feel like it, you can buy the ready made kind. If you decide to take on the challenge the following four tricks should help: cut your dough once you have kneaded it in more parts than is usually advised, keep on flouring all surfaces and roll the parts with a rolling pin before stretching the dough with the pasta rollers. Finally follow carefully the resting time in between the different operations.

Green egg pasta dough (1 lb= 500 g)*
(Delicate, Preparation time: 60 minutes, resting time: 30 and then 20 minutes, Cheap)
Ingredients:
2½ cups (390 g) all purpose flour, quite a bit more flour for dusting
4 large eggs
2 teaspoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon dried thyme
2 cup (250 g) washed, dried and shredded chards
Material:
Food processor with the pastry blade attachment and then with the lasagna rolling attachment well floured
Parchment paper
Rolling pin

Place 2 cups of flour in the food processor. Add the chard. Crack the eggs into the food processor. Add the olive oil. Process until a ball forms. Add flour if it is too sticky.
Flour the parchment paper and place the dough in the center.
Knead the dough for about 1 minute, alternating using your palm and folding.
Shape it into a ball and cover it up with a transparent salad bowl for at least 30 minutes or until it relaxes.
Separate the dough in four sections. Change the attachment of the food processor from the hook to the lasagna rollers.
Place the dial on the first position and run the machine at low speed to roll out the first ball. Then fold it three times and roll it out again. Repeat several times until the dough is smooth and shiny. Repeat with the other balls. Use dusted flour as needed.
Using the cranks 2 to 5, roll progressively the dough into sheets and form long bands. Measure the length of the ovenproof dish and cut the lasagna to fit two long sheets at a time. Insert paper towels in between layers and let the sheets dry for 20 minutes. If you wait any longer before boiling the lasagna, refrigerate the sheets in the fridge.
*This dough is good for lasagna, ravioli and fettuccini
Fall vegetable lasagna
(Easy, Preparation and cooking time: 2 hours, Cheap)
1 cup basic tomato sauce unfrozen (9/18/07)
1 cup béchamel (8/14/09)
½ cup Parmesan cheese
1 lb (500g) spinach
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 cup (250g) ricotta
1 butternut squash
2 eggs
Juice of a lemon
Material
Colander
Large stockpot
Wok
Set of tongues
Paper towels
Ovenproof rectangular dish 9 x 13 inches (23 x 33) buttered

Preheat the oven to 375 F (190 C)
Halve the squash. Scoop out the seeds and bake in the oven for an hour.
Wash and dry the spinach. Stir-fry in a little olive oil. Drain well and place in the food processor with the blade attachment on. Add the ricotta cheese, a teaspoon of salt and blend well.
When the squash is soft, scoop out the flesh and place in the bowl of the food processor, blade attachment on. Add 1 teaspoon of salt and crack the two eggs in. Mix well.
Bring a large quantity of water to boil. Add the lemon juice, 2 tablespoon of salt and 1 tablespoon olive oil. Plunge two sheets at a time. Wait until the boil resumes and cook for another minute. Place in a colander under running cold water. Place the cooled lasagna onto paper towels. Repeat until you are out of lasagna sheets.
Place two overlapping sheets at the bottom of the buttered ovenproof dish. Pour 1/2 of the tomato sauce on top. Add ½ of the pumpkin purée. Cover with two sheets 1/3 of the béchamel ½ of the spinach purée. Repeat the process twice, ending with the final two sheets. Sprinkle with the Parmesan cheese mixed with the last 1/3 of béchamel.
Bake the lasagna for 40 minutes, covering the top with aluminum foil for the 20 last minutes. Remove from the oven and cool for 15 minutes before cutting it.
Serves 8 with a salad as a main course

The bread of life

Bread is a mainstay of our occidental culture. Besides figuring prominently in Christian liturgies, it is the essential component of a meal: before plates became the rule, a slice of bread was a good substitute. Pâté was originally meat enclosed in bread. A brief analysis of the words derived from “bread” and “loaf” in our language indicates how crucial its role is in society: lord (Anglo-Saxon hlaford) means the master who supplies the loaf and lady (hlaefdige) the person who kneads the loaf. Company comes from the Latin companio, those who share bread (pane). In ancient times villages were built around a communal exterior oven, a well and a church.
Bread (especially leavened) is one of the wonders of the kitchen. Its transformative powers appear almost magical. The flour mixed with water when left outside for a couple of day will double in volume and cook to a crusty outside and crumbly internal structure. What is responsible for the metamorphosis is the addition of water causing the two components of flour, gluten proteins and starch granules, to react and become alive. The first recipe given to me by my friend Karen, builds on this slow rising process. It requires patience, as the leavening time takes 24 hours. Incidentally a version of the same recipe appeared in a recent New York Magazine issue under the name Pane Integrale. There are several advantages to the usage of this technique: no kneading is necessary, less yeast is used and the bread is very digestible and tasty. To encourage the final rise during the first 10 minutes of the 35 it takes to bake the bread, it helps to add some steam. To do so, just add ice cubes in the oven along with the bread.
Kugloff, (this is the Alsatian form, one of many spellings) is a form of bread favored in Central Europe. I like the savory kind rather than the sweet brioche. It is traditionally cooked in the turban like mold we call bund in the United States. I like to think its shape alludes to its Turkish origins : the Ottoman Empire was barely stopped in its progression in front of Vienna. It is a great addition to a buffet table.
Karen’s bread (Easy, Rising and prep: 24 hours, Cooking time : 35 minutes, Cheap)
Ingredients:
3 cups flour (2 cups ¼ unbleached bread flour ¾ cup whole wheat)
¼ teaspoon Instant dry yeast
1¼ teaspoon salt
1½ cups water
Ice cubes

Material
Wooden spoon
Salad bowl
Clean towel
Ovenproof container
Cookie sheet

Place the flour in the salad bowl. Add the salt and dry yeast. Pour the water and mix until moistened and shaggy looking. The dough should be on the wet side: if not add a little water. Cover with a clean towel.
Forget for 24 hours. The bread should have doubled in volume. Place the towel on the counter and sprinkle with flour.
Briefly knead the bread and shape into a round country loaf. Fold loosely with the towel and let rise for the second time for another 1 to 2 hours.
Preheat the oven at 450F (220C) with the cookie sheet positioned in its lower tier for 30 minutes. When the temperature of the oven has reached the set heat, add the ice cubes in an ovenproof container and the bread on a parchment paper on to the cookie sheet.
Bake for 35 minutes.

Savory Kugloff
(Easy, Preparation and cooking time: 3 hours partly unattended, Cheap)
Ingredients:
4 cups (500g) flour
1 envelope fast rising yeast or 1 cube fresh yeast
2/3 cup (100g) softened butter
2-3 tablespoons (30 g) sugar
1 cup (225ml) milk boiled and then cooled
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 whole eggs
1/2 pound (250g) smoked bacon, chopped
3 tablespoons chestnuts, coarsely chopped

Material:
Food processor with the dough hook on
Sillicone spoon
Bund cake pan
Ice cubes in an ovenproof container

Put the flour in your food processor and add the eggs and the yeast. Mix them quickly with the flour and let it rest for ten minutes.
Add the salt and the milk, and mix well. Beat in the softened butter. Add the chopped bacon and chopped chestnuts. Beat with the dough hook or with a wooden spoon for about five minutes. Cover the bowl and let it rise for about twenty minutes.
Butter the cake pan extremely well, being careful not to miss the deep grooves in any of the flutings. Spoon the dough into the mold, even out the top, and allow to rise for about an hour and a half, or until even with the top of the mold.
Preheat the oven to 400° F (220C).
Bake the loaf along with the ice cube container in the center of the oven for approximately 40 minutes. When done, remove and cool in its mold for 15-20 minutes before turning out on a rack to cool.
Serve slightly warm as an appetizer or snack with wine.

Thanksgiving to the pumpkin

Born in France, I first encountered pumpkin in soups. Brought to our shores by the Portuguese in the Sixteenth century, it was not fully integrated in the French culture except in this form. As no romantic link to Cinderella was made obvious at the time - there was no such nicety as serving it in the skin of the pumpkin- it left me at best indifferent. The skill of the cook or the type of squash might have been the culprit. For my pumpkin-apple soup as in my previous December 13th 2008 pumpkin soup, I prefer to use an acorn of the pumpkin (cucurbita pepo) family associated to a butternut squash (cucurbita moschata). The latter’s flesh firm, sweet and tasty is the only one I would use in a pie. My second encounter with a pumpkin concoction in its native land was much more satisfactory. I however object to the canned purée with which it most often starts. I like a little chew in my sweets. Keeping the fruit and vegetable cubed and caramelizing them together, tatin style, is the solution. The savory dish was the inspiration behind the sweet one. Apples and squashes combine well and provide just the right sweetness in both recipes. Cinnamon is the spice most often associated with apples and is featured in the pie as in the soup. Ginger provides the tart with the tang cayenne pepper gave to the starter. The pumpkin seeds offer crunch in one case, the walnuts in the other.
The soup serves 4, the pie 8.

Pumpkin-Apple soup
(Easy, Preparation and cooking time: 40 minutes, cheap)
Ingredients:
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 butternut squash
1 acorn squash
1 onion
1 apple
1 pinch ground cinnamon
2 pinch red pepper flakes or Cayenne

Material:
4-quart saucepan
Wooden saucepan
Potato peeler
Grapefruit spoon
Blender

Peel the onion and slice it thinly. Pour the olive oil in the saucepan. Set it over low gas and soften the onion for 5 minutes, stirring from time to time.
Peel the butternut and the acorn squash. Cut in halves and remove the seeds with a grapefruit spoon. Wash the seeds separated from any pumpkin flesh in a strainer. Leave to dry.
Add the pumpkin flesh cubed to the onions, cover with a cup of water (220 ml) and simmer for twenty minutes. Add the peeled and cored apple and the spices after 10 minutes.
Blend well until the soup is smooth and creamy. Return the soup to the saucepan and bring to a low simmer before serving.
Stir-fry the seeds with a pinch of red pepper flakes in a frying pan for a couple of minutes. Serve on top of the soup.

Pumpkin-Apple pie
(Easy, preparation and cooking time: 75 minutes largely unattended, Cheap)
Ingredients
2 recipes for sweet pastry dough (February 27th, 2009) unfrozen in the refrigerator 12 hours ahead and additional flour to roll out the pastry
2 small butternut squashes
1 large Fuji apples
½ cup (118g) walnuts broken in pieces
½ cup sugar (118g) plus additional sugar to sprinkle on top of the pastry
2 tablespoons (30g) unsalted butter plus one (50g) melted tablespoon to brush on the topcoat of the pastry
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger

Material
1 9-inch (30 cm) pie mold
1 large non-stick skillet
Wooden spoon
Potato peeler
Grapefruit spoon
Parchment paper
Rolling pin

Peel and core the apples and pumpkin. Cut them in small 1-inch cube. Place them in a salad bowl and sprinkle the crystallized sugar on top. Toss well to coat evenly. Save the pumpkin seeds to toast them. Place the walnut in a plastic bag and run the rolling pan over the closed bag to break them.
Place the non-stick skillet over the low-range of the gas. Add the butter. When it is melted, add the sugarcoated apple and pumpkin cubes. Cook stirring until the cubes are tender and lightly caramelized. Add the spices. Return the fruit to the salad bowl to cool.
Preheat the oven at 425F (215C)
Butter and flour the mold
Divide out the dough in two portions, one slightly larger than the other one. Roll them out separately on a sheet of parchment paper sprinkled with flour.
Place the larger pastry sheet in the buttered mold. Pour the fruit walnut on top. Add the fruit. Set the second pastry sheet on top, closing the two pastry sheets together by pinching the sides. Create a few slits with a knife and paint the melted butter on top. Sprinkle with sugar. Bake for 10 minutes and then lower the temperature to 350F (180C) and cook for another 30 minutes.
Serve warm a la mode.

Comfort food: from Potée to Apfelstruedel

With the cold weather, the need for comfort food returns. The oldest one (another Middle Ages staple) is cabbage soup. All the regions of France have a variant of it. It starts with the vegetables – onions, cabbages, carrots, dry beans – which resisted winter well in pre refrigerator times, and continued with salted meats for the same reason. Today the dish is a great way to entertain a crowd with minimal time spent in the kitchen thanks to the slow cooker. My version uses chicken and duck breasts whereas the traditional one is limited to pork in different guises. One can forego pork entirely and substitute fowls instead if so desired. Because of the conservation techniques of the meat, no additional salt is required. In fact the soaking is needed to attenuate the salty taste.
To complete the meal and make use of the abundance of seasonal apples, I made an Austrian apple pie for dessert. I still remember an obscure Eastern Europe movie of 25 years ago, which before Julie/Julia showed to my utter fascination the confection of the pastry. It took the 4 women of the family to pull the sheet of pastry over a clean towel to paper transparency. The towel, gripped firmly by expert hands served to guide safely the pastry over the apple filling. As 4 hands are much better than 2, Apfelstruedel is great couple therapy (or not). By preparing the dough some time ahead and freezing it, it is rendered more pliable to the rolling pin once unfrozen. As I mastered the art of obtaining a very thin pastry sheet, I decided to use the leftover potée to create a savory cabbage struedel. Prepare 1 dough recipe and a half at a time. Another use for my new found expertise is Beef Wellington, which I shall feature in a next issue.
The first two recipes serve 8 generously, the last one 4.
Potée (Cabbage and smoked meat stew)
Easy, Preparation: 15 minutes, Cooking time: 6 hours largely unattended, Reasonable)

Ingredients:
3 garlic sausages
6 oz bacon
1½ lbs (750 g) smoked pork chops
2 smoked chicken breasts
2 smoked duck breasts
1 smoked ham hock
2 onions
3 garlic cloves in their skin
1 cup (237 g) great northern beans
1½ cabbages
6 carrots
6 potatoes
1 bouquet garni
Material:
Saucepan
Strainer
Slow cooker

The day before:
Soak the beans overnight in cold water.
Place all smoked meats in cold water for 12 hours, changing the water twice.
The day of the meal:
Cut the bottom of the cabbages, remove the outer leaves if needed and quarter them. Blanch the quarters in boiling water for 5 minutes with the garlic cloves in their skin.
Strain the meats and discard the water. Cut the smoked bacon in small pieces.
Peel and slice the onions. Stir-fry them in the saucepan. Add the bacon bits and cook for another 5 minutes.
Place the onion slices and bacon in the inset of the slow cooker. Add all the meats and the bouquet garni. Cover with water and cook for three hours on the low setting of the slow cooker. After three hours, add the cabbage quarters, the garlic, the carrots, and the northern beans. Cook for another 2 hours and ½. During the last half hour, add the garlic sausages in the slow cooker. Set the halved potatoes in cold water in a saucepan over the stove. Bring to a boil and cook for 20 minutes.
Serve each guest a mixture of strained vegetables and all the kinds of meat. Propose a variety of mustards on the side. Keep the broth for the next day and serve it hot over slices of bread.

Austrian apple pie (Apfelstruedel)
Easy, Preparation and cooking time: 60 minutes, Cheap

Ingredients:
Dough:
3 cups flour (710g) plus extra flour to dust the clean towel
1 egg
½ stick (60g) butter cut in small pieces
½ teaspoon salt
1 cup (237ml) cold water

Filling 1
¾ cups (170g) coarse white bread crumbs
½ cup (113 ml) melted unsalted butter

Filling 2
4 cooking apples peeled, cored and roughly sliced.
1/3 cup (80g) granulated sugar
¾ cup raisins (170g) soaked in orange juice
¾ cup (170g) coarsely crushed nuts
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon grated lemon zest


Material:
Food processor
Toaster
Frying pan
Towel
Brush
Parchment paper lined pastry sheet

The day before:
Place all the ingredients of the dough except the water in the food processor fitted with the dough blade. Start mixing and add the water while the machine is running. When the ball is formed, stop the machine. Wrap in a plastic sheet and freeze.
The day of the meal:
Preheat the oven at 375F (190C)
Remove the dough from the freezer and bring to room temperature.
Pour ½ of the melted butter in a pan. Place the pan on the medium range of the gas and cook the breadcrumbs until light brown. Reserve
Mix all the ingredients of the second filling together in a salad bowl.
Roll out the dough as thinly as possible on a clean towel to obtain a rectangle roughly 11 inches by 13. Brush the dough with the melted butter. Place the apple filling in a roll shape along the longest edge of the dough closest to you. Sprinkle the breadcrumbs over the remainder of the dough. Using the cloth, lift the dough on the side of the filling to roll it over the crumb side. Seal the log on all three sides and roll seam side down onto a parchment lined baking sheet. Brush the strudel with the last of the melted butter.
Bake in the oven for 40 minutes.
When it has cooled, sprinkle with powdered sugar*, slice and serve at room temperature.
*To spread out evenly the sugar use a strainer and shake the strainer over the surface you want covered.

Cabbage Struedel
Easy, Preparation and cooking time: 45 minutes, Cheap

Ingredients
Dough:
1½ (350g) cups flour plus extra flour to dust the clean towel
1 egg
¼ stick (60g) butter cut in small pieces
½ teaspoon salt
½ cup (113g) cold water

Filling
¼ cup (60 ml) melted butter
Leftover cabbage
Leftover garlic sausage

Material
Food processor
Strainer
Clean towel dusted with flour
Rolling pin
Parchment paper lined pastry sheet
Brush

Prepare the dough the day before. Freeze. The following day, unfreeze for at least 8 hours in the refrigerator. Follow the technique described in the previous recipe to roll out the pastry.
Peel and cut the garlic sausage in cubes. Strain the cabbage. Mix the two together. Place in a link on the pastry side closest to you and brush with butter the exposed band of pastry. Using the towel roll the pastry sheet until it meets the other side. Brush the outside of the roll with butter. Place on a pastry sheet lined up with parchment paper and bake at 375 F (190C) in a preheated oven for 40 minutes.
Serve as a light lunch with a green salad.