Homemade Porchetta Sandwiches with Salsa Verde: Crack(ling) for Foodies

Porchetta Panini with Salsa Verde: highly addictive, but legal.

I wrote this post over a month ago - life is so busy I didn't get to finish it and publish it till May, but I am retroactively publishing it :)

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I'm struggling a little bit, as I usually do at this time of year, with the fact that it snowed again a few days ago.  In April.  And it's not easy to face the fact that it will probably keep doing that sporadically until mid May.  High desert.  Yep - sometimes I think you seriously do need to be high to put up with this shite with a smile on your face!  Freaking Denver.  Good thing I had these pictures and my porchetta adventure in the archives ready for a post that warms.

Not cool, Nature.  Not cool.

I'm not sure where the idea came from exactly but at a certain point in 2013 I became completely obsessed with making porchetta.  I suppose it might have been my subconscious harkening back to the market in Rome's Campo dei Fiori and the porchetta stand we'd passed by on our trip in 2010.  The regret of not buying a sandwich that day clung tightly to my capricious culinary heart.  I'd tried porchetta before - I'm not sure where - and the taste of it, crunchy-salty-deliciousness, lingered, like an unattainable sensory high, in my memory.  It could also be that since then I've been victim to what seems to be nothing short of a porchetta-centric-campaign of cooking shows aimed at me only, pedaling that legalized and quite addictive substance and how to make it yourself, featuring food trucks and restaurants alike showcasing kick-ass porchetta.  I was truly convinced I'd become the unwitting victim of a universal conspiracy to entice me to death with crackling, herbs and lemon juice.  Something had to be done. 

Porchetta in Campo dei Fiori; be still my beating heart!

 

A couple of months ago I happened to land on an episode of Guy Fieri's "Diners, Drive-ins and Dives" (a show and celebrity chef I love to hate but can't stop watching) and was sucked into an episode on a sandwich joint that made what can only be described as the most tasty thing I'd ever seen (again): their own homemade porchetta sandwiches.  The place was called Meat and Bread in Vancouver, BC, and their purposely-simple approach to sandwiches (meat and bread, literally) drew me in.  Well, and I simply couldn't take it anymore.  I had to get out and finally commence that delicious hunt for the ingredients that would ensure that the most delicious of roasted pork belly sandwiches would be mine at last.

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THE HUNT

Crackling Heaven.

Porchetta is traditionally from Lazio, the region in Italy where Rome is located.  As if that is not already appealing enough to me, It's also considered something of a celebratory food in the sense that it's usually sold out of food stands, trucks or markets during festivals, and most people consider it a picnic or holiday food in Italy.  It was, not surprisingly, introduced to the US by Italian immigrants and has been adopted and adapted around the country.  It is wonderful served as a main dish (like a pork roast) but truly shines, in my humble opinion, when served as part of a "panino" or sandwich, along with Italian salsa verde - a divinely acidic and earthy sauce that perfectly cuts the fat of the pork belly.

And what is this salsa verde of which I speak?  It has nothing to do with tomatillos and onions.  Nothing new-world about it, really.  It's a sauce rumored to have been brought back from the near east by Roman soldiers to Italy where it was then exported to France and Germany and theoretically also the new world - which is where we get things like Argentina's Chimichurri.  Admittedly, there is some question in my mind as to whether salsa verde is always traditionally served with porchetta in Italy as most of the recipes for porchetta with salsa verde I've encountered tend to be found in modern American publications, but, frankly, at this point, I truly do not care about authenticity.  Salsa Verde is one of the few foods that makes me salivate on command.  At this very moment I have visions of fresh herbs, garlic, peperoncino, lemon juice, olive oil and anchovies dancing through my head.  Those six things may very well be my favorite ingredients of all time.  Ok, plus salt.  I can't imagine anything savory they wouldn't make taste better.  No, really. :)

I figured it would be pretty easy to find what I needed to make the porchetta.  Who doesn't like pork belly?!  Well, apparently nobody in Denver likes it enough to demand it be sold at their local grocery store.  I went to at least 5 different grocery stores.  I tried the regular suspects in addition to my two favorite ethnic Mexican grocery stores, but it wasn't until I entered the meat section at Pacific Ocean Int'l Market (my go-to Asian market here in Denver) that I found what I was looking for.  Amidst the smells of fermented bean curd, dried shrimp and science-experiment-looking tapioca puddings, I found a large selection of pork bellies, none of which had the loin still attached as is generally used in Italy - but no matter.  The vast availability of pork loins - the least flavorful part of the pig - is a testament to the boring culinary lives most of us lead.  I picked one up at King Soopers - and I swear I left my judgments at the meat cooler - and moved on with my life and recipe.

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THE FEAST

Delishness from above.

I read an article recently in Food & Wine written by a woman who grew up in Soviet Russia, living through food shortages and her mother's creative ways of making the government issued rations of nast palatable (see "Russian Food: A Love Story").  Apart from contemplating the oft-discussed reality that when there is none around, everything becomes about food, she also recalled her mother as having (maybe because of the food shortage, maybe in spite of it) "compulsive hospitality syndrome" - the compulsive love of sharing food with those you care about.  She would prepare dinner parties from tinned meat and half-rotting potatoes.  She coveted the neighbor's black-market bananas.  There was also a kettle ready to brew tea for a passing friend or neighbor.  I suppose this is akin to being called a "feeder," which is what my sister calls me.  I can't stand not feeding people, and, most of the time, if I am excited about making a recipe, it's at least in part because I can't wait to share it with someone I love. 

Which is why, one snowy weekend in February I invited our good friends and old neighbors over for a porchetta dinner after Matt and Tony went off to watch a Monster Truck Rally with the boys.  It left me ample time to make the salsa verde, make the salt rub for the porchetta with my friend Gaea, a recent convert to meat.  We rubbed the salt and lemon zest spice mix on the slotted pork belly skin.  We filled it with herbs.  We rolled it.  And then we roasted it low and slow in the oven, so that the skin on the pork belly became the crunchiest, saltiest of crackling, breaking off in chips as you sliced the roast, crushed onto the sandwich in an infinitely more sophisticated version of the ham-sandwich-with-Lays-potato-chips.

That night we feasted.  We served the sandwiches on ciabatta slathered in salsa verde, piled high with pork and crackling, and topped with more salsa verde.  A brisk white wine for me and beer for the rest finished it off quite nicely.  I'm certain I was in a salt and meat coma after the first three bites, my former vegetarian friend sitting across from me, smiling, licking her fingers - the best and realest testament to the transformative power of food - and the fact that Porchetta is crack for foodies.

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Porchetta Sandwiches with Salsa Verde

Recipe from Meat & Bread in Vancouver

Serves 8-10

Ingredients

Salsa Verde
1 bunch parsley
1 cup canola oil
2 teaspoons toasted fennel seeds ground
2 teaspoons toasted coriander ground
2 teaspoons chili flakes
small handful of fresh fennel fronds, chopped (optional)
2 anchovy fillets (optional)
salt
2 cloves garlic
zest of 1 lemon
lemon juice from 2 lemons

Salt & Herb Rub
2 tbsp coarse salt
2 tsp toasted fresh rosemary, chopped
2 tsp toasted fennel seed, crushed
2 tsp crushed red pepper flakes
2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
zest of 1 lemon
small handful of fresh fennel fronds, chopped


Other Ingredients
2-3lbs (combined weight) Pork Belly with loin still attached (or buy them separately)

kitchen twine
extra canola oil
ciabatta rolls, sliced lengthwise for sandwiches

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 275F.

2. Make the salsa verde in a blender (or chop by hand if you're feeling it), set aside.

3. Make the salt & herb rub in a small bowl and set aside.

4. Score the pork belly skin in a hatch pattern so it will roast and crisp up nicely (see pic above).  Spread some (about half) salt & herb rub on the inside of the belly and loin.  Roll the pork belly and loin (with the loin in the center) into a cylinder and tie tightlywith kitchen twine.  Rub the rest of the salt & herb rub and a generous amount of oil all over the outside.

5. Place porchetta in a roasting pan (relatively deep as lots of fat will be coming off this baby) and roast in the oven for 3 1/2 to 4 hours.

6. Turn the heat up to 450F and roast for a further 25-30 minutes or until the skin is completely golden and crispy (as in the pictures above).


Serve on ciabatta rolls smeared with the salsa verde, with chopped up meat, sprinkled with the crispy crackling on top and more salsa verde.  Enjoy!

A Time to Cheese.

Alluring cheeses at Borough Market, London 2010

In life there are times to cook, and then there are times to cheese.

Some days you just can't bring yourself to whip even the simplest of dinners up, and, lucky for me, I live with two men who will happily sit down to a table of bread and cheese as a complete meal.  Confession: I can't say I'm entirely with them.  I need something to go with the bread and cheese (prosciutto? olives? avocado? homemade jam? Membrillo!), but maybe that's the Mexican in me coming out.  My ancestral tendency to leave the cheese to the Europeans can't be entirely escaped.  (Translation: I'd still rather have some huevos rancheros.)  But despite all that, I do have to agree with my 3 year-old, there are most definitely days when you just have to cheese.

I remember well the feeling I had as the cheese cart was wheeled over to us at Daniel in NYC back in 2006.  (Brenda's inner-monologue: "A cheese course?! Amazing. OMG - what the hell do I choose?!")  It was the same feeling I used to get when I'd timidly walk to the cheese counter in Agata & Valentina and then run off pretending I didn't want cheese anyway.  Or how I felt going into the infamous Murray's Cheese with my chef brother-in-law for the first time.

Overwhelmed.

Slightly scared to ask questions.  Worried I'd pick the wrong one and end up not eating it, or, worse yet, not pick anything at all.  Then worrying the monger / waiter would judge me based on what I did pick.  Dreading that with one wrong turn I might end up with a shoe-box apartment that was not only stiflingly small, but also smelled like stinky feet.

A good meal.
Image credit: Marcus Ciardiello

  It has taken a couple of years (about seven, actually) for me to feel somewhat comfortable going to a cheese monger.  I didn't grow up eating a lot of cheese - outside of Oaxaca and Queso Fresco, of course.  As a remedy, it helped to live in London for almost four years.  There, cheese - good cheese - is available at even the worst supermarkets (well, not at the rather unfortunate Iceland, but you get the idea).  I dove head first into deliciously crumbly, aged Cheddars.  Dabbled in the world of wonderfully fruity Wensleydales.  And occasionally even tried a Stilton or two - ever-eyeing the Potted Stiltons at Fortnum & Mason - though I've, admittedly and somewhat shamefully, never been a huge fan of blue cheeses.

At some point in there, I also made a brief foray into the world of luxury food marketing and had the opportunity to visit Casa dei Giovani - and their cheese farm (a side business to their charity-fueled olive oil) where I took home a small wheel of handmade Pecorino plucked from the aging barn where the sheep themselves were tended to.  I carried it home to England, gently tucked in between my clothes on my carry-on.  I never looked at cheese the same way again.

These days, I am decidedly more adventurous in my cheesing.  I don't buy imitation Parmiggiano - Matt and Roman are far-too addicted to the real-thing to ever go back.  And I am lucky to, even in Denver, have grocers near me that carry wonderful, wonderful cheeses from both local (US) and international makers. 

After tasting many, many cheeses I feel it's truly an art and something that takes time to appreciate.  Each is different, unique and worth getting to know.  I still have some I like better (goat) than others (sheep), but at least now I can eat cheese for cheese's sake - without having to drown it in Membrillo or cold cuts.

Here are some of my favorites lately - maybe next time you don't feel like cooking, grab a few, sit down, and enjoy one of life's acquired-yet-simple pleasures.  Go on, cheese it.

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Brenda's Top Five Favorite Cheeses

Lately, anyway, and in no particular order

Camembert, fruit, saucisson & olives: an old standby.
Image Credit: Marcus Ciardiello

 

 

1. Cypress Grove's Humboldt Fog, American, Goat's Milk
This is a cheese I discovered in Maine, though it's made in California.  I love the tangy goatness of it.  So delicious and creamy - kind of a crowd-pleaser, actually.  And yet somewhat more sophisticated than the average goat cheese because of the distinctive layer of vegetable ash running like a vein through the center.  I love that America is producing such great cheeses now - no longer have to only buy French, Swiss or Italian.

2. Gorgonzola Dolce, Italian, Cow's Milk
My local King Soopers Supermarket is a hidden gem of delicious and reasonably priced cheeses.  They have a bargain bin where all the pieces are under $5 - a deal for good cheese.  In one of those a couple of weeks back I found a great looking piece of Gorgonzola Dolce.  Being a professed blue-hater, I had no clue that this would be the cheese for me.  Developed specifically to be milder than regular gorgonzola, it packs a gentler, kinder punch.

3. Parmiggian Reggiano, Italian, Raw Cow's Milk
Does Parma make any bad food?!  This is a classic but it bears repeating: everything tastes better with a little Parmiggiano on it.  I've always cooked with it, but it's only been in the past few years that I've started eating it alone, serving it as part of my cheese plates, and letting Roman snack on it.  It's a strong flavor, but one that is complex and infinitely satisfying with its crumbly, yet substantial feel.  While I almost always buy the Italian original, it's worth noting that there are now some nice American counterparts (counterfeits? :)) from, of course, Wisconsin.

Personal goal: to one day have a whole wheel in my house for the holidays, and finish it. :)

4. Taleggio, Italian, Cow's Milk
What a stinker this cheese is!  But it's creamy and receives the honor of being classified as "truly delish" by yours truly.  I have to admit that I especially like when it's really aged and becomes runny.  I don't like keeping it in the fridge for long because it really does make it awkward when you have visitors who don't like / know much about stinky cheese and its surprisingly large stink-span.  I also think it's cool that this type of cheese (washed-rind, smear-ripened) has been around since the Roman times.  Cicero cheese, anyone?

5. Saint-André
This cheese is almost too much.  Triple-cream?  Seriously?  
Predictably, it's one of Matt's favorites - a self-professed cream-freak and lover of cow's milk cheeses.  And after having it several times, I've also come around to loving it.  I especially love the white, fluffly, billowy little mold skin that covers the outside of the cheese.  If left to properly come to temp, this cheese is the closest thing you'll find to eating really, really sophisticated cheese-flavored-butter.  Ok, something about that almost grosses me out.  I can't eat much when we do have it (not that Matt minds), but I do love having an indulgent slice or two.

Italy Part 2: Rome: "Avrai tu l'universo, resti l'Italia a me."

Approximately two years and two months ago, Matt and I were in Italy, celebrating our unofficial 8-year-meeting-anniversary.  And almost exactly two years ago today, I wrote the first part of what was meant to be a duet of posts - a musing I called: Italy Part I: San Martino: "Il Bel Far Niente."  Needless to say, things in the early parts of 2011 got crazy for us - on many levels - and I never got to write the second part.  Two moves later and two years later, today I was prompted to finally do so by the happy and unexpected request from a friend to give her some recommendations for good food and beautiful sights to see in Rome.  After writing an inappropriately long list for her, I also spent some time re-living our last trip there through the beautiful photos we took and felt compelled to share here - if for no other reason than just to prolong the feeling of delicious nostalgia all this has provoked.

I believe we left off somewhere in Campania...

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Have you ever had ten shots of espresso in one morning?  I don't recommend it. That's precisely the reason that I found myself suddenly vomiting out the rental car door on a rather hideous side road in the south of Italy on the morning we said goodbye to Matt's family in San Martino.  We were headed to Rome.  And, as if to purge it of any lingering non-Roman commitments, my body decided that all the good-intentioned-Campanian-caffe's of the past few hours had to go.  Basta already with all this Campanian-sciocchezze: there's only room for Roma.

It was fitting because, for me, as a rule, vacation is a delicate and constant struggle between eating too much and not seeing enough.  I am a self-professed not-doer on vacations - I prefer not to fill my day with places I have to be at a certain hour, things I have to see to check-off the endless mental list of "been-there-done-thats" - but I like to take in the scenery, the people, the feel of the place -- and eat.  A LOT.  For me, the memories are made at the lunch table, at the coffee-stop, at the random bench where we sat and chatted for an hour while eating strawberries from the market (where I still regret not getting some porchetta to-go as well).

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"You may have the universe - but Italy is mine."

 "Avrai tu l'universo, resti l'Italia a me."

Italy has always had its hold on me - for no good, particular reason.  And within Italy, despite two years in Trieste, Rome is the favored, overflowing cup of happy memories for me.  I could sit in almost any spot in that city and feel happily satisfied just to be there, without seeing or doing anything else (except maybe eating, of course).  It holds so much meaning, so much history for me, that simply having made it back there with Matt once more was almost enough for me.

Almost.

Matt and Roman Fecit.

I wanted to go back and bask in all the old and new (for Rome) and old and new (for me).  I
wanted to see our school, stop at our favorite bar, see the restaurant where we had our first date.  And I wanted to try all the restaurants (or at least a few) that we never could have afforded in our college days, to bring our son Roman (!) to the garden where I met his father, stay at a hotel in the center of it all, buy useless mementos, drink good wines.  I wanted to see how the city had changed, relish how much it had stayed the same.  I wanted to take destination-less walks - in circles, even - and admire the stores that I'd frequented once, or the new ones that had taken their place.  And despite my otherwise aimless wandering, I wanted to gleefully check off every single thing and place I wanted to eat or eat at off my impossibly long food-itinerary (I can't entirely let go of type-A Brenda).  And I did.  We did it all.  And, to-date, that brief moment of time in Rome stands out as one of my favorite vacations we've ever taken.

I often tell Matt that I think I'll never be one of those people who can find a place they want to go back to every year and not get sick of it.  In some ways I'm addicted to finding and experiencing newness.  But if I'm really honest with myself, I know that, if given half a chance, I'd be back in Rome every single year if I could.  You may have the universe - but Italy is mine.

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Top Five Memories of Roma 2010

the old-the new, the very long-winded

5. The Only Real Roman.

There was something about seeing Roman in Rome.  It was like my life had come full-circle for one brief second, like all the things that meant most to me had been fulfilled, granted to me in complete perfection for just one moment, to observe and enjoy. 

The little man & Stone Pines at Villa Pamphili Park

He had no idea where we were and much less why it held so much meaning to me and Matt.  And perhaps that innocent glee was what made watching him - run in the rain in Piazza del Popolo (the first sight in Rome-proper that Matt and I ever visited together), or snootily lift his nose and pretend to drink wine at his first Roman lunch, or splash the water in the Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi with utter disregard for Bernini's sculpture - all the more endearing and perfect.

Piazza del Popolo in the rain.

Doing like the Roman does.

4.  Boring Pretty Things Everywhere.

One of the first things that ever struck me about Italy was how - to me - everything looked so pretty, no matter how boring.  Literally, everything.  It still does.

I had a few chances to walk around Rome by myself on this trip and it was often at those moments - temporarily removed from Roman's demands - that I had the chance to savor the beauty of quotidian life in Rome once more.

A city of fountains, ruins, strong opinions and a mish-mash of cultures that all somehow converge into a mutual - and expected - reverence for all things Italian. But mostly all things Roman. Filled with beauty to the very brim, for anyone willing to stop a moment and find it: A dimly lit barber shop on a cobblestone street. The perfect espresso with the perfect schiuma, gone almost before you can even admire it. The most impossibly tiny little car parked on what surely must be a sidewalk - and no parking tickets on the window. A fountain with a serendipitous mosaic of red, orange, brown and yellow Autumn leaves floating on the water's surface; a temporary art installation by nature herself, gone with the next flow of water. Chestnuts - castagne - arranged just-so on a street vendor's fire pit, their familiar scent filling everyone's mind with unmistakably Autumnal smells. Rows of stores selling hand-crafted Saint figurines. Priests walking together, laughing, in the Vatican. A man sitting on thousand-year-old ruins, smoking a cigarette, talking on his telefonino. Giant puddles of water forming in between imperfectly laid cobblestones. My son hugging a column at the Pantheon. The Carabinieri standing in the Piazza - enjoying their cigarettes and coffees more than keeping the peace. Or maybe that's just how they do it - keep the peace, I mean - by living well, and beautifully, alongside everything and everyone else.

3. Back to School.

It's difficult to describe seeing your one-year-old stand in the courtyard of the school where you met his father - the same courtyard you snuck into by climbing over the wrought-iron fence because you broke curfew.

 It's strange to watch him sit on the chair in the classroom where your then-boyfriend had Latin class and loved to hang-out at night reading Tacitus standing up, at the professor's podium (after he'd all but done your Latin homework for you :)).

the courtyard

It's a completely bizarre sensation to take him down to the little dining room where you and your now-husband first got to know each other over pumpkin risotto and a somewhat unorthodox version of veal Carpaccio that you still talk about to this day.

But it's also pretty fantastic.

Even more fantastic, somehow, than that same blonde-Italian secretary (Letizia - "Titz" for short, if I recall), still there 8 years later, recognizing you both and being blown away that you actually did get married - just like everyone said you would.

2. Simple food, joyfully served. 

One of the things I recall vividly about living in Rome as a student was the real feeling of indignation I carried with me over the fact that I could not afford to eat everywhere and everything I wanted to.  In that sense, this trip was near-complete vindication.  

Our meals were not extravagant.  They were not particularly fancy or expensive, nor were they at the trendiest or most talked-about spots in Rome.  They were something far better than that: they were elegant, simple, and joyfully served.

Italian food is not complicated, - sometimes I would even say it is an endless collection of variations on a theme - but what makes the food stand out is the care and the true joy you find in how it is crafted, cared about, and passed over to you - an edible representation of all the culture and history behind that person, that family, that city, that particular moment.

Here are my three favorite meals from our trip:

Piazza delle Coppelle

I. Osteria Da Mario
Piazza delle Coppelle, 51  00186 Rome, Italy
A short-and-scenic-walk from the Pantheon through winding streets leads to a small courtyard filled with a small food market and a covered seating area for this family-owned osteria. 

As our first Roman meal - salsiccia e broccoletti for Matt, pasta pomodoro for the Master, and saltimbocca alla Romana with carciofi alla Romana for me - it was perfection.

salsiccia e broccoletti

II. Da Lucia

The dining room at Da Lucia

Vicolo del Mattonato, 2b, 00153 Rome, Italy

 

"Da Lucia," in Italian, means "at Lucia's place.  It feels like a Roman house in this trattoria, tucked away in a beautiful corner of Trastevere, family-owned and run since WWII.

We had a quiet, beautiful lunch of stewed rabbit, involtini con piselli and - because we were lucky enough to be in Rome while they were in season - Puntarelle alla Romana (chicory sprouts with a pungent but delicious anchovy dressing) while Roman slept in his stroller.  

It was pouring rain outside that day, so we didn't get to take the leisurely stroll through Trastevere that we'd hoped for, but instead we stopped by a nearby bar for a quick caffe' and chatted about the good old days.

It was almost too good to be true.

III. Piccola Cuccagna

Vicolo della Cuccagna, 13  186 Rome, Italy

 

Piccola Cuccagna Piccola Cuccagna is just the type of place I would have never stopped had it not been recommended to me.  On the corner of Piazza Navona, in plain view of Bernini's 4 Rivers, I'm fairly certain that most people who don't know Rome write it off as a tourist trap.  Well, it's not. The combination of the setting with, an unrelenting penchant for, as one writer put it, the "unapologetically impolite foods favoured by Romans" - pasta with small intestines, Tripe alla Romana, and Puntarelle (vinegared chicory shoots with anchovy sauce) - left nothing to be desired.  We were utterly satisfied and even giddy. For primi piatti we had: prosciutto e melone (because it never gets old), bruschette, and some buccattini all'ammatriciana - a Roman pasta specialty. For the secondo, Matt was bold and ordered the roast branzino (fileted and deboned at the table) served with perfect rosemary potatoes and some radicchio and lemon.      I,however, was vastly bolder and ordered the Trippa alla Romana (tripe in tomato and parmesan) served with - what else? - lovely Romanesco broccoli. Trippa alla Romana Dessert was, as always in Italy, a delicious but forgettable afterthought to the main event. 1. Oldies but Goodies.

I don't remember when it happened, but I do recall the odd sensation of suddenly realizing that the world no longer saw me as a kid.  It didn't change how I saw myself - eternally in my mid-twenties for the record - but it changed the way I experienced other people, and other places too.  It is lucky, therefore, that certain things in this life - only a few, really - never get old.  And, in fact, they often get better the longer they're around.

walking our old path up the gianiculum hill

We might have returned to Rome almost a decade older and, for the sake of argument, wiser - suddenly, it seems, married, parents, professionals.  But we still felt the same exhilaration when we saw the forum, the Colosseum, the Victor Emmanuel Monument again that we did in our college days.   And we loved going back and taking cheesy pictures together, re-living the places, sights and smells that have thrilled people for more than two thousand years, the same places that make up a special piece of our past - and now, present - lives together and forever will.  Oldies but Goodies.

kisses in front of Vittorio Emmanuele

Culinary Synesthesia: Lobster Tails & Radicchio

Pan fried Lobster tails and Radicchio with oyster mushrooms, grape tomatoes and white rice.

I have to share something I ate last night that kind of blew me away.  It encapsulates the great affinity I have for certain foods because it includes some of the foods I have come to intensely love, but once intensely hated (or, worse, was completely ignorant of).  It is also unique in that all the foods on the plate hold strong emotional ties for me, harkening me back to my days of studying Romance languages and the random but fateful encounter I had with Proust's A Remembrance of Things Past.

I was a sophomore in college set on a Romance Language degree track.  My French teacher, whose name I don't and could never recall, brought up the concept of Proust's Madeleine.  With it, she introduced the idea of Synesthesia - the thought that a smell, sensation or taste can emotionally transport you to a specific time or memory in the past.  The whole notion thoroughly intrigued me and stayed with me, leaving lingering and permanent curiosities about what my own "Madeleines" might be.  Surely for some they are experiences - like riding with the top down in a convertible, smelling someone's perfume, or sleeping with an old blanket.  But surely also, mine must be culinary as I make so much of my emotional attachment to food.

So many foods we eat and love or hate are a question of attachment and relation.  They invoke either distaste and bitterness (literally near-gagging), negative memories (being forced to eat your Brussels sprouts as a child), or a sudden transport back to happy times.  Without expecting it, last night, this plate temporarily became my Proustian Madeleine.  Not that I could eat it every day, nor that it's my favorite dish in the world, but that all its components have meaning, are linked to vivid memories that hold keys to who I am.

It all started with a plate of white rice.  Matt was going to be at a company dinner (no doubt dining on the many-splendid delicacies offered at The Oxford, here in Denver).  I was sick of eating leftovers at home and decided to splurge and buy myself two petite Lobster tails.  From there, I let this recipe and my refrigerator and its shockingly inspired contents guide the way...

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Culinary Synesthesia: Lobster & Radicchio

Some of the things I love, and some I loved to hate - until I loved them, of course :)

Ingredient 1: Half a head of Radicchio
The first time I ever tried radicchio was in 1998 in a picturesque Friulian village, at a small bar called - of all the unromantic things in the world! - "Mickey Mouse."  I didn't have much spending money but on occasion I did treat myself to what was one of the few good, edible things at Mickey Mouse (besides their patatine con salsa rossa, of course): An Italian Insalatona.

While I erroneously labored, for quite some time, under the impression that the word was spelled "insalatonna," with the "tonn[o]" at the end referring to the prerequisite tuna fish that the salad at Mickey Mouse was comprised of, I eventually realized that the "tona" part actually denotes an augmentative suffix at the end of certain Italian words.  And in this case, it differentiated this salad as something one would have as a "main course" rather than just a side salad due to its larger size.

The salad was, of course, amazing.  In and of itself it reminded me of a million things: 

- tuna fish in salad recalled my mother's love of tuna salad and my thankfulness that, unlike hers, this one did not contain raw celery (one of my few nemeses) 

- a hard-boiled egg recalled early years spent at my grandmother's house boiling eggs and eating them together

- loose corn kernels brought to mind a simple farmhouse salad I once ate at a dairy in the country in Denmark after a beautiful bike ride

-the simple red-wine-vinegar-and-olive-oil dressing inspired me, as this was one of the first times I'd ever mixed my own vinaigrette, and a lifelong affair officially commenced 

- the "mesclun" that comprised the "meat" of the salad reminded me of my father, who, as a chef, often used to bring mesclun home for us to eat, inspiring unmeasured amounts of awe in me to the tune of - how can we literally be eating leaves?!  The idea of it - of foraging, of food as a part of nature, not just something at a supermarket, seemed too amazing to be true, and never left my mind thereafter.

But also in that amazing salad was a strange reddish purple lettuce, something I'd never tried before, something that went beyond the often euphemized (and often by the British, actually) "pepperiness" of Arugula, or the soft bitterness of Frisee.  It was Radicchio.  And when I took that first bite of it, I absolutely, positively, vehemently hated it.  
I felt wronged.  How could this beautiful salad be sullied by that nasty, unnecessary purple thing?  I diligently went through and picked it all out every time I ever had an insalatona after that.

It wasn't until very recently - about a year ago - that I suddenly intellectually decided that my hatred of radicchio was nonsensical.  How could someone who delights in so many bitter things (Campari, Gin, many wines, and some olives, wasabi, among them), truly hate radicchio?  So I bravely purchased some and decided it wasn't actually bad.

About a week ago I suddenly had a craving for radicchio again after watching an episode of Chopped where it was served up to the judges grilled.  I did some research and found an utterly simple and sensational recipe for Roasted Radicchio and my life was changed forever.

Roasted Radicchio (1 head)
Serves 2

Preheat oven to 450F.
Quarter the radicchio, rinse in cold water, shake off most of the water.
Place on a roasting pan.   
Sprinkle with olive oil, salt, pepper and some dried thyme (very little).
Roast for 15 minutes (or until wilted).  
Serve warm or at room temperature, drizzled with good balsamic vinegar or simply lemon juice.
*For a variation, halve and include a few grape tomatoes.


Ingredient 2: 1 Lb of Oyster Mushrooms 
I have sung the praises of mushrooms before (here and here).  They have always been one of my favorite things to eat.  I admit to often sneaking a raw white mushroom at the grocery store as a child.  But I'd never had Oyster mushrooms until I met Matt's grandmother.  She makes them every time we go to her house for breakfast (yes, sauteed mushrooms at breakfast - my kind of meal).  I don't know what it is about the texture, the combination of flavors, but to me they recall a kind of meat - but better.  I had no idea that in the south of Italy, in the mountains of Campania, for generations Matt's ancestors foraged for mushrooms of a similar quality and texture, and that those mushrooms made up a large and delicious part of their everyday food.   
The other night I decided that some sauteed Oyster Mushrooms - in the perfect state of readiness from Whole Foods to me - would pair beautifully with the roasted radicchio I mentioned above. 

Sauteed Oyster Mushrooms
Serves 2

Separate the Oyster mushrooms (half a pound).
Heat olive oil in a pan (3tbsp or so) and perhaps some butter too.
Add the mushrooms once hot.  Add garlic (3 cloves, minced) and pepperoncino (crushed red pepper, to taste).
Sprinkle liberally with salt and black pepper.
Allow to brown on both sides, tossing occasionally.
Once all wilted and browned, serve warm or at room temperature.
Garnish with a juicy lemon.


Ingredient 3: Steamed White Rice (1 cup)
 As a mother I aspire to pass down my love for rice to my son.  I don't buy brown rice (unless it's a wild rice medley, but that's a story for another day) and I don't like it.  If I'm going to have rice I want it white and I want it steamed (unless I want it Mexican style, in which case I go all out with the Saffron or tomato sauce).
 Every week I make a pot of rice with extra to keep in the fridge.  I eat it at breakfast, lunch and dinner some days.  It is warm, soft and filling, and a wonderful receptacle for so many flavors.
 As a child I loved to eat it with soy sauce.  I had it with Sopa de Frijol (bean soup).  It was presented to me at almost every main meal (and often breakfast too).  Last night, my leftover rice was the perfect thing to soak up all the delicious olive oil and sauces that would come with the radicchio, mushrooms, and lobster tails.  I think my full-proof method of making good white rice is worth sharing.

Steamed White Rice 
Heat a pot on high heat and add the uncooked long grain white rice (2 cups).  
Add 4 cups of water.
Cover and allow to boil.
When boiling, reduce heat to simmer and cover.
Cook for 21 minutes. 
Allow to rest for 5-20 minutes on hot stove.
Serve.


Ingredient 4: Two Petite Lobster Tails
I've written about Lobster at-length before.  It's funny to me that a food I had never really had before the age of 21 has become so closely linked with fond memories for me.  I become nostalgic every time I see lobsters featured in any show or sitting in tanks at restaurants or grocery stores (a rare sight here in Denver).
Yesterday while on a rare visit to the exorbitantly-priced but so appealing Whole Foods in Cherry Creek, I noticed that the petite lobster tails were on sale: two for $12.  Not a bad deal at all.  I snagged two and took them home with visions of succulent crustacean meat dancing inside my head.

After determining that all the previously mentioned iningredients would be part of this ad hoc gourmet dinner, I decided it was too cold to grill the lobster tails like I wanted.  So for the surf part to my already-made turf, I pan-fried the lobster tails (shell-on) in a garlic, crushed red pepper, butter, olive oil and white wine sauce.  I think that's actually enough of a recipe to go on :)  And, as always, I was sadly disappointed with how Lobster tastes when I cook it myself, which only increased the nostalgia for the $4.99/lb days back in the land of Ports.

*  *  *

Voilà : Home, Italy, Mexico and Maine on a plate.

Take that Proust. :)