Welcome to the roundup of the 18th edition of Novel Food, the literary/culinary event that Lisa of Champaign Taste
and I created in 2007 and that I continue to host with great pleasure. Novel Food is about
literary works (prose or poetry) that inspire the preparation of dishes. The event brings together two of my passions: literature and food.
Like all its predecessors,
the current edition includes a lovely set of posts, each describing a literary work that the blogger read and the dish that the reading inspired. Please, follow me on a short literary/culinary tour. For
each contribution, I will offer a small bite to whet your appetite for
more: follow the link to read the details. I hope that by the time you reach
the end of this post, you will have a nice reading and cooking list to
be used in the near future.
Ruhama of rumahama presents What the Moon Saw by Laura Resau, which inspired her to parepare some Mexican Hot Chocolate
"Clara's parents don't know what to do with her, as she keeps disobeying on a grand scale." They send her to live with her grandparents in a remote area of Mexico, where she discovers, among other things, the magic of Mexican hot chocolate. In her post, besides giving a recipe, Ruhama shows us a Mexican molinillo (wooden whisk) in action.
Lucia of Torta di Rose read Blackberry Wineby Joanne Harris (published in Italy as Vino, patate e mele rosse) and prepared Ciambelline al vino di visciola (ring-shaped cookies with sour cherry wine)
In this novel, the unusual narrator is a bottle of wine from the year in which the protagonist was
born. "The story inspired me to bake ciambelline
(ring-shaped cookies) with sour cherry wine... a special wine based on an ancient wild cherry species widespread in the
Marche region, in Italy." The cookies can be prepared with any kind of wine, not only of grape but also of other fruits.
"Near as I can tell from my online research and her books, this was a
variety of “johnny” or “journey” cake – a rough equivalent to today’s
trail mix or granola bar. You made them ahead and they’d keep, even if
they needed dunking to make them palatable after a few weeks in a
rucksack or a saddlebag.
Corn dodgers can be as simple or as fancy as you like."
"I couldn’t help but be fascinated... Mattanza is a powerful, captivating story of man, fish, life, death and love. Perhaps, I should have prepared some kind of tuna meal. However, I... felt like preparing a simple pasta dish... Making pasta and steaming up the windows during winter (or anytime of the year) sounds like a good idea to me."
In her novel, "Morrison explores the different facets of love, its proximity to hate, and its destructive effects on the psyche when it is missing from one’s life, especially the life of a child." This smooth-as-silk smoothie reminds Ana of Silk, the fictional town in which Love is set, once famous for Cosey’s Hotel and Resort, on the Southern East Coast.
Inspired by The Shape of Water by Andrea Camilleri, Simona of briciole(your host) baked reginelle (sesame seed cookies)
"Sicily smells of sesame seeds. Not the actual island, but the Sicily of my memory. I close my eyes, I whisper "Sicilia"
and I smell toasted sesame seeds. The same thing happens if I read
about Sicily: I open one of my Montalbano books and my nose smiles."
"One
recurrent motif in the novel is [the protagonist's] wish to start eating better, a
resolution that gets repeatedly postponed to the following day when,
supposedly, he will have more time to choose mindfully how to feed
himself. But the healthy, nutritious salad in his thoughts never
materializes on his plate, so I thought I would make one for him."
My special "thank you!" goes to the event's participants: I hope you had as much fun as I always do when I host this event. You will find a link to this roundup and to those of the earlier editions on this page.
The next edition of Novel Food will be in early summer: I will announce it here, on The Food Blog Diary, and other venues, so stay tuned. The Food Blog Diary is the lovely event announcement site created and maintained by Jacqueline of Tinned Tomatoes.
Visit the site to read about current events and let her know about your
event and she will post it on her well-organized site. Thank you,
Jacqueline!
In
the meantime, read good books (maybe with the next Novel Food in
mind), cook good dishes, and otherwise savor life's local and seasonal
offerings. And if
The first scene brings us to a large rapeseed field. Our eyes luxuriate in the saturated colors of tall yellow flowers under a blindingly blue sky. As our mind wonders where such a beautiful place is, a painful sense of foreboding starts to distort the idyllic image. The young woman in the middle of the yellow ocean is panicking and the middle-aged men trying to reach her is anxious. The tension builds up as the camera switches vintage point until the scene goes up in flames — literally.
Sidetracked, the first episode of the BBC movies Wallander turned me into a terrified fan of the series. I could not stop watching that and the other two episodes of the first season: the movies held me in their power. But the horror of the deaths and crimes shown in them terrified me. A part of me wanted to flee, while the other part was glued to the couch, totally focused on the screen and the events shown on it.
I like everything about the movies and find the character of police inspector Kurt Wallander fascinating and poignantly rendered by Kenneth Branagh. After watching three movies, I had to read the novels by Swedish author Henning Mankell. I started from the first one Faceless Killers, which introduced Kurt Wallander to the public 23 years ago. In 1999 Mankell published The Pyramid, a collection of five stories that follows Wallander career from his beginning as a patrolman who helps solve a crime and gets moved into the investigative branch of the police, to the middle-aged, seasoned investigator recently separated from his wife that we meet in the first novel. (This is the book I am reading right now.)
Faceless Killers opens with a brutal, inexplicable murder of a farmer and his wife. As Wallander applies known investigative techniques, based on looking very carefully at the available information, spiced up with a bit of gut feelings and intuition, to find who did it and why, we follow his having to come to terms with his wife's recent decision to leave him.
The chaos without is reflected in the chaos within Wallander's life. Of course, a murder is not at the same level as a separation and an estranged daughter, Linda — whose suicide attempt he thwarted some years prior. However, the need to rationalize and act upon them has similarity. In the end, he cannot do anything to recreate the family nucleus, which in practice had ceased to exist for a while, but he can bring the murderers to justice, thereby resetting the scales, so to speak — albeit temporarily.
The novel includes more than one personal thread: Wallander's father, a painter, appears and his mental and physical decline requires attention. And Rydberg, Wallander's mentor and most trusted colleague, is diagnosed with cancer. The mood of the novel is definitely somber. And the fact that it starts in early January, in the dead of winter, adds some more darkness. The one steady light is Wallander's determination to solve the crime that haunts him. And he will do that.
bean and albacore tuna salad for Wallander
Often Wallander is so engrossed in his investigations that food and sleep are pushed aside, sometimes with dangerous consequences. One recurrent motif in the novel is his wish to start eating better, a resolution that gets repeatedly postponed to the following day when, supposedly, he will have more time to choose mindfully how to feed himself. But the healthy, nutritious salad in his thoughts never materializes on his plate, so I thought I would make one for him, one that, with a bit of planning, he could prepare for himself at home.
The combination of beans and canned tuna (we called it fagioli col tonno) reminds me of childhood summer vacations (vacanze estive), when salads of various kinds rotated on the menu. Its simplicity leaves room
for interesting variations, like this one. The baby kale pesto with cashews I
described yesterday smoothes the edges of the two
bold flavors of beans and albacore. I cook beans
whenever I have time and if I don't need them right away, I freeze
them. The pesto can also be made in advance and frozen. Particularly useful are the two-tablespoon cubes you can obtain by freezing it in an ice tray. And canned albacore is an item always in my pantry, the kind I
discovered some years ago: troll caught and preserved in its own juices, flavorful, low in mercury and without added ingredients besides salt.
Paul's mix, a medley of organic beans
Once you have the elements of the salad, combining them together takes
little time and the result is satisfying and nourishing, just what Kurt Wallander and we all need.
How to cook dry beans The
way I cook beans for further use comes from Vegetarian Cooking for
Everyone by Deborah Madison (Beans with Aromatics). After soaking a
cup of dry beans for several hours or overnight in enough water to
cover them by about an inch (I use 3 1/2 cups), empty the whole bowl into a
saucepan and add
A small onion (or half of a medium one), halved
A large bay leaf
A large clove of garlic, or two small ones, sliced
A few sprigs of fresh parsley
A piece of kombu or other seaweed of choice (optional)
If it feels that there is not enough water to cook the beans well, add 1/2 cup. Bring
the water to a lively boil quickly, and keep it there for five minutes,
then turn down the heat and let the beans simmer, covered, until they
are ready. How long this takes depends on the type of beans and their
freshness. Let them cool in their broth, then remove the aromatics
and discard them. Let the beans rest in their cooking broth until ready
to use.
How to assemble the salad Drain the beans but leave them a bit moist. Open the can, empty it in a bowl, and with a fork flake the albacore to incorporate its juices. Add kale pesto and mix thoroughly to combine the ingredients. Serve (at room temperature).
To my palate, this salad does not need additional salt an neither does it need olive oil, since the albacore provides its oil.
Besides choosing healthier dishes, hopefully Wallander will learn to enjoy the food, instead of just stuffing
himself, which is what he does when eating on the run. When it comes to his relation with food, he can
learn from Montalbano.
This is my second contribution to the 18th edition of Novel Food, the literary/culinary event that Lisa of Champaign Taste and I started some time ago and that I continue to host.
[Depending on your set-up, the audio
file will be played within the browser or by your mp3 player
application. Please, contact me if you encounter any problems.]
Sicily smells of sesame seeds. Not the actual island, but the Sicily of my memory. I close my eyes, I whisper "Sicilia" and I smell toasted sesame seeds. The same thing happens if I read about Sicily: I open one of my Montalbano books and my nose smiles.
My first visit to Sicily, the summer before I turned 18, overloaded all of my senses in a joyous way: the beauty of churches and other buildings in Palermo, the sticky smell of the hot July days, the pleasant coolness of the sea, the sound of the dialect (of which I learned a few words), the taste of new foods. Of all the novelties my senses encountered, the smell of sesame seeds (semi di sesamo) is the one with highest emotional content. I had never tasted sesame seeds before, not even set my eyes on them. I only knew the name and that they were small.
First, I ate bread with the surface sprinkled with sesame seeds and I was amazed at the amount of flavor the small seeds packed. So, when I saw reginelle, cookies covered with sesame seeds, I did not need any special encouragement to pick one up (gently, to avoid seed loss) and bring it to my mouth. As each bite crumbled in my mouth, sesame seeds were scattered around. The cookie softened but retained a bit of crunch and the seeds teased my teeth into chasing them. A light swetness supported the pleasure without distracting the taste buds. One reginella was a dose of pure and simple pleasure, the memory of which lasted a long time.
I have vivid memories of other foods I tasted during that vacation, from rich gelato eaten in a soft, sweet bun, to fresh fish, from light mini cannoli to intense cheeses, but it's reginelle that feed my nostalgia. When I visited Palermo with my husband a few years ago, I carefully chose the bakery in which to purchase reginelle: I wanted the very best. A bite, stolen when hardly out of the store, sent me back to that summer of many years before, when I first discovered the pleasure these cookies provide.
brought back from Palermo
Until recently, I had never tried to bake them at home, afraid, I suspect, of taking out of the oven something so different from the original that the disappointment would be crushing. Reading again The Shape of Water by Andrea Camilleri (1994), the first of the novels that have as protagonitst police inspector Salvo Montalbano, brought me back to my first visit to Sicily and back to the yearning for reginelle, so this time I didn't skirt their calling and set about to make them. First, a note on vocabulary. In Sicilian dialect, sesame seeds are called cimino or giuggiulena. Just let this word tingle your ears: giuggiulena. It comes from from Arabic جلجلا (juljulān, "sesame").
I made several batches, trying a slightly different combination of ingredients each time, in search of the elusive bite of recognition. As I expected, none were exactly the same, and some were further from the archetype than others. The recipe I settled on is good: it makes reginelle that are a pleasure to eat and that have already made a couple of converts to their cause.
Ingredients:
200 g all-purpose flour
50 g whole-wheat pastry flour or 50 g all-purpose flour
70 g ultrafine sugar
a pinch of salt
2 g baking ammonia
40 g cold unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
20 g cold strutto (rendered pork fat) or 20 g cold unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
1 large egg (possibly from pastured poultry), lightly beaten to mix white and yolk
1-2 tablespoons milk
flavoring of choice: a pinch (1/16 teaspoon) saffron powder + grated zest of 1/4 Meyer lemon; or vanilla sugar + 1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract (see Notes)
plenty of sesame seeds (I used unhulled ones)
Notes:
The whole-wheat pastry flour is my way of making cookies a bit more nutricious.
I had my homemade strutto and pretty much finished it due to all the batches of reginelle I baked. It makes the cookies friabili (crumbly), but it also has a bit of a flavor and that is why I mixed it with butter. You can use all butter.
Based upon my reading, baking ammonia is the leavening agent traditionally used in reginelle. I have some I bought in Italy, where it is easy to find it in grocery stores. As you can read on this page, baking ammonia has advantages over baking powder when used in baked goods like cookies.
The recipes I read used various flavorings, from saffron powder to lemon zest to vanilla. In my first batch I used a small amount of saffron powder (1/16 teaspoon) I had and liked the result, but then I could not find more in the store and using saffron threads did not give me the same result. I then used a combination vanilla and lemon zest and was not happy, so I removed the lemon zest and used my vanilla sugar plus a bit of vanilla extract.
If using saffron powder, dissolve it in a tablespoon of warm milk.
Put flours, sugar (vanilla sugar, if using), salt, and baking ammonia in the food processor and pulse a few times to mix.
Add butter and strutto, and pulse a few times, until the mixture has the consistency of coarse meal.
Empty food processor's bowl onto your work surface.
Make a well in the center of the
mounded flour and butter mixture and pour the beaten eggs into it.
Add the vanilla extract or lemon zest (whichever using) to the well.
Add 1 tablespoon of milk or the milk and saffron powder mix (if using).
Use a fork to incorporate the liquid into the solid ingredients, and then use your fingertips.
Knead lightly just until the dough comes together into a ball. Add a bit more milk, if necessary.
Shape the dough into a flat ellipse
and wrap in plastic wrap. Place the dough in the refrigerator and chill while you get ready for the next phase.
shaping the dough
Take a kitchen towel, spread it on your working surface and pour some
water over it, so about half of it gets wet, but there is no pool of water. Take a
round cake pan and pour sesame seeds in it so you have a nice layer.
Preheat the oven to 400 F (or 350 F, see below). Line a baking sheet with a silicone baking mat.
Halve the dough and keep one half in the fridge. The following is how I decided to shape the reginelle and to roll them in the sesame seeds. Place dough on your working surface and pushing on its surface with the rolling pin, flatten it slightly (about 1/2 inch / 1.25 cm thick). With the bench scraper, cut strips (3/4 inch / 2 cm wide) and then cut each strip into pieces (1.5 inch / 4 cm long).
prepping the surface
Place a piece of dough on the towel and lightly roll it with the palm
of your hand so its surface becomes slightly damp, then deposit it on
the sesame seeds. Shake the pan so the dough rolls around and covers
itself with seeds. Gently pick up the seeded piece of dough and place it
on the lined baking sheet. Leave at least an inch (2.5 cm) of space all
around each reginella. When you become comfortable with the
process, you can work with a few pieces of dough at a time. And of
course, you can come up with your own version of how to do all this.
I have read two schools of thought in terms of baking: one starts at high temperature (400 F) and then drops to lower 10 minutes after the start and one uses the same temperature (350 F) throughout. I think I prefer the result of the first version, while my husband prefers the result of the second: you can be your own judge. Either way, I follow the advice of leaving the oven door slightly ajar (1/8 inch / 3 mm) to let the ammonia escape but without letting too much heat dissipate.
If starting at 400 F, 10 minutes after the start, lower temperature to 320 F
If starting at 350 F, keep the same temperature throughout
Either way, check the reginelle after 20 minutes from the beginning and estimate the amount of time still needed. The reginelle are ready when the surface is golden. Check the bottom as well: it should be brown but not dark brown. Take the baking sheet out of the oven and move the reginelle to a rack to cool. While the first batch is baking, prepare the second batch as above.
Store reginelle in an airtight container and enjoy. You probably won't think about Sicily when you bite on one, but you should still have a pleasant, crunchy experience.
Final note: reginelle shed sesame seeds throughout their life cycle. I have been collecting them and used them for a second time: the second baking did not affect their flavor, in part, I think, because I used unhulled seeds. I will not use them a third time for reginelle, but I have already used them as toasted sesame seeds on salads.
rolling in the sesame seeds
I have not visited Porto Empedocle
Vigata, where the novels are set, but years ago, I spent a month working at the
Club Med Kamarina and have been to Ragusa, Vittoria and other places in the area, so I
have a sense of the landscape Camilleri describes in his Montalbano novels.
It was interesting to read again the first one of the series. We meet
Montalbano and see his charming human touch at work. For example, he lies about his identity to
the mother of a young man he wants to question to avoid alarming her. He
understands immediately that Ingegner Luparello's wife is a smart woman
and the two of them develop a mutual esteem. He may be a bit rough, but
his first instinct is to try and connect to the person he is dealing
with.
The most memorable part of the novel is probably the improbable
friendship that blossoms between Montalbano and Ingrid, a beautiful Swedish
woman accidentally married to an absent Sicilian. The story moves
forward to reach the solution. We never doubt that Montalbano will
figure out what happened. But the process of uncovering the truth
includes also making sure that innocent Ingrid is not dragged into the
mud, that the Luparello widow's wish is respected, that Saro gets some money to
cure his little boy, in sum, that the chaos of the world in general and of
that corner of Sicily in particular, for at least a brief time, is
organized in a sort of just order that allows Montalbano a few hours of
quiet sleep or a long swim in the sea in front of his house in
Marinella.
a cookie from the heart
In an interview (in Italian), Camilleri says (my translation of the transcription):
I wrote the first, then the second [The Terra-Cotta Dog], and said: the end. I wrote the second to better define the character, but then what happened happened.
"What happened" was that The Terra-Cotta Dog was a huge success. Nineteen
years after the publication of The Shape of
Water, readers around the world still wait impatiently for the next Montalbano to come
out. Long live Andrea Camilleri.
This is my contribution to the 18th edition of Novel Food, the literary/culinary event that Lisa of Champaign Taste and I started some time ago and that I continue to host.
This is also my contribution to the current edition of Cook the Books, hosted by Rachel of The Crispy Cook. You can find the guidelines for participating in the event here, and here is the announcement.
[Depending on your set-up, the audio
file will be played within the browser or by your mp3 player
application. Please, contact me if you encounter any problems.]
I usually start my announcement of a new edition of Novel Food by sharing the title of the book I am currently reading. This time, instead, I am showing you a book I just made. In January, I attended a nice workshop taught by artist Jill Berry where I learned to make a Spontaneous Deconstructed Journal. When I left for Austin to attend the LongHouse Food Revival, I carried in my bag a set of pages and various writing and drawing tools. I wrote and drew and marked the pages while I was in Austin and also collected material to add to them later. A few days ago, I completed the pages and bound the journal: voilà!
Almost everything I did, saw and listened to during my stay in Austin is recorded in the journal, so in the future, I can go back to it to remind myself of events, people, places, words.
And now on to the business of the day: I am hereby announcing a new
edition of Novel Food, the culinary/literary event that Lisa of Champaign Taste
and I started in the fall of 2007. I am now carrying the torch. I am a
bookworm and this event is really close to my heart as it brings
together two of my passions, as does the other lovely culinary/literary event I am involved with, Cook the Books.
Every
edition of Novel Food is a little voyage of literary discovery, as you
learn about literary works new to you, and it is also a delightful
banquet made up of the literary-inspired dishes contributed by the
event's participants.
I hope
you will join the party. I am looking forward to learning about a
published literary work (a novel, novella, short story, memoir,
bio, poem, etc.) that provided you with culinary inspiration.
Here are the simple rules for participating in Novel Food:
Prepare
a dish of your choosing that has a connection to a published
literary work (novel, novella, short story, memoir, bio, poem).
Publish
a post about it on your blog by the end of Sunday March 24, 2013
(midnight, Pacific Time), referencing the Novel Food event. Include a
link to this announcement. If you wish, you can use the Novel
Food logo.
Send an
e-mail to simosite AT mac DOT com and include your name, blog
name and blog address, and a permanent link to your post. Please,
include the words "Novel Food" in the email subject, so I can more
easily retrieve the message in my inbox.
Non-English submissions are fine. If possible, include an introduction in English.
If you
don't have a blog, send me an email telling us about the dish, the
literary work that inspired it, and, if you have it, a picture of
what you made: I will add it to the roundup as well.
Note #1:
If you don't receive an answer to your email or a comment on
your post within two days of sending me the email, please contact
me again: sometimes email messages get lost in cyberspace.
Note #2: If you follow this link,
you will be able to browse my portion of the roundup of all
previous editions. In relevant posts, you will find a link to Lisa's
portion of the roundup.
Welcome to the roundup of the 17th edition of Novel Food, the literary/culinary event that Lisa of Champaign Taste
and I created in 2007 and that I continue to host. Novel Food is about
literary works (prose or poetry) that inspire the preparation of dishes.
Like all its predecessors,
the current edition of the event includes a lovely set of readables
and edibles. Please, follow me on a short literary/culinary tour. For
each contribution, I will offer a small bite to whet your appetite for
more: follow the link to read the details of the inspiring work of
literature and of the inspired recipe. I hope that by the time you reach
the end of this post, you will have a nice reading and cooking list to
be used in the near future.
Lucy's main character, Hayley Snow is a food critic in Key West. She "eats a lot of meals out in restaurants. So when she's at home on her
houseboat, I imagine she prefers to cook home-style food that's not too fancy but still delicious" like this "sort of Creole stew crossed with a jambalaya."
"The wedding tiers of the title aludes to Josie's wedding cake
business, where she makes weird and wonderful cakes for brides-to-be... The story is full of baking, cooking, preserving and brewing, with a
lovely dip into village life and all it's weird and wonderful
characters."
Ruhama of rumahama presents The Scorpio Races by Maggie Stiefvater, which inspired her to parepare some November Cakes
"This is a
story about girl power, family, horses, small island life and a little
bit of love. The main characters, of course, are the horses. These
horses are not typical horses, but rather fantastical creatures that
come from the sea and take a different kind of care... and the most memorable food of the Races is the November cake."
"A gorgeously understated and beautiful tale of an unusual cookery school
where there are, in fact, no essential ingredients – only the needs and desires
of the pupils. Steered on their journeys of culinary discovery by the enigmatic
Lillian, the participants, of course, learn more than how to cook – they learn
self-esteem and confidence."
"The book is full of interesting characters from all walks of life. The most tantalizing character to me is the investigator Pepe Carvalho who appears to have a zeal for good food a good drink...
I enjoyed the dialog... It’s sharp, fun and witty. I found myself laughing aloud several times. Investigator Pepe Carvalho certainly held my attention throughout the book."
"The
novel is set mostly in Venice and it seems to me that a plateful of
risi e bisi will make a very nice accompaniment to my reading endeavor." The novel "is about a love affair. Not so much between the 50 year old protagonist, Cantwell, and his eighteen year old
contessa... More distinct is the love Cantwell feels
for Venice, a city which he considers unrivaled."
Inspired by Southern Seas by Manuel Vázquez Montalbán, Simona of briciole prepared frico con patate (frico with potatoes)
"Private detective Pepe Carvalho is an interesting character, at
times difficult to fathom, which is part of his appeal... I imagined
that Carvalho, allergic as he is to any kind of limitation placed upon
food and drink, would leave Artimbau's studio with a craving for
potatoes, so I prepared something to satisfy such craving: my rendition of frico, a traditional dish from Friuli."
"Ms. McTigue
shows us that if you take a sliver of time of a sliver of space, you'll
find a universe that resonates with us, regardless of whether we are
dealing with someone who is sick... I came back to my kitchen determined to bake a mela al cartoccio as a special, early act of giving thanks. But... the idea came to my mind to stuff the apple cavity with cheese instead of raisins."
My special "thank you!" goes to the event's participants. The next edition of Novel Food will be in the spring of 2013: I will announce it here, on The Food Blog Diary, and other venues, so stay tuned. The Food Blog Diary is the lovely event announcement site created and maintained by Jacqueline of Tinned Tomatoes.
Visit the site to read about current events and let her know about your
event and she will post it on her well-organized site. Thank you,
Jacqueline!
In
the meantime, read good books (maybe with the next Novel Food in
mind), cook good foods, and otherwise savor life's local and seasonal
offerings.
Well-demarcated in both time and space, the novel Going to Solace by Amanda McTigue is expansive in the varied cast of characters and rich array of themes it presents:
It's Thanksgiving week, 1989. We're in Big Piney and
Little Piney, two hollows near the town of Garnet in the Blue Ridge
Mountains. A handful of mismatched folks - some country people, some
far-flung, fancy people - discover they have one thing in common:
someone they know is sick, real sick, dying sick. Their paths cross at a
local hospice called Solace. Suddenly, they're caregivers, bedside
improvisers, doing all they can to beat back death or "hurry him on
about his business." (source)
Ms. McTigue shows us that if you take a sliver of time of a sliver of space, you'll find a universe that resonates with us, regardless of whether we are dealing with someone who is sick. She follows the characters as they deal with the task of accepting the various elements of their lives (who they are, where they are, etc.), and move forward.
The character that got most of my attention is Maggie Dull (now calling herself Dulé). Maggie flies from Palo Alto to her hometown to be with her mother, who has written "I do not want to see my children." I finished reading the book as I was visiting my hometown (Perugia) and staying with my family in the apartment where I lived for 15 years before moving to Milan. Differently from Maggie, I go back regularly. This time, something special happened: I attended a high school reunion, a dinner at which I met some people I had not seen since we graduated. It was a truly special evening and one that I hope will be repeated the next time I visit.
My background as a nurse and my professional experience with people nearing the end of their life also provided a special perspective to the reading. As the novel is set during Thanksgiving week, the traditional dinner and the foods served during it are part of the story. The novel inspired me to bake a special treat, connected to the season and to my youth.
During my training as a nurse, I spent a three-month rotation in the department of the Perugia hospital that used to be the sanatorium. The old building, with big windows and a balcony originally used as a sun deck, was located in the middle of a large garden. I remember in particular the many persimmon trees loaded with fruit this time of the year. The tradition of nourishing food that was part of TB treatment was carried on in the kitchen, though the patient population had changed.
In the morning, we would ask the patients whether they wanted baked apples for lunch and/or dinner. The other nurse student and I then went into the kitchen to bring the order. Of course, we could have called on the phone, but we both liked to take a little break and visit the welcoming kitchen. The cook in charge always gave us something special for our breakfast. The kitchen at Solace and its cook, Miss Cherille, reminded me of it. The apples were baked whole, unpeeled, with just a light dusting of sugar on top. From the pan carrying them emanated a sweet smell with a hint of tartness. The apples sat in a shallow pool of juice, unadorned yet proud of their deeply flavored simplicity.
View of a portion of my daily walk to high school
When I was in high school, I sometimes treated myself to a sumptuous mid-morning snack, which I purchased from a bakery located not far from the school (in downtown Perugia): mela al cartoccio, an apple peeled, cored and stuffed with raisins (uvetta) enclosed in crisp puff pastry (pasta sfoglia). I could never eat the whole apple: I would bring home half of it and eat it in the afternoon or for dinner. My deskmate liked it too, a fact I remembered when I saw her at the dinner after seeing mele al cartoccio in the window of the bakery. Time has not stood still, and yet it seemed that for a split moment, I could reach back to that past and get an apple like I used to.
I came back to my Californian kitchen determined to bake a mela al cartoccio as a special, early act of giving thanks. But no sooner had I decided to bake a mela al cartoccio that the idea came to my mind to stuff the apple cavity with cheese instead of raisins. Combining apples and cheese in a baked good is not a new thing for me: last year I made a crostata di mele, burro di mele e formaggio Cheshire (apple, apple butter and Cheshire cheese tart).
I wanted to use Cheddar cheese for the mela al cartoccio and I could do that thanks to the raffle prize I won at the LongHouse Food Writers' Revival event I attended last month: a Kerrygold gift basket containing butter and cheese. For the mela al cartoccio, I chose their Aged Cheddar. It was a great idea.
With apples from the new crop now available, this is the time to try this recipe. Just one piece of advice: get yourself an apple corer. It's really worth the expense. I tried doing without it, but it's tricky: the apple corer makes the operation quick and precise.
Ingredients for one apple (to be multiplied as needed):
An apple of a variety that is good for baking: I used Braeburn (see this page for alternatives)
1/4 of the amount made by the recipe for "alternative" puff pastry (about 3 oz. / 83 g); while I have not tried making the recipe with regular puff pastry, I don't see why it would not work with it
20 g / 3/4 oz. aged Cheddar cheese, shredded using an extra-coarse grater
Preheat the oven to 350 F.
Peel and core the apple. You may or may not want to use a vegetable peeler for the first task, but you want to use an apple corer for the second (trust me). Stuff the apple cavity with the cheese.
Roll the puff pastry into a thin square. Place the apple in the center of the pastry square and wrap it, pinching the seams. Where you see that there is extra puff pastry, you may want to cut a wedge and use it to seal the top or to make a decoration. I skipped the egg wash, but you don't have to: in a small bowl, beat an egg lightly with a tablespoon of water, then brush the surface with the egg wash.
Place the apple on a baking sheet lined with a silicone baking mat and put the baking sheet in the oven. Bake for 35-40 minutes, until the surface is golden. Serve with fanfare (it's justified). When you cut the apple, the smell of melted cheddar and baked apple is irresistible.
Everything that ends marks the beginning of something new. This applies to us as well as to the characters of Going to Solace. That such beginnings occur on Thanksgiving is quite fitting.
This is my second contribution to the 17th edition of Novel Food, the literary/culinary event that Lisa of Champaign Taste and I started some time ago and that I continue to host.
Click on the button to hear me pronounce the Italian words mentioned in the post:
[Depending on your set-up, the audio
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FTC disclosure: I have received a copy of the book mentioned in this post from the publisher. I
have not and will not receive any monetary compensation for discussing
the book on my blog. The opinions expressed are entirely my own.
La tradizionale mela al cartoccio ha un ripieno d'uvetta ed è avvolta in un fazzoletto di pasta sfoglia. A me è venuta l'idea di usare del formaggio Cheddar invece dell'uvetta.
Togliere il torsolo della mela con un coltello non è facile mentre il leva torsolo rende l'operazione veloce e precisa. Vale la pena averne uno a portata di mano.
ripiena e pronta per essere vestita
Ingredienti per una mela (da moltiplicare a seconda del necessario):
una mela Melinda (Braeburn, Renetta, Golden delicious, o Gala )
1/4 della pasta sfoglia che ottenete seguendo la ricetta per la pasta sfoglia "alternativa" (83 g); non ho provato ad usare la pasta sfoglia regolare, ma non vedo perché non dovrebbe funzionare
20 g di formaggio Cheddar invecchiato un anno, tagliato a filetti (usando una grattugia a buchi grossi come questa); se non lo trovate, provate ad usare dell'Asiago o del Gruyère
Scaldare il forno a 177-180 C.
Sbucciare la mela e rimuovere il torsolo. Riempire la cavità con il formaggio.
Stendere la pasta sfoglia in modo da formare all'incirca un quadrato. Porre la mela al centro del quadrato e avvolgerla con la pasta sfoglia. Chiudere i lati premendo la pasta sfoglia con le dita. Dove vedete che c'è un eccesso di pasta sfoglia, potete tagliarne un cuneo e usarlo per chiudere la cima o per fare una decorazione (vedi foto).
Io non ho usato la glassa d'uovo, ma voi potete farlo. In una piccola ciotola sbattere un uovo con un cucchiaio (15 ml) d'acqua e poi stenderne un leggero strato sulla pasta sfoglia usando un pennello da pasticceria.
Porre la mela su una lastra da forno foderata con un tappetino di silicone per forno e infornare. Cuocere per 35-40 minuti, fino a quando la superficie sia dorata. Servire con un po' di fanfara (è ben giustificata). Quando tagliate la mela, verrete avvolti dal profumo irresistibile di formaggio fuso e di mela cotta al forno.
Questo è il mio contributo all'evento La mia ricetta per l'Emilia organizzato dall'azienda Melinda Val di Non, produttrice di mele eccellenti (e lo so perché ne mangio sempre una al giorno quando sono in Italia).
Ho contribuito a tale evento anche una ricetta inedita che trovate sulla pagina dell'evento su Facebook: frittata di mele. Andate a vedere quante belle ricette fanno parte della raccolta.
Three years ago, I read my first Pepe Carvalho novel, Tattoo. It inspired me to make caldeirada (traditional Portuguese fish stew), as recounted in this post. I arrived at Manuel Vázquez Montalbán (1939-2003), Carvalho's creator, through the Montalbano novels. The connection between Montalbano and Montalbán is not an accidental one: as mentioned in the post, Andrea Camilleri, Montalbano's creator, named his character after Montalbán in gratitude, and the two authors knew each other.
After Tattoo, I read The Angst-Ridden Executive and Southern Seas (1979). Private detective Pepe Carvalho is an interesting character, at times difficult to fathom, which is part of his appeal. He has a strange relationship with the people who are
closer to him. There is Biscuter, his sort-of receptionist, who lives in
his office and cooks meals that Carvalho not always can enjoy, but for
which he is very grateful.
'Do you realize, Biscuter – we
private eyes are the barometers of established morality. I tell you,
this society is rotten. It doesn't believe in anything.' 'Yes, boss.' Biscuter backed Carvalho up, not only because he guessed that the boss was drunk, but also because he could recognize a catastrophe when he saw one.
Then, there is Charo, his sort-of girlfriend,
who is also a prostitute with a high-class clientele. Carvalho appears to care about those two people, but at the same time, he does not seem close to them. In Southern Seas, he also cares about Bleda, the
puppy he purchases on a whim after seeing her in the window of a pet
shop.
Carvalho is subject to dark moods. It is not easy to predict how he will react to what happens to him. He may not like the person who hires him or his/her motives, but he does the job he is paid to do, then lets the hiring party deal with the results.
In Southern Seas, Carvalho is hired by the widow of Carlos Stuart Pedrell, a Barcelona businessman, construction magnate, and arts' patron. Stuart Pedrell disappeared not long after
announcing plans to travel to the South Pacific, then, a year later,
he is found stabbed to death at a construction site in Barcelona. His wife asks Carvalho to find out
what happened. The detective reconstructs Stuart Pedrell's existential and physical journey. In the process, he meets an interesting array of characters, from Stuart Pedrell's cocaine-addicted daughter, to his power-addicted business partners (one of them fitness-obsessed, the other an epicure), to his lovers, and travels from the opulence of Stuart Pedrell's residence to the squalor of the apartment where he lived incognito until the violent end. The journey allows the novel's author to offer a composite view of the vibrant Mediterranean city and the people who inhabit it.
Barcelona and food and wine are co-protagonists of this and the other Carvalho novels I have read so far. The detective loves to eat and drink and, as recounted in more details in the previous post, he can cook. He knows his city, walks around it, and describes it in crisp sentences, like this one, where he refers to Franco's dictatorship, which ended only four years prior to the novel's publication, and during which Vázquez Montalbán spent time in prison:
Artimbau's studio was on Calle Baja de San Pedro. As usual, Carvalho felt a flicker of nervousness as he passed the police headquarters in Vía Layetana. He had only bad memories of the barracks-like building. However much they tried to give it a democratic face-lift, for him it would always be a grim fortress of repression.
Artimbau is a painter whom Stuart Pedrell had patronized and he is also a former political associate of Carvalho. The detective visits the artist in his studio and, upon being invited to eat, finds out that Artimbau is on a diet:
Carvalho lifted the lid and was assailed by the aroma of a strange, potato-less stew in which vegetables vied with meat. 'I have to watch my weight, so I don't put in potatoes, And hardly any fat either. But it tastes OK.'
Over stew and plenty of wine, Artimbau tells Carvalho about Stuart Pedrell's rise to power and about the rich man's relationship with the artists he sponsored, which helps Carvalho in his efforts to construct for himself an image of the murdered man.
I read this passage of the book at a time when I was harvesting potatoes I had planted in my little vegetable patch. I love digging potatoes: it's a kind of treasure hunt that ends with something truly valuable. (I have featured my potatoes in the recent post on jota / bean, sauerkraut and potato soup.) I imagined that Carvalho, allergic as he is to any kind of limitation placed upon food and drink, would leave Artimbau's studio with a craving for potatoes, so I prepared something to satisfy such craving: my rendition of frico, a traditional dish from Friuli (the region from which jota also hails).
There are various types of frico, defined by the ingredients used. The basic frico is a crisp cheese fritter. The one I made contains potatoes and also some onion (cipolla). Among the many recipes I looked at, the one that I used to guide me is on this page (in Italian). I did not use pancetta and in terms of cheese, I used half Montasio and half Crescenza, both made by me.
Ingredients:
olive oil
1/2 onion, thinly sliced
9 oz. / 250 g potatoes (I used Yukon Gold from my garden), scrubbed well and grated using an extra-coarse grater (I did not peel them)
4.5 oz. / 125 g cheese half Montasio, sliced thinly and half Crescenza, diced (both homemade)
sea salt and freshly milled black pepper
My homemade Crescenza
My homemade Montasio
Warm up some olive oil in a pan, add the onion, stir well and cook for a few minutes.
Add the grated potatoes and 1/4 cup of water. Stir, cover, and cook until onion and potatoes are soft. Check the pan often and, if it becomes dry, add some hot water to it.
When the potatoes are ready, add the cheese and salt and pepper to taste, then stir to incorporate. Transfer to a warm 8 inch / 20 com non-stick frying pan and flatten into a sort of pancake. Cook the frico on both sides until golden. Use a plate or a rimless lid to flip the frico. When ready, cut into portions and serve immediately.
What about Carvalho and his search for Stuart Pedrell's murder? Southern Seas being a mystery, I don't want to divulge more than necessary to whet your appetite. If you enjoy complex characters that move in a fascinating environment and masterly woven plots, then Manuel Vázquez Montalbán is your type of writer and you may want to pick up one of the Carvalho novels available in English translation (see this page). They are satisfying books, just as frico is a satisfying dish.
This is my contribution to the 17th edition of Novel Food, the literary/culinary event that Lisa of Champaign Taste and I started some time ago and that I continue to host.
Check the announcement for details about participating: the deadline is end of the day Monday, October 22.
Click on the button to hear me pronounce the Italian words mentioned in the post:
[Depending on your set-up, the audio
file will be played within the browser or by your mp3 player
application. Please, contact me if you encounter any problems.]
FTC disclosure: I have received a free
review copy of the book mentioned in this post from the publisher. I
have not and will not receive any monetary compensation for discussing
the book on my blog. The opinions expressed are entirely my own.
What are you reading now? I am reading and enjoying Going to Solace by Amanda McTigue and Thomas Jefferson's Crème Brûlée by Thomas J. Craughwell. Both books have a food component, so I may talk about them in the near future.
As you
can imagine based on the logo on the left, today I am announcing a new
edition of Novel Food, the culinary/literary event that Lisa of Champaign Taste
and I started in the fall of 2007. I am now carrying the torch. I am a
bookworm and this event is really close to my heart as it brings
together two of my passions.
Every
edition of Novel Food is a little voyage of literary discovery, as you
learn about literary works new to you, and it is also a delightful
banquet made up of the literary-inspired dishes contributed by the
event's participants.
I hope
you will join the party. I am looking forward to learning about a
published literary work (a novel, novella, short story, memoir,
bio, poem, etc.) that provided you with culinary inspiration.
Here are the simple rules for participating in Novel Food:
Prepare
a dish of your choosing that has a connection to a published
literary work (novel, novella, short story, memoir, bio, poem).
Publish
a post about it on your blog by the end of Monday October 22, 2012
(midnight, Pacific Time), referencing the Novel Food event. Include a
link to this announcement. If you wish, you can use the Novel
Food logo.
Send an
e-mail to simosite AT mac DOT com and include your name, blog
name and blog address, and a permanent link to your post. Please,
include the words "Novel Food" in the email subject, so I can more
easily retrieve the message in my inbox.
Non-English submissions are fine. If possible, include an introduction in English.
If you
don't have a blog, send me an email telling us about the dish, the
literary work that inspired it, and, if you have it, a picture of
what you made: I will add it to the roundup as well.
Note #1:
If you don't receive an answer to your email or a comment on
your post within two days of sending me the email, please contact
me again: sometimes email messages get lost in cyberspace.
Note #2: If you follow this link,
you will be able to browse my portion of the roundup of all
previous editions. In relevant posts, you will find a link to Lisa's
portion of the roundup.
Welcome to the roundup of the 16th edition of Novel Food, the literary/culinary event that Lisa of Champaign Taste and I created in 2007 and that I continue to host. Novel Food is about literary works (prose or poetry) that inspire the preparation of dishes.
Like all its predecessors, the current edition of the event includes an lovely set of readables and edibles. Please, follow me on a short literary/culinary tour. For each contribution, I will offer a small bite to whet your appetite for more: follow the link to read the details of the inspiring work of literature and of the inspired recipe. I hope that by the time you reach the end of this post, you will have a nice reading and cooking list to be used in the near future.
"Popsicles are enough to make anybody smile, right? Especially when it's still hot enough outside to break a sweat. So, in honor of Earl Grey (the Dalbrador) being safe and as a nod to their business and passion, I infused some of that tea by the same name that always seems to lift my spirits and bring me peace all at the same time, Earl Grey."
Ruhama of rumahama presents Peppermints in the Parlor by Barbara Brooks Wallace, which inspired her to parepare some Eclairs
"Emily's just been orphaned and is going to live with her Aunt Twice at Sugar Hill Hall,... Through the course of the story, Emily is drawn into the confidences of Mrs. Plumly, who invites the poor girl into her private rooms for tea. There she has things like cherry cream tarts, lemon tarts and chocolate cream eclairs."
Phil of As Strong As Soup' continues to find inspiration in poetry: his Eccles Cakes were inspired by Mrs Albion You’ve Got A Lovely Daughter by Adrian Henri.
The poem is "an ecstatic celebration of Liverpool (‘Albion’s most lovely daughter’) and the girls who live (or rather lived) there... I’m not pretending that this is an authentic Eccles cake recipe but it’s the way I like them to be... I prefer them cold or, even better, slightly warm."
"The book... tells the story about this mountain, or I should say chain of mountains which is more correct. Monte Baldo is a chain, stretching from Nago/Torbole in the North of the Garda Lake, to Garda, 36km further south or more exactly San Vigilio, where it ends in the water. [the book] tells the story about the flowers, the trees and how once this mountain was called the Hortus Europae, the European Botanical Garden."
"I am cooking porridge, a nice version of porridge, and nothing resembling the stuff poor Jane had to eat during the Brocklehurst regime at Lowood. Consider this porridge as my present to little Jane, who suffered much but never gave up her quest to find independence and love."
"Please, help yourself to a square of the moist, golden cornbread punctuated with juicy blueberries that I just cut. It's light and substantial at the same time, lightly sweetened and rich in flavor. After partaking of this sunny bread, follow me as I introduce you to a beloved author and one of his novels."
Superintendent Adam Dalgliesh (of Scotland Yard), "sensitive, taciturn, and hardworking" and also a published poet, is offered a lavish tea by Mrs. Fenton as a prelude to an important conversation: "fresh-baked scones, two kinds of sandwiches, home-made cakes and an iced sponge."
My special "thank you!" goes to the event's participants. The next edition of Novel Food will be in the fall: I will announce it here, on The Food Blog Diary, and other venues, so stay tuned. The Food Blog Diary is the lovely event announcement site created and maintained by Jacqueline of Tinned Tomatoes. Visit the site to read about current events and let her know about your event and she will post it on her well-organized site. Thank you, Jacqueline!
In the meantime, read good books (maybe with the next Novel Food in mind), cook good foods, and otherwise savor life's local and seasonal offerings.
This delightful page comes from the novel A Mind to Murder by P.D. James (1963), the second of the Adam Dalgliesh novels. In my announcement for the current edition of Novel Food, I mentioned that I was reading it:
I read the first one Cover Her Face and liked it a lot, so now I am on to the second one. "In 1962 P.D. James' first novel, Cover Her Face, was published. In that novel she introduced the sensitive, taciturn, and hardworking Inspector Adam Dalgliesh" (source).
The murder to which the excerpt refers occurrs at the Steen Psychiatric Clinic, in London. An interesting detail is that at the beginning of the story, Superintendent Dalgliesh (of Scotland Yard) is asked to visit the scene of the crime while he is at a party:
At the other end of the square Superintendent Adam Dalgliesh of the Criminal Investigation Department was attending the ritual autumn sherry party given by his publishers which had coincided with the third reprint of his first book of verse. He didn't overestimate his talent or the success of his book. The poems, which reflected his detached, ironic and fundamentally restless spirit, had happened to catch a public mood.
Dalgliesh is a published poet: see, I told you that he is an interesting character. And P.D. James is a skillful and sensitive writer. I hope that the excerpts give you a glimpse of her art. With both novels, I had difficulty putting down the book, the traditional hallmark of the deeply absorbed reader.
The passage about the tea offered to Dalgliesh by Mrs. Fenton struck me particularly, since we are told in detail what was prepared for Dalgliesh and his reaction to the feast. Having recently presented two recipes for scones, I decided try my hand at something different to offer Superintendent Dalgliesh. I started my search using "iced sponge" as a trace, and, after looking at a number of recipes, I chose the one for Lemon Sponge Cake with Mixed Berries.
For Superintendent Dalgliesh, in the case at hand the conclusion does not come easy. In fact, in the lead up to the novel's denouement, he voices his uneasiness. This being a mystery, saying more would put me in the difficult position of revealing important details of the story and I'd much rather pique your curiosity and make you reach for the volume.
a nice, light cake
And now for the cake that I contribute to the tea prepared for Superintendent Dalgliesh. It a lightly sweetened cake with an soft texture that is just perfect for a proper English tea. I halved the quantities of the original recipe, halved again the sugar and made a couple more adjustments. I also used a mix of fruit, rather than jsut berries: raspberries (lamponi), mango and cherries (ciliegie). Instead of honey, I drizzled some fruit syrup on the top. The syrup is a by-product of macerating fruit for making preserves. At a preserve-making class I took from June Taylor, I saw her drain some of the juice produced by the fruit, when it was too much, which can happen, depending on the kind of fruit used. I boiled the syrup to reduce it slightly, and jarred it with the intention of using it in situations like the one at hand. It is lightly sweetened and very fruity.
Ingredients:
3 large eggs, separated
1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar
1/4 cup (50 g) superfine sugar: take 1 tablespoon of it after measuring
1 tablespoon hot water
1/2 tablespoon freshly grated lemon zest
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
Pinch of salt
1/2 cup cake flour
Mixed fruit
2 tablespoons fruit syrup
Follow the instructions as on the original recipe with the following adjustments:
Add the tablespoon of sugar you separated to the egg whites.
Use an 8-inch springform pan and line the bottom with parchment paper.
If your oven allows it, use the convenction bake option.
Check the cake after 30 minutes in the oven.
Drizzle fruit syrup over top of cake; however, if you don't have syrup, use the honey and lemon juice blend as in the original recipe.
Considering the challenge I face every time I decide to decorate something, I am proud of myself for how I was able to keep my inner genie under control here. I think that a Kandinsky-influenced decoration would not have been appropriate in the case of Mrs. Fenton's tea.
[Depending on your set-up, the audio file will be played within the browser or by your mp3 player application. Please, contact me if you encounter any problems.]
Sono un Esperto di Allrecipes su base volontaria e pertanto non percepisco alcun compenso per il lavoro svolto per Allrecipes.it.
Le recensioni, i contenuti e le opinioni espresse in questo blog sono da attribuire esclusivamente a Simona
