F*$K CHICKEN, I WANT DUCK!

   
     Julie. Julie. Julie. What can I say? Awesome. Funny. Beautiful. Perfect! Julie has the best attitude: "you cook and I eat." Then, after we eat and drink wine and have lots of fun, "I clean." Marry me? So when she invited a few friends and myself up to her house in Carmel, I was delighted.

    Then we had to plan the menu. DUCK!!! Its expensive, especially from the Farmer's Market. Chicken? You know what I say to chicken (see blog title). So I was the duck lady. And I failed. Miserably. I went to the Farmer's Market. There it was, exactly what made me drool the week before. But the price was up there. So I figured, I can get it somewhere upstate. NOT. I couldn't find it anywhere! So we were stuck with stupid chicken.

     I was determined to make this the most delicious chicken ever. It was pretty good. I stuffed the skin with butter, garlic and rosemary and roasted the thing. But it wasn't duck! Chicken just is not duck. Can we just change the subject? Please!

     Julie's house is gorgeous, inside and out, and the view of the lake she has from her porch is so serene. For a bird watcher, it was the perfect vantage point. I saw a crested woodpecker!!! Don't get too excited! No one else but myself did anyway.
     Back to food: Julie got us started with a fantastic cheese plate. And Miguel made a vat of his infamous and the best guacamole.

     I made some pesto pinwheels. Easy. Defrost some puff pastry, spread some olive oil, pesto and grated cheese on it, roll it, cut it, then bake cut side down. A really easy appetizer.

   Some rosemary lamb chops. Bleeding. Succulent.

  Markus' Sunchoke Bruschetta.

    Along with the chicken, Miguel made a mushroom risotto, and we roasted some carrots and brussels sprouts.
    Dessert: with the rest of that puff pastry I made Elephant Ears.

 It was a fantastic (duckless) dinner. 

Next day for breakfast we had a delicious kale and mushroom frittata, some yummy fried potatoes and banana bread. Needless to say we were full and happy. Lake time and catchphrase and it was a perfect day! I did not want to leave the wonderful company and Julie's gorgeous home. Thanks for your grace and hospitality Jules! You're the best!   

THE SCIENCE AND PHILOSOPHY OF FRYING EGGPLANTS

   I recently was stranded in the country and the parental units had to come and pick me up. Well if thats not an excuse to fry some eggplant then I don't know what is. Sergio, the CSA farmer, gave us some gigantic eggplants this week. And if I have one special talent to save from the apocalypse it would be my frying technique. Eggplants are good for one thing, sopping up olive oil. How many times have I heard the lame complaint, "I hate the way eggplants soak up so much oil." Well what kind of oil are you using? I can put good extra virgin olive oil on anything and when its embedded in a spongy fat eggplant slice, it is fried heaven.

   The key to frying eggplant is first soaking the slices in salted water for an hour or so. Some people think it removes the bitterness but its really just osmosis in action: the movement of water from an area of higher concentration to an area of lower concentration through a semi-permeable membrane, in this case sweet eggplant flesh. So the eggplant has lots of non-salty water in it. So when you put it into salty water, all that water in the eggplant wants to hook up with the salt on the outside so the water gets drawn out, making the eggplant perfect for frying. You know when water mixes with hot oil it can be a dangerous situation, so after I remove the eggplant slices from the salt water I get rid of the excess water by placing them on paper towels.

    Now its time to fry! You really should not fry in extra virgin olive oil because it has a low burning temperature but you don't want your eggplant to sop up canola or worse corn oil. Gross. So I create a blend of extra virgin olive oil with canola oil in order to raise the burning temperature of the extra virgin olive oil. Smoking oil is not good for the body. I do not use a thermometer when I fry. I heat it up, then when I feel like its right, I put in a little piece of bread or whatever I am frying in the oil and if it gets all bubbly and happy then its the right temperature. 

   You want to use at least an inch of oil because like I mentioned the eggplants just soak in the oil. When they get nice and golden on each side, remove from the oil, place on more paper towels, then (do not forget this step) salt them with sea salt while they are hot.

   So now you have all this fried eggplant, what do you do with it? Well philosophically speaking, the eggplants is the end, and the means to enjoying these oily beauties is either a nice red sauce or some good Italian Bread. 

   As my parents were driving up here I said, "Listen, I have some eggplant frying, we are going to need to figure out a sauce situation." Rocco arrived and was on it. His sauce is inspired by a tomato sauce he had in Tuscany but he made it Sicilian by adding basil. He fried some garlic in olive oil and added some peperoncino. Then he added some canned plum tomatoes and cut them up in the pan while they were cooking. He added some salt and pepper and after about 15 minutes added some fresh basil. It was done that fast and so delicious. 

   Mommy was like, "that sauce was so good." 

   Me: "how did he make that?" 

   "I don't know. I can't make sauce like that." 

   Its so simple, yet Rocco can really hook up a mean sauce in a hurry, like a magician while no one is looking. (And for the record, Mommy, who Rocco calls the "American Woman" makes a fresh tomato sauce that rivals Nonna's. Good thing Nonna has no internet access because what I just said was a major mala figura.) 

   And now its the moment we have all been waiting for. The marriage between the sweet fried eggplant and the delicious tomato sauce. The grated pecorino romano cheese is like the wedding band that bring the two flavors together in such delicious harmony for our bellies to enjoy. Good thing, Rocco has been complaining that his panza (It: stomach) is not fat enough.

APPLE CIDER DONUTS

     Fall is definitely my favorite season. The brisk air is nice and that fall foliage is super perdy, but what makes fall so delicious is Apple Cider Donuts!!! I had just bought an Apply Crisp and a bag of Apple Cider Donuts from Ritter's Cider Mill while taking a weekend trip with Charlie the Catahoula to the Pocono Mountains of PA. 

     Then the car broke down while I was at the dog run. Elaine, a lovely lady, drove me home. Picture this, Elaine and me, in her red mini cooper with the crazy Catahoula plus two 5 month old Labrador Puppies wrestling in the back. It was a tight and wild fit. For being my saviour Elaine got to take home that Apple Crisp, but I was left with nothing to eat but ALL of those Apple Cider Donuts. I am not complaining. They were a perfect breakfast and lunch until Rocco and Mommy came from Queens and picked me up. We picked up more on the way home, 18 in total, so apologies to all my friends who I am pushing the donuts on. Its just that if you don't help me, I WILL eat them all. They are so good. 

     Does anyone have any Apple Cider Donut recipes? I am a frying Queen and know I can handle this. Although it might be danger to know how.

THE PORCH

(photo: ©Jennifer Galatioto)

Above: Country House With New Screened in Porch

This is an essay I entered into a contest to win a trip for my entire family to go on vacation to a luxury camping resort in Montana. I don't think I won, because I've never yet been to Montana, but I figured I'd  share. The topic was Memorable Family Get Togethers. 

An Italian American family get together is about food, food and more food. About thirty of us were visiting my parent’s country house. It was a special occasion because our cousin Leonardo was visiting from Italy and a gigantic feast was in order. It was a smorgasbord of delicious dishes, a hybrid of American barbeque like hot dogs, hamburgers and local corn, combined with Italian delights like eggplant, mozzarella and of course the pasta, which my father Rocco was in charge of. A meal in our family does not begin until the pasta is boiled perfectly al dente. The rest of the food was waiting, warm under aluminum foil, while my family was sitting, mouths watering at the table on the deck. I could see my father in the kitchen straining the pasta. He finally emerged. This would be a truly unforgettable meal. As the gigantic platter of pasta made contact with the table, the four feet high deck gave out from under the weight of us all. Everyone slid off the deck, followed by mounds of uneaten food. In a moment of crisis in an Italian American family, food comes before women and children. It was a hysterical effort on everyone’s part to grab flying sausages and tubs of mashed potatoes. Diving across the table to save a tray of my grandmother’s veal cutlets was worth the risk of breaking a limb. We were all so concerned with rescuing the food that it wasn’t until the madness was over that we realized poor Leonardo, our Italian guest, was pinned beneath the table covered in pasta and tomato sauce. It was the most memorable meal we never ate.