Notes from a week in the kitchen
Last week I finally spent a proper stretch of time in the kitchen - my first since Francesca was born.
It finally seems my little girl is easing into nursery life, and the whole family has already adjusted to her new rhythm: dad drops her off at 9am on his way to work; and I pick her up on foot around 4pm - her school being only a short walk from home.
So what did I do with all this “free time”?
I cooked. (Cleaned the apartment, ran errands, worked on a new newsletter piece for the relaunch.) And then I cooked some more.
Here’s what I made, what worked, what didn’t, and a few things worth trying in your own kitchen.
1. Monday: Hazelnut Sage Thumbprint Cookies
I'm on the hunt for a really good thumbprint cookie and was excited to try Jess Elliott Dennison's version w almond flour and garden herbs. I used what I could find in the kitchen: I subbed hazelnut flour for almond; then I chopped a handful of sage very thinly and added the zest of both a lemon and an orange.
Tbh I worried the sage would be odd in a sweet recipe - but curiousity won. There are tons of savoury recipes calling for both hazelnuts and sage these days so I was hoping they might work well together in a sweet bake, too.
As for toppings, some cookies got my quince jam, some a toasted almond, and the rest a tiny teaspoon of hazelnut butter - just enough to fill the small indentation I'd made by pushing my thumb down on each ball of dough.
The little nuggets baked quickly and were a tad dry at first, but softened nicely after a day on the counter. The sweet hazelnut really suited the gray sky outside my kitchen window, bringing some much needed warmth and comfort.
In the end, the sage was not bad at all, if a tad subdued. I may use more next time! (Do give garden herbs a try in your baking - it's fun.)
My favourite topping ended up being hazelnut butter, although I reckon that with all the different flavours already coming together beautifullly in the dough (lemon, orange, hazelnut, sage), these chubbies may not need any additions at all. I enjoyed them with my coffee in the morning and in the afternoon.
You can find the recipe in Lazy Baking by Jessica Elliott Dennison.
2. Tuesday: Garlicky Cavolo Nero Stew
On Tuesday, I was in the mood for a big pot of cavolo nero soup for dinner. I'm annoyed by the amount of manual labour these billowy bunches require, but I know it's worth it. So I busied myself with the preparation: I snapped each green plume from the bunch, slid my fingers along the stem to strip the leaves off, tore them into bite-sized strips and ran them under cold water for a quick rinse.
Cavolo nero truly sings when it's propped by a healthy dose of garlic. I added 2 fat cloves to the pot, alongside a generous glug of evo oil. Then I dropped in a thinly chopped onion, the torn cavolo nero, a scant kilo of potatoes - peeled and cubed - a can of butter beans (drained), and my favourite stock cube (veg+oraganic). Covered with boiling water from the kettle and left to its own devices until thick and smelling homely.
Consistency wise, it's the potatoes that make a difference here: by the time they start collapsing, most of the water will have gone and you'll end up with a dense, creamy, hearty stew that's both filling and comforting. So don't rush the cooking.
We ate it w more evo oil, black pepper, and grated Grana Padano.
3. Wednesday: Eggplant Lasagna Rolls
Somehow I found a handful of thin and long Sicilian eggplants in my fridge - in November! Outrageous. They'd started to go a bit limp and I really didn't want them to go to waste. I also noticed a small collection of items nearing their end of life: a pot of ricotta, half a pack of ready-made polenta (the firm kind shaped like a flat brick), and some fresh lasagna sheets.
I thought: let's bake a tiny eggplant lasagna for Francesca!
I mixed the ricotta and the polenta together really well, seasoning w a generous squeeze of tomato paste, grated Grana Padano, evo oil, pepper and salt. Fried the sliced eggplants until tender and juicy, and folded them in.
At this point, all I needed to complete the lasagna was a tin of tomato sauce. Of which, of course, there was none in the pantry.
Now, fresh lasagna sheets don't need poaching before layering and baking. They cook in the oven by absorbing the moisture from the raw passata (and bèchamel if using), resulting in tender layers and a thick, sticky, reduced sauce.
But, as I said, I had no passata at home (and no milk for the bèchamel).
So here's how I troubleshooted: I wet each sheet under warm water, added the filling, rolled it up, cut each roll in half, and nestled them upright in a tin. A few tablespoons of water in the tin (plus a splash in the airfryer drawer for steam), and a film of parchment on top, for 20 minutes at 160°C.
The tops turned crunchy, but the rest steamed itself fairly soft. All in all it was a succes - and it tasted absolutely rich and great. Although... next time, a better idea might be to simply poach the sheets a little, like you do with the dry ones. Oh well...
Still, I'm quite chuffed that I was able to put dinner on the table AND avoid chucking out so much great food.
4. Thursday: Batch Roasting a Giant Pumpkin
I saw it at the supermarket and fell in love with it - a gorgeous, enormous fairy-tale pumpkin... ten kilos of pure autumnal vibes. I sent Pier back to pick it up because it was too heavy for me, and them he also sliced it for me into quarters which I slid into the oven, two chunks per time, for about 1 hour at 180 C.
It was a Muscade pumpkin, a French variety that I was trying out for the first time, and boy was I excited.
Google says its named after nutmeg (noix de muscade in French, noce moscata in Italian), because of the sweet, nutty flavour of its flesh. That sounded so good.
I went through my usual batch-roasting method: bake it with the skin on until very tender, scoop out the flesh, and freeze it flat in plastic bags (easier to store and defrost).
This time however, I left the stringy, seedy part on while roasting, as I’d seen on some Instagram reel. I've got bad hands myself so any hack that puts less strain on them, I try!
Only, it burnt. Not the whole thing, but the seedy part, yes. The apartment smelled awful the whole morning - never again. I’m afraid I'm going to have to keep scooping the seeds before roasting, even though my poor hands hate that bit.
I don't think I'll buy Muscade again. It turned out to be way too watery and as stringy as a spaghetti squash. Taste wise - it's more like carroty than pumpkin-y, so for me it's a no.
Too bad I’ve got 8 kilos of roast flesh in the freezer to get through before I can go back to my beloved zucca marina di Chioggia or a delica.
5. Friday: Radicchio Salad & Tomato Bread
On Friday, I realised I had three rosy bunches of radicchio in the fridge - as fresh as roses in their buds on a misty morning. My dad had given them to me from his vegetable patch.
I washed, tore, and tossed them in olive oil, white wine vinegar, and a little salt and called it lunch. There was also a small loaf of homemade bread I’d flavoured with tomato paste (the same paste from the lasagna rolls). I usually start from scratch, but this time I relied on some help...
If you travel around Italy, you’ll often find ready-made flour mixes for focaccia, pinza, or pizza. They usually contain a simple blend of strong flour and dried baker’s yeast. If you’re in a rush, or maybe you’ve run out of yeast, all you have to do is weigh your flour mix first, and then add the same amount of lukewarm water minus 100 grams.
So: if I’m going for 400 g of flour, I’ll need about 300 g of water (up to 330 max).
Once you’ve got your shaggy dough, you leave it in a cosy spot, under a tea towel, for at least a couple of hours. Then you can tip it into a tin and bake for 15 minutes at 225°C, ideally with a bit of water in a small tin at the bottom of the oven to create steam.
(Alternatively, you can make soft stuffed bread: portion the dough into balls the size of your palm, flatten them, fill with whatever you like, then wrap the sides up and flatten again. Bake as above.)
I slathered fresh goat's cheese on my tomato bread and dug into the radicchio w great pleasure, knowing that it's the simple things that bring the most reward.
Extra Nice: A Crate of Gifted Persimmons
Not much cooking involved here, but I wanted to acknowledge how cool it is to receive a full crate of persimmons (or any fruit, for that matter) from someone’s tree - in my case, a friend of a friend.
I love persimmons. Any day.
And in case you’re not familiar with them, here’s how you eat a ripe one…
And that's a wrap! I loved sharing my kitchen notes here. I hope you've found something interesting or useful - and if you have, I'd love to know what..
Happy cooking,
Sinù xx
--
Comments
Post a Comment