Recipe: Hamburger

Nothing whatsoever to do with commercially-produced junk food, this recipe is quick and easy, and bursting with flavour. Delicious served hot, as in this version with a mustard cream sauce - but arguably even more delicious served cold, the following day, after the flavours have all matured generously, when the burgers go well with a fresh salad.

This was variously derived from Pierre Franey and Marcella Hazan, with a few variations of my own which have been introduced over the years.

For four.

Ingredients: 500g ground meat (beef, lamb, or pork); half a red pepper; half a medium onion; 30g butter; 2 medium eggs; 60g freshly-grated parmesan; half a teaspoon dried thyme; salt & pepper; 2 tablespoons olive oil.

For the mustard-cream sauce: half a cup chicken stock; quarter cup of cream; generous teaspoon of dijon mustard.

Method:

1. Melt the butter in a small pan. Finely dice onion and pepper and sauté in melted butter for several minutes, until collapsed, then allow to cool.

2. Combine the onion and pepper in a bowl with the ground meat, parmesan, eggs, thyme and seasoning, to taste (I find it takes quite a lot of salt to work to my liking). Set aside in the fridge for twenty minutes or so, to firm.

3. Heat the oil in a heavy pan, large enough to sauté four burgers comfortably without them touching each other. Turn the mixture out onto a floured board, and divide it into four. Make each one into an individual patty approx 3" across and 1" thick. (If the mixture seems quite sloppy at this stage, try adding a little flour in order to make it more resilient - if the burgers aren't firm enough, they'll fall apart in cooking)

4. Carefully place the burgers in the hot oil, and cook for about seven minutes on each side. Take great care when turning them over - the egg within the mixture should have coagulated decently by this stage, but it's better to be safe than sorry.

5. Meanwhile, in a small pan, combine the stock and cream, heat to an enthusiastic simmer and reduce the combined mixture until it is of coating density; add the mustard at this stage and continue to reduce further, for several minutes, stirring, until it's quite thick. Taste for seasoning (but it shouldn't really need any)

6. Serve, with a spoonful of sauce over each burger.

Back on track...

Last week, my computer died. Definitively. With a deafening and high-pitched scream, which indicated that recent ministrations by the Technical Dept had achieved nothing...and that if the beast wasn't swiftly despatched, in order to put us all out of our misery, its banshee wail would drive the entire quartiere to distraction. It now rests in the elephants' graveyard which is laughingly (ha!) supposed to be the computer repair shop at the other end of Via San Francesco...but the only basis on which I would leave it there was because this was (only marginally) better than merely slinging the thing in the dustbin forthwith. Last year, the TD left one of his subsidiary machines there to have the hard disk upgraded, and we've not seen it back since!

Hence the protracted silence over the airwaves for the past week or so. Now broken only by the expedient of investing in a new computer...by which I'm deeply impressed, as I had no idea that laptop technology had advanced in the past seven years (since I last upgraded) to the extent that it has. No more steam-driven internet access for me!

And in the meantime, you've been excused postings about the weather, which was truly unbearable for several days, as humidity levels reached an all-time high. To the extent that all the salt and sugar which weren't in sealed containers solidified into claggy lumps, which made them very difficult to use. And in the middle of that period, I made the mistake of thinking I'd make ravioli for supper, one evening. Even as I was clamping the pasta rolling machine in place, I started to have well-placed misgivings. As the sheets of pasta got longer and thinner and clammier by the minute, I realised that fresh pasta, in its own way, is as sensitive to climate as is chocolate. And just as you don't temper chocolate on a hot day, so you don't even think about rolling pasta when there's a hint of humidity in the atmosphere.

And as we were gasping at the temperatures down on the plain, and wishing that the distant rolls of thunder would resolve themselves into a decent air-clearing thunderstorm, up in the Garfagnana it was apparently bucketing down. With the result that Umberto was soon delivering industrial quantities of funghi porcini to Louisa, next door, and she in turn was passing on generous quantities of the same to us. The consequent funghi porcini fest lasted three days, with porcini roast in the oven with garlic on the first day, followed by a porcini and parmesan salad on the next day, and finally indulging in wonderful porcini tempura on the final funghi dinner. The stuff of memories...!

Tonight's dinner:

Phyllo tart shells, filled with chicken livers and wild mushrooms, in a cream & marsala sauce.

Salsicce, with sweet & sour zucchini.

Chocolate-vodka clafoutis, with fresh apricots.

Recipe: Osso Bucco with Orange

For years I've ignored the traditional Osso Bucco recipe - which uses tomatoes - in favour of a version Bugialli calls 'alla Novese', which is a 'white' recipe, where the usual combination of tomatoes and aromatic vegetables is replaced by lemon and garlic, green olives and white wine. Light and delicious, it has always seemed to me preferable to the indistinct mess of tomatoes and chopped vegetables that risks being mistaken for the base of a second-rate pizza. I've now discovered that the simple addition of orange to the traditional ingredients changes all that, however, and the citrus flavour more than adequately counter-balances the bland sweetness of the tomato. Well worth trying.

For four.

Ingredients: 4 Osso Bucco; 150g Carrots; 150g Onions; 100g Celery; 200g tinned tomatoes; 8 tbs Olive Oil; 30g Butter; grated zest of 1 Orange (or 1/4 teaspoon Orange Oil); 1 sprig fresh Thyme; 100 ml White Wine; 2 cloves Garlic, minced; 4 tbs Soy Sauce; approx 500 ml Chicken Stock; Seasoning. Chopped Parsley, for garnish when serving.

Method:

1. Heat the oven to 180 degrees C.

2. Heat half the Oil in a sauté pan and brown the Osso Bucco on both sides.

3. Remove the Osso Bucco pieces from the pan, add the Butter. Peel and dice Carrots and Onions, and dice the Celery. Add 2/3 of the Carrots and Onions to the pan, along with half of the Celery, the Orange zest (or Oil) and fresh Thyme. Sauté until the vegetables have completely collapsed, about ten minutes.

4. Add White wine, raise heat and cook, stirring, for about two minutes, then add Tomatoes, Garlic and Soy Sauce. Mix everything well together, then return the Osso Bucco pieces to the pan. Cover with Chicken Stock, put the lid on the pan, and put into the pre-heated oven for about one and a half hours.

5. Towards the end of this period, lightly sauté the remaining diced vegetables in the remaining Oil - they should be tender, but not entirely collapsed. Season lightly.

6. Remove Osso Bucco from the oven. Put the meat to one side, strain the cooking liquid and discard the vegetables. Reduce the sauce to a coating consistency, then return the Osso Bucco pieces to it, along with the sautéed vegetables, and re-heat gently for about five minutes. Check and adjust seasoning before serving.

Sprinkle with freshly chopped Parsley, once plated.

Quote of the week...

Nothing whatsoever to do with food, but probably the reason why I end up having so many arguments with the security morons at the airport:

"However good a law is, it is invariably clumsy. This is why its application should be disputed or questioned. And the practice of doing this corrects its clumsiness and serves justice."

It comes from John Berger's excellent novel 'From A to X' - a perfect gem, which I've just finished.

And the other book which rates highly on my list, currently, is Raymond Blanc's 'Blanc Vite', which forms the underpinning to our ongoing weight-loss regime. I've had a copy for many years, and a number of recipes from it have been regulars on my list for some time. It was written after Blanc had had a mild heart attack, I think, and focuses significantly on healthy eating. In practice - and if you can ignore the tedious pontifications of his attendant dietician which pepper the text - it works excellently within a low-carb diet. Where he uses fructose, I substitute Splenda, and in place of marscapone or crème fraiche I use double cream. The recipes are good and interesting, and it means being able to eat well even as the pounds fall off - which they appear to be doing. He's a little one-noted when it comes to desserts in this book - many variations on stewed fruit, in practice - but it's easy enough to vary them in menu planning by the inclusion of dietarily sound things like soufflés and phyllo tarts and mousses. So highly do I think of the book that I've bought a second copy to take with me back to Italy next week - amazingly, the going rate for a second-hand copy (of the paperback!) was £104 on both Amazon and Abe, so I was pleased to be able to snaffle a copy on ebay for a tenner!

All the indications are that Massimo has indeed worked magic re the contract for the fourteenth century farmhouse in Pisa - although the situation was much more complicated than we'd realised, and has involved a convocation of the church curia, and the demise of Pisa Football Team (with much wailing and gnashing of teeth from its loyal fan base). All being well, we can sign a lease next week, once a few final legalities have been dealt with...

Tonight's dinner:

Sweet & sour salad of Cucumber and Prawns, with toasted Sesame seeds.

Blanquette of Lamb. Cavolo Nero, sautéed with Garlic.

Strawberry Soufflé.

Recipe: Peppers, with Rosemary & Balsamic Vinegar

Another one from the master, Bruno Loubet. Originally, he paired this dish with his splendid recipe for Cod wrapped in Parma Ham - but in fact, it will work just as well with any fleshy white fish fillet, or even with something like a plain grilled chicken breast or a piece of roast pork. Although a great deal less work than ratatouille, this is more than just a poor man's version of that; the flavours here of rosemary, basil, and balsamic vinegar are beguiling, and give to the finished dish a first class status all of its own.

For four.

Ingredients: 4 Peppers (Capsicums) of assorted colours; 1 tablespoon Olive Oil; 2 cloves Garlic, minced; 1 teaspoon capers (cut up, if large); the needles from 1 sprig Rosemary, finely chopped; Salt, to taste; 4 large, fresh Basil leaves; 2 tablespoons Balsamic Vinegar.

Method:

1. Heat the oven to 200 degrees C. Halve the Peppers, discarding cores and seeds, and place cut-side down in a roasting dish; brush the skin of the Peppers with Olive Oil and roast in the oven for twenty minutes or so, until they begin to blacken and the skins are visibly swelling.

2. Put the Pepper halves in a bowl, along with all of the juices in the bottom of the roasting dish, and cover with clingfilm. Leave for twenty minutes or so, then remove the skins from the Peppers and cut each one into four slices.

3. Put the sliced Peppers into a saucepan, along with their cooking juices. Add all of the remaining ingredients apart from the Basil and the Vinegar. Cover the pan and cook over a medium heat, stirring from time to time for about thirty minutes. Just before serving, stir in the Balsamic Vinegar, and the Basil leaves, finely sliced.

A new arrival...

The mini-four-footed has been born!

On June 12th, to be precise, at around 10.30 in the evening. Mother and puppies - all five of them - are doing well, and we're heading off to Hampshire tomorrow morning to inspect in person. Of the five, three are bitches and two are dogs - and although there's no requirement at this stage to choose which of the dogs we'll take, I suspect we'll start bonding on the spot, and the decision will take itself...


Tonight's dinner:

...is in Clerkenwell, somewhere. A new discovery by the Brancolis-in-London, so they're making all the arrangements.

Manna from Heaven.

Hand-made cumbrian fudge, from The Toffee Shop in Penrith. Wonderful stuff...we dished out boxes of it as stocking-filler presents at Christmas, several years ago, and it has been spoken of ever since in awed tones by the various recipients. Last time we were in London, we stocked up on supplies (from the traiteur on Chelsea Green, who sometimes carries it) to have on-hand as gifts when going to dinner parties in Pisa. Which was why we happened to have some lying around last week, which the Technical Department thought might be just the right sort of thing to give as an offering to the octagenarian Monsignor who is our new landlord for the storage lock-up in Via Sant'Andrea which we've just leased.

We'd gone along to his den last Monday, to sign the rental contract, on which occasion the Monsignor had sat, on a large ecclesiastical throne, through the entire proceeding reading 'Oggi' magazine, and every so often pointing out interesting articles to his one-armed (and almost octagenarian himself) major domo - seated at his right hand, on a smaller ecclesiastical throne - who'd been deputed to deal with the practicalities of the matter. The Monsignor seemed a jolly old cove, generally delighted with life, and inclined to make long and rambling jokes, the point of which were way out of our reach - but it seemed polite to laugh anyway, and the whole affair was jovial all round.
So, when he telephoned later in the week to say that the registered copy of the contract was available for us to collect (he managed to drop the phone in the process, and then pressed the wrong buttons on his phone console, so that after he thought he'd finished the phone call he could be heard for several minutes afterwards saying querulously to somebody else that he thought he'd done something wrong as the phone didn't seem to work any more) the TD suggested we take him a box of fudge as a gesture of goodwill. With surprising results.
Since the Contessa hasn't yet favoured us with a response to our offer re renting her Palazzo on the lungarno, we thought we'd ask, in passing, if the church had any property that might be appropriate for us to rent instead. The initial answer was a regretful 'no', that all of their property was spoken for...which turned perceptibly into a 'but, then again, maybe', after presentation of the box of fudge.

And the 'but, then again, maybe' turned out to be a fourteenth century farmhouse nestled under the eaves of the church of Santa Catarina, with beams and exposed medieval brickwork and the whole nine yards....oh, and a couple of acres of garden, looking out onto fields beyond, and not another house in sight. And all within the middle of the Centro Storico, five minutes walk from the leaning tower...

Pinching ourselves in disbelief, we've come back to London, leaving Massimo to work his magic on contract negotiations. It's tempting fate to say more about it before the ink is dry on the paper, so I won't...

Tonight's Dinner:

Smoked salmon tiède, on a soubise of onion & basil

Grilled duck breast, with bay leaves and garlic; fava beans in parsley sauce.

Peach tarts (made with white peaches from the garden - incomparable!)