Pasta Under (Not With) the Stars

Wines:

Concerto Reggiano Lambrusco - 2004
Chateau La Conseillante Pomerol 1982

Our friend John who owns The Wine House in San Francisco, often stays with us. He imports wines and comes to Los Angeles to sell them. We decided to a cook a dinner for him and he brought us a 1982 Pomerol for the dinner.

Los Angeles had been unusually warm and humid. What Global Warming? See the movie: An Inconvenient Truth for the sorry details. At least when the snow caps melt and the water rises, being on top of a hill we will be safe!

The warm weather dictated the menu and the dining location. We decided to eat on the deck overlooking the city and it was a beautiful night.

We started with drinks and a Goat Cheese, Salami Almonds and Olives. We had recently had the Salami from Fra’ Mani at La Terza. It was excellent. We had other sausages from Fra’ Mani but not the Salami. We asked Chris at The Cheese Store of Silverlake if he was getting the Salami and he just happened to have ordered it. It is very good.

We then had Melon and Prosciutto. The melon season is in full swing and every melon we have selected has been excellent.

When we first came to Los Angeles, John came down to visit us and we went to an Italian Restaurant: Locanda Veneta. We had a fabulous Pasta made with Tomatoes, Spinach and Lentils. It is exceptionally rich and you would think it has Meat in the sauce, but it doesn’t. We obtained the recipe and make it every summer using fresh heirloom tomatoes. We first made Oven Candied Summer Tomatoes using a recipe by Lynne Rossetto Kasper from The Italian Country Table.

Oven Candied Summer Tomatoes

Cut up tomatoes into wedges combine with salt and 1 cup extra-virgin oil. Place pulp up on a baking sheet in a 400 degree oven for 30 minutes. Reduce heat to 350 and bake 30 more minutes more, reduce heat to 250 and bake to edges of tomatoes start to darken. Remove from oven cool 20 minutes. Transfer to a glass dish pour oil from pan over the tomatoes and let set uncovered for 4 – 6 hours. Refrigerate till use.

Here is the Pasta Recipe using the tomatoes.

Massimo's Spaghetti with Spinach and Lentils

Yield: 6

Ingredients:

3/4 cup lentils
Water as needed
1 bn spinach
6 x Roma tomatoes halved
Salt to taste
Freshly-ground black pepper to taste
1 sm bunch Italian parsley chopped
2 x garlic cloves minced
Dried oregano to taste
Olive oil as needed
1 sm carrot minced
1 x red onion minced
1 x celery stalk minced
1 lb spaghetti
1 tbl butter - (to 2 tbspns)
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese

Method:
Rinse lentils, then cover with water and soak 2 hours. Drain.

Rinse spinach and remove stems, keeping some water on leaves. Saute spinach in skillet over medium heat until wilted, 2 to 3 minutes. Set aside.

Place tomatoes in 9-inch square baking pan, cut-side up. Sprinkle with salt and pepper to taste, parsley, garlic, dash oregano and 1 tablespoon oil. Roast at 450 degrees until very tender and lightly browned, 20 to 30 minutes. Set aside.

Heat 1/3 cup oil in large saucepan over medium heat. Add carrot, onion and celery and saute until vegetables are golden, 8 to 10 minutes. Add lentils and enough water to come 2 to 3 inches above lentils. Cook over low heat until lentils are al dente, 30 to 35 minutes. Drain, reserving 1 cup cooking water. Return reserved water to lentils and set aside.

Heat 1 teaspoon oil in large saucepan over high heat. Add spinach and tomatoes, breaking them up with wooden spoon. Saute 1 minute. Add lentil mixture and cook 2 to 3 minutes longer.

Cook spaghetti in boiling salted water until al dente, about 10 minutes. Strain and pour spaghetti into saucepan with lentil sauce. Cook together 1 minute over high heat, adding butter and Parmesan cheese while tossing.

This recipe yields 6 servings.

We finished with Brownies from Clementine and Dulce De Leche Ice Cream from Hagen-Daaz.

We then just sat out on the deck and enjoyed the warm weather.

Perfect summer night!

Chicken and Figs

Wines:

Baglio di Pianetto Ficiligno 2003 White Sicilia
Bugey Cerdon
Le Clos du Caillou Les Roches Rondes 1998 Cotes du Rhone


Heirloom tomatoes are now in the market! We are glad to see them return plentifully to the Hollywood Market. Expect to see lots of recipes with them in the next several postings. Cliff usually eats yoghurt for lunch (would you believe?). But during tomato season instead he eats lots of tomatoes at lunch time.

In addition we are growing our own and will soon start harvesting from our stock. Our friends Bill and Kevin down the street have a huge garden with lots of tomatoes so we will probably be raiding them too! One of the most difficult parts of growing tomatoes (actually quite simple if I just thought about it ahead of time) is that I plant them all at the same time and they ripen at the same time. Memo to my self – next year plant them about every 2 – 3 weeks. That way there will always be ripe ones.

We started with a Burrata and Heirloom Tomato Salad. We get our Burrata at the Cheese Store of Silverlake. Basil, Salt, pepper, good olive oil. Yum!

I am combining two dinners for this post. We had leftover Chicken and Fig (by plan – we like leftovers).

For the 2nd meal we made a Salad of Nectarines, Spanish Marcona Almonds, Arugula, Prosciutto, Saba and Walnut oil it was fresh and delicious.

Figs are fresh at the Hollywood Farmer’s Market. We made a recipe from The Zuni Cafe Cookbook: Chicken Braised with Figs, Honey and Vinegar. We purchased very sweet green figs. The dish is easy to make. It is first braised on top of the stove then finished in the oven. I hope we make it again this summer.


We have lots of fruit trees in out back yard. Plums are ripe so we made a Plum Crisp for dessert. We used the crisp recipe from Mark Peel & Nancy Silverton Cook at Separate Homes.

It was an excellent summer meal!

Grilled Lamb

Wine:

Bugey Cerdon Methode Ancestrale Rose Sparkling Wine
Chateau Maris 2003 Minervois


We have just returned from Santa Fe and entertaining out of town guests, so we were ready to cook!

The weather in Los Angeles was very warm and we knew we would grill outdoors at night and eat on our deck. We decided to make Grilled Lamb Loin in Yogurt Marinade. Although we don’t go out for Indian Food a lot, the preparation and flavors definitely are Indian! We really liked it! With that we made a rice dish from The Moro Cookbook. We have eaten at Moro’s in London and like their Spanish / Moroccan dishes. We made the Augergine and Tomato Pilav. It is very much a Spanish Rice and very good.

When the sun finally set we drank bubbly rose while preparing the wine.
With the Rice and Lamb we had a bottle of Chateau Maris.

Once again we had German Chocolate Cake from Perfectly Sweet.

Grilled Lamb Loin in Yogurt Marinade
2/3 cups Yogurt
4 garlic cloves crushed
1 ½ inch piece of fresh ginger peeled, grated
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon turmeric
1 teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 boneless lamb loin about 2 pounds (we used loin lamb chops)

Mix yogurt and seasonings together and pour over lamb to coat completely. A large zip-lock bag works well for this. Marinate the loin in the refrigerator for 24 hours. Every once in a while turn bag to make sure meat is totally covered. Remove meat 1 hr before grilling. Drain and wipe off excess marinade. Grill to completion.

You can make a sauce by heating the leftover marinade with ½ cup of yogurt.

Porcini Pasta

Wine: Bugey Cerdon methode ancestrale Sparkling Rose (This has become our sparkling rose of choice on hot summer nights).

We had eaten at Campanile on the Saturday night before our trip to Santa Fe and we had a wonderful appetizer: Porcini Tarjarin with Garlic, Fleur de Sal, and Farmehouse Egg Yolk. It is basically like Spaghetti Carbonara with the egg pasta and yolk cooked by the heat of the pasta. Tom an.d Susie had recommended it highly to us when we arrived at the restaurant.

Since we were leaving town on the morning of the 5th for Santa Fe, we decided to have an easy dinner by ourselves, make Porcini Tarjarin (a new name to us) and eat it on our deck and watch the 4th of July Fireworks. The only critical issue was: would they Hollywood Farmer’s Market be able to provide us with Porcini mushrooms. David had them and we were set to make the pasta.

It was excellent. A great new pasta for us! The night was quite warm and we totally enjoyed the fireworks, thinking they were just for us.

We had our pasta, drank lots of wine, watched the fireworks and went to bed awaiting our trip to the land of Green Chili, Cold Margaritas and friends.