Make Pasta, But Do It Right (spaghetti with fennel and Italian sausage)

Pasta is easy.  It really is however there are a few unbreakable rules.  The first is that you have to understand the noodle that you are using.  Generally, pasta has a neutral, pleasant grain flavor.  The flavors derived from carrot, spinach or squid ink are also understated.  Those ingredients are mostly there to contribute orange, green or black color.  I’ve never been a big fan of multicolor pasta, although there was a chef in Lambertville who served white and black angel hair with his zebra chops.  That seemed to be more of a laugh than a culinary breakthrough.

Shape matters.  Those ridges on your penne will hold the sauce.  That’s why rigatoni should be baked with sauce and messy cheeses (always plural), because it is smooth on the outside and will not sauce well.  Size is also important.  You should match the size of the flavoring ingredients with the size of the pasta.  That’s why bowties, farfalle, makes such great salad when combined with celery, red onion, pepperoncini, provolone and big hunks of salami.

Since it is such a simple thing to prepare, if it is not done correctly, the dish will be a complete disaster.  It’s rare that I will cop out and tell you to follow the manufacturer’s advice, but with pasta, their cooking directions are usually right on.  Again, you won’t hear me recommending avoidance of store brands often.  Name brand pasta, in my experience at least, tends to cook up more evenly and taste better than store brand.  It also only costs a quarter more, so this might not be a place to count pennies.

Pasta’s greatest contribution to a dish, much like tofu, is that it has a subtle, delicate taste and will soak up the flavors of whatever it is paired with.  That’s why tomato sauce and any of the cream sauces work so well with noodles.  Additionally, something simple like olive oil, garlic and basil, all strong flavors, elevate pasta to greatness.  I lived on that in college.

Today’s recipe is designed to show off a few things.  Pasta that is hot when combined with the sauce will soak it up more readily that cold noodles.  You’ll be making the sauce as the pasta boils.  Don’t worry.  It is a simple process.  We’ll also play with flavor, doing a spin on Carbonara, the classic egg yolk, onion, garlic and bacon sauce by instead using a whole egg, fennel, garlic and Italian sausage.  Using the same technique, while making a few substitutions creates a new dish that I hope you’ll like.

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Spaghetti with Fennel and Italian Sausage (serves 4 as an appetizer, 2 as a main course)

½ pound spaghetti

4 oz. Italian sausage, hot or sweet

2 eggs

1 c. fresh fennel, thinly sliced

1 c. heavy cream

½ c. Locatelli or Parmesean cheese, grate your own*

1 clove garlic, chopped

salt and black pepper

Following the directions on the package, boil a large pot of salted water and cook the spaghetti al dente, so that is cooked through, but still firm.  Begin making the sauce when the spaghetti goes in the pot.

Remove the sausage from its casing and brown it on a high heat in a large sauté pan.  Drain 2/3 of the grease from the pan.  Break the egg into the pan.  Scramble it, add the garlic and fennel.  Sauté these aromatics until the fennel has wilted.  Pour in the cream and 2/3 of the grated cheese.  Reduce the sauce by half.

By this time, the spaghetti will be properly cooked.  Drain it, then immediately add it to the sauce.  Stir it together, blending the sauce and the spaghetti.  Plate immediately, topping with the remainder of the grated cheese.

*Yes, grate you own.  Read the packaging on the pregrated stuff.  Unless you think that eating “powdered cellulose,” sawdust, is a good thing, you should take the 30 seconds it’ll take to grate up some cheese.

I Want My Kitchen Back!!!! (Italian grilled cheese sandwich, garlic butter)

Some of you know that we have been rehabbing the downstairs of our house, so that we can begin teaching cooking and later Reiki and yoga.  http://www.freshfunfoods.com/ourkitchen/  The contractors are great guys, doing top quality work at a reasonable price.  If anyone wants a quote on a concrete counter or vinyl flooring, I’d be happy to set you up with Brett, Bill and Tim. 

The gas company is a different thing.  We are changing over to LP from electric, so some piping and electrical work needs doing.  The guy showed up last Friday with a big tank, but insisted that he couldn’t do the wiring or punch a hole in the wall to run copper to the new stove.  I would have to find a contractor to do that work, and then he’ll come back.  If his company wasn’t the cheapest, I’d go elsewhere, although I don’t really have a choice, since it would take about two weeks to line up another supplier.  Bill is knocking out the work right now.  After a few calls, I found Green Propane in Hatfield.  Their manager was out this morning and by 9:00 am had speced out the job and given me a price that was far lower than the previous company.  Installation and hookup is scheduled for early Thursday morning.  Additionally, the cost for the gas is $.50 lower than the other guys, a big win all around.

I feel like I’m camping, cooking in such a stripped down way.  Remember that I normally don’t think anything of using a half dozen knives to make a salad.  The whole idea of chopping on a cutting board on a card table and then cooking either on an electric griddle or a crock pot bugs me a bit.  We’ve have not pasta in a couple of weeks.  It is a hassle to brew my last remaining addiction, coffee, in the morning.  I had to go into four rooms to retrieve a knife, butter, bread jelly and finally the toaster for breakfast yesterday. 

The high point, and this may sound silly, has been the rediscovery of my love for grilled cheese.  Seriously, you would not expect a heavy weight chef to go nuts over something as simple as melted cheese on grilled bread.  Maybe it answer is in the process or the ingredients or the limitations that only having an electric griddle being loaded on my head.  Whatever, grilled cheese is good, food of the Gods on a cold day and something you should make right now.

Start with the bread.  It has to be good, as it makes up most of the sandwich.  Stay away from grocery store air bread, no flavor plus it burns quickly.  You’ll want something that has character and texture.  Bakers on Broad in Souderton is your place for good bread.  http://bakersonbroad.com/  The baguettes are everything you expect from French bread, the whole wheat is toasty and nutty, their Italian loaves are great smeared with garlic butter.  Slice it yourself.  You’ll want slightly thicker slices than their machine will produce.  Use top quality cheese.  Cheddar and Asiago are my favorites and both are available in any supermarket. 

Electric griddles are cheap these days.  I saw one at Kohl’s for $7.95 on Black Friday.  Even if you do spend $30, consider it disposable, that’s the society we live in.  It will be Teflon coated, so use only plastic spatulas.  Your griddle will have one of those dials to adjust the temperature, but don’t trust it.  These things are normally blazing hot or cold, not much in between.  Size, not more than 25 inches across.  The space is wasted and the Teflon tends to burn out on the unused space.  Don’t buy a used electric griddle.  It is probably unsafe.  You are only buying someone else’s problem.

Today, I’ve provided a recipe for an Italian grilled cheese sandwich.  You’ll be able to cook the whole thing on an electric griddle, even sautéing the rapini.  Do yourself a favor, grate your own Locatelli cheese.  The bagged stuff has “powdered cellulose” in it to prevent caking.  Powdered cellulose is better known as sawdust.  Ummmmmmmm!!!!  You’ll also need to make garlic butter for this sandwich.  It’s a good thing to have hanging around in the fridge, since you’ll learn to use it on pasta, vegetables, garlic bread, grilled chicken…

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Italian Style Grilled Cheese Sandwich

4 slices of Italian bread, ½ inch thick

8 slices sharp provolone cheese

2 oz. Locatelli cheese, grated

½ bunch broccoli rabe (rapini)

2 tsp. garlic butter

4 tsp. olive oil

salt and pepper

Heat the griddle to high.  Trim the thick bottoms from the broccoli rabe.   Pour 1 tsp. of olive oil onto the griddle.  Sauté the broccoli rabe for five minutes, until cooked, but still crisp.  Move the broccoli rabe off to the side of the griddle. 

Pour the remainder of the olive oil onto the griddle.  Put the bread on the griddle, spread a ½ tsp of garlic butter on each piece of bread.

Top each with a slice of provolone cheese.  Divide the Locatelli cheese equally and spread it on top of the provolone.  Top the sandwiches with the broccoli rabe. 

Cook for two minutes.  Put the tops on the sandwiches and cook, flipping every two minutes, until the cheese has fully melted.  The bread should be browned evenly.  Remove from the griddle, cut in half and serve immediately.

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Garlic Butter

8 tbs. unsalted butter

4 tbs. olive oil

4 cloves garlic, chopped

2 tsp. fresh parsley

2 tsp. fresh oregano

½ tsp. pepper

pinch of salt

In mixing bowl, soften the butter by leaving it sit at room temperature for an hour.

Add the remaining ingredients; mix with a rubber spatula, folding the aromatics into the butter.  Put the garlic butter into a plastic container and refrigerate.