Salsa verde has, since those days, become something of a menu commonplace in Britain, but the salsa verde that gets served up is often much fancier—with mint, basil, sometimes even coriander thrown in—than Benvenuto’s version, which was just parsley, capers, cornichons, anchovy, oil, and vinegar, making a semi-liquid, deep-flavored, and spiky sauce the color of pool table felt. I, too, sometimes add to that basic mixture. I might throw in arugula, bought in robust great bunches from a Greek greengrocer’s; it gives a wonderful pepperiness (itself a good balance for the gratifyingly searing saltiness of the anchovies). At other times, tarragon, just a little, lends an aniseedy and hay-fresh muskiness.
After the salsa verde has emulsified, to make it creamier and more liquid I spoon or dribble in a good few tablespoons of the winy liquid in which the fish has been soaking. Normally, salsa verde has lemon added at the end if it’s to accompany fish, vinegar if it’s to go with boiled meats, but I tend to use vinegar more often, even with fish. And although it is not at all come si deve, I quite like borrowing a trick from sauce gribiche and adding some finely chopped hard-boiled egg white, too—but for practical purposes, when the idea is to cook quickly, there’s no call even to consider such innovations.
Now I know most people put garlic in. But I thought I remembered that, when I had the salsa verde with tongue in Florence all that time ago, there wasn’t any garlic in it. I couldn’t be absolutely sure, so I asked Anna del Conte, the best Italian foodwriter in English, a great authority, utterly versed in her subject and a reassuring, illuminating recipe doctor. I felt doubtful suddenly only because every salsa verde I’ve eaten since has had garlic in. She reassured me, said that it most certainly wouldn’t have had. Salsa verde emanates from Lombardy (where the parsley is especially prized) and garlic was then anathema to the Lombardi. Bread crumbs or some boiled or mashed potato (to thicken the mixture) are also traditional. Of course you can add garlic if you want, but I suggest not too much. I don’t add bread crumbs or potato simply because I use the food processor to blend it all, and the machine automatically thickens it. It is difficult to be specific about amounts, but what you should end up with is a green-flecked, almost solid liquid that looks as if a spoon would stand up in it—even if, in fact, the spoon would, put to the test, soon sink gloopily into that thick, green, parsley-dense pond.
1 large bunch parsley
3 anchovy fillets
1 tablespoon capers, preferably packed in salt
2 cornichons (miniature gherkins)
8 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, plus more, if needed
5 tablespoons fish poaching liquid (from Chambéry Trout, above), plus more, if needed
1 tablespoon wine vinegar or lemon juice, plus more, if needed
Tear the parsley leaves from the stalks (don’t worry about being too neat) and put them in the bowl of the food processor (don’t even think about doing this sauce, or at least not if you want to get it ready quickly and with a minimum of effort, if you haven’t got a food processor; just mix some oil and lemon together instead). Add the anchovy fillets (if they taste rebarbatively salty, then soak them briefly in a saucer of milk), the capers (well rinsed in cold water and drained if they’ve been packed in salt), and the cornichons. Pulse, then scrape the bowl with a spatula and, with the machine running, gradually pour the olive oil through the feed tube. Take the lid off to check how thick the sauce is becoming and dip in a finger to taste. Scrape down any mixture from the sides. Add more oil if needed; then when the fish is ready, spoon in some of the poaching liquid, all while processing. Taste after every small addition, adding more of the liquid if needed. Then pour the salsa verde into a bowl with a spoon and stir in the vinegar or lemon, a little at a time, adding more if needed. And that’s it. Keep whatever salsa’s left over in the fridge, covered with plastic film. Eccentric though this might sound, I love it, sharp and cold and salty, with hot, fat, spicy, or even not spicy, sausages.
GUSSIED-UP ICE CREAM
Again, this idea has been adumbrated earlier: to ice cream you simply add some processor-pulverized chocolate. Break 4 ounces of the best, most malevolently dark chocolate you can find into small squares and put them into the bowl of the food processor. Make sure they’re cold before you start. Pulse them to dusty rubble. Empty onto a plate and put this plate in the fridge until you need it. At which time, pour the pulverized chocolate into a small bowl and put on the table alongside the container of ice cream.
SALMON SCALLOPS WITH WARM BALSAMIC VINAIGRETTE
BREAD, CHEESE, AND GRAPES
Any thin fillet of meat or fish will cook quickly, but salmon is particularly useful because its oiliness stops it from drying to irritating cardboardiness in the heat. But still, exercise caution; don’t overcook—just dunk these fleshy, coral-colored slices into the pan.
Balsamic vinegar is one of those ingredients whose fashionability leads people to disparage it. But the sweet pungency of the balsamic vinegar here is so right with the oily meatiness of the fish that its use is justified. After this, you can expand into a good plate of perfectly à point brie or camembert and another of aromatic, wine-toned grapes. Both must be at room temperature.
SALMON SCALLOPS WITH WARM BALSAMIC VINAIGRETTE
1 tablespoon vegetable oil , if needed
8 scallops or thin fillets of salmon (about 4 ounces each)
small bunch chives, snipped
6 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
6 tablespoons olive oil
Heat a heavy-bottomed, well-seasoned frying pan or good nonstick pan or griddle. Add the vegetable oil if you have any doubt about the fish sticking, put in the salmon, and cook for 1 minute on each side, then turn again and cook for another minute on each side. The fish should be just cooked through. Put on a warmed plate and, when all are ready, sprinkle with chives. Keep warm with tented foil.
In a small saucepan, heat the balsamic vinegar and olive oil until warm (but not hot) and dribble a little over the fish. Pour the remaining vinaigrette into a small pitcher (with a teaspoon near it, for stirring) and let people pour or spoon over as they wish. The measurements I’ve stipulated, strictly speaking, give you more than you need, but otherwise you would be producing such a stingy-looking puddle.
Another way of doing this, and how I always do it if there’s just me eating, is to pour a few drops of oil into the pan (you can’t use a griddle here) and fry the salmon in it. Then, when the fish is cooked and on its plate, I pour a few drops of balsamic vinegar into the pan in which I’ve cooked the fish, swirl it about, and pour it over the fish. Dot with scissored chives and eat.
What works here is the gentle balance between the sweet acidity of the vinegar and the meaty oiliness of the fish. But you could elaborate on this theme with other vinegars, or the juices of lime, lemon, or Seville orange.
If you’re using lemon juice, fry the salmon in a small amount of olive oil and add (off the heat, at the end) parsley, feathery green clumps of the stuff, vigorously chopped but not minced by machine (unless you’re using huge great quantities, the food processor is not the answer—you just end up with a damp green mess) in place of the chives.
If you want to deglaze the pan with lime, which makes for an intense and astringent dressing, cook the salmon first in a nut of butter. The sweetness of the butter counters the more invasively acid punch of the lime. Sprinkle over musky, pungent, freshly chopped coriander, but not much of it, just before serving. Or leave the salmon itself relatively unprinked and add the coriander, in relative abundance, to a couple of cans of drained, oil-dressed cannellini beans.
Before the cheese, you may want a green salad, or put all on the table together.
CINNAMON-HOT RACK OF LAMB WITH CHERRIED AND CHICKPEA’D COUSCOUS
BAKED FIGS
Lamb can be cooked very quickly indeed. Many people, however, stuff, prink, and generally fuss about rack of lamb, but the truth is you need do nothing providing you buy good meat. Applying a little oil and spice will not take very long
. It will make the fat crisp up better, which is a consideration, but frankly it won’t matter if you don’t bother. The figs afterward offer sweet, plump, ripe fruitiness and appropriately exotic voluptuousness.
If you wanted, you could cook quail instead of lamb, in which case substitute 8 quail for the lamb and add some butter, also mixed with a little cinnamon, to put into the birds’ cavities.
CINNAMON-HOT RACK OF LAMB
1 scant tablespoon chili oil
½ tablespoon ground cinnamon
2 racks lamb (7–8 ribs each)
Preheat the oven to 450°F.
Mix the oil and cinnamon to a paste and rub over the meat. Place on a rack over a baking dish and cook for about 30 minutes. The skin should be shiny brown and the meat within pink and tender. Let stand for 5 minutes or so before serving. Turn the oven down to 350° for the figs.
CHERRIED AND CHICKPEA’D COUSCOUS
Couscous should, traditionally, be soaked and then steamed (see page 207), but you don’t have to; if you’re adding bits and pieces to it, you can get away with this incorrect procedure, although expect aficionados to be shocked. It is difficult to give precise details for the couscous, as different brands give slightly different instructions. I use precooked couscous; depending on the make, you may need to add a little more liquid if you think the grains are too heavy. Check package instructions.
Now, normally, I hate fruit in savory concoctions, but the sour cherries here really do work. There is an authenticity to the mixture of sweet dried fruit and waxy nut and fragrant buttery grain. But if you don’t like the idea of sour cherries, just leave them out.
The couscous will taste better if it has been steeped in stock rather than water, but by making stock I don’t mean anything more arduous than stirring half a stock cube into boiling water.
½ vegetable bouillon cube
salt
2 cups quick-cooking couscous
¼ cup dried sour cherries
½ teaspoon ground cumin
½ teaspoon cinnamon
½ cup pine nuts
1 can (14 ounces) chickpeas
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
3 scallions (white and green parts), cut into thin rings
harissa (page 208), for serving
Pour boiling water into a measuring cup to get 2 cups, add the half bouillon cube, crumbled, then pour into a saucepan and bring to the boil again. Add salt to taste. Put the couscous in a bowl, mix in the cherries, cumin, and cinnamon, and then turn into the saucepan of boiling water. Wait until it starts to boil again, put the lid on, and take the pan off the heat. Meanwhile, put a heavy frying pan on the stove and, when it’s hot, toast the pine nuts. When they are beginning to turn golden, remove them.
Heat the chickpeas with their liquid in a saucepan. When the couscous is tender and has absorbed the liquid, about 10 minutes, add the drained warm chickpeas, stir in the butter, then half the pine nuts, and turn out on to a large heated plate and sprinkle with the remaining pine nuts. You will probably have more couscous than you need here, but I feel that making less than this looks so miserable and unwelcoming. Anyway, it tastes good the next day. The best way of reheating it is either by steaming (a strainer suspended over a saucepan of boiling water will do it) or a quick burst in a microwave. Stir in the scallions and eat hot with the harissa to the side.
BAKED FIGS
8 black figs
4 tablespoons unsalted butter
4 heaping tablespoons honey
½ cup red wine
4 cardamom pods, lightly crushed, or
2 bay leaves, crumbled
1 cup yogurt, chilled, for serving
Preheat the oven to 350°F.
Put the figs in an ovenproof dish in which they’ll fit pretty snugly. Cut each one as if in quarters, only leaving the base intact. In a saucepan put the butter, honey, wine, and cardamom and heat up. When the butter’s melted, the honey’s dissolved, and you have a smooth, hot, sweet gravy, pour over the figs and put in the oven for about a quarter of an hour. Remove and let sit for 5 minutes or so before eating; and when you eat, make sure it’s with dollops of the satiny, cold yogurt to the side.
CHICKEN WITH SCALLIONS, CHILI, AND YOGURT
SEVEN-MINUTE STEAMED CHOCOLATE PUDDING
During my time as a restaurant critic, I became obsessed with the insistent inanities of the fashionable menu. In the end, either someone can cook or they can’t, either the food tastes good or it doesn’t. I object, for example, to the term pan-fried. I mind because what are you going to fry something in, if not in a pan? But the thing about pan-fried is not so much that it is tautologous, as that it is a con-trick. Let me deconstruct: fried is greasy, heavy, fattening, old-style food that none of us eats any more; pan-fried is modern, light, clean-living, healthy. The distorted echoes of “stir-fried” help formulate that image-by-association. But food, whether fried or pan-fried, is cooked in the same way. It’s a brilliant wheeze. I could call it grilled (or even griddled) chicken and that would have been OK. But I have my doubts about the efficacy of the domestic broiler, in the first place; not everyone owns a griddle, in the second. I cannot, just cannot, bring myself to call it pan-fried chicken. So, just chicken it is.
CHICKEN WITH SCALLIONS, CHILI, AND YOGURT
The accompaniment borrows from the idea of tzatziki and all those Middle Eastern yogurt salads; I have my friends Lucy Heller and Charles Elton to thank for it. I haven’t put cucumber in this recipe, but sometimes I do. Coriander is, funnily enough, easier to come by than mint these days (although mint is certainly the traditional herb to use here), so you can use either of them. The point is to have a cool, pungent accompaniment to the tender, but not strongly flavored, poultry. You can fashion it as you wish. If I use cucumber, I don’t bother to salt and degorge it; it may, therefore, get watery if you leave it lying around—but, as this is a quick dinner, the tradeoff is worth it. Make sure to use whole-milk yogurt; you want this sauce to be astringent but voluptuous; and low-fat natural yogurt is too thin, sour, and depressing.
For this I would use the cut known as a suprême: a boned chicken breast half that has been skinned, usually called a cutlet. If it’s easier, just buy whole breast portions, but in either case preferably from a free-range bird, and leave the skin on if you wish. It will look glorious if you happen to have a ridged griddle or grill pan to cook the breast in, but a heavy-bottomed frying pan is more than fine. Don’t use a nonstick pan; you want a burnt-golden exterior and the nonstick pan pointedly can’t give you that.
I think it’s necessary to cook extra chicken, even if you have to fry it in two batches, just because I have never known people not to want more. And how could leftovers matter? The half cucumber used in this is optional; peel it or don’t peel it as you wish. I tend to use a potato peeler to shave off strips of peel so that there’s a stripey dark-green, light-green effect; this was how my mother always did it.
6 chicken cutlets (about 6 ounces each)
juice of 2 lemons
6 tablespoons olive oil, plus more,
if needed
salt and freshly milled black pepper
6 scallions (white and green parts) cut into thin rings
1 green chili, seeded and minced
2 garlic cloves, minced
½ cucumber, cut into small dice (see headnote; optional)
3–4 tablespoons chopped coriander
1–2 tablespoons chopped mint
1¾ cups yogurt
Marinate the chicken in the lemon juice and 3 tablespoons of the oil. Season with salt and pepper. If the cutlets look fat and plump—you want them to cook fairly speedily—put them between 2 sheets of wax paper or plastic film and bash them, using anything heavy you can lay your hands on—a can of baked beans, say—if you’re not the sort to keep a meat mallet in the top drawer in your kitchen.
To make the sauce, add the scallions, chili, garlic, cucumber, coriander, and mint to the yogurt. Stir, taste, and add salt as needed.
/> Remove the chicken from the marinade. Add the remaining oil to a large frying pan and, when it’s hot, fry the cutlets. Turn over after 5 minutes or so and cook the other side for about 5 minutes, or until just cooked through. It may be cooked, it may need more time. You may need to add a little more oil while cooking; you certainly will if you’re frying in two batches. If you want, when the chicken is cooked, you can throw the lemony marinade over it in the pan at the last minute. Arrange the cutlets on a large plate and serve the yogurt relish in a bowl with a spoon.
With this, I might give the couscous on page 186, minus the cinnamon and minus the dried cherries. A tomato salad, with or without black olives, is all you need otherwise. If you can’t find any tomatoes with flavor, then a crisp-leaved green salad will do.
SEVEN-MINUTE STEAMED CHOCOLATE PUDDING
I am not a particular fan of the microwave, except for defrosting baby meals and reheating cold roast potatoes (divine, though dangerously easy to eat; I wish my Aunt Fel hadn’t told me of this), but I had this chocolate pudding at the home of some friends one Saturday lunchtime and thought it was amazingly good—thick and rich and chocolatey. One thing, though—don’t hide the fact that you’re microwaving it; they do say the proof of the pudding is in the eating. This takes 2 minutes to prepare in the food processor, 5 minutes actually to cook in the microwave, and 10 minutes’ standing time after that. If you get everything ready in advance, just throw it in the microwave 15 minutes or so before you think you’ll want to eat it.
This recipe comes from Barbara Kafka’s Microwave Gourmet and I have kept to her quantities for 8 people because I am greedy. If you—unlike me—think 4 people won’t eat enough for 8, then halve the quantities and cooking time and use a 3-cup pudding basin.
10 tablespoons (1 stick plus 2 tablespoons) unsalted butter
8 ounces best-quality semisweet chocolate
½ cup light brown sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
How to Eat Page 25