Panzanella - A Quick and Tasty Summer Salad

July and August mean hot weather and cool food. After all, who wants to work in a hot kitchen in the heat of summer? One of the best summer salads is the classic Italian dish panzanella. This dish, based on tomatoes and left-over bread, has several variations. Italian cookbook author Marcella Hazan adds anchovies and capers; some versions add roasted pepper; in some, bread is toasted and cubed; and in Lucca, the bread is often soaked and quite mushy.  

I prefer a simple panzanella with four main ingredients - ripe tomatoes, cucumber, red onion, and cubes of toasted bread with a dressing of red wine vinegar and good olive oil, salt and pepper. If I have fresh basi, I will add some of that as well.  

The panzanella goes well with grilled steaks.

That’s it! Easy, fresh, tasty.  

When visiting my family in New Mexico, and missing Italian food, I decided to make a panzanella salad, along with an olive oil and herb-based potato salad (Ina Garten’s French potato salad) to serve alongside grilled steaks.  

A mash-up of Italian, French, and American dishes and great backyard barbecue food. 

To make the panzanella salad, you’ll need:: 

Ripe tomatoes, medium dice, to equal about 2 cups (save any juices that escape during chopping)

I English cucumber, seeded, small to medium dice

I/4 of a medium red onion, diced small

3 tablespoons good red wine vinegar

5 tablespoons good olive oil  (Italian is best!)

Salt and pepper to taste (I like French gray sea salt and coarse group pepper)

3 slices of firm rustic bread, toasted

1 large clove of fresh garlic, peeled and sliced in half

A few fresh basil leaves

Rubbing the hot toasted bread with fresh garlic really adds flavor.

Marinate the diced tomatoes (with any juices), cucumbers, and onion in the vinegar, olive oil, salt and pepper for 45 minutes to an hour. 

Toast the bread and rub with the cut edge of the garlic. Cut into medium cubes and add to the marinated tomatoes 10 to 15 minutes before serving. The bread will be soft, having absorbed some of the juices, but still a bit firm.  

If you prefer the bread a bit squishier, add it a little sooner. I prefer firmer bread, and yet find myself picking out those squishy bits when they are left in the bowl at the end of the meal.

-post by Joanne

From my Italian Kitchen: A Spring Pasta

Last spring I was introduced to agretti - an italian veggie with a very short season. Agretti, with its slender chive-shaped leaves, is considered a delicacy and its appearance in the market is always greeted with excitement. 

Agretti, roots and all, comes wrapped in paper - clean and trim before using.

I began to cook with it last spring (see link at the end of this post to read last spring’s post). Experimenting was fun, but before I knew it the agretti season was over.

Since I’ve now waited a whole year for agretti season to roll around again, I was quite excited when I found the first agretti of the spring at my local ortofrutta (small fruit and vegetable market) recently.  

I first cooked it as a side dish, a simple sauté in olive oil and garlic finished with a squeeze of lemon and a pinch of salt. This is a classic preparation, no recipe needed.

Next, I decided to try agretti in a pasta dish. I proceeded without a recipe, combining flavors that are classically paired with agretti - lemon juice and olive oil - along with ingredients I had on hand, including pancetta, Parmigiano Reggiano cheese, and penne pasta. The dish tasted bright and lemony, just like spring. I will definitely make this dish again and, if you come across agretti in your local farmer’s market, I hope you will be inspired to try it as well.

Penne with Pancetta, Agretti, and Lemon  (Serves three as a main dish, four as a “primi piatti”)

250 grams penne pasta (amount 8 ounces)

2 Tablespoons good olive oil, divided

200 grams cubed pancetta dolce (about 6 ounces)

90 grams agretti (about 3 ounces), roots and thick stems removed, rinsed well, and rough chopped

Juice of 1/2 lemon (about 2 Tablespoons)

1/8 tsp ground black pepper

1/4 tsp sea salt

1/4 cup grated Parmigiano Reggiano

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil - add penne and cook al dente.

Meanwhile, rinse agretti well, remove roots and lower stems, rough chop into strands about 2 inches long. Heat 1 Tablespoon of olive oil in a sauté pan, add pancetta and cook over medium heat until cooked through but not crisp. 

Add cleaned and chopped agretti. Cook until softened, stirring from time to time. This shouldn’t take more than about 10 minutes over medium low heat.

Season with salt and pepper.

Drain the penne pasta and return to the pot.  Add the lemon juice, 1 Tablespoon olive oil, and the pancetta / agretti mixture and give it a stir. Add the grated Parmesan and toss. 

Serve immediately with more grated Parmesan on the side.

This makes a nice, light main dish or a flavorful side with chicken or fish.  It pairs well with a crisp white wine.   -post by JMB

 For more info about agretti:    

http://www.twopartsitaly.com/blog/2018/5/1/agretti-a-taste-of-spring-in-italy

A Ligurian Pasta

A market in Porto Venere, Liguria, selling pesto and trofie along with other local specialties

How many pasta shapes can you name? Spaghetti, linguine, tagliatelle, fettucine, farfalle, pici, pappardelle, fusilli, lasagna, and orzo all come to mind - and those are just some of the many solid pasta forms. In Italy, there is a seemingly endless variety of shapes and sizes of pasta. One shape that is found in northern Italy, especially in Liguria, is trofie. I was less familiar with this type of pasta, but recently encountered it at a market in Porto Venere. When I saw it again a few days later in a restaurant in Lucca I couldn't pass up the opportunity to try it. 

Trofie is a simple eggless pasta, made with just three ingredients - flour, salt, and water. After mixing, a little kneading, and a short rest, the dough is rolled into long thin strands (as if making pici) and then cut into smaller pieces. It's the shaping of these small bits of dough that is key to making trofie. Each small piece is rolled between the palms of the hand in a downward motion, allowing them to fall off the end of the hands (picture a good Ligurian cook doing this in one very quick motion). This gives them their characteristic shape - short thin twists of pasta, a bit thicker in the middle and tapered at the ends.

Trofie are best when fatto a mano (made by hand). The commercial varieties have a more structured twist to them, and are more dense than the lighter, roughly shaped hand-rolled ones.

In Liguria, it is typical to top trofie with pesto (another local Ligurian specialty). In Lucca, my lunch was trofie with tonno (tuna), fiori di zucca (squash blossoms), pomodoro (tomato) and pan grattato (toasted bread crumbs) .

It was a light and tasty dish, perfect with a glass of local vino bianco di Montecarlo (white wine from the Montecarlo region). Delizioso!   

I'm looking forward to making some trofie at home in New Mexico  - I think my grandchildren will enjoy trying to hand shape them with me.                                  -post by JMB