Tomato Salad with Bariani Olive Oil and Maine Sea Salt

A satisfying Sunday afternoon refresher. Perfectly red vine-ripened tomato. Unctuous, peppery olive oil. Crunchy salt. Bright and strong basil.

As delightful as a tomato at the pinnacle of ripeness is, especially with the addition of grown-by-Matt-in-the-windowsill basil, what makes this salad/snack shine is the proper selection of the olive oil and the salt. Options abound. I want to share with you my choices:

Bariani Extra Virgin Olive Oil and Maine Sea Salt. The Bariani, I get at the Walpole Grocery at Burdick's in Walpole, NH. The Maine Sea Salt I picked up in a random shop in Bar Harbor, ME. But both can be ordered online.

If you're looking for a special olive oil, the Bariani is great for any raw olive oil application, from drizzling on vegetables or blending with a vinegar or lemon juice for salad dressings. I would never use this olive oil in cooked applications, because it is too expensive to allow heat to kill its nuances.

Until I started using the Maine Sea Salt, I thought that a good kosher salt would suit my needs anytime. The Maine Sea Salt has a delightful crunchiness, and the flavor has a clean saltiness, like breathing in the salt air on a clear day on the Maine coast. I use the Maine Sea Salt on vegetables and fruit, and raw salads of all sorts. I wouldn't put into pasta water or bake with it, for it is too crunchy and too distinctive to work in dishes like that.

Enjoy!

Shrimp and Pea Risotto

Another freezer/pantry dinner satisfying beyond the expectations of its humble origins. The peas and shrimp give this dish a freshness and a sweetness, that it feels impossible that the only item requiring recent purchase is the parsley. And if I didn't have the parsley already in the fridge and wasn't going to the store, I'd leave out the parsley in a second.

For two people~

From the freezer: 4 cups lobster stock (from the shells of our lobster rolls last week), 18 raw medium shrimp, 1/2 cup peas

From the pantry: 3/4 cup carnaroli rice, half a medium onion, 1 TBS olive oil

From the fridge: 1/4 cup white wine, 3 TBS butter, 1/2 cup freshly grated parmigiano, 2 TBS chopped parsley

If you don't have lobster stock (and really, if you didn't have lobster shells leftover from a lobster dinner....who does?), use a very light chicken or vegetable stock cut with water 1:1. You don't want a strong chicken flavor in this, you want the stock/broth to be very light. Any seafood stock would work too, if you had made some from shrimp shells and/or fish bones.

Also, I use carnaroli rice for my risotti, which can be found in most specialty Italian groceries, but of course arborio, available at the supermarket, is good too.

Bring the lobster stock to a simmer. Shell the shrimp (put shells in the freezer for stock-making in the future). Cook shrimp for about 2 minutes (until pink, curled and tender). Remove shrimp from stock with a slotted spoon. When shrimp are cool, cut into bite-sized pieces. Put lid on lobster stock and turn off heat.

Finely chop the onion. Melt 1 1/2 TBS of butter and the TBS of olive oil in a large pan over medium heat. Add onion and cook, stirring often, until softened. Add rice and stir around for a few minutes to toast the rice. Add wine, stir and cook until evaporated.

Add a couple ladles of the warm stock. Stirring regularly, when the stock has mostly evaporated, add more, stirring frequently, if not constantly at times. Continue this until the rice is al dente (if running low on stock, add water, bring back to a simmer, then turn off heat again). The process of adding stock and stirring should take about 30 minutes, maybe less, maybe more. When the rice is to your liking, stir in peas, stir for about 30 seconds, until peas have thawed. Turn off heat. Add shrimp, remaining 1 1/2 TBS butter, parmigiano and parsley. Stir until butter is melted into rice and other ingredients well-distributed. Serve immediately.

Cannellini Bean and Chard Soup

This soup is hearty and perfect for cold and gray rainy days. It also is pantry-friendly and tastes like it took much more than only 20 minutes to make. Earlier in the week I made eggs with spicy, garlicky chard (recipe to come!). I had a few stalks of the chard leftover, pancetta and chicken stock in the freezer, a can of cannellini beans in the pantry, and some fresh oregano in the herb pot Matt tends for me on the windowsill. The following recipe makes enough soup for two people when put out with a crusty bread for dipping.

I defrosted 2 cups of chicken broth in the microwave. You can also use broth from a can or box (Swanson's or Imagine are my preferred brands, low sodium on both). Another great thing to keep in the freezer are slices of pancetta. I get about a half dozen 1/4 inch slices at the deli every couple months. I individually plastic wrap each one and put into a bag in the freezer. With a good sharp knife, it is easy to cut the frozen pancetta.

So, small dice a 1/4" thick slice of pancetta. In a 3 quart pot, cook the pancetta over medium heat until rendered and crispy. Using a slotted spoon, remove the pancetta and set aside in a small bowl. Leave the rendered fat in the pot.

Next, add half a medium-small onion, finely chopped. Cook in the pancetta fat over medium heat until softened. Then, add a small clove of garlic, minced. Stir for about 30 seconds, do not let it brown. Pour in two cups of broth and one cup of water. Bring to a simmer.

Take a few leaves of chard off of the stems and ribs and chop the leaves into strips (I like red chard when I can get it, but regular chard would work just as well). If you want you can very, very thinly slice the stems and add those too. Drain and rinse a can of cannellini beans, and divide in half (save the other half in the fridge or freezer to make a quick bean and tuna spread later in the week). Add the half can of beans and chard to the simmering broth. Simmer gently for about 5 minutes, add a few inch sprig's worth of chopped fresh oregano or thyme (no fresh herbs? add a 1/2 tsp of dried oregano or thyme with garlic before adding broth). Season with a few grinds of black pepper. If you used store bought stock, you will not want to add salt. But if you are using homemade chicken broth and like me, keep the salt low for more flexibility in later dishes....you will want to add maybe a 1/2 tsp of salt.

Serve with chewy crusty bread for dipping. Sprinkle the soup with reserved pancetta or freshly grated parmigiano, or both, or neither. If not using either topping, maybe add another 1/2 tsp of salt to the pot before serving.

Obviously the little bit of pancetta doesn't make this a *healthy* soup. But it is a very small amount of cured pork, and the beans and chard are very good for you, as is homemade chicken broth.

More Good Black Box Wines

Last summer I tried out Black Box Wine on the suggestion of my mother. The cabernet sauvignon and the pinot grigio have become my table wines. The merlot is good too and I hear the chardonnay is nice, although I'm not into chards.

Until this spring/summer, those were the only options available at my liquor store. Luckily, the selections have grown. I now have two new favorites: sauvignon blanc and shiraz. I may go back to the pinot grigio in the winter, but right now the sauvignon blanc is perfect for summer. The cabernet and the shiraz are both California coast, the pinot grigio is Italian, and the sauvignon blanc is a great example from New Zealand of what that country produces in this grape.

At $19 for a box which equals 4 bottles...very nice.

For my friends in NH....I hear black box is around $10 more expensive up there than here in Massachusetts. My sister also reports a $19 box in Brattleboro, VT. If you are driving through MA or VT, you should load up whilst there.

Sausages with Peppers, Onions and Mushrooms

I love this comfort classic. Along with stuffed shells, I made this the first time I cooked for Matt. In addition to a few other dishes over the past couple years, the evidence of its awesomeness is the ring on my left hand. I started making this years ago for myself because it makes wonderful leftovers, and freezes great. This recipe is my version of a Lidia Bastianich recipe and serves 4 (or 2 with leftovers).

You want about a pound and a half of sausage total. These days, if you buy your sausage from a butcher or quality meat counter, they are much longer than the classic 5 inch link that you still see in packages in grocery stores. American super-sizing.... Anyways, I get my sausages at Whole Foods, and for this dish I get the Hot Italian variety, but using the Sweet Italian would be great too. I wait until they are on sale at $2.99/lb and then I load up the freezer. Truly, you can make this dish with any type of sausage. I once used some wonderful rabbit sausages from the Burdick Grocery in Walpole, NH. So yummy, but so out of my budget these days. If you are going to use a non-pork sausage, be sure it has a high fat content (of added pork fat or otherwise). If the sausages are not fatty enough, they will dry out in the oven.

Other than the sausage you'll need 8 cloves of garlic, 2 onions, about 8 ounces of white button mushrooms, 2 red peppers and 4-5 cubanelle peppers (also known as Italian frying peppers). Use the flat side of your knife and the heel of your hand atop it to whack the garlic to crush it a little and get the skin off. I've been using this knife method all my life, since watching my mother do it. However, I've recently discovered equally successful results by pounding my olive oil cruet atop the cloves. Onions get sliced in one-inch thick slices, as do the peppers. Mushrooms get quartered (or halved if really small).

This is sort of an assembly-line cooking situation. If you are in a rush, you can prep each ingredient while the previous one is cooking, but I prefer to prep everything, and then leisurely cook everything while sipping some wine or a refreshing orange juice with seltzer. It feels civilized.

So, take out your big skillet (regular, not nonstick). Pour in a couple TBS of olive oil and heat over medium high heat. Prick the sausages all over with a fork and brown in pan for about 10 minutes, turning a few times to brown them all over. Half way through cooking the sausages, add the garlic, turning frequently until golden brown. Transfer sausages and garlic to a large, deep baking dish. Leave oil in pan.

Add onions to pan and cook for about 7-8 minutes, stirring frequently, until lightly browned, but still a bit crisp. Transfer onions to baking dish with sausages and garlic. Add mushrooms to pan, and cook for about 4-5 minutes until browned and transfer to baking dish. Add a little extra olive oil to the pan (the mushrooms will have soaked up most of what was left after the onions), and add the peppers. Cook for about 7-8 minutes stirring frequently, until slightly wilted, but still a bit crisp and add to baking dish.

Put baking dish, uncovered, in a 400 degree oven for 30 minutes, tossing vegetables and turning sausages every ten minutes. Eat straight up with a good crusty bread on the side to dip in the olive oil and vegetable juicy goodness or make grinders with a nice roll. Obviously, this dish is easily shrinkable or expandable. But unless you don't like having an easy dinner in the freezer, it is usually worth making the whole thing, even for one person. If you prefer yellow peppers to red or don't like mushrooms, this is also very customizable. If you are thinking of substituting mushroom varieties, I have found that white button mushrooms are sturdier than criminis/baby bellas and better maintain a separate flavor from the other ingredients. The criminis and such work fine if that's what you have on hand, but they are too delicate to bring the same earthy punch in this dish.

This dish also holds pretty well. You can make a double batch if you have company coming over and serve at room temperature (summer room temp, not winter room temp) or reheat gently in a 200 degree oven. If you have frozen a portion or two, put on a plate and defrost and then reheat in the microwave. Enjoy!