Smothered Cabbage Risotto

Among the oft-neglected cookbooks on my shelf is a big, light green volume called Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking. It's by Marcella Hazan, the justly venerated Italian cookbook writer notorious for her particularity, her precision, and her deep understanding of proper Italian cuisine. While the recipes reflect that precision (you can practically hear her preemptively chiding you for matching pasta with the wrong sauce), some of them are really quite simple. Case in point: smothered cabbage. A whole head of cabbage is shredded thinly, then braised low and slow with olive oil, onion and garlic, salt and pepper, and a shake of red wine vinegar. To say it's simple is to understate it a bit.

If you have extra cabbage (though really, why would you? I made a double recipe so I wouldn't be forced to choose), Hazan offers a modest recipe for Rice and Smothered Cabbage Soup. It's basically chicken broth, rice, the cabbage, and a dusting of permigiano reggiano cheese. A one-pot wonder.

The night I made the cabbage was dark and rainy -- nothing like the beautiful spring weather that's suddenly appeared this week. My sweatshirt and I were in the mood for something substantive and comforting, but also a bit luxurious. No sweat: I used basically the same ingredients in Hazan's soup to riff a bit and make risotto. If you're one of those people who think risotto is mighty difficult, hark! It's just not. Watch as I spell out the instructions in less than 50 words:

Sweat onions in oil. Add rice and salt. When hot, add wine. Then add broth by the ladelful, stirring intermittently. replenish broth as rice absorbs it. Taste at 12 minutes. Adjust for salt. When cooked but still al dente, with thickness of polenta, remove from heat. Add cheese. Eat.

And that's almost exactly what I did -- except that instead of wine, I added a couple tablespoons red wine vinegar. And I added the cabbage at the end. People, would you please just make this already? It's a miraculously luxurious dish made from downright humble ingredients. I guarantee it won't disappoint.

Smothered Cabbage Risotto inspired by Marcella Hazan

For the cabbage:

* 2 pounds green or Savoy cabbage * 1/2 cup chopped onion * 1/4 cup olive oil * 1 tablespoon chopped garlic * salt * freshly ground pepper * 1 tablespoon red wine vinegar

Clean cabbage and discard tough outer layers. Slice cabbage in half lengthwise, and shred as finely as possible using either a sharp knife or a mandoline. Be sure to remove the inner core of the cabbage -- it's too tough to cut.

Heat oil in a large saute pan over medium heat. Add onion and cook, stirring regularly, until golden, about 5 minutes. Add garlic. When garlic takes on some color, add cabbage. Using tongs, turn cabbage once or twice to incorporate it with the oil and onions, and cook until wilted.

Add vinegar, salt, and pepper. Turn heat to lowest possible setting, cover pot, and cook at least 1.5 hours, stirring occasionally, until soft, tender, and practically melted. If at any point the cabbage looks dry or it looks like the bottom may burn, add a tablespoon of water to moisten. When cabbage is fully cooked, taste and adjust for salt, pepper, and vinegar. You want the cabbage just a very little bit tangy -- mostly sweet and soft and buttery. When cabbage is ready, transfer to a bowl and wipe out pot.

For the Risotto:

* olive oil * 1.5 cups Arborio rice * 6 cups homemade chicken or vegetable stock, simmering on the stove * half a recipe or more of the Smothered Cabbage * 2 tablespoons red wine vinegar, divided * 2 tablespoons butter * 1/3 cup parmesan cheese

Swirl a couple tablespoons of olive oil in the same pot you used to make the cabbage. Heat over medium. Add rice and use a wooden spoon to stir and evenly coat the kernels with the olive oil. When rice is hot to the touch, add 1 tablespoon red wine vinegar and 1 ladle of stock. Lower heat to medium-low and cook, stirring continuously, until stock evaporates. Add more starch and continue stirring. As you continue adding stock and stirring, the rice will emit some of its starch, which will thicken the risotto and make it silky. Around 10 minutes into cooking, add two ladles of cabbage. Stir to incorporate and continue stirring and adding stock as before. At around 13 minutes, begin tasting the risotto; adjust seasoning and add more cabbage if desired. Continue cooking, adding stock as necessary, until rice is done but ever so slightly al dente. Add some or all of remaining tablespoon red wine vinegar to add slight tang. Off the heat, add butter and parmesan cheese. Stir to incorporate and serve immediately.

Spinach Bourekas

At some point last year, I fell off the puff pastry cliff. It all started with this onion-date tart, one of the best and easiest recipes I've ever written. I made it once, twice, three times, and more; I couldn't stop. I'd tweak a thing or two every time: I'd add mushrooms, swap the goat cheese for feta, add some roasted red peppers, etc. The tart never failed to please, so I just didn't stop making it.

From there, I branched out to other similar tarts, like this one with zucchini and olives. Why hadn't I thought of this sooner? Why had it taken so long to realize that when you pile delicious stuff on a buttery piece of dough and bake it off, the results are...delicious?

Just when I thought I'd had my revelation, D had had just about enough. She finally confessed that she hated all these tarts -- these big pieces of flaky dough meant to pose as entrees -- and that if I could stop making them, forever, that'dbegreatthanks. I was bummed: had I reached the end of puff pastry heaven so quickly? Without it, what else would I make? There was NOTHING else to make! Nothing but puff pastry! AACK!

Needless to say, I moved on. I made other delicious things like baked pastas and quiches and even the occasional (gasp!) meat dish. I moved on so well, in fact, that I actually forgot about puff pastry entirely. That is, until my friend Jeremy asked me to make some bourekas for a potluck he and his wife Beth hosted this weekend.

Given that I lived in Israel for two years, where bourekas could easily make a run against falafel, hummus, and schnitzel for the country's national dish, it's hard to believe that they haven't come up on NDP before today. I guess I don't make them as often as I'd have thought. But they're really very easy to make, they keep well and reheat like a charm, and they're as appropriate for a fancy meal as they are in a ziplock baggie.

Using the recipe below, I made about 50 bourekas before running out of puff pastry. I sandwiched the leftover filling between layers of filo dough for an easy mid-week pie that was a close relative of spanikopita.

Spinach Bourekas adapted from Ina Garten's spanikopita recipe makes about 50, plus extra filling

1/4 cup good olive oil 1 cup chopped yellow onion 3 scallions, white and green parts, chopped 2 (10-oz) packages frozen chopped spinach, defrosted 4 eggs, lightly beaten 3 tablespoons parmesan cheese 3 tablespoons plain dry bread crumbs 1 teaspoon freshly-grated nutmeg 2 teaspoons salt 1 teaspoon black pepper 2 cups diced feta cheese 3 tablespoons toasted pine nuts 3 tablespoons golden raisins 1 small wedge lemon 3 packages (6 sheets) puff pastry, defrosted

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees

Heat olive oil over medium heat in a large saute pan. Add onion and cook for 5 minutes, until soft but not browned. Add scallions and cook two more minutes, until wilted. Meanwhile, squeeze the water out of the chopped spinach and transfer to a large bowl.

Add cooked onions and scallions to spinach and stir to combine. Mix in eggs, parmesan, bread crumbs, nutmeg, salt, pepper, and raisins. Squeeze in lemon juice; gently fold in feta and pine nuts.

Sprinkle working surface with flour. Place one sheet of puff pastry on suface and roll it out to about 1/8-inch thick, rotating it 90 degrees after each roll to ensure that dough grows evenly and doesn't stick. Use more flour as necessary. Once dough is proper size, cut the dough into three lengthwise and three horizontally, dividing the dough into nine equally-sized squares.

Place two tablespoons filling into the middle of each square. Dip your finger in a bit of water and run it along the edges of the square, then bring one corner its opposite corner and seal to make a triangle. Use the tines of a fork to make a decorative edge and ensure that bourekas stay shut.

Place bourekas on parchment or silpat-lined baking sheet and bake about 25 minutes, until golden on top. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Down and Dirty Pasta e Cecci

Anything that has the words "down and dirty" in the title is something I will, sooner or later, make. "Down and dirty" suggests a rough-and-tumble version of the refined original, something you're more likely to eat on your front stoop than in a dining room. When I hear down and dirty, I see myself in cutoff jean shorts and one of those ribbed white tank tops, sitting outside on a balmy summer day. There are mosquitos in the air, bangs in my face. I'm eating from a clay bowl I threw in the pottery studio down the street. When lunchtime rolls around, I notice some chickpeas in the cabinet, so I decide to throw them in with some chili, anchovies, and pasta, and call it lunch. Down and dirty lunch, that is.

Surely you can understand how, when I saw a recipe for "down and dirty pasta e cecci" on Food52's website (via Jennifer Steinhauser of NYT, via her friend fisheri -- that's his username, not his real name -- oh, the confusion!), I simply had to make it. Mind you, I didn't even know what "cecci" were. I don't speak Italian. But down and dirty pasta is something that best be coming out of my kitchen, like, pronto.

I read the recipe around 8am. Turns out cecci are chickpeas. Great! I love chickpeas. At 8:03, I was in the kitchen, a pot of water boiling on the stove, rummaging through my cabinets for a (suddenly precious) can of chickpeas. With good anchovies in the fridge and a can of tomatoes by my side, I was moments away from having a tupperware of down and dirty pasta and cecci for lunch. Chickpeas were found, I got down and dirty in the kitchen, the rest is down and dirty history.

As Jennifer rightly points out, this is the kind of recipe that lends itself to adjustments -- both intentional and entirely accidental ones. Fisheri calls for fresh tomatoes, but I assure you if he'd written the recipe during an East Coast winter, he'd have called for canned. I actually cheated and used half canned tomatoes, half sundried tomatoes that I reconstituted in a bit of boiling water. Come summer, I'll try this with fresh ones, but not these days. I have a unconquerable weakness for spice, so I've added chili flakes both times I've made this recipe, and highly recommend them. Fisheri called for farfalle or another small pasta, but I broke all the rules and used spaghetti. Know what? It was still delicious. In terms of the liquid used, I've tried it with chicken broth and water; both are fine, broth is is better. If you use water, be sure to really load up that bowl with cheese. As for the rosemary: it's delicious, but so was a sprig of thyme that I accidentally used instead. Any which way you make it, dinner (or lunch) just doesn't get much easier.

Also, now that I have your attention, apologies for the shameless self-promotion, but if I can't do it here, where can I? I'm super excited to announce that I'm featured in this week's Washingtonian Blogger Beat! Check it out!

Down and Dirty Pasta e Cecci From Food52, via Jennifer Steinhauser, via her friend Fisheri

2 cloves garlic 4 filets anchovies 3 sprigs rosemary 3 tablespoons olive oil chili flakes to taste 1 can chickpeas, drained 4 ripe plum tomatoes (or 4 canned tomatoes, strained if desired; or a mix of canned and sundried, reconstituted; you get the drift: anything goes.) 1/2 pound small pasta like farfalle (I used spaghetti) 4 cups chicken broth or water heaps of grated parmesan salt and pepper

Dice garlic, roughly chop anchovies, and cut up tomatoes.

If using water instead of broth, bring water to a boil in small pot.

In a large pot over medium heat, saute the garlic, anchovies, and two sprigs of rosemary in olive oil until anchovies melt into the oil. Add chili flakes, if using.

Add chopped tomatoes. Saute 10-15 minutes, until tomatoes are cooked through. Taste, and salt if needed.

Turn heat to medium-high and add chickpeas, along with a few cups of boiling water or chicken broth. Ad last sprig of rosemary and bring the whole thing to a gentle boil.

Add pasta. If liquid doesn't cover pasta, add enough that it's just covered. Reduce heat to simmer and cook for one minute less than the pasta package recommends. You want the pasta to be cooking in what will become its sauce, so add liquid only if necessary; you don't want the sauce to be too thin.

When the pasta is done, spoon it into bowls, grind in some pepper, and top with as much parmesan cheese as your heart desires. Add a glug of olive oil, if you like. Dig in.

Moroccan Salmon with Curried Yogurt

Though it doesn't appear very often on this site, fish -- salmon in particular -- is a staple in the NDP kitchen. I like it because it's a substantial cornerstone of a meal without being as heavy as meat often is. I frequently host lunch on Saturdays, and I almost always cook for these lunches in advance; salmon can be served cold with a dipping sauce, obviating the need to carefully par-bake it before reheating the next day to serve. Also, it's delicious.

Last year, I frequently cooked fish "en papillote," each filet wrapped with care in its own little parcel of parchment paper. It's a very healthful way of cooking fish, in its own juices and little else. Sometimes I'd add slivers of thai bird chillies or slices of peach, but the method was always the same. This year, I'm planning to broil my fish more often. That little spot at the bottom of my oven doesn't get enough airtime, and considering its ability to make sugar into caramel and turn anything that beautiful shade of brown, it really should.

The method here couldn't be simpler. Clean the salmon and slice into individual servings (or don't, if you prefer the drama of bring a long side of salmon to the table). Season generously with salt and just about anything else. My favorite of late is Ras El Hanout, a Moroccan spice blend of nutmeg, mace, cloves, black pepper, saffron, and more (recipe below), that's mellow but still intensely flavorful. Salmon has plenty of natural fat, so drizzling oil over the fillets is optional. Either way, tuck it under the broiler for about 15 minutes, until it's just cooked through.

When it comes to serving the salmon, serve warm or chilled, and offer plenty of lemon slices. I also served a super-easy curried yogurt that comes together in a jiffy. I used a spice blend called Hawaij, a Yemenite blend of cumin, tumeric, cloves, black pepper, and more. I've included the recipe below, but you could also use a curry powder or a different spice blend.

Moroccan Salmon with Curried Yogurt serves 4

For the Ras El Hanout:

2 teaspoons ground nutmeg 1 teaspoon salt 1 teaspoon ground ginger 3/4 teaspoon ground black pepper 1/2 teaspoon ground mace 1/2 teaspoon ground allspice 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon 1/4 teaspoon crushed saffron threads

Blend in spice blender. Best if used within a week.

For the Salmon:

Preheat the broiler. Slice salmon into individual portions, if desired, and transfer to broiler-safe baking sheet or 9x13 pan. Season generously with salt and about 5 tablespoons of a dry spice mixture. Drizzle lightly with olive oil or dot with butter, if desired. Place salmon underneath broiler about 7 minutes, until top is browned. Transfer to oven and lower heat to 400; bake another 7-9 minutes, until salmon is fully cooked.

For the Hawaij:

6 1/2 tablespoons black peppercorns 1/4 cup cumin seed 2 1/2 tablespoons coriander seeds 1 1/2 tablespoons green cardamom pods 1 1/2 teaspoons whole cloves 3 1/2 tablespoons ground turmeric

Blend. Add two tablespoons to 1 cup yogurt and stir to combine.