Sunday Recipe: Sicilian Meatballs with a Basic Tomato Sauce

It started, simply enough, with a stale hunk of bread. Really.

I had purchased a loaf of rustic Italian bread from Breadworks and used about two-thirds of it. There it sat on my butcher's block in it's paper bag. It was too hard for sandwiches, yet I left it there. Finally, that stale hunk of bread taunted me. Silently, I could hear the bread whispering recriminations as I tried to catch up on my viewings of Top Chef and Parks & Rec. I tried to get on with some writing assignments, but the bread was almost shouting at me. This went on for a solid day. The next day I woke up and thought -- meatballs.

Sunday Recipe: Trofie with Perfect Pesto

I distinctly remember the first time I had pesto -- sublime insouciance, a revelation on my tongue. Then the 1990's happened and everybody served pesto on everything. On bread, on fish, on pasta, on pizza, on your breakfast cereal. It was served year round with old, flavorless basil and too much garlic. It turned me off pesto for a good long time. In fact, I don't think I had eaten pesto in more than a decade.

This passed winter, while perusing my mother-in-law's bookshelves, I discovered Waverly Root's comprehensive guide to the regional foods of Italy, titled, simply enough, 'The Food of Italy.' (Published in 1972 by Vintage Books, a division of Random House. I think it is out of print now, but if you can lay your hands on it, give it a look.) At any rate, in Root's book, I discovered that pesto was invented in Liguria (as was ravioli, so I personally owe those crazy sea-faring Ligurians a big debt of gratitude.) Liguria is the province right around the knee-cap of the peninsula that extends out into the Mediterranean as you can see in this map, and the basil grows thick and lush on the hillsides there. From Root's book:

Sunday Recipe: Mushrooms Stuffed with Pine Nuts

Ah, pignolis, those unctuous little nuts.

These are a great treat for your vegetarian friends, but don't let that scare you off. They are sublime little pockets of goodness.

You will need:
18 large button mushrooms
4 ounces (ish) of pine nuts (that's two little jars)
2 cloves garlic, finely chopped
1 cup bread crumbs
1/2 cup finely grated romano cheese
1 lemon, juiced
pinch of crushed red pepper

First, toast the pine nuts in a hot, dry sautee pan. Remove.

Clean the mushroom caps and remove the stems of the mushrooms. Dip each one of the caps in lemon juice and put top side down in a glass baking dish that has been brushed with olive oil(reserve the remaining lemon).

Chop the mushroom stems and sautee with the garlic in olive oil until they are completely broken down. Add the crushed red pepper and bread crumbs and sautee a couple of minutes. Then remove from the pan and toss in a large bowl with the grated romano and toasted pine nuts. Taste for salt and, if the stuffing mix seems a little dry, mix in some additional olive oil.

Stuff each cap with the filing and pour the remaining lemon juice over top.

Bake uncovered at 400 degrees for 25 to 30 minutes.

This is adapted from the Moosewood Cookbook, if you want to go to the mother-ship.