Che Inferno!

 So today I made homemade ricotta cheese. Technically, it is not true ricotta cheese, even though most of the YouTube videos referred to it as ricotta cheese. To make real ricotta cheese, you need fresh milk, preferably from a goat, and you treat it with rennet, make mozzarella, and then using the whey leftover, you recook it (ri-cotta) to make the cheese. 

Anyway, this is made using whole milk and heavy cream and lemon juice or vinegar. Heated to about 190°. Add a little salt and after adding the acid, that is lemon juice or vinegar, you let it sit until the curds form. 

It was a bit of a mess. I made a single container of ricotta plus a little bit more. It cost about $3.49 for the milk, $2.99 for the heavy cream $3.99 for the cheesecloth, about $.50 for one and 1/2 lemons. For a total of $10.97.

I can buy a container of BelGioioso ricotta at sprouts for $7.99 when it’s on sale, or $8.99 when it’s not. And there’s no mess to clean up.

Traditions and Validation

An Italian couple hubs and I have become friends with came for dinner last evening. 

They have become like family and we shared conversation about language, travel, food and work among other things. They really love living in the States - I think more than some of us disillusioned citizens. 

And I really enjoyed serving Italian ethnic food (antipasto, homemade ricotta and spinach filled egg crepe manicotti, meatballs, sausage, homemade bread, wine, sambuca, Italian Christmas cookies) to these friends as they gave me their approval of authenticity for my cooking.

So often in New Mexico I feel like I can’t relate. Our non-Italian/American friends have said they like my cooking, but somehow the compliments coming from native Italians carry extra weight!

It was nice to have a cultural connection for a change -- like what I was used to back East. 

We had what our Christmas Day meal would be if we weren’t going to a neighbors on Monday. 

Today, Christmas Eve we’ll have maybe only three (out of seven) fishes (anchovies in fried bread, salmon, shrimp) with a couple of guys from Texas who don’t have a clue why we eat fish!

And in closing...as I likely won't be posting again for days...I will share again the video of my niece Andrea singing a beautiful rendition of O Holy Night. She is truly talented. To all who read and listen: Have a peaceful and restful Christmas and always be there for those you love.

Catching up a Bit After That Depressing Rant (AND now Blogger is messing up the Fonts! Why????)

 AND now Blogger is messing up the Fonts! Why????

1. Mardi Gras Dinner Party

 A few weeks ago I was informed by a neighbor, Wendy, our favorite fag hag, and I use the term lovingly, that there is a "new" gay guy in town. Well, new since COVID practically ended any large social gatherings where established resident could meet newbies. Remember our town has a population of only about 450 residents and one gets to know many, if not on a personal level, then by site or reputation.

Wendy met him through their mutual involvement in the NM Gay Men's Chorus and he has apparently been involved in Opera in some way for years. Anyhow, Wendy said that W.R. was having a Mardi Gras dinner party and she volunteered me to make the King Cake and jambalaya! Last year I swore I would not be making King Cake again, but as Grandma used to say, "You don't know nothing yet!"

The actual colors were better than the photo and the plastic cup was to keep the plastic wrap from messing up the frosting. So my King Cake was not as elegant as it could have been,

So I somewhat reluctantly made a King Cake and jambalaya for the dinner party of someone who I'd never met. W.R. had invited a total of eight guests: Leon and me, Wendy and her husband, two other men who were somehow involved in opera or singing and two women who were friends of his who arrived with a cute little barking dog.

Both W.R. and one of the men were in the habit of talking as though they were projecting their voices to the very back row of the second balcony. The guest in particular was excruciatingly loud. I am not exaggerating. His husband was almost as loud. Probably in order to be heard over his husband's habitually deafening voice. W.R. and the two men dominated the conversation most of the evening and with the little dog barking, other guests having to occasionally shout trying to get a word in, and the woman yelling at her dog to stop barking, the decibel level in the room was off the charts. It was literally PAINFULL. I couldn't wait to leave.

I will say the food was excellent. W.R. is somewhat of a professional cook and he prepared turkey with andouille dressing, mini beef Wellingtons, green beans, sweet potatoes. My jambalaya was made with chicken, andouille and shrimp. W.R. is currently on a very strict diet so was not able to eat anything. The eight guests sat at the festively decorated table while W.R. stood in the kitchen encouraging guests to eat more.

We stayed for what seemed like an endless two and a half hours. Everyone left at about the same time and no one offered to help with the clean-up. I am hoping that W.R. will not try to "be my friend" for several reasons that I will sum up by saying he has some strange quirks and personal issues and I don't wish to be a therapist.

2. Miscellaneous

A few photos etc.

Made Cornetti recently - not easy

It's the Italian Version of Croissants

Pizza and Sausage Bread

View from Our Town

The BIG Snow of 2023

Another View - Jemez Mountains

Hoochaneesta Blvd - Our Main Street

The Rio Grande

One Corner of Dystopia

 

A Post Especially for Mitchell

 Ok, I cannot compete with Mitchell of Moving With Mitchell fame when it comes to blog posts, especially one about food or desserts or restaurants or cafés. Nevertheless I am posting this for Mitchell because I thought of him when Hubby Leon and I had lunch at Cafe Pasqual's in Santa Fe on Thursday afternoon. 

Leon generally works Monday through Friday, has a one hour commute each way to work in Albuquerque and so it is not often we have an opportunity for a weekday lunch date. But he was able to work from home on Thursday morning and took the afternoon off for a doctor appointment and lunch in town.

After his noon appointment and my visit to the eye doctor to order a pair of prescription sunglasses (so as to get Leon's opinion on the correct frames) we decided to have lunch at Cafe Pasqual's. It's a small restaurant we'd never been to and probably never would have gone to if not for a gift certificate that my brother Mike and sister-in-law Claire gave us for Christmas. As mike and Claire live in Connecticut, I imagine he looked on line for restaurants in Santa Fe. I'm not sure how or why he chose this particular restaurant. Maybe he liked the wolf or coyote logo.

 

 

Anyway, it was a very generous $100 gift certificate. The note from my brother said "I know it's not much but it might buy you lunch"

 

I looked up Cafe Pasqual's on the internet and, well, judging from their menu, I figured lunch would be the best bet with maybe a few dollars left to spend in their gift shop. One hundred dollars is an amount we never in our wildest imagination would ever think of spending for a meal - anywhere.

The Cafe is very compact. It is not what one would call "posh" rather it is very Santa Fe shabby chic if I had to give it a description. Huge ristras of chili peppers hanging from the ceiling and strings of those Mexican cut-out flags, papel picado, strung across the room. 

 It's a small room with a, I guess you might call it a mezzanine...a half dozen tables up a few steps from the main dining area which probably had at most ten tables. I think the sign said "Seating capacity 47"

https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/legalcode

 We had to wait for a table. 

I was looking up at the mezzanine and said to Leon, "That looks like Wendy." He got up to get a better look and as she turned around toward us I said, "That is Wendy."

A surprise and a coincidence, for sure. Wendy is a neighbor of ours in the tiny village where we live, population 500 plus or minus. Wendy was probably the first person to welcome us when we moved to Cochiti Lake... somehow scoping us out as we were unpacking the van and moving furniture and greeting us with hugs and excitement, "Oh, new gays in the neighborhood!" 

And Wendy is also the ONLY woman in the New Mexico Gay Men's Chorus. She was having lunch with a colleague and we all dished a bit before Leon and I got seated.

I said, now I feel like a real Santa Fean...running into a friend at a hoity-toity Santa Fe restaurant!

Finally, we were seated and looked through the menus for breakfast and lunch, both served till 3pm. I decided on the

 SOFT POLENTA WITH SPINACH & BALSAMIC GRILLED PORTOBELLOS ~ House-made Heirloom Tomato Sauce / Mascarpone / Blizzard of Fresh Parmesan Reggiano 19. Add Talus Wind Ranch Spicy Pork Sausage Meatballs 6.

 Organic Lemonade 5.50

 I didn't point out to the waiter that "Parmesan Reggiano" is a horrible mixture of terms. It's either Parmesan or it's Parmigiano Reggiano. But I did say to the waiter, "I'm very curious to see what a "BLIZZARD" of Parmesan Reggiano will look like. He was amused but non-committal. 

Leon ordered the

*HOT PASTRAMI SANDWICH, WOOD-SMOKED ON TOASTED RYE ~ Melted Jack / Roasted Green Chile Strips / White Wine Sauerkraut 21.

 Ginger Pineapple Juice 6.50

 My lunch arrived with something less than a BLIZZARD of cheese, more like seven or eight flakes of snow. It was an interesting dish, good, not spectacular, not bad. The polenta was soft and perhaps more like a cross between grits and creamed corn with an unusual spice, good spinach and a large portobello cap. The sausage meatballs were...basically Italian sausage without the casing. The dish was satisfying, filling, tasty.

Leon said his pastrami was good, better than the "New York Deli" on Rodeo Road. He even liked the green chile strips.

We had already dug in before I thought to take a photo. Mitchell would never be so thoughtless.

 We decided to splurge as this would be lunch and dinner. So dessert was next. I got the

Boca Negra Dark Chocolate Torte / Bourbon White Chocolate Cream ~ Julia Childs 13.

I took a photo before doing any damage

Leon ordered 

Warm Apple Turnover / Rum Ice Cream / Dominique Dark Rum Sauce 13.

 I thought about ordering a coffee or espresso for 7.5 but decided that the chocolate was plenty of calories and caffeine. We will be sure to serve ice cream in Martini glasses from now on, however. Our guests will be impressed and think we are real Santa Fe sophisticates. 

So the check, with tax came to $92 and some change. We were given change back from the $100 gift and we left a $25 tip. So lunch came to a bit over $117!!! OMG. What a splurge. 

But we laughed and cajoled with Wendy and with each other and enjoyed the craziness of having lunch in a hoity-toity Santa Fe restaurant that we will likely never set foot in again.

It was a fun, and dare I say "romantic" lunch treat, even without a BLIZZARD of Parmesan Reggiano.

P.S. Mitchell, Sorry I didn't get photos of us or of Wendy and her friend. And for not taking a photo of our meals before we started eating. I'm just not that conscientious about such things. Maybe I'll do better next time.

Addendum: After my brother read the post he sent me this email:

Glad you enjoyed lunch, but here's the thing...

The gift card was only supposed to be $50, and they only billed me $50. So, I guess you made out pretty well. After reading your review, I probably should have sent you a $100 card after all. I didn't think $50 was quite enough for lunch, and I wanted to make it $75, but they were out of $25 cards - it was either $50 or $100. Maybe they ran out of the $50s and said What the heck, and sent what they had left?

Anyway, I'm glad you guys had a nice lunch.

Mike

The World May Be Going To Hell But We Eat Well: Chicken Cacciatore

 Chicken Cacciatore to a new level: I had 5 leftover roasted chicken legs (thighs were not available) and some mini sweet peppers and an eggplant and white and baby bella mushrooms, so chicken cacciatore was the logical result. In some "authentic" recipes it does not have eggplant or mushrooms or peppers. But this was taking cacciatore to a new level.

I would have put this on my other blog(Dinner's Ready) https//cookingfranco.blogspot.com but I just don't have the patience to do a step by step description of how I made this dish.

What went into it (not necessarily in this order) olive oil, garlic, sliced onion, sweet red, yellow and orange mini peppers, white mushrooms, baby bella mushrooms, red wine, eggplant, imported canned whole San Marzano tomatoes lightly crushed, salt, black pepper, hot red pepper flakes, oregano, fresh basil. Simmered low and slow for a couple of hours.

I don't know whether it was the vermouth on the rocks that I had before dinner or the imported San Marzano tomatoes, but this was a heavenly meal with a nice oven warmed ciabatta roll. Fall off the bone chicken. Sweet flavor of peppers, eggplant and tomato. a slight bite from the hot pepper flakes. Extra meatiness from the mushrooms. And some good bread to soak up the sauce. 

I didn't even put parmigiano cheese on mine. 

The photos do not do it justice. I out did myself on this one.

Tonight's Dinner: What Some People Call Weeds

Dandelion greens, lacinato kale,wilted in olive oil, garlic and red pepper flakes; cannellini beans, very little Italian sausage just for flavor, black pepper, chicken stock. Served over a little white rice and topped with grated parmigiano reggiano.

Note: I remember way back when my aunts would all go out together in the spring to the Connecticut dairy farmlands (now upscale housing communities or shopping malls) to pick wild dandelions. Now we pay $3.79 for a bunch which is maybe 10 ounces, grown on California farms for people like me craving the food of my ancestors. 

P.S. I am not ignoring the news or current events. I just have nothing of import to add to the commentary or sentiments that I read or hear or see every day. My heart is weary and I cook.

Making Pasta

 Maybe it's because I had a cortisone injection into my left knee yesterday after nearly four months of doctor appointments, x-rays, MRI, NSAIDS, and Physical Therapy...I felt ambitious today so made vegetarian onion soup with mushrooms au gratin (had two nieghbors for dinner, one who is from France. The soup passed with approval)

Also made homemade pasta. Tagliatelle and Pappardelle. 300 grams of all purpose organic flour, 200 grams of semolina flour, 5 whole eggs, a little water as needed (because our climate is so dry, the flour may need extra moisture).

Took some videos of that my technique. OK so Pasta Grannies I'm not.

I have a pasta machine but sometimes I just prefer rolling out the dough by hand. It gives me a connection to my heritage and how that did it for centureis.

 The pasta board and rolling pin were my mom's. Dad made them for her more than 50 years ago. They are prized possessions and I am reminded of her whenever I use them. 

Nor am I a videographer. So here goes nothing (and sorry, that background noise is hubby running the vacuum cleaner in the dining/living room. I'm not complaining, I hate to vacuum.) Also you should probably fast forward a lot as I didn't edit. I'm not one to talk incessantly like some cooking videos; I don't know what to say. A picture is worth...

 

 

  

 

 

Mastering the Art of La Pizza

 I have been making pizza (wrong) for like 33 years or more. Basically using my bread dough which is less hydrated than authentic Neopolitan pizza dough.

But just made my best pizza ever after watching this video several times.  (see below if you want to see an expert)

Despite the fact that my oven only goes to 500 F and I don't have a pizza stone (been there done that) and I was out of mozzarella because I put the last of it in my one-egg omelet for lunch!

It took 8+ minutes in the oven. Next time I will slip the pizza out onto the rack after 4 minutes to get the bottom crust more brown. 

I put three balls of dough into the freezer...I hope they will turn out as good. Thanks for the lesson, Ciao, Vito.

Granted, this is kind of an advertisement for a very expensive pizza oven, but Vito shows the proper technique. I am learning that hydration (ratio of water to flour) is the key. A 900 degree oven helps.

And if you want to see a REAL Pizza Oven being built you can watch this (in Italian, so you may want to turn off the sound). It looks like a real mess while he's building it, but the final result is ART.

 

Cook...It's What I Do

 I just put tonight's dinner "recipe" on my Cooking Blog: "Dinner's Ready".  We're having Ciambotta with Italian sausage. Kind of like ratatouille on steroids: eggplant, zucchini, mushrooms, onions, sweet peppers, potatoes, tomatoes, sausage. Spent hours chopping and dicing.

My homemade Italian sesame seed bread. A little parmegiano reggiano.

I must say it was scrumptious. The leftovers can feed maybe 12 people. Half will go into the freezer and the other half will be saved for the election workers in our tiny village for lunch on next Tuesday. It will be a change from the usual "New Mexican" cuisine.

Hubby seems happy.

Pasta Grannies goes Pasta Papa

 One of my favorite YouTube channels is Pasta Grannies. I've learned so much about making homemade (from scratch) pasta and I'm amazed at the infinite varieties of shapes, dough bases and sauces.

But Pasta Grannies surprised me (and apparently several others) this past week with a video of a sexy fisherman, Guido and his son Pietro making Spaghetti ai' Frutti di Mar'.*(Spaghetti with seafood). 

This was the meal I had hoped to eat while we were in California. Alas, it did not come to pass. Yes we ate some seafood but nothing like this spectacular meal.

We cannot get anything like fresh seafood in New Mexico. Yes,  the markets will call it fresh, but really even it it were jetted in from the nearest coast on ice, it is no longer fresh when it gets here. The seafood menu in most restaurants here has basically five options: shrimp, shrimp, shrimp, salmon, and tilapia (which is technically not seafood).

So here are Guido and Pietro. Even if you don't cook, do enjoy the video:

 

*an interesting aside: Guido uses a colloquial "un spaghetto ai frutti di mare" - the singular "spaghetto" is unusual, but really cool. There is another colloquial phrase, "ci facciamo due spaghetti" - let's make two spaghetti - meaning just two strands of spaghetti - but really, "spaghetti for two".

Getting Back To Life As We Once Knew It (Kind Of)

 Some photos of what we've been up to since we aren't on edge about politics so much, although with COVID none of us are really back to "normal" yet.

Moon Over Cochiti Lake (or Moon Over Neighbor's Roof)

Inauguration Evening

My Version of Chili con Carne

Not Bad, Actually

On the Way to Faywood

USFS Info

Gila National Forest

One of the Pools at Faywood Hot Springs

Leon and Benni Lounging at the Cabin - Faywood Hot Springs

Benni Late Afternoon in the Dessert

Home by the Hearth

Pond at Botanical Gardens

Leon, You Have a Surgical Mask Hanging from Your Ear....

Ducks and Koy

Pond, Japanese Garden, Botanical Gardens Albuquerque

Pond, Japanese Gardens

Pond, Waterfall, Japanese Gardens

Feral? Horses by the Rio Grande, Pena Blanca

Post script...this blog is a chore...I cannot upload more than three photos at a time because one always fails and if one fails, it will not allow me to insert ANY of the ones that uploaded! So I have to do it in small batches. And then, ocassionally two photos will "stick together" and it is a nightmare trying to separate them.