We have just harvested Zucchini, and also bought some great white eggplant at our local Farmer's Market. We have developed a couple of recipes that take advantage of these Summer vegetables, and we hope you will try them, as well as enjoy them.
They are:
Zucchini "Carpaccio" Salad:
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Eggplant Stuffed with Pasta:
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of these recipe can also be found on The New Stuff Page:
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on the Food Page:
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errors are mine, and should you find any, please feel free to let me know, so that I can correct them. NOTE: For the bread bakers on this or other News Groups, we have done quite a bit of work on The Flour Treatise, and will be posting the additions/revisions to that before too long.
You guys need to lighten up. I told you where we got the name, and that is the name. If this confounds you I am sorry. Let's just call it raw "zucchini, cut into thin strips, and then dressed with olive oil and garlic." I suppose that would make it something you could all relate to when it comes to food.
I imagine that when you hear the word foam you think of foaming at the mouth. It turns out that the most famous restaurant in Spain, as well as many in the USA are big into foams. I think this is a stupid mane for the product, but it is the name they chose. So I spent 2 minutes learning about it, as well as about "de-constructed foods". If you want something to tax your intellect, spend a bit of time studying de-constructed food.
Have a great day.
Jerry @ The Artisan
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- before you bitch about a recipe, try it. If it's good, the name is irrelevant. If you don't like it, delete it, or forget it. =================================================================================
It's not a matter of being confounded, it's a matter of your "chef" and his utter lack of understanding where names come from and what they mean. And your endorsing that ignorance. As for your flaccid effort to strike out at people who look for coherent intelligence in the kitchen, save that energy for your bread doughs. It'll be less painful in the long run.
I bet this guy piles up foods and calls the heap a "Napoleon."
Or he makes a blueberry pie and calls it a "clafouti."
If you and your web site demonstrated deep knowledge and extraordinary skill, you might be able to pull that snide crap off. Your stuff is pretty good, but you ain't the top of the mountain.
More ignorance, Jerry. When Adria introduced foams at El Bulli, they were precisely and exactly that - foams. They were dispensed from devices usually used for whipped cream. When various and sundry morons tried to swing onto his bandwagon (about three years after he'd already moved on), they were as well informed as your "chef" and squirted out all sorts of hilarious perversions of the real thing. Adria is truly in a class of his own. The would-be clones who try to imitate him are so far off the mark as to deserve gentle snickers and a dismissive wave of the hand.
One great danger you seem to have fallen prey to is thinking that because you just learned something that nobody else knows it already. The notion of deconstruction is as old as passing on recipes. And actively dismantling foods to create separated variants is likewise nothing new. Two whole minutes, huh? Real science...
I've written probably 500 articles that specifically deconstructed traditional foods. Or factory foods. Or something a neighbor made. Or a wild-assed idea like blueberry nuke cakes.
Hey, Jerry. The name is never irrelevant except to knuckle-dragging Neanderthals for whom language is a burden, a trifle, rather than a means to the end of transmitting information. Childish attempts to be oh-so-modern with names that are uninformative and even wrong brands those users with an unfortunate mark.
Here's some free advice about language and writing: Don't write it so they can understand it. Write it so they can't misunderstand it.
You are totally off base here. You cannot read, or choose not to, as I have posted a number of references that contradict your assertion of what Carpaccio is, or should be. I stand by the Zucchini Carpaccio, as do the references I provided. You seem to think because you write articles, you wear the white robe of a Pope. You don't, and your diatribe suggests you never will.
It is nice to see that you are familiar with foams and deconstructed foods. I too have written about them, but have no need to impress anyone here. In short, I find them silly and of limited value in the real world inhabited by most people.
When you have 1.3 million visitors a year to your website - from all parts of the world - you can crow a bit. If indeed you have web site please, provide the URL so that we can visit it, and be enlightened.
I know that we have strong opinions, and over the years have made others angry because of them. It is nice to know, that we have not done that with everyone!
Jerry, you posted two references, both of which I dealt with, and took it further to full explanation of why I made the assertions. You've just repeated your initial notion that because you did it, it was right. Carpaccio should be red meat on a plate - to echo the color palette of the painter Carpaccio, as originally construed at Harry's Bar. That others misuse, misconstrue or simply want to sound more swell and nifty by using it to mean that which it doesn't, merely demonstrates that while 100 is the average IQ, it isn't necessarily sufficient.
Jerry, I'm a chef with more than 30 years experience, with European and American training, and ownership of many, and operation of many more restaurants. I'm a member of several professional organizations involved with foodservice. I also have a degree in English and have written more than 1500 articles which have been published in places like the NYTimes and LATimes syndicates as well as many other magazines and newspapers, even an encyclopedia. I've been doing a call-in radio program for nearly 20 years about food and cooking. I'm not the pope and I don't play him on tv. But I surely do have a lengthy professional background in this field. And while I may not be the smartest kitchen hand, the - literally - thousands of books in my library, all of which I've read and used, would seem to comprise a reasonably exhaustive source bank. I ain't the pope, but I also ain't a rookie.
I don't think I'm going to defer to your literary criticism, given your own writing, although "diatribe" was a nice touch.
Of course. That's why you brought them up to try to seem more widely knowledgeable than you are. And assumed that others - probably me - aren't as versed as you are. But I somewhat agree with your assessment of foams. They do have a real, if limited, place in culinaria, as foie gras, caviar, balut, Velveeta, durian and Miracle Whip do. The table is nothing if not democratic. If the "real world as inhabited by most people" were to be the sole criterion for value, there would be no great music, architecture, art or literature. Or cuisine. Perhaps try to aspire higher.
I don't have a web site up. That total of visitors is a large number. I note that you've just bragged about your web site, but above you say you "have no need to impress anyone here." Perhaps a tiny contradiction.
Welcome. It is very nice to find posters who seem literate.
I suppose that having a "place in culinaria" can be taken to=20 imply that they are edible. I have always been partial to Miracle Whip -- I wonder if you (Bob) can help me understand how it is made? Can do mayonnaise, but not Miracle Whip. Balut and durian do not seem very interesting, particularly balut.
One thing I have always liked is a fried baloney sandwich on=20 sourdough bread, with Miracle Whip and kimchee.
The same Harry's that developed "Fettucini(e) Alfredo" I imagine....
Well, I suppose this was a reflection on the aspects of raw, and thin slices. The same can be said of positing that a strawberry shortcake becomes a napoleon, or a moldless trifle. I think the appelation "-tini" now applies to just about anything, I"ve seen a "cheesecaketini" which was simply a cream cheese mousseline poured into martini glass and garnished with piece of candied fruit on a toothpick.
I *believe* it was Pierre Troisgrois (sp?) who was known for telling jokes with dishes, such as his salmon scallopine--he was playing on large flat disks of flesh and referring to "leg of salmon" which some would find amusing.
The problem is when someone doesn't realize they're pulling the finger and takes themselves too seriously.
Pastorio....arguing on the Internet is like running in the Special Olympics. .......and you know the rest.
Self appointed "experts" abound...and it doesn't take much to figure out the contributors that are just looking for attention that was lacking in their life as a child.
Except that Vegetable Carpaccio is not unknown in Italy, nor is it any sort of food joke.
The web page below gives a recipe for Carpaccio Vegetale.
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Carpaccio Carpaccio Vegetale
Robbio is a farming town in Lombardy, near Alessandria, not too far from the Piedmont border. In the heart of rice-growing country, Robbio is surrounded by paddies, which produce Italy's famed Baldo, Arbono, and Carnaroli rice. Da Mino, a small restaurant located in the center of town, specializes in typical rural dishes of the area, and I was particularly taken by Chef Enrica Abatte's unusual fresh vegetable carpaccio. Made with produce from the garden of Pietro Lorizzo, her husband and the restaurants owner, the macerated paper-thin vegetables came to the table lightly chilled, tender, and full of texture and flavor.
When I have the time, I prepare the carpaccio as they do at Da Mino, but when I don't want to wait, I simply toss all the vegetables and seasonings together and serve it immediately. The styles are different; both are delicious. Try this with a light, luscious, and dry red, such as Bonarda dell'Oltrepó Pavese.
4 medium zucchini, trimmed and cut into paper-thin rounds
2 teaspoons best-quality red wine vinegar
2 small red bell peppers, stemmed, seeds and pith removed, cut into paper-thin strips Fine sea salt Freshly ground black pepper (optional)
2 cups arugula, rinsed, patted dry, and torn into bite-size pieces
2 ounces Parmigiano-Reggiano, shaved into paper-thin curls (see Segreti)
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
Cover the bottom of a 12-inch round nonreactive dish with a layer of the zucchini, using half the rounds, slightly over-lapping them in concentric circles. Using a pastry brush, brush half the vinegar as evenly as possible over the zucchini. Scatter half the bell pepper slices over the zucchini, then season lightly with salt and, if desired, black pepper. Arrange half the arugula leaves on top with half the Parmesan cheese curls. Drizzle with half the olive oil and season lightly again with salt and, if desired, pepper. Repeat the layers using the remaining ingredients.
Cover the dish tightly with aluminum foil and refrigerate for 18 to
24 hours. Remove from the refrigerator about 15 minutes before serving.
Segreti To shave Parmesan cheese, use a vegetable peeler and simply "peel" the curls from the hunk of cheese, holding it right over the salad.
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And here is a restaurant in Italy that has it on its menu:
Oh, he probably already knows that he's fighting a rearguard action against a change in languages [English and Italian] that is well under way. We've all seen many examples of specific names morphing into descriptives for semi-related things. It's quite like the way brand names and trademarks become generic words, notwithstanding the efforts of trademark lawyers. I've made similar objections a number of times here in rfc, usually saying something like, "That sounds like an interesting recipe, but don't call it ___[some misappropriated name]_____ , make up a new name for it."
He's only recently been revisiting rfc anyway, and probably didn't really feel at home until he tried to pick a fight. -aem
Miracle Whip is a factory product that you can't exactly duplicate at home. It's an evolution of "salad dressing" and there are lots of recipes out there for it.
And balut is not interesting. Really not interesting.
Not a combination I've ever had. I don't especially like Miracle Whip. I find the sweetness offputting. When I was a kid, one of our neighbors used to make us Miracle Whip sandwiches on Wonder bread. We thought they were terrific.
I grew up with homemade bologna (actually it was my grandfather's homemade version of mortadella) that was never fried that way. Until I got to college and my roommate introduced me to its delights. Bologna, lettuce, mayo on a New York kaiser roll at 3 in the morning in anticipation of a monster hangover in a few hours.
I hate to tell ya, but I suspect a large number of those are merely people curious to see if you are as much of a pompous ass as your writing makes you out to be...
Dictionary is wrong on place and time. Written by John Mariani who contradicts himself, below, 16 years later.
"Harry's Bar Rome was born in 1959, took its name only in
1962 but the café existed since 1918. It was the Golden Gate Confectioner's, quoted in many books. At the end of the Twenties it became part of the De Gasperis' family until
1958, the very year it cake to be American Bar Restaurant." Complete with typos...
"Fettucini Alfredo....A dish of fettuccini egg noodles mixed with butter, Parmesean cheese, and cream. The dish has been a staple of Italian-American restaurants since the mid-1960s. It was created in 1914 by Alfred Di Lelio, who opened a restaurant in Rome, Italy, under his first name on the Via della Scrofa in 1910. The dish supposedly helped restore the appetite of his wife after she gave birth to their son. The original dish was made with a very rich triple butter Di Lelio made himself, three kinds of four, and only the heart of the best parmigiano. Fettuccini all'Alfredo became famous after Hollywood movie actors Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford ate the dish at Alfredo's restaurant while on their honeymoon in
1927...After World War II Di Lelio moved to the Piazza Augusto Imperatore, and in the 1950s his restaurant became a mecca for visiting Americans, most of whom came to sample fettuccini Alfredo...Because most cooks could not reproduce the richness of the original butter, today the dish almost always contains heavy cream."
---Encyclopedia of American Food and Drink, John F. Mariani [Lebhar-Friedman:New York] 1999 (p. 126) Complete with typos.
"The story goes that while honeymooning in Rome in 1927, Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford dined almost daily on this rich pasta at Alfredo's restaurant, and in gratitude, presented restauranteur Alfredo Di Lelio with a golden pasta fork and spoon at the end of their stay. Journalists picked up the story and spread news of Fettucchine Alfredo across the Atlantic. Before long, American chefs were imporvising. According to Marie Simmons...food writer who is of Italian heritage, an authentic Fettuccini Alfredo is not tricked out with cream or mushrooms or green peas or garlic. It's a mix of sweet creamery butter, Parmigiano-Reggiano, homemade fettuccini, and black pepper. Nothing more, nothing less."
---The American Century Cookbook: The Most Popular Recipes of the 20th Century, Jean Anderson [Clarkson Potter:New York] 1997 (p. 213) Complete with typos.
"Carpaccio was invented by Giuseppe Cipriani in 1950 at Harry's Bar in Venice, Italy. It was named for the Renaissance painter Vittore Carpaccio who was noted for his use of red in his paintings. Thin sliced raw beef served with a cold vinaigrette made with olive oil, or just olive oil and lemon juice (and sometimes Parmesan cheese). Generally served on a bed of greens such as watercresss, endive, arugula and/or radicchio."
I thought it might be interesting to see what the Italians themselves have to say about this, so I looked it up in the Zingarelli, a standard reference dictionary in Italy, such as is Websters in the U.S., or the OED in other English-speaking countries. Thus far, they agree with you, but
"carpaccio [denominato così da G. Cipriani intorno al 1960, perché il piatto fu inventato in occasione della mostra del pittore V. Carpaccio (1465-1526) a Venezia]"
they date it ten years later
Zingarelli agrees with that, too:
"Vivanda consistente in carne, gener. filetto, affettata molto sottile, condita con olio e formaggio parmigiano in scaglie e consumata cruda"
but then goes on to add that by extension
"(est.) Preparazione simile a base di pesce: carpaccio di salmone crudo; carpaccio di pesce spada."
the term also includes fish-based preparations. My version of the Zingarelli dates from 1996, so it does not appear unreasonable that by normal evolution of language, the term now also be extended to vegetable-based dishes.
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