Polenta: The Next Big Thing?

Not long ago, in the epicenter of Brooklyn's culinary scene, I had a delightful dinner in a place called Osteria il Paiolo. Williamsburg, Brooklyn, home to some of the world's hippest dining venues, is a multi-culti morass of righteous Jews, old-time Italians and Dominicans, and newly-converted food passionistas with young families and big dreams. It is also home to one of the only places I know that features polenta as its calling card, authentically made in an "il paiolo" -- a large unlined copper pot -- the traditional vessel in northern Italy in which to s-l-o-w-l-y stir ground cornmeal into boiling water and salt until thick and creamy. It is sturdier than porridge and more sublime than its humble ingredients might imply. I was no more than 19 years old when I first met its acquaintance during a trip to northern Italy. It was there that I had one of the my most memorable dishes of my life: A thick slice of Gorgonzola dolce onto which was poured a stream of hot buttery polenta across its girth. An exercise in simplicity, its creamy texture and unexpected melding of flavors and fragrances, was downright sinful. And while not the traditional form polenta usually takes, it remains a love-at-first bite memory. While the good people of Tuscany are known as "bean-eaters" because of their culinary proclivity towards legumes, the Piemontese locals are known as polentone. Apparently, everyone in Piedmont eats polenta all the time, and have done so before the Roman empire! (At that time, polenta was made from other grains such as millet, barley, and farro. Corn, or maize, appeared in the 16th century.)

That said, I was excited to try the polenta, and all the other good things I had heard about, at the dining spot loosely translated as "the polenta pot." It is an osteria which, in Italy, connotes a rather casual restaurant where the owner is also the host: Enter Alex Palumbo. Alex, a native of northern Italy's Piedmont region, was primed to bring the signature dish of his family's kitchen to slightly tonier environs. Amidst a sprawl of white table-clothed tables in an industrial modern space, one can dine very well indeed. In addition to the myriad ways to eat polenta, topped with tomatoes and quail, with shrimp and rosemary, with fontina, are exemplary antipasti and main courses -- we especially loved the homemade sausage with savory cabbage served in a terracotta casserole, and my husband said his roasted quail, prepared with pancetta, cream and sage, was the best he ever had. Good, too, was the unusual pappardelle al cioccolata, chocolate pasta with a wild boar and vegetable ragu.

Unbeknownst to me, authentic polenta is made with only water and salt, not the butter and cheese we have come to expect. But along the way, the latter ingredients have become commonplace. And while the ingredients may be 1-2-3, the mastery is in the preparation: Polenta must be slowly stirred for up to 45 minutes for its requisite creaminess and flavor. There are huge copper paiolo pots that have electric motors attached, but at Alex's osteria, everything is lovingly stirred by a mano (by hand.) Alex gets his heirloom polenta -- which is coarse and toothsome -- from a "secret source" in Italy and claims that no one else in New York (ergo the country) has it. At last count, the kitchen is stirring up more than 60 pound per month, up from 10 pounds when he first got started, not so long ago. Clearly, the locals are catching on.

In my own kitchen at home, I make polenta with tomatoes and Parmigiano-Reggiano as one of my ultimate comfort dishes, and on occasion, indulge in that time-honored memory of gorgonzola topped with steaming polenta. Only now I gild the dish with a tuft of balsamic-tinged wild arugula and anoint it all with my best extra-virgin olive oil on top. And I am still enamored of Colman Andrews' polenta with oranges and olive oil from his wonderful book, Flavors of the Riviera. The potential for polenta is promising, perhaps turning us all into polentone one day.

Osteria il Paiolo, 106 North 6th Street, Brooklyn, NY 11211 (www.ilpaiolonyc.com)

A Radically Delicious Recipe

Every Wednesday and Friday Orecchiette with Fried Chickpeas, Cracked Pepper & Sage

This is an adaptation of a recipe from Little Meals which I wrote almost two decades ago!  It won me my first James Beard Award.  I have updated this recipe only slightly, using fresh sage and grated lemon zest.  I also cook up my own chickpeas but canned chickpeas are perfectly acceptable.  The dish is a riff on an old Italian recipe known as "Thunder & Lightning" -- where "thunder" refers to the profusion of fried chickpeas, and "lightning" to the excessive amount of coarsely cracked black pepper.  As a bonus, sometimes I drizzle a bit of my best extra-virgin olive oil over each dish for extra complexity and "perfume."  Nice with a bottle of Arneis (a white wine from northern Italy) or a simple Chianti.

12 ounces dried orecchiette pasta 4 tablespoons olive oil 2 large cloves garlic, very finely chopped 2 cups cooked chickpeas 1 tablespoon finely slivered sage, plus sprigs for garnishing 1 cup good-quality chicken broth 2 teaspoons coarsely cracked black pepper, "mignonette or butcher-grind" 2 tablespoons unsalted butter 3/4 cup freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano grated zest of 1 lemon

Bring a large pot of salted water to a rapid boil.  Add orecchiette and cook until al dente (about 12 minutes.) Meanwhile, heat the olive oil in a very large skillet.  Add the garlic and chickpeas and cook over high heat, stirring, until the chickpeas begin to pop.  Add the sage, broth and pepper.  Continue to cook over high heat until the broth reduces a bit and becomes syrupy (about 5 minutes.)   Drain pasta well.  Put butter in a large warm bowl and add pasta.  Toss.  Add chickpeas and broth to bowl and stir well. Add 1/2 cup cheese and salt to taste.  Stir in the grated lemon zest.  Mix gently.  Drizzle with extra-virgin olive oil, if desired, and dust with remaining cheese. Garnish with small sage leaves.  Serve immediately.  Serves 4

Tastes of the Week

April 8 to April 16, 2012 Several years ago, the revered restaurant San Domenico located on Central Park South moved to East 26th Street across from Madison Park. Owned by father-daughter team, Tony and Marisa May the place was a bit of an enigma -- modernistically designed by Massimo Vignelli, cavernous, and re-named SD26.  My husband had gone for lunch several times, and enjoyed it, but it wasn't until last Friday that I decided to check it out. I had a splendid time, and the risotto was one of the best I've ever had. It certainly was one of the healthiest! Made without the requisite butter and cheese, Mr. May's "new-style" risotto is instead "mounted" with extra-virgin olive oil and stirred until every grain of rice is perfectly cooked, toothsome, and voluptuous. Prepared with fish fumet and white wine, with a touch of garlic, scallion, and herbs, we tried one version with periwinkles (tiny sea snails) and another topped with pencil thin asparagus; the epitome of Spring. It's easy to be skeptical, but easier to be wowed by the pristine quality of the result. We began our meal with paper thin slices of bottarga (a southern Italian delicacy of dried tuna roe) sprinkled with lemon zest and droplets of Sardinian olive oil; and followed our risotto with olive-oil poached cod with polenta taragna, baby calamari & squid ink, accompanied by a few glasses of very good Arneis (a white grape variety from the north of Italy.)  Bomboloni (custard-filled doughnuts), panna cotta with balsamic reduction and strawberries, and zabaione millefoglie with wild berries and caramel sauce, finished our "girl's night out" with great satisfaction. Tony's chef was a fabulous woman, Odette Fada, who for many years was the only three-star female chef in New York. Together we invented olive oil ice cream before anyone did (sometime in the 1980's) for a press event sponsored by the International Olive Oil Council. Today the chefs at SD26 are a trio of very handsome young men; the culinary equivalent of the "three tenors" all hailing from interesting places in Italy. Their food speaks for itself.  I look forward to many more meals at SD26, especially when the outdoor seating opens up and I can pretend I am, once again, dining al fresco en Italia.

We ate lots of delicious things during the two nights of Passover. But perhaps the most delicious, and unusual offering, was a two-ingredient haroses, which got everyone's attention.  It is a Persian version of the symbolic recipe served, with matzoh, to represent the mortar used in Egypt.  Generally is it an amalgam of chopped apples, walnuts, cinnamon, bound together with sweet wine. But this new (or very old) haroses is made with only date honey (or date syrup or date molasses) and lots of finely chopped walnuts.  It is sticky and tar-ry and wonderful to drizzle on almost anything. My approximate recipe is 2 cups date molasses (or date honey) stirred with 3 cups of very finely chopped walnuts. Date honey is the honey mentioned in the Bible (not honey from bees) and can be found in any Middle Eastern market. I will now make it is staple in my pantry. We also enjoyed Arthur Schwartz's wonderful potato kugel and a long-simmering tzimmes made with sour prunes, carrots, sweet potatoes and a generous, succulent chunk of flanken.

Cultural nourishment included the simulcast of Manon Lescaut at the Brooklyn Academy of Music (starring Anna Netrebko); and a movie about the artist Gerhard Richter at the Film Forum -- one of my favorite places in the city. They pop their popcorn in peanut oil.

We also ate our first "frozen dinner" in decades:  "Butter Chicken" which we bought at Costco. Butter chicken is a very famous dish in India. This was a great version and we served it alongside a mound of basmati rice and drank tea. Not bad for a weeknight dinner.

May your coming week be filled with great tastes and nourishing experiences.

Italian Cheesecake by Way of Atlantic City

In the nick of time this morning, a recipe for a radically simple Italian cheesecake popped up on my computer screen.  It was sent to me by Anne Kabo of Margate, New Jersey who is the wonderful baker featured in Radically Simple. Anne generously taught me how to make her richly decadent cream cheese cake, better than any New York style cheesecake I've had.  You can find it on page 318 of Radically Simple (now available on Amazon!  A great gift for Mother's Day -- if not for Anne's cheesecake recipe alone!)   But yesterday Anne told me about another cheesecake -- this one based on ricotta cheese and little else.  She found it in the local Atlantic City newspaper which features recipes from affable home cooks.  Anne eyed it and made it immediately (and brought it to a friend in the hospital.)  She added fresh raspberries dusted with confectioner's sugar on top but exclaimed that it was delicious enough without.  Anne knew this recipe would appeal to me because it fit the criteria for each one of my radically simple recipes -- which balance the elements of time, ease and number of ingredients.   And...whose procedures can be explained in 140 words or less!  Not quite Twitter but close.  This genuinely appealing recipe has no crust, can be make in one bowl, and has only six ingredients.  Anne says, "It bakes up beautifully with no cracks -- unlike the other cheesecake I make."  Am running to the store to get some nice fresh ricotta....see you there!  The recipe comes from Alice Cologna of Mays Landing, New Jersey by way of the Life Section Editor of the Press of Atlantic City, Steven V. Cronin, who writes a weekly column called "Legacy Recipes." Atlantic City Italian Cheesecake I'm inclined to add a pinch of sea salt to this.

Butter for greasing the pan 3 pounds whole milk ricotta cheese 6 extra-large eggs (or large if you have those) 3/4 cup whole milk 1-1/4-1-1/2 cups sugar (sweetness is up to you) 3 tablespoons corn starch 1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.  Generously butter an 8- or 9-inch spring form pan.  Mix all the ingredients in a standing mixer until smooth.  Pour into the pan and bake for 1 hour and 20 minutes.  Cool for an hour before placing it in the refrigerator.  That's it!  Serves 10