Is There a Nutmeg in the House? (30 page)

Fill the apples with the meat, arrange them in a baking dish in which they can be served, and in which they fit nicely. Reheat the prepared sauce, pour about 6 tablespoons of it round the apples, add approximately 300 ml (½ pint) of boiling water. Cook uncovered on the centre shelf of a moderately hot oven (180°C/350°F/gas mark 4) for 30 minutes, then move the dish to the bottom shelf and leave it for another 15–20 minutes, or until the apples are very soft but not broken. If it is necessary to slow up the cooking, cover the dish at this stage and reduce the temperature.

It is traditional to serve rice with these stuffed apples. Personally, I prefer them on their own.

Allow 2 apples per person. Any not eaten can be reheated slowly, in a covered dish.

Notes

1. Although walnuts are very characteristic of Persian cooking, I have sometimes used pine nuts instead. They are best left whole, and a couple of tablespoons will be sufficient. Sometimes minced beef is used instead of lamb. I have, incidentally, halved the quantity of meat specified by Mr Haroutunian. He, or his chef, hollows out the apples almost completely. To me, this makes for too much meat and not enough fruit.

2. When fresh tomatoes are scarce and expensive the sauce can be made entirely with the tinned variety. Those who object to the tomato pips will find it very easy to sieve the sauce.

3. Although Persia is predominantly a Moslem country, and therefore officially a non-alcohol drinking one, it is also one of the oldest wine-producing countries in the world, so the inclusion of wine in traditional Persian dishes is not surprising. And not every Moslem adheres to the rules laid down by the Prophet.

4. A spoon and fork are the implements needed for eating these stuffed apples.

5. A recipe very similar to the one used by The Armenian Restaurant is given in Claudia Roden’s
Book of Middle Eastern Food
(Penguin 1968), although Mrs Roden includes cooked yellow split peas in the stuffing and omits the walnuts. Her sauce is a sweet-sour one of wine vinegar, sugar and water, without tomatoes.

Unpublished, September 1973

OSSI BUCHI BENEDETTI

The following recipe for ossi buchi, a famous speciality of northern Italy, was sent to me, via Signora Fany Benedetti, by the lady who, for many years, supplied my shop with olive oil direct from her Tuscan property. Seldom have I tasted more delicious olive oil, and rarely has any reader or acquaintance given me a recipe which has so taken my fancy.

My own recipe for ossi buchi, published in my
Italian Food
, is the one more usually encountered in Italy. I wrote it and cooked it from versions noted down after I had eaten it in and round about Milan, said to be the native home of the dish, in 1951 and 1952. Signora Benedetti’s formula seems to me altogether superior, lighter, and more interesting. Her recipe, given to me in
a brief paragraph, and with perfect clarity to anyone already familiar with the dish, dispenses with onion, tomato and stock, and calls for garlic, parsley, spices, white wine, and lemon in the form of whole slices rather than simply the grated peel, as normally used in the better known version. I suspect that the Benedetti recipe must be an older one, perhaps from the days before the tomato became so commonly used in Italian cooking.

I recommend this recipe to anyone who can manage to lay hands on the right cut of veal, which is knuckle, sawn across the bone into slices approximately 3 cm (1¼ in) thick. (In Italy, where the veal used is much younger than any we get in England, the slices are cut thicker, as there is less meat to the bone, and it requires a shorter cooking time.)

You will need 4 slices of knuckle of veal sawn across into 3-cm (1¼-in) pieces, salt, freshly milled pepper, freshly grated nutmeg, powdered cinnamon. It is not feasible to suggest precise quantities of spices and seasonings, which must depend upon the taste of the cook – and in the case at least of cinnamon will vary according to the quality and freshness or otherwise of the ground spice; 2 cloves of garlic, 2–3 tablespoons of roughly chopped parsley (the flat leaf variety when obtainable), 6 thin slices of lemon with the rind, approximately 6 tablespoons of olive oil, 300–450 ml (½–¾ pint) of water, 150 ml (¼ pint) of dry white wine.

It is advisable, at any rate for a first attempt, not to cook more than 4 slices of ossi buchi (which means, literally, hollow bones) at a time. The meat takes up a lot of room in the pan, and the pieces must be cooked in one layer or the gradual reduction of the liquid as the meat cooks will not work with the quantities given.

To prepare the meat, rub each slice on both sides with salt, then add seasonings of freshly milled pepper, ground cinnamon and freshly grated nutmeg.

Peel, slice and crush a couple of cloves of garlic, have ready chopped 2 or 3 tablespoons of parsley, and prepare about half a dozen thin slices of lemon with the peel, and without the pips.

Immediately before the ossi buchi are to be cooked, sprinkle them lightly with flour.

In a 2 5-cm (10-in) sauté pan, deepish frying pan or skillet, warm enough olive oil to cover, generously, the bottom of the pan. In this brown the pieces of meat, gently and on each side. Now scatter in the garlic, parsley and lemon slices. Pour in enough cold water to
reach just or barely to the top of the slices of meat. Cover the pan, lower the heat, and simmer gently for just about one hour.

By this time the meat, although not yet ready, should be tender enough to be easily pierced with a skewer. Into the pan pour a glass of dry white wine. Increase the heat just for a minute or two, so that the wine and juices bubble a little, then lower it again, and leave the meat to cook for approximately 30 minutes. Whether at this stage you cover the pan or leave it open depends upon the degree to which the liquid has already reduced. Bearing in mind that by the time the ossi buchi are quite tender there should not be so much sauce that the meat is swimming, but sufficient to ensure that it is not dry, the cook must make his own decision. So much depends upon the shape and weight of the pan as well as upon the degree of heat and the relative toughness or otherwise of the meat that it is impossible, and would be misleading, to give precise instructions.

By the time the meat is perfectly tender, the sauce should be reduced to barely more than a half-dozen tablespoonsful. Veal, of its nature, and especially knuckle or shin, produces a characteristically gelatinous and sticky quality in the sauce, a key point in this particular dish.

Transfer the ossi buchi to a heated serving dish, pour the sauce over them, and if you like, add a little extra freshly chopped parsley.

The special treat of ossi buchi is the marrow from the bones; a teaspoon or marrow scoop should be provided for each person – and bread on which the marrow can be spread.

In Lombard tradition, a risotto, saffron-flavoured, is always served with ossi buchi. This is a good combination, but a very filling one. A lighter and more delicate accompaniment is a dish of courgettes, grated and cooked in butter. A dish of chopped spinach, very freshly cooked, would be another good alternative.

Sufficient for 2 or 3, according to capacity; my own never runs to more than one slice, but the young and hungry would certainly be able to manage two.

Notes

To be sure of getting knuckle of veal, it is advisable to order from your butcher well in advance. It is no bad idea to take the extra pieces (the knuckle cuts into 7 or 8 pieces, the 4 in the centre being the best) and freeze them to use later for broth, to add to a
pot-au-feu or to a chicken stock. Shin of veal from the front legs of the animal is often used in Italy as an alternative to knuckle. Again this is due to the difference in age and size of the calves. In England, it is best to use knuckle which, contrarily, is the name given by English butchers to the lower
hind
leg of the animal, while shin is the lower
foreleg
.

Care should be taken that the butcher does not cut the slices too thin, or they will buckle during the cooking, and emerge in shapeless and unattractive condition.

I have seen recipes in which a weighty cast-iron cocotte, or casserole, or in American usage Dutch oven, hermetically sealed, is recommended for the cooking of ossi buchi. This is exactly what is not wanted. Although, if absolutely necessary, ossi buchi
can
be transferred to the oven once the initial browning has been achieved and after the water is added, this method is less satisfactory than cooking over direct heat in that it fails to reduce the sauce slowly, steadily, and to the correct consistency, with this dish a point of prime importance. How much less satisfactory would be a hermetically sealed oven pot in which no evaporation takes place, is surely obvious.

Unpublished, 1972

PORK CHOPS, SPICED AND GRILLED

This is an effortless and delicious lunch or supper dish. It does however presuppose a supply of the home-made Italian spice (white peppercorns, juniper berries, nutmeg and cloves) for which the recipe is given on
page 95
.

Pork chops with the rind, about 2 cm (1 in) thick, salt, garlic, olive oil, Italian seasoning, wild thyme on the stalk, dry bay leaves.

The pork chops should be rather thick ones, with the rind left on – for the reasons given in the recipe for pork chops with green peppercorns on
page 91
.

Rub each chop on both sides with a cut clove of garlic, salt and olive oil. Then sprinkle them on each side with Italian seasoning – it really is not possible to give precise quantities, but allow something in the region of a quarter-teaspoonful for each chop.

Put the prepared chops in a shallow, fireproof dish, with the twigs of thyme and the bay leaves and one or two pieces of garlic.
Cook them under the grill, about 15 cm (6 in) away from the heat, for about 15 minutes, turning them from time to time with steak tongs.

Transfer the dish to a low oven, 170°C/325°F/gas mark 3 for about 7 minutes. Serve the chops in the dish in which they have cooked, so that they will be sizzling hot.

A simple salad is a better accompaniment than green vegetables, but potatoes cooked in the oven are always good with pork chops.

Notes

There seems to me no reason why this recipe should not also be used for lamb cutlets – the Italian seasoning is good with lamb – but they would take less time to cook.

Anyone who has the ingredients of the spice mixture in the kitchen cupboard can, it goes without saying, make up enough for each dish as needed; but it is not easy to pound cloves so the ready-ground variety would probably have to be used.

Unpublished, 1973

BACON IN BRIOCHE

Buy a 1–1.2 kg (2½ lb) piece of long back bacon (the leanest end), preferably Wiltshire mild-cured. Soak it in cold water to cover for 48 hours, changing the water at least twice.

To cook the bacon, wrap it in two sheets of foil, twisting the ends and folding in the edges so that no juices escape while the bacon is cooking.

Put the parcel on a rack in a baking tin half-filled with water. (This is to create steam which keeps the bacon moist.) Place low down in the oven, and bake at 150°C/300°F/gas mark 2 for approximately 2 hours, or 1¼ hour to 500 g/1 lb, turning the parcel at half time.

Remove from the oven, leave for 30 minutes or so before unwrapping and peeling off the skin, which is easily done while the bacon is still warm.

When cool, spread the fat side of the bacon with a scant teacupful of the herb, spice and breadcrumb mixture described on page 181 of
Salt, Spices
, etc. Press well down, spreading it as thickly as you can. Press some of the mixture also into any cavities left where bones have been removed. Leave to set.

For the brioche dough, you will need 250 g (8 oz) of strong plain flour, salt, 15 g (½ oz) of bakers’ yeast, 2 whole eggs, 4–6 tablespoons of very thick cream. (If possible, use Jersey cream bought a day or two in advance.)

With a little warm water, mix the yeast to a cream. Put the flour in a bowl with a teaspoon or two of salt. Add the yeast and the whole eggs and mix, using a wooden spoon. Add the cream (or if you prefer, 75–90 g/2½–3 oz of softened butter). Knead very lightly into a ball. Sprinkle with flour. With scissors make a deep cross cut in the dough. Cover it, and leave to rise in a warm place for an hour to an hour and a half. (The ideal temperature is about 21°C/70°F.) By this time the dough should have doubled in volume, and will be soft, springy and malleable. Break it down, and without kneading, re-shape it into a ball.

Brush an iron baking-sheet with melted butter or pork fat, and sprinkle it with flour. Put the ball of dough in the centre. With your fingers and knuckles press it out (if very soft, it may need extra sprinklings of flour) into a rectangle large enough to enclose your piece of bacon.

Put the bacon in the centre of the sheet of dough, gather up the edges, so that the bacon is completely enveloped. You should have a neat rectangular parcel (perhaps at the first try it may be rather ragged and untidy. No matter. After one or two more experiments it will all be very easy.) .

The joined edges of the dough should be pressed together with your fingers dipped in cold water. This detail is quite important. If forgotten, the joins may break open during baking.

Heat the oven to 220°C/425°F/gas mark 7. Put the baking-sheet with the enwrapped bacon on top of the stove for 15 minutes while the oven heats up.

Finally, with the back of a knife make light scores in the shape of a diamond or criss-cross pattern on the dough. Bake on the centre shelf for 15 minutes, then lower the oven to 190°C/375°F/ gas mark 5 and cook for another 10–15 minutes.

When you take the brioche from the oven, brush it over with thick cream. This gives a nice finish in the pastry, without making it too shiny.

Transfer the bacon in brioche to a board and leave it for a few minutes before carving, on the slant.

Notes

Larger pieces of bacon can, of course, be cooked in the same way, increasing the proportions of dough accordingly. Remember, though, that although bacon – or almost any meat – in brioche dough is very good cold on the day after it is cooked, the brioche soon goes hard and dry. So don’t make a great deal more than you need for two meals.