Gnocchi with Oxtail Ragu

In a post a while back, I mentioned how even though I have not yet tried Babbo Ristorante, the last time that I was in Las Vegas I did eat at Mario's other restaurant B&B Ristorante, which had a similar menu. It's hard to believe that since that inspiring meal, Mario's empire has grown to operating over 20 restaurants, one of which is as far away as Singapore. 

I believe it was a Wednesday night that I went to Mario's for dinner. I couldn't even remember how many years ago it was. But I can remember everything about the ambience of the restaurant right down to the way it smelled. Because it was a night in the middle of the week, many of the seats in the restaurant were available, and there was plenty of staff to provide that extra touch of service. 

The amouse-bouche that was passed at the very beginning of the meal, the ceci bruschetta, is something that I have already cooked on this blog. But the main entrée that I ordered that night, the gnocchi, is the subject for this post. 

I remember gazing my eyes upon it as my server put the plate in front of me. The portion size seemed quite modest, but the smell was intoxicating. The gnocchi were like little soft pillows, tossed with a Ragu that was so hearty and flavorful that it really blew me away. I knew from eating that meal that Mario was the real deal. It was at that moment that I knew I had to study more about him and learn about how he approaches his craft. 

In my professional career at that time I was what most would consider a young apprentice, still wet behind the ears. As the years passed, I came to study more and more about Mario and his approach in the kitchen. But it was nothing quite as in depth as the training that I am getting from this blog, which excites me to be able to really go back, take my time and pick apart what makes Babbo and Mario Batali tick. So when I stopped into my local market today and saw these lonely packages of some of the nicest looking oxtail that I've ever seen on the shelf, it brought me back to the thrill of that night, the thrill of a great meal that I just had to replicate. 

A little fore warning though, this is not a quick one-two and you're out kind of recipe. There's a lot going on here. First I have to make fresh pasta, then I have to make a very flavorful Ragu and put it all together. Plus, checking the ingredients list, I see that I'm going to need  some basic tomato sauce and some brown chicken stock to make this. I had the day off today so I was able to invest the several hours of preparation time that was needed to make this recipe perfect. 

You will need to invest in some inexpensive but essential equipment to make the perfect gnocchi. First is a tool that's called a potato ricer as shown in the picture below right. Passing cooked potatoes through one of these aerates them and makes them fluffy enough to avoid gummy pasta dough and is a must if you want light gnocchi. The other tool is kind of nonessential but I found it on Amazon.com for a couple of bucks so I bought it anyway. It's called a gnocchi board and later on I show how to use it to give the gnocchi those little ridges that help the sauce adhere to the pasta. You can use a fork, though, to achieve the same effect

After reading the many steps that are involved in making this recipe, many home cooks would probably just say that it's not worth the time to try making this. I assure you that if you're a little adventurous and have the time that it is totally worth it. 

With some newly washed comfortable pajamas on, I'm going to dive right into production. The recipe itself has you start by making the Ragu, but really what needs to be prepared first is the gnocchi. I say this because unlike the other fresh pasta recipes that I've made in other posts, the dough for the gnocchi recipe requires cooked russet potatoes. 

Once the potatoes are soft they get drained, peeled, and passed through the ricer as such;

Next I set up an ice bath and bring water in my pasta pot to a boil. While that's going, I make a well in the center of the potatoes and sprinkle the flour over the top. The egg goes in the middle of the well and from here it's standard Batali pasta making. 

Four minutes of kneading will bring the dough together, forming a ball that is dry to the touch. 

The dough gets divided into 6 balls. Each ball rolled out into a diameter of 3/4 inch and cut into 1 inch pieces. 

The 1 inch pieces get rolled over the gnocchi board as such, creating the signature ridges. 

These then get tossed into the boiling water, but not all at once. They should be split up and cooked in batches because overcrowding lowers the heat of the water and will turn the gnocchi into a glob of mashed potatoes. When dropped in the water they sink to the bottom, but when they are finished cooking, which only takes a few minutes, they float to the top. 

When fully cooked, I transfer them to the ice bath to stop the cooking. Here, they can be drained, tossed with canola oil, and reserved for later. 

Next I need to get the Ragu cooking. The oven is preheated to 375°. The oxtail are trimmed of excess fat and heavily seasoned. 

I take out my Dutch oven again and heat olive oil over high heat until smoking. The oxtails get dredged in flour and browned on all sides. I make sure to take the extra time to develop a rich brown color here. 

When finished, the oxtails are transferred to a plate, and I throw some diced onions into the Dutch oven, cooking until golden brown. 

Next, I deglaze with red wine, a whole bottle mind you (gasp), brown chicken stock, the basic tomato sauce, and thyme. It is brought to a boil. 

Once at a boil I put the oxtails back in, put a lid on the pan, and put it in the oven until the oxtails are fork tender. Mario says that this will take about an hour and a half, but I cooked mine for a total of three and a half hours. 

I use some tongs to remove the oxtails and skim the fat from the sauce. The meat can now be pulled off the bones, the bones discarded, and the shredded oxtails put back into the Ragu. 

I transfer the Ragu to a sauté pan for easier mixing and add the gnocchi. The only thing left is to adjust the seasoning and plate. 

I grated some fresh cheese over the top as expected. It was a good idea that I made extra of this dish so that I could get at least a full plate to myself. I ended up taking two, it was that freaking good! This dish is warm and heavy, perfect for an under 30° night here in Holyoke. As in the case of the short ribs, the smell of the Ragu permeates every square inch of your house. The gnocchi were light and fluffy, not gummy at all. This recipe took a lot out of me but I stuck it out to the end. 

Would I make it again? Well I would certainly eat it again, but making it is a little bit involved so I will probably reserve it for a special occasion meal. Was it as good as the plate of gnocchi that Mario made in Las Vegas? You betcha!

Until next time...

Cod in Saor

I have this habit of putting off watching newly released movies until they've been out for a while. 

A long while. 

Like sometimes years down the road kind of while. What can I say, I'm a procrastinator. 

Take this past Saturday as an example. I'm off from work, blog writing on the couch after finishing my recipes for the weekend, and being one that likes background noise, I rent Julie & Julia on Prime. 

This movie came out what, 5 years ago and I'm just getting around to watching it now? It seemed kind of an appropriate movie to watch when you're writing a blog about cooking your way through a cookbook. 

When I first started this blog, the Julie/Julia questions came up.  Are you hoping to meet Mario after finishing this project? Do you think it'll make you famous?

My answer was and will always remain, no. 

You have to do a project like this out of love. Maybe a little bit of craziness too. But mostly love. Love for the craft of cooking. Love for the feeling of completion. For the love of learning. But never for a free meal ticket to 15 minutes of fame. 

I think that's what upset me about the movie. The part about Julia's life was fascinating. She led an amazing life. Julie, however, did not. 

Julie's blog is now ancient history, so there is nothing left to dissect. But I find it hard to believe that she cooked 524 of Julia Child's recipes from Mastering The Art of French Cooking in 365 days. She worked a full time job, had to take the subway home, grocery shop for the recipes, prep all of the ingredients in a tiny apartment kitchen that sat over a pizzeria, cook the recipes, clean up afterwards, then write the damn blog post, EVERYDAY, That's roughly 2 recipes a day and writing for a solid year. No days off or now you'll need to make 4 recipes just to catch up. Or to put it into another perspective, that's nearly 43 recipes a month! I smell bullshit in the air. 

Turns out Julia could smell the bullshit too. Julia didn't take her as a serious cook. Her editor was quoted as saying, 'She (Julie) would never really describe the end results, how delicious it was, and what she learned. Julia didn't like what she called 'the flimsies.' It was clear through watching the movie that it was all just a publicity stunt. 

Most months if I'm able to knock out four or five recipes in this cookbook I'm a happy man. I have a full-time job with a beautiful wife, a sassy pet rabbit, a mortgage, and many other responsibilities. The little bit of extra free time that I have to pursue an endeavor such as this involves research, planning, shopping, cleaning, writing, and the like. To be able to cook and write your way through 43 recipes a month would literally be a full-time job. 

There have been people who have actually cooked their way through hard cookbooks and blogged about it, with pictures to prove it ( see http://carolcookskeller.blogspot.com, or http://www.allenhemberger.com). And they've taken several years to complete it. Not 12 months. With the exception of August, I think I am keeping pace quite well and should finish this book in a few years. And I'm ready for that. 

I'm also ready to dive into the next recipe. This one was a surprise at how good it was. At least that what my wife's opinion was. I got a only a small bite. She devoured it. A shock after the look on her face when I told her what it was. 

In saor means 'sour' in Italian and is a Venetian way of making something sweet and sour. Mario notes that this dish is traditionally made with sole, but he prefers the taste of deep-fried cod at room temperature. Oh ya forgot to mention, this dish is served at room temperature which I thought was a little weird at first, but I put my trust in Mario. 

First I heat some olive oil to about 375°. The cod gets seasoned with salt and pepper and dredged in flour. I pan fry it on both sides until golden brown. 

In another pan, I heat olive oil and cook a diced red onion until just brown. 

Then I added black currants, sugar, pine nuts, and vinegar and boil it. Once the currants are softened, I removed them from the heat and let it cool in the pan. 

When this mixture has cooled, I pour it over the cod, wrap the pan in plastic wrap, and let it marinate overnight in the fridge. About an hour before I'm going to serve it, I take it out of the fridge and add fresh chopped chives. 

This fish comes with a simple side salad. I peeled 6-inch strips of celery and tossed them with lemon juice, olive oil, and salt and pepper. 

I'm ready to try this thing. The fish gets plated with a little of the marinade and the celery salad. 

This dish was just terrific! Wow what a surprise. I don't know if I would put it in the antipasto category because I think it would be perfect for lunch. But my wife devoured it, so it had to be good. We put this on my make again list. 

I find my motivation for this project renewed. I don't know if Mario will ever read the words of this blog. And I don't care. Well I do. I'd love to know that he's cool with what I'm doing. I'd certainly love the chance to meet him. But does it really matter either way? No. And I'm fine with that. Not even a third of the way through and already I've learned so much and have pushed myself to new levels of creation. When I open this book, I train with Mario as if he's there, helping to take my craft to a new level. Until next time...

Roasted Beet and Parmigiano Bruschetta

A while back in a previous post you'll remember that I saved one of the three bruschetta recipes, the subject of this post, for a later date. It being Midsummer, it seemed appropriate for the time to utilize fresh tomatoes for one bruschetta, and using the Ceci beans for the other bruschetta also reminded me of the bean salads that my mom used to make for summer cook-outs and picnics. So I completed those two recipes together, saving the very first food recipe of The Babbo Cookbook until a time in the fall when the best beets are in bloom. 

My goal was also to utilize some of the fresh beets for this recipe that I grew in my garden. Those beets never actually grew in my garden, along with many other vegetables that were a no-show, so it was back into the car to take a trip to my local Whole Foods. 

I knew I was in good hands after checking around the market and seeing what beautiful produce they had. As it has been written in the book and brought up by yours truly many times in this blog, when you have a recipe that only calls for a few ingredients, each one of those ingredients needs to be top notch. I chose a few beets with the greens removed simply because I didn't really have any other uses for them in the near future. It is worth mentioning that I so wish I had some other use for the greens because those looked beautiful as well. 

This is another quick and simple recipe, so don't blink or you may just miss the whole thing. I start by preheating the oven to 400°. I then take the beets, wrap them in aluminum foil, and roast them in the oven for the better part of an hour or until they're easily pierced with a knife. Once they are fully cooked, they need to be set aside to cool completely. 

From there, I get my broiler preheated to toast the bread. 

While that's heating, I dice the beets into quarter inch cubes and combine them with balsamic vinegar, extra-virgin olive oil, caraway seeds, chives, and I season with salt and pepper. 

Once the bread is thoroughly toasted, I portion the beet mixture on top of the bread. I then grate a little bit of Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese over each piece of bruschetta. Done!

I hope you can see how simple it is to make delicious bruschetta at home. These make a wonderful, simple no-brainer hors d'oeuvre for a dinner party or gathering, that don't require tons of work but are guaranteed to impress. Or you can do as I did in the picture above and dress some greens with olive oil and lemon juice to make a simple salad to accompany them, turning the dish into a light meal.

I didn't hate this recipe as much as I thought I would. Beets aren't that high up on my vegetable appreciation list, but I liked it and would make it again. 

Next up is another appetizer course featuring a fish that's a New England staple; cod. Until next time...

Braised Short Ribs with Horseradish Gremolata (Bresato al Barolo)

'To understand meat cookery is to understand the science of heat transfer.'

That's quite deep isn't it? I mean, just reading that statement from the opening paragraph of the meat chapter in The Babbo Cookbook, and I feel like a Zen student, shaven head and all, sitting at the foot of Master Batali, on the path to culinary enlightenment. 

But what Mario is trying to say is that when the home-cook becomes familiar with the different cuts, grades, and the anatomy of meat, the different ways of injecting flavor into those cuts, and how to properly handle them, meat cookery then becomes a cinch. With a little bit of practice and perhaps even a Google search or two, the novice cook can then take a fearless gander into any grocery store and find a myriad of possibilities for dinner, without the need to buy the most expensive cuts of steak because of the fear of what to do with what cut of meat. 

So far the recipes in every chapter have kept with Mario's food philosophy as to why Babbo does what they do, and this chapter is no different. For example, Mario points out and rightfully so that the tougher or fattier cuts of meat tend to have more flavor because they come from well used muscles. It is because of this reason that cuts of meat like osso bucco or short ribs have so much more flavor then a filet mignon, which Mario states will never show up on a menu in one of his restaurants. 

He seems to celebrate the alternative cuts of meat mostly because this is the tradition found in Italy. In America we tend to eat the boneless skinless chicken breast or the beef tenderloin and throw the rest of the animal out because we don't quite know what to do with it. In Italian culture nothing goes to waste. 

It is after all understandable how we became to eat the way that we do. We are blessed in this country with just tons of open space and farmland. Through the use of farming ingenuity, we are able to produce of lot of cheap agriculture and meat. So because of that, it's affordable to put the 16 ounce ribeye or fillet mignon on our plates almost every single night for dinner and throw away the rest of the animal. It is important to remember though that other countries don't have the ability to grow as much livestock as we do, and all of this cheap meat comes at a price for our health. (Can you tell that I have been reading a lot of Michael Pollan lately?)

So considering that the weather has been getting a little colder here and we're celebrating alternative cuts of meat, I chose this next post which made a wonderful dinner the other night when I needed a hearty meal to fill my tub. 

Braising is a moist heat cooking method that takes a tough cut of meat, and over the course of several hours, tenderizes it in a way that will bring a tear to your eye. The smell from the combination of the ingredients in this recipe that we will soon go over will turn your house into a magnet for anyone who is hungry. 

I start by preheating the oven to 375°  I take out my heavy bottomed Dutch oven and heat some extra-virgin olive oil until smoking. Then, I heavily season these sweet short ribs that I found at the market, and brown them over high heat on all sides. The browning here is a key point because as Mario notes the final braise will not be as intensely flavored or colored if you give the ribs a light sear. This step should take about a total of 15 minutes. 

Once properly browned,  I remove the ribs on to a dinner plate and set them aside and start sweating my mirepoix (onions, carrots, celery) and garlic in the pan until softened. 

The veggies get seasoned, then I deglaze with Barolo wine, scraping up the brown bits called fond. Here is also where I add whole peeled tomatoes crushed by hand, and brown stock that we made in a previous post. 

Ohh forgot to mention that I also throw in a bunch of whole thyme, rosemary, and oregano. These herbs are just to flavor the pan juices so they don't need to be chopped. The short ribs go back to the pan and the mixture is brought to a boil. 

At this point Mario said to cover the Dutch oven with aluminum foil and put it in the oven, but I covered the pan with a vented parchment paper lid. I learned this technique from The French Laundry Cookbook and the gradual slow cooking allows for a little loss of liquid, creating more of a sauce as opposed to a broth. The ribs get cooked for at least two hours or until they are fork tender. 

This is really all there is to do to make the ribs, but upon inspecting the ingredient list, I see that Mario pairs the ribs with a pumpkin orzo. The recipe is in the contorno or side dish chapter. I could have highlighted that in another blog post, but I'll just include it in this one and give you two recipes for the price of one. It only takes about 20 minutes to make so we can time it for when the ribs are about ready to pull from the oven. 

For the orzo, some pumpkin gets cubed, tossed with olive oil, seasoned, and roasted until tender. When finished and taken out of the oven, it needs to cool then go into the bowl of a food processor, along with honey, balsamic vinegar, and salt pepper. This mixture gets blitzed to form a relatively smooth purée. 

Next some salted water is brought to a boil and orzo is dropped in to blanch. With an ice bath nearby, the orzo gets drained after three minutes and plunged into the ice bath to stop the cooking. This is not enough time to fully cook the orzo, but it's okay because the orzo will cook more later on. I should note here that orzo is a rice shaped pasta. It can be a little confusing to people but it is pasta. 

Some more of the homemade brown chicken stock is brought up to a boil along with the pumpkin purée, and the orzo is added in. The orzo is done when the stock is fully absorbed. This then gets seasoned. 

Okay so there is one more component to the short rib dish after all. It's quick and it's something that I didn't want to do too far ahead of time for quality purposes. I have to make the gremolata garnish. It's super simple. You take a handful of fresh parsley and grate in some fresh horseradish and lemon zest and toss to combine. That's it. 

The suspense is killing me because it smells so damn good in my house right now, so I'm ready to start plating. I spoon some of the pumpkin orzo onto the plate, place a couple of the short ribs on the orzo, spoon some of the pan juices over the short ribs, and top with the fresh gremolata. 

Was it tasty? I'll let you be the judge of that...

Without a doubt this has to be my favorite recipe in this book so far. While I wasn't a big fan of the pumpkin orzo, I would continue to make short ribs in this manner for many years to come. This after all is real cooking. Anyone can take a tenderloin and cook it for a little while and produce a somewhat tender cut of meat. It takes skill to take a tough piece of meat and turn it into something as soft as butter with a rich flavor. For the people who are following along with me at home, this technique of braising is something that you really must master. 

I'm not really sure which chapter my next blog post will come from. After completing this short rib dish, I feel like I just completed my magnum opus, like I have made it to the top of the mountain. But there's more to do and more to learn. Until next time...