Bridge with the Brothers

Every second month or so, T plays bridge with his two brothers and their childhood friend. Tonight is such a night and this normally calls for something that can simmer while they are playing. This time we opt for braised veal tail with polenta and a green salad.
The kids and two of their cousins make up a party of 9 people and the portions are made accordingly.

3,5 kilos of tails are browned first whereafter a soffreto of three red onions, 5 cloves of garlic, 3 stalks of celery and 4 carrots are fried with thyme, sage and bay leaves.

When fried a small tin of tomato paste is added and fried a little.
After 5 minutes all the browned pieces of veal tail are put back in the pot and 1 liter of beef stock as well as 1,5 bottle of (left-over) red wine is added and the pot is almost ready to be left simmering for 3 hours.

Before that the, by now customary, lid of baking paper is placed on top.
The tails contain much fat from both the marrow and the meat and a lot of starch from the bones which means that fat and starch can and should be skimmed off after the 3 hours of simmering.
Skim, remove the meat, skim again, cook down and skim and finally blend so that the vegetables are used for thickening the sauce. Add s/p and perhaps a bit of acid like balsamico. When finished return the meat and let it heat up while making the polenta.
The polenta is not a favorite with everyone in the company. Some would have preferred mashed potatoes, but the fact is that polenta is selected for how easy it is to make and as such making it is well suited for a night where we hope to focus on playing bridge. Actually that is a lame excuse as K is exiled in the kitchen while the men pursue the noble game. But, at least, that was what was planned..

For the polenta use 600 grams of coarse-grained corn flour and 0,75 liter of boiling water and mix over the stove. When cooked (after app. 5 minutes) add some grated parmesan and butter. The veal tails are very successful and we think it is a 8,5/10, but our guests might differ due to the polenta. But there is no arguing that the tails are a huge success.

A lot of wine is tried tonight and some goes better with the than others:
Poggio Valente 2007 Morellino di Scansano
Casanuova 2004 Chianti Classico Riserva
Waterbrook Shiraz 2006
Killikanoon The Covenant 2005
K thinks that the fruity shiraz'es are totally wrong with the intense taste of the braised sauce and T would normally concede but by this time his tasting buds have lost some of their edge. K's argument is that this extremely rich dish needs the acidity and bitterness from for instance the Sangiovese and insists on staying with the Chianti.

For dessert K prepares an apple-blueberry crumble.
6 large apples, 150 gr blueberries. These apples were kindly given to us by K's sister from her garden. Nice spicy cooking apples – a bit on the sour side but great for this dish.
For the crumble: 2 dl of flour, a good handful of almond 'flour' (almonds crushed to flour in the blender), 2 dl of sugar, 200 gr butter, a good handful of oatmeal. All mixed to a crumble.

The fruit is put in an ovenproof dish. Muscovado-sugar and cinnamon is sprinkled on top and finally the crumble is spread all over.
30 min. in the oven at 200°C. Served on this occasion with sour cream, but it may have been even better with whipped cream. 8,2/10

Take-away, part 3 – or Come home, Fine!

'Salad-pizza'; pizza with kebab, lettuce, chilipaste, some kind of sour cream dressing and two leaves of basil (the latter an attempt to insist on the Italian connection). An absolute must for lazy, perhaps even slightly hung-over, late sundays and a favorite of Fine's (and in fact also of M's but without the chili). Fine has been gone for over a month and is coming home from Paris this week.


We hope she's not too sad to see that this month's ration of salad pizza has been exhausted!

Tonight we have a glass of Poggio Valente 2006, which seem to be a little off, but after a bite of the spicy dish nothing could be detected.

Now, Fine, drool. We're  looking forward to sharing soon!

Penne con straccetti e rucola

In the beginning of our relationship we decided to make a list of 10 dishes that could be made in 10 minutes. Of course this was not because we do not like to cook, but just a result of the golf season, the concert season and the summer. Monday night was an occasion for one of our quick dishes, if ever there was one. Arriving home late after a reception we embark on our penne con straccetti e rucola. This dish was inspired by something K had in Rome some years ago (but not as a pasta dish) and maybe also something T has tried to recall (unsuccessfully). Whatever, here goes...

Two sirloin steaks are cut into thin strips and fried briefly on a hot pan (if T remembers he has to wait until it's hot). Cook the pasta in the meantime. After the strips have fried, take them off and fry 3 cloves of garlic and one red onion. Not for long as the garlic must not be burned and the red onion must not become soft. Toss in 200g de-seeded San Marzano tomatoes, add the meat and 200g rucola and a generous splash of good balsamico. Finally put in the cooked and drained pasta and toss it all together. Serve with grated parmesan and lots of freshly ground black pepper. (We refrained from the pepper since MK had an appetite for an additional dinner serving. Her young taste buds are not yet set for pepper. She had already had dinner at her grandmothers while we were at the reception. In any event, the dish is delicious on its own.)

T loves pasta, but has to concede that it is not entirely healthy for him. K often suggests to use a whole-grain variety, but this is not possible when the kids are home. Today, we expected to be eating on our own despite the kids being home, so we went for the 50/50 variety, which we can buy at Irma and to this dish it works marvelously adding a nice nutty flavour. For two hungry adults and a not-so hungry 6-year old we use appr. 300g of Penne pasta.

It can be a challenge to cook according to the latest health bulletins and still make everybody happy. In many dishes the whole grain pasta tastes like oat meal and has the texture of sawdust. So we have been looking for pasta that didn't taste too 'healthy' and have come up with this variety from il fornaio. In many dishes we still use the classic white grain variety, but the 50/50 actually adds to some dishes.

To this we select sangiovese, as we often do when having pasta. Today we chose a bottle of Podere 414, Morellino di Scansano from 2008. We found this, when we were in Siena last year and it was a very pleasant surprise then, as it is now (but no surprise). Very well balanced with good acidity and notes of cherry(seed). Not being modest we rate the meal, the wine and the combination as 9/10 on a day where it all worked to near perfection.