Fusilli Salsiccia e Cime di Rapa (Italian Sausage and Turnip Greens)

This is a traditional recipe from Apulia, although you should cook this with orecchiette-Pasta and not with Fusilli. Oh well....

You need:
Italian Sausage
White wine
Cime di Rapa (wikipedia gives these to me as Turnip Greens, it is the leafy part - I'll show pics) If someone knows how these are called in English, please let me know!!!
Peperoncino
Pasta (orecchiette or any short pasta you like)
Onion
Olive-Oil

Info:
These are the Cime di Rapa. Cima is the Italian word for "top, end, summit" and Rapa is a turnip.

 

Preparation:
Put on pasta-water. Dice a small onion and cut the sausages in small pieces. Fry both in olive-oil until crispy and brown, add some peperoncino and a nice shot of white wine. Have a nice glass yourself. Let simmer until the wine is almost evaporated. Meanwhile prepare the Rapa: We only need the leaves and the little flower-parts, not the stems. You can strip or peel off the leaves from the stems. Wash and then throw in with the sausages. You might need to add a bit of boiling water (from the pasta-pot). Be aware that a big bag of Rapa will turn into an almost-not-there part once cooked, similar to fresh spinach. Cook the rapa for some minutes. Meanwhile your pasta should be ready. Drain well and throw in with the rapa-sausages-sauce, mix well. Serve hot and covered in fresh parmesan cheese!!!
Note: Since the sausages usually are quite salty and peppery, you won't need to add other spices to the sauce!

Mealplan 27 November - 03 December

Saturday:
Sunday: It's my father-in-law's 70th birthday, so we'll celebrate in a restaurant.
Monday: Bucatini amatriciana
Tuesday: CBC
Wednesday: Pasta e Ceci (Pasta and Chickpeas)
Thursday: Something Indian
Friday: I'd love to go for Pizza. Let's see ;-))

Foodwaste 26/11/10

I haven't done any foodwaste for a long time. A lot was going on and I had almost no time for blogging. I'll try toi keep up again for december and then of course throughout the next year.


- some pasta with sauce
- celery sticks from god knows when
- some yoghurt which was even older than the celery.....
- probably something else, but I cannot remember

CBC - Spaghetti with Lemon-Lamb-Sauce

This was on request of my Mom. And it was awesome!!!! I'll make this one again, that's for sure!

The cook-book is still this one: Pasta, Zabert Sandmann, 2000, page 70

Ingredients: 

400gr Lamb 

100gr bacon

1 big onion

1 bouquet of dandelion or rocket

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 clove garlic

400gr Spaghetti

1/8 l white wine

1/4 l veggie-broth

freshly ground pepper, salt, nutmeg

1 teaspoon lemon-peel

150gr Crème Fraiche or Cream

6 tablespoons lemon-juice

Preparation:

1. Cut meat and onion in small dices. Wash and dry dandelion or rocket. 

2. Heat oil in a skillet, fry meat for circa 5 minutes and then drain the oil in a small bowl (and put aside for the moment). Add garlic and onion to the meat and fry some more.

3. Bring water to a boil and cook spaghetti.

4. Add drained oil, broth and wine to the meat and season with salt, pepper, nutmeg (I left it out) and lemonpeel. Let simmer for another 10 minutes.

5. Stir in Crème Fraiche and Lemon juice, lower heat and let simmer another 10 minutes.

6. Drain Spaghetti and mix well with sauce, decorate with dandelion.

Quick and easy Pumpkin-Potato-Soup with Feta Cheese

Cut pumpkin in pieces, peel potatoes and dice. Heat oil in a big pot, fry pumpkin and potato, than top with boiling water and cook until both are tender. You can add whatever spices you like, such as chilis or ginger. Drain, but save the cooking water!!! Blend potatoes and pumpkin and add cooking water to make a thicker or thinner soup, just as you like it best. Top with feta cheese and serve with bread.

CBC - Fusilli ai peperoni

I wasn't thrilled by this recipe, but I'd make it again. The preparation is kind of a turn-off though...


The cookbook was: La cucina dell'Emilia Romagna in 450 ricette tradizionali; Newton & Compton Editori 1998, page 83


Ingredients (for 6):
400gr Fusilli
400gr bellpeppers
80gr butter
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 ladle of fine broth
one glass of dry white wine
salt and pepper

Preparation:
Prepare the peppers (cut out the "innards", little white skins ecc.) and put into boiling water for a moment to skin them. I did this step only partially, the skin did not want to come off, no matter what! If you have a better way to do this, please tell me (I think one can put them in the hot oven?). Cut into small pieces and fry in butter and oil. Add wine and simmer until evaporated, do the same with the broth. Salt and pepper, and let simmer on low heat. Prepare the Pasta, drain and mix with sauce, serve immediately.

As you can see from my pic, there was no sauce. There were only single pieces of pepper, nicely cooked in wine and broth. I think I also added a whole lot of broth, because the peppers were still hard and started to burn as all the broth had already evaporated. The dish is also in desperate need of parmesan cheese to top it off.

CBC - Strozzapreti with Salmon-Cream-Sauce

I made this on request of my better half, and it was good. Crazy good. I have no idea what made it taste so good, as it was basically only pasta + salmon + cream. But I thought not to ask, but to enjoy instead. And I am adding this to Soul-Food!!!!! Definitely.

So, the cookbook is the following: Pasta, Zabert Sandmann, 2000 (the same editor as the Antipasti-Book), page 64

Ingredients:
400gr Strozzapreti (it's a kind of thick-cut pasta)
Salt
various herbs (e.g. Basil., Rosemary, Oregano ecc.)
1 tablespoon butter
250gr cream
2 tablespoons Lemon-Juice
400gr Smoked Salmon (I think I used less)
freshly ground pepper


Preparation:
1. Cook Pasta according to package instructions.
2. wash herbs, shake dry and pick leaves from stems. Put aside some for decoration, cut the others in small stripes.
3. Heat butter in pan. Fry herbs in butter, add cream and lemon-juice, let simmer for 4 minutes.

4. Cut salmon in stripes and warm in hot sauce. Add salt and pepper to sauceas you like it.

5. Drain pasta and mix with sauce. Decorate with herbs (or not, see below).

Mealplan 13 - 19 november

Saturday: Oven-chicken with veggies and Fries
Sunday: Left-Overs
Monday: Pasta with Roman Cauliflower and Feta-Cheese
Tuesday: Hubby's Birthday - so it'll be fish!!! Linguine alle Vongole and afterwards some fish-plate
Wednesday: Meatloaf + some Veggie
Thursday: My alone-night - something Chinese / Thai
Friday: not decided yet