Mary Ann Esposito's Ciao Italia™

Ciao Italia Blog Exclusive Cranberry Relish Recipe: Relish This

Pick up any November food magazine and on the cover will surely be the hero of the Thanksgiving table, Tom the turkey, dressed in all his finery. There will be all kinds of informative articles in the magazine about how best to cook it. All that is fine, but it seems that roast turkey’s best companion, cranberry relish never gets its culinary due. But, truth be told, cranberry relish is what I crave on Thanksgiving; it says fall is really here and comfort foods will, well, comfort us through a long hard winter. 

So while the butterball turkey hotline will be lit up like a Christmas tree with questions from nervous cooks about what to do with the bird, I will anxiously be waiting to spoon my favorite cranberry sauce out of Aunt Phoebe’s antique glass bowl and onto my plate.

And I will relish every spoonful.

Cranberry Relish

Makes about 2 cups (recipe can be doubled)

1 pound cranberries, washed and drained

1 ¼ cups sugar

Pinch salt

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

¼ teaspoon ground cloves

1 tablespoon fresh squeezed lemon juice

1 cup diced California dried apricots

Combine the cranberries and sugar in a sauce pan. Bring the mixture to a boil, then lower the heat to medium and cook until the cranberries begin to burst. Add the salt, cinnamon, cloves and lemon juice. Cook until the mixture thickens. Remove from the heat and stir in the apricots. Let the mixture cool, then transfer to a jar and refrigerate until needed. It will keep for weeks.

A Fungus Among Us: Types of Mushrooms

All the rain we had this past summer resulted in a carpet of wild mushrooms growing in my back yard.

They are bright orange clusters of smooth capped mushrooms that I could not tell you one thing about. And I guess that is just my point. If you don’t know ALL there is to know about wild mushrooms, stay way away.

That’s because they could be extremely poisonous, even to the touch. Unless you are a mycologist (one who studies mushrooms), wild mushrooms are best left to those who know.

I hunt for mushrooms in my local grocery store and while these are cultivated and not wild, there is a pretty wide selection for every mushroom lover. Here are some of my favorites:

Oyster are grayish white looking with a fluted cap and their taste is delicate. I like them cooked in butter with just a sprinkling of salt and pepper.

Shitake are tan to dark brown with a broad umbrella cap. These are great marinated and grilled

Enoki are tender, white with long stems and small caps. They have a sweet, mild taste. These are best used raw in salads or soups or lightly stir fried.

Royal Trumpet so called because they have light brown trumpet shaped caps. I use them grilled or in stir fry.

Crimini are the brown cousins of the lowly and common button mushroom that most of us are familiar with. They are more intense in flavor than button mushrooms and can be sautéed or grilled.

And while there are hundreds more types, the best thing to remember about mushrooms is that they provide selenium, an essential mineral that is beneficial in producing antioxidants. And mushrooms are a great source of potassium and that is good news for your heart, muscle and nerve function.

I’ll let you in on a few cooking tips too, don’t store them in plastic bags, paper bags let them breath. Never wash mushrooms, just wipe them with a damp cloth and when they are cooking, leave them alone; let them ooze their water and start to brown on one side before stirring them.

It is a wise person who knows what fungus is among us.

In Or Out

It is getting to that time of the year when I take stock of what’s really been in and what definitely must go out. You know, those defining statements that appear at year’s end in fashionista magazines and newspaper articles like they were the best guideline of our lives since the Ten Commandments.

Well, this year, I am well ahead of the pack because I have come up with my own list from the culinary world. So here is what’s in and out.

What’s on your list?

In	Out
7 Grain Cereal	Sugar Coated Cereals
Macaroni and Cheese	Canned Ravioli
Wet Sea Salts	Dry Sea Salts
Pink Peppercorns	Green Peppercorns
Unsalted Butter	Salted Butter
Extra Virgin Olive Oil	Vegetable Shortening
Dry Rubs	Brines
Pomegranates	Apples
Capon	Turkey
Grilled Fish	Fish N’Chips
Chili	Beef Stew
Fennel	Celery
Escarole	Iceberg Lettuce
Honey	Brown Sugar
Green Tea	Vitamin Water
Walnuts	Peanuts

If It's Thursday, It Must Be Gnocchi

Of all the adventures on my recent trip to Italy, one menu in a Roman restaurant perhaps amused me more than any other.

I really wanted to order something very classically Roman, like roast lamb, or Jewish stye artichokes, or spaghetti all amatriciana, but then I noticed that gnocchi were on the menu and next to its listing, the words "solo giovedi." That meant you could only order them on Thursdays, and that's because that's the way it is!

Gnocchi are found all over Italy, but are made in very different ways. Gnocchi translates to dumpling; the most popular are made with potato but there are gnocchi variations across the boot like pumpkin gnocchi, ricotta cheese gnocchi, spinach gnocchi, prune filled gnocchi and semolina gnocchi.

But, when in Rome, do as the Romans do and only have gnocchi on Thursdays!

You can find even more gnocchi recipes on CiaoItalia.com.

And one last thing, never ever call someone a gnocco; that's like calling them a dunce, and it's worse than trying to order gnocchi on a Friday.

Almost Nothing To Buy

Unless you are paying someone to do it for you, you are the supermarket specialist in the family.

I say this because for many people, the weekly grocery trip is right up there with getting a colonoscopy. It just is not fun.

You’ve got your list, your budget, and maybe an idea of what you want to eat. You’re in a hurry. You want convenience and someone to truck it all home and put it away. And it is getting harder to buy real food!

This struck me as I made my way through the throngs of shoppers to get to the fish department. I had no idea what I wanted before I got there; I just knew that I was looking for something wild. And by law, supermarkets must post the place of origin for meats, fish and produce. I scoured the fish case. Farm raised tilapia? Nope. Farm raised jumbo shrimp from Thailand? Nope. Farm raised salmon from Norway?Nope. "I’ll take a pound of those wild seas scallops and a pound of the wild haddock,” I say, making sure the clerk knows I said wild good and loud. 

Meat selection is next. The sign over the meat case reads that all the meat is either from the US, Mexico, Canada or Argentina. I think I’ll make a quiche instead.

I dread the time when my garden is kaput for the season. I know that what I have grown myself is better than produce in the store that has, on average, traveled over 1500 miles to get here. How fresh can it be? Instead I look for produce coming from close to home like blueberries from New Jersey, that’s only 400 miles away. And escarole from Massachussetts.

In the cereal aisle, I reach for anything whole grain with lots of fiber. All those other sugar coated cereals should be banned. I read the labels on the cracker boxes, too much sodium and yellow dye. Ditto in the cheese department. You want Swiss, cheddar, and food coloring too? It’s amazing how many additives, food coloring, and pesticides are in just about everything we buy. When I stop and think about it, there is almost nothing pure and unadulterated to buy in the grocery store, not even water.

Choosing a Pumpkin

Beginning in late September and continuing into November, the landscape is dotted with bright orange pumpkins of every size. It just would not be fall without them decorating porch steps and doorways, carved into every configuration for Halloween.

For me, it is not the size or shape of the pumpkin that keeps me scrutinizing the pumpkin patch or the truckloads at the grocery store. No, what keeps me from making a critical decision about which pumpkin to choose is the stem. It has to be just right.

That means a long stem that curves gracefully, not a short stubby one with no charm or character. And it must be like new wood, looking freshly carved, not dried out. You'd be surprised how an artful stem can elicit interest family and friends. Comments like, "Where did you find THAT pumpkin?" bring a smile to my face.

Oh, yes, there are more important decisions to be made each day. That's for sure. But even Charlie Brown knew a great pumpkin when he saw one.

Royal Fruit

Did someone say pomegranates?

This Christmas ornament-looking fruit is showing up in supermarkets nationwide because fall and winter are the season!

Originally from Persia, pomegranates are the new darling of the antioxidant world. Ruby red with hundreds of seeds called pips that sparkle like tiny rubies, pomegranates are tart sweet, a good source of vitamin C and potassium, and can keep you healthy in flu season.

In Italy they are called melagrana, and they grow on shrubs just about everywhere, dangling on slender stems like Christmas ornaments. Italians love them, and consider them royal fruit because they appear so much in Renaissance paintings. Pomegranates were also thought to be the "apple" that Eve plucked in the Garden of Eden.

When you ask Italians how they use them, they just smile and say, "Mangia cosi!" That means just tossing the pips in your mouth and enjoying them naturally. I don't recall seeing too many recipes in Italy for pomegranates other than as garnish for salads in upscale restaurants or as gelato. Italians like to keep things pure and simple.

California is our source for pomegranates in the U.S., and when they are in season, I grab as many as I can and squeeze them for their juice. I also freeze the seeds to use in salads and sauces, and one of my most requested recipes using them is for a ricotta cheesecake with pomegranate sauce.

Pomegranates are also used to make granadine, a syrup used in cocktails. When you buy them, look for plump, round, and heavy fruit with a deep red color that is blemish free. A large pomegranate will yield about 1/2 cup of juice.

Have you tried them yet this fall?

Trick or Treat

With Halloween just around the corner, stores are packed with costumes, masks of just about everything in the universe, special effects for making your home creepy for trick or treaters, and loads of candy.

And every Halloween, I carve the great pumpkin and get into the spirit of the night, waiting for the doorbell to ring right at dinner time. Funny thing is that in the last few years, I have noticed fewer ghosts and goblins showing up to claim their booty. At first I thought it was the health food we were handing out, like granola bars and small packages of dried cranberries. I didn't want moms and dads to think we didn't care about the sugar rush that most kids would get from all the loot they collected.

No, it must be the chilly nights that kept them away. But talking to friends in other neighborhoods, I got the same reaction.

Are kids just not interested in the spooky anymore? Are they more interested in playing video games than being driven around the block by their parents? Or texting their friends? And I can't believe that with teenage vampires being the hottest (make that coldest) thing out there right now, that this year won't be a banner year for Halloween. I'm optimistic.

So what will I give as a treat this year? I'll be giving out Bones of the Dead, a wonderful cookie from Italy made especially for Halloween to commemorate the memory of those who have died.

Happy Halloween!

It's Time To Bake The Cookies

This weekend begins the fall foliage trek for many leaf peepers. They will pay a pretty penny,traveling by the busload to New England to marvel at what nature can do. Since I live in New England, I can enjoy the riotous display of color for free!

But, besides the foliage, Columbus Day is also upon us, when we honor the great Genovese explorer for discovering America. I know it is a touchy subject with many who think Columbus was less of a hero and more of a tyrant. I will leave that for the historians to debate.

In my household, Columbus Day marks the beginning of the holiday baking season. In other words, it is time to bake Christmas cookies!

My mother always started baking on Columbus Day, and it has rubbed off on me. Starting now and continuing well into December, I will be filling my freezer with all kinds of Christmas cookies from dainty pizzelle to sturdy biscotti.

I usually make one or two kinds each week so by the time December arrives, my freezer is chocked full of cookies that we will enjoy and also give away to neighbors and friends. It's a nice touch to give something homemade. Besides, while others who procrastinate will be scrambling to bake cookies into the wee hours of Christmas Eve, those who start now can just sit back and let December be the most wonderful time of the year.

Pesto!

Update from the editors: Here is a video series on the Ciao Italia garden with some pesto tips! Watch Part 1 here and Part 2 here.

Original Post...

Say the word pesto to most people, and they have a vague idea of something green in a jar that is used on pasta or pizza. And they would be half-right. About the green part, that is.

Pesto used to mean one thing: fresh basil leaves pounded into a pulp with coarse salt, extra virgin olive oil, walnuts or pine nuts, and cheese, either Pecorino or Parmigiano Reggiano. That's it.

Pesto's roots are in the region of Liguria, especially around Genoa. Today, there are many kinds of "pesto" from arugola to parsley to sun-dried tomato.

The word pesto means to pound down, coming from the verb pestare. That's because a mortar and pestle are the classic kitchen tools to make the original pesto. Nowadays, chefs throw everything in a food processor, whirl and call it a day. There's only one problem with this: a food processor really bruises those fragile basil leaves, while a mortar and pestle releases their oils in a much gentler way. This results in not only better color, but also better flavor.

Each year, we go overboard with the amount of basil we plant. I like to grow the small leaf basil that is the basis of Genovese pesto, but I also love basilico napoletano, a huge lettuce leaf sized basil that I use for wraps, tomato sauce, soups and stews. Then there is the Sicilian basil that has a more peppery bite to it. That I use in salads. 

One of the easiest ways to preserve your bountiful basil is to gather the leaves and throw them into ziplock sandwich bags. Freeze them for use during the winter months when you need a fresh garden flavor for your soups, stews, and braises.

Here is a little secret about basil leaves: they hate to be refrigerated because the cold causes them to wilt too fast. They also don't like being wet. That turns the leaves brown.

Get more basil tips in this video at CiaoItalia.com.