Food brings families and friends together, and so do the holidays. In this spirit, I have asked Nicoletta & Fabio to share a story about Christmas in their family and what role food had in the celebration. Fabio’s father – Aldo – was so kind not only to share his memories of Christmas in the late 40s in the Italian countryside, but also one of the family’s traditional Christmas dishes: Risotto w. Chicken liver. Read on, enjoy and happy holidays!

I was growing up after the Second World War, and the predominant memory of winter is the cold. The cold was icy and crept into our house, our clothing and our bones. The only heated room was the kitchen with the wood fired oven, and some of the warmth escaped into the adjacent living room, where the family gathered, further warming the room with their bodies. The beds were icy, so mother would heat tiles in the open fire and used them to warm your beds 30 minutes before we were supposed to go to sleep.

With all the hardship we suffered through in those winters, Christmas Eve was pure magic. This was long before Christmas trees had found their way into the living rooms of Italian families. Our tradition was build around the Nativity Scene. Every family had their treasured collection of little statues and figures; every year they gathered on a bed of moss we children had collected in the woods. A piece of silver colored paper turned into a creek and pebbles and stones came together to form the cave which cows and donkeys called their home. On Christmas Eve, before going to bed, we would gently take the little Baby Jesus figure and put it to sleep in the tiny hay filled crib, guarded by Mary and Joseph. The three wise men were still positioned afar in a pool of sand and every day, they would be moved closer to the crib, until their arrival on January 6th.

Christmas morning was pure bliss! We would fly out of bed to see which gifts Baby Jesus (not Santa!) had brought. Maybe a slingshot done by Sig. Tadi - famous for his craft? Or a construction kit of metal wires, tubes, screws and beams? Or maybe even a bat to play “lipa”, an Italian version of baseball? And of course there were the precious sweets and fruits we only enjoyed once a year, at Christmas: nougat, caramels, mandarin oranges or even peanuts!

All family members would gather at the home of the grandparents for the celebration and the holiday feast. I always remember the taste of my grandmother’s special dishes: A broiled capon as “secondo”. As antipasto we would dip vegetables into warm, oily “bagna cauda” (garlic and anchovies dissolved in warm olive oil), munch on homemade salame and snack on the pickled bell peppers my grandfather was famous for. We were even allowed to have a sip of red wine, which Grandfather would strictly ration as if it were pure gold. The “primo piatto” to be enjoyed before the main dish, was a capon liver risotto. It is a simple dish, but mighty tasty and I am happy to share it with you, as it is still served at my family's Christmas table year after year.

Ciao da daddy Aldo

Grignasco, novembre 2010

Nicoletta's & Fabio's Family Christmas 2009: Nicoletta is the third from the right (holding her and Fabio's son Federico), Aldo is dressed up as Babbo Natale (Santa Claus), with his grandson Lorenzo. Far left: Fabio's Mum Fulvia, on the right Fabio's sister Leila holding baby Sofia, behind her her husband Francesco.

Chicken Liver Risotto

(We adapted this recipe slightly to US cooking styles. As a capon is a rooster castrated for better taste, we prefer to suggest liver from a happy, pasture raised chicken in the spirit of humanely raised livestock)

1 cup of Nicoletta’s & Fabio’s Carnaroli Rice

3.5 cups chicken stock, hot

1 small onion, finely sliced

1 clove garlic, minced

1 Tbsp. Cosimo’s Extra Virgin Olive Oil

8 oz. Chicken liver, chopped

3.5 tbsp butter

1 cup grated Parmigiano Reggiano

2 tbsp chopped parsley

Salt & pepper to taste

serves 4

Method

(1) Sautee’ the onions and garlic in Cosimo’s EVOO. (2) Add the rice, stir to coat and cook till the rice is slightly toasted. (3) Add 1 cup of hot chicken stock, stirring well over medium-low heat. (4) Once the liquid has evaporated, add the remaining chicken stock ½ cup at a time, stirring every 3-4 minutes. (5) In a separate pan, heat the butter over medium-high heat until foamy. (6) Add the chopped chicken liver and sautee’ until they are nicely browned, but still pink in the center. Be careful not to overcook! (7) When the rice is almost al dente (ca. 15 min. into the cooking process), add the liver, parmigiano, parsley and stir well. (8) Let rest with the heat turned off for ca. 4 minutes. (9) Salt & pepper to taste and serve in warmed plates.

Recommended wine pairing: Barbera d’Asti

Updating...

When I was growing up, deviled eggs were served as a the protein component to our sandwich dinners from time to time, following the classic recipe that had been passed down to my mum through her Czech family roots: eggs, mustard, capers, anchovies. Although I liked them, they never made my list of my favorite foods. If Mum asked me what I wanted for dinner, you could bet that I would request bacon pancakes, but no deviled eggs. (German style pancakes and no – they are nothing like the German pancake sold at the International House of Pancakes. Never saw anything like that in Germany). But I never had a soft spot for boiled eggs, either. Guess I am just a frittata kind of girl.

So why oh why did visions of deviled eggs suddenly form in my mind when I started reading one of my favorite new cookbooks, Amanda Hesser’s “The Essential New York Times Cookbook”? Maybe it was the descriptions in the recipe for deep fried deviled eggs (it calls for first filling the egg halves, putting them back together, breading the egg and then frying it)? Or was it the image of a summer picnic appearing before my inner eye as I learned that the deviled egg originated as a picnic food? (Of all things! Who would take a delicately filled deviled egg on a road trip?!) Winter has arrived and the thought of a summer picnic felt kind of comforting. Plus, is there is no doubt that deviled eggs make a mighty good finger food at the upcoming holiday parties.

And this is how this deviled egg with an Italian twist was conceived! Roberta’s Eggplant Spread takes center stage here. Being a blend of eggplants, sun-dried tomatoes, olives, oregano and chili peppers it has so many great taste components, that preparing this deviled egg is easy as 1-2-3.

Enjoy the holiday preparation frenzy, share great food and moments with your friends & family and please make sure you are buying your eggs for this dish from your trusted farmer that raises the chickens on pasture.

Ingredients

6 eggs, hard boiled

1 3/4 tbsp red onion, finely chopped

5 tbsp Cosimo’s Extra Virgin Olive Oil “blend”

2 1/2 tbsp Roberta’s Eggplant Spread

1 ½ tsp white wine mustard

½ tsp lemon juice

salt and pepper to taste

oregano for decoration

Method

(1) Cut eggs lengthwise into halves and gently take out the egg yolk. (2) Mash the egg yolks with a fork and mix in onions, Cosimo’s Extra Virgin Olive Oil, Roberta’s Eggplant Spread, mustard and lemon juice. Let sit for 15 minutes. (3) Adjust lemon juice, salt & pepper to taste. (4) Fill the empty egg whites and add spring of fresh oregano or sprinkle with dried oregano.

You can prepare the filling a day ahead and assemble eggs before serving them. Make sure to keep everything well refrigerated!

Black Friday, Cyber Monday - here comes Scrumptious Friday & Monday:

Buy a Scrumptious Pantry Food gift and get a FREE GIFT FOR YOURSELF. Get a jar of Barbara's & Fabio's Tuscan Red Onion Chutney w. Juniper Berries for FREE if you contact us till Tue Nov 30, 1am PST with your Holiday order (see terms & conditions below)

Cause who said that you only have to be the one giving this weekend?

Email your request to lee(at)scrumptiouspantry.com and we will work with our partnering retailers to put together a great gift  according to your specifications - shipped nationwide.

Pls. include the following info in your email: budget, sweet or savory gift, for the advances home cook or the snacker, food allergies, state shipped to? We can also include wine to selected States, pls. specify if interested.

We will get back to you with our suggestion for  a tasty gift by Wednesday, Dic 1st. Once you confirmed your order with your credit card with our partnering retailers, The Scrumptious Pantry will ship you your delicious gift - which btw goes great with leftover Turkey!

TERMS & CONDITIONS

This offer is exclusive to individuals that follow/"like" The Scrumptious Pantry on Facebook. Individuals can have purchases billed to a company address.

Minimum order to qualify for this promotion is 50USD (excl. shipping).

Pls. understand that we can only offer one free jar of Tuscan Red Onion Chutney per customer address, even if multiple food gifts are ordered or multiple credit cards used.

We reserve the right to substitute the Tuscan Red Onion Chutney with a product of equal value once our inventory of Tuscan Red Onion Chutney is exhausted.

USA & Canada only

Ever wondered what the secret to a deliciously juicy turkey is, no matter the long roasting time? The secret is to brine it! The brine has two effects on the meat of this flavorful bird: the salt breaks down the proteins and it infuses liquid into the meat. You can go with a simple salt brine, or use the occasion to infuse your turkey with some seasoning, too. There are many fancy recipes: you can blend cranberry juice with your brine, or wine, add citrus… see http://allrecipes.com//HowTo/brining-turkey/Detail.aspx for some ideas. We suggest an easy & tasty brining solution that takes no time to prepare. We are using Roberta’s & Giulio’s Coarse Roasting & Grilling Salt – it contains juniper berries, rose peppercorns, rosemary, sage, bay leaf, thyme and tarragon, which is a great flavor profile for your Thanksgiving Turkey. Thanks to the love Roberta & Giulio poured into this salt, it is extremely flavorful: their estate grown organic herbs were minced by hand while still fresh, so the essential oils are sealed into the salt.

You can brine a 14lb. turkey from eight – 16 hours, but note that the saltiness of the meat increases with the brining time. So if this is the first Turkey you are brining, we recommend you choose a shorter brining time, no one wants a too salty turkey at Thanksgiving! And take the saltiness of the meat and the drippings into consideration when seasoning the bird and the sauce!

Having a recipe that works for first time briners was our main intention. If you are an experienced turkey briner and want to use more salt and a different brining time, consider that a jar of the Coarse Salt equals approx. 3/4 cups of sea salt.

Ingredients

For a Turkey of about 14lb. plan with 2 gallons of brine:

2 gallons of cold water

1 jar of Roberta’s Coarse Roasting & Grilling Salt

1/2 cup kosher salt

5 lb of ice cubes

Make sure you have a very large container/bucket!

Method

You should prepare the brine ahead and refrigerate it, to make sure it is cold (to eliminate the risk of bacteria).

To prepare the brine, combine two quarts of water with Roberta’s Coarse Roasting & Grilling Salt and the kosher salt. Over medium-high heat bring to a boil. Simmer for about 20 minutes. Make sure to stir occasionally, so the coarse salt dissolves. Cool the brine and refrigerate.

When you are ready to brine the bird, in a large bucket mix the cold brine, the remaining cold water and ice cubes (again, we want to eliminate the ground for bacteria). Make sure the innards are removed from the Turkey when you immerse it in the brine (breast side down). You can press the bird down, if necessary. Cover and refrigerate.

At the end of the brining time, take the Turkey out of the brine, rinse it briefly with cold water and pat it dry. Then follow your favorite recipe for roasting the bird. Note that a brined Turkey will cook approximately 30 min faster, so watch the internal temperature!

Following the concept of eating with one’s eyes, I first bought quinoa because the red seeds looked fun and I thought they would be an attractive addition to my home baked bread. Sure, I had heard about how healthy it was, but I never buy anything because it is healthy. I buy food because it tastes good and is real and satisfies body & soul. And then a whole new world opened up. Quinoa seeds steamed or cooked are just delicious and there are so many uses to cook with them – any given time of the day. They are a perfect start of the day mixed with fruits for breakfast and great in a savory dish, too. This fall salad has a little sweet twist from apples and roasted pumpkin and is tasty with all sort of seasonal greens, such as chard and beet greens. Fennel is also a possible addition. Cosimo’s Extra Virgin Olive Oil “Blend” with its robust character gives a great kick as a finishing touch.

Ingredients:

1 small Delicata Squash

3 tbsp Cosimo’s Extra Virgin Olive Oil “Blend”

3 tsp Roberta’s Fine Roasting & Grilling Salt

2 cups cooked Quinoa

1 medium sized Jonagold apple

1 small red onion

2 tbsp apple cider vinegar

1 tsp Cinnamon

Salad greens or chard/beet greens

Method: (1) Cut seeded squash into bite size cubes, toss with 1 tbsp Cosimo’s Extra Virgin Olive Oil and 1 tsp of Roberta’s Fine Roasting & Grilling Salt, and roast till tender, let cool (2) Finely slice apple and dice onion (3) Mix cooked quinoa, roasted pumpkin, sliced apples and onions (4) Add vinegar, season w. remaining Roasting & Grilling Salt and cinnamon (5) Mix well and let stand for 30 min (6) Wash greens, cut roughly and toss into quinoa salad (7) Drizzle Cosimo’s Extra Virgin Olive Oil over each serving.

Extra Virgin Olive Oil is a wold of flavor in itself. And it can bring a world of flavor to other dishes, savory and sweet. In Italy I got used to baking with Extra Virgin Olive Oil - one of my favorites is a light spongecake made orange juice and EVOO. So now that I am on the other side of the ocean, where local oranges in winter are rare and the cold screams for higher calorie count, I wondered about chocolate brownies. So I paired Cosimo's nice peppery Extra Virgin Olive Oil with unsweetened chocolate, added some smoked sea salt and pink peppercorns for an extra luxurious treat. The texture of this brownie is more on the lighter side, like chocolate cake. If you like your brownie all gooey and dense, you can incorporate EVOO and pink peppercorns into your favorite brownie recipe. The suggested "conversion rate" from butter to Extra Virgin Olive oil is ¾ cup of olive oil for one cup/two sticks of butter. When working with dark chocolate make sure you choose a robust EVOO to stand up to the taste of the chocolate!

Have you ever baked with Extra Virgin Olive Oil? What is your favorite recipe?

Pink-Peppercorn Brownies

Ingredients

4 eggs

8 oz. unsweetened chocolate

3/4 cup Cosimo's Extra Virgin Olive Oil

1 cup raw sugar

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp smoked sea salt

1 tbsp pink peppercorns

Method: (1) Beat egg yolks and sugar (2) Add Cosimo's Extra-Virgin Olive Oil and melted chocolate (3) In a separate bowl, beat egg whites until they are stiff (4) Add 1/3 of the flour and baking powder (5) Fold parts of the egg whites under the batter (6) Repeat mixing in flour & folding in egg whites till all the ingredients are incorporated (7) Add salt and the crushed pink peppercorns (8) Line a baking sheet with Extra Virgin Olive Oil, fill with the batter and bake in a 375F oven for about 40 minutes if using a 8x8 pan. That will give you fairly high brownies. If you use a larger pan, reduce the baking time to about 20 minutes.

You can glaze the donuts with chocolate-EVOO and sprinkle them with a little coarse sea salt & crushed peppercorns for decoration - melt the chocolate and mix in 1tsp of EVOO for every 1 tbsp of melted chocolate.

I am grateful for the many great publications - in print and online - that bring together the community of consumers interested in delicious, healthy food, in sustainable agriculture, in supporting small family farms. Mindful Metropolis is one of those publications that are a joy to read and that broaden my horizon every time I pick up one of their issues.

This month's issue though made me take a pen, circle a part in an otherwise great piece on apple harvest roadtrip, put a question mark next to it and reach for my email program. Time for a letter to the editor!

What caused my attention was the following sentence: "...why not get out of town and pick (the apples) yourself...Plus, it's the quintessential locavore statement: supporting local farmers (cutting out the grocery store middlemen saves farmers about $50/bushel)"

And this is what I wrote:

Dear Mindful Metropolis Team,

thank you for another great edition of Mindful Metropolis. I do have one comment though on Daisy Simmons' "Orchard Days". I am all about buying directly from farmers whenever I can - be in the farmer's market, a CSA or a road side stand. These are great ways to better understand where the food I enjoy comes from and to interact with the people that grow it. I do not agree though that it is the best way to support local farmers by "cutting out the grocery store middlemen" as your article suggests.

I am pretty sure that if you ask the majority of our farmers if they want to spend hours every week commuting to local farmers' market, they will tell you they might prefer to sell to a distributor who pays fair prices and through a grocery store that respects their work. Also, I am sure they will agree that for most of them, having unannounced visitors dropping by to pick up a couple of pounds of produce, is more of a distraction from their work than anything else. Selling directly might save them a couple of dollars, but the opportunity costs for that sale are pretty high, too.

The solution to fixing our broken food system is a new system of middlemen. We have great little grocery stores in Chicago that are driven by this spirit: the GreenGrocer, the Dill Pickle Coop, Provenance Food and Wine.
But if we want to really change the system, those efforts can only be a start. We will need a system of middlemen on the distribution level designed to deal with small farmers and with heritage crops (JDY Gourmet is a great local example of a company making a difference to small farmers). A system that will not reject tomatoes with little "clawmarks" as seconds, a system that will not let a farmer down because of a lower yield in one year. We need those middlemen with a new thinking both in handling fresh produce, meat, poultry & dairy, and we urgently need it in creating processed foods, too.

Writing off the middleman and discouraging the consumers to buy at the grocery stores is the wrong approach. Change can only come through demand pressuring supply on a larger scale.

Best regards
M. Lee Greene
Owner
The Scrumptious Pantry

What do you think? Does cutting out the middlemen really help the local farmers in the long run? I am very interested in hearing your opinions!

You might have heard about the "October:Unprocessed" challenge (it is actually kind of sad that it is considered a challenge to eat unprocessed food). Through the month of October 400 people (as of now) have pledged to be eating unprocessed foods and only diverting to store bought if the packaged food could have been prepared at home (like, if you had your coffee roaster or olive press or grain mill). It is a great way to make people aware of the quality of most foods out there in the supermarket aisles.

We are very honored to have been asked to share our thoughts on unprocessed foods on the project's website. Hop over to eatingrules.com to read what we got to say! And while you are browsing their page, sign the pledge!

I remember the first time I tasted fresh Extra Virgin Olive Oil the day I arrived at the Tuscan vineyard that was going to be my home for five years. I was blown away. I even coughed a little bit, as its pungency caught me by surprise. This was nothing I had ever tasted before. Immediately, I was won over. Here and there, I fell in love with Extra Virgin Olive Oil and its contribution not only to our health, but how it can add flavor to the dishes. A drizzle of good quality, robust Extra Virgin Olive Oil on soups, stews, grilled meats or fish is now a must in my kitchen. Back at Cosimo's vineyard, we ended up bottling three different Extra Virgin Olive Oils from our 1,000 trees (as approximation: 1 tree = 1 liter of EVOO). It was a lot of work for only a few bottles, but the character of the oil really changed dramatically from one part of the land to the other. The Premium Blend became the finishing oil, starting a little more on the delicate side and then developing to a whirlwind of taste expressions on the palate. The Blend is a great robust oil that is perfect for dipping, to toss pasta, to roast pumpkin, to make a vinaigrette.

So with my passion for all things Extra Virgin Olive Oil, you can imagine how excited I was when the City Olive in Chicago - a great source for Extra Virgin Olive Oils from all over the world - hosted a book presentation by Fran Gage. Fran is one of America's leading experts on Extra Virgin Olive Oil and has published this very lovely book on American EVOO (well, Californian really) producers, including 75 recipes differentiated by style of EVOO. A great read and a great source of inspiration, too!

So here is a recipe from Fran's book "The New American Olive Oil", perfect for these fall days and Cosimo's Premium Blend

Apple and Parsnip Soup

Ingredients

3 tbsp delicate EVOO (Fran recommends an EVOO with tropical & floral notes such as the Ascolano)

2 leeks, washed, with green tops removed, thinly sliced

1 lb parsnips (2 or 3 medium), peeled & cut into 1-inch dice

fine salt and freshly ground black pepper

2 large garlic cloves, peeled and finely sliced

1 tsp thyme leaves

5 cups chicken stock

1.5lb (approx. 4) apples, peeled, cored and cut into 1-inch dice - look for crisp apples with a hint of sweeteness

3 tbsp Cosimo's Extra Virgin Olive Oil Premium Blend for drizzling

1.5 tbsp snipped chives

Method:

(1) Heat the delicate EVOO in a medium casserole over medium heat until it trembles, becomes aromatic, and easily coasts the bottom of the casserole. (2) Add the leeks and parsnips. Season with salt and pepper. Cook until the leeks are wilted, but not browned, about 5 minutes. (3) Add the garlic and thyme and cook for 2 more minutes. add the chicken stock and the apples. (4) Bring to a simmer. Cover and cook until the parsnips and apples are falling apart for about 35 to 40 minutes. (5) Puree the soup with an immersion blender. Adjust seasoning if necessary. (6)  Ladle the soup into bowls. Drizzle with Cosimo'a Premium Blend and garnish with snipped chives.

They smile at us from porches and out of windows at this time of year. They are stacked high at farmer’s markets, in all shapes and colors. Such a delicious variety! The bright orange pumpkin, the traditional object of Halloween carving. The smaller, more reddish colored hokkaido squash. The pear shaped butternut squash, the orange sprinkled acorn squash with its deep green color. And the fuzzy squash, which I discovered in my garden this summer and which has developed in such a grotesquely huge thing that I have decided it will be dished up at my birthday dinner in January. Although I certainly regret to bid the summer goodbye, I cannot really be upset about the dying tomato plants and shorter days. I am too happy to see the pumpkins and squashes out and about!

To get you in the mood for fall, try this easy Roasted Pumpkin Crepe w. Goat Cheese. It makes a delicious dinner with a small side salad of the season’s last lettuces and tomatoes!

Ingredients (for 4 persons)

1 small pumpkin or acorn squash (ca 1 ½ lb)

4 tbsp Cosimo’s Extra Virgin Olive Oil “blend”

1 tsp Roberta’s Roasting & Grilling salt

1 spring rosemary

4 tablespoons fresh goat cheese spread

4 tablespoons cooked quinoa (if you have none on hand, do not stress yourself about it. It is not crucial to the recipe, although it adds a nice texture component!)

1 cup chopped chard

For the pancake

6 tbsp flour

4 eggs

3/4 cup water

½ tsp Roberta’s Roasting & Grilling Salt

Method: (1) Heat oven to 375 F (2) Wash pumpkin/squash well under warm water (3) Cut in half once and clean from the seeds (if the thought of nibbling on pumpkin seeds makes you has happy as me, put seeds aside in a baking dish and sprinkle w. salt to be roasted in the hot oven later) (4) Cut lengthwise into slices ca. ½ inch thick, toss w. 2 tbsp EVOO and Roasting & Grilling Salt and put in the oven for approx. 15 min with the rosemary (5) In the meantime, beat eggs well and mix in the flour and salt (6) add the water gradually, make sure the mix does not get too liquid! (7) Let sit for about 10 min. (8) Clean chard and chop into bite size pieces (9) Add chard to the pumpkin/squash, turning over the latter to make sure they are well covered in EVOO. Put back into the oven for another 10 min. (at this point you can stick the seeds into the oven, too)  (10) Add a dash of EVOO to a well heated large pan, and add a small ladle of pancake mix, turning the pan well, so the dough covers the whole surface of the pan (you should have enough dough for 4 crepes) (11) When lightly brown, flip and cook for another 90 seconds. While you repeat this for all crepes, you can keep the finished ones warm in the oven (11) Spread a tablespoon of goat cheese on every crepe, arrange pumpkin slices and chard, as well as a tablespoon of cooked quinoa in the center of the crepe (12) Fold up and transfer to plate. Drizzle with EVOO and serve.