Passata

31 Tuesday Jul 2012

Posted by fincafood in Preserves, Sauces

There are two slightly different ways of making this. One method, you leave the tomatoes whole, skin them and then make them into the passata and jar the passata straight away. The other method you chop the tomatoes without skinning them, make them into the passata, put the pulp through a mouli, re-heat the passata and then put it into jars.

Each method has its advantages. For the first you obviously don’t need a mouli, and you get a much chunkier texture. I tend to use this method when I have a garden full of perfectly formed but small tomatoes.

The second method is good for when your home grown tomatoes are a little less than perfect. Maybe they have a tad of blossom end rot or woody centres but most of the tomato is OK. Because you cut up the tomatoes you can use the good bits and send the rest to the compost heap, thus not wasting any of your crop. Also this method despite having to re-heat the pulp is actually quicker than the first method with all the tomato peeling. Another plus to this method is that you can mix in other vegetables. Although the recipe below is for tomatoes alone, when I made the batch in the photos, I had some courgettes that had raced off and were aspiring to be marrows, so they were peeled and chopped and added to the mix. Red peppers work very well, but not green as they are too bitter. Onions, all types of squashes, auberines. All add thier own flavours. I would never go more than one third of the other vegetables to two thirds tomatoes.

Before I get into the recipe a note about jars. I keep all jars that have the type of lids that create a vacuum and have a plastic seal around the inside of the lid. These can be re-used as long as they will still fasten tight. The lids must not be pierced, rusty or bent round the edges or they will not seal and create a vacuum. When you come to use them for preserving the passata they need to be hot and sterile. I find that a hot wash in the dishwasher with a steam dry works really well. You need to be ready to use the jars straight from the dishwasher when they are pretty well too hot to handle.

Alternatively, if the jars are already clean, put them with thier lids a few at a time in a large pan with boiling water and heat to a simmer to sterilize them. Fish them out, drain them and use while still hot.

For 1 kilo of tomatoes

2 or 3 cloves of garlic – finely chopped

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 bayleaf

pinch of sugar

salt and pepper

Firstly prepare the tomatoes. If you are doing the first version peel the tomatoes by bringing a pan of water to the boil. When it is boiling add a few of the tomatoes. You don’t want to lower the temperature of the water by adding too many. As soon as you see the skins of the tomatoes start to split, which will only take a couple of minutes, scoop them out and let them cool. Carry on with the rest of the tomatoes. When the tomatoes are cool, slip the skins off.

If you are going for the second method, just cut up the tomatoes. Remember to weigh them after cutting if there is a lot of waste.

In a pan large enough to take all the tomatoes, heat the oil gently. Add the garlic and cook a minute or two. Add the tomatoes, bayleaf and seasonings. Stir to mix. Cover and leave to stew on a low heat for about half an hour.

If you are with method one, taste the passata to check the seasonings and adjust accordingly. Then put in hot jars filling to half a centimetre from the top. Make sure that there are no bits of sauce around the top where the glass will meet the seal in the lid. You can just wipe the top with kitchen roll. To begin with put the lids on loosely, the passata will then warm the lid a bit more. After a couple of minutes you can tighten them up.

If you are on method two, put the pulp through the mouli using the coarsest disc, this will sieve out the pips as well as the skin. Return the pulp to the pan and bring back to the boil. Lower the heat and simmer for three minutes to kill any bacteria that may have infiltrated the pulp. Then continue as above adjusting the seasoning and jarring up the passata.

The herbs in the passata can be changed as you like. Instead of the bayleaf, try fresh basil or oregano.

Uses? Pasta sauces, ready made tomato topping for pizza, soups, stews. Anywhere where a recipe calls for tomatoes.

Sun Drying Tomatoes

30 Monday Jul 2012

Posted by fincafood in Techniques

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Those of us who have tomatoes growing in their huertas – vegetable gardens – are finding that we have more than we can eat fresh, so I am going to give you two methods of preserving them. If you live in a climate with not much sun, you may wonder what use the instructions for sun drying would be to you, but should you find yourself holidaying somewhere hot, you may be grateful to have the knowledge that in the space of three to four days you can have your own sun dried tomatoes to take home as a culinary memento of your stay.

Komato Sun Dried

First principle is only use perfect fruit. Small tomatoes are quicker and easier to dry than large ones. So certainly while you getting used to drying tomatoes, and particularly if the weather looks uncertain, go for smaller ones if you have the choice.

Wind is as much of a factor in successful drying as heat. Look for a drying spot that has all day sun and a breeze. You may have to have a morning drying spot and a different afternoon one.

Any flat tray/plate can be used to dry the tomatoes on. Because I dry a lot, I have an old fold out clothes drying rack to which I peg teatowels to make a flat surface. But I have used oven trays, unused cupboard shelves and plates.

Always bring the tomatoes in at night. No matter how hot it feels there is always too much condensation at night, which will encourage your tomatoes to rot. Not to mention all the vermin, cats and bugs that roam around at night.

Beginning of day 1

Start at the beginning of the morning to give the tomatoes a good full day of drying for their first day.

Wash the tomatoes. For plum tomatoes cut them in half as above. For round varieties cut them in half across their equators.

Lay out the tomatoes on a tray cut side up and sprinkle generously sea salt onto the flesh.

Put them outside in a sunny and breezy spot.

End of Day 1

End of day 2

After one and a half to two days of drying the tomatoes will have curled inwards, so to enable them to keep drying you need to uncurl them and flatten them out. Sometimes little bugs may have crept into the curled up edges, just evict them.

End of day 4 – the dried tomatoes

The length of time that tomatoes need to dry varies depending on the size of tomato and the weather conditions. Normally here in the second half of July the conditions are perfect for drying, which they were for the Komato variety at the beginning of the post, which dried in two and a half days. Just because I wanted to do a step by step with photos for you, the plum tomatoes last week took four days to dry as we had unseasonal cloud and humidity. Occasionally and usually towards the end of the season the weather turns too humid and you have to abandon the drying half way through and use the tomatoes for something else.

Don’t be tempted to leave the tomatoes out in the sun too long either. I have done this thinking that extra drying will help them keep longer. It doesn’t and you end up with tomatoes like dried up bits of leather. So stop when the tomatoes feel dry but still have some flesh to them.

To store I pack the tomatoes into jars with olive oil. The first year that I dried tomatoes I had read somewhere that they could be stored in paper bags. By November they were covered in little spots of a type of mould. Maybe harmless – but not appetising. This would probably happen even more quickly in a less dry climate than here. Putting them in oil holds the colour much better too.

Put a little oil in the jar first, and then layers of tomatoes and oil making sure that you have no air bubbles. Make sure that there is about 1cm of oil above the last tomato. Seal and store in a cool dark place.

Next post will be the recipe for Passata.

I leave you with Pablo Neruda

Ode to Tomatoes

The street

filled with tomatoes

midday,

summer,

light is

halved

tomato,

its juice

runs

through the streets.

In December,

unabated,

the tomato invades the kitchen,

it enters at lunchtime,

takes its ease on countertops,

among glasses,

butter dishes,

blue saltcellars.

It sheds its own light,

benign majesty.

Unfortunately,

we must murder it:

the knife sinks into living flesh,

red viscera,

a cool sun,

profound,

inexhausible,

populates the salads of Chile,

happily,

it is wed to the clear onion,

and to celebrate the union we pour oil,

essential child of the olive,

onto its halved hemispheres,

pepper adds its fragrance,

salt,

its magnetism;

it is the wedding of the day,

parsley hoists its flag,

potatoes bubble vigorously,

the aroma of the roast knocks
at the door,

it’s time! come on!

and,

on the table,

at the midpoint of summer,

the tomato,

star of earth,

recurrent and fertile star,

displays its convolutions,

its canals,

its remarkable amplitude and abundance,

no pit,

no husk,

no leaves or thorns,

the tomato

offers its gift of fiery color

and cool completeness.

Roast Pork Belly with Green Olive Stuffing

29 Sunday Jul 2012

Posted by fincafood in Main Courses

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Inspired by the pork butchery course, on returning home to Spain I felt the need to treat my friends to a good piece of roast pork, but Spanish style of course……..

I first had a slice of this as a tapa in Bar Lucero in Cuevas De Almanzora. On a dreary winter day when we had had a dreary morning chasing officialdome – a frequent occurrence here – to brighten ourselves a bit we stopped for a small glass of and a tapa before going home for lunch. It was a cold slice and the mix of the salty olives, garlic and lots of coarsely ground black pepper as a seasoning to the slightly fatty pork immediately caught the attention of my taste buds. It was further seasoned with a squeeze of fresh lemon and drizzled with olive oil. Suitably brightened we stayed for another glass so we could check out what other tapas were good. The pork however remained the star of the show.

For a piece of belly pork weighing about 1.5 kilos – with or without skin, and if there are any bones remove them or have the butcher remove them for you.

200 gms green olives – the bright green ones that have been crushed to open the skin and then cured in brine are best, but if you can only get the ones that are cured to a yellowy green colour and are softer in texture then use those.

6 fat cloves of sweet garlic

3 large eggs – hard boiled

1 table spoon coarsely ground black pepper

Peel and finely chop the garlic.

Coarsely chop the olives removing the stones if they have them.

Mix the olives and garlic together.

If your pork belly has skin and you want crackling, then score the skin either in stripes or a diamond pattern. Salt the skin and leave for half an hour for the salt to draw out any moisture. Wipe dry with kitchen roll.

Lay the pork on a board skin/fat side down and season all over with the black pepper. Spread the olive mix evenly over the surface. There is no need for salt as the olives are salty.

Peel the eggs and slice them. Lay the slices over the olive layer. Roll the pork and tie it.

Roast at 160 Centigrade for 3 hours. If you have crackling, then roast for 2.5 hours at 160 Centigrade then turn the oven up to 240 Centigrade and roast for another half hour.

Remove the meat from the oven and let rest in a warm place for 20 minutes before carving.

To serve cold I like to not only season the meat with lemon juice and olive oil as described above, but I save the juices and fat that have come out of the meat while it was cooking and I let that go cold in the fridge. Then you can remove the fat from the top, and save for frying potatoes, and below will be some lovely brown tasty jelly. Cut this into cubes and serve these as an extra seasoning on the cold slices of pork.

The Butchers Art

23 Monday Jul 2012

Posted by fincafood in Techniques

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Last week I was in London where I was treated to a course on pork butchery at The Ginger Pig. Then this week I visited the gallery of Andres Garcia Ibanez, one of Spains foremost contemporary artists, who has recently added a selection of paintings from his series Naturalezas Muertas to the anthology of his works.The gallery in Olula Del Rio is where the artist has his house and studio, is a little cultural oasis in this very rural part of spain. Although I have included here as a tempter for you, two of his meat pictures, being a blog about food, any of out of his recent series of portraits was what I wanted to take home and look at for a long period of time. If you are in the vicinity, go and have a look.

On to the real flesh and blood and my date with a pig. Half a pig to be exact.

The roast in the final picture was treat for us after we had done lots of tiring sawing, cutting, chining and tying of pieces of pork.

The course was very good. They are not trying to turn you into a master butcher in three hours, but to have you come away with a much better understanding of which cuts come from which part of the animal, and what the best use of those cuts would be. On top of that they give you a roast dinner of their excellent pork featuring the best crackling that I have ever had, and I am not normally a crackling fan, and a good joint to take home and cook yourself. Highly recommended.

Mediterranean Fish Soup with Rouille & Aliolli

19 Thursday Jul 2012

Posted by fincafood in Fish, Starters

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The promised fish soup recipe. The only specialist bit of equipment needed to make this is a Mouli for straining the soup. You can use a sieve but a Mouli makes it much less work and gets more of the flesh of the fish and hence more flavour into the soup. It is a very useful bit of equipment for all soups especially Gazpacho Andaluz and not expensive to furnish yourself with. I have found that the cheaper plastic ones, while not looking so smart hanging in the kitchen, actually work much better than the all metal.

For 8

The body and head of a skate, cut into 3 or 4 pieces

10 large prawns

4 cloves of garlic sliced

Half and onion sliced

Either 250 ml Passata – home made being best, or 250 ml Tomato Frito, or Standard sized tin of chopped plum tomatoes plus 3-4 tablespoons of tomato puree.

The cooking liquid from the skate wings from the previous post if you have done that.

Salt & Freshly ground black pepper

Peel the prawns and put the heads and skins in a pan with the cooking liquid from the skate wings if you have that, otherwise with enough water to cover. Bring to the boil and simmer for ten minutes.

Strain this stock and add to a large pan containing the pieces of skate body, the garlic, and the onion. Add more water to cover the ingredients and bring to the boil. Simmer for half an hour.

Let cool and strain through the coarse blade of the mouli making sure that you get as much of the fish flesh in the soup as you can. It will look a bit grey and unappetising at this point, but do not worry the tomatoes will transform it into a gorgeous red puree.

Return to the pan with whichever version of tomatoes that you are using and reheat. Cook for five minutes. Check seasoning. I have left this until this stage because some of the Passata and Tomato Frito in the shops has a high salt content so you can allow for this at this stage.

Add the chopped prawns to the soup and simmer a minute or two more. Serve with Rouille and Aliolli to stir in to taste.

I have given you already the recipe for Aloilli made like a mayonaise with eggs. This is the simpler version using just garlic and olive oil. Put three cloves of garlic in the mortar with a good pinch of salt. Pound to a paste.

Have the olive oil at room temperature. Add a drizzle at a time, pounding well between the drizzles until you have a thick paste. For this condiment I added about 40 ml of oil as I wanted the garlic flavour to be strong, but for an eggless mayonaise keep adding the oil until you have a mayonaise consistency. You should be able to add about 150 ml of oil.

Rouille is a spicy condiment made with red chillis and seasonings, but you can easily substitute Harissa the Moroccan Chilli paste. I improvised mine by blending together some roasted red peppers from the freezer with fresh green chilli from the garden and a little olive oil and salt.

Skate Wings with Caper Sauce

18 Wednesday Jul 2012

Posted by fincafood in Fish, Food for One, Main Courses

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I have been on my travels in recent weeks and whenever I am away from my home in southern Spain there are two things that always miss – the quality of the fresh fruit – and fresh fish. So on my return from my latest trip I hot-footed it to my local market to see what fish looked good. It is the season now for Bonito which is a variety related to Tuna, and that looked really good and fresh, but what really caught the attention of my mental taste buds was the Skate.

You could have the skinned wings only, or at a more economical price the whole fish. In these straightened times I thought you would like to know how to deal with the whole fish, from which there were two portions of a wing each, the body made enough soup for eight, and there were a couple of meals for the cats as well – all for less than 4€!

Skate has no scales, but the skin feels a little slimy and it has some sharp barbs around its head area, so rubber gloves are essential for handling it. Firstly wash it, and then put it on a board and cut off the wings. Remove the guts from the body and give to a grateful cat. Cut the body into three or four pieces for making into soup. The recipe will be in next post.As I mentioned above the fishmonger will skin the skate wings for you, but I prefer to cook them with the skin on as the skate cooks so quickly that it is too easy to overcook them if they are already skinned. Once cooked the skin peels off very easily.

To cook the wing put it in a pan with some sliced onion, a sliced clove of garlic and a pinch of salt. Put in enough water to just cover the fish. Put the pan over a medium heat and bring slowly to a simmer. If you want you can add sliced potatoes at this stage to cook with the fish. For a wing the size above – it is pictured on a standard sized dinner plate – simmer for seven minutes.

Prepare the sauce. In a small saucepan put about 20 gms butter, the juice of half a lemon and dessertspoon of chopped capers. Leave on one side until you are ready for it.

Remove the fish to a warmed plate. You can leave your potatoes cooking with the onions while you skin the fish. Put the sauce on a very gentle heat. Starting from the thicker side of the fish using a smooth bladed knife gently push the skin away from the flesh and then slide it off the plate. Turn the fish over and do the same the other side. The darker side of the wing always has tougher and thicker skin than the pale side.Keep an eye on your sauce and stir it or swirl it around from time to time. You do not want the butter to melt entirely, just enough to mix with the lemon and capers, and then remove it from the heat.

Transfer the fish to a clean warm plate. Drain the potatoes reserving the liquid to go towards the soup, and put the potatoes on the plate with the fish. Pour over the sauce. Season well with lots of freshly ground black pepper and serve.

I will continue with the fish soup recipe tomorrow.

Spanish Style Liver

05 Thursday Jul 2012

Posted by fincafood in Food for One, Main Courses

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I actually bought liver this week to recook the recipe in the previous post so that I could retake the picture of it without the camera shake, but on the day I didn’t fancy eating that, I fancied something more spicy. The liver was already cut into lovely thin escalopes perfect for cooking it the way that the locals here like it.

The liver is cooked simply with garlic and then the pan juices are seasoned with the Pimenton that is so popular here and with wine vinegar. The most prized Pimenton in Spain comes from La Vera in Estremadura where the peppers are dried over oak fires before being ground. This drying gives the Pimenton its distinctive smokey taste. It comes in Dulce – Sweet, Picante – Spicy and Agri-Dulce – Sweet and Sour. For this recipe I like to use a mixture of the Dulce and Picante.

So for one person peel and slice 3 large cloves of garlic and put the slices to fry gently in a shallow pan with some good olive oil.

Season the slices of liver with salt and freshly ground black pepper, and once the garlic starts to colour, add the slices to the pan. Cook gently for five minutes and then turn over and cook for five minutes on the other side.

Remove the liver to a warm plate and keep warm.

Add to the pan juices a good large pinch of sweet Smoked Pimenton and a pinch of the spicy. Stir this round for a minute and then add a couple of tablespoons of red wine or sherry vinegar. Swirl this around the pan over the heat to collect up all the juices and immediately pour it over the liver.

I served my liver with the baby courgettes that are so sweet straight from the garden and then grilled after being annointed with garlic and oil, and a little mashed potatoes.

Tapas Lunch – for my friends in St Gervais Les Bains

03 Tuesday Jul 2012

Posted by fincafood in Snacks and Tapas

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Tags

Apricot Gazpacho, Bizcocho de Tres Leches, Gazpacho de Albaricoques, Liver with Peppers, Morcilla con Ajos, Revuelto

While I was in St Gervais I wanted to treat my friends there to a little taste of Spain so decide to prepare a lunch of tapas dishes. This is what we had –

A little glass of Apricot Gazpacho.

I had planned to use Black Cherries for this and had bought some as well as the Apricots, but on trying the apricots they were quite tart to say the least so I swapped for them. See the Nispero Gazpacho post for the master recipe. There is no need to blanch the apricots, I just needed to add some water to the soup as the puree came out quite thick. And don’t forget to chill the glasses – the condensation on the glass looks pretty as well as keeping the soup well chilled.

Sobresada on Toasts

The Sobresada is bought ready made all over Spain, it is almost like a Chorizo rillette if that makes sense. It is pork meat and fat beaten to a paste and flavoured with the same Pimenton and garlic flavourings as Chorizo. You spread it thickly onto stale bread and then bake in a medium oven -160 centigrade – for ten minutes. Sprinkle over some capers if you have them and serve.

Ensaladilla Rusa

Russian Salad – Spanish style. Small diced Boiled potatoes, Garlic Mayonaise or Aliolli, a small tin of Tuna, chopped Green Olives and Gerkins, Green Beans boiled and chopped finely or Sweet Peas all mixed well together. You want to add enough mayonaise to get a smooth consistency – some Spanish cooks mash part of the potatoes to add to the smoothness. The ideas is to get the salad to hold together on top of a piece of bread.

Revuelto De Setas

Revueltos are soft scrambled eggs that hold together whatever is in season. They are also made with Asparagus and Prawns, Spring Garlics, Peppers – the famous Piperrada, Salt Cod……….the list goes on.In good olive oil, fry a couple of cloves of garlic cut small. When slightly golden add the mushrooms – whichever variety you have to hand, stir, cover and stew until cooked. Break the eggs into a bowl, stir to break up the yolks and season. When the mushrooms are cooked add them to the eggs and mix well. Add more oil to the cooking pan, return the egg mix to the pan and cook slowly until just setting. Serve immediately.

Morcilla con Ajos

Morcilla is the Spanish version of Black Pudding and there are as many versions of it as chefs who make it. In my area of spain it is flavoured with Pine Nuts and little Anis. One can have it sweet or slightly spicy.Cut it up and roast it with whole cloves of garlic in a medium oven for half an hour.

Liver with Peppers

There are two keys to getting this right. The first is to make sure that you fry the onions and peppers long enough that they are starting to caramelise around the edges, and the second is not to overcook the liver. Bear in mind that liver even though it is cooked enough will ooze pink juices like a steak and like a steak if you find that it is undercooked it can always go back to the pan for a few more minutes.

Fry in olive oil a finely chopped onion and a chopped red and yellow pepper. Fry on a medium heat stirring from time to time until the vegetables are well cooked and starting to caramelise.

Meanwhile cut pigs liver into bite sized pieces. Season well with salt and freshly ground black pepper.

When the vegetables are cooked add the liver and stir to mix. Season with more freshly ground black pepper. Stir again. As soon as the liver is just cooked, serve. Then try to take a photo without camera shake!

Mixed Salad with Oil and Red Wine Vinegar Dressing

And to finish my friend Conny made a Bizcocho de Tres Leches – Cake of Three Milks – I will leave you to search for the recipe for yourselves. It was wonderfully light and creamy – and so pretty !

fincafood

~ culinary and horticultural life on a Spanish farm

Monthly Archives: July 2012

Passata

Sun Drying Tomatoes

Ode to Tomatoes

Roast Pork Belly with Green Olive Stuffing

The Butchers Art

Mediterranean Fish Soup with Rouille & Aliolli

Skate Wings with Caper Sauce

Spanish Style Liver

Tapas Lunch – for my friends in St Gervais Les Bains