A Book of Mediterranean Food Read online

  The intestines of the animal are cleaned and wound round and round the skewers, which are then grilled very slowly on a spit. They are, in fact, a sort of primitive sausage, the intestine on the outside acting as a sausage skin.

  TURKISH STUFFING FOR A WHOLE ROAST SHEEP

  2 cups partly cooked rice, 1 dozen cooked chestnuts, 1 cup currants, 1 cup shelled pistachio nuts, salt, cayenne pepper, 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon, ¼ lb butter.

  Chop the chestnuts and the pistachio nuts finely, mix with the other ingredients. Melt the butter and cook the stuffing in it gently, stirring until all the ingredients are well amalgamated.

  This stuffing can also be used for chicken and turkey.

  GIGOT DE MOUTON EN CHEVREUIL (leg of mutton to taste like venison)

  A medium leg of mutton, choose it short, not freshly killed, and with the fibres close together, and make sure it has no smell of grease. Chop finely a small carrot, a large onion, half a head of celery. Heat in a casserole a wineglass of oil; when it is hot put in the vegetables and brown them lightly. Add ¼ pint of white wine and 2 glasses of wine vinegar. Add 4 or 5 stalks of parsley, 4 large shallots, 2 cloves of garlic, thyme, bay leaf, a good pinch of rosemary, 6 peppercorns, 8 crushed juniper berries, salt. Boil and cook slowly for 30 minutes. Leave to get cold. Remove the skin from the leg of mutton, taking care not to damage the flesh. Lard the surface with 5 or 6 rows of little pieces of bacon, close to each other. Put the leg of mutton into a terrine and pour over the cold marinade. Leave the meat 2 or 3 days in summer, 4 or 5 days in winter. Turn it over with a fork (do not touch with the fingers). Remove any pieces which may be sticking to the meat and wipe thoroughly (important). Put into a roasting dish with melted butter or lard. Start to cook over a very hot fire; this is important, as in a medium oven the meat will boil and not get brown. After it has browned, lower the oven and continue roasting in a good even medium heat and baste frequently.

  Serve in a hot dish, surrounded by galettes of pastry and accompanied by a sauce chevreuil (see p. 186), and a compote of apples.

  FILETS DE MOUTON EN CHEVREUIL (fillets of mutton to taste like venison)

  Ask the butcher for 8 small fillets or noisettes of mutton, insert small pieces of bacon into each and marinade (see gigot de mouton en chevreuil) for 3 days. To cook them, put them in a casserole with butter. When they are cooked, serve with a sauce poivrade or any highly seasoned sauce.

  SAUCE POIVRADE

  Add to the butter in which the fillets have cooked a good pinch of ground black pepper, a small glass of wine vinegar and 2 shallots shredded; reduce this by rapid boiling, and add 2 tablespoons of meat glaze or, failing that, of brown stock, and half a glass of red wine and reduce again.

  Beef

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  ‘Any of us would kill a cow rather than not have beef.’

  Dr Johnson

  STIPHÁDO (a Greek ragoût)

  Cut 2 lb of steak into large pieces. Brown them in oil with 3 lb of small onions and several cloves of garlic. Into the same pan put ½ pint of thick and highly seasoned tomato purée and a glass of red wine. Simmer slowly for 4 or 5 hours, until the meat is very tender and the sauce is reduced almost to the consistency of jam.

  BOEUF À L’ITALIENNE

  Lard a 3 lb or 4 lb piece of beef with cloves of garlic. Season with salt and pepper, rub with thyme and rosemary and tie up with pieces of fat bacon. Braise in its own fat in a deep braising pan or earthenware dish. Add 2 sliced onions, about ¾ pint of tomato purée, either freshly made, or from 2 tablespoons of concentrated tomato paste thinned with water or stock, 4 whole carrots, 2 whole turnips, a large piece of orange peel, a piece of lemon peel and a glass of Burgundy. Cover the pan and simmer very slowly indeed for about 8 hours. (The dish can be left in the oven all night at Regulo 1 or 2.)

  The sauce will have the consistency almost of jam, the meat should be so soft it will fall apart at a touch, and the orange and lemon peel should have dissolved entirely into the sauce.

  To serve, cut the carrots and turnips into big strips, sprinkle with fresh parsley and chopped lemon peel and reheat slowly.

  To serve cold remove all fat from the sauce, reheat and then leave to cool again.

  BOEUF EN DAUBE À LA NIÇOISE

  3 lb round of beef, 3 cloves of garlic, ½ lb salt streaky pork or un-smoked fat bacon, ½ lb carrots, ½ lb stoned black olives, 3 tomatoes, herbs. For the marinade: ¼ pint of red wine, a coffeecupful of olive oil, a small piece of celery, a carrot, 4 shallots, an onion, 2 cloves of garlic, peppercorns, herbs, salt.

  Heat the oil in a small pan, put in the sliced onion, shallots, celery, and carrot. Let them simmer a minute or two, add the red wine, peppercorns, garlic, and fresh or dried herbs (bay leaf, thyme, marjoram, or rosemary), and a stalk or two of parsley. Season with a little salt, and simmer the marinade gently for 15–20 minutes. Let it cool before pouring over the meat, which should be left to marinate for at least 12 hours, and should be turned over once or twice.

  In an earthenware or other fireproof casserole, into which it will just about fit, put the meat. Arrange the carrots round it, put in fresh herbs and the garlic, put the bacon in one piece on top, and pour over the strained marinade. Cover the pot with greaseproof paper and the lid, and cook in a slow oven (Regulo 3) for 2½ hours. At this stage add the stoned olives and the skinned and chopped tomatoes. Cook another half-hour, and before serving cut the pork or bacon into squares and the meat into good thick slices.

  This dish has a really beautiful southern smell and appearance. Serve with it boiled haricot or flageolet beans, or pasta, or the aïgroissade toulonnaise (p. 131), and a red Rhône wine.

  PEBRONATA DE BOEUF (a Corsican ragoût)

  About 2 lb of a cheap cut of beef (top rump, or thick flank, or shin) is cut into dice and browned in olive oil. Add white wine, all kinds of herbs and seasonings, and simmer very slowly.

  When it is nearly cooked add the following pebronata sauce: a thick tomato purée to which you have added pimentos, onions, garlic, thyme, parsley, pounded juniper berries, and red wine. For the detailed recipe, see p. 190.

  FILET DE BOEUF FLAMBÉ À L’AVIGNONNAISE

  A small thick fillet for each person, a slice of bread for each fillet, butter, brandy, coarsely ground black pepper, garlic, salt.

  Rub the fillets over with garlic and roll them in salt and the black pepper. Put a little butter into a thick pan, make it very hot and put in the fillets and let them sizzle until the outsides are very brown. Add a little more butter, and as soon as it has melted drench the steaks in brandy, set it alight and cook another half-minute after the flames have died down.

  In the meantime have ready the slices of bread fried in butter. Slip each one under a fillet, and serve immediately with the sauce poured over. The whole process takes about 3 minutes.

  CULOTTE DE BOEUF AU FOUR

  Cover a 2 lb piece of topside beef with thick pieces of fat bacon, season with salt and herbs and put in a casserole with a glass of white wine. Cover hermetically, seal the lid with flour and water paste and cook in the oven 4 or 5 hours. Serve with the sauce.

  FILET DE BOEUF À L’AMIRAL

  Slice 5 or 6 onions and fry them in dripping; take them out of the pan and add to them 4 or 5 fillets of anchovies chopped, 2 tablespoons of chopped bacon, pepper, thyme, marjoram, parsley, and 2 yolks of eggs.

  Cut a fillet of beef into slices, but not right through, and between each slice put some of the prepared stuffing. Tie the fillet up, put it in a covered pan with dripping, and bake it slowly in the oven.

  Pork

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  ‘Cochon. – C’est le roi des animaux immondes; c’est celui dont l’empire est le plus universel, et les qualités les moins contestées: sans lui point de lard, et par conséquent, point de cuisine, sans lui, point de jambons, point de saucissons, point d’andouilles, point de boudins noirs, et par conséquent point de charcutiers. – Ingrats médecins!
vous condamnez le cochon; il est, sous le rapport des indigestions, l’un des plus beaux fleurons de votre couronne. – La cochonnaille est beaucoup meillcure à Lyon et à Troyes que partout ailleurs. – Les cuisses et les épaules de cochon ont fait la fortune de deux villes, Mayence et Bayonne. Tout est bon en lui. – Par quel oubli coupable a-t-on pu faire de son nom une injure grossière!’

  Calendrier Gastronomique

  by Grimod de la Reynière

  RÔTI DE PORC À LA PURÉE DE POMMES

  In France a loin or leg of pork is usually sold by the butcher with the rind and some of the fat removed (the French do not set such store by the crackling as we do in England, and the rind is sold separately to enrich stews and soups). This method makes the pork less fat, and also easier to cook. A clove or two of garlic is stuck into the meat, it is seasoned with herbs (marjoram, thyme, or rosemary), and roasted in a rather slow oven. Serve it with a very creamy purée of potatoes, to which should be added, before serving, some of the juice and fat from the roast.

  PORK CHOPS MARINATED AND GRILLED

  Strew plenty of fresh herbs, such as fennel, parsley, and marjoram or thyme, chopped with a little garlic, over the pork chops. Season with salt and ground black pepper, and pour over them a little olive oil and lemon juice. Leave them to marinate in this mixture for an hour or two. Grill them and serve with a green salad upon which, instead of dressing, you pour the juices and herbs which have fallen from the meat into the grilling pan.

  FILET DE PORC AUX POIS NOUVEAUX

  For this dish you need a fillet of pork from a young and tender animal. Braise it in a covered pan in bacon fat with onions and a bouquet garni. When it is almost ready, take it out and cut it in slices. Put between each slice a layer of a purée made of fresh green peas which have been cooked with onions and a lettuce heart. Reshape the piece of meat and cover with a well-seasoned béchamel. When ready to serve put a beaten white of egg over the whole and sprinkle with breadcrumbs. Place in the oven until it has risen like a soufflé and is golden brown. (Translated from Plats Nouveaux, by Paul Reboux.)

  FILET DE PORC EN SANGLIER (pork to taste like wild boar)

  3½ lb fillet or boned leg of pork. Soak it for 8 days in a marinade of wine vinegar (this is an old recipe from the days when tastes were robust and the powerful taste of a vinegar marinade was liked. Nowadays a marinade of wine, red or white, plus a tablespoon or two of wine vinegar is more suitable) seasoned with salt, pepper, coriander seeds, juniper berries, 2 cloves of garlic, a branch of thyme, a bay leaf, cloves, a branch of basil, a branch of sage, mint, and parsley. Turn the meat each day. Take it out and wipe it. Put it in a very hot oven for the first 15 minutes and leave it to cook 2 hours in a moderate oven. Serve it in a dish surrounded by a purée of chestnuts and accompanied by a sauce chasseur.

  SAUCE CHASSEUR

  Reduce the marinade to one-third of its original quantity. Make a brown roux with 2 oz of butter, 2 oz of flour, and a glass of stock. Add the marinade and finally the gravy from the roast and if possible 2 soupspoons of fresh cream. Serve very hot.

  Kid

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  The meat of young kid is much appreciated all over the Mediterranean, especially in the more primitive parts such as Corsica and the Greek islands. It is hard to say why there is such a prejudice against this animal in England, and it is only the gastronomically ignorant who, the moment they go abroad, suppose that whatever meat they are eating is disguised horse or goat. The textures of these meats are quite unlike those of veal, beef, or mutton, and there is besides no call for a French or Italian cook to pretend that he is serving mutton when it is in fact goat.

  In the same way, foreigners in the Middle East are often heard to complain that they are being served with camel instead of beef. If they had ever eaten camel meat they would soon know the difference.

  Young kid is at its best when roasted on a spit over a wood fire, and is also cooked en ragoût with red wine, tomatoes, and garlic, or threaded on skewers as for the Greek kebabs, and grilled.

  A Corsican way of cooking kid is to stuff a shoulder with a mixture of chopped veal and pork, the liver of the kid and spinach, bound with yolk of egg. The shoulder is roasted and served with polenta di castagne, a purée of chestnut flour. This chestnut flour is used in all kinds of ways in Corsica, for cakes pancakes, soups, fritters, and sauces.

  Boar

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  Strictly speaking of course boar counts as game, but as it is rare in England I have included it in the meat section, hoping that the recipe might be tried, as Mr Norman Douglas suggests, with a saddle of mutton, with venison perhaps, or even with a leg of pork.

  SADDLE OF BOAR

  ‘Trim a saddle of boar and give it a good shape; salt and pepper it, and steep it for 12 to 14 hours in one litre of dry white wine, together with the following seasoning:

  100 grammes chopped onions

  100 grammes chopped carrots

  2 heads of garlic

  1 head of celery cut in slices

  1 bay leaf

  2 cloves

  10 grammes black pepper

  a pinch of parsley and thyme.

  ‘The saddle should be turned at frequent intervals to absorb the ingredients.

  ‘Now braise it in a stewpan over a slow fire together with the above vegetable seasoning, adding 100 grammes of butter. Baste the saddle with the liquor in which it was lying, and, when this is at an end, with jus de viande. The operation should take about two hours, according to the size of the saddle. Then remove from the fire and strain through a sieve the liquor in which it was lying.

  ‘The following hot and thick sauce must meanwhile be held in readiness:

  ‘Put 30 grammes of sugar into a saucepan and melt brown over the fire; then add a claret-glass of wine-vinegar and bring to the boil. Now add the above strained liquor, together with 25 grammes of roasted pine nuts, 20 grammes each of dried raisins, candied citron peel cut into small squares, and currants (the latter having previously been soaked in water), and 100 grammes of best powdered chocolate. Stir well over the fire. If not sufficiently thick, a little potato flour should be added.

  ‘Serve both as hot as may be. The saddle must be cut in slices immediately, and the sauce poured over the whole. A single nonassertive vegetable, such as purée of chestnuts or lentils – not mashed potatoes: they have no cachet – should be served with this, and a rough red wine will be found to marry well with the rather cloying sauce.

  ‘ “Not a dish for every day,” someone may remark. Assuredly not. The longer one lives, the more one realizes that nothing is a dish for every day. And if anybody will take the trouble to dress a saddle of mutton in the same manner, he will be pleasantly surprised at the result. But I fear we shall go on roasting the beast to the end of time.’*

  For the benefit of the adventurous who attempt Mr Norman Douglas’s splendid recipe, his measures can be translated approximately as follows:

  1¾ pints wine, 3 oz each chopped onion and carrots, 1/3 oz black pepper, 3 oz butter, 1 oz sugar, just under 1 oz roasted pine nuts, 2/3 oz each raisins, candied citron peel, and currants, 3 oz chocolate.

  Substantial Dishes

  A Portuguese Supper Party

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  ‘The play ended, we hastened back to the palace, and traversing a number of dark vestibules and guard-chambers (all of a snore with jaded equeries) were almost blinded with a blaze of light from the room in which supper was served up. There we found in addition to all the Marialvas, the old marquis only excepted, the Camareira-mor, and five or six other hags of supreme quality, feeding like cormorants upon a variety of high-coloured and high-seasoned dishes. I suppose the keen air from the Tagus, which blows right into the palace-windows, operates as a powerful whet, for I never beheld eaters or eateresses, no, not even our old aquaintance Madame la Presidente at Paris, lay about them with greater intrepidity. To be sure
, it was a splendid repast, quite a banquet. We had manjar branco and manjar real, and among other good things a certain preparation of rice and chicken which suited me exactly, and no wonder, for this excellent mess had been just tossed up by Donna Isabel de Castro with her own illustrious hands, in a nice little kitchen adjoining the queen’s apartment, in which all the utensils are of solid silver.’

  The Travel-Diaries of William Beckford of Fonthill

  edited by Guy Chapman

  RISOTTO WITH MUSHROOMS

  This is a very simple form of risotto and, needless to say, all sorts of things can be added – slices of chicken, sautéd chicken livers, beef marrow. It should also be noted that risotto is made with Italian rice, which is a round, absorbent variety; no other will serve the purpose so well, the long Patna type of rice being wasted on this dish, for it is not sufficiently absorbent and makes your risotto tough and brittle, whereas a poor quality or small-grained rice will turn into a pudding.

  Take 2 cups of Italian rice, 2 pints of chicken stock, 1 medium onion chopped fine, 2 cloves of garlic, 1 wineglass of oil, ¼ lb of white mushrooms cut into slices. Into a heavy sauté pan put the oil and as soon as it is warm put in the onion, the garlic and the mushrooms. As soon as the onion begins to brown, add the rice and stir until it takes on a transparent look. This is the moment to start adding the stock, which should be kept just on the boil by the side of the fire. Pour in about 2 cups at a time, and go on stirring, and adding stock each time it has been absorbed. The whole process is done over a low flame, and in about 45 to 50 minutes, the risotto should be ready. It should be creamy, homogeneous, but on no account reduced to porridge. One must be able to taste each grain of rice although it is not separated as in a pilaff. Grated Parmesan cheese is served with it, and sometimes stirred in before bringing the risotto to the table. In any case a risotto must be eaten immediately it is ready, and cannot be kept warm in the oven, steamed over a pan of boiling water, or otherwise kept waiting.