After my little trip to Portland, I came back very inspired, with lots of recipe ideas. I think I fell in love with the city, its beautiful trails and restaurant scene, not to mention the gorgeous neighborhoods with magnificent trees and greenery. Portland truly has great quality produce and what a wonderful city if you care for great organic and fresh food and the outdoors. It’s heaven. At least, I hope heaven will be like that.

After a delightful lunch at Tasty n Alder, downtown Portland, where I ordered a salade niçoise and smoked trout board, it gave me the idea to play around with the salad, its content and texture.

The traditional salade niçoise (from the city of Nice in France) has similar ingredients, except for the bitter greens which I added here. I grilled some radicchio and endive, and made my egg “à la coque” as we say (in the shell) instead of hard boiled egg. I did not add red peppers because I used a vinegar with infused red peppers. The potatoes are broiled in the oven and the salad is a mix of shredded endives and radicchio with anchovies and capers. This salad can be served lukewarm, or cold. I like it lukewarm when I am not in the mood for a salad.

You need top ingredients to truly appreciate this salad. Get the best tomatoes, green beans and olive oil.

There are different steps in this recipe, but well worth it. If you are in hurry, I would not recommend this, but if you have some time ahead and in the mood for a wholesome and delicious meal, try it out.

Ingredients for 2

• 100 g (or two handful) thin green beans
• 4 small red potatoes, cut in halves
• 3 small endives, cut lengthwise
• 1 head of radicchio, cut in small quarters
• 8 small farm tomatoes
• 1/2 red tuna steak
• 1 tsp red and black sesame seeds
• 4 anchovies, chopped
• 1 tsp capers, chopped
• 1 tbs olive oil

For the vinaigrette

•  1 tbs kalamata olives, chopped
• 3 tbs olive oil (raw and unrefined)
• 1 tbs red pepper vinegar (or any other mild vinegar)
• 1 garlic clove, crushed
• 1 tsp chives, chopped
• salt and pepper

Preparation

Cook green beans in a pot of salted boiling water.

Season potatoes with olive oil, salt and pepper and broil in the oven until golden brown on both sides.

Heat up a skillet and grill radicchio and endive on both sides. Keep warm.

In small pan, place eggs and count three minutes after the water started boiling. Remove from stove and cut the top of the egg.

Coat tuna with white and black sesame seeds. Heat up a grill pan or skillet and grill on both sides, making sure not to over cook it. The middle needs to remain a little pink (or up to your tastes). Adjust with salt and pepper. Cut in 5mm slices.

In a mixing container, combine shredded endive and radicchio and add anchovies, capers, olive oil, salt and pepper. Toss well.

In a large plate, place one egg in the center of the plate. Arrange some shredded salad around. Place nicely all other ingredients around the plate. Drizzle with vinaigrette.

For the vinaigrette

Combine all ingredients together.

Pardon my ignorance, I thought the soft crabs were a particular kind of specie…They’re apparently not. When I found out that they’re basically regular crabs that molted their hard shell, I felt a little bad to eat them. Poor little crab without his house…but I already bought them, so I had no other option that cook them…so the little homeless crab had to end up in my plate. I found a very useful site explaining how to clean them on ChefsLine.

Radicchio has two of my favorite features, colorful and bitter, which combined with fennel makes a very harmonious combination. The sweetness of the grilled fennel stands out beautifully, and complement the slight acidity of the cream of chick peas due to lemon juice and capers. So what about the crab?? I have been talking about everything except about our naked crab..and this recipe is not about fennel, nor radicchio BUT only about the crab!

This crab is such a treat, every bite is meaty and delicate, it is baked so not as crunchy as you would get it it was fried, but definitely healthier. So delicious! the topping makes it flavorful with a little sesame note and blends to perfection with the chick pea cream.

Ingredients for 4

• 8 soft shell crabs
• 6 tbs breadcrumbs
• 2 tbs olive oil
• 3 tbs almond meal
• 1 tbs sesame seeds
• 2 garlic cloves
• 1 tbs parsley, chopped
• salt and pepper
  

For the cream of chick peas and capers

• 1/2 lb cooked chick peas
• 4 tbs plain yogurt
• 1 tbs garlic, crushed
• juice of one lemon
• 1 tbs capers, chopped
• cayenne pepper
• salt and pepper

For the fennel-radicchio salad

• 2 fennel bulbs, thinly sliced
• 1 radicchio head, sliced in 1 inches slices
• 1 tbs olive oil
• balsamic vinegar
• salt and pepper

Preparation

For the salad

Grill radicchio and fennel on a grill pan, then place on a large bowl, add other ingredients and set aside.

For the crab

In a mixing bowl, mix all ingredients together except for the crab (of course). Top each crab with the breadcrumb/almond mixture, drizzle each crab with a little olive oil, and back in the oven at 400F until the top is golden brown and the crab is cooked.

For the cream of chick peas

Mix all ingredients except capers and yogurt in a blender. Remove from blender and add capers and yogurt. Mix well and set aside.

Serve with some warm salad in the middle of the plate, two soft shell crabs on top and spoon cream of chick pea on the side.

Radicchio al forno is a typical Northern Italian dish. I somehow added a little touch to it, by adding artichokes and topping it all with breadcrumbs, garlic and parsley. Artichokes and radicchio go perfectly well together, the sweetness of the artichoke blends beautifully with the bitterness of radicchio, and you get a wonderful side dish, or if you’re like me, just forget the “side” it’s just a dish in itself since I can eat the whole plate.

There are many different types of radicchio, the round and red one like this one is called radicchio di Chioggia which is mainly grown all year around. My parents would grow the green kind with long leaves that was really bitter much bitter than this one, and my mom made it with anchovies and garlic as a salad and even as a young child, I loved it. The bitter, the better. No wonder why I love Fernet, Cynar and anything that has a bitter taste.

Our neighbor when I was growing up was from Udine (Friuli region), Giovanni drove a Vespa and was speaking so so loud that we would wake up the whole neighborhood with his loud voice and Vespa honks, everyone called him “petrolette” because of his “honk honk”. Such a funny and sweet character with a huge heart and a terrible French. His French was terrible, and his Italian too, since he spoke mainly Friulan dialect, so even my parents had a tough time understanding him. Every Sunday, he would bring us so many bags of radicchio from his garden. Friulans eat an incredible amount of radicchio, it’s hard to keep up with them unless you’re a rabbit!

He moved back to Friuli with his wife when he retired, he must be around 80 now and anytime we go visit him, radicchio is always on the table twice a day and seven days a week. Let’s not forget the white polenta sliced and eaten along salame e radicchio!

Ingredients for 3-4

• 1 large head of radicchio, cut in thick slices
• 1 lb artichokes (baby ones or medium)
• 1/3 cup white wine
• 2 garlic cloves
• 1 tbs parsley, finely chopped
• 1/3 cup plain breadcrumbs
• 1 lemon
• 3 tbs olive oil
• salt and pepper

Preparation

First start trimming the artichokes. Remove the tough green leaves, the with a knife, trim to top of the leaves and cut the green part around the bottom, close to the stem. You can either slice them if you are using the medium ones, or cut them in half if using the baby ones. Place in a bowl of water with the juice of one lemon, which will prevent the artichokes from discoloring.

Cut radicchio in half, then in slices of about 1 inch think.

In a pan, heat olive oil, crush one garlic clove and let the flavors out. Drain artichokes and add to the pan, stir for a few minutes, then add wine. Add salt and pepper and cover with a lid. Cook at medium heat until the wine has evaporated and the artichokes are cooked all the way through.

Add salt, pepper to the radicchio slices, and drizzle with olive oil. Grill in a grill pan, until radicchio changes color and is cooked but not mushy.

Add radicchio to artichokes pan and mix well.

In a small container, prepare the topping. Mix breadcrumbs, garlic, parsley, olive oil, salt and pepper.

Place radicchio/artichokes mixture in a oven dish and top with breadcrumb mixture. Cook in a pre-heated oven at 375F for about 20 minutes or until the top is golden brown.

]]> http://citronetvanille.com/blog/2009/12/two-friends-in-a-pan-radicchio-and-artichoke-casserole/feed/ 6 http://citronetvanille.com/blog/2009/11/bitter-and-sweet-scallops-with-mandarin-sauce-on-saute-radicchio/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=bitter-and-sweet-scallops-with-mandarin-sauce-on-saute-radicchio http://citronetvanille.com/blog/2009/11/bitter-and-sweet-scallops-with-mandarin-sauce-on-saute-radicchio/#comments Thu, 26 Nov 2009 06:03:02 +0000 silvia http://www.citronetvanille.com/blog/?p=5473 Amer et sucré – St Jacques à la mandarine sur lit de Trévise

One day before thanksgiving and I am so not in the mood for turkey, but fish, seafood, and more seafood. I think my guests would be disappointed, if I serve them a seafood dinner.

Thanksgiving dinner will be a non-American Thanksgiving with a white fish terrine, turkey with porcini, truffles, and cognac stuffing, chestnuts, chanterelles, and a bunch of nontraditional vegetables such as cauliflower purée, and potatoes boulangère, and to keep the tradition, a cheese plate with a green salad and ending with a pear and chocolate charlotte.

I was going to make a chocolate and pear tiramisù but then I realized that’s what I made last year, so let’s be a little more fun. I think there is still a little bit of Thanksgiving in there, don’t you think? I would make yams but the French don’t like yams nor cranberry sauce, so two ingredients that won’t be on the table…and no pumpkin pie either….

I’m sure there will be people thinking I am just ruining it, and that is so not a Thanksgiving dinner. I am sorry if I’m calling Thanksgiving something that should be called something different.

It’s been a while I did not make scallops, and those made my day…Scallops marry perfectly well with the the citrusy flavor of the mandarin. Radicchio brings a little bitterness to the dish and balances well the natural sweetness of scallop and mandarin. I love flaming with liquor, and Calvados is one of my favorite alcohol in cooking, since it’s made with apples and a you do get a very fruity flavor. It’s a quick dish to prepare when you feel like something on the fancy side but still that doesn’t take forever to prepare, that’s the one. I had to make my fish terrine and my chocolate charlotte so I didn’t have much time to play with anything else today.

Ingredients for 10 scallops

• 10 large scallops
• 10 mandarins
• 1 head of radicchio, cut in strips
• 1 garlic clove, crushed
• 1 shallot, finely chopped
• 1 tsp coriander seeds, crushed
• 1 tbs heavy cream or crème fraîche
• 1 tbs calvados (or any fruity liquor)
• 1 tsp olive oil
• salt and pepper

Preparation

In a pan, heat olive oil, add garlic, stir and add radicchio, adjust with salt and pepper. Cover and let it cook at medium temperature until radicchio is tender but not overcooked.

In a grill pan, grill scallops on both sides and keep warm.

Squeeze the juice of the mandarins and keep aside. Crush coriander seeds in a mortar.

In another pan, heat olive oil, add shallots and let them brown. Add coriander seeds, stir to get the flavors out, then add mandarin juice. Let it reduce for a few minutes. Add Calvados and flame. Add cream and let it reduce for less them one minute. Adjust with salt and pepper

Serve in individual small dishes. Place one tsp of radicchio in the middle of the plate, add one scallop on top and spoon some mandarin sauce on scallop. Decorate with chervil.

It looks like a crêpe, but is not one. It’s made out of chick pea flour and quite a popular little snack in the South of France. Actually there is an Italian version of it called “Farinata” or “Cecina”  (ceci = chick peas) and eaten in the bordering regions of Nice. I think Socca came originally from Italy and was spread out in the South of France. Chick pea flour is used a lot in Middle Eastern cuisine and probably was introduced to Southern Europe during Arabic invasions…

There are different versions of it, actually the traditional one has only chick pea flour, no egg, no milk and is cooked in the oven. I adjusted mine a little, I placed it in the oven after I stuffed it. The real socca Niçoise is served with just cracked pepper and has to be eaten very hot, or it tends to harden quickly. Street vendors do sell it and it’s mainly eaten on the spot. I somehow like its texture, it’s softer and a little thicker than a crepe but the chick pea flour gives a specific unusual flavor. My version is a little different from the traditional socca, I combined two flours and I stuffed it. You can serve this socca with a tomato concassée (concassée de tomates). Also, you can use spinach, chards, and other types of greens, but I like the rucola because of its peppery taste, it goes perfectly with chick pea sweet flavor.

Actually, I don’t know the South of France that well (been there twice), since we always went to Italy visit the family during Easter, Summer and Christmas. My parents never went anywhere else on vacation, only to their hometown in Italy and at some point, I really wanted to visit other cities, but that was not an option, so I am much more familiar with Italian cuisine, Marchiggiano style than traditional Southern French cuisine.

Besides anytime, my mom wanted to go home, she always used all kinds of excuses, nonno Bruno being sick, zio Tonino being depressed with some kind of unexplained disease, freshen up the house, etc…so whatever reason was good to take a trip to Isola di Fano (her village). Besides Nancy-Isola is only 9-10 hour drive, so not that big of a deal. You can hop on the car, cross Switzerland and get to Italy (mainly in Chiasso, the Italian Border) in about 5 hours.

The thing is with my dad, he hates stopping when he goes from point A to point B, so he would drive non-stop from Nancy to Isola (about 1000 km) and was not happy to let the girls out not even for the “pause pipi“  Peepee break?  and would tell us, not to think about it, as if you stop thinking you want to urinate, then everything is fine, the urge is gone. Yes, my father has always been a character…

Ingredients for 4-5 socca

For the socca

• 1/2 cup (a little more) Chick pea flour
• 1/2 cup white flour
• 1 egg
• 1/3 cup milk
• water (enough so that it forms a creamy batter)
• 1 tbs olive oil + 1 tbs for the pan
• salt
• coarse black pepper

For the filling

• 1/2 head of radicchio, chopped
• 1 bag rucola or 2 bunches
• 2 garlic cloves
• 3 tbs kalamata olives, chopped
• 3 tbs goat cheese
• 1 tbs olive + extra for drizzling
• salt and pepper

Preparation

Mix the two flours together. Add egg and gradually milk, water and olive oil. If the batter is too thick add water. Add salt and mix well to obtain a creamy and smooth consistency. Set aside.

In the meantime, prepare the greens. In a pan, heat olive oil chopped garlic. Let the flavor of the garlic come out without burning it, then add greens. Adjust with salt and pepper, and stir to wilt them (about 5 minutes), when cooked, set aside and keep warm.

Heat olive oil in a pan, add one small ladle of batter and proceed like you would for a crepe, spreading the batter all over the pan and evenly spread it. Cook and turn on the other side. Proceed the same way until all the batter has been used.

Fill half of the socca with some greens, goat cheese and olives, fold the other half on top and fold once more in a quarter, in order to have a little triangle. Place in a pre-heated oven at 380F for 5-7 minutes. Crack a good quantity of black pepper on top. You can serve this with a tomato concassée.

Orzo in the US, is that tiny pasta shape like a bird’s tongue, orzo in Italian means barley, so when I just arrived to the US, I got confused. Now since I am in the US, I will try to use american names so that people don’t get confused either. I have known orzo to be a cereal whole my life, in Italy they use it even as a drink, caffè d’orzo, it’s basically a powder like the instant coffee, you add hot water, dilute it and you get a cup of dark drink that somehow tastes like coffee and has no caffeine. It’s an alternative to coffee.

My mom used to make me soups with this pasta when I was a child and called it “bicca” meaning “seed” in her local dialect, they’re called Risoni in Italian (riso = rice, big rice grain).

Anyway going back to the other orzo, the pasta-orzo, in this dish I cooked it like risotto, coating it with olive oil, then adding broth and white wine gradually. You can also cook pasta this way. The water is absorbed gradually and pasta gets all the flavors of the stock.

I love this dish, it’s healthy, flavorful and very delicate and an alternative to risotto, if you want once in a while get some whole wheat grain in your diet and still be fully satisfied with your meal, this would be be perfect. I love risotto, a well-made risotto is heavenly but sometime I just want some whole wheat grains.

Ingredients for 2-3

• 1 cup whole wheat orzo
• 12 shrimps with shell and heads on
• 2/3 cups small sea scallops
• 1 shallot, chopped
• 1 carrot
• 1/2 onion
• 3 cloves
• celery stick
• 2 cups water
• 1/2 cup dry white wine
• 1 tbs fresh tarragon
• 12 mint leaves
• 6 large basil leaves
• 2 tbs parlsey
• 1 tbs fresh oregano
• 1/2 fennel, finely diced
• 1 cup shredded radicchio
• 1 tbs olive oil
• salt and pepper

Preparation

Start making the stock. Place 3 cups of water to a boil and add all the herbs, the fennel, the radicchio, let cook for 2 minutes. Remove from the water and drain. Chop the herbs finely and set aside.

Add carrot, celeri stick, stick cloves inside the onion, and add to the stock. Peel the shrimps, head and shell and add to the stock, reduce until you have about 2 cups of stock. Let it simmer for about 30-40 minutes, adding a little water if the water evaporates.

When the stock is ready, drain and keep the liquid.

In a pot, heat olive oil, add shallot and let it brown. Add risoni, coat them with olive like you would for a risotto. Add a little stock and wine, stir until the liquid has evaporated, and add continue stiring and adding stock and wine.

10 minutes before the orzo is almost cooked, add sea scallops and 9 shrimps cut in pieces, leave 3 or 4 for decoration. Stir well and cook until the seafood is cooked all the way through. Add the herbs, radicchio, fennel mixture. Stir well and let rest for about 5-7 minutes. Drizzle with olive oil and serve very hot.

It’s a nice and cute story of lentils and shrimps, but then many other ingredients got involved…and we have a nice and complex soup filled with vitamins and flavors. Not that it is necessarily soup season but I think that you have to eat whatever you feel like despite the season, ice cream in winter and soup in summer is perfectly fine.

It’s a light soup, brothy enhanced with pistachio pesto. I did not add parmesan to the pesto, I think its strong flavor can alter the shrimp flavor, most of the time I don’t really like to mix cheese and fish.

You don’t have to soak the lentils, they cook relatively quickly comparing to the other dry beans. Lentils are filled with iron, protein and fibers so don’t hesitate add them into your diet. I like to use French green lentils (lentilles du Puy), they tend to keep their shape and don’t get as mushy as the brown ones, besides they tend to have more flavor. In France, lentilles du Puy is the first vegetable that has AOC (appellation d’origine controllée) thanks to its specific nutritious values. You can check out the national site for Lentilles du Puy.

Ingredients for 4

For the soup

• 24 medium size uncooked shrimps, deveined
• 3/4 cups French green lentils (duPuy)
• 3/4 cups split peas
• 1 leek, chopped
• 2 carrots, chopped
• 1 yellow onion, chopped
• 2 celeri sticks, chopped
• 1/2 head of radicchio, chopped
• 1 bay leaf
• 2 cloves
• olive oil
• 4 cups vegetable broth
• salt and pepper

For the pistachio pesto

• 1/2 cup parsley
• 1/2 cup cilantro
• 2 tbs unsalted pistachios
• 1/2 tsp paprika
• 1 garlic clove
• 2 tbs olive oil
• salt and pepper

Preparation

Heat olive oil in a large pot, add onions and brown them. Add the rest of the chopped vegetables. Stir all vegetables, and let cook for about 10 minutes to blend all flavors. Add split peas and lentils, cloves and bay leaf, mix well and cover with broth. Add salt and pepper. Cover and cook at medium heat for about 30 minutes or until the lentils and peas are cooked.

For the pesto, mix all ingredients in a blender, and blend to a medium consistency.

Saute shrimps in 1 tsp olive oil, add salt and pepper.

Serve soup with shrimps in the middle and a tbs of pesto on top of the shrimps.