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Couscous Au Poulet, Boulette, Makoud, 2007 Hagafen Lodi Roussanne, 2004 Four Gates Chardonnay, N.V. Four Gates Pinot Noir, 2006 Four Gates Cabernet Franc, 2005 Herzog Special Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon/Zinfandel/Syrah

Sep 8

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Two weeks ago saw us huddled around our shabbos table enjoying some wonderful company, friends, family, food, and wine.  This past Friday Night we had my family and friends over for a classical Tunisian Friday Night dinner – Couscous Au Poulet and Boulette.  Many have had couscous, which is fine, but proper boulette(s) and fluffy couscous is what makes a couscous dish work.  Boulette is French for balls, which in this context mean meat balls.  But if you think Italian meatballs, again, you are missing the point.  My family makes boulette by frying the meatballs, and then topping them with slices of potato, obviously they are thank god all very healthy!  However, being that I care for my heart and arteries, and they work far better when not stuffed with cholesterol, I go with lean meat and braise them in a pan of tomato sauce and wine.  The meat sauce is a hit on the table often, though not true to the Couscous heritage.  But the main ingredient to meatball heaven (other than the meat), is the Quatre Epices!  WAIT!  If you are wondering what the heck is going on – yeah that is the last bit of French, I hope – 🙂 . Truly, there are few things that totally metamorphosize a dish like FRESH Four Spices!  What an explosion of flavor that is tempered by the sweet flavor of cinnamon.  There are those who use Four Spices that is based on Ginger – but that is not what we use!  The Four Spices we use is based on: Cinnamon, Nutmeg, Cloves, and Black Pepper, though the black pepper is not in equal proportions as the other three spices, but that is fine with me.

Meatballs Recipe:
2 pound of sliced onions
2 tbsp of olive oil
2 tbsp of sea salt
1 pound of finely diced onions
1 pound of finely diced zucchini
4 tbsp of Four Spices
3 pounds of meat
3 slices of thick bread soaked in rice milk
5 cans of 10oz tomato sauce (or 2 large cans of tomatoes)

Heat the wide and deep pan with olive oil, once the oil starts to shimmer, add the sliced onions and sprinkle them with salt (to help them release their water), and then sauté them until they brown nicely.  In the mean time mix the rest of the ingredients (except for the tomato sauce) until the meat moves well in your hands but can keep its form.  I find that the meat we order is rarely the same in terms of consistency.  So at times it is really thick, while other times it moves far better.  I can only guess it depends on how much fat, versus God knows what else, makes the meat more solid or more fluid.  This time, we added rice milk to the mixture to make it more fluid, as after the mixture was made, it was far too thick.  Roll the meat into balls that have a rough diameter of one and half inches to two inches.  Once the onions are browned, add the tomato sauce to the pan, along with some basil, and pepper.  Cook the sauce until it starts to reduce slightly.  Then drop in the rolled meatballs and simmer them for 1 hour.

Bouillon Au Poulet (Chicken soup) Recipe:
1 chicken cut up
Cubed Carrots
Cubed Onions
Cubed Parsnip
Cubed Turnip
Cubed Sweet Potato
Cubed Potato
Cubed Zucchini
Parsley
Tons of Garlic
Saffron
Bay leafs

This all depends on the size of your pot, and I always overdo the amount that I cook, which is fine with me, but too much leftovers, becomes a hassle!  So, keep the amount to a single large pot with a double boiler to cook the Couscous.  This part is important, the only way you will get the correct texture and flavor in your couscous, is to boil it over the Bouillon.  First drop the chicken into the pot and start browning the meat.  Next throw in the hard vegetables and let them get some of the chicken fat.  Once some of the chicken fat is rendered, mix the vegetables around and then remove the chicken for a bit.  Place the rest of the softer vegetables in, and then place the chicken and spices on top.  We do this to allow you access to the chicken for later on, when it is removed for making the Makoud.  Finally fill the pot till the top with water and you are good to go.  Boil the soup for an hour or two.  Be careful to not overcook the sweet potato or zucchini.  I normally pull them after an hour (or a bit less), and let them cool.  At that same time (about an hour in), I pull the chicken meat off and then return the carcass back to the soup to help it thicken the soup more. After the soup is fully cooked, we let the soup cool and throw it into the fridge for the next day.  I find the soup tastes much better after a few hours of chill on it.  Normally, I cook this Thursday night for Friday night dinner – the classic Tunisian meal for Friday Night.  The next day I will reheat the soup, and at that time I drop on the double boiler, wet the holes so that the couscous sticks to the pot, and then I pour in two boxes of dry couscous.  Now, on an aside, the folks who make couscous from scratch need to be praised, but I have no time to do that.  There is a GREAT video on how to make couscous from scratch.  I guess it is a touchy issue to the real Tunisian cooks, much like dry vs. fresh pasta is to a true Italian cook.  Now, once the double boiler it hot and MAKE SURE that there is a GOOD INCH at least between the boiling liquid and the bottom of the double boiler.  Remember, we want steamed couscous and NOT boiled couscous.  Another very important tip is that once you have poured in either the fresh or dry couscous in the double boiler make sure to create three holes in the couscous layer.  By doing this you will have three circles in the couscous layer and should be able to see the double boilers holes.  By making these holes into the couscous layer, you allow the soup steam to rise from out of the bottom pot and circulate inside the upper boiler.  Also, start the process by ladling a few ladles of broth from the bottom into the double boiler.  This will allow the top layer of couscous to not get dry off the bat.

Makoud Recipe:

This dish has been described by Ashkenazim as Potato Kugel!  AHAHHH!  What a shanda!  No way my friends, Makoud is NOT potato kugel.  It is more of a chicken potato Soufflé.  Like any good potato casserole, you MUST preheat the pan with the oil, so that the potatoes and mixture get crispy underneath and on top (from the oven heat).  Further, do NOT overcook the makoud!  In the beginning, I was like – what we do not need all of those eggs!  Wow was I wrong.  The eggs of course make it a soufflé instead of a kugel!

Canola Oil
Potatoes (from the chicken soup) – just add more to the soup for the second hour
Chicken from the soup, pulled and cubed
2 eggs per pound of chicken
Salt
White or Black Pepper
Cumin`
Basil

Place the oil in the casserole dish and preheat for 10 minutes at 350 degrees.  In the mean time mash the rest of the ingredients together, and place into preheated dish and then cook for 40 minutes or until crispy on top.  This is simple as can be, the most difficult part is stripping down the chicken when it is still boiling hot!

That makes up the Couscous menu.  There are two side dishes of sliced carrots (classic middle-eastern carrot salad) BUT without Cilantro (Cilantro is the work of the devil!), along with Marmouma (a pepper and tomato salad).

To pair with all of this lovely food, we chose a set of wines, as I wanted to taste a few of them and well, it was time to drink some of them already.  So enjoy the recipes and the wine notes follow below (in the order they were drunk):

2007 Hagafen Lodi Roussanne (15% of Marsanne) – Score: B+
This was not a winner on the table, but I kind of liked it.  It is deceptive in its nose and mouth.  Initially, you think it is bone dry from the nose.  Then you taste it and you think it is actually sweet, to only concentrate a bit more and realize that this wine is as dry as a Sancerre, but ripe with fresh fruit flavors, quite a ride.  The nose on this golden straw colored wine is popping with kiwi, melon, lemon, and dry green grass.  The mouth on this medium bodied wine is ripe with melon, kiwi, grapefruit, and lemon.  The mid palate quickly flows from the mouth in an almost shocking manner.  The fruit just ends and then there is an onslaught of bone dry green tea, flowers, and bright acidity.  The finish is long with summer fruit, slight bitterness, and toasty flavors.  The fruit attacks to start and is then annihilated by the bitterness and green flavors that come bright into the finish.  I think the finish is what turned off the crowd.  I can see this work with sweeter flavored foods, with something like maple glazed salmon, or veal.  Interesting wine indeed that exhibits characteristics that are not commonly seen in the other kosher white wines.  The closest that I have tasted recently, that compares to the Roussanne is this Chilean Chardonnay.  It may not as good as the Roussanne; but has many commonalities, the most striking one is its green dryness.

2004 Four Gates Chardonnay – Score: A
Well, after tasting that bone dry wine, any Kosher California Chardonnay will taste sweet!  Still, the 2004 vintage has a bit more residual vintage than do the 2005 or 2007 vintages.  This wine has not really changed much since our last tasting.  The oak is ever present, and the sweet tooth is receding, which gives rise to the acidity and the fresh fruit flavors that still abound.  Thank goodness I have a few more leftover.  I want to taste these soon side by side my 2005 and 2007 vintages that will be a real kick!

N.V. Four Gates Pinot Noir – Score: A-
This wine is still holding to our previous tastings, with the tannins receding further, which is allowing the dark cherry fruit to come through, while showing a bit more wood as well.

2006 Four Gates Cabernet Franc – Score: A-
What a treat, we have recently had this wine a few times, and the latest tasting is still true (which after a few weeks is almost obvious with this winery).  Of course we are not complaining.  Many thanks to Benyamin for bringing this wine to the dinner.

2005 Herzog Special Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon/Zinfandel/Syrah – Score: B – B+
What can I say; this is normally a wine that we love!  This vintage or bottle was not a winner.  Almost no one took more than a drop.  The wine was overly Zinny — tasting of rose and blackberry intertwined.  It may sound cool, but not great.  The wine was left open in the fridge for a couple of days and the Zin flavors (31%) finally gave way to the dominantly measured Cabernet (66%) and Syrah (3%).  At that point the American Oak and full body of the Cabernet were tempered by time and vanilla.  Still, the wine was way off balance and overall off putting.  I would recommend decanting this for a few hours in advance to give a chance for all the flavors to come out and play.

Posted in Food and drink, Kosher Red Wine, Kosher Rose Wine, Kosher White Wine, Wine

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Alfasi Malbec/Syrah Reserve and Parve Spaghetti Bolognese

Jun 12

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We have made Spaghetti Bolognese before, but this was a bit crazy, I must say.  You know when you mother used to tell you, no going out with friends on a school night?  Well, my friend Benyamin Cantz (from Four Gates Winery), had invited me to his house for a Sheva Berachot of friends of his.  Well, I should have remembered my mother, when I accepted the invite.  I had a grand time and when it was done, I was so tired (worked and cleaned up and God knows what else), that I barely could get up the next morning!  Worse, I had yet to cook the meal for Friday night.  So when I dragged myself in from work on Friday, I was pooped, and could almost not bring myself to whip up a nice Sabbath dinner.  Thank Goodness I woke up enough to make a nice affair – otherwise, I would have been kicking myself all Sabbath.

This recipe was meant to be a Pasta Puttanesca, but we had bought all these lovely vegetables from our local farmer’s market (zucchini, eggplant, etc.), and they do not last forever, and they do not fit in Puttanesca.  So, when we thought what we needed to create we came up with the Parve Spaghetti Bolognese.  The recipe is pretty simple:

Parve Spaghetti Bolognese Recipe
As many onions you have or like (you can never have enough onions)
16 ounces of sliced mushrooms
3 Japanese eggplants
3 colored (yellow, green, striped green) zucchini
4 cloves of garlic
2 tsp Thyme
2 tsp Basil
2 packages of fake ground/crumbled meat
28 ounces of good tomatoes
1 jar of Kalamata Olives
Half a bottle of good cooking wine

It not only looks easy, it is crazy easy to make.  Dice the onions and then sauté them until nice and brown.  Throw in the mushrooms and sauté them as well until you have nice brown onions and mushrooms.  At this point one could have thrown in some tomato paste to thicken the pot and food, but I passed on that, because I had little time.  Now throw in the diced zucchini and eggplant until they cook down.  Then throw in the herbs, garlic, and the rest of the ingredients, and cook down until the pasta sauce is at the consistency that you like.  I like my sauce a bit thicker, so I cooked it a bit longer than most would.

The food is thick and heavy and yummy, and I grabbed a bottle of wine that I was not initially so sure about.  But wow was I surprised, another great QPR (Quality to Price Ratio), though the score does not show it (as price is not part of wine scoring).

The wine note follows below:

2007 Alfasi Malbec – Syrah Reserve (50% Malbec/50% Syrah) – Score: B+
The nose on this ruby to garnet colored wine is hot out of the bottle, along with raisins, sweet oak, vanilla, roasted herbs, and nice heady and spicy aroma. The mouth on this medium to full bodied wine is busy with plum, raspberry, and cherry. The mid palate is where this nicely balanced and soft yet velvety wine comes to life with acid, integrated tannins, and a nice layer of dust. The finish is long with mounds of spice, coffee, white chocolate, and a dollop of vanilla. Quite a nice wine that really gets better with a couple of hours of air.

Posted in Food and drink, Kosher Red Wine, Wine

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Baked Gefilte Fish Loaf, Stuffed Vegetables, Château Malmaison Baronne Nadine, Recanati Cabernet Sauvignon, Gamla Cabernet Sauvignon

Apr 16

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We had our family over for the last part of Passover, and so we had a few dinners and lunches with guests and some alone, which were really nice.  Anyway, we served the baked fish, which is described here, along with our now famous stuffed vegetables.  This started a long time ago, when we had a group of people coming for a Passover meal, and we had no idea what to serve them.  We were sick of roast or brisket, and did not want chicken or fish.  We thought about the rudimentary meat loaf and such stuff.  But, that got us thinking about stuffed vegetables that my sister once served us.  They were crazy good, but man they sounded like a ton of work.  So, unfazed by the potential madness that faced us, we pushed on unfazed, and found out that the work is just maddening.  So here is the rough sketch of the recipe, but you can find out for yourself if it is worth the effort.

Meat Stuffed Vegetables Recipe
5 or more really large onions cored
3 large eggplant scooped until just the skin and a bit of flesh is left
3 large sweet yellow or red peppers
2 large green peppers
1 large can of tomato sauce
2 tbsp of olive oil
2 pounds of ground meat
3 tbsp Parsley
5 cloves of garlic – chopped
2 tbsp of sugar (or until it does not taste bitter)

Core the onions, which are crazy hard, with a large and strong spoon.  Cut the top of the onion off, and then with a large spoon start digging into the onion from the top.  Keep digging until you start to peel the onion from the inside out.  Do not worry if you cut all the way through the bottom of the onion, I do that all the time, but I put a small thin sliver in the bottom to cover the hole, and it bingo – it is like nothing happened.  Once you are done with the onions, move on to the eggplant by slicing them length wise, and coring them until there is just a drop of flesh and the skin left.  Do not puncture this one – it is far more difficult to remedy!  Drop the cored remnants and whole eggplants into a bucket of cold water to slow down their oxidation, which causes them to turn brown.  Then core the sweet peppers by cutting the tops off and removing the ribs.  Leave the peppers whole.  Now take a deep roasting pan and place 1 inch of water at the bottom of the pan.  Place the peppers and onions standing up in bottom of the roasting pan, along with eggplant lying skin down.  As a heads up, the eggplant dos not cook too well, unless you spray the eggplant ahead of time with some olive oil.

OK, so now you have a bunch of vegetable remnants, which should be in separate buckets.  So we now move on to cooking the meat and vegetable mixture that will be going into the vegetables to bake.  Start off by taking all the remnants and chopping them up finely.  Start off by placing 2 tablespoons of oil into a large Dutch oven and heating the oil until it shimmers. Next place the chopped onions into the Dutch oven and sauté the onions until golden brown.  Once golden, add the rest of the chopped remnants and sauté them until nice and soft.  Now add the chopped meat into the pot and cook the meat until it is browned.  Now add in the tomato sauce and spices and simmer for 20 minutes.  Now place the cooked mixture into the cored vegetables and put the roasting pan into a 350 degree oven for one hour.

With served an assortment of wines with the cooked vegetables.  The wine notes follow below:

2002 Château Malmaison Baronne Nadine – Score: B
The nose on this garnet colored wine has blackberry, cassis, mounds of dirt, mineral, and graphite.  The mouth on this soft but terroir harsh wine is really packed with earth, black fruit and oak.  The wine is simple enough, but still gets your attention with mounds of earth that melds with acidity and oak.  The finish is long and spicy along with more dark fruit.  It should have been a better wine, but the wine was out of balance and too aggressive in its mineral notes.

2006 Recanati Cabernet Sauvignon – Score: B+
The nose on this purple colored wine with brown halos is hot out of the bottle, but calms down with oak, cranberry, dark plum, and roasted herbs.  The mouth of this medium bodied wine follows the nose with cranberry and plum.  The mid palate is packed with acid, spice, oak, and nice tantalizing tannins. The finish is long and spicy with more fruit and herbs.

2004 Gamla Cabernet Sauvignon – Score: B+
The nose on this garnet colored wine is classically Cabernet with dark cassis, blackberry, oak, and anise.  The mouth on this medium to full bodied wine follows the nose with black fruit and a semi complex mixture of spice, oak, and integrating tannins.  The finish is long with more cassis, spicy wood, and chocolate.

Posted in Food and drink, Kosher Red Wine, Wine

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Baked Gefilte Fish Loaf, Sweet and Sour Brisket, Roasted Root Vegetables, Castello di Cesare Bianco Lazio Toscana, Chateau Graveyron-Carrere Bordeaux, Galil Cabernet, Borgo Reale Chianti Classico, Kadesh Barnea Gilad, Tierra Salvaje Chardonnay

Apr 9

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The first night of Passover found us with friends and we had the usual four cups of wine ritual, that makes Passover a wonderful precursor for Alcoholics Anonymous Meetings 🙂  The wines are listed below in the order that they were drunk, also we had quite a few folks, so please do not think I actually need to attend some AA meetings.

Once the first two cups were drunk we started in on the Matzoh (we only use shemurah matzoh), Maror (our custom is to use endives, because they are so easy to clean), and then the meal.  Mind you I am really happy with how the meal came out.  We started with hard boiled eggs with salt water poured over it.  There are many people who are starting to make this simple dish Haute Cuisine, but that is so broken.  The reason for the boiled egg is to remind us of the temple’s destruction and how we used to have a Passover Sacrifice, which is oxymoronic.

The meal started with a new dish for us and a major hit on the table – Baked Gefilte Fish Loaf.  A friend of ours was kind enough to share the recipe, and I hope she does not mind me sharing it with all of you.  It is crazy simple to boot!

Herb Encrusted baked Fish Loaf Recipe
1 loaf of Gefilte Fish
1 onion slices into thin rings
3-4 tsp of a mixture of any Italian Herbs you want (we used Oregano, Parsley, Thyme, and Savory)
2 tbsp of oil
Garlic Powder, Paprika, and Black Pepper

Mix the spices and oil in a bowl and drop the sliced onions into the herb mixture and mix around to coat the onions well.  Next drop the loaf into a baking pan and coat it with the garlic, paprika, and pepper.  Then drop the onions on top and cook covered for 30 minutes in a 350 degree oven.  Then flip the loaf, remove cover and bake until the pan is dry and onions are crispy.

We made three loafs at a time, by simply tripling the recipe and using a large baking pan.  The fish was a hit as were the onions.  The thing that was awesome was that the fish was permeated with a really cool herb and garlic flavor, not just flavored on top – really cool.  We of course served it cold with a nice cold eggplant salad.  We make our own, but it is available in small plastic containers at the supermarket as well.

The fish and eggplant went well with the Castello di Cesare and the Tierra Salvaje Chardonnay.  After the fish appetizer, we moved on to the main course of Sweet and Sour Brisket and roasted root vegetables.  I have described it a few times before, but put simply I braise a whole brisket and ONLY a whole brisket.  I have no idea how anyone can braise any other version of a brisket, really.  Without the top layer of fat to keep the meat moist, it would turn into shoe leather, which I have been forced to eat from time to time.

My World Famous Whole Brisket Recipe
10 white onions sliced thinly and browned in batches
1 10 or more pound whole brisket
1 can of whole berry cranberry
1 cup of ketchup
20 or more garlic cloves
1 bottle of a nice Cabernet or full bodied Merlot

So Anyway, place the browned onions in the bottom of a large roasting pan.  Then take a whole brisket and rub it with garlic powder, black pepper, and tons of paprika on both sides.  Next take the cloves and puncture the top of the meat (fat side up) and place a clove in each whole – make sure to NOT puncture the meat all the way through.  Finally, place the meat fat side up into the roasting pan, and pour the cranberry and ketchup mixture on the meat and then pour the bottle over the mixture.  The liquid should NOT cover more than half of the meat – if it does stop and add no more liquid of any kind.  I need to stress this, as the meat exudes tons of liquid and the fat melts on top of that.  Anymore and you will have a mess and worse a boiled chunk of meat, which is NOT what is meant by braising meat.  Finally roast the meat for 4 or so hours.  After it finishes cooking, let it cool over night and then slice it the next day and rebraise before serving for at least another two hours.

The roasted vegetables were pretty simple; toss whatever vegetables you want to roast in a deep pan with oil, garlic, paprika, and cumin.  Roast until just puncture soft by a fork.

The wine notes follow below:

2001 Four Gates Merlot M.S.C. – Score: A
The color of this wine is a beautiful deep garnet. The nose on this wine has strong aromas of blackberry, dark plum, cranberry, eucalyptus, and oak. The mouth on this full bodied wine is layered and complex. The mouth is full with blackberry, plum, and raspberry and then layers in mint. The mid palate adds core acidity, eucalyptus and lovely integrated tannins. The finish is long and satisfying with black fruit, chocolate, and vanilla. A wonderful wine – it is at its peak if not a bit over the other side – drink up!!

2005 Kadesh Barnea Gilad (Undisclosed mixture of Merlot/Petit Verdot/Syrah) – Score: B+
The nose on this garnet-brown colored classic Cote’ de Rhone wine blend, is heavy in earth, cranberry, cassis, and oak.  The mouth on this balanced medium to full bodied wine follows the nose with cranberry, cassis, and earth.  The mid palate is jammy with red fruit, acidity, and nice oak.  The finish is smooth, balanced, and long with red fruit and oak.  The clear winner of the night, and just as good as when I tasted it in NY.

2002 Chateau Graveyron-Carrere Bordeaux – Score: B
The nose on this ruby/light garnet colored wine was the best part of this wine, with pencil shavings, blackberry, mineral, and oak.  The mouth on this astringent medium bodied wine was unbalanced and really not there.  The fruit was there, but overpowered by the mineral and musty French flavors.  The mid palate had a nice acid core, but the finish was what threw the wine into a tizzy.  It needed a ton of air, and even after all that, it was the least appreciated bottle of the night.

2007 Galil Mountain Winery Cabernet – Score: B
The nose on this dark ruby colored wine was also the best feature of this wine, it had lovely notes of blackberry, raspberry, and spice.  The mouth on this medium bodies wine was also off and astringent.  It may have been the bottle, or the fact that it was shipped to me recently.  I will be taste wine again in the future and will repost.  The fruit did show, but was overpowered by the acidity and astringency.

2007 Castello di Cesare Bianco Lazio Toscana – Score: B
The nose on this straw colored wine is super crisp with citrus, apple, peach, and lychee.  The mouth on this light bodied wine is extra dry, with citrus and green flavors.  The mouth is not as crisp and sharp as the nose is and is a letdown, almost flat.  The mid palate is citrus with a nice but not so long finish.  A bit brighter and fresher than what we tasted in NY.

2008 Tierra Salvaje Chardonnay Estate Bottled – Score: B+
This wine is controversial to say the least.  Many people on the table hated it while I really liked it.  This is not a democracy; it is more like a benevolent dictatorship.  Still, it is important to tell readers that many hated this wine, and that it may not ring true with you.  So on to the notes:

The nose on this brilliant golden colored wine with green halos is almost sweet with clear vegetal leanings, bright acidity, spice, green apples, pear, and lychee.  The mouth on this medium bodied wine is not sweet at all; rather it is almost bone dry, which is funny given its sweet nose.  The mouth is semi rich with green apples, flowers, and dry tea flavors.  The mid palate is acidic and dry.  The finish is medium long with more apples and nice acidity.  This is not a big or complex wine, but a nice dry change of pace and a quite nice quaffing wine, especially given its dirt cheap price.

2007 Borgo Reale Chianti Classico Vespertino – Score: B+
I must start by stating that this wine needs air like Frankenstein needs a new marketing agent!  It was the second worst bottle of the night, but I truly felt all it needed was air.  Sure enough 24 HOURS later, it was really yummy and tasty.  The wine had opened and now the ruby colored wine has a nose filled with cherry, raspberry, and cranberry, along with a nice dollop of chocolate.  The mouth of this medium bodied wine follows the nose with more of the same fruit, in a soft mouth that you feel throughout.   The mid palate is still bright with acidity, and the finish is long with more bright fruit and chocolate.  A really nice showing, it just needs a TON of air or time.

Posted in Food and drink, Kosher Red Wine, Kosher White Wine, Wine

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Puttanesca and the Correct Pasta

Feb 20

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Well this past weekend I was pooped out of wine, after tasting so many wines on Wednesday.  However, I had a great desire to make some fun food.  So my friend Benyamin explained to me his version of Puttanesca, which is pretty much in-line with this recipe.  However, like all recipes I am not interested in standing pat, and more, I wanted to add in some fake ground meat.  So I followed the recipe, but when it called for the sauce, I added the fake ground meat, browned it for a bit, and then added in the sauce and an hour late it was done.  I must stress that using any olives other than Kalamata olives is a waste of time and money.

I hope this helps people try this recipe.  I must stress that the capers and anchovies are a base and should not be increased in volume.  Also, please do not shy away from it just because it has anchovies and/or capers.  They are barely noticeable and they add this thickness and weight to the flavor profile, but the olives dominate the palate.

We enjoyed the dish with a nice whole wheat spaghetti.  Normally, a Puttanesca would NEVER work spaghetti, but because we modified the recipe to become a far thicker and heftier sauce with the fake meat, it worked quite nicely.

Now depending on if you want to modify the recipe and/or make it thicker, you will have to make a choice of the correct pasta, to serve with the Puttanesca.  People commonly think that pasta is pasta – man that cannot be further from the truth.  First you need to look at how thirsty of a pasta you want – a web site like this.  There is a reason why there are SO many boxes of shapes on the supermarket shelves.  The more surface space a pasta has, the more liquid it can soak up.  Equally important is the thickness or density of the pasta itself. If the sauce or meal is more delicate than pair it with a delicate pasta.  If the sauce is thick and heavy, better to pair it with a pasta with more volume.  Pasta, sauce, and wine all meld together to reach a true nirvana or something less than that.

Enjoy that pasta!

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