Pasta with Burst Tomatoes

So it's fall. And that's great. That's really great. But it being fall means saying goodbye to summer, and, with that, to many wonderful foods. I love little tomatoes. Cherries, grapes, mini heirlooms, whatever. You can still get them in the winter, but the ones in the summer are better on every level. So, normally,  I treat them as a summer-only food.

I wanted one last gasp of summer cooking, so when I went shopping a couple days ago I bought a box of little tomatoes, and then I burst them. The results were simple and delicious.

Ingredients

• a couple glugs of olive oil
• 3 large cloves garlic, sliced
• 1/2 tsp dried basil
• 1/4 tsp dried oregano
• a handful of fresh basil, if you've got it
• 1/2 lb small tomatoes
• 1/2 lb pasta
• salt and pepper to taste
• grated parmesan, romano, asiago, or any other cheese you like for serving

Procedure:

• Cook pasta according to package directions. Make sure to save a bit of cooking water. While it's going:
• Heat a glug of olive oil over medium heat. Add the garlic and dried basil and oregano and cook, stirring, for a few minutes, until it starts to soften.
• Add in the chopped basil, another small glug of oil, and tomatoes and turn the heat up a bit. Let the tomatoes cook for 5-8 minutes, stirring  until they start to crinkle and burst at the seams. 



Into the Pan



2 minutes in



5 minutes in


• Drain the pasta if you've not already done so and stir about a half cup of the cooking liquid into the tomatoes, letting the tomatoes begin to absorb it.
• Mix the pasta into the tomatoes and give it a minute to all come together. 
• Season with salt and pepper, and pass the cheese please!
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Pasta with Summer

Yes, I will claim that the dish I'm about to post here is the quintessential summer spaghetti dish. I adore my pesto, and I enjoy many other summer pastas, but for a true summer pasta you gotta embrace the tomato, and it's gotta be quick.

So, I started with this (because it was just for me--if you're cooking for a crowd, double/triple/octuple appropriately):

A handful of chopped fresh tomatoes (mini-heirlooms from Trader Joe's in this case--if you've got fresh, use them!!), a handful of chopped basil from the garden, and a thinly sliced clove of garlic from the CSA. 

If I'd chopped the garlic smaller, I honestly could have had this sauce raw, but I like to cook just a little bit to mellow out the garlic, and my grandma has a habit of refrigerating tomatoes, which meant that cooking them could give them more flavor. Still, a light touch is important.

Put water up to boil and cook your pasta--I chose about 1/4 lb of straight up spaghetti (which made dinner and lunch-- 2 bowls like the size of the one pictured below), but feel free to use whatever shape you like, and adjust amounts accordingly. 

While your pasta's cooking (and do wait until the water's boiled and the pasta's in it, because you really don't need much time for this), throw a glug of olive oil into a small frying pan over medium-low heat. For me, a glug is about a TBS. Swish it around a bit and then add your garlic. You want it slowly sizzling so that it will cook but not burn. Toss in a couple strips of basil as well, to season the oil. 

When the garlic is getting really nicely aromatic, about 5 minutes into cooking, toss in your basil and tomatoes and cook just for a couple of minutes, stirring so everything blends. Season with salt and pepper, and perhaps a bit more oil if things start to stick. When the tomatoes are slightly softened, pull the sauce from the heat.

Drain the pasta and mix with the sauce. At this point, I threw in a bit of crumbled feta, but that's definitely optional. 

Sprinkle with parmesan, drizzle with oil, and smell the summer. 

Pizza!

Pizza's a big deal for me. I eat Papa John's and Pizza Hut on occasion, it's true, but in general I am indeed a pizza snob. The crust has to be appropriately thin, the toppings fresh, the cheese plentiful but not overwhelming. My go-to crust comes from the NYT and can be found here. The good news about the NYT recipe is that it makes a crust like no other-- very easy to stretch into shape and wonderfully crisp and golden once cooked. The bad news is that it requires a 24 hour+ rising period. So, when I'm planning on pizza, I go for that recipe. When I'm not, I hunt for another. I have yet to find my perfect "in-a-pinch" pizza dough. Yesterday, I decided to give Jamie Oliver's a try. Jamie's awesome, but the man loves his meat, so when I encounter a recipe of his that doesn't require flesh, I tend to jump on it.

My grandma absolutely loved the crust; she called it rich. I wasn't a huge fan. The dough tasted a bit sweet and was breadier than I like my pizza to be. It's not bad, but it's not fantastic either. The reason I'm blogging this pizza isn't so much for the crust as for the toppings, which I definitely intend to replicate on future pizzas. The crust recipe is here; I found halving it to be enough for 2 medium/largeish pies

For toppings, I went in two directions, opting for one traditional pizza with tomatoes, cheese, and veggies; and another with a white sauce, caramelized onions, and arugula. The traditional pizza doesn't require much prep work at all; the white pizza, due to the caramelized onions, needs to be thought up at least an hour before baking.

Also, sorry I don't have a lot of prep pictures. We were having company, and it was kinda awkward to play with the iPhone while chatting with guests. :)


Ingredients (Traditional)
-a sprinkling of salt and olive oil
-2 cloves of garlic, minced
-about 6 oz diced tomatoes, preferably fresh but canned will work too
-a handful of fresh basil leaves, torn
-8 oz of sliced mushrooms, sauteed in a little butter with a few torn basil leaves and a minced clove of garlic
-several sun-dried tomatoes, julienned or minced.
-7 oz of grated mozzarella
-1 oz feta cheese, crumbled
-black pepper to taste


Procedure
1) Pre-heat the oven as hot as it'll go. For me, that's 500°F. If your oven gets hotter, all the more power to you. If you're fortunate enough to have a pizza stone, make sure it's in the oven on the lowest shelf, so it can get nice and hot. If not, grease a baking sheet and stick it on the middle rack. Your pizza will be good--just not as good. On that note, I highly recommend investing in a stone. Even the cheapest ones (I think mine was $25 or so) make a big difference in quality, and they can be used to bake bread as well.
2) I find (clean) hands to be the best way to prep the pizza. Roll out half of the dough (if using Jamie's recipe) to a 1/4 inch circle, or whatever size necessary to fit your pizza stone or baking tray. Use your fingers to pinch the edges all around the dough, creating a ridged side the better to keep the toppings/sauce in place. Put the entire crust on top of a piece of parchment paper, unless of course you have a pizza peel. The parchment paper will ease the process of getting the dough in and out of the hot oven.
3) Start with the olive oil, sprinkling a bit on the dough and using your hand to rub it around. Add more oil if you can't get a little sheen all the way to the edges. Sprinkle on a dash of salt, followed by the minced garlic, the basil, and the tomatoes, trying to get even coverage.
4) Spread a thin layer of mozzarella over the dough, then add the mushrooms, sun-dried tomatoes, feta, and the rest of the mozzarella. Grind black pepper over the top.
5) Bake for about 10 minutes. The best way I've found to get the pizza into the oven is to put the pizza, on top of the parchment paper, onto a large cutting board, pulling the rack with the pizza stone or baking tray as far out of the oven as you can, and carefully tugging the paper onto the stone/sheet. Of course, you want to do this as quickly as possible to preserve the heat, but don't touch the stone or the oven or do anything else that will burn your hands! The crust will grow golden and the cheeses will bubble and perhaps even start to brown in spots.
6) Remove from the oven, let cool for just a moment, slice, and serve.

Ingredients (White)
-White Sauce:
      -1 TB butter
      -1 TB flour
      -1/2 cup milk (I used skim--use whatever you have)
      -2 cloves minced garlic
      -dashes of salt, pepper, and marjoram
-1 tsp lemon juice
-1 large onion, sliced thinly
-8 oz grated mozzarella
-1/4 cup parmesan cheese
-1 cup baby arugula, tossed in 1 tsp balsamic vinegar


Procedure (White)
1) Prep the caramelized onions. Essentially, you're allowing them to cook slowly enough to really release and celebrate the sugars inside. Take as wide-bottomed a pan or pot as you have and coat with about a TBS of olive oil or butter. When the oil shimmers, add your onions, stirring gently for a few moments, trying to get as many onions to retain surface contact with the bottom as possible. Allow the onions to cook on medium-low heat, stirring often enough to keep them from burning and seldom enough to let them brown. That turned out to be about every 5 minutes, on my stove. After the first 10 minutes, sprinkle the onions with a bit of salt and just the tiniest dash of sugar. The entire process should take at least 30 minutes and up to an hour. Just be patient, and when they look wonderfully brown, remove them from the heat.

Onions pre-caramelization

Onions 15 minutes into cooking

Caramelized Onions

2) Prep the sauce. Melt the butter in a small saucepan over medium heat and stir in the flour quickly, trying to avoid lumps. After a moment, pour in the milk, stirring well. Add a bit of salt and pepper and marjoram, along with the basil and garlic. Let the milk heat gently, stirring often. When it begins to bubble around the sides and thicken, cut the heat.
3) Prep the crust as described above.
4) Spoon the white sauce over the crust, spreading it evenly over the surface. Top with the onions and mozzarella, then sprinkle with black pepper.
5) Bake for about 9 minutes, then pull out of the oven, top with the arugula, and bake for one minute more before pulling out, letting cool very briefly, and serving.

Sometimes Simple is Just Best- Pasta with Eggplant and Marinara

I'm behind on my blogging. Very behind. I have several good excuses, however. I started a new job, I spent two weeks cramming like mad for the Foreign Service Test, and I celebrated two of the most important Jewish Holidays of the year. Still, that doesn't change the fact that I've not been blogging and that's rather unfortunate. I'm now back at it and intend to stay that way!

My favorite smells in the world are fresh basil and freshly ground coffee (not at the same time, of course). Coffee, luckily, is something I can smell all-year-round in the States, but basil is about to slip out of my life for some months. I already miss it.

Georgia changes seasons a little later than the northern parts of our beautiful country, so it's only in the last week or so that we've started to experience real fall. The recipe I'm posting today was a supper cooked right on the edge of summer, peaking over into autumn, but it's the sort of thing that's good any time and super easy to throw together. To be perfectly honest, this isn't even the sort of thing I'd typically use a recipe for. It's more of a formula that can be changed up as needed to accomodate different vegetables and the like.

Ingredients
-1 lb box pasta of choice (I prefer shapes to spaghetti-type noodles for this sort of chunkier sauce)
-2-3 TBS olive oil
-3-4 Japanese eggplant, ends trimmed, cut into strips (I prefer Japanese eggplant, but traditional round eggplant will also work)
-dried basil and oregano (for the eggplant)
-2-3 medium tomatoes
-1-2 small peppers (red are great if you have them, but whatever works for you)
-2-4 cloves of garlic, minced
-sprigs of fresh basil, leaves removed and cut or torn into smaller pieces
-1-2 cups of commercial tomato sauce or 1 can of diced or pureed tomatoes, undrained
-salt and pepper to taste
-parmesan cheese, to serve


Procedure
-Prepare the eggplant: preheat the oven to 450°F, brush some olive oil onto a baking sheet, and place the eggplant strips on top. Brush the strips with more olive oil and sprinkle with salt, pepper, dried basil, and dried oregano. Use a spatula to flip the strips around and try to get an even coat. Bake 15-20 minutes, until soft and slightly crispy. If the outsides are too pale for your liking, you can use the broiler for a few minutes at the end, but watch carefully so they don't burn!
-While the eggplant is baking, put up a pot of water to boil and prepare the pasta. 

-Chop the peppers and tomatoes into medium-sized chunks (large dice, perhaps)
-Heat a saucepan and swirl in about a tablespoon of olive oil, along with a bit of salt (kosher or other coarse is great, if you have it)
-Add the garlic and cook over medium-low heat, letting it slowly cook without browning. After a minute or two, add the peppers and cook together, then throw in the chopped tomatoes and basil. 


-Let simmer for a few minutes until the vegetables start to break down somewhat but the peppers retain a bit of crunch.
-Stir in the canned sauce or tomatoes. I almost always use tomatoes for this, but it so happened that when I made this a couple weeks ago we had half a can of tomato sauce that really needed using up. If you're using canned tomatoes, you'll likely want to add more salt and perhaps more oregano, and a little drizzle of balsamic or red wine vinegar is lovely.
-Leave to cook for another few minutes, until warm and bubbly. Season to taste.
-Mix the drained pasta with the eggplant and sauce and serve with grated cheese, and perhaps a fresh-baked loaf of sourdough.