Start now, enjoy later

This will start to be good about Christmas. It isn’t something you can whip up because unexpected company is arriving, you have to make it ahead and keep at it and after a couple of months it’s always ready to make dessert.

My enormous sealable jar became empty after a three year stint as a plum soaker. I bought a fifth of aged Cuban rum that is just too old and too rummy for my taste. I had a lunch party and lots of leftover fruits from it. It was magic. Everything pushed my pointy little head towards Rumtopf.

Since I took this photo I have added dried apricots. My peaches will be ripe in a few days and I will add lots of those. Through the autumn as fruits get rarer I will probably add more dried things, like those giant white grape raisins from Chile or currants and figs. The only things that should be added only outside the jar are citrus or other super juicy fruits.

It’s just fruit, brown sugar and rum. Every time you add fruit, add more brown sugar and rum, too. Don’t make it too sweet because you can always make it sweeter but it’s hard to make it less sweet.

I can serve this over plain cakes, panna cotta, custard, creamy cheeses, ice cream — who knows what else? I’ve already tasted it and it’s good!

Tilda and the preserving kitchen

I am not alone when I work to preserve the wonderful fruits of autumn.

Tilda Curious

Tilda What The?

Tilda and Plums

Let me assure you that once her curiosity had been photographed for her mum, she was removed and the plums were re-washed. Yes, I know wild animals are all over wild fruits until I get them inside, but I wash them off, too.

Wild plums this morning

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This is an experiment. These are three kinds of wild plums which I have pitted, covered in strong alcohol and then a long-cooked heavy syrup with spices. I don’t know what it will become over time, but here is a photo showing you how it all began.

I hadn’t planned to photograph it, but I became enraptured by the irregular glitter of the morning sun on the glass. It looks smooth until you see the way the light dances on it. It made me notice the forms and colors of the plums and go get the camera.

That’s a lot of pleasure from something Paola and I found on our Sunday morning walk and stuffed into our pockets!

Plums and figs

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plum fig geranium

Figs are finished until September brings a second crop, if we are lucky. That’s why I was in a rush to make some Caramelized Fig and Lemon Conserve. That’s the big jar in the middle of the chorus line. I serve it with variously aged or not Pecorino cheeses as either an antipasto or sometimes dessert at home. It’s a slightly bitter sophisticated taste and not at all what some expect if you call it fig jam. It ain’t.

You can make any amount that makes sense to you by just dividing or multiplying the quantities below, but considering the length of time it cooks, it probably doesn’t make sense unless you are making at least a pound or half kilo of figs, because it would otherwise use too much fuel. Or, you could freeze the figs now and make the conserve when your wood stove or your oven are on more often. Recipes and more photos after the jump.

Food thoughts: what are yours?

I just clicked on that revolving photo presentation in the margin a moment ago. I couldn’t figure out what I was looking at. It was a portion of spoonbread! I haven’t even thought of spoonbread since I posted that article and recipe. It was just delicious. Why haven’t I even thought of it?

What food occupies the top layer of the mind right now?

Tomatoes. I bought a book yesterday that is just different recipes using tomatoes. They are late this year, so they are just beginning to ripen and should stay with us until November, when we will take advantage of Puglia’s longer summer and buy from the Pugliese farmers every Saturday. I’ve already Post-It marked several pages to try, and have started wondering if any of the newly discovered regional dishes will make up readily for twenty.

Lamb. I still have half the lamb I bought this spring. I am pondering slow-cooking a leg in the fireplace for lunch in the garden. Or I could invite just one person and flash cook the rack.

Green beans, or fagionlini. I helped Amelia pick hers this morning right after I picked mine. Mine provided two fists full, hers a whole basin full. We discussed various recipes in which the bigger and more mature beans are good. Amelia went in to prepare Fagiolini alla Greca for lunch! I decided to make a puree one day and a sformato another day. Mine, who live under a walnut tree, are never going to provide that many, but this time of year you can pick anyone’s beans and they’ll thank you for it. If they are not completely stripped they stop making new beans.

Pickles. The cucumbers are really coming on and the dill is almost heading. If the plums don’t hurry up and riped, I may make some pickles from them, too. There are too many to just eat, even if you made plum cake everyday until they were over.

Suppers. When the heat recedes and you can take pleasure in making food just-so for happy people who are happy to eat what you make. Here below is a supper from a few weeks ago. What pleasant people they were! Think what size that table must be to hold fifteen and still have room for another fifteen. What a gorgeous villa that is, and what a terrific kitchen it has! If you ever need eight bedrooms, just ask.

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What makes you think of food, and what food are you thinking of this season?

The easiest cake you’ve never yet made

This is a recipe that came together so fast and was eaten so instantly I could almost forget I made it up. The very first version was everything I wanted or expected it to be. That’s something of a record for me in baking. My worst grade in high school was chemistry. This, however, is a success. Not too sweet, fluffy, not overly rich or fatty– in fact most of the weight is in fruit. It should serve six easily or eight with cheese or ice cream and any Italian would like it for breakfast, too.

I took it around to seven various neighbors and they all agree: this is really good. The fact that it is really easy and designed to be made by anyone with an oven, even if they have never made a cake before, is just garnish. It started with yellow plums I froze last summer when they were so good and so everywhere you hardly knew what to do. I made a bit of syrup for them, so they’d come out as nice as they went in. I usually don’t, but they do stay prettier if you do. I thawed them about half way so I could taste them and see what I had to work with. They were firm, tart and very juicy, all good characteristics to work with.

Shopping the fruits of Puglia

I have lived here for just short of seven years. For all those years I have shopped for vegetables and fruits in the street markets, on Thursday and Saturday, and the covered market everyday but Monday. Local stuff abounds in growing season, but although we’re warmer, we are at about the same latitude as Maine, which means the days shorten and things stop producing very well if at all.

I was kicking myself because for one reason or another, I’d missed a lot of the season’s produce. Tomatoes are just about over, even though we’re still far from frost. But a couple of weeks ago when there was a market displacement due to a feast for St. Bartolomeo, I found that the trucks that sell outside the walls are from Puglia. They may be bragging, but Puglia says they have a seven month summer. I dropped by today and goodness gracious, great balls of fire! What incredible produce!

I dragged home three different kinds of plums, a small sack of hot cherry peppers and three kilos of tomatoes. Everything is being washed now in preparation for various preserving techniques. I was also given a beautiful bunch of the most honey-like grapes I’ve ever tasted. I tried to buy them, but the boy shrugged me off with a smiling, “Enjoy.”

Just yesterday an old man at the parking in Pienza let me out without payment. Was it just the joking about why he wasn’t there when I drove in? Or am I becoming a cute little old lady who is given things as she moves through life? I’m really not sure what to wish for.

A non-dairy torta: fresh plums in a nut crust with a citrus honey glaze

One of this weekend’s clients is lactose intolerant, so the meal had to be dairy free, other than fully ripened cheeses. That’s not as simple as you might think. Italian desserts, for example, largely do have milk, cream, butter, mascarpone or ricotta in them.

I juggled some recipes to pull off this easy dessert that they all liked very much. It’s very toasted walnut in essence when it’s done.

The crust:

Preheat the oven to 180°C or 350°F

.5 cup lard (butter is the usual fat here, so feel free)
1/3 cup brown sugar, packed
1.25 cups of plain flour
1/4 teaspoon of salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup chopped walnuts– the last of the old crop and the new ones will be ready any day now.

Using a mixer, whip the lard and brown sugar together until well-blended. Add the flour, salt and baking soda and mix well. Stir in the nut meats.

In hindsight I will tell you to grease a pie or tart pan, because this crunchy crust fell apart when I cut and served it. Anyway, press the mixture with your hands into the greased pan, and put it into the oven for 15 to 20 minutes. It will look like a nut cookie.

Just before you want to serve it, make the honey glaze using:

.5 cup honey
the grated rind of one lemon
the juice of 1/2 lemon
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Put them all in a pan and bring to a simmer and allow to simmer for a few minutes. Keep an eye on it so it doesn’t catch on and burn. You may be able to cut the plums while it cooks, or you may need to take it off the heat before the plums are ready. I guess it depends how fast you are with a knife.

You need a little less than a pound of plums. Cut in half about eight Stanley prune plums, remove the stones and cut the plums into nice crescents, about 3 per half plum. Arrange the plum crescents in overlapping circles to completely cover the crust. Pour the hot honey glaze over everything. Serve with a little pitcher of heavy cream for the dairy tolerant.

Sorry, no photos, because once again, I get way too busy when I’m working. Photos happen at home when it’s only me to worry about, or willing victims.

Plum tart with goat cheese “Torta di Susine e Formaggio di Capra” (from cooking class)

This is a dessert that was adapted from a fig tart to use those slim, blue, frosted prune plums you find at the end of summer. You can make the pastry, which here is pasta brisé, or buy it at the grocery store or a bakery.

Pastry for a tart pan, fitted into the pan, trimmed to 3/4″ larger than the pan, then folded under and fluted.
soft goat cheese– not the ripened one with crust, but the fresh one you can spread. In Italy look in the fridge for “di Capra”
grated rind of 1 lemon
fresh blue prune plums about a pound, but who’s counting– eat the ones you have leftover
sugar
heavy cream

Preheat the oven to 180°C or 375°F.
Spread the goat cheese onto the bottom of the pastry you’ve arranged in the tart pan. It will be less than 1/4″ thick.
Sprinkle the grated lemon rind over the cheese layer.
Cut the plums in half, remove the stone, and place them in a pattern on the goat cheese, cut side down.
Sprinkle lightly with sugar.
Put it into the hot oven and cook for about 25 Minutes or until the plums have softened. Cool to just warm, and before cutting pour a little fresh cream over it so that it pools a bit around the plums. Serve with a little pitcher with more fresh cream.

This is great for weight gaining diets.