The other day I walked into my pantry – I have nice, big walk-in type – and glanced around at the bulging shelves. What to fix? I was looking for something else, but my eyes landed on this box mix for panna cotta that I bought many months ago.

I don’t know about you, but I’m a sucker for any jars and bottles of things, like pickled onions, relishes, chutneys, toppings for cheese, or fruit. Even occasionally a sauce. But this was a box, and even those who don’t know me well, will perhaps recognize early on that I rarely use a box mix for anything.

Panna cotta happens to be one of my favorite desserts. It’s relatively easy to make, but when I read the ingredients in this little Canadian Dr. Oetker panna cotta box mix, there wasn’t really anything suspicious in it. And it looked like it took no time at all to make. Even less time than the real thing, and it didn’t have to bake or cook except for heating milk and water.

Sure enough, it was absolutely cinchy easy. It took less than 10 minutes to make the entire thing. You heat up a cup of milk to a simmer, remove from the heat, and stir in the contents of one of the little packages in the box. Once whisked in, you add a cup of heavy cream and whisk some more. Pour into serving bowls and cool, then chill. Meanwhile, the other package contains a nice raspberry sauce. This dry mix is combined with a half a cup of boiling water, and it’s done too.

I didn’t have time to chill the pannas for 2 hours, as suggested, so I put them in a pan surrounded by ice cubes and they were well enough chilled to serve (I did it in the little bowls instead of turning them out onto a serving plate) in about 45 minutes. I was amazed. They were delicious. I may need to have one of these boxes on hand for those occasions when I need a dessert – quick like. I bought it at Cost Plus World Market for $2.49. Probably last year. It’s Dr. Oetker brand. I’d recommend it, believe it or not!

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Needing to clean out my freezer in preparation for receiving a quarter of a 4-H pig in a month, I’ve been working diligently to discard old stuff that I’ll never use and cook up things that have been hiding in corners. I had this nice 2-pound boneless pork loin roast, but what to do with it? I turned to my newest favorite grilling book: The Barbecue Bible by Steven Raichlen. Sure enough, he had several pork loin recipes. This one fit the bill since it didn’t require me to run to the grocery store. All I needed was garlic (yup), rosemary (yup, out of the garden, in abundance), salt, pepper and olive oil. How cinchy is that?

Ideally you’ll want to marinate this roast for a few hours with the herb-garlic mixture all over it, but I didn’t have the time. I’d forgotten to defrost the roast until about noon the other day, so soaked it in cold water (all sealed up) for several hours. Some parts of the middle were still a bit on the frosty side, so I opened up the roast (which is a procedure in the recipe anyway) and let it sit at room temp for about 20 minutes.

photo, from Raichlen’s The Barbecue Bible, showing how to butterfly a pork tenderloin. I used the same technique for a pork roast.

The recipe indicates using a mortar for grinding up the herb mixture, but I had frozen little cubes of garlic to use (pureed) and it took no time at all to mince the fresh rosemary. I just minced and minced and minced with my long santoku knife, then mashed in the garlic, salt, pepper, and finally the oil. It took no time at all to make. I’m including a photo of a page in the cookbook about butterflying the meat. The meat I had was from Costco, and it was already rolled. I opened it up (it was already butterflied), but then you cut shorter pockets in each side (in the fat side of the loins) – not all the way through, and leaving ½ inch at each end. So it’s a kind of slot. To stuff the herbs into. You slather half of the mixture on the inside edges, reform the roast, tie it up (I used those nifty reusable baking rubber bands), then slather the remaining herbs on the outside.

We decided to rotisserie the roast. My DH warmed the grill to high, and between us we positioned the rotisserie prongs in the meat and started it up. You can also do this over indirect heat on the grill itself (positioning a drip pan under the grill, however). It took about 70 minutes for our roast to reach 160 degrees F. We removed it, let it rest for about 5 minutes while I quick-like arranged the artichoke half I’d just pressure-cooked, and a nice green salad. I had meat from the inside of the roast – it was delicious – absolutely mouth-filling with the garlic and rosemary. Loved it. DH had a slice from the outside, and he thought it was a bit overdone. Next time I’d remove the roast at 155 degrees F. and let it sit. And I’d push the pocket to almost the end, so only the very outside slice would be without some of the herb mixture in it. I might also make a sauce to serve with this – a pan sauce would be easy enough to do. Maybe just chicken broth, rosemary and garlic, perhaps some chopped up dried apricots. Boiled and thickened, then with some added butter just at the end. Just a thought. I’ll be making this again, in any case.
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So, there was a blurb by John Willoughby in June’s issue of Gourmet that almost missed my radar. Here’s the blurb quoted from the magazine:

Myth: Searing meat at the beginning of cooking helps seal in the juices.

Facts: Despite its impressive heritage (Escoffier himself espoused the concept), this well-known axiom is completely false. In his book The Curious Cook, food scientist Harold McGee explains how he cooked a series of identical steaks with and without initial searing, then measured the moisture loss from each. The results were clear – the seared steaks actually lost a bit MORE juice during cooking. There is, however, a very good reason to give meat a nice, hard sear when it first goes into the pan. Thanks to a chemical process called the Maillard reaction, it creates literally hundreds of new flavor compounds that give the meat a much deeper and more complex flavor.

 Thank goodness for that last sentence; otherwise we’d be eating gray meat from hereon in. But, they missed one other ascetic – meat just plain LOOKS better when it’s been marked or seared, don’t you think? Photo above is our favorite grilled beef: Ribeye Steaks with Amazing Glaze.

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In preparing a dinner for guests the other evening I wanted something bright green on the plate. Regular broccoli didn’t sound right. Zucchini would have worked, but I wanted something brighter. Lots of other veggies flitted through my mind, but none seemed just right until I thought about broccoli rabe. Seems like it’s only been the last 5 years or so we can even FIND broccoli rabe (rapini) in our regular markets. Sure enough, found some easily enough. I always thought broccoli rabe was just young broccoli, but according to wikipedia, it’s its own genus, more related to a turnip than broccoli. Mine sure looked more like broccoli, so I wonder if our stores are selling young broccoli or broccolini and just calling it rabe (or raab, or rapini). Mine didn’t look anything like the photograph at that site (theirs is mostly leaf; mine was mostly stem).

In my rush to get dinner on the table, though, I forgot one step. I followed the recipe just fine from step two on. I just forgot to blanch the rabe beforehand, so it was a tad bit on the crunchy side. Still good, but the stems were a bit firm for my taste and everyone else’s, for that matter. But I like the preparation – garlic, red pepper flakes, some chicken broth and pancetta. I didn’t use the pancetta because it would have been superfluous with the Zinfandel Sausage Sauce with pasta I’d made. Hopefully next time I’ll remember to blanch it first! I definitely liked the sauce on the rabe and it was quite easy to make once you start.
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It was several years ago that Joanne Weir was making regular circuits of cooking schools. That’s when I first discovered what a kick-in-the-pants she is. I think she’s just about my favorite cooking instructor. As she teaches, she maintains a lively monologue about the different dishes, and about everything else under the sun. She teaches week-long classes in Italy, France and Spain too. Oh, if only our dollar and the euro were a bit more aligned I’d be on a plane to attend one of those European cooking vacations. She also has a PBS cooking show, but none of her spark shows through on it, in case you’ve watched it.  Joanne also teaches classes in her home in San Francisco (for a very small group) which sounds like fun too. But it’s also not a bargain. Alas. I’ll just have to stick to reading her cookbooks, of which I own many.

This recipe was one she served at a class some years ago. It’s from her book, Weir Cooking in the City. At this evening class, she whipped it up first thing so we could have some little something in our tummies while she prepared all the other dishes. I really liked it a lot. It’s spicy (from the cayenne), spreads nicely (as long as you let it the cheese or the finished dip sit out at room temp for half an hour before serving) and attractive (with olives or Italian parsley sprinkled on top). I’ve made it at least half a dozen times. You do need to like Feta cheese, however, and in this case she recommends buying barrel-aged Feta (sheep’s milk) if you can find it. Our local grocery carries it, and I’ve also purchased it at Whole Foods. But if all you can find is regular Feta, use it. It’s served with hot pita bread (not toasted, just hot), so you need to eat it immediately; otherwise the pita is cold. Not all bad that way either, but the bread is supposed to be served hot. This dip is EASY – takes less than 5 minutes to prepare once you have the ingredients out.
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