Posts Tagged With: Italy

Sausage and Lentil Soup

Posted on January 6, 2014 by pauldelancey

American Soup

SAUSAGE AND LENTIL SOUP

INGREDIENTSSausageLentilSoup-

1 pound Italian sausage
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 garlic cloves
3 medium onions
1 1/4 cups brown lentils
2 stalks celery
2 carrots
1 bay leaf
3/4 teaspoon thyme
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1/2 teaspoon Italian seasoning
64 ounces chicken broth
12 leaves spinach

makes 8 bowls

PREPARATION

Sauté sausages in olive oil in pan on medium heat for 10 minutes or until done. Remove sausages. Cut sausages into slices 1/4″ thick. Dice garlic cloves and onions. Add garlic and onion to pan. Sauté garlic and onion on medium-high heat for 5 minutes or until onion is tender. Devein celery. Dice celery, carrots, and spinach. Add all ingredient to large pot. Cover pot and simmer on warm-low heat for 2 hours.

TIDBITS

1) This recipe uses garlic. Garlic wards off vampires.

2) Italy uses a lot of garlic. It has hardly any vampire sightings worth mentioning.

3) Garlic never wards off sausages. Italy has a lot of sausages.

4) So, it could be argued it’s all those Italian sausages that keep vampires away.

5) I’ve looked at garlic and Italian sausage. Neither item looks particularly scary to me. But then again, I’m not a vampire. However, most vampires don’t fear tax auditors as much as we humans do. This is because they don’t have jobs. They just bite necks of teenagers who don’t have the wit to get out of a scary building.

6) The United States, Russia, and China don’t have vampires. It’s safe to say the armies of these mighty nations are well equipped with garlic and Italian sausages.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

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Lime-Chili Popcorn

Posted on December 3, 2013 by pauldelancey

American Appetizer

LIME-CHILI POPCORN

INGREDIENTSLimeChiliPopcorn-

1/4 cup popcorn
2 tablespoons lime juice
1 teaspoon chili powder

SPECIAL UTENSIL

air popcorn popper

PREPARATION

Put popcorn in popper. Put bowl underneath popper’s opening. Keep bowl in place until all the kernels have popped. Sprinkle lime juice and chili powder into bowl with popcorn. Stir with long spoon or fork.

TIDBITS

1) There is moisture in each kernel. This liquid turns to steam as the popcorn heats up. Water cannot escape the kernel shell. Pressure builds up until the kernel explodes.

2) Popcorn dating from 3000 B.C. has been found in New Mexican caves. People were happy.

3) The first permanent income tax for the United States was established in 1913. Americans became cranky. We fought a bloody war in Germany from 1917 to 1918. We greatly expanded our navy.

4) Charles Manley developed the first good electric popcorn popper in 1925 and sold it to theaters. Americans became happy again. Our economy boomed. It was the Golden Age of Comedy.

5) The Great Depression struck in 1929. Harrowing economic hardships resulted in fascist dictatorships in Germany, Italy, and Spain. America kept its democratic form of government.

6) Why? Popcorn. Popcorn was one of the few treats millions of Americans could afford to eat while watching their beloved movies.

7) The recent and relatively peaceful break up of the Soviet Union occurred because of the easy accessibility of popcorn in contrast to its popcornless Revolution of 1917.

8) The Wampanoag tribe brought popcorn to the colonists for that famous autumnal feast in Plymouth, Massachusetts. The grateful settlers called the meal, “Thanksgiving.” We are still grateful.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

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Caprese

Posted on September 18, 2013 by pauldelancey

Italian Entree

CAPRESE

INGREDIENTSCaprese-

1 pound mozzarella cheese
4 vine-ripened tomatoes
1/4 teaspoon peppercorns (or black pepper)
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1/3 cup fresh basil
1/4 teaspoon sea salt

PREPARATION

There aren’t many ingredients in this dish, so fresh ingredients are especially important. Slice mozzarella into 1/4″ slabs. Slice tomatoes 1/4″ thick. Grind peppercorns. Put alternating layers of mozzarella and tomato slices on serving plate until they are all used. Drizzle olive oil over everything and evenly sprinkle your creation with basil, pepper, and salt.

TIDBITS

1) The ancient Greeks and Romans believed basil was the devil’s herb. Put basil leaves in an urn and presto chango, basil becomes scorpions.

2) Basil helps to ease gas pains and nausea. The ancient Romans and Greeks had trouble farting as they refused to add basil to their cuisine. This bloating made them crabby, made them want to make war, made them want to destroy their tooting neighbors. Indeed, most of the wars of conquest through the centuries have been waged by basil-hating cultures.

3) Basil’s strong flavor rebuffs garden pests. It even repels insects wanting to attack neighboring plants. What a nice herb! Don’t you wish you had neighbors like basil?

4) Haitians believe basil protects their country. Indeed, basil was the first country in the French colonial empire to gain independence. However as Haiti has suffered extensive domestic turmoil since then, there seems to be a limit to its magical properties.

5) William Gaines, the founder of Mad Magazine, once flew to Haiti to get the nation’s one subscriber to order issues for another year.

6) Basil works wonders in Italy as well, where it is a token of love in Italy. Italians love basil. They have a reputation for being great lovers. Coincidence? Who can say?

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

 

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Lavender Lemon Chicken

Posted on July 28, 2013 by pauldelancey

French Entree

LAVENDER LEMON CHICKEN

INGREDIENTSLavLemChicken-

4 chicken breasts
1/2 tablespoon thyme
2 teaspoons lavender
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
2 garlic cloves
2 tablespoons lemon juice
zest from 1 lemon
1/4 cup chicken stock
1/2 cup white wine
5 teaspoons honey

PREPARATION

Crush lavender with rolling pin. Mince garlic cloves. Add lavender, garlic, honey, thyme, lemon juice, lemon zest, salt, pepper, white wine, and chicken stock to large mixing bowl. Mix with fork until well blended. Add chicken breasts to mixing bowl. Coat chicken thoroughly with mixture in bowl. Marinate chicken for at least 30 minutes.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Put chicken and marinade in roasting pan. Roast chicken at 400 degrees for 40-to-50 minutes or until chicken has an internal temperature of 165 degrees or until juices from chicken, pierced by a fork, are clear. Turn chicken breasts over halfway through.

Transfer chicken breasts to large serving bowl. Pour juice from roasting pan over chicken. Serve and enjoy.

TIDBITS

1) People in the Middle ages believe lemon juice dissolved fish bones. That is why they served a lemon slice with a fish entree; the slice would get rid of any accidentally swallowed fish bones.

2) Tidbit 1) shows us why the Middle Ages were also know as the Dark Ages. A fish bone might get stuck in a diner’s throat, the place where the bone could do the most harm. But how would a lemon slice help clear the tracheal passage? I would think the lemon slice would prevent breathing much more than a small fish bone.

3) Indeed in 1355, Antonio Pesto, of Pavia, Italy, thought the same way. In his horribly misspelled work, Pescatus Lemonatus Librecum Keteris Pareebus, experiments show how lemon juice will absolutely not dissolve a fish bone in time to prevent choking. Indeed, a lemon slice caught in the throat will cause many more deaths by asphyxiation.
4) Mortality rates plunged in plague ravage Europe after Pesto’s findings became widely disseminated.

5) Indeed, many modern scholars believe that 35% to 63% of all deaths attributed to the horrific Black Death plague of 1347 to 1352 were actually caused by lemon slices stuck in throats.

6) Lemonade was invented in 1378 as a way of letting people savor the taste of lemon without the danger of its slices. Life has gotten better for humanity ever since.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

 

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Bajan Macaroni Pie From Barbados

Posted on June 4, 2013 by pauldelancey

Barbadian Entree

BAJAN MACARONI PIE

INGREDIENTSBajanMacaroni-

1 pound macaroni
2 onions
2 tablespoons butter
1 tablespoon banana ketchup
1 tablespoon mayonnaise
1 cup milk
1 tablespoon yellow mustard
3/4 cup grated cheddar cheese (1/4 cup more later)
2 tablespoons Bajan seasoning
2 teaspoons paprika
1/2 tablespoon parsley
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1 egg
1/4 cup grated cheddar cheese

SPECIAL UTENSIL

colander
8″ casserole dish

PREPARATION

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Boil water in large pot on high heat. Put macaroni in pot. Boil macaroni for about 12 minutes or until tender Drain macaroni in colander.

While macaroni is boiling, dice onions. Put butter and onions in now empty pot. Sauté at medium-high heat for 5 minutes or until onions are tender. Add banana ketchup, mayonnaise, milk, yellow mustard, 3/4 cup cheddar cheese, Bajan seasoning, paprika, parsley, pepper, and egg. Mix with hands. (Pretend you are throttling the people who make hated software upgrades.)

Put mixture in casserole dish. Sprinkle 1/4 cup grated cheddar cheese on top. Bake for 30 minutes or until top starts to turn brown.

TIDBITS

1) You should serve Burgundy alongside the macaroni you serve to your guests. Serving any other wine would be gauche.

2) When the ancient Egyptians entombed their dead they sometimes gave their departed ones cheese for their journey in the afterworld.

3) The first written recipe for mac and cheese comes from thirteenth-century Italy. It used fermented cheese. Hurray!

4) The box recipe for macaroni and cheese appeared in 1802. One year later, Napoleon crowned himself Emperor of France. He would plunge Europe into war after war for most of the next twelve years. Coincidence? Perhaps.

5) The phrase “Big Cheese” originally referred to people wealthy enough to purchase a whole wheel of cheese.

6) Kraft debuted its boxed mac and cheese in 1937. The Great Depression ends two years later.

7) In 1993, Crayola came out with the color, “macaroni and cheese.” We’ve had no global wars since then.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

Categories: cuisine, history, humor, international | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Spinach Ravioli

Posted on November 3, 2012 by pauldelancey

Italian Entree

SPINACH RAVIOLI

INGREDIENTS

PASTA

3 cups or more of flour (1/4 cup more later in FINAL STAGE)
2 eggs
3/4 cup water or more
1 tablespoon olive oil (1 tablespoon more used later)
1 teaspoon salt (Used 3 times for a total of 2 teaspoons)

FILLING

2 garlic cloves
1/2 pound fresh spinach
1 1/2 teaspoons parsley
2 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese
1/2 teaspoon salt (Used 3 times for a total of 2 teaspoons)

MARINARA SAUCE

6 Roma tomatoes
1/2 large white onion
2 garlic cloves
2 teaspoons basil
1/2 teaspoon marjoram
1 teaspoon oregano
1/2 teaspoon salt (Used 3 times for a total of 2 teaspoons)
1/2 teaspoon thyme
1 6 ounce can tomato sauce

UTENSILS

rolling pin
cutting board

FINAL STAGE

water
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon olive oil (1 tablespoon more used earlier)
1/4 cup flour (3 cups more earlier in PASTA)

Makes about 40 ravioli.

PREPARATION OF PASTA

Combine flour, eggs, and cup water. Mix with hands. Make a ball of the mixture. It should just be able to come off your hand. If some of the ball sticks to your hand, then add a bit more flour, mix again, and try the new flour. If the flour ball is powdery, it is too dry. Add a bit more water, mix again, until the consistency of the next ball is just right.

Sprinkle a generous amount of flour on your cutting board and rolling pin. Roll flour ball out until it is NO THICKER than 1/4-inch. Frequently sprinkle the rolling pin to keep the dough from sticking. Let rolled-out flour sit for AT LEAST 4 hours. It should be nearly dry.

PREPARATION OF FILLING

While rolled out flour dries, peel and mince 2 garlic cloves. Dice spinach. Put garlic, spinach, parsley, Parmesan cheese, and salt in frying pan. Cook on medium-high heat for about 5 minutes. Put contents of frying pan into bowl. Mix and put spinach filling in fridge.

PREPARATION OF MARINARA SAUCE

Mince Roma tomatoes. Peel and mince 1/2 onion (Wouldn’t it be nice if you could buy a 1/2 onion at the store?) and 2 garlic cloves. Add tomato, onion, garlic, basil, marjoram, oregano, salt, thyme, and tomato sauce to sauce pot. Cook ingredients on medium-high heat until it boils, stirring occasionally. Reduce heat to low and simmer for about 20 minutes with the lid on. Stir occasionally.

FINAL PREPARATION

Dust cutting board with flour. Use knife to make 1 1/2-inch wide strips in the flour. Cut these strips into rectangles every 3 inches. Dust strips with flour. Put a 1/2 teaspoon or so of the filling on the right side of the 1 1/2-inch by 3-inch flour rectangle. (Did you know there is cutting board that has all sorts of measurements and angles on it if you want to make an exact 1 1/2-inch square ravioli? You can order it on line.) Fold the left side over the filling. Push down on the open sides with the tines of the fork to seal the spinach ravioli.

Fill pot with enough water to cover ravioli. Add salt and olive oil. Boil water. Add ravioli and cook for 20 to 30 minutes. Ravioli should float to the top and the dough should be completely soft.

While your ravioli boils itself to perfection, cook pasta sauce in pot on medium heat until it is warm. Put ravioli in bowl and add pasta sauce.

TIDBITS

1) There are a lot of Italians in Italy.

2) There are a lot outside Italy as well. This is why Italian cuisine is so easy to find.

3) But Caesar’s salad isn’t Italian. This salad is often considered to be American though it was actually first made at Caesar’s Hotel in Tijuana, Mexico.

4) I recently went to a dentist in Tijuana for my teeth. Dentist’s in Mexico are much cheaper than in America. Caesar’s Hotel was only a block away.

5) The savings from seeing the Mexican dentist vastly outweighed the cost of the meal.

6) Indeed, there are “surgery” cruises and vacation packages to Mexico. People enjoy the cruise ship, the sights of the Mexican ports, and have a surgery for less than the cost of the same surgery in the United States.

7) There are a lot of ordinary American tourists in Mexico as well.

8) And there are certainly a lot of Mexicans in Mexico.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

Categories: cuisine, humor | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Margherita Pizza

Posted on September 16, 2012 by pauldelancey

Italian Entree

MARGHERITA PIZZA

INGREDIENTS

PIZZA CRUST (If you have a bread maker)

3 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup water
2 1/2 tablespoons vegetable oil
3/4 teaspoon sugar
3/4 teaspoon salt
2 1/2 teaspoons active dry yeast
no-stick cooking spray

TOPPING

3 garlic cloves
1/4 cup olive oil
2 Roma tomatoes
2 ripe red tomatoes
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
8 ounces mozzarella cheese
1/2 cup Parmesan cheese
1 teaspoon basil
1 teaspoon oregano
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1 teaspoon thyme

UTENSILS

1 16-inch pizza dish or 2 12-inch dishes
bread machine
no-stick spray

PREPARATION.

Measure out the flour and set aside. Pour the water into the bread maker. If you measure the water before the flour, the flour will stick to the sides of the measuring cup. Egads!

Add oil, sugar, salt, and yeast to the bread maker. Do not put the yeast directly on top of the salt. Salt is bad for yeast and yeast makes the dough rise. (I debated putting a comment here, but decided not to.)

Set the timer or the menu on the bread maker to “Dough.” Wait the required time, probably a bit more than an hour. In the meantime liberally spray the pizza pan with no-stick spray. This will prevent the crust from forming a glue-like bond with the pan.

While bread making is whizzing away, mince garlic cloves. Slice Roma tomatoes and ripe red tomatoes. Put garlic, olive oil, and sea salt. Mix with whisk. Coat all tomato slices in mixture and set aside.

Take the dough out of the bread maker and roll it out until the dough covers the pizza pan. If you do not possess a rolling pin, any canned food can will do as long as it is at least 6 inches tall. It is best to spray the can or coat it with a thin layer of flour before spreading the dough.

After rolling, let the dough sit and rise for 30-to-60 minutes. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Coat pizza crust with garlic/tomato mix. Put Roma tomato and ripe red tomatoes slices evenly on pizza crust.

Mix Mozzarella cheese, Parmesan cheese, basil, oregano, pepper, and thyme in small mixing bowl. Sprinkle cheese/spice mixture evenly on pizza crust.

Bake pizza in oven at 400 degrees for 10 to 15 minutes or until cheese is golden brown.
TIDBITS

1) This margherita is a pizza. Eating it will not get you drunk or even give you a buzz. Jimmy Buffet was not “wasting away in Margheritaville.”

2) Okay, you could assemble the sugar and the other ingredients that go in the bread machine and let them ferment until you get alcohol. But I suspect you’d only get a sour tasting alcoholic glob.

3) Margherita Pizza was named after the Queen of Naples sometime ago.

4) It’s difficult to remember to type in that “h” in “Margherita.” My spell checker doesn’t like it either. Why, why couldn’t that queen have been named something easy such as, “Maria” or “Sophia?”

5) My two sons have simple names just in case they create a world-famous pizza.

6) Italy was unified during the years 1860 to 1870. This event, thank goodness, put an end to Neapolitan queens bestowing their weirdly spelled names on perfectly good pizzas.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

Categories: cuisine, food, humor, international, recipes | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Poway, Vacation Getaway – A Loving Poem

Posted on August 28, 2012 by pauldelancey

Poway, Vacation Getaway

Oh Poway! Oh Poway!
You’re such a vacation wowie.
You beat the pants off Maui.
With Your Lake Poway.

Paris just can’t compare
With our Old Poway Fare
Not even on a dare
Would I go over there.

Italy with its many grand plazas
Or Sinai with its teeming Gaza
Can’t beat Taco Bell’s enchilada.
For me, I’ll have Poway or nada.

Why go to Nice with its weather fair
Or to Moscow for a Russian bear?
Come to Poway, mon frère.
Enjoy our constant street repair

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

Categories: humor, poems | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Chicken Scallopini From Cookbook

Posted on March 31, 2012 by pauldelancey

Italian Entree

CHICKEN SCALLOPINI

INGREDIENTS

2 garlic cloves
2 chicken breasts
1/4 cup flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1 teaspoon sage
2 tablespoons butter
1/4 cup chicken broth
3 tablespoons water
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 teaspoon drained capers
1 tablespoon flour
3/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1 teaspoon parsley

(Possibly 2 teaspoons more olive oil. See 3rd paragraph below.)

SPECIAL UTENSIL

cooking mallet

PREPARATION

Mince garlic cloves. Pound chicken breasts to 1/4-inch thickness with clean cooking mallet. If you don’t have such a cooking tool, try putting a few sheets of wax paper on top of the chicken and whack away with a blunt instrument. (And sing, “If I had a hammer, I’d make Chicken Scallopini…” But don’t let your guests hear this. They just might sneak away before the second verse.)

Combine flour, salt, pepper, and sage in mixing bowl. Coat the chicken breasts with this mixture. Cut each breast into three cutlets.

Put broth, water, lemon juice, capers, and flour in second mixing bowl. Mix sauce thoroughly.

Melt butter in no-stick frying pan. Cook on medium high and add olive oil. Place as many cutlets as possible into frying pan. Cook for up to 2 minutes on each side or until chicken turns completely white. Add 1 teaspoon olive oil to the pan each time you cook another batch of chicken cutlets. Remove chicken.

Pour broth/caper sauce into frying pan. Heat on medium high for 1 to 2 minutes or until sauce boils and thickens. Pour sauce over chicken cutlets. Sprinkle Parmesan and parsley over the chicken.

Serve dish to wildly applauding guests. (If they don’t applaud, you still have that mallet, don’t you?)

TIDBITS

1) I read that in 1969 America had 3 billion surplus eggs.

2) Where did they go?

3) Chickens can have four or five toes on each foot.

4) This is probably why you can’t find shoes to fit your chicken.

5) Chicken Little thought the sky was falling. Was this from a meteorite shower? Did Chicken Little collaborate with Sir Edmund Halley?

6) A chicken can live without a brain for a short time.

7) People cannot, contrary to what relatives might say.

8) It is illegal to eat chickens in Gainesville, Georgia without a fork.

9) Chickens can run at a speed of nine miles per hour. If you could get a chicken to run around a track for a mile, it could complete its task in 6 minutes 40 seconds.

10) In high school I could run the mile in 7 minutes 37 seconds. Thank goodness, that chicken in the next lane stopped to peck for worms.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

Categories: cuisine, food, humor, international, recipes | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

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