Posts Tagged With: Roma tomatoes

Flatbread Cheese Pizza

Posted on December 17, 2024 by pauldelancey

Fusion Entree

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FLATBREAD CHEESE PIZZA

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INGREDIENTS­
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3 Roma tomatoes
6 9″ flatbreads
2 tablespoons olive oil (1 teaspoon on each flatbread)
1½ cups pizza sauce (¼ cup on each flatbread)
½ tablespoon basil
2 teaspoons minced garlic
½ tablespoon oregano
½ teaspoon pepper
3 cups shredded mozzarella cheese (½ cup on each flatbread)
¾ cup shredded Parmesan cheese (2 tablespoons on each flatbread)
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SPECIAL UTENSILS
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2 baking sheets
parchment paper
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Serves 6. Takes 20 minutes.
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PREPARATION
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Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Slice each Roma tomatoes into 6 slices. Use brush to spread 1 tablespoon olive oil on each flatbread. Use brush to spread ¼ cup pizza sauce over each flatbread. Add 3 tomato slices to each flatbread. Sprinkle basil, minced garlic, oregano, and pepper evenly over each flatbread. Sprinkle ½ cup mozzarella cheese on each flatbread. Sprinkle 2 tablespoons Parmesan cheese on each flatbread.
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Put parchment paper on baking sheets. Place flatbreads on baking sheets. Bake at 400 degrees for 12 minutes or until cheese starts to brown.
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TIDBITS
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1) Flatbread is great. It sure can satisfy any hunger. Flatbread is great. Just let it dry out and it can patch sails.
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2) Columbus used dried flatbread to patch his ship’s sails during his epic voyage of discovery in 1492.
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3) Columbus and his Spanish explorers gave the natives flatbread. In return, the local tribes presented the adventurers with corn. Relations between the two peoples would soon deteriorate, but it wasn’t the flatbread’s fault.
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– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, Ph.D.

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: Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Tomato Rules of Thumb

Posted on September 6, 2024 by pauldelancey
No one likes an unruly tomato.  The really bad ones escape to outer space. So here are rules to keep them on Earth.
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1 pound = 2 big* tomatoes = 8 plum tomatoes = 3 Roma tomatoes = 25 cherry tomatoes
1 pound = 1¾ cups diced** tomatoes
1 cup canned tomatoes = 1¾ diced, cooked tomatoes
1 cup tomato sauce = ⅓ cup tomato paste plus ½ cup water
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* = This is an approximation. Tomatoes come in all shapes and sizes even within the same type of tomato, such as Roma. It would be nicer for chefs around the world if tomatoes displayed a greater degree of uniformity. However, the tomato world is a fractious community. Perhaps you can convince them to be the same. Then you will be the long awaited Tomato Whisperer.
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** = Again, an approximation. The number of cups you get from a pound of tomatoes depends on how finely you slice them. You can’t blame all your culinary uncertainty on the tomato.
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“The fault, dear Brutus, is not in the stars, but in ourselves. . .”
– Shakespeare, Julius Caesar, Act I, Scene II
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– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, Ph.D.

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: cookbook, Paul De Lancey, science | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Beef Ravioli

Posted on December 14, 2022 by pauldelancey

Italian Entree

BEEF RAVIOLI

INGREDIENTS

PASTA

3 cups or more of flour (¼ cup more later)
2 eggs (1 more egg used later)
¾ cup water or more

FILLING

2 garlic cloves (2 more cloves used later)
½ pound ground beef
1½ teaspoons parsley
2 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese
½ teaspoon salt (Used 3 times for a total of 2 teaspoons)
1 egg

MARINARA SAUCE

6 Roma tomatoes
½ large white onion
2 garlic cloves
2 teaspoons basil
½ teaspoon marjoram
1 teaspoon oregano
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon thyme
1 6 ounce can tomato sauce

FINAL PREPARATION

water
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon olive oil
¼ cup flour

Serves 4. Takes 1 hour 30 minutes.

PREPARATION OF PASTA

Combine 3 cups flour, eggs, and 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, and try the consistency of the next ball. There may be a number of these iterations but it must be done. (You don’t want to let all the Italianos and Italianas in the world down, do you?)

Sprinkle a generous amount of flour on your cutting board and rolling pin. Roll flour ball out until it is 1/16″ or NO THICKER than ⅛”. 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. Put garlic, ground beef, Parmesan cheese, parsley, and ½ teaspoon salt in frying pan. Cook on medium-high heat for about 5 minutes or until beef is no longer red. Put contents of frying pan into bowl. Add egg to bowl. Mix and put beef filling in fridge. (Time to sneak a nice, cold root beer or maybe something even stronger.)

PREPARATION OF MARINARA SAUCE

Mince Roma tomatoes. Peel and mince onion and 2 garlic cloves. Add tomato, onion, garlic, basil, marjoram, oregano, ½ teaspoon 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. (Although the Republic will stand if you chose to cook with it off, you wild child you.) Stir occasionally.

FINAL PREPARATION

Dust cutting board with ¼ cup flour. Use knife to cut 1½”- wide strips in the flour. Cut these strips into rectangles every 3 inches. Dust strips with flour. Put a ½ teaspoon or so of the filling on the right side of the 1½-inch by 3-inch flour rectangle. Fold the left side over the filling. Push down on the open sides with the tines of the fork to seal the ravioli.

Fill pot with enough water to cover ravioli. Add 1 teaspoon 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. (Pure gold is soft as well. However, it’s not a great ravioli ingredient. Gold’s extreme lethality in a molten state make using it an expensive culinary faux pas.)

Meanwhile back at the range, cook pasta sauce in pot on medium heat until it is warm. Put ravioli in bowl and add pasta sauce.

TIDBITS

1) This tidbit was traded for a second-round and a third-round tidbit in a future cookbook.

2) Flour is extremely flammable. You might want to sweep up spilled flour instead of vacuuming it. Flour mills make strong efforts to prevent flour dust from getting into the air and onto the floors. Metallic and coal dust are also quite flammable.

3) Indeed, the Germans in World War II tried to make thermobaric bombs by releasing coal dust in the air just before the Allied Air Force would make its bombing runs. The Germans planned to ignite the coal dust, but could never do so satisfactorily due to problems in getting the dust to disperse.

4) But if you had tons of coal dust and thousands of giant fans on the ground, I mean really huge, you could ignite the air around the enemy bombers with a powerful flare.

5) It might be hard to smuggle thousands of giant fans into an enemy city, though. Maybe if you did it at night.

 

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, Ph.D.

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, international | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Costa Rican Chifrijo

Posted on May 7, 2022 by pauldelancey

Costa Rican Entree

CHIFRIJO

INGREDIENTS – PICO DE GALLO

4 Roma tomatoes
1 medium white onion
1 tablespoon fresh cilantro
1 jalapeno pepper (or ½ if you like it milder)
4 teaspoons lime juice
½ teaspoon salt (½ teaspoon more later)

INGREDIENTS – MAIN

1⅓ cups rice
1 pound pork belly*
2 garlic cloves
1 medium yellow or white onion
¼ teaspoon cumin
¼ teaspoon pepper
½ teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon olive oil (2 tablespoons more later)
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 15-oz can red kidney beans, drained
2 tablespoons salsa Lizano* or Worcestershire sauce

INGREDIENTS – FINAL

2 avocados
1 cup tortilla chips

* = Pork belly can be found at CostcoTM. They tend to sell in 5-to-6 pound packages. However, what you don’t use, can be sliced to make bacon.
* = Salsa Lizano can be found online and in ethnic supermarkets.

Serves 4. Takes 1 hour.

PREPARATION – PICO DE GALLO

Dice tomatoes, white onion, and cilantro. Seed and dice jalapeno. (Wash hands afterward. If you touch your face before washing, it will burn.) Put tomato, white onion, cilantro, jalapeno, lime juice, and ½ teaspoon salt in bowl. Mix with spoon until well blended.

PREPARATION – MAIN

Cook rice according to instructions on package. Cut pork belly into ½” cubes. Dice garlic cloves and yellow onion.

Add pork-belly cubes, garlic, cumin, pepper, and ½ teaspoon salt to small mixing bowl. Mix by hand until pork-belly cubes are well coated. Add 1 tablespoon olive oil to pan. Heat olive oil using high heat until a tiny bit of garlic starts to dance in the oil. Add coated pork belly cubes. Sauté cubes for 10 minutes or until cubes turn golden brown and become mostly crispy. Stir frequently, especially so when they start to brown.

While pork belly sautés, add 2 tablespoons olive oil and yellow onion to pot. Sauté at medium-high heat for 5 minutes or until yellow onion softens. Stir frequently. Add red kidney beans and salsa Lizon. Reduce heat to medium. Cook until beans are warm. Stir occasionally

PREPARATION – FINAL

Peel avocados and cut them in half lengthwise. Remove pits. Cut avocado halves into 4 slices each. Add equal amounts of cooked rice to 4 serving bowls. Top rice with red kidney beans and yellow onion,. Top red kidney beans with pork belly cubes (chicharrone). Finally, top chicharrone with pico de gallo. Garnish with avocado slices and tortilla chips.

TIDBITS

1) This dish uses Roma tomatoes.

2) Roma is Latin for Rome. The Romans had a word for everything.

3) The Roman legionnaires carried Roma tomatoes into battle.

4) When the Roman soldiers got close to the enemy’s forces, they’d hurl Roma tomatoes.

5) The tomatoes splattered on the faces of the opposing infantry. Tomato juice got into the eyes of the foe.

6) Clear-sighted Romans charged into the ranks of the blinded enemy. The professional Roman army would gain a decisive victory within minutes.

7) “LycopersiciSusceptibility et gladii,” “Tomatoes and Swords.” was the slogan of the Roman soldiers.

8) Indeed, early Roman emperors wore a purple robe with vivid red Roma tomatoes on it.

9) But in late 405, extreme frost conditions totally destroyed the entire Roman Empire’s crop of tomatoes. Barbarian hordes crossed the frozen Rhine River and plunged into the heart of the empire.

10) It had been quite a long time since the legionnaires had fought without tomatoes. They didn’t know how to fight without them. The confused Roman army could no longer hold the barbarian forces at bay.

12) So Rome lost battle after battle. The barbarian conquered everything. Mighty Rome was no more. This is why you should stock your pantry with tomatoes.

 

Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, Ph.D.

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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Pico de Gallo

Posted on September 4, 2013 by pauldelancey

Mexican Appetizer

PICO DE GALLO

INGREDIENTSPicoDeGallo-

4 Roma tomatoes
1 medium white onion
1 jalapeno pepper (1/2 or even 1/4 if you like it milder)
1 tablespoon fresh cilantro
4 teaspoons lime juice
1/2 teaspoon salt

PREPARATION

Dice tomatoes, onion, and cilantro. De-seed and dice jalapeno. (Wash hands afterward. If you touch your face before washing, it will burn.) Put tomato, onion, jalapeno, cilantro, lime juice, and salt in bowl. Mix with spoon.

TIDBITS

1) You really should listen to the song “Pico de Gallo” by Trout Fishing in America. The link to the song is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2kL5f0np7EU. Visit Trout Fishing in America’s website at: http://www.troutmusic.com/.

2) Pico de gallo goes well with tortilla chips.

3) Guatemala has suffered through many years of civil wars. Peasants would often take to the hills to avoid the guerrillas and the government forces. The villagers’ main source of sustenance was the humble tortilla. However, old tortillas dry out and become hard to eat. So the peasants would fry their tortillas in oil to make tortilla chips which lasted longer.

4) Humanity began its ascent in the Americas with the development of the first tortillas in 10,000 B.C.. Beer provided the upward impetus across the Atlantic Ocean. Civilizations such as the Aztecs and the Mayans flourished because of the tortillas and indeed they developed advanced art, architecture, math, astronomy, and pico de gallo. America has the world’s largest economy because of its great tortilla chip and beer industries.

5) The Spanish royalty dispatched Christopher Columbus in 1492 to find these fabled tortilla lands. In 1519 Hernando Cortez conquered the Aztecs on Central Mexico securing a Spanish tortilla monopoly. Mexican tortillas would provide the sustenance for the many and mighty armies that held together the vast and numerous of the Spanish empire..

6) In 1993 China began producing flour tortillas. China will soon have the world’s largest economy.

– 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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Salsa Criolla from Argentina

Posted on August 22, 2013 by pauldelancey

Argentinian Appetizer

SALSA CRIOLLA
(barbecue salsa)

INGREDIENTSSalsaCriolla-

1 green bell pepper
1 red bell pepper
1 clove garlic
1 onion
2 Roma tomatoes
2 teaspoons parsley
1/2 cup olive oil
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar

PREPARATION

Remove seeds from both bell peppers. Dice green bell pepper, red bell pepper, garlic, onion, and tomatoes. Put pepper, salt and red wine vinegar in mixing bowl. Stir until salt dissolves. Stir remaining ingredients into mixing bowl. Refrigerate for at least two hours.

TIDBITS

1) “Salsa criolla” is an anagram for “Class Aria – lol,” something you might text from your iPadTM while watching an opera.

2) It is not, however, a palindrome. A palindrome is the same thing backward as forward.

3) Here are some culinary palindromes:
A man, a plan, a cat, a ham, a yak, a yam, a hat, a canal-Panama!
A nut for a jar of tuna.
Desserts, I stressed!
Do offer ref food.
Evil olive
Elk rap song? No sparkle.
Go hang a salami, I’m a lasagna hog.
Lived on DecafTM; faced no Devil.
Ma has a ham.
No lemon, no melon
Sit  on a potato pan, Otis.
Tuna roll or a nut?
Won tons, not now?
Yo Bob! Mug o’ gumbo, boy?

– 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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Jollof Rice From Liberia

Posted on August 15, 2013 by pauldelancey

Liberian Entree

JOLLOF RICE

INGREDIENTSJollofRice-

1 pound chicken breast
1 pound bacon
2 medium yellow onions
1 yellow bell pepper
4 Roma tomatoes
1/4 cup vegetable oil (1/4 cup more later)
1/2 teaspoon ginger
1/4 cup vegetable oil
2 6 ounces cans tomato paste
3 cups water
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1/2 teaspoon thyme
1 teaspoon crushed red pepper

2 cups rice
4 cups chicken broth

Needs 2 pots and 1 skillet

PREPARATION

Cut chicken breast into 1″ cubes. Cut bacon strips into pieces 1″ wide. Mince onions, bell pepper, and tomatoes. Add chicken, bacon, and 1/4 vegetable oil into skillet. Sauté at medium-high heat for 10 minutes or until chicken begins to brown. Stir occasionally.

While chicken/bacon sautés, Add onion, bell pepper, tomato, ginger, and 1/4 cup vegetable oil or to large pot. Sauté for 5 minutes on medium-high heat or until onion softens. Stir occasionally.

Add chicken/bacon mix from skillet to veggie mix in pot. Add tomato paste, water, salt, pepper, thyme, and red pepper. Simmer on low heat for 20 minutes. Stir occasionally.

Cook rice according to instructions on bag, substituting chicken broth for water. If no instructions are available, put broth in pot. Cook with high heat until broth starts to boil. Turn heat down to low. Add rice. Simmer for 20-to-30 minutes or until all the broth is absorbed by the rice or the rice is tender.

Ladle meat/veggie/sauce over rice and serve.

This is an exciting meal to make for those who are making their first forays into cooking as this dish requires being active at all times. However, if you pass this rite of culinary passage with flying colors you’ll be able to do anything. Anything. Excelsior!

TIDBITS

1) Liberia has a low percentage of redheads. England has never warred with Liberia.

2) 4% of Europe’s population is redheaded. England has fought many times there. No part of that continent is owned by England save tiny Gibraltar.

2) England fought many wars with Scotland. That land is now joined with England. 13% of Scots have red hair. Coincidence?

4) Redheads require up to 20% more anesthesia to be knocked out. That is why gingers are twice as likely to skip going to the dentist.

5) The Karma Sutra says ginger is a potent aphrodisiac.

6) The FDA says ginger is generally recognized as safe.

7) So you can see why ginger is so expensive. At one point, a pound of ginger rated an entire sheep in barter. When the barter ratio of sheep to ginger rose higher than that, outlaw gangs switched from rustling sheep to rustling ginger. When the barter ratio rose even more, wars broke out.

9) Gingers never get gray hair.

9) The great film actress Ginger Rogers had red hair. But she never caused a war. She didn’t even drink alcohol. She preferred ice-cream sodas.

– 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, history, humor, international, recipes | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Tunisian Meshwiya (relish) on Baguettes

Posted on June 12, 2013 by pauldelancey

Tunisian Appetizer

MESHWIYA ON BAGUETTES
(relish)

INGREDIENTSMeshwiya-

2 eggs
5 Roma tomatoes
1 green bell pepper
1 red bell pepper
2 cloves garlic
4 tablespoons lemon juice
1/4 cup olive oil
1/4 teaspoon cayenne
1 tablespoon cumin
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons parsley

1 baguette

PREPARATION

Boil eggs in water. (6 minutes for soft-boiled or 12 minutes for hard-boiled.) While eggs are boiling, also boil tomato, green bell pepper, and red bell pepper on high heat for 1 minute. Remove tomato, green bell pepper, and red-bell pepper and put in cold water. Their skins should peel off easily. (The skin of the tomato is the easiest to peel, then the red bell pepper, while the hardest to peel is the green bell pepper.

Dice boiled eggs. Cut tomatoes, green bell pepper, and red bell pepper into small bits. Mince garlic. Combine all ingredients except baguette in large mixing bowl with fork or whisk. Cut baguette into 1″ wide slices.

Top baguette slices with tomatp/bell pepper/spice mixture from mixing bowl. Also spoon liquid from mixing bowl onto baguette slices. Enjoy while you can. They go fast.

TIDBITS

1) About 1920 the French banned bakers from working before 4am. This didn’t give the bakers enough time to make loaves for the breakfast crowd. So they made the thinner baguettes which baked quicker.

2) In 2009, a bird dropped a piece of baguette into the Large Hadron Collider at Cern in Switzerland, causing a shut-down of the system. The NASDAQ stock exchange was twice shut down by squirrels chewing through cable insulation.

3) “Baguette” is derived from the Latin word “baculum,” meaning wand or staff. Baculum is also the name for a mammal’s penis bone.

4) Baguettes are sometimes used as swords in slapstick scenes in American movies. The French don’t appreciate this. But come on, I bet they have baguette sword fights on the sly.

5) In Baguette sword fights, you win if you stab your opponent with your baguette or you break your opponent’s baguette. Baguettes costs money and a shattered one sprays small crumbs all over the floor, making this game somewhat unpopular with mothers everywhere.

6) You can use the baguette as an old-fashioned fountain pen. Simply dip one end of the baguette in chocolate syrup. Again, permission from mother is recommended.

– 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

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

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