Penne with Haricot Verts and Bacon

I'm pretty limited in terms of ingredients here in Dominica, especially with the little free time I have while in medical school. However, my goal for this semester is to cook dinner more often, no matter how simple and unimpressive it may be. Well, I went to Roseau (the main city in Dominica) yesterday. It's an hour away, so it's not too often I can give myself the chance to go there. On Saturday mornings, they have a huge outdoor market where tons of vendors sell their fresh fruits, veggies, and fish. I believe you have to get to the market SUPER early in the morning in order to score some fish, so I haven't had any luck with that yet. Anyways, I bought some onions and haricot verts. I would've liked to buy more fruits and veggies, but food spoils SO quickly here, so I didn't want to buy much more than that. I also had heavy groceries from the grocery store with me too.

So for dinner tonight, I made penne with haricot verts and fully-cooked bacon. Yes, bacon is VERY hard to come by here, so I had to bring a Costco package of fully-cooked bacon with me from home. I cooked the haricot verts and bacon in olive oil, salt, pepper, and red chili flakes. Overall, the pasta turned out surprisingly well. It was simple and healthy, minus the bacon part...but really, everything tastes so much better with bacon.

Da Andrea

When strolling in the West Village last week, Gabe and I decided to eat at Da Andrea on a whim. I had heard about this place on Chowhound, and I've seen it get compared to Bianca, a little Italian restaurant we went to way back in the day.

Da Andrea is very much a cute, little neighborhood restaurant with a very Italian rustic feel. From the moment I stepped in, I felt like I was transported back to my previous trips to Italy, minus the fact that I don't think anyone who worked there was actually Italian. But I was definitely feelin' the homey, rustic vibe.

After we decided what to order, we were given a basket of focaccia bread served with black olives in olive oil, which I enjoyed.



I got the Cavatelli with Fresh Salmon and Shrimp and in Light Pesto Sauce ($12.50). What I did not know when ordering this is that cavatelli is similar to gnocchi and that they look like mealworms. Aside from that, this was a really good dish. I was surprised by the amount of shrimp I got. There must have been around 10 well-sized shrimps that were cooked perfectly. I've never been a fan of fish in pasta, so I was actually happy that there wasn't much salmon in this pasta. The pesto sauce was slightly thicker than what I'm used to, but it was very good and not too heavy. Perhaps the only downside is that once the pasta started to cool towards the end, it started to taste very starchy which was sort of weird to me.


Gabe got the Squid Ink Tagliolini with Fresh Clams, Cherry Tomatoes, and White Wine ($12.50). I felt that this was the better pasta of the two. The pasta was perfectly fresh and al dente, there was a generous serving of clams, and the white wine sauce was quite tasty.

As you can see, the food here is very affordable. Our two pastas were the most expensive, believe it or not. I don't think I would go out of my way for this restaurant, especially since it's a bit far in the West Village, but it's definitely a great neighborhood restaurant that's affordable and reliable.

Da Andrea
557 Hudson St
New York, NY

Ramps!

I honestly had never heard of ramps before until Gabe half-jokingly told me to go look for some. All of a sudden, it's all over food blogs, food news sites, Chowhound, seasonal menus, etc. So I was pretty intrigued as to what this unappetizingly-looking vegetable would taste like. Do note that ramps are only in season for a mere 1-2 months during mid-late spring (aka now). It's unfortunately quite fleeting. Another interesting fact is that Chicago, my hometown, is named after ramps due to its strong smell. From the sounds of it, local and notable chefs in Chicago make a big deal out of ramps. There's even a Rampfest every year, which for whatever reason, I find amusing. When I described this wild leek to my dad, he said that we actually have them in our backyard!

Anyways, I finally picked up a bunch of ramps for $3 at the Union Square Greenmarket last Wednesday. The lady selling them was offering 2 for 1 for the less fresh ones (meant to be cooked that night), but since we weren't planning on cooking them until last night or tomorrow (Sunday), I asked for the freshest ones. Let me tell you, ramps smell so strong. It has this onion-y, scallion-y, garlicky thing going on. I was honestly embarrassed to carry the bag around Barnes&Noble in fear that it would bother fellow browsers.

After looking up a bunch of recipes online, we settled with Batali's Spaghetti with Ramps recipe since it was simple enough. Even though neither Gabe nor I had ever tried ramps before, he thought that maybe the pasta would be good with guanciale. After coming across this recipe, his assumption was correct. So spaghetti with ramps and guanciale it was. As I've said before, I don't really follow recipes or measurements to a tee, so Gabe and I pretty much just went with the flow and did everything to taste. We probably used 1/3 of the bunch I had bought and 1/2 pound of guanciale.

In brief, I cooked the guanciale until the fat was rendered, removed the pieces from the pan and let them sit on some paper towels. Then, we cooked the ramps (bulbs separated from leaves, but you eat everything) in olive oil, red chili pepper flakes, salt, and pepper. We then mixed everything with approximately half a box of spaghetti, and topped it with bread crumbs. I think we used way too much guanciale this time. It would've been fine with 1/4 pound. We both felt pretty nasty after since it's so fatty, but hey, at least it tasted good. And we also should've used at least double the amount of ramps. We didn't realize how much the ramps would shrink when cooked. But overall, the pasta tasted better than I thought it would.



We accompanied our meal with a nice bottle of a 2006 Lilla, Montepulciano d'Abruzzo. It's a light, everyday wine that you could drink with almost anything. It's easy to drink and not dry at all.

Since we still have a bunch of ramps left, I'll have to find another way to cook them. Maybe we'll try the eggs or simply sautee them in olive oil and garlic.

Lupa

Gabe and I went to Lupa for our "Christmas Dinner." It's a Mario Batali restaurant, and Babbo (his most famed restaurant) is our favorite, so it was about time to try Lupa, which gets great reviews as well. It's much more casual than Babbo and is more of a trattoria specializing in Roman dishes. It is also much cheaper than Babbo, most likely due to the simpler food.

We settled on a bottle of medium-bodied red wine from Piemonte. I forgot to copy down the whole name, but I believe it's a 2004 Boroli Quattro Fratelli Barbera d'Alli. It was definitely a good recommendation by our waiter. The nice thing about Lupa is that they have a pretty good amount of wines under $40 which is considered relatively "cheap" in NYC restaurants. Our bottle was somewhere around $35. We were also given really tasty and moist foccacia bread with olive oil.

For our antipasti, we decided to have the Baccala with Potatoes&Lovage ($10). I'm assuming the lovage is the greens garnishing the baccala. Gabe and I love baccala, so that's why we picked this. This was a really enjoyable, tasty, and fresh antipasti served at room temperature. Lupa seems to have a great selection of antipasti. I think I'd be happy just sharing a few of them with someone as my whole meal.

I got the Ricotta Gnocchi with Sausage&Fennel ($15) for my primi. The serving is actually bigger than what many pictures indicate because it's served in such a huge bowl. I got this because it seems to be the favorite primi at Lupa, and it definitely lived up to its hype! The gnocchi was so soft and pillowy, not chewy or super heavy like other gnocchi. The sauce was perfect as well, though maybe I would have liked more sausage. This one was definitely a winner.


Gabe got the Bucatini All'Amatriciana ($15). Since we used Batali's recipe to make this dish ourselves for my birthday, it was interesting to compare our version to Lupa's. Lupa's was definitely better. The tomatoes were pureed, while ours were diced, but even so, somehow their tomato sauce was much tastier, most likely due to better/fresher/riper tomatoes rather than canned tomatoes haha. And of course the guanciale added a great flavor.


(Sorry, got a little excited and forgot to take a picture before we started eating it)
We shared the Saltimbocca ($17) for our secondi. According to the glossary, it's veal, prosciutto, and sage. This was such a flavorful dish, and the portion was really big. It shouldn't be for one person. It's definitely a unique dish - I recommend it for a secondi.

We were so full from our food that we didn't bother getting dessert. Overall, this is such a great restaurant with very simple Italian/Roman fare. I've read that their spaghetti al pomodoro is quite exceptional, and I think that's really saying a lot. That's the simplest dish ever, yet Lupa manages to make it stand out somehow with quality ingredients and cooking. Considering the quality of the food, really warm service/atmosphere, and even the reputation, the food really isn't expensive. You can spend the same amount on mediocre pasta at blah and even commercial/chain restaurants, so it's totally worth the trip to Lupa.

Please go to Lupa (as well as Babbo and Otto...I<3mario>

My 22nd birthday dinner with Gabe

Instead of going out to eat for my 22nd birthday, Gabe and I decided to cook a nice dinner for two. Since it was almost MCAT time, I think I was really just in the mood to do something low key. We decided on Bucatini All'Amatriciana and Garlic and Herb Crusted Lamb Chops. This was probably one of the more complex dinners we've done, but everything turned out really well. I think this is also one of the times I actually followed a recipe completely. If I did anything different than what the recipes said, it was probably just slight measurement adjustments.

We used this recipe for the bucatini - another Batali recipe. It was really quite a challenge to find guanciale, but I finally found it at a tiny Italian deli in the west 30's. I'm glad we used that instead of pancetta or regular bacon because it definitely made a big difference and added a really unique flavor. Normally I hate really fatty meat, but this was the one exception. Gabe and I were really pleased with the way this turned out - perhaps the best thing we've made together thus far.


We also followed this for the lamb chops. I had never cooked with lamb before, so this was fun. It turned out better than I thought it would, and it was very tasty. The only thing is that one of my chops was extremely rare. Normally, I do like rare meat, but if I were to make this again, I would keep it in the oven for a few minutes longer. The flash was a bit bright, but I think you can tell from the picture that it was quite rare.

We had a great bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon (La Tour de By, Medoc, 2003, France) to accompany the food.

scialatielli ai gamberetti

This is perhaps one of my most successful attempts in the kitchen. Especially when I'm home in Chicago with my family, I never follow a recipe completely because sometimes I think it's annoying to measure everything and to keep looking at the recipe after every step. Plus, cooking is all about experimenting with what works for you and what doesn't!

I followed this recipe. Mario Batali is perhaps my favorite chef. I made some changes/modifications to this recipe. First of all, I didn't make my own pasta noodles because that's too much unnecessary work. I also didn't make basic marinara sauce prior.

1. Heated MORE than 6tbs of olive oil and 6 cloves of garlic (minced) in a wok. (My dad, who helped me cook this, likes to put a lot of olive oil in anything)
2. Added shallots (not in recipe, but we like shallots) and zucchini pieces. (I should've bought a bigger zucchini)
3. Added a lot of red chili flakes. (Recipe called for 1tsp, but we definitely added way more than that...pasta ended up being spicier than what Batali probably wanted, but it was spicy in a good way)
4. Added MORE than 1 cup of dry white wine (Recipe called for 1 cup, but my dad and I like to go overboard with alcohol when cooking haha)
5. Added 2 cans (28oz) of diced tomatoes. Added regular medium shrimp (about 1lb uncooked. I couldn't find rock shrimp at the grocery).

NOTE: So this is where I sort of messed up. Since I didn't make the basic tomato sauce prior to everything else, the sauce ended up being extremely soupy in the wok, so I had to keep it going on the stove for like half an hour until it reduced to about half of what it was upon adding the tomatoes.

6. During this reduction time, I added salt and pepper to taste, a tiny bit more red chili flakes, and probably a couple of tablespoons of SUGAR (Not in the recipe, but that was a good call by my Dad. It balanced the spiciness from the chili flakes).
7. When it reduced to a thicker and grainier texture, that's when it was time to finally add the spaghetti (used one box).
8. Chopped up a whole bunch of fresh parsley (i'm sure this ended up being at least a whole cup instead of 1/4cup) and mixed it in.

Using that much parsley really added a ton of GOOD flavor. I need to use more fresh parsley in my pasta from now on.

We made this when two of my cousins, aunt, and uncle came over for dinner a couple of days befor Christmas. Because of all the red and green in the pasta, it was good timing too haha. Everyone loved it, so I definitely have to make this pasta again.