Italian Style Beans

These beans I’m told by several people are just amazing. They are very rich and luxurious. The secret ingredient is chicken fat that you save from your roasted chicken. Only chicken fat can give that deep intense  taste that is the backbone to this dish. Also instead of adding salt I use chicken base and think of it as chicken flavored salt for more flavor. The taste with the beans, spices with tomato and chicken is almost like pasta fagioli. This is one of those recipes that I don’t usually measure but made a point this time to measure.

I also make this dish slightly different because that depends on what I have in my pantry. Last time I used canned Italian tomatoes in this dish and this time I used fresh roasted tomatoes.

I’ve made these beans often using local dried beans from the farmer’s market. Those are the only dry beans that come out well all the time. Often the beans from any store are old and an old bean will never be tender. Although the farmer’s market beans are by far the best I ever cooked I went with the second best bean, the low sodium canned varieties. I had one problem with the farmer market’s beans and they are always packed with small stones and I always miss a few. I don’t want to damage my teeth or anyones so I went with low sodium beans because they taste the best of the canned beans.

Ingredients for 20 small servings

1/2 onion chopped fine

3 garlic cloves smashed

6 hot/sweet cherry peppers chopped fine (maybe 4 if you don’t want heat)

2 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

1/4 cup chicken fat

1/4 cup flour

3 cups chicken stock

1 6.2oz. can tomato paste

2 15.5 cans reduced sodium cannelloni beans rinsed well and drained

1 15.5 oz. can reduced sodium garbanzo beans rinsed well and drained

1 15.5 oz. can reduced sodium pinto beans rinsed well and drained

1/2 cup roasted bell peppers chopped

1 cup (heaping) roasted tomatoes – rough chopped

2 15.5 cans of large  butter beans rinsed well and drained

1 15.5 can reduce sodium cannelloni beans rinsed well and drained

1 15.5 can reduce sodium kidney beans rinsed well and drained

1 15.5 can reduce sodium garbanzo beans rinsed well and drained

2 teaspoons reduced sodium all natural chicken base ( I use better than bullion brand) (this is instead of salt)

1/4 cup dry white wine

1 Tablespoon pluss 1 teaspoon dried oregano

1/2 teaspoon dried rosemary

1 Tablespoon dried basil

1 Tablespoon savory

1/2 teaspoon crushed red pepper (cut to 1/4 if you don’t want heat)

1 Tablespoon sugar

Directions

In your medium/large sauce on medium high heat add your, onion, cherry peppers, and olive oil after a minute or two add your garlic and cook a few minutes till onions are translucent. Remove mixture from pot and set  to the side. Add your chicken fat and flour and cook till it bubbles. Whip in the chicken stock, tomato paste, 2 cans cannelloni beans, garbanzo beans and pinto beans and blend this all up with your stick mixer. Bring this to a slow boil. Next is adding everything else you have left. Lower heat slightly and bring to slow boil and lower again to low and let simmer at least a half hour.

You will have this much left after someone in your house helps himself to two bowls.

Freezes well to be used for latter.

People just forking love this dish.

This is Forking great and that’s The Forking Truth

Fennel Fava Bean Radish and Walnut Salad in Lemon Dijon Dressing

A great little tasty light refreshing salad that’s easy to prepare with a good presentation. The dressing is very delicious. You might want to save it for many other salads. It taste almost like an eggless caesar.

Ingredients for 4 servings

2 celery ribs with some inner leaves – peal the celery, slice thin at slight diagonal. Set the inner leaves to the side.

1 fennel bulb – wash and core fennel and slice thin on slight diagonal – save some of the fennel fronds and set them to the side

3-4 radishes depending on size and variety.- thinly sliced

2 cups fava beans – shelled and pealed and cooked

cup (scant) walnuts – toasted

1/4 cup parmesan – shaved

1 garlic clove – minced

1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

1/2 teaspoon black pepper

1 Tablespoon dijon mustard

1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil

1 large  lemon – just the fresh squeezed juice

splash Worcestershire Sauce

1 teaspoon sugar

Directions

Mix up the garlic, salt, black pepper, dijon, olive oil, lemon juice, Worcestershire and sugar together. Add the fennel, walnuts, celery and beans and mix well. Top with fennel fronds, celery leaves and parmesan shavings.

Fennel Fava Radish and Walnut Salad in Lemon Dijon Dressing

This is Forking Good and that’s The Forking Truth

Fresh Ricotta Gnocchi

I’ve done fresh ricotta gnocchi before about a year and a half back on this blog but it is one of the many recipes that I usually don’t measure and didn’t publish exact measurements before. I’ve been making gnocchi for years because it’s one of my husband’s favorites. When I first starting making gnocchi I based my recipe on the only gnocchi I ever had at that time and they were frozen gnocchi that I learned some time back are a world different than fresh made gnocchi. Frozen pasta dishes like gnocchi and raviolis are very thick and dense without a fresh flavor. Fresh gnocchi are very light and tender and do have more flavor. About ten to fifteen years back I ate my first fresh made gnocchi in New York at one of Mario Batali’s Restaurants and not until then learned I was making gnocchi wrong. I happened to purchase a book about that same time called Mom’s Secret Recipe File by Chris Styler. It’s a book of treasured recipes by the Mother’s of Great Chefs. One of the recipes I learned from was Lidia (Matticchio) Bastianich’s Mother’s potato gnocchi recipe. I made it a bunch of times. Eventually I did start playing around with the potato dumpling recipe and changing it to a cheese dumpling with my own seasonings. The recipe is simple but I learned to make a correct gnocchi the amount of flour always starts as half of whatever the filling recipe is. Like one cup of potatoes would be half a cup of flour and would never be more than 3/4 cup of flour. The amount of flour you need might differ in either potato, cheese or potato cheese gnocchi due to the amount of moisture in what you mix in and the humidity. You ALWAYS need your filling (cheese or potato) to be as dry as possible for the best results. Most gnocchi are made with potato, some are half potato and half cheese and sometimes the gnocchi are all cheese.

Since I can’t purchase good tasting ricotta cheese near where I live I just make the ricotta cheese fresh and then make the gnocchi. It’s very easy and I’ll walk you though it after the gnocchi recipe. I have also already posted how to prepare ricotta cheese on this site.

Ingredients makes around 7 servings

2 cups fresh made ricotta cheese (see end of recipe for easy directions)

1 XL egg beaten

1 cup parmigiana reggiano – shredded (for more flavor…I don’t always add the parmigiana)

1 cup flour

a few grates fresh grated nutmeg

1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

pinch white ground pepper

1 Tablespoon kosher salt (for your boiling water)

3 Tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil (to coat the gnocchi you pull from the water)

Directions mix cheeses, egg, flour, white pepper, nutmeg, and 1/2 t. salt together with a fork till smooth. Get a pot of boiling water on and add remaining salt to water. Make a 1/2 inch cut off an end of a disposable pastry bag 1/2 way fill with dough and twist end to hold it in.

Hold over boiling water and squeeze out each gnocchi dapping them off with your finger.

Let them boil a couple minutes and they will float to the top and remove them with a slotted spoon. Each batch you remove sprinkle with a little extra virgin olive oil.

Fresh Ricotta Gnocchi

Serve and enjoy.

To make ricotta cheese. Makes around 4 1/2 cups of cheese.

In a big pot add one gallon whole milk, one pint heavy cream and a 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt. Bring to a slow boil. (this will take a while) Let the mixture boil a few minutes and slowly add fresh squeezed lemon juice, add a few tablespoons at a time until it curdles.

Get a colander and line it with paper towels. Use a soup ladle and ladle out your curds and whey. Let drain until you see curds and place in a clean container and repeat till done.

You will be rewarded with really great tasting cheese you will never forking purchase it again.

This is GREAT and that’s The Forking Truth