Monday, May 19, 2014

Culinary History: Parmigiana

Parmigiana is one of those interesting dishes that turns out to have very different origins than what you might expect.  Even though it is strongly associated with 1950’s Italian American cuisine, there is a lot more to it.  Armed with some new information, I started imagining some crazy new possibilities.


History
When we talk about Parmigiana, we are talking about a thin fillet, usually a meat cutlet, that is breaded, fried or sauteed, layered with cheese and tomato sauce, and then baked.  Interestingly, this dish didn’t originally include chicken or veal, but eggplant and it did not always include breading or tomato sauce.


Even though many believe the name, which means “Parma style” it is believed the dish originated in Southern Italy, probably Sicily, Naples, or Campania.  Some believe the word “parmigiana” is in fact a mispronunciation of a Sicilian word that refers to the slats of wood in shutters because the eggplant overlapped in a similar manner when cooked in this dish.


The first mention of something resembling eggplant parmigiana actually comes from 1387, though it was not a recipe and little is known about it.  However, in 1786, an eggplant dish seasoned with butter, herbs, cinnamon and other spices, parmigiano cheese and covered in a cream sauce made with egg yolks was published by Neapolitan chef Vincenzo Corrado.  The version we think of today was first published by Ippolito Cavalcanti in 1837 most likely because tomatoes were just becoming more popular in Italy at this time.  


It wasn’t until an increase of Italian immigrants to America in the 1800’s that parmigiano started to include chicken and veal.  This is my favorite recipe for Chicken Parmigiana.


Essence
For our purposes I decided to make some limitations to this dish or risk including too many things as parmigiana.  It had to have a sauce, so Wiener Schnitzel is out.  It had to have cheese, so Pork Tonkatsu is out, and it had to use bread crumbs rather than flour or batter so Chicken Fried Steak is out.  Other than that, the “cutlet” used, the type of sauce, and the type of cheese was completely open leading to some very interesting variations.  Even though eggplant is the original, it has been surpassed in America by chicken, so that is the recipe I will start with.



Italian-American Chicken Parmigiana
- 2 minced garlic cloves
- ½ tsp. dried oregano
- 28 oz. crushed tomatoes
- 2 Tbsp. chopped fresh basil
- 2 boneless chicken breasts, each cut into two thin fillets
- 4 oz. shredded whole-milk mozzarella
- 1 egg
- 1 Tbsp. flour
- 1 ½ oz. freshly grated parmesan cheese
- 1 cup panko
- ½ tsp. garlic powder
- ¼ tsp. pepper
- olive oil for sauteing


1. saute minced garlic, ¼ tsp. oregano, ¾ tsp. salt over medium heat until fragrant and sizzling.  Add in crushed tomatoes, reduce heat so it is barely simmering and cook for 20 minutes.  Stir in basil and salt and pepper to taste
2. sprinkle chicken cutlets with a little salt and let sit.  Whisk egg and flour together in shallow bowl.  Combine the panko, parmesan cheese, garlic powder, ¼ tsp. dried oregano, and pepper in a shallow bowl.  Dredge each cutlet in the egg mixture and then in the panko mixture and set aside.  
3. Heat enough oil to cover pan bottom over medium high heat until flour sizzles when added.  Saute for 2 minutes per side, until golden brown.  Sprinkle with cheese and broil until cheese is melted and spotty brown.  Top with some of the tomato sauce and serve, garnishing with more basil if desired.


Variations
To be honest there are almost no variations on this dish that deviate much from the original.  Sure, you can substitute veal or eggplant for the chicken, or add bacon or ham to the mix like they do in Australia, but it is all still clearly Italian.  So when I found Teeside Parmo, a Northern British variation, I was pretty excited to try it.  It is often made with chicken, but is also made with pork, so that is how I made it.



Teeside Parmo
- 1 pork tenderloin, cut into 4 pieces and flattened with a meat mallet
- 1 egg
- 1 cup panko
- 1 cup milk
- 2 cardamom pods or ¼ tsp. ground cardamom
- 4 whole cloves
- 1 tsp. peppercorns or coarse ground pepper
- ½ sweet or yellow onion, chopped
- 1 bay leaf
- ½ stick butter
- 2 Tbsp. flour plus more for dusting the pork
- ½ oz. freshly grated parmesan cheese
- 4 oz. sharp cheddar cheese, shredded


1. Microwave the milk, cardamom, cloves, pepper, onion, and bay leaf until very hot, but not boiling, about 3 minutes.  Melt the butter in a saucepan over medium heat.  Add the flour and cook one minute.  Pour the milk through a very fine-mesh strainer into the roux whisking as you pour. Whisk in the parmesan and add more milk if too thick and salt and pepper to taste. Set the sauce aside while you prepare the rest of the dish.
2. Salt the pork cutlets, then dredge the in flour, then egg, then breadcrumbs.  Saute in some vegetable oil over medium high heat until golden brown on each side, about 2 minutes per side.  Top with cheddar cheese and broil until cheese is melted and spotty brown.  Top with sauce and serve, garnishing with some parsley if desired.


Experiments
For my first experiment, I decided to harken back to the original parmigiana, but think about other cuisines known for both their use of eggplant and their excellent sauces.  Using a Chinese eggplant stir-fry as my inspiration, I decided to do a new take on an eggplant parmigiana.  My greatest hurdle, though, was cheese.  China is not well known for its use of cheese, so a bit of research was required.  I soon learned that the Bai people of Yunnan province are known for a cheese called Rubing, which is similar to paneer or queso blanco but with a goat’s milk flavor.  It is a non-melting cheese, meaning it can be grilled.  Since this would be far too esoteric a cheese to find, I decided to substitute a more common cheese, halloumi, instead.  Treat it just like a grilled-cheese sandwich, cooking it in a nonstick skillet over medium heat until golden brown on each side. In this picture, though, I am sad to say I used some of the mozzarella I already had.



Yunnan-style eggplant parmigiana
- 2 medium-sized eggplants cut into ½ inch rounds, salted and set in a colander for an hour
- 8 oz. halloumi, sliced thin, and cooked on a skillet until browned
- 2 egg
- 2 Tbsp. flour
- 1 ½ cups panko
- olive oil for sauteing
- 1 Tbsp. rice vinegar, or white vinegar
- 1 tsp. Asian chili sauce, like sriracha
- 1 Tbsp. cornstarch
- ½ cup chicken stock
- 3 Tbsp. soy sauce
- 3 Tbsp. honey


1. Whisk egg and flour together in shallow bowl.  Put panko in another shallow bowl.  Place eggplant slices between two thick layers of paper towels and gently press to dry the slices.  Dredge each slice in the egg mixture and then in the panko mixture and set aside.  
2. Heat enough oil to cover pan bottom over medium high heat until flour sizzles when added.  Saute for 2 minutes per side, until golden brown, and set aside.
3. Whisk  vinegar, chili sauce, cornstarch, chicken stock, soy sauce, and honey until combined and cook in a small saucepan over medium heat until thickened, adding more cornstarch if necessary.
4. Top each cooked eggplant slice with a slice of cooked cheese and some of the sauce and serve.


For my final experiment, I will admit I went a little off the rails.  I had already done chicken, pork, and eggplant.  I didn’t really feel like repeating any of those and I didn’t want to do veal.  Then, my mother who was in town visiting suggested crab cakes.  I immediately dismissed the idea for being too far from the original.  I really wanted to do something mediterranean.  But then I found and modified this recipe for mediterranean crab cakes and it was a resounding success.  It also inspired me to do a series on seafood cakes sometime in the future, but I’m getting ahead of myself.  If doing crabcakes is too far gone for you to still be parmigiana, just bread a fish cutlet instead.



Mediterranean Crab Cake Parmigiana
- 1 medium cucumber, peeled, halved, seeded, and then shredded on a box grater
- 1 cup of plain Greek yogurt
- 2 Tbsp. minced fresh dill
- 1 Tbsp. minced fresh mint
- 4 oz. crumbled feta
- 6 minced garlic cloves
- 2 cups tomatoes
- 2 Tbsp. basil
- 2 Tbsp. chives
- 1 Tbsp. honey
- 4 Tbsp. dijon
- 2 Tbsp. sherry vinegar
- 1 head of fennel, minced
- 1 red onion, minced
- zest and juice of 1 lemon
- ¾ cup mayonnaise
- ¼ cup sour cream
- 2 lbs crabmeat
- 3 cups panko (more if needed
- oil for sauteing


1. Mix the shredded cucumber, yogurt, dill, mint, feta, and 1 minced garlic clove and set aside.  In a food processor, puree the tomatoes, basil, chives, honey, 1 Tbsp. dijon, vinegar, and 2 minced garlic cloves and set aside.
2. Saute the fennel, onion, and 3 cloves garlic over medium heat until soft and then let cool to room temperature.  Mix the cooled fennel/onion mix with 3 Tbsp. dijon, lemon juice and zest, mayonnaise, and sour cream.  Add 1 cup of the panko.  Gently add the crabmeat and more breadcrumbs if needed to make it bind.
3. Form the crab cakes into 3” wide 1” thick patties.  In a shallow dish add the other 2 cups of panko.  Gently press the patties in the panko to coat them.  Freeze the crab cakes for 1 hour on a parchment lined baking sheet.
4. Saute the crab cakes over medium high heat until golden browned, gently flipping them (using two spatulas if needed for stability).
5. Top the crab cakes with a little bit of of the feta mixture and the tomato sauce and serve.


What’s your favorite version of parmigiana? Have you seen any other variations I didn’t mention Let me know if you have any good ideas in the comments.






Monday, May 12, 2014

Culinary History: Hunter's Poultry

Hunter’s style chicken is one of my favorite dishes in both French and Italian cuisine.  However, it’s origins are a bit murky.  Based on what little I could find and some speculation I was able to come up with what I thought was the spirit of the dish and a few fun variations.


History
Hunter’s style dishes can be found Poland (Bigos), Germany (jaeger), France (chasseur), and Italy (cacciatore) and probably many other countries.  In France and Italy it is chicken, tomatoes, wine, onions, herbs, and mushrooms (with bell pepper added in the cacciatore).  The theories of its origins are completely contradictory. Some say it is a dish prepared for wealthy country gentry during the Renaissance since they were the only ones wealthy enough to enjoy hunting for sport.  Others suggest it was a meal of consolation for hunters who failed to kill anything, substituting a purchased chicken.  Still others suggest it was dish made by subsistence hunters who cooked whatever game bird they killed along with wild herbs and vegetables they found.  Because I find it the most Romantic, I prefer the third option.  My favorite version is this recipe for Chicken Chasseur.


Essence
For me, Hunter’s poultry needs a few things: poultry, onion, one or more vegetables, mushrooms, and a thick broth, preferably made with wine, and cooked slowly.  My favorite chasseur is this one.




Chicken Chasseur
- 8 bone-in chicken thighs, skin removed
- 1 lb cremini mushrooms, quartered
- 1 large sweet or yellow onion, chopped
- 4 garlic cloves, minced
- 1 ½ cups white wine
- 2 Tbsp. tomato paste
- 4 sprigs fresh thyme
- 2 bay leaves
- 2 cups chicken broth
- 1 14.5 oz. can diced tomatoes, drained
- ¼ cup flour
- ¼ cup minced fresh parsley


1. Saute the mushrooms, onions, and garlic over medium heat until the pan is mostly dry and the vegetables are soft.  Add the tomato paste and cook for 1 minute.  Add the wine, increase the heat to high and simmer for 5 minutes.  Add this mixture, the thyme, bay leaves, chicken broth, diced tomatoes, chicken thighs to a slow-cooker and cook over low-heat for 4 hours.  Remove the chicken.  Remove a little of the broth and whisk the flour into it.  Quickly stir the flour mixture back into the slow-cooker, increase heat to high, and cook another 15 minutes to thicken, season with salt and pepper to taste.  Serve the chicken, topping it with the mushroom gravy and some minced parsley. This dish goes well with boiled potatoes or egg noodles.


Variations
So other than the aforementioned Italian, German, and Polish varieties, I couldn’t really find any variations, so I had to loosen the rules a little.  If this dish is truly based on throwing whatever you could procure while on the hunt, I decided it had some similarities to a community meal, like the one mentioned in my post on clam chowder.  But I wanted a community dish built around foraging and that’s when I discovered Irish-American Mulligan stew.  


As mentioned in The Sunday Oregonian on January 21, 1900, “Another traveler present described the operation of making a "mulligan." Five or six hobos join in this. One builds a fire and rustles a can. Another has to procure meat; another potatoes; one fellow pledges himself to obtain bread, and still another has to furnish onions, salt and pepper. If a chicken can be stolen, so much the better. The whole outfit is placed in the can and boiled until it is done.”


Instead of hunting, they are stealing a chicken, but otherwise I think this really feels akin to the original, albeit more complicated.  Looking at the ingredient list you can imagine a whole group of people coming together with whatever they had to make something filling and delicious.  The dish has a surprising following, being mentioned in songs by Jefferson Airplane, Tom Waits, and Rogers and Hart as well as TV shows like Mad Men, Criminal Minds, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer.




Irish-American Mulligan Stew
- 1 quart chicken stock
- 4 chicken thighs, skins removed
- 2 bay leaves
- ½ tsp. garlic powder
- ½ tsp. dried oregano
- 1 sprig of fresh dill
- 1 torn basil leaf
- 3 carrots, chopped
- 1 lb potatoes, diced
- 2 celery ribs, chopped
- 1 onion, chopped
- 1 cup lima beans
- 1 cup green beans
- 1 cup corn
- cornstarch


1. Cook the chicken thighs, chicken broth, bay leaves, garlic, oregano, dill, and basil in a crockpot on the low setting for 3 hours.  Add the carrots, potatoes, celery, and onion and cook another hour until the vegetables are tender.  Add the lima beans, green beans, and corn and cook until heated through.  Remove the chicken thighs then quickly whisk in some cornstarch into the crockpot until it reaches the desired thickness.  Serve the chicken topped with the crockpot mixture or shred the chicken back into the crockpot and serve as a stew.


Experiments
I remember a few years ago when my friend Michael brought home some morel mushrooms that he found while out hiking.  Needless to say, I was a little leery about trying wild mushrooms so I made him eat some first.  A few hours later when it appeared he hadn’t died or gone insane I had him cook up a few more for me to try.  They were amazing.  Since it is morel season in the spring and hunting is popular here in Ohio I decided to make an Ohio hunter’s poultry using ingredients that could be found wild in the woods (though I got mine at the store).




Ohio Hunter’s Duck
- 4 duck breasts
- 1 lb morel mushrooms, (or substitute another mushroom like chanterelle or shitake if you like)
- 2 cups pearl onions
- 1 lb asparagus
- 4 garlic cloves, minced
- 1 ½ cups white wine
- 4 sprigs fresh thyme
- 2 bay leaves
- 2 cups chicken broth
- ¼ cup flour
- ¼ cup minced fresh parsley


1. Saute the duck-breasts skin side down over medium-high heat for 3 minutes until the skin is golden brown and then set aside.  Saute the mushrooms, onions, asparagus, and garlic over medium heat until the pan is mostly dry and the vegetables are soft.  Add the wine, increase the heat to high and simmer for 5 minutes.  Add this mixture, the thyme, bay leaves, chicken broth, and duck breasts to a slow-cooker and cook over low-heat for 4 hours.  Remove the duck.  Remove a little of the broth and whisk the flour into it.  Quickly stir the flour mixture back into the slow-cooker, increase heat to high, and cook another 15 minutes to thicken, season with salt and pepper to taste.  Serve the duck, topping it with the mushroom gravy and some minced parsley. This dish goes well with roasted or boiled potatoes.


For my final experiment I thought I wanted to do something with quail, since it is another popular game bird.  When I learned about Japanese quail, I thought a dish using ingredients wild to Japan could be interesting.  If you enjoy quail, by all means proceed with the original recipe, but I found them to be overpriced, difficult to eat, and not very filling.  I would recommend just substituting chicken or duck breast instead.




Kakin Hantā
- 8 bone-in chicken thighs, skin removed or 8 quail
- 1 lb shitake mushrooms, quartered
- 10 scallions, white and green parts sliced and kept separate
- 4 garlic cloves, minced
- 1 ¼ cups sake and ¼ cup of mirin
- 2 pieces of kombu
- 2 cups chicken broth
- ¼ cup flour
- bean sprouts and the green parts of the scallion for garnish


1. Saute the mushrooms, scallions, and garlic over medium heat until the pan is mostly dry and the vegetables are soft.  Add the wines, increase the heat to high and simmer for 5 minutes.  Add this mixture, the kombu, chicken broth, and chicken thighs or quail to a slow-cooker and cook over low-heat for 4 hours.  Remove the poultry.  Remove a little of the broth and whisk the flour into it.  Quickly stir the flour mixture back into the slow-cooker, increase heat to high, and cook another 15 minutes to thicken, season with salt and pepper to taste.  Serve the chicken, topping it with the mushroom gravy and some bean sprouts and scallion greens. This dish goes well over japanese noodles.


Have you ever had cacciatore or chasseur? If not, what is one of your favorite stews, mushroom or slow-cooker dishes?  Let me know in the comments.

Monday, May 5, 2014

Culinary History: White Fish Chowder

A couple of months ago when I wrote my first blog post about chili, I described it as “practically a religion.” Well, I lived in Boston for six years and I can tell you that they take their clam chowder as seriously as Texans take their chili.  And, just like chili, it has a few agreed upon ingredients and a slew of disputed ones.  Hopefully an exploration of its history will help inform what this dish is at it’s essence so we can come up with some fun new variations on it.


History
The word chowder has its roots from the Latin calderia, which originally meant a place to keep things warm, but later came to mean a cooking pot.  We get the world cauldron from this root.  The dish, much like lasagne, came to be named after the vessel it was cooked in.  It originates on either side of the English channel in Cornwall in England and Brittany in France.  When fishing ships returned, their village had a cauldon ready for the fishermen to put some of their catch in it. The community donated various other ingredients and later it was served as a celebratory meal for the community.


Chowder came to America with the earliest settlers.  Originally it would have used preserved ingredients like salt pork and ships “biscuits” to add body along with whatever else they could get their hands on: birds, fish, or vegetables.  However, the abundance of quahogs (clams) in the new world led to this being the primary ingredient rather than fish.  The earliest known printed chowder recipe was in the Boston Evening Post in 1751 and by 1836 clam chowder was already being served in Ye Olde Union Oyster House, the country’s oldest continuously operating restaurant.


Herman Melville even wrote an entire chapter about chowder in Moby Dick, “Oh, sweet friends! hearken to me. It was made of small juicy clams, scarcely bigger than hazel nuts, mixed with pounded ship biscuit, and salted pork cut up into little flakes; the whole enriched with butter, and plentifully seasoned with pepper and salt. Our appetites being sharpened by the frosty voyage, and in particular, Queequeg seeing his favourite fishing food before him, and the chowder being surpassingly excellent, we despatched it with great expedition”


Essence
White Seafood chowders are very simple.  They all contain seafood, onions, potatoes, an herb or two, and some kind of milk or cream.  New England Clam Chowder, though often thick when served in outside of New England is actually fairly thin.  Oyster crackers are still the preferred method for thickening chowder to one’s liking.  Though the most authentic recipes use whole clams, I prefer the easy version of this quicker clam chowder:



New England Clam Chowder
- 4 oz. of salt pork, diced
- 1 large sweet or yellow onion, diced
- ¼ c. flour
- 2 8 oz. bottles clam juice
- 4 6.5 oz. cans clams
- 1 ½ lbs. of red potatoes, diced
- 1 bay leaf
- 1 tsp. fresh thyme leaves
- 1 cup. heavy cream
- 2 Tbsp. minced fresh parsley


1. Fry the salt pork in a stock pot over medium heat until it browns.  Add the onion and saute 5 minutes until it is softened.  Add the flour and stir for 1 minute.  Slowly whisk in the clam juice and 1 cup water.  Add the potatoes, bay leaf, and thyme and cook about 10 minutes until potatoes are tender.  Add clams with their juice, cream, parsley, and salt and pepper to taste and serve.


Variations
Now, it is true that there are lot of variations on fish chowder.  In Manhatten, it has a tomato broth.  Rhode Islanders' “South County Style” chowder has a clear broth.  New Jersey chowder adds celery powder, old bay seasoning, asparagus, and sliced tomatoes to a cream broth. Floridians near St. Augustine is more like a Manhatten chowder, but with datil pepper added, which is about as hot as a habanero.  These are some of the many variations that exist.  So, I decided to just focus on variations of white chowder.  
What amazes me is how you can change the recipe just a little and create something that feels totally different.  Take the Scottish dish Cullen Skink for example.  Except for the substitution of smoked haddock for clams and the fact that the potatoes and onions are pureed into the broth, it is almost identical.


Scottish Cullen Skink
- 2 lbs smoked whitefish (bones carefully removed if not boneless)
- 5 cups milk
- 2 baking potatoes, peeled and diced
- 1 large sweet or yellow onion, diced
- parsley for garnish


1. Combine fish and milk in a stockpot over medium heat and cook until the fish flakes easily, about 10 minutes.  Remove the fish with a slotted spoon and set aside. Add the potatoes and onion and simmer until cooked through, about 10 minutes.
2. Transfer the onion, potato, milk mixture to a blender and blend, in batches if necessary, or use an immersion blender in the pot.  Return the pot and add more milk if necessary to get it to the desired consistency.  Flake the fish into the soup, season with salt and pepper to taste, and serve, garnishing with parsley.


Experiments
I started looking at other cuisines to see if anyone else was making soups with milk and cream and I remembered a favorite of mine from Colombian cuisine: ajiaco.  This dish is made with chicken, but Colombians also enjoy fish as a part of their diet, so I decided to re-tool the recipe. Aside from a couple of additions, It is remarkably similar to the original.


Colombian Fish Chowder
- 2 lbs white fish filets, baked, and cut into chunks.
- 1 sweet or yellow onion, diced
- 1 tsp. ground cumin
- 1 tsp. dried thyme
- 1 lb red potatoes, diced
- 1 quart fish stock or 4 bottles clam juice
- 1 cup corn kernals
- 1 cup heavy cream
- 1 ripe avocado, diced


1. Saute the onion in a little oil over medium heat until softened.  Add the garlic and thyme and cook until fragrant.  Add the potatoes and fish stock and bring to a simmer over medium high heat.  Reduce heat to low and cook until potatoes are cooked through, about 10 minutes.  Add the corn, heavy cream, and chunks of fish, salt and pepper to taste, and serve, topping with some of the avocado.


For my final experiment, I immediately thought of tom kha thale, a delicious shrimp soup in a coconut milk broth.  However, I had a problem. My friend John, who has traveled extensively in southeast Asia assured me that they do not eat potatoes.  However, they do, at least on occasion, eat sweet potatoes.  Since I was already substituting coconut milk for dairy I decided sweet potatoes were an acceptable substitute as well.  The result did not disappoint.


Thai Shrimp Chowder
- 3 stalks of lemongrass, bottom 5 inches only, thick outer leaves removed, and sliced thin
- 3 shallots, chopped
- 3 sprigs of cilantro
- 3 Tbsp. fish sauce
- 4 cups fish stock or 4 bottles clam juice
- 2 cans of coconut milk
- 2 lbs. shrimp, peeled and tails removed
- 1 ½ lbs. sweet potatoes, peeled and diced
- 3 Tbsp. juice from 2 limes
- 1 Tbsp. red curry paste
- cilantro leaves and sliced scallions for garnish


1. Saute the lemongrass, shallots, and cilantro over medium heat until softened. Add the fish sauce, fish stock, coconut milk, and sweet potatoes and bring to a simmer.  Reduce the heat to low and cook until the sweet potatoes are cooked through, about 15 minutes.  Remove the cilantro sprigs, add the lime juice, red curry paste, and shrimp and cook a few minutes more until the shrimp are cooked through.  Serve, garnishing with cilantro leaves and scallion slices.


I love New England clam chowder and all of these variations really hit the spot.  It makes me think that you can’t go wrong with fish, potato, onion, and cream.  Do you have a favorite White seafood chowder you’d care to share with us? Let me know in the comment section.