Bravo Baked Linguini

Jennifer and I recently perused Square Books on the square in Oxford, MS, home to Ole Miss, her alma mater. I noticed a cookbook called Square Table which contained a collection of recipes from Oxford restaurants. As Jennifer’s birthday was only a month away, I didn’t point it out to her and was able to surprise her with it. Several recipes were from restaurants she loved during her college days but which have since closed. We’ll certainly be revisiting this cookbook for its time-machine possibilities.

Deciding on this cookbook for dinner, we took to its pages in search of just the recipe. Jennifer had already tagged four. We decided on a baked linguine recipe that sounded divine.

We browned two pounds of ground beef (we found fresh ground chuck from our butcher’s case that was beautiful) with some freshly minced garlic, about double the requested two cloves. Once browned, one can each of crushed tomatoes, tomato sauce, and tomato paste, a teaspoon of salt and two of sugar were stirred in and the wonderful mixture was allowed to simmer for 30 minutes.

It’s worth pointing out that this recipe does not call for any pepper. Pepper is such a ubiquitous spice (and one of our personal favorites) that it’s absence was noticed. Trusting the recipe, we followed it and were curious to see how it turned out.

We started working on the linguini while the sauce simmered. Twelve ounces of linguini boiled to al dente. With the pasta in the pot, we turned to a very special component. A brick of cream cheese, 16 ounces of sour cream, and two bundles of green onions (how could we kick off Eating Onions Together without some onions!?), chopped. These were mixed together, smelled (followed by an excited discussion), and set aside.

When the pasta was ready, we drained it and added it to a 9×13 pan. Jennifer received a beautiful Le Creuset pan recently and was excited to give it a try. It was a little less than 13″, so we used most of the pasta, filling the pan about halfway. The cream cheese, sour cream and onion mixture was spooned on top of the pasta and topped with the meat sauce.

After 20 minutes in the oven at 350, we removed the pan and added 1 cup of shredded cheddar cheese and eyeballed 1/2 cup of grated parmesan. Then it was back into the oven for 5 minutes to melt the cheese. We let it set the suggested 10 minutes before serving. Being a big Alton Brown fan, I’m familiar with his frequent saying, “your patience will be rewarded.” This is also why I’m suspicious of any meal that can be whipped together in 30 minutes. I have to say that taking photographs makes this waiting period much easier to bear.

We paired this meal with a chianti, the 2003 Classico made by Cecchi. When in doubt, a good chianti will compliment a pasta dish. To be honest, despite my love of wine, I’ve never had the olfactory skills to drink one and pick out the hints of lilac and elm bark with clear mineral tones. Mineral tones?! I have always had this suspicion that people just sit around a table (drinking way too much wine) and make these things up. However, I’m keeping an open mind and will try to hone my appreciation and super-sniffer skills. Does anyone have any recommendations for books or resources on wineology?

How was the linguini? Well, I think a rating scale based on “would we make this again?” is the best measure of a recipe. It balances taste and difficulty together.. if it’s torture to make, it’d better taste awfully good. The baked linguini is definitely a keeper. Jennifer and I discussed the similarities with lasagna while we were preparing it and while we were eating it, as well. Its components are somewhat similar to Jennifer’s lasagna recipe: pasta, meaty red sauce, and a cheesy layers. This baked linguini has one layer of each that all blended together a little during cooking and completely during the meal. The baked linguini was an involved production, but not as time-consuming as lasagna. It was definitely worth the effort.

The creamy layer was a huge hit, the first thing Jennifer commented on. It was a pleasant departure from a ricotta-based component. We didn’t miss the pepper in this dish. The seasoning in this dish were predominantly from the garlic and onions. At Alton’s recent seminar, he commented that he had minimized his spices down to about six items (although he didn’t list them). He went on to say that he was more concerned with simplifying food, echoing the sentiments of Hippocrates: first do no harm. I think this dish lives up to this wisdom.

Add comment September 1st, 2006

Eating Onions Together

Jennifer and I have become aware of a trend. Trends abound in our lives, many dissociated from us, distanced by social or cultural boundaries, something noticed (perhaps clouded by myopia) from afar. But this trend involves something central to everyone’s lives, something we cannot escape: food.

Alton Brown recently aired a four-part series called Feasting on Asphalt in which he and a small crew motored across country on narrow roads avoiding interstates and their resulting homogenization. He was unsettled by his findings that American road food, the mom and pop diners, were being choked out of existence by the familiar and “safe” name brand chains clogging our highways. His experiences made us reflect on our own eating habits.

So this trend we’ve found is one of safe eating. Safe not from the cardiologist’s perspective, but a different kind of culinary security. Many years ago I overheard a cook and owner of a local restaurant in a small town say that it wasn’t important that his food be good, only that it be consistent. Change, it seems, is worse than bland. In my youth I scoffed at his declaration, but now I see the wisdom of it. It is safer for me to revisit a big chain restaurant and order the same item over and over, maybe the only thing I’ve ever tried, than to take a chance and order something I’ve never dreamt of before.

This trend of safety extends to the home kitchen as well. We have shelves of cookbooks, all purchased with great optimism, filled with the hope of so many delicious possibilities. Yet from these books, we mark the safest selections, ones we know that we will like, and those become the staple pages. The bindings of these books eventually weaken, flattening the books when opened to these favorites.

The saddest consequence of this trend of safe food is that eating becomes less personal, less important, less nourishing to our souls. I know of a family in a nearby house that never eats a home cooked meal. They openly admit that they eat out every night. They miss out on the bonding between people who create something as important as food, something that sustains our lives. I know they are not the only ones.

Jennifer found this delightful quote from Charles Warner’s 1871 book My Summer in a Garden:

“I know that there is supposed to be a prejudice against the onion; but I think there is rather a cowardice in regard to it. I doubt not that all men and women love the onion; but few confess their love. Affection for it is concealed… Happy is said to be the family which can eat onions together. They are, for the time being, separate, from the world, and have a harmony of aspiration.”

We were immediately smitten with the sentiment and based the name of our new blog from it. That, and we both love onions. And we love eating together. Not just the sitting down to plates of food, but sharing the process of cooking as well as the pleasures of consuming creations made together.

Jennifer speaks fondly and frequently of memories of eating at her grandmother’s home. Every meal there was served with a slice of onion. It makes me wonder if she was familiar with Warner’s words. If not, I believe that she embraced the idea.

Jennifer and I embark on a new culinary quest. We plan to share our experiences through these pages. Not everything we eat will have onions, not everything we eat will be home cooked, but we will try to break out of our safety zone.

Add comment September 1st, 2006