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Joe Trivelli’s rich and warming winter recipes | Food
We are never without butter at home, as essential to us as dried oregano, garlic, tomato sauce, capers and olive oil. My wife has been known to melt a pat of Jersey butter for flapjacks, and my children eat it like cheese on the endless rounds of toast they clamour each morning. Everyday luxury.
Butter is a staple of northern Italian cooking, used much more than in the south. Historically the fat of choice for the wealthy, its rich, mellow sweetness is in the elevated fine pasta served with white truffles, and is also crucial in risotto. What is poetically described by Elizabeth David as “a walnut of butter”, added towards the end of something home-cooked with everyday ingredients, making it the hug one needs at this time of year.
Pollo alla cacciatore
An Italian classic, this can be heaped on a bed of marigold-yellow polenta – an opportunity for more lashings of butter. It would also work well with greens and bread on the table to mop up the juices.
Serves 4
chicken 1, small (roughly 1 kg)
butter 90g
celery with leaves 3 sticks
leek 1, large
garlic 2 cloves
green olives 12
rosemary 3 sprigs
bay 4 leaves
passata 200ml
white wine 250ml
salt and black pepper
Using a good knife or scissors, cut the backbone out of the chicken. Turn it upside down and cut the chicken in 2 between the breasts. Remove the wings and thighs and separate them from the drumsticks. Cut each breast in 2. (Alternatively, ask your butcher to joint the chicken for you.) Season with salt and black pepper.
Melt the butter over a medium-high heat in a wide, lidded pan. When it is foaming, add the chicken, skin side down. Fry, gently crackling, for 8 minutes, turning from time to time until golden brown. While this is happening, chop the celery and leek into 2cm pieces. Peel and then add the garlic with the olives into the crackling butter in a space between the chicken. Fry for a further minute or 2.
Add the herbs and vegetables and mix them through – the butter will quieten down at this point. After 3 minutes, add the wet ingredients, incorporate and cover. Cook over medium low heat for 35 minutes, turning and basting halfway through.
Porcini and saffron risotto
There is a strong argument that porcini makes the very best risotto. The luxurious lick of saffron, along with butter and parmesan, highlights their depth of flavour. Use powdered saffron if you like it or omit it altogether if you don’t have any.
Serves 6
dried porcini 15g
saffron threads a pinch
celery with leaves ¼ of a head
red onions 1, small
garlic 1 cloves
butter 80g
olive oil
risotto rice 400g
white wine 1 large glass
stock 1.5 liters (chicken, meat or vegetables)
parmesan 60g, grated
salt and pepper
Soak the porcini in a cup of boiling water and, separately, the saffron in a couple of tablespoons. Reserving any leaves, finely chop the celery along with the onion and garlic. Warm the stock.
Melt half the butter with a little olive oil in a saucepan and sweat the vegetables with a pinch of salt over medium heat until soft. Reserving the water, drain and chop the porcini and add to the pan. After 3 minutes, add the rice and continue to gently fry, stirring for a minute or until all the grains are hot. Turn the heat up, add the saffron in its water and all the wine. Stir well as the wine evaporates. Once the liquid has evaporated, add the mushroom water, continuing to stir. Now it’s time for the stock. Add ladle by ladle, stirring and allowing for the last ladle to be absorbed before adding the next one.
Continue cooking until the rice is to your liking. Slightly al dente is the best. The whole process should take about 25 minutes. Turn off the heat. Check the seasonings. Complete it by stirring in the rest of the butter, parmesan and chopped celery leaves. Cover and allow the glossy rice to rest for 2 minutes before serving.
Celeriac, fennel and squash
A slightly aniseed, comforting mix of braised autumn vegetables. This works as well with a savory centrepiece as it does as the centrepiece itself.
Serves 4
fennel 3 bulbs (about 500g)
celeriac 350g
winter squash 300g
garlic 5 cloves
butter 50g
parsley or marjoram ½ a bunch
red wine vinegar ½ tbsp
sea salt and black pepper
Cut the fennel into 3cm wedges. Peel the celeriac and winter squash and cut both into 2cm slices. Peel and cut each garlic in half.
Melt
Cruise Ship Passenger Who Fell Off Ship Swam with Sharks for 20 Hours
Coast Guard Air Station New Orleans
The man who fell off a Carnival ocean liner and treaded water for 20 hours before being rescued literally swam with sharks and miraculously survived, but there’s one big mystery — how many drinks did this dude consume before going overboard?!?
EXCLUSIVE: James Michael Grimes said he treaded water for nearly 20 hours after falling overboard on a Carnival cruise ship on Thanksgiving Eve — battling jelly fish, rip currents and shark-infested waters before being airlifted by the US Coast Guard.
@evapilgrim pic.twitter.com/DE4n6vdLhA
— Good Morning America (@GMA) December 2, 2022
@GMA
James Michael Grimes had an amazingly entertaining chitchat Friday on ‘GMA,’ where he described the harrowing experience last week in the Gulf of Mexico.
He thought he had been drinking the day of the fall, although he could not remember how much he had. He remembers downing a few, and winning one in an air guitar contest.
The 28-year-old told a family member he was going to the bathroom, and that’s the last anyone saw of him. He doesn’t remember going to the bathroom, falling off the ship or hitting the water.
The first thing he recalls is that he was in the ocean with no boat in sight. He was actually passed out in the water after the fall. Unreal!
James was treading water in an area known as a feeding ground for sharks, and it appears he has encountered at least one. You gotta watch the video and hear how he survived that.
Eventually, he saw a freighter and swam with the little energy had left … heading toward the vessel. When a Coast Guard chopper lifted him out of the water, the first thing he did was warn one of the military guys he was naked!
This guy wins the most entertaining person of the year… and the most amazing survival story.
Red Stag Supperclub in Minneapolis is closing
This month is the last for Red Stag Supperclub, a restaurant that has served hearty, homey fare in Northeast Minneapolis for 15 years.
Opened in 2007 by restaurateur Kim Bartmann, Red Stag was a prominent example of the trendy Twin Cities supper club with a mid-century Wisconsin vibe, adapted most recently by The Apostle Supper Club across from the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul.
Red Stag announced the closure last month, writing on Instagram that the “restaurant business has been challenged since the onset of COVID-19, and in turn, the changing of consumer habits.”
“These challenges have affected how all restaurants do business,” the post continued.
The restaurant will serve its final meals on Dec. 31 but is continuing regular service — including weekly events such as Friday fish fries and Sunday chicken dinners — until then. Red Stag is also hosting a holiday craft market on Dec. 11.
Bartmann’s business practices during the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic landed her in hot water with Attorney General Keith Ellison’s office. Following a state investigation into alleged wage theft, Bartmann’s company was required to repay more than $230,000 to employees last year. In response to continued criticism earlier this year when Bartmann was named a semifinalist for a James Beard award for Outstanding Restaurateur, she blamed the backlash on “double standards” and “misogyny.” Bartmann’s restaurant group, Placemaker Hospitality, did not return a request for comment.
As Red Stag closes, Placemaker Hospitality is making other moves in Minneapolis. After the Italian spot Amore Uptown closed last month, Bartmann bought the space — which is located across Lake Street from another restaurant of hers, Barbette — and she plans to reopen an Italian restaurant there in the near future.
Bartmann also operates the Minneapolis restaurants Book Club, Tiny Diner, Gigi’s Cafe and Pat’s Tap, and the concession stand Bread & Pickle at Lake Harriet. She also helped open Kyatchi in Lowertown, which closed earlier this year.
Red Stag Super Club: 509 1st Avenue NE, Minneapolis; 612-767-7766; www.redstagsupperclub.com/