2014 A to Z Blogging Challenge - I is for Italian veal rolls (involtini) with stuffed aubergine: Chef in Venice #11

There's nothing better than getting away from cooking 24/7 and going on holiday..... and cooking! 

Involtini of veal

My excuse is it's more relaxed cooking - and food shops and markets in other countries are always so much more exciting!
We're going back to 2011 now - seems a long time since my last holiday....
Been to Venice a few times - the Biennale keeps dragging me & my friend back - I've been told I'm going next year (yay!).

Cooking for yourselves rather than eating out in Venice (along with a few other canny tips) means you can get by on a shoestring - I'm only a poor chef after all.
I also try out new things. Right then I was trying out roasted whole aubergines. We served them at a few weddings afterwards - a great vegetarian alternative for hog roasts I find.

Roasted aubergine

1. Cut aubergine in half lengthways.
2. Slash the aubergine flesh with a sharp knife in centimetre wide cuts so you almost get down to the skin, but not quite. Then turn it 90 degrees and cut the other way so you end up with diamond shaped cuts.
3. Cut garlic cloves in half and place these in random places in the cut aubergine. Do the same with rosemary and oregano sprigs.
4. Drizzle olive oil over generously, season with salt and pepper and roast in the oven @ 180 oC for about 20 mins.
5. Once cooked you can either leave to cool and scoop out the flesh and use for aubergine caviar or you can chop the flesh and mix it with.. say... parmesan, oregano, salami, tomato and cooked onion and place it back in the aubergine shell and re-bake it to let all those flavours melt together. Tasty!

Involtini veal raw with mozzarella, roast peppers & capers

With the involtini of veal you can either roll it in pancetta like I did with this one or secure it with cocktail ticks like the one above. You can be all healthy and bake it in the oven or fry it in butter with lemon juice added in at the end.

A trip the the Veneto hills is definitely recommended! (It really is that blue!)

Random figurine with parasol on the backstret walk early morning. Get to know the back streets & shortcuts - saves fighting your way through the grockles! 

Besides the 2 main exhibition centres of the Biennale (Giardini & Arsenale) other countries have their pavillions scattered in random palazzos, churches and tumble down buildings across the city - and it is these which by far provide the best experience... maybe because you have a break in between finding each one, or that actually finding some of them is a mission in itself!

For the 2011 Anish Kapoor offering you had to travel by vaporetto as Basilica di San Giorgio sits on its own island. Less is more they say. It is a work he has done apparently in other venues, but this was the first time in a sacred place - and the symbolism sure got everyone thinking....



Related posts 

Other Chef in Venice posts

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Meze starter for a hen party near Stratford-on-Avon and trout and asparagus en papilotte

You've got to love hen parties! They had a special guest at this one - didn't say much though, some people are just 2 dimensional I guess.
The other one serving them cocktails in the lounge however, was much more.... er 3D and talkative. It must have been warm in the house though - he wasn't wearing much.







They had asked for a meze style starter served in the lounge while they had drinks.

Hoummous

Baba ganoush

Aubergines are cooked on the gas top. First saw them being cooked like this by Madonna's personal cook. Totally transforms them & gives it the smoky flavour. Used this great recipe again.

Olives

Stuffed vine leaves

Grilled halloumi

Spicy meatballs

Tzatzkiki

Homemade taramasalata

As the main course was trout I had a few trout roes on hand. Taramaslata is just one of those things I'd never tried making till about 4:15pm on Saturday. But wow - it's so amazing. So different to those lurid supermarket versions you can buy. I mixed the fried trout roe with smoked salmon and made a smoked salmon taramaslata - adapting this recipe (I used cream rather than cream cheese).

Watermelon, feta, red onion and olive salad

Homemade flat bread and grissini

First time I had made the breadsticks - how did it take so long? I often see shop brought ones in the holiday house kitchens that we work in - people must have brought them for the night before. Making your own is so much better.
These ones were sesame, onion seed and some dusted with ras-el-hanout. I also did the same varieties of crisp flat breads (below) rolled out thin so you can snap & share. There was also a sun dried tomato, olive and herbes de provence foccacia.
As we had 3 other events going on, this was one of the last jobs to do and time was running by then, so I forgot to dock the first flat bread - bottom right. It bubbles if you don't.
Trout and asparagus en pappilote
Trout with asparagus, fennel, red onion, dill, cherry tomatoes, ginger, garlic and a generous splash of vermouth.
With grilled vegetables - aubergine, courgette, field mushrooms, peppers and globe artichoke slice.
Ever since the underground food bloggers conference where Ms Marmitelover served up spaghetti con vognole en papillote I've been hooked. I've also just noticed I had the greaseproof/ foil combo the wrong way round. Oops. You live and learn......


Grilled butternut squash, pommegranate, rocket and coconut salad
This also went with the trout. Normally it's with feta, but as they had feta with the meze I shaved some fresh coconut over this instead. They seemed to love it - another winning dish.

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Nicoise vegetable tart

An old family ratatouille recipe bound with liason (1 pint cream & 3 - 4 eggs - or scaled down for small amounts) and a sprinkling of fresh thyme.

Underneath - since you ask - are oven dried tomatoes - see link below. And it's olive oil and balsamic.

Edit

How do you stop your pastry from shrinking when you blind bake the case?

I cut the pastry much larger that I need so there's a large overhang as shown here. You put your weight inside (baking beans or flour), then take it out when it's half done, brush the inside with beaten egg to cover any holes (see link below) and make the base firmer, then finish baking.

When it is cooked, take it out of the oven and trim the edges to the top of the case. You have to be careful when doing this or the side can crack - use a small sharp (not serrated) knife, almost flat against the rim of the pastry case tin. I start at the heel of the knife, and run it through to the tip turning the tart tin as I go - one long knife stroke. Do it while the pastry is still hot (use a t-towel) so it's pliable.

Related posts

1001 Kitchen tips #39 - Oven dried tomatoes

Sunday lunch in the Cotswolds

Golden wedding buffet lunch

The best balsamic

1001 kitchen tips #4 - no holes in your pastry case

1001 Kitchen tips #23 - the alternative to baking beans

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Chef in Venice #5 - Grilled langoustines with aubergine caviar and rocket salad

“You go” says my holiday companion (in all fairness she does organise the whole holiday) “while I get changed….”
What? On my own? In a food market? You should have seen the dust move.

Food markets for chefs are like the row of chic jewellery, clothes, textiles and glass shops that run from the Rialto to San Marco’s are to the rest of the world. You need it.

You’ll know about the Rialto of course. Even if you haven’t been to Venice. It is the market, the meeting place - and that’s back in the times of the Merchant of Venice. But as you become a more experienced itinerant (as Venetians call visiting tourists) you start to learn the secrets. And one of them is the market stalls in the Campo Margherita.

Venice is really just a serious of very small islands all joined together by bridges. Each of these small ‘islands’ has its own campo (square) and church. The Campo Margherita is one of these secrets. The new glass bridge in Venice, much ridiculed for it’s over-spend and delays, has sealed the fate of many traders in that it takes visitors directly from the Piazzale Roma (the main entrance point, and the end of the road literally - for any road vehicle at least, to Venice) over the bridge and on through Cannaregio passed the Rialto to Piazzale San Marco. If you there just for the day (perish the thought) you might never cross onto the San Palo/ Dorsoduro side.
This is why, walking through the Campo Margherita, you see mainly locals. At the weekends you see the Italian locals too. And when you see the locals you know you’re on to something good. Like the Rialto the fish stalls (there were 3 of them there) start early - while the rest of the city is waking up, and by lunch time they’re packing up. But unlike the Rialto, the prices are much more reasonable. On Saturday and Sunday you see a real market place - antiques, clothes, fabrics, Murano glass - everything you see elsewhere in the city - again, everything but the inflated tourist prices. Yes - the Campo Margherrita is really the place. And while you’re considering your purchases you might just rest in one of the many tavernas for a cappuchino. There’s so many things you can do with langoustines. But sometimes they are such good quality you want to just enjoy them as they are - less, as they say, is more.
I went down the simple route. Turn them oven and cut them straight through the middle.

Then place on a baking tray. Drizzle generously with olive oil and season with salt and pepper and place under the grill till cooked. And I served them with aubergine caviar as shown in the last entry and rocket (dressed with olive oil and lemon juice).

What else could you do with my langoustines?

• You could also grill them on a flat grill, or griddle - the taste that the cooking shells impart - there can be no better taste.
• You could also sprinkle over chilli and garlic as they cooked, or chilli oil.
  You could also serve them raw as sashimi (not advisable for children, the elderly or pregnant ladies).
• You can also drop them in court bouillon for a minute so they cook that way, leave the body on but peel the tail, so you pick them up by the head and dip the tail in flavoured mayonnaise.
  

Notes

Always buy your langoustines live. As soon as they die the flesh deteriorates. Like lobsters the flesh goes to a mush. They may be cheaper in a supermarket, but it’s worth finding out a real fishmonger who sells them live.

It’s hard to find a good high street fishmonger these days in the UK - the old business model just doesn’t work with the reality of supermarket shopping. Many fishmongers have moved from the high street to obscure sites on industrial estates from where they serve the catering trade. Many of these are also open to the public - such as Simpsons in Stratford opn Avon and New Wave in Cirencester which I have been to - though I see now that New Wave have opened a shop in Cirencester (which I will have to investigate) - that is a good step forward.

It’s worth looking these up in the yellow pages, and you can phone them an order to pick up, or if you‘re on their delivery route they may well deliver.

For more Venice dishes see here - http://www.thecotswoldfoodyear.com/search/label/venice

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Chef in Venice #4 - Aubergine caviar

Cut your aubergine (I used the local variety) in half, then score down to the skin (taking care not to actually cut through - you don’t want to dice it).


Drizzle generously with olive oil (aubergines really soak it up) and season with salt, pepper, and any spice if you want to - cumin is nice. As we had rosemary in abundance I studded it with these, pushing them down in to the flesh, so as they cooked it would impart the flavour. You can also use whole garlic cloves. These roasted for around 45 minutes or so at 180 oC.
Once cooked you can take a dessert spoon, and run it along the skin to scoop up the roasted flesh. Then chop it, mix with crème fraich/ or marscapone/ yogurt (depending on what you have), olive oil, lemon juice and season. Ideally you add chopped fresh coriander too.

What else to do with aubergine puree

• If you want a strong roasted flavour leave them uncovered - if you want a lighter taste and colour cover the tray of aubergines in foil while they are cooking.


• You could puree the cooked aubergine in a food proccessor and add the resulting puree to you red wine sauce.


• It makes a great vegetarian sandwich topping.
  
• Instead of roasting like this you can put it directly on the gas flame of your stove. Keep turning every 5 minutes or so. By the time it is cooked in the middle it will be well charred on the outside. This gives the resulting puree the most wonderful smoky flavour.

For more Venice dishes see here - http://www.thecotswoldfoodyear.com/search/label/venice

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