Pasta with slow-cooked porcini and tomato sauce

This is originally from the River Cafe's blue cookbook. I made some changes based on what I could get. The result worked out quite nice. This serves 2 and takes ages.

Ingredients

• 30g dried porcini
• a big clove of garlic
• parsley
• thyme
• 1/2 tsp dried chilli flakes
• half a lemon
• a 400g tin of peeled plum tomatoes
• 250g conchiglie or other shell-shaped pasta
• 60ml double cream
• 60g Parmesan

First, prepare a bowl of hot water and soak the porcini in it, for 20 minutes. 

Kill time by slicing the garlic, chopping parsley to get 1 tbsp, and picking thyme leaves to get 1/2 tbsp. Just before the time is up, heat 1 tbsp olive oil in a skillet and fry the garlic, parsley, thyme and chilli flakes for maybe a minute on low fire, just enough to color the garlic a bit. 

Drain the porcini, but keep the "juice." Add porcini and fry it for a minute, then add the "juice" bit by bit. Stir each time to let the ingredients absorb the liquid. Now simmer this for 20 minutes.

Kill time by juicing half a lemon and draining the plum tomatoes.When time is up, add the lemon juice and tomatoes, breaking them into smaller pieces with a spatula. Simmer for another 30 minutes.

Meanwhile, cut the Parmesan into two equal knobs, and grate each. boil water and make the pasta. (Don't start too soon. We wouldn't want to rush things!)

When the 30 minutes are up, add double cream and bring to a boil. Add one half of the Parmesan and stir it in.

Drain the pasta. Add the sauce, season and mix.

Serve topped with the rest of the Parmesan and with some more chopped parsley.

Tasty crusted cod by Jamie Oliver

Here's Jamie Oliver's video. 

I did things in a different order so I wouldn't have to rush. I also left out some ingredients I didn't have. My method below. I had plenty of sauce and crumble left over, it's enough for 6 people I'd say.

Ingredients

• Olive oil
• Cod fillets for as many people as are eating
• Half a chili pepper
• 10 sun-dried tomatoes in oil
• bunch of basil (15g or more)
• 4 cloves garlic
• 40g Parmesan
• Half a lemon
• 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
• 200g white bread
• 20g anchovies (= half a tin)

Note that for this recipe, you need a food processor and an oven with a broiler/grill.

In a baking tray, put olive oil and some freshly ground pepper. Put the cod fillets in, press down a bit, then flip them. Start your oven at the highest temperature and on the broiler/grill setting, but don't put the fish in just yet.

Take the seeds out of the 1/2 a chili pepper. Grate the Parmesan. Zest and juice the 1/2 a lemon. Put all of this in the food processor, then add: the sun-dried tomatoes, with some of its oil, the basil, 2 cloves garlic, the balsamic vinegar. Pulse till smooth. Remove from the food processor into a bowl.

Tear the bread into bits, and put it in the food processor (no need to clean it), together with: the anchovies with some its oil, again 2 cloves garlic, some pepper. Pulse till you have a crumbly mix.

Put the fish in the oven for 5 minutes, tray on the lower end of the oven. Take it out and spread the sauce on top with a spoon. Cover everything. Then top that with the crumbles. Again, cover everything. You can put any leftover sauce and crumbs in the fridge for the next time you make this dish. Put back in the oven, same position, for another 10 minutes. Then serve.

Alongside this, I made some well-worn side dishes:

• mashed potatoes (boil the peeled and cut potatoes about 20 minutes, drain, add some milk, butter and some grated Parmesan, mash, add more milk as needed for desired fluffiness)
• a green leafy salad with cucumber and cherry tomatoes, with a vinaigrette of extra virgin olive oil and balsamic vinegar (not shown in photo)

Meatless paella

 

This is based off of a recipe for vegetarian Paella I found online. I added some big prawns, but no meat, because I stopped eating meat. This recipe serves 3.

Ingredients:

• a medium zucchini
• 180g mushrooms
• olive oil
• a medium yellow onion
• 3 garlic cloves
• 1 tsp smoked paprika
• a pinch of saffron
• a tin of chopped tomatoes
• 150g short-grain rice (paella rice if you can get it; I used risotto rice)
• 150g (1 cup) of peas
• 150g roasted bell peppers (from a jar)
• 100g spinach
• 2/3s of a veg stock cube
• 250g big uncooked prawns in the shell (about 6-7 prawns)
• parsley
• a lemon

You'll need an oven, and preferably a large (about 30 cm diameter) ovenproof skillet.

Halve and then thinly slice the zucchini. Slice the mushrooms. Heat 1 tbsp oil in the skillet and fry the zucchini and mushrooms in it for about 12 minutes. Meanwhile, peel and mince the onions and slice the roasted bell peppers. Remove into a bowl. 

In a separate pan, start boiling 600ml water with the 2/3 stock cube in it. Preheat the oven at 220C.

In the skillet, heat another 1 tbsp of oil and fry the onion in it for 5 minutes. Add the garlic, smoked paprika and saffron. Stir briefly. Add the tomatoes and rice, stir to combine. Then add the peas, bell pepper and spinach. It's getting crowded now, so carefully stir the spinach until it's wilted. Finally, add the stock and bring to a boil.

If your skillet is ovenproof, place the prawns on top of this stew and then load the whole thing into the oven. Otherwise, transfer it to a baking tray first, then put the prawns on top, and then put it into the oven.

Bake this for 20 minutes. While you wait, chop some parsley and quarter a lemon. 

In my case, it was still quite stewy/soupy when I took it out, but the rice was done. If you want it drier, bake it longer. Serve topped with some parsley and with a lemon wedge on the side.

The case that Jack built

As Donald Trump is drowning in lawsuits, it's a good idea to get the opinions of actual lawyers to learn about Trump's actual chances. One resource I like is the Serious Trouble podcast, with Ken White (aka Popehat), a seasoned federal lawyer, as co-host. 

Another valuable voice is the LegalEagle YouTube channel, which recently posted its breakdown of Trump's Jan 6 indictment. While the video gives a good analysis of what's going on and what the prosecution does and doesn't need to prove, I think it also reveals something ingenious about Special Counsel Jack Smith's strategy.

In the video, LegalEagle host Devin Stone goes through a list of possible defense strategies for Trump. For example, protected free speech is one argument; another is the exact definition of "corrupt intent" in one of the articles under which he's charged. And so on. 

Stone then goes through a number of trials of the Jan 6 insurrectionists, many of which were charged with the very same articles that Trump is charged with now. He shows how the lawyers for those insurrectionists raised the same objections Trump's lawyers could make. And then he shows how those objections failed.

In other words, the lawyers for the Jan 6 traitors have inadvertently provided the Special Counsel with a wealth of possible defense strategies to guard against. Not only that, where the courts have roundly rejected these strategies, Smith can simply cite those rejections as precedents. This makes the defense's case much weaker, and will probably also speed up the trial.

Back to blog

Twenty-three years ago, I read an article in the New Yorker about this new phenomenon called blogging, and the two prominent people behind it, Meg Hourihan and Jason Kottke. A year later, ten days after 9/11, I wrote my first post on my first blog. I neglected it, revived it, neglected it again, and this year, after getting a massive hosting bill, I decided to ditch it. I returned to good old Blogger, on which I'm starting this new blog, mainly for thoughts that are too long for Mastodon. You'll find me there as eribosot@mastodon.social. It's good to start things.