The holidays are upon us and for many people, this is the one time they fix a whole beef tenderloin.  Roasting a whole tenderloin is super simple to do, but most people skip the actual preparation of trimming the tenderloin, which they leave to their butcher.  This usually makes the tenderloin more expensive to buy. Learning to trim it properly yourself can be a big savings and is easy to do.  I'm going to give you step-by-step photos to show you how. 

 

What do you do when you miss a dish that you can get in Italy but doesn't exist here? If you're Chef Sara Jenkins, you open your own storefront and start making and selling that dish. That's how Porchetta was born, a tiny storefront in the East Village in New York City that sells heavenly servings of porchetta, a pork dish that is found all over central Italy.  In Rome, it's sold frequently on the street in food carts.  It's pork that is stuffed with herbs, slow roasted and piled high on a bun.  And it's outrageously delicious.

 

When I was growing up, this was often how we ate pork chops - simmered in tomato sauce and served with pasta. When I introduced this dish to my husband, he loved it right from the start. It's a simple dish but giving it the time it deserves is what is essential.

I really love pork and one of my favorite cuts is the pork shoulder.  Sliced into steaks, it's one of my family's favorites on the grill with lots of cracked pepper and lemon.  Cooked whole and braised for hours in the oven, it becomes pulled pork.  It's a really versatile and delicious cut of meat.  In my version, San Marzano tomatoes and peperoncini are put into a big pot with the pork and cooked for about 5 hours.  The result is a tender, fall-apart pork with tangy sauce.

 

ceramic platter from Fifty One and a Half

 

Here is an oldie but a goodie.  I made this dish a lot when I was first married.  It was simple, lowfat and it felt like a fancy dish even if it wasn't.  Most of the items are things you already have on hand, so there isn't a lot of special items to get - maybe just the fresh tarragon.  It's quick to make, too.  You can have this dish on the table within 30 minutes.  

Here's an easy recipe that lets you do something different with pork tenderloin.  It uses the classic combination of fresh sage, rosemary and sea salt that goes so well with pork.  It's a cinch to make - the pork is seared and then tucked inside the baguette, wrapped in foil and baked in the oven.  You slice it up and eat it like a sandwich.

Cucina Povera is an expression in Italian cooking that literally means "the poor kitchen".  It is used when referring to peasant cooking and having to make do with what you have and not wasting anything.  I was recently sent a copy of "Cucina Povera", Pamela Sheldon Johns' beautiful new cookbook in which she has shared just these kind of dishes from Italy.  She has a number of interviews with her Tuscan friends who recall what it was like to cook and eat through hard times. It's a very interesting book to read aside from the great recipes it has in it, like classic Ribollita, Farro Salad and a cookie I love - Ugly but Good (Brutti ma Buoni).  

Are you still buying steaks and just throwing them on the grill?  Well, it's time to take your steaks to the next level and marinate them.  You won't believe the difference.   I get asked a lot what I marinate my steaks in and I'm going to share it with you.

I'm also going to introduce you to a sauce that's used in Italian cooking called salsa verde.  It's not like the spicy Mexican version, but is an herb based sharp sauce that is the traditional accompaniment for bollito misto - the Piedmontese dish of boiled meats. I like it very much over grilled steak.  It is a raw sauce made with fresh parsley and is simple to whirl up in your food processor.  When we had dinner at Perbacco in San Francisco, they brought out breadsticks with salsa verde for dipping and their version was out of this world. 

Yeah, I know.  That's a little bold, isn't it?  But honestly this dish will have you groaning with gustatory pleasure. I guarantee it. There's a lot of very good short rib recipes out there but this one is special. What's so different about it? The power of reduction.

A typical recipe for short ribs would call for braising the beef in wine, broth and vegetables for a long period of time. And this recipe does just that, but there's an important difference - you start out with a reduction of a whole bottle of red wine and vegetables and then you add that to your beef braise along with more vegetables and beef stock and when that is finished, you remove the meat and reduce the sauce even more.  You are left with liquid gold that is so delicious as a sauce you won't believe it. 

Thomas Keller is the guy behind this recipe and he uses two interesting techniques here. One is that he fashions a little tool for this dish - a parchment paper lid. Instead of placing a lid on the pot for the long braise, he cuts out a "lid" of parchment paper with a hole in the middle.  This allows some evaporation of liquid without allowing too much. It's really a brilliant little idea.  I show you how to make one below.  The other interesting thing that he does is to place a piece of cheesecloth between the meat and the vegetables, so that the flavor can pass through but the bits of vegetables don't end up clinging to the meat. 

Keller calls for "boneless short ribs" for this dish.  If you can't find those or can't find a butcher to prepare them for you, you can also just prepare a regular chuck roast using this method.  Just slice it into smaller sections. It will be equally over-the-top delicious.

Here is an alternative for Thanksgiving for those of you who either don't want to cook a whole bird or don't have to. In our household, a whole bird is a must but if you want something different for Thanksgiving, here is a delicious alternative.  I also think that turkey white meat is pretty bland and dry and this recipe gives it a lot of flavor and combines the turkey and stuffing in one neat package. 

It's funny how short ribs have turned up on so many restaurant menus over the last few years. - especially in fine dining establishments, where they charge an arm and a leg for them.  They've become very trendy, but the dish itself is cheap, easy to prepare and a real no brainer - it's one of those long braises in the oven that you have to try really hard to mess up. 

Short ribs aren't for everyone - they are a very fatty cut of meat but, of course, that's why the dish is so flavorful and rich.  If you make this dish the day before, or early in the day, you can refrigerate the liquid and let the fat rise to the top, to be skimmed off.  This is worth doing and the dish will actually be more flavorful if you make it the day before.  It's a lazy day dish - just pop it in the oven and forget about it for a couple of hours. 

Wow, that sounds fancy, doesn't it? I love giving you a recipe that makes you look like a star in the kitchen. This one will have your family or guests think you're a fabulous gourmet cook, but it's so easy - I'll show you how. 

I do not like boneless pork loin. I don't even like the white meat of chicken or turkey. Yes, these meats are lean but they are boring, totally devoid of taste and dry.  The only decent parts of a chicken is the dark meat. If I ever fix a turkey breast, I butterfly the thing and stuff it, to add some taste.  I do the same thing with pork loin.  There's no use in fixing that cut of meat, in my opinion, unless you add something to it.  And it needs help.  If you like stuffing, why not make up a stuffing that you really love and butterfly the pork loin and put it inside?  And to make it even tastier, buy a bone-in rack of pork loin.  If you can't find a bone-in pork loin, just use a regular loin.  But if you like eating ribs, do try to find the bone-in version.

I've cooked plenty of whole chickens and I think it's a great way to easily fix a whole bird. It's very simple and you can place herbs and lemons inside the chicken for extra flavor. But my favorite way to fix a whole chicken is to spatchcock it - to butterfly it. There's a couple of reason why I prefer this method. First, I love dark meat and when you butterfly a chicken, the thighs get nice and crispy. When you cook a whole bird, unless you flip the chicken, the thighs will be on the bottom of the pan and they end up never really getting brown. Also, if you are pressed for time, a butterflied chicken will cook much faster than a whole chicken. To butterfly the chicken, you simply remove the backbone, flip the chicken over, and press down on the breastbone until the chicken cracks and lays flat.

When it comes to southern Italian food, this is a very traditional dish. It's usually made with delicious Italian pork sausage and regular pasta. It's not the kind of thing you want to eat when you're trying to eat light or just healthier. But when you substitute turkey sausage for the pork sausage and when you use whole wheat pasta instead of regular pasta, this dish can be very healthy. There's a lot of great whole wheat pastas out there that not only are high in fiber, but are high in protein. Barilla Plus pasta is very high in protein because it contains legumes - specifically, lentil and chickpea flours. Bell peppers are incredibly healthy - they are high in fiber and contain more Vitamin C than an orange.