Recipe: Mostaccioli

I had never heard of “mahstacholee” until I spent a few years in the Chicago area where it was a time honored (and competitive!) traditional meal amongst all my new found Irish relatives. Years later, I tried my hand, and it turned out to be so tasty, it has become an oft-requested favorite back here in New England as well.

I didn’t find out until I started writing up my recipes that Mostaccioli is actually the name of a pasta (“little mustaches”) rather than a dish, but, hey, who am I to stand on principle . . . Besides, I’d never found a pasta named Mostaccioli on my store shelves (until last week), so I’ve made this dish with Ziti, Penne, elbow Macaroni, Rigatoni and a few other shapes I’ve never heard of before or since! So I say, call this meal “mahstacholee” and dig in!

Here’s what you’ll need . . .

beef (ground beef, chopped beef, sliced beef, shredded beef, cubed beef, roast beef, stew beef, steak or . . .)
hot Italian sausage
onion
garlic
red pepper
green pepper
mushrooms (optional)
celery (optional)
tomatoes
white wine
bay leaf
oregano, basil,
salt
Tellicherry
sriracha
olive oil
pasta

Brown some sausage and beef in a little oil in a skillet, or a Dutch Oven big enough to hold the entire mess. You can use ground beef, or shredded beef or chopped up beef or left over steak or roast beef or, hey, if you want, make the dish with chicken or with pork or with veal (if you’re a mean heartless carnivore) or . . .





But I like beef. One time, I found an old cube steak in the freezer and an old burger. Chopped ‘em up, thawed ‘em while they browned, and the whole thing turned out great. This time, I used some frozen ground beef, a couple of sausage links and some leftover deli roast beef cut into pieces.



I like to have some chunks in the finished dish, so I usually slice up the sausage. If you’d prefer a texture more like a traditional meat sauce, slit the sausage casing and squeeze the meat out before cooking it. Same with leftovers or other cuts of meat – leave ‘em chunky for character, or shred them small for a smoother sauce.

After the meat browns (not burned – just take the red off and let the first of the fat render out), remove the meat to a plate, preserving every last drip of juice in the pan.



Also, along about here somewhere, put the pasta water on to boil.

Throw in a mess of chopped onion and let it get tender, probably 2 – 3 minutes. Then add your chopped celery, if you’re using it (I like a little bit, just for the extra flavor it adds), and cook for another minute or two. Then add the red and green peppers and cook gently for another 5 minutes or so. You want the peppers to give up the first sweetness of their flavor and that takes about 5 minutes of heat.



About 1 minute into the pepper-time, add the mushrooms, if you’re using them. And, about 3 minutes into the pepper-time, toss in a clove (or 12) of chopped garlic. (This is going to cook for at least another hour, so you can leave the garlic fairly chunky – it will get tender,)



By now the water should be boiling, so toss the pasta in and stir it around. I usually use Ziti, but any hollow tubular shaped pasta will do fine. This batch was Rigatoni because that’s what I had on hand. Cook it al dente, with a definite ‘bite’ to it. It’s going to cook into creaminess in the sauce – you just want to start it here in the water.



While the pasta cooks, add a can of whole tomatoes to the Dutch oven (or whatever pot you’re using), and break them up with the edge of your spatula.



For this batch I used a 28 oz. can of whole tomatoes (yes, Pastene), and a 28 oz. can of crushed tomatoes (also Pastene).



Add a good slug of white wine, a healthy grind or 12 of black pepper, a goodly squeeze of sriracha (about an inch long), a bay leaf or two, and maybe a handful or two of oregano, basil, and parsley (not cilantro – it’s too strong at this point – save that for serving time!)



Now stir it all around and add the meat back into your burgeoning sauce.




When the pasta is done, drain most of the water but save a ½ cup or so and toss it into the sauce with along with the pasta.



Stir it all around, put a lid on it and leave it over barely there heat for an hour or three. Yes, you can check on it from time to time, give it another stir, add some more water (or wine or beer or . . .) if it starts to dry out (but unless you keep popping the lid every five minutes, or have the heat way too hot, you shouldn’t need more liquid).



When you can’t stand the wait any longer, serve it up with tossed salad and crunchy bread.

(And if you would like a quick primer on pasta shapes and names, be sure to check out http://www.ilovepasta.org/shapes.html)

Recipe: Cream of Broccoli Soup Etc.

It started out as “I refuse to throw out this pint of cream!” Which led to: “This broccoli is getting kinda old.” Which led to: “What’s for dinner?” Which led to this concoction . . .

I have no photos of this one. Since it sort of created itself as it went along, and since I had no idea whether it would be edible, the camera didn’t join me in the kitchen. But we just finished the leftovers for lunch, and they were every bit as good as the batch we had for dinner a couple of nights ago. So, hey, give it a try and see what you think.

Here’s what you’ll need . . .

bacon
1/3 lb. thin sliced ham
3 – 4 small broccoli heads
3 - 4 small potatoes
1 medium onion
2 – 3 cloves garlic
12 oz. light cream
2 – 4 cups chicken stock
6 oz. extra sharp cheddar cheese
Tellicherry
parsley flakes

Here’s how you do it . . .

Since it started out to be just a plain old cream of broccoli soup, and I couldn’t find any salt pork to make some ‘cracklins’ for a little crunch and flavor, I decided to use bacon instead. We don’t use bacon very often, so there’s usually a slab in the freezer, which makes slicing ¼” strips from the end of the slab pretty easy.

I used three strips. One I left ‘whole’ so that the pieces, when thawed, would be as ‘long’ as a normal slice of bacon is wide. The other two strips got turned on their side and cut into ¼” ‘confetti.’ Then into the skillet over low heat to thaw, render the fat, and slowly brown.

While that was going on, I chopped the onion (a small tennis ball size), minced the garlic cloves, and washed and trimmed the broccoli into little floret pieces. And even though my aging broccoli was picked young, with skinny stalks, I still trimmed the stalks down to their white center parts, which are tender and full of flavor, and chopped them up.

For chicken stock, I dissolved a heaping teaspoon of ‘chicken base’ in two cups of hot water. If I’d used a measuring spoon, it would have been a tablespoon, for sure, so the ‘stock’ I created was pretty rich. But that’s OK ‘cause we’ll be adding more liquid later.

And by that time, the bacon was all nicely browned. So, carefully out of the skillet and onto some paper towel to dry. Into the skillet goes the onion. Turn the heat up a little, just until you get some slight sizzle going on. Stir it around from time to time while you peel the potatoes.

When the potatoes are peeled, toss the garlic into the onions, and stir, stir, stir. As the garlic aroma pervades the kitchen, dice up the potatoes into little cubes – you should be able to fit 3 or 4 of them into a soupspoon.

When the potatoes are all cut up, carefully spatulate the onion/garlic mixture into the bottom of your soup pot, trying to leave all the bacon fat behind in the skillet. Turn up the heat under the skillet a little more and toss in the potatoes. Yup. Stir, stir, stir . . .

While the potatoes cook, add the chicken stock to the soup pot and get a little heat under it. Add a pinch (or six) of ground cayenne if you like, and grind a goodly sprinkle of Tellicherry all over the surface of the soup. Oh, and toss in your bacon bits.

While the soup warms and the potatoes cook, cut your brick of cheddar up into little cubes.

When the potatoes show just a hint of color, into the soup pot with ‘em, and into the skillet with your broccoli florets (and stalk bits). Stir, stir . . . But just for a couple of minutes – warm the broccoli (and let it get coated with all the great flavors now lurking in the last sheen of bacon fat left in the skillet), don’t cook it. Then into the soup!

Now, decision time. How much more liquid to add? Since my cheater stock was pretty strong, I decided another two cups of water would be about right – plenty of room in the pot, plenty of flavor to start, and more to come, and with some evaporation during the rest of the cooking, yup, two cups.

So pour it in, stir it through, and raise the heat to get a bare bubble going. And while that’s going on, get out that deli ham that would have gone bad in the next few days, and start frizzling it.

Frizzle? Sure. Skillet on low heat, lay out two or three slices of ham, leaving room to flip them easily. When they start to sizzle, look for a touch of color around their edges, and for them to ‘bubble-up’ in the middle. When they do, flip them over, cook a bit, and maybe even one more cycle of flips until they reach whatever state of cookedness pleases you. I like char; Cathy likes none; so I compromised – half the slices my way, half hers. As the slices get done, move them to a plate.

By now the soup should be bubbling gently, so toss in the cheese and just keep stirring slowly until it all melts. Cook for another minute or two and then add in the cream, stirring all the while. Then cut, shred, tear, or otherwise rend the ham slices into edible sized pieces and throw them into the pot. Give a goodly sprinkle of parsley flakes across the top, and now just let it cook slowly, stirring now and then, until you declare done. I waited until the level of soup in the pot had gone down about an inch, and then served it up with some crunchy rye toast. Next time, I’ll take pictures . . .