Thanksgiving Dinner - Fennel With Béchamel Side Dish

Finocchi e Funghi Gratinati Con Salsa Besciamella

This recipe appeared in a now defunct magazine called "Attenzione" back in the early 1980's. We have been having this for Thanksgiving for many years now - at least in those years when I do the meal. It is good any time and Leon likes it a lot. The original recipe does not have mushrooms, that is my addition - makes the dish "stretch" a bit.

These Are The Tops of The Fennel
Sorry, I Forgot to Get A Picture of the "Bulbs"
Before Slicing Them Up

Fennel or Anise is a celery-like vegetable with a mild licorice taste.  The large bulbous bottom is the part we eat; the celery like stalks can be used to flavor a pork roast.  It is great in green salads, tuna fish salad, or braised like in this recipe.

Cut the tops and bottoms off three large fennel "bulbs" and cut the bulbs into quarters or, if very large, smaller.

Braise The Fennel

Heat a little olive oil in a skillet with 2 garlic cloves, add the fennel, 1/2 cup of dry vermouth and a little water. Allow to braise for about 10 minutes or a little longer, until the fennel is just this side of tender.  Remove to a casserole without the juices.  Braise some sliced white mushrooms in the juices until just cooked.  Transfer the mushrooms to the casserole with fennel. Leave out the juices or the dish will be too watery.

Mushrooms

Salsa Besciamella:  Melt 3 tbs. butter in a saucepan.  Add 3 tbs. of flour and whisk until blended and just cooked, not browned.  Add 2 1/2 cups of warm milk, 1/2 tsp salt.  Whisk over medium heat until the sauce thickens. Add some ground (white) pepper (I only have black) and ground nutmeg, about 1/4 tsp. or so, and a good 4 tbs. of grated parmesan cheese.

Besciamella - Béchamel

Pour the sauce over the vegetables and top with more parmesan and bread crumbs.  Bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for 20 minutes or so, until golden brown and bubbly.  If you prepare it ahead and have it refrigerated, adjust the time in the oven.

Before Baking

Out Of The Oven

We kept it simple: Turkey, Stuffing, Fennel, Sweet Potato, White Potato and of course Pies.  See stuffing on last post.

Stuffed Bird

Re-stuffed Sweet Potato

All American Mashed Potato

Home Made Rolls

Note: Finocchio (Fennel or Anise) is the Italian, rather derogatory, slang term for gay.

Turkey Stuffing and Dinner Rolls

Spent the afternoon making rolls and stuffing.

The stuffing is a bread (whatever kind I have, air or oven dried and cubed), ground beef, pork sausage (breakfast sausage) mixture that is a tradition in our family. Sorry no chestnuts here.

I am making extra stuffing, because you can never have enough of a good thing. The problem with stuffing cooked outside the bird is that it does not get the flavor from the turkey. So tomorrow, after stuffing the turkey, I will see how I'm going to handle the extra. Maybe pour some turkey drippings over it while cooking.

I used butter, oil, 1 large onion, 2.5 lb. ground beef, 1 lb. sausage, about 8-10 cups of bread cubes, 4 eggs, salt, pepper, Scarborough Fair (parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme) and, this year a little Bells Seasoning.

Oil and Butter

I start with a little oil and butter in the skillet and add the chopped onion. Let it cook until translucent - don't brown the onion. Add the ground beef and saute until the pink is gone. Don't over cook. Remove the meat and saute the sausage. Set aside the meats with pan drippings.

Saute Onion

Sausage and Ground Beef

Saute the Beef

And the Sausage

Cube up dried sliced bread or rolls or breads that have been dried in the oven. Add the meats with pan drippings, eggs, salt, pepper, herbs and spices and mix together.

Bread Chunks

New This Year - An Old Fashioned Spice Mix

Toss the Meats and Bread With the Egg and Herbs

And on to the rolls.  I've done bread dough before, so won't go into it. (see side bar for links to bread posts)

It Makes Me Happy When the Dough Rises Nicely

Forming Bread Knots

A Little Egg Wash to Make the Sesame Seeds Stick

Sage Is Nice With Turkey Too

Sesame

Sage

Two Rolls Are Already Missing
(Me and My Sis Couldn't Resist)

Re-run: Unstuffed Cabbage

I have posted unstuffed cabbage or lazy stuffed cabbage before, but without photos. Here are some pics.

Green Cabbage, Onion

Saute The Beef With Onion, Garlic, Salt, Pepper,
Set Aside

Shred And Saute The Cabbage in Butter And Oil,
a Bit Of Salt

Use Some Kind Of Tomato 

I Prefer Unadulterated

I Put Uncooked Rice In The Pot With Oil and/or Butter,
Toss It Around, Then Add Water or Stock, Salt and Simmer

Mix Together The Cooked Rice, Beef and Cabbage
Eat It As Is OR
Put In A Casserole and Warm In the Oven
(Helps the Tomato and Flavors Absorb In The Rice)

This dish is great for a cold winter night, for a pot-luck (double the recipe) or, if you're frugal, to stretch some ground beef.  It's a healthy "hamburger helper" without the box and chemicals (really - you can google that yourself).

Gotta go, Dinner's Ready!

Stir Fry Veggies

I had some leftover pork roast in the fridge and one of the best things to do with left over pork other than making tomato sauce is serving it up with stir fried veggies.

Get some white rice going on the stovetop - you know how to do that.

Heat up the left over pork in a skillet, maybe add a splash of soy sauce.

Here we have the cut up pork, onion, mushroom, green pepper, broccoli, celery, snow peas and bean sprouts.  Heat up a wok, throw in some some oil and garlic, toss in the veggies and stir it up.  A few dashes of soy sauce to season it up.  Heat through, but don't over cook - the veggies should be hot but crisp.

Serve it all together - pork, rice and veggies.  Nice.

Jambalaya

I love one-pot meals.  Last night it was beef stew, sorry it was prepared, cooked and devoured before I even thought of doing a post.  Tonight it's Jambalaya with Andouille Sausage and Chicken.

The original recipe came from "The New Orleans School of Cooking" at Jackson Brewery where Leon and I saw a cooking demonstration years ago.  I use the recipe, more or less, without making it "brown" or "red", i.e. I omit the Kitchen Bouquet or brown sugar or roux and/or paprika and/or tomato juice.  I cut down on the amount of chicken and the amount of rice - and it's still too much.  Too bad y'all weren't here!

CLICK TO ENLARGE

First Apple Pie of the Season

I haven't been posting because the menu hasn't changed much around here, especially during the summer.  Now, even though late September is usually not very autumnal in these woods, the ground is covered with ugly brown and yellow leaves with large fungus spots.  The constant wet weather has wrecked havoc with the fall foliage, despite what the tourist spokespeople are saying.

Anyhow, Leon and I picked apples at the local orchard on the weekend and I should hate for them to go bad.

Here's a simple, basic apple pie:

Filling 6 large apples, mix of Cortland and MacIntosh (varieties that I consider the true New England Apple Flavor), lemon juice, cinnamon, half cup or more of sugar.  (add raisins or dried cranberries)

Crust: 1 cup Crisco, 2 cups flour, 1/2 tsp salt, 3 Tbsp cold water, 1 Tbsp vinegar.  Divide in two (one a bit larger) and roll each between wax paper.  Larger crust on bottom, fill with apples, place top crust and pinch, brush with milk.  Bake at 475 for 45 minutes.

We're having spaghetti tonight and I don't think apple pie goes well as a follow-up, but we'll suffer.  Dinner's Ready!

Discordant Courses

Some foods that are perfectly good, just don't complement one another.  But given what's in the fridge and garden, they make their way to the table.  Tonight's dinner was a composition of green bean and tomato salad with basil (all from the garden), swiss chard (from the garden) with beans and sausage and some homemade sweet potato gnocchi that were in the freezer and needed to get cooked.

The three made for a rather discordant melody of flavors.  Oh, well.  We're not starving.

Colorful Garden Bean and Tomato Salad

Swiss Chard, Cannellini Beans and Sausage
(See Escarole and Beans elsewhere on this blog)

Sweet Potato Gnocchi
(see recipe elsewhere on this blog)

The Sum of the Parts

Pasta alla Prima Verdura - First Vegetables of Summer

Pasta, First Vegetables of Summer as we don't really get vegetables in the "Primavera"

We had this tonight, but I made it yesterday except for the actual pasta.  It's a variation on chicken cacciatore or chicken with peppers.  It takes a few pots and pans.

First fry up some chicken parts - I used chicken legs and some boneless breast.  Season with salt, pepper and garlic powder while cooking.  Cook thoroughly but do not overcook.  Also fry up some Italian sausages.

In a large saucepan add a half to two thirds or all of a can of tomato puree or for a lighter sauce, use whole or crushed tomatoes.  Add four or five leaves of fresh basil.  Add the chicken and sausage and bring to a simmer.

In a separate pot saute some garlic in olive oil.  Add a sliced onion.  Then add a medium zucchini or a small zucchini and a small yellow squash.  Add two or three handfuls of green beans (stringless, Romano, yellow or any other variety - I mixed all of the aforementioned) cleaned and cut in half.  Stir the veggies occasionally while cooking over medium/high heat.  They should produce a bit of their own juices to steam in but do not overcook.

Once the vegetables are steamed through, add them to the tomato/chicken/sausage sauce.  Simmer until the chicken is easily removed from the bone.

Serve over pasta.  Garnish with shredded mozzarella and parmesan.

First Green Beans of the Summer

Picked a good handful of beans this afternoon and wondered how I would use them.  I remembered I bought some mushrooms and peppers yesterday, had some frozen shrimp, an onion, garlic, a little hot pepper flakes, soy sauce, a little rice...

 Stir fried veggies with sautéed shrimp in garlic over white rice.  Nice. Easy, except I used 2 skillets and a pot - hate the clean-up.

Lazy Leftovers

We often go out for dinner on Friday evening.  Nothing fancy, just the old standbys Blondies' for a burger or fish and chips or Chinese or pizza.  But Leon looked frazzled when he got home from work and when I mentioned going out he didn't have to say more than "If we have to" which means "I really don't want to go out".

So, last night's pasta dish became tonight's Mac and Cheese.  Made a quick roux with butter, flour, milk.  Added whatever cheeses were in the fridge including cheddar, muenster, sour cream, and parmesan (add after turning off the heat).  Pour the whole thing into a casserole with the leftover pasta with broccoli and sausage (hum, where's all the sausage?).  A little breadcrumbs on top.  Into the oven for a bit.  Dinner was ready again in no time.

It's a long weekend, so we're likely to eat out at least once.

A Variation on Grandma's "Aglio e Olio"

Grandma made "agghiu ogghiu" (proper italian: aglio e olio; translation:garlic and oil) with spaghetti.  Simple and one of my favorites.  My aunt added anchovies. This version has veggies so it's so much better for you.  This serves 4 to 6.

In the time it takes to boil pasta:

Get 5 or 6 hot Italian sausages frying in the skillet.

Put a large pot of salted water on to boil.

Peel 4 or 5 garlic cloves and put them into a small skillet with several tablespoons of olive oil, (up to 1/4 to 1/3 cup) and let them all sizzle, (add hot pepper flakes if you like),  let the garlic get a little brown but not burnt.

Wash and cut up three small heads of broccoli.

Add the pasta to the boiling water -  I like farfalle (bow ties, literally butterflies).

In another pot put a half an inch or so of water, bring to a boil and add the broccoli, cover and steam for a few minutes till cooked but still a little crunchy (al dente).

Cut the sausages into bite size pieces.

Drain the pasta, toss in the broccoli, the oil and garlic and the sausage pieces.

Serve with parmesan cheese of course.