Spice (55 page)

¼ pound De Cecco brand angel hair pasta coils (capelli d’angelo) or vermicelli

¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil

8 cups chicken broth, preferably homemade

Salt and pepper to taste

3 cups Greek-style yogurt or whole-milk plain yogurt

3 egg yolks

1 tablespoon flour

1 tablespoon dried mint

2 teaspoons sumac

1.
In a medium mixing bowl, crush the coils of angel hair pasta with your hands, until they are broken into pieces ¼ to ½ inch long.

2.
In a medium soup pot (3 quarts or more) over medium heat, warm the olive oil (don’t turn up the heat too high or the oil will break down) and add the crushed pasta. Stir the pasta to coat it evenly with the oil and continue to stir for 3 to 4 minutes, until it is toasted and golden brown.

3.
Add the chicken broth and increase the heat from medium to high. Bring the soup to a boil and reduce the heat to medium-low. Simmer the soup for 6 to 8 minutes, until the pasta is cooked. Season with salt and pepper.

4.
In a medium mixing bowl, combine the yogurt, egg yolks, and flour.

5.
Ladle 1 cup of the hot soup into the yogurt mixture, whisking until combined. This tempers the yogurt and egg so that it won’t curdle when you add it to the soup. The flour also keeps the yogurt from curdling.

6.
Add the yogurt mixture to the soup pot, whisking and continue to whisk on and off for about 5 minutes, until the soup starts to simmer.

7.
Ladle the soup into bowls and sprinkle the top with dried mint and sumac. Serve hot.

DISCOVER GREEK WINES

Theresa Paopao, Wine Director at Oleana

Although the Greeks were one of the first civilizations to create wine, they are not the first to spring to mind for most people when choosing wine for dinner. The indigenous grape varieties have names that are not as easy to pronounce as merlot or chardonnay; assyrtiko, agiorgitiko, and xino-mavro don’t exactly roll off the tongue. For some, retsina may be the first introduction to Greek wine made from savatiano, rhoditis, or assyrtiko and treated with pine resin—outside Greece, an acquired taste.

Here’s a rundown on some of the more prominent Greek grapes.

Agiorgitiko (red)
— also known as the grape of St. George, from the Nemea valley in the Peloponnesos, dark berry fruit flavors and oak aging give this wine New World appeal

Assyrtiko (white)
— a white grape with high acidity; best known from Santorini

Malagousia (white)
— a spicy, aromatic white, possibly related to malvasia

Mandelaria (red)
— a very tannic grape from the island of Crete, which makes concentrated, powerful wines

Moscofilero (pink)
— comparable to Muscat or Gewürztraminer, this grape makes white or rosé wines with delicate floral aromatics like rose petals

Rhoditis (white)
— a spicy, Peloponnesian variety with low sugar and high acidity

Savatiano (white)
— commonly used for retsina but also produces fruity, balanced wines

Xinomavro (red)
— some think this grape may be related to nebbiolo. Highly acidic with red berry flavors with distinct savory qualities of truffles and leather. Look for Xinomavro from the Naousa region.

Crispy Lemon Chicken with Za’atar

This is an Oleana favorite, and my customers would protest if I took it off the menu. I developed this recipe in my quest to find a chicken recipe that’s interesting enough to make people want to order it from the menu or to prepare as a special meal at home.

In the United States, chicken is so mass-produced and inexpensive that we consider it to be a boring, everyday protein. And the flavor isn’t terribly exciting either, unless you can find a free-range bird. A chicken that roams freely, eating grass, bugs, nuts, seeds, dark wild greens, herbs, and fallen tree fruits will taste a whole lot better than a chicken that has spent its life in a tiny cage. Natural and organic chickens—often fed grains to fatten them up quickly—are a good alternative if you can’t find free-range. “Natural” means the birds haven’t been treated with antibiotics or been given steroids. The same is true for organic chickens, and in addition, the feed these birds eat is certified organic.

Deboning and tucking butter and herbs into a chicken and then cooking it under a brick is a classic Tuscan preparation that makes the skin crispy and tight—not flabby or soggy. The brick presses the chicken down to an equal thickness throughout, so the meat cooks evenly and retains its moisture. At Oleana, we debone half a chicken intact, and tuck some of the dark thigh meat around the white breast, which marbles the chicken and enriches the flavor.

If you’re daunted about deboning the chicken yourself, your butcher can do it for you. Or you can buy the pieces separately and serve the breast and thigh pieces side by side, as in the variation below.

Don’t be shy with the za’atar. Make sure you sprinkle each crispy chicken piece generously with this delicious spice mixture.

Serve this chicken with Turkish Cheese Pancakes (page 343).

The chicken itself pairs wonderfully with a crisp, dry, snappy, and citrusy Assyrtiko from the Greek island of Santorini.

S
ERVES
4

2 lemons, cut into 1/8-inch slices, seeds removed

¾ cup plus 1 tablespoon olive oil

6 tablespoons butter

Salt and pepper to taste

2 whole chickens, cut in half and deboned

2 terra-cotta bricks, like those found at a garden store, wrapped 3 times in aluminum foil

8 tablespoons za’atar

1.
Make the lemon confit. In a small saucepan over very low heat, cook the lemon slices in ¾ cup of the olive oil, slowly and gently (barely simmering) for about 1½ hours, or until soft and jamlike. Drain the oil off and discard because it tastes bitter. Cool for at least 10 minutes and then refrigerate for at least 20 minutes. The confit should be cool before you stuff the chicken; it can be made days ahead if kept covered in the refrigerator.

2.
Cut the butter into 6 pieces and then into 12 pieces and then again into 24 pieces so that you have 24 small cubes.

3.
Season the chicken with salt and pepper on all sides.

4.
Create pockets under the chicken skin on both the thigh and breast with your fingers. Make the pockets as deep as you can without piercing all the way through to the other side.

5.
Stuff 6 cubes of butter under the skin in each chicken half and then smear a tablespoon of lemon confit in the pockets. Press down on the skin so the butter and confit distribute evenly. The butter may spread only a little, and that’s fine; the heat will melt it and the pressure from the bricks will force the butter to baste the meat as it cooks.

6.
Place the chicken skin-side up and fold each half together, pressing the thigh meat up against the breast meat and forming a round shape.

7.
In a large sauté pan (about 14 inches), heat 2 cubes of the leftover butter with the remaining 1 tablespoon of olive oil, over high heat. When the butter begins to brown, add the pieces of chicken, placing them skin-side down into the pan. Be careful not to overcrowd the pan; you will need to cook the chicken in two pans or in two batches. Place the bricks on top of the chicken pieces. It’s okay if some chicken sticks out from under the bricks; you can move the bricks around as the chicken cooks.

8.
Reduce the heat to medium-high and cook the chicken until it’s brown and crispy on one side, for about 8 minutes. Remove the bricks and turn the chicken pieces over. Add the remaining butter pieces to the pan and arrange the bricks on top again. Cook for another 8 to 10 minutes on this side, or until the chicken is just cooked through.

9.
Remove the bricks from the pan. When cool, you can remove the first two layers of foil from the bricks and re-wrap them for later use.

10.
Place the chicken onto a large platter, skin-side up. Sprinkle each piece generously with za’atar and serve.

Variation