Notes on Some Recurring Ingredients
I’m known in culinary circles as something of a pork-o-phile, and I don’t deny it. I love just about every cut of meat you can extract from the beast that no less a food authority than Homer Simpson once declared “the magical animal.”
Put simply, bacon is the meat from a pig’s belly, partially cooked via brine-curing and smoking. There are a number of versions, from Canadian bacon to Italian pancetta. For our purposes, I’ll confine myself to those I use most often: slab bacon and double-smoked bacon, which are unsliced. Contrary to what the name suggests, double-smoked bacon isn’t smoked twice; rather, it’s slowly smoked to give it an even more pronounced smoky flavor than slab bacon. The flavor of double-smoked bacon differs depending upon which type of wood chips (such as apple or my favorite, hickory) is used for smoking.
I often make bacon the first ingredient to go into a pot, because it gives off a lot of fat, making it a more flavorful alternative to olive oil or butter. As for when I use which bacon, I use slab bacon in most instances and double-smoked bacon when I want an extra-smoky undercurrent.
Where can you find these? Generally speaking, any bacon kept uncut by a butcher is what you’re looking for. You might also find a high-quality brand in your market’s refrigerator case. Look for those that say “smoked bacon” but beware the ones that aim to trick you with the not-so-clever phrase “smoke flavored,” meaning it uses liquid smoke flavoring rather than the real thing.
Double-smoked bacon may be sold in a vacuum-sealed wrapper. If it is, the outer layer of the bacon is rich with smoky flavor, though a bit tough to chew. Trim this portion and use it along with the bacon in the beginning of a recipe, then pick it out with tongs or a slotted spoon at the end of the cooking process. (Incidentally, my favorite smoked bacon is made by Schaller & Weber, see Mail-Order Sources.)
If your market doesn’t have any high-quality slab bacon, you can simply revert to olive oil or butter in most cases. You can also use the omnipresent thin strips sold in your market’s refrigerator case, but you won’t get exactly the same flavor and they won’t maintain their shape over long cooking (in fact, they’ll melt away). Personally, I’d save those for breakfast and enjoy them with your eggs and toast rather than using them for cooking at other times of the day. Try thick-cut bacon instead, which will hold up better through the cooking process and is also available in most supermarkets.
Garlic Powder
No ingredient I use inspires more raised eyebrows than garlic powder, which many disdain as a poor substitute for garlic. I agree: It is a poor substitute for garlic. But I don’t use it for that purpose. I use garlic powder to preseason fish and meats. It offers a more pronounced and complex flavor than the standard combination of salt and pepper.
Marjoram
I love marjoram because its flavor is utterly unique, and it gets along especially well with slow-cooked meats and braised poultry and game. I’ve offered substitutions for marjoram throughout the book, but if you’ve never tasted it, seek out fresh marjoram, especially for the way it completes the Rabbit Stew with Marjoram and Vermouth.
Parmesan Cheese (Parmigiano-Reggiano)
Ever wonder why chefs and cookbooks urge you to go to the trouble and expense of purchasing a large chunk of Parmigiano-Reggiano and grating it yourself? There are a number of good reasons, actually. First of all, though a block of imported cheese may seem expensive, you’d be surprised at the sheer volume of grated cheese just a few ounces yields. Secondly, the texture and intense flavor of freshly grated cheese is simply beyond compare. I use the small-holed side of an old-fashioned box grater for Parmesan cheese because the fine grating allows the cheese to melt more easily into a soup or pasta sauce.
Finally, Parmesan rinds are useful for flavoring simmering sauces and soups such as Tomato, Bread, and Parmesan Soup. Save rinds by tightly wrapping them in plastic wrap and starting them in the refrigerator where they will keep nearly indefinitely. They can also be frozen and thawed as needed.
Even if reconstituted with water straight from the Fountain of Youth, dried porcini mushrooms will never attain the same meaty perfection they had when they were fresh. But dried porcini mushrooms are an extremely potent source of hearty mushroom flavor that can be invaluable in soups, stocks, and cooking liquids. I love it so much that I also pulverize dried porcinis into a powder.
I skip the step of reconstituting dried porcini mushrooms in hot water before adding them to the recipes in this book because this keeps all of their flavor in the pot rather than sacrificing some of it to the soaking liquid. Just be sure to rinse them briefly under cold running water before using them, rubbing them to remove any lingering grit.
Salt, Coarse
I use coarse, Kosher salt almost exclusively. Avoid brands that contain prussiate of soda, an anti-caking agent that delays the dissolving of the salt in liquid, which makes it enormously difficult to season properly and can absolutely ruin a dish.
Stocks and Broth
As I mentioned in the Introduction, most of the recipes in this book can be made with store-bought broth. However, there are a few dishes that really benefit from homemade stocks, so if you want to make your own, here are the recipes.