Israeli White Bean Soup

There's an Israeli hole-in-the-wall restaurant that the CC has patronized for more than a decade now.

The owner is a curmudgeon who knows exactly how amazing his food is.

(For US readers: think Soup Nazi from Seinfeld and yes! the CC is perfectly aware of the idiocy and offensiveness of using the term "Israeli Nazi" but that is the only characterization that fits.)

Only two things soften him up — an appreciation for his cooking, and cute chicks, and the latter sometimes doesn't cut any mustard. He once tossed out out two clueless cute giggling girls. Then he turned to the CC and said, "They don't know anything about food."

The CC has always been on the good side but it took time and patience to become an insider. One fine day, the maestro said in a mocking and ironic way, "So you like my soup, eh?"

And that was that. The gates of paradise had been thrown open.

A decade later (yes! it's a slow burn), the CC asked him why his soup was so good and the answer was as blunt as the man, "Everyone knows the recipe. It takes time, and people don't want to spend the time."

The ingredients are humble, the technique is straightforward and there's nothing difficult about it.

People just don't want to take the time.

Ingredients

1 cup white beans

1 large red onion (diced fine)
4 cloves garlic (diced fine)

4 tbsp tomato paste
8 tomatoes (passed through a food mill)

4 tbsp olive oil

salt
pepper (lots!)

Recipe

Note 1: You can't hurry this recipe up. Don't even try. In fact, this is ideal for a slow cooker kind of situation except that since it involves two steps, it doesn't fit the mold of the slow cooker recipes.

Note 2: For most of the recipe, you are doing nothing. It's eminently week-day friendly. Set the timer and forget about it.

Note 3: It is very important to use fresh tomatoes. If you don't have any double down on the tomato paste. Do not use canned tomatoes. The final color of the soup should be a pale orange not a deep red characteristic of tomatoes. The beans are the star not the tomatoes.

Note 4: You may be tempted to add herbs — the dish is very Mediterranean and Israel is part of that Mediterranean culture but be judicious. Less is more here.

Heat up the olive oil in a pot. When it shimmers, add the onions and garlic. Let them cook at a medium heat until they are translucent. Do not let them caramelize. You want the color to be this sublimely clear white.

Add the beans and stir them around. Add 3 cups of water, salt and black pepper. Turn the heat down to the lowest possible setting. Let them cook for an hour. Sample to see if the beans are barely done.

When they still not cooked, add the tomato paste and the tomatoes. Cook for another 20 minutes. The acid in the tomatoes will slow down the cooking of the beans.

Check again that the beans are done. More salt and pepper if necessary. Add more water if necessary. It's a soup after all.

Serve with some pita.

Kale Me, Kale Me Now!

The culinary world, like the world at large, is subject to the ebbs and tides of fashion. Things come and go, they fall in and out of vogue. The seasons change and so does the culinary world.

Anyone that thinks this is a recent notion should be disabused of it rather quickly.

"I hate everything Egyptian", said Goethe once. He can't have been too familiar with Egypt never having been there what with travel being so difficult in those days. He was responding to the aftermath of Napoleon's campaign in Egypt and Syria which set off a fad for all things "Egyptian". (There may have been more than a trace of anti-French attitude given the nationalistic times but the point stands nevertheless.)

In the same age, Byron, the hedonist poet of his age and burgeoning metrosexual, who was so terrified of his figure that he weighed himself compulsively, advocated a diet of vinegar and rice and thanks to him being the male Beyoncé of his day, not only did women (and men!) throw themselves at him in disproportionate proportions but also did they submit themselves to the regular bouts of vomiting and diarrhea that came with the dietary territory.

Fun times.

America has always been the land of food fads. What with Fletcherism ("chew your food 100 times in a minute before swallowing") to Kellogg who invented cereals as a "cure for masturbation" (sic) to low-carb diets and the low-carb backlash (Atkins), there has always been room in a new country for a new mechanism to reinvent yourself.

Not that the old world is exempt. Almost all of the modern ideas derive in one way or the other from the ideas of Galen (29 A.D.) The notion of things as "hot" and "cold". There are competing systems in India ("Ayurveda") and China (食疗).

All of which are completely bogus, of course.

The latest fad seems to be kale but most people don't know how to work with the vegetable. It seems to be a "cure all" but nobody in the 19th century would've considered it so. It was peasant food because you have to work to make it edible. It's natural form is not given to tasting good.

Tasting bad is, ironically "mostly universal".  It tastes bad because we have evolved a mechanism whereby something that tastes bad is probably poisonous or rotten and our senses are steering us away from it. Except that we humans, are insanely inventive. We invented cooking which neutralizes these poisons. And we're risk takers so that when we taste something bitter (bitter melons, brussel sprouts, beer!) and survive, it's like a roller coaster and we want more of the same.

This leads us to a digression. If you are going to make something that "tastes good", it takes considerable ingenuity to make it so.

Kale is undoubtedly "good for you". It also undoubtedly sucks in taste in its native form. We've had millennia to figure this out. The rational response has always been to pair it with a completely irresistible umami flavor and whether you did it via meat, mushroom, tomatoes or cheese is irrelevant. We have recipes from across the globe that do this.

There are a few things that need to be done. Firstly the tough central rib must be removed. They would've been fed to the animals on the farm. Secondly, with winter kale, you must massage it vigorously with your hands. You are breaking up the cellular structure. You will feel the kale go limp in your hands. After that, let the umami begin!

The recipes here are not only "good for you" but also "waste very little" and it will also make you roll your eyes back in pleasure.

Kale & White Bean Soup with Parmesan Broth

Ingredients

1 bunch kale
1/2 cup white beans

1 large onion (chopped coarsely)
4-6 cloves garlic (chopped)
2 parmesan rinds
6 cups water

olive oil

salt
pepper

Recipe

First make the parmesan broth. You need to have saved some parmesan rinds. They function like the "bones" in the broth.

Fry the onions and garlic in the olive oil. Add the rinds and the water, bring to a simmer and let it simmer for an hour at a low temperature. Strain the broth through a strainer retaining the liquid.

Meanwhile, make the beans. Simmer in water and salt until just below tender. This depends on the age of your beans. Separate the beans and the liquid and retain both.

Prep the kale. Remove the tough stems, and cut into a chiffonade.

Combine the broth, the beans, the bean liquor and bring to a simmer. Add black pepper to taste (the CC likes to amp it!). Adjust the salt. The parmesan is already salty so you may not need much. When it simmers, toss in the kale leaves and let wilt for 3 minutes.

Serve at once preferably poured over stale bread.

Kale Salad with Buttermilk Dressing

Ingredients

1 bunch kale
4 radishes (sliced paper thin)
1 carrot (sliced paper thin)
croutons

4 tbsp.. shaved parmigiano-reggiano (or more!)
1 tbsp. olive oil
1/2 tbsp. sherry vinegar
buttermilk (read below - exact proportions are hard)

salt (to taste)
black pepper

Recipe

Note: When the CC refers to buttermilk, it means real buttermilk. When cream is whipped, it separates out into butter (the fat) and the liquid (the non-fat). The latter is the buttermilk. It has a smooth complexity thanks to the lecithin. Commercial stuff called "buttermilk" is not really buttermilk. It'll still taste good but you will have to thin it with water.

First prep the kale. Remove the tough stems and cut into thin strips. Do the massage thing. They will wilt. (This is important otherwise you will be chewing like a cow and cursing the CC. Not recommended!)

Meanwhile, make the dressing. Add the parmesan, olive oil and vinegar. Slowly pour in the buttermilk while whisking continuously. You will need more than the conventional 3:1 ratio because the parmesan is adding heft to the dressing. Thin till it has the consistency of a dressing. Add the salt and black pepper to taste.

Mix everything together. Let sit for at least 3 minutes. Dig in!

Golden Beet & Beet Greens Soup

This is the ultimate meta-recipe for a simple soup based on the barest minimum of ingredients.

The modern-day conception is unmistakably French although soups of this nature undoubtedly floated all around Europe before the codification of national cuisines in the 19th century.

They rely on only a handful of ingredients for flavoring and they can be tailored to both the seasons and the occasion. The soup can be made limpid and elegant or hearty and robust using just a few tricks.

The recipe at its heart is simple. Onions and/or related alliums — leeks, garlic, shallots are sautéed in olive oil till they are golden. Then water (or a clear broth) is added and the mixture brought to a boil. To this are added some vegetables which are cooked until tender. The vegetables (typically root vegetables) add their own flavor to the broth. At the last minute, finely chiffonaded greens are added and the soup is taken off the heat and served.

The recipe is so extraordinarily simple that naturally the CC needs to explain it in copious detail.

Simplicity frequently belies an underlying deep complexity.

The allium family, of which onions are a member of, are rich in volatile sulfur compounds. This is what causes their pungency and all the tearing. Only a small amount of molecules make their way to your eye but it's enough for you to start crying. It's a defense mechanism to prevent them from being eaten by animals but, of course, we humans figured a work around.

Cooking.

The flavor is coming from the sautéeing of the alliums. The sulfur compound that causes the tearing (1-propenyl sulfenic acid)  converts in the presence of heat into another compound (3-mercapto-2-methlylpentan-1-ol) that is strongly present in meat broth. This is perceived to our tongues in the presence of salt as a very strong savory flavor. We're using alliums but our tongues and stomach are screaming  "MEAT!!!".

This is why many cuisines worldwide use onions as the base of any recipe. It also shows how strongly the evolution of our tongue and diet has relied on meat, the last few thousand years of modern-day vegetarianism notwithstanding.

The addition of vegetables to this broth increases the savory quotient and results in an intensely flavored broth. The greens add complexity, nutrition, textural and visual interest.

The vegetables are almost always paired with their corresponding greens. Beets and beet greens. Turnips and turnip greens. Carrots and carrot fronds. Potatoes and dandelion greens (weeds). You get the idea.

This recipe is clearly a peasant recipe that got refined and passed upwards into the nobility. It's origins clearly betray the fact that it was meant as a recipe that doesn't waste anything. You use the beets and the greens that come up with the beets. The entire plant and no wastage. Something that should appeal to the present "back-to-the-past waste-not-want-not" movement.

Heft can be added in one of four different ways:

• Broth instead of water.
• Cooked beans which add more protein.
• Soup poured over stale bread.
• Sprinkling of parmesan on top (more umami.)

The plainest recipe works superbly as a first course in an elegant meal. The recipe with all the bells and whistles performs perfectly as a light but nutritiously complete one-pot meal. It works particularly well as the ideal light lunch.

For the record, the CC once made the lightest alternative for his mom as part of a three-course lunch and he was greeted with, "I want a second helping."

This is a meta-recipe that clearly belongs in the Pantheon of the Greats.

Ingredients

(serves 2)

2 small golden beets with greens attached
2 onions
1 head spring garlic

3 cups water

sea salt
black pepper (lots!)

1/2 cup white beans pre-cooked (optional)
4 slices stale bread (optional)
1/2 cup parmigiano-reggiano (optional)

Recipe

Note 1: The recipe is made with golden beets because it respects the "clean" broth look that this recipe entails. The water has a light golden color. Regular beets would work but they would color the broth pink. The recipe has a clear limpid texture even though that's not obvious in the picture above.

Note 2: For a more elegant presentation while adding heft, make some parmesan toasts.

Separate the beets from the greens. Cut out the central stem of each frond retaining just the leafy green part.

Peel the beets and chop into flat medium-thick rings.

Chop the onions into quarter rings. Chop the garlic into slivers.

Sautée the onions and garlic in some olive oil at medium heat. Add the black pepper. When they are golden (but not colored) add 3 cups of water and bring to a boil. Turn the heat down. Add the beets and beans (if using) and let cook covered for about 6-7 minutes at medium heat until the beets are done.

Taste the broth for salt and add as much as necessary.

Once more bring the mixture to a rolling boil. Add the greens and turn the heat off. Let them sit for 1 minute.

Serve at once over bread (if using) with parmesan (if using).

Clam, White Bean & Saffron Soup with Parmesan Toasts

This is a very simple recipe. The CC has seen it made with mussels as well.

The parmesan toasts are simply superb. They would work with most soups.

The advantage of making them is you do get a subtle umami flavoring from the parmesan as you dunk them in clam soup but at no point does it overwhelm the purity of the clam flavor which would be the case if you just added parmesan directly to the soup.

Parmesan Toasts

(yields 8 triangles)

Ingredients

1 1/2 cup grated parmigiano-reggiano
4 slices bread

Recipe

Preheat the oven to 350°F.

On a tray lay out the slices of bread and evenly divide the parmesan onto each.

Bake for about 10 minutes. Be careful that they do not burn. Cut into triangles and set aside.

Clam, White Bean & Saffron Soup

(serves 2)

Ingredients

2 dozen clams

1 small onion (sliced into thin half-rounds)

1/4 cup white beans

olive oil

large pinch of saffron

black pepper

Recipe

First make the beans. Cook them in very lightly salted water till done. Roughly 20 minutes. Reserve the broth. (Do not oversalt the water because the clams are briny and the soup will become overly salty)

Cook the clams with some water. When they open fish them out. Pass the clam broth through a cheesecloth to eliminate the sand. Reserve the clams and broth separately.

In a pot, heat up some olive oil. Add the onions and cook till they are limp but not colored. Fry the cooked beans for a bit. Add the two broths and black pepper. Bring to a boil and let it cook for about 8-10 minutes. Add the saffron at the last minute. Turn off the heat.

Divide the clams into two bowls. Top with the soup. Serve with the parmesan toasts.

Flavor Infusion

Have you ever had a watery soup with only one or two ingredients that was absolutely delicious? Did you ever wonder how they managed to get it infused with so much flavor? Did you suspect them of using broth?

You'd be wrong.

It is possible to bring out a vast array of flavors from just a few vegetables and water but you need to know a few tricks first.

The Italians call the technique insaporire – to infuse with flavor.

The first and the hardest part is that you cannot hurry the process. Time is the secret to success here.

The second is that you need to actually drop the vegetables in the "correct" order. The order is actually based on water content something that you will not learn from an Italian nonna's, who know these things instinctively, but since you and the CC aren't of a certain age yet, we resort to science.

The vegetables must be fried in order of least water content to most water content. Onions, leeks, garlic come first, followed by root vegetables like carrot and potato, followed by celery, followed by cooked beans, followed by mushrooms and leafy vegetables come last.

The last part is that you actually need to fry the leafy vegetables not just cook them. They have a ton of water so they need to be both blanched and wrung dry. (The broth can be preserved and added back to the soup when the time of frying is over.)

This really really matters. You cannot hurry the process nor short-circuit it.

What is really happening here?

When you fry vegetables languidly at a medium-low heat, you are basically allowing Maestro Maillard to work his magic.

When you add the water, you are just transferring the rich flavor from the surface of the vegetables to the broth. It allows you to interleave two steps into one and more importantly, do it in an economic manner – something that has always been important in the kitchen.

There are generalizations on this technique. You could use a ton of vegetables. That's what a minestrone really is. Or you could add greens. Or bung in an anchovy. Or a little diced pork. Or some raw shrimp right before serving.

However, the technique of slow frying to build the flavor remains the same.

Let's showcase this with a classic summer recipe.

Ingredients

2 leeks or spring onions (thinly sliced)
1 zucchini (sliced into half-moons)
1/2 cup white beans

2 sprigs rosemary
1 sprig sage

sea salt
black pepper

1/2 cup parmigiano-reggiano

Recipe

Cook the beans with 1 sprig of rosemary and some sea salt. Drain and set aside.

In a medium vessel, heat up some olive oil. When it shimmers, add the leeks and turn the heat to medium-low. Let it cook languidly for at least 10 minutes. Make sure they don't brown. Add the black pepper.

Add the zucchini and let it cook languidly for at least 10 minutes till the zucchini is limp but not falling apart. It may be browned in places which is fine.

Add the beans and cook for an additional 5 minutes.

Add the water and bring to a boil. Serve at once topped with the parmigiano-reggiano and additional black pepper. Crusty bread works its charm here.

White Bean Risotto with Mushrooms

We've encountered something like this before but the CC can't invent new tricks all the time. You gotta revisit the old ones from time to time.

Difference is he added dashi (= umami) infused with mushrooms as the broth, and added some wild mushrooms to the mix.


(Recipe: link.)

Prosciutto, White Bean & Mesclun Salad with Basil Vinaigrette

This is really really brilliant. The CC first ate it at a local eaterie and has been hankering for it ever since.

The origin is only vaguely Tuscan in nature pairing off their love for white beans and prosciutto and basil into one lovely salad. The multitudinous textures alone do the trick but this is a meal in and of itself.

The original salad had arugula in it but the arugula was so pathetic locally that the CC bought home some mesclun instead.

It makes a perfect summer meal.

Ingredients

1 cup white beans
1 tomato (diced fine)
generous handful of basil

2 servings mesclun
parmigiano-reggiano (thinly shaved)
prosciutto

olive oil
vinegar
salt
pepper

Recipe

The recipe may sound fussy but the hardest part - cooking the white beans - can be done in advance.

Cook the white beans until just under tender. The CC used a pressure cooker. Let it cool down in a refrigerator for a while.

Shave the parm really thin. This may sound fussy but is really necessary.

Blend the basil with some vinegar and salt into a liquidy paste. Mix the white beans, chopped tomato, and 75% of the basil liquid. Season to taste. Set aside.

The rest of the paste should be mixed with some more vinegar, olive oil, salt and pepper and made into a vinaigrette.

Serve the white bean salad topped with parm, and the mesclun and vinaigrette topped with the prosciutto.

Decadence Florentine Style

The CC has already talked before about the Tuscan love of beans but today he encountered a Florentine recipe from the decadent 1920's that calls for Beluga caviar served on top of white bean paste (fagioli con caviale.) The author tartly observes that "surely this must be the most expensive way of salting your beans!"

Pasta con fagioli

The Tuscans really really love their beans. Among the Italians, they are sometimes referred to derisively as mangiafagioli (bean-eaters.)

White beans are not just a dish but a way of life.

We're gonna make a Tuscan classic, and we're gonna do it the Tuscan way, which is the ol'-fashioned anal-retentive way, which needless to say gives superior results.

This one trick over here gives it the serious complexity of a meat sauce, even though this is completely vegetarian. Of course, if you have some prosciutto or guanciale, toss the diced pig in post-soffrito, and pig out afterwards.

There is only one way to describe this dish: effin' delicious.

In fact, serve it lukewarm with some olive oil drizzled on top, and you can dump the pretense of the pasta too.

Ingredients

2 cups white beans (soaked overnight)

3 cloves of garlic

1 large onion† (diced fine)
2 large carrots (diced fine)
1 stick celery (diced fine)

† After they are diced, they must be in a ratio of 2:1:1.

12-16 tomatoes (passed through a food mill)

1 parmigiano-reggiano rind
more parmigiano-reggiano (grated)

1 cup red wine (use drinkable stuff)

1 bay leaf
2 cloves
1 stick cinnamon
1 dried red chilli pepper

1 branch rosemary

extra-virgin olive oil
parsley (chopped fine)
sea salt
black pepper

Recipe

First up, the beans need to be soaked overnight, and the water discarded at 12-hour intervals. The water will turn yellow, and those in the know, refer to it as acqua fartorum. Let it go. For your own well-being, and for those that sleep besides you at night.

The tomatoes need to put in boiling water for roughly 8 minutes each, and passed through a food mill. Yeah, this is hard work but since this is not Rachel Ray™'s Room for Rubes & Retards™, you must pay the price for good food.

Rotate, baby, rotate; get those triceps a movin'. Yeah, that means you.

The recipe is quite simple but needs patience.

First up, the soffrito of the Holy Trinity (just like the French mirepoix.)

At a low heat (you knew that, right?) fry the onions and garlic, then the carrots, finally the celery. If this doesn't take the better part of 20 minutes, you're doing it wrong, and you will pay the price in taste.




Add the cinnamon, cloves, red chilli pepper, and bay leaf, and fry for a bit.

Add the wine, and scrape the bottom to deglaze the pan. This is the last of the "hard work" so just scrape properly, okay? OKAY.

Just make sure you use a good Italian red, and the CC ain't talking about Roberto Rosselini neither.


Ignore the spillage at the left hand side of the picture. That's what happens when you try and cook and take pictures at the same time.

Add the beans, and the tomatoes, and the salt and pepper, and the rosemary and the parm rind.





Let it simmer (at a low heat) until the beans are soft. Timings are hard because they basically depend on the age of the beans but we're looking at the better part of 2 hours here.

Yes, this matters, it matters, it matters. Don't argue. Make it first the CC's way; talk back later.



You may need to add some water from time to time if the stuff starts sticking.

Now, it's time for a visit to the confessional. After about 2 hours, the beans hadn't even started softening while the tomato sauce was getting nicely caramelized. Outside, the hungry hordes were pawing at the kitchen door. The summer heat and the kitchen heat and the stomach heat was getting to everyone concerned. Tension was mounting.

So the CC unceremoniously dumped the entire melange into his pressure cooker, added some water, and the beans were ready 10 minutes later.

Serve with parsley, the grated parm, lots of black pepper, and an Italian red.

Mangia bene!

Pasta con fagioli