MINEST, classic Brooklyn-Italian winter soup of greens

Photograph of fresh Greens via Wikipedia under GNU Free Documentation License

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Minest: It's unlikely that you will find this recipe in a cookbook or even on-line.  It's classic Brooklyn-Italian, great winter comfort food, a soup lush with mixed greens and rich with flavor.  If your kids generally don't like to eat greens, there's a good chance they will eat them this way. 

Serve the minest with warm slices of a quality gluten-free bread that you have made or purchased at Whole Foods.

A salad of fresh herbs, grape tomatoes, and cubes of fresh mozzarella. Dress the salad with a savory vinaigrette. You can substitute extra-firm tofu for mozzarella if you are vegan. Just cube and marinate the tofu for about an hour in some vinaigrette first. 

Follow the soup and salad with a light dessert such as fresh orange sections drizzled with Amaretto and topped with a sprinkle of chopped almonds or shredded coconut. Wind it all up with a cup of smokey, black China tea like Russian Caravan Tea from Peet's.  

Traditionally minest was made by first boiling a prosciutto bone in water for a broth and then adding the other ingredients after several hours.  I always used to make the broth and then refrigerate it so that I could skim the fat and proceed after that. I have not included it here for a few reasons: 1.) Given the times, it just won't be budget-wise for many folks.  It used to be you could get a prosciutto bone from the Italian Pork Store for nothing.  I'm sure they come dear these days.  2.) I don't know if they are gluten-free. 3.) Many of us are cutting back on or forgoing meat for reasons of health, and/or ethics, and/or compassion.  I don't think the recipe suffers from this modification.  I have enriched the veggie broth with a base of sauted minced vegetables, extra virgin olive oil, and the addition of pesto (for those who have no nut or cheese allergies) or pistou for those who do.  Although some folks add cheese to pistou, the traditional version does not include it. 

If you must have meat and can't afford or don't have access to prosciutto, you could substitute smoked turkey legs or a hunk of gluten-free American ham. Whatever you use, check the packages or contact the manufacturer to be sure that whatever you buy is gluten-free.  Other variations:  you could add polpetti (tiny meatballs) or take a page out of the French cookbook and top each serving of minest with a fried egg.

This post includes recipes for minest, pesto, pistou, and vinaigrette salad dressing. 

GLUTEN-FREE MINEST

The Recipe

Serves six as a main course

1 large onion, peeled and minced

6 cloves of garlic, peeled and minced

1 carrot, shredded

1 celery stalk, minced

1/2 green bell pepper, minced

4 mushrooms, minced

Olive Oil (doesn't have to be first press)

1 small head of savoy cabbage, washed, cored and cut into wedges

1 bunch of escarole, washed and torn into small pieces

1 bunch of swiss chard, washed and torn into small pieces

1 - 32 ounce container of  Imagine gluten-free vegetable broth

1 cup of cold, filtered water

1/2 cup of Extra Virgin Olive Oil, the best you can afford

Sea salt and cracked black pepper to taste

Saute the onion, garlic, carrot, celery, bell pepper, and mushroom in the olive oil in a pot large enough to accommodate all the greens. When they are lightly browned and beginning to soften, add the both to the pot and follow with the greens.  Simmer until the greens are tender.  Add the extra virgin olive oil and salt and pepper to taste.  Stir.

After you dish out the soup, pass around the pesto or the pistou so that each person can add what they would like to flavor their own bowl of soup.

Pesto: Process the following in your food processor, everything but the basil leaves at first.  Once the rest is processed, add the basil.

• 2 cups fresh basil leaves, washed and dried
• 1/2 cup freshly grated sheep's milk pecorino romano
• 1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil, best you can afford
• 1/3 cup pine nuts
• 3 cloves of garlic, peeled and sliced
• Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

Pistou: Process the following in your food processor, everything but the basil leaves at first. Once the rest is processed, add the basil.

• 2 cups fresh basil leaves, washed and dried
• 6 garlic cloves, peeled and sliced
• 6 ripe tomatoes, peeled, seeded, and chopped
• 4 to 6 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil, best you can afford
• sea salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste

GLUTEN-FREE VINAIGRETTE, adapted from Charles Virion's French Country Cookbook
The recipe
Makes 1 1/2 cups
3 tablespoons wine vinegar
9 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil, best you can afford
1 tablespoon Annie's Gluten-free Dijon Mustard
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/2 teaspoon fresh parsley, minced
1/2 teaspoon fresh chives, minced or 3/4 teaspoon dried chives
3/4 teaspoon dried oregano

Place all the ingredients except any fresh herbs into a mixing bowl and beat vigorously with a wire whisk until well mixed.  Add fresh herbs just before dressing the salad.

Actual product ingredients may be other than that which is shown or suggested on this blog. Please remember that you should not rely solely on the information presented here or anywhere online and that you always read package labels, warnings, and directions before purchasing and consuming a product. 

LASAGNA, BEST BROOKLYN MEMORY

Photograph by PD Photo.org

I have such an unrelenting food-trivia tracker, that I don't know how I missed National Lasagna Day . . . or Month . . . your choice . . . in July.  It finally crossed my radar while I was checking my favorite Brooklyn picture blogs. I haven't found any official source of information.  Well, after all, what industries could claim it?.  So many . . . pasta makers, tomato growers, cheese manufactures, purveyors of frozen foods, spice growers, and the restaurant industry.  Perhaps there are too many players for any one to lay a claim. The articles and postings I've found are inconsistent with regard to length.  Is it a one-day celebration or a month-long celebration?  I guess it depends on the depth of your devotion. At any rate, I doubt that Brooklyn needs an official day to celebrate this wonderful ethnic dish.

I'm surprised that whomever started this tradition, scheduled it in July.  Too hot!  A good, properly made lasagna takes hours to prepare.  Although there are shortcuts. One innovation layers ravioli for what is certainly a quick - and probably a tasty - alternative.
I used to make a "mock lasagna" in the summer time. I would gather together some of my own frozen tomato sauce or some prepared sauce,  full-fat ricotta, hard mozzarella, Ronzoni ochi de lupo (a wonderful, large macaroni), and various spices. I'd chop the cheese, cook the pasta, and warm the sauce.  Then I'd put all the ingredients together in a large pot on a medium gas, stirring well until the mozzarella was melted and the lasagna was hot.  Not particularly attractive, but the flavor was right. Add a green salad, some vino for the husband du jour, and we were set to go. It was quick.  The kitchen remained bearable.  I never had any complaints.

As I look back, I don't think I've ever encountered a lasagna I didn't like; but, quality ingredients and a good, classic, homemade meat-sauce, produces the best product. This means using homemade or artisan noodles, fresh high-quality cheeses, fresh herbs and spices, a variety of meats, good extra-virgin olive oil, and your own garden tomatoes or canned Italian plum tomatoes with basil. A superior lasagna requires a willingness to invest considerable time and money for something that will be immensely enjoyed, but pretty quickly polished off by family and guests, not to mention you.

My childhood and youth were rich in good cooks. A significant number of them were from Italy or were first generation Americans of Italian decent.  My schoolmate, Fran V., and her mom made trays of lasagna on a regular basis and brought them from their home in Rego Park, Queens to our convent school in Brentwood, Long Island on Sunday afternoons. Mrs. V. would use imported noodles, which had a wonderful bite.  Her sauce and her lasagna included a lot of delicious pork sausage with fennel seed.  Mrs. D., another friend's mother, lived near the Russian embassy in Glen Cove, Long Island.  She would always stud a large white onion with cloves and put that in her sauce as it simmered, removing it before serving. Nice flavor.
Everyone did something that made their sauce uniquely theirs.  Some used wine. Mrs. D. felt there should be some heat and added dried red pepper.  My high school sweetheart's mom didn't agree.  She added a pinch of sugar to her sauce. One family added cinnamon, which strikes me as quite a Greek thing.  Most added nutmeg to their ricotta. I knew women who thickened their sauce through long-hours of simmering.  Other's speeded the process by adding a can of tomato paste.  I think the latter makes for a highly acid sauce.  I have found through time that the addition of meatballs with their breadcrumbs serves well as a thickening. Everyone used Locatelli brand Romano. No dry, tasteless cheese from little, round, green containers.

My Aunt Mildred (see also the post on Roman Egg Drop Soup) was the best of the Brooklyn cooks.  She was a first-generation Italian-American. She used chicken in her sauce along with the other meats.  The meats included a small tenderloin of pork, Italian pork sausages (sweet and hot) and braciole (top round, sliced thin and pounded, rolled around a savory filling, and tied with cotton string).  Meatballs were standard additions to everyone's meat sauce, and my Aunt Mildred's were the gold standard. They were made from beef, sometimes from a combination of beef, pork, and veal. Generally eggs, seasoned Italian breadcrumbs, generous amounts of fresh, minced parsley,and grated Romano were incorporated into the ground meat, which was then formed into balls and browned in a fry pan before going into the sauce to simmer.

When assembling the lasagna, these wonderful old-world cooks would crumble meatballs and sausages and layer the crumbled meats in the lasagna along with the noodles, cheeses, and the sauce.  Most of the time, the sauce and the lasagna would be made a day or more ahead.  When this dinner was finally served, usually on Sunday, it started with a voluptuous vegetable salad with plenty of salty, oily olives . There was wine for the adults and water for the children. The meats were set out in a side dish. Extra sauce was served in a gravy boat. Big chunks of Locatelli Romano would be passed around the table along with a Muli grater, enabling each of us to have freshly grated cheese on our noodles. There were always dense, fragrant slices of Italian bread fresh from small, local, family-run bakeries. Sopping up extra meat sauce with the bread was a must and a delight. Dessert might be a selection of pastries, or fresh fruit that had been macerated or simmered in wine, or Amoretti cookies. There was espresso coffee too, often with grappa or a slice of lemon peel.

Lasagna Day or Lasagna Month, it's an interesting concept, but in the Brooklyn of my childhood, we didn't need an event. Many, many Sundays were lasagna day. It was quite a regular thing. I think it has probably become more and more difficult for people to come up with the time and money for such memorable civilities.

Actual product ingredients may differ from than that which is shown or suggested on this blog. Please remember that you should not rely solely on the information presented here or anywhere online and that you always read labels, warnings, and directions before purchasing and consuming a product.