Lasagna with vegetables and beef with Soubise sauce

One of the restaurants where I had the "opportunity" to work recently, in his letter had several pasta dishes accompanied by sauce Soubise. I was pleasantly surprised to find in the letter because it is a classic little used, and made the next day at work was excited, thinking I would find the truth in the kitchen I think. But to get there I realized that this restaurant was not just another "VIP" or other "Ginosa" more: almost everything was pre-cooked and the sauce Soubise was just a cheese sauce. So I decided to put the recipe here with one of my favorite dishes.

Sauce Soubise

Two onions
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons flour
500 ml of milk
Nutmeg
1 / 2 teaspoon sugar
Salt
Freshly ground pepper
6 tablespoons crème fraîche

Soubise sauce created in the eighteenth century, Bertrand, the cook of Charles de Rohan, prince de Soubise. It consists of melting the butter in a small pot on the fire, then add flour and cook one minute. Then add the milk stirring constantly to avoid lumps are created and enter the onions cut in half or quarters. After ten minutes remove the onions and saute in butter. When tender, shred and add to the sauce with a little sugar, salt, nutmeg and pepper. Then we let it boil another 10 minutes to thicken and then add the crème fraîche.

Tomato reduction

1 kg of crushed tomatoes
1 tablespoon sugar
Oregano or basil (preferably fresh)
1 clove garlic
1 / 4 olive oil
Salt

Pour oil in large skillet with the garlic. When you throw a little gold crushed tomatoes with remaining ingredients. Cook over low heat, stirring for about an hour. Add a little more oil if necessary.

Lasagna

1 eggplant
1 zucchini
1 package pasta plates
Sauce Soubise
Ketchup
300 g minced beef
Olive oil
Salt

Peel eggplant and cut into slices. Do the same with the zucchini without peeling. Normally I prefer to leave the vegetables with skin, unless they have been in direct contact with the earth, but for cutting lasagna is then more comfortable, I prefer removing the skin of the eggplant for this development. Make the vegetables to Grilled with a little oil and a pinch of salt. Reserve the vegetables for later use.

In a skillet with a little oil, cook ground beef with a little salt and, when well done, add 4 tablespoons of tomato we've already developed.

Then, in a baking pan approximately 30cm x 20cm with about 6 cm deep, into the bottom base of tomato sauce on top, covering the bottom, a layer of pasta plates. Place a layer over the vegetables to the plate and behind it, a layer of meat. Repeat the operation several times, layer pasta, vegetables, layer, layer of meat and final layer of pasta and cover with sauce Soubise.
The get in the oven to 150 º C for 20-30 minutes.

Gnocchi

I guess all you have ever tried the gnocchi, but usually do not know potato is usually not know anything. But events at home ... Ay! that is another thing.

Potato Gnocchi

500 g of skinless baked potato
75 gr flour
75g cornflour
20 g of salt
2 eggs

The coceremos potatoes whole with skin, abundant water and a handful of salt. After the pelaremos and grate or crush with a fork. To get you kicked potato flour, eggs and salt and mix well.
Cut small pieces of dough to which we will make these brands after features. I have the wooden contraption below because I bought in Siena, but you can do the same with a grater or with a fork. When we formed the coceremos in boiling water for 4 minutes.
After this, we can freeze, or put them in the fridge and then adding our favorite sauce.

Those pictured are potato gnocchi gorgonzola flavored vanilla and strawberry dice

Pizza

For the dough

500 gr flour
1 1 / 2 cup water
1 / 4 cup olive oil
50 gr yeast
1 tablespoon salt

Make the dough is very simple and worthwhile. First you have to mix the fresh yeast with the flour, crumbled with the fingers. The salt will put it on one side, without mixing to the yeast does not touch directly and then we'll take a volcano to the water and oil in it. Then we'll just knead until a homogeneous mass.
Before joining the pizza let the dough rest for an hour in a bowl covered with plastic wrap, or a clean dish towel.

When making the pizza there are several types depending on the thickness of it, the Roman pizza is the finest and crujente, about 2mm, the Neapolitan-style pizza 5mm and focaccia about 1cm.

Filling ... that's a thing of each. First tomatoes (crushed or natural ketchup fried), then cheese and finally everything else ham, more cheese, sausage, vegetables, frutti di mare ... what you like, that's the beauty of a pizza.

Not rice, risotto

Today I will write my recipe for risotto. The risotto is fantastic but only when done right. I do not usually ask for risotto when and away from home because I almost always try depressed. I do not know why most l @ s @ s think cooking the risotto should be able to cut with a knife. I look forward to asking for something that sounds as good as "seasonal mushroom risotto" and finally I have to leave home because I thought that helped me was a thick paste with lumps that required a lot of water to swallow. Well, sometimes I found that hard rice taste.
The risotto should be creamy, and bathe the plate to fall and not be glued to the ceramic stone like a sticky.
It can do many things, the most famous in Spain is the mushroom, I suppose, but even with strawberries is not too bad. But I'm going to teach you or the asparagus or the artichoke (the latter is my favorite). Well, later I will show a more substantial, p, but what I will teach you today is to make a simple risotto, with nothing, and when you do it you will find that this recipe does not need rice or foie gras, or duck, nor ingredients to make your longer name. When you do it you prove one of the tastiest things in the world.

The ingredients are easily available. Rice is the most appropriate one Italian rice called arborio, is perfect because it has a lot of starch and does not open easily, leaving the perfect center but the grain absorb much liquid. But, you know what? I do it with rice round, fat as ever and he looks great. You also need salt, black pepper, butter, cream, Parmesan and water. That's it. If you seek a risotto recipe in google or youtube will all be extremely complicated and convoluted, but that's not risotto, gazpacho is like strawberry gazpacho that is not. It can be cold strawberry soup with vegetables, but never a gazpacho.

Risotto for 4 people

4 handfuls of rice
Water
1 1 / 4 tablespoon Butter
1 cup cream
5 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese
Salt
Black pepper

In a deep skillet or saucepan melt a teaspoon of butter (with or without salt, it does not matter), and add the rice for a bit refreshing. Then add salt and pepper. Do not be burdened in this way, sometimes people think that salt is a problem but should not be. I tend to add salt to my meals a lot of times, every step of the recipe. You must add and test, add and test, nothing more. Provided that we spend, there will be a solution. And if we spend our solution also exists.
After adding the salt water cover the rice and let it go by but never stirring and adding water while rice whenever we asked. What we are looking at is that rice risotto release all their starch. So we should NEVER wash. We must ensure that the grain is tender but not pass. The core of the grains should be crispy, crunchy.
When rice is ready and has little water, remove from the heat and add butter, Parmesan and cream and, without stirring, we covered him for two minutes.
Then uncover and stir. We test, salt to taste and see that the risotto is creamy, more dense liquid (for which we will take more cream if we believed necessary.) And you're ready to taste.

This recipe I learned in Florence's Ristorante Rossini, Antonio taught me, though I knew some words in Spanish was very shy and hardly spoke to me. He put a pinch of ground coffee into the bowl, covered it with the risotto to serve before he threw a spoonful of honey, and painted with powdered crispy duck skin and lavender flowers. Thanks Antonio.