Easter: Aunt May, Macaroons & Matzo Balls

With these matzo balls, who need Easter Ham?

Aunt May used to feed me matzo ball soup secretly in the kitchen before Easter Dinner. I loved the soup, and I hated the Easter ham and sweet potatoes that were always on the family Easter dinner table. My Aunt May was actually my Jewish step-grandmother who had married late in life into a slightly deranged Italian - Catholic family who always had an “American” Easter dinner. Ham, sweet potatoes, asparagus. She was afraid I’d starve since I’d sit tight-lipped in front of my mother’s baked ham. I don’t know what Mom did to that chunk of smoked pork, but it was always dry, and no amount of pineapple glaze could save it in my eyes.

Not that Aunt May was a perfect cook, either. She actually didn’t cook much, but I loved her matzo ball soup. On the other hand, her macaroons for Passover were so bad we used to hide them under the seat cushions until her visit ended. Sadly, she passed away before I had the sense to gather any of her recipes, but my mother had the matzo ball recipe since it was something her picky daughter would eat. No one, even to be polite, ever asked for that macaroon recipe, although I suspect it was off a cake meal box. Those Passover macaroons were truly vile.

These matzo balls are a bit of a compilation of recipes: Aunt May’s recipe uses the eggs separated and the whites beaten stiff, plus chicken fat (schmaltz) and chicken stock. I’ve added the chives, parsley, the longer resting time and the extra salt in the cooking water. Just like with pasta, these absorb water, and its all about the flavor! My friend Amy has also reminded me to not to lift the lid once you are boiling them. Because these are lightened with egg whites, you don’t want to handle them very much when forming. Compressing and hand forming them will make them rather stodgy. To keep them light and airy when I form them, I use this approx. 1” OXO cookie scoop and just gently roll them off my wet fingers into the pot. They puff to about 1-1/2”.

Puffy, gently chicken-y, and made with love, these taste like just the thing a Jewish “Auntie” would be happy her Italian granddaughter serves each year on her Easter table.

All of you, please, hold your family close this holiday weekend, and if you really want them to know they’re loved, serve these.

Recipe notes: I make my own chicken stock, unsalted, and I make it double or triple strength. If you don’t want to make your own, buy a good brand of boxed, unsalted stock and cook it down to half its original volume. Use part in the matzo balls and the rest add to the chicken stock in which you’ll serve them. You can sub a neutral oil for the chicken fat, (please don’t use melted margarine) although I save the fat that I skim from the aforementioned homemade stock to use in cooking. Obviously, if you keep kosher, you’ll need to adjust the ingredients used here to suit your dietary needs.

Everybody’s Matzo Balls

Makes 28-30 balls

1 cup matzo meal

4 large eggs, separated

¼ cup strong chicken stock

¼ cup chicken fat (schmaltz)

1 tsp. kosher salt

1 tsp. finely minced chives

1 Tblsp finely minced parsley, leaves only

Freshly ground black pepper, to taste

To cook:

4 quarts of boiling water in a pot that has a cover

2 Tblsp of kosher salt

To serve:

3 quarts of good strong chicken stock

The matzo balls

A few chives for garnish

Beat the egg whites in a medium bowl wit a hand mixer until soft, shiny peaks form when you lift the beaters. Set aside. In a second bowl, whisk together the yolks, the chicken stock, the chicken fat, the salt, the chives, the parsley and a few grinds of black pepper. Mix well. Add the matzo meal, and combine it completely.

Simple steps, here.

 Take 1/3 of the egg whites and mix it thoroughly into the matzo meal mixture. Be sure to scrape the bottom of the bowl. Take ½ of the remaining whipped whites and fold it in gently until no white streaks occur. Be sure to get all the way down to the bottom of the bowl. Take the last of the whites and again, gently fold in until there are only a few white streaks. Cover the bowl and refrigerate at least 4 hours and as long as 12.

When you are ready to cook the matzo balls, bring a gallon of water to a boil in a large covered pot, and add 2 Tblsp of kosher salt to the boiling water. Using the 1” cookie scoop  (or a small spoon), portion out little balls of the matzo dough and drop onto your wet fingers and then roll them off your fingers into the boiling salt water. Keep a bowl of water close, and wet your fingers as needed so they don’t stick. When they rise to the surface, stir very gently with a slotted spoon to turn them over, lower the heat to low, cover, and simmer for 40 minutes. They will puff to about 1-1/2”.  No peeking! Remove with a slotted spoon, and either chill, covered well, or place directly into soup bowls.

Do not lift the lid until done...or Amy will get you!

At serving time bring the 3 quarts of chicken stock to a simmer and taste for seasoning, add salt or pepper as needed. Drop in the matzo balls and simmer in the stock for about 10 minutes, if you’ve made the balls ahead and chilled them. If you are serving them straight from boiling, place in bowls, and ladle the hot chicken broth over and garnish with chives.

Makes 28 -30 matzo balls, and will serve anywhere from 6 to 10 people depending on what else is in the meal.

Rolling in Braciole

My mom stayed home when I was a kid, and depending on her mood, there’d occasionally be some sort of Italian extravaganza of pasta and meats and sauce for dinner.  My dad and I loved it. A favorite was braciole and rigatoni. The first time I ever heard my mother swear was while she was flattening the beef for braciole and dropped the mallet on her bare toes. It added greatly to my vocabulary at age 7. Sadly, I don’t have her recipe, since she wrote down next to nothing, but this comes pretty damn close. And I DO remember what she said. And it wasn’t damn.

 

We had this tonight with some goat cheese gnocchi made in big batches and frozen (yes, yes, the recipe will show up here sooner or later), and some simply cooked green beans from the last of this years’ garden. Mom would have loved this, especially since she didn’t have to swing a mallet.

Braciole Carlo
My husband, Chuck, aka "Carlo" adores braciole, so this is for you, hon.

4 servings

1 lb. top round beef, braciole-cut scallops in 4 pieces

8 oz. hot or sweet Italian style sausage, patties or casings removed

2 large garlic cloves, minced

1 large green onion (scallion) green and white part, minced

1/3 cup minced flat-leaf parsley

3 oz. stale bread, in fine crumbs

2 oz. Romano cheese, grated, Locatelli Romano preferred

¾ cup+ dry white wine

2 Tblsp extra virgin olive oil

Coarse ground black pepper to taste

4 toothpicks

Two quarts of basic tomato sauce or marinara* (see below)

Brown the sausage meat in a large non-stick sauté pan over medium heat, breaking up with a wooden spoon as it cooks.  You want to render the fat from the sausage a bit and brown it lightly. Next add the scallion and garlic and continue to stir until the green onion softens.

Use a nonstick pan for this, so you won't need to drown it all in oil.

Turn off the heat. Add the parsley, bread crumbs and the Romano. Mix gently to combine and absorb the oil from fat from the pan. Begin to add the wine, slowly, a bit at a time until the bread mixture can be molded easily, but there should be no excess juices seeping out. You may need a few extra tablespoons of wine. If you put in too much, turn on the heat under the pan and let some of the moisture steam away. Let cool away from the burner while you prepare the beef.

Place each beef scallop between two sheets of waxed paper, or in a leftover produce plastic bag (I save them for stuff like this) and hammer them out carefully to less than ¼” thick. Be careful not to make holes in the meat, although a few are inevitable and really don’t matter.  When you’ve done all four, lay them out lengthwise on a counter with one of the short ends towards you.

No swearing, yet.

Place one quarter of the bread crumb mixture on the wider of the short sides, covering about 1/3 of the meat, then roll up to the narrowest end, securing with a toothpick. If the filling comes out a bit, don’t worry, just push it back in.

Wipe out the same non-stick sauté pan, and heat the olive oil in it over medium-high heat. When it shimmers, add the braciole, and brown on all sides.

The braciole won't be perfectly browned, but do the best you can.

While the braciole is cooking, bring your tomato sauce to a simmer in a pan just wide enough to hold the bracciole without crowding. When the bracciole is browned, drop them into the tomato sauce or marinara sauce and braise at a simmer for about 2 to 2.5 hours until tender.

Serve with pasta, gnocchi or soft polenta and a green vegetable.

  

*Quick, Lazy Tomato Sauce

Heat 2 Tblsp of olive oil in a deep saucepan. Add two garlic cloves, minced. Add two 28 oz. cans of tomato puree, one 15- ounce can of diced tomatoes and a half cup of dry red or white wine. If you have tomato paste in a tube, add 3 Tblsp of that, too. If not, skip it.

Bring to a boil, and then reduce to a simmer. Add one heaping tablespoon each of dried basil and dried oregano. Add a small pinch of dried red pepper flakes, and add salt and fresh-ground black pepper to taste. I personally like a pinch of powdered cloves and a teaspoon of anchovy paste added, too, but that’s sort of a family thing.

Simmer for as long as you can, up to an hour, but 15 minutes will do. Makes about two quarts.

Braciole, with goat cheese gnocchi and homegrown beans!