Mashed Potatoes and Salmon

You know how it is:  You go to a restaurant with other people, you order a dish and, when they bring the food, you look at what the other guests at your table have ordered and you regret that you can't eat that too.  It happened to me on a business trip to Atlanta last week when I really craved for the mashed potatoes my colleague had on his plate. I've been craving mashed potatoes since then and I've decided to make them tonight along with salmon because it have been eating very little fish lately.  It is a winter Sunday night, a perfect time for comfort food.

Mashed Potatoes with Garlic and Cheese

Ingredients (for 2-4 - it depends on your appetite!):

1 cup of milk
4 gloves of garlic

4 medium (about 1 1/4 lb) Yukon gold potatoes
2 tsp sea salt
1 1/2 Tbs butter
1/2 cup of grated Parmigiano cheese

Instructions:

1.  Scald one cup of milk with the garlic.  Let it simmer for five minutes,then set aside.
2. Wash the potatoes and cover them with water.  Bring the water to a boil, lower the flame, and let the potatoes simmer, covered, for about 30 minutes or until done - a fork can easily be poked through them.
3. Peel the potatoes and pass them through a food mill or masher.  
4. Remove the garlic from the milk.  Fold the garlic-infused milk, butter and cheese into the potatoes.

Salmon Steaks with Balsamic Vinegar and Ginger

Ingredients (for 2):

1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
2 Tbs fresh ginger, finely chopped
1 Tbs olive oil
1 clove of garlic, finely chopped
1/8 tbs sea salt
1/8 tbs black pepper, ground
2 salmon steaks
Olive oil spray

Instructions:

1. Place the first 5 ingredients in a large sealable plastic bag. Shake well. Add salmon and refrigerate 30 minutes to 1 hour. 
2. Heat the oven at 375F.  Spray a shallow baking pan with olive oil.  
3. Remove steaks from marinade, place them in the baking pan and bake them for about 40 minutes until they are flaky.

Amaretti Cake (Torta agli Amaretti)

Some time ago I was looking through my Italian cookbooks and I stumbled upon a recipe I had never noticed before and never heard of. It was a recipe for Torta agli Amaretti.  Amaretti, for those of you who don't already know it, are flourless, almond cookies that originally are from Lombardy and are widely used in Piedmont's cuisine.  They are one of the traditional ingredients of Fritto Misto, a sumptuous dish with both sweet and savory components, but it is mostly used in making desserts such as Bonnet, the classic flan from Piedmont.

The recipe for this cake asked for several tablespoons of plum jam that I had made a couple of weeks earlier.   The recipe was easy.  The biggest challenge I had was finding the amaretti cookies.  I went to Buona Italia in Manhattan sure they would have them but they only sell the soft kind and to make desserts you need the hard ones.  Corrado's in Clifton was again my savior:  They had the correct type of amaretti piled up right next to the cashier.

The cake is in four layers. The first is the dough (not need for a rolling pin) that is covered with plum jam. After soaking the amaretti in Amaretto liqueur, the almond cookies are placed on the jam and, in turn, they are covered with a mixture of almond, eggs, and sugar.  The result is a rustic, moist, and quite tasty cake, perfect to warm up the first fall chills.

Amaretti Cake

Ingredients

2  1/4 cups (10 ounces) whole wheat or unbleached all-purpose flour

1/2 cup + 1/2cup & 1 Tbs  (4 ounces + 5 ounces) sugar

  1 Tbsp. baking powder

 1 1/2 Tbs (3 ounces) butter, melted, + some for the pie dish

  1 egg + 2 eggs 
  6 Tbsp. plum jam

 1 box (7 ounces) amaretti (hard) cookies

 2 Tbsp. + 3/4 cup Amaretto liqueur

 1 cup (4 ounces) peeled almond

Instructions

1. Slightly butter a spring cake form.
2. Preheat the oven at 325 F.
3. Swift flour, four ounces of sugar, baking soda and combine them in a bowl with the melted butter, two tablespoons of Amaretto, and one of the eggs.  Mix them by hand or with an electric mixer.  It is perfectly all right if the product you obtain is somewhat crumbling.  
4. Put the mixture in the fridge for 10 minutes. Then press the mixture against the bottom and the wall of the pan cake.  Lay on top of it the plum jam.
5. Soak the amaretti cookies in 3/4 cup of Amaretti liqueur and place them on top of the plum jam.
6. In food processor, crumb the almonds and mix them with five ounces of sugar and two eggs to obtain a custard-like mixture, and pour it on the amaretti to cover them.
7. Bake the cake for 60 minutes.  Then remove it from the oven and let it cool.