Grilled Vegetable Pasta and My Dad’s Garden
Most Italians I know have a garden. I don’t know why; it just seems to be the case. My grandmother Angela had a small garden. My uncle Oscar had a garden. Or rather, he had someone build him a garden and maintain it. Oscar wasn’t a dig-in-the-dirt kinda guy. I don’t think he ever mowed a lawn in his adult life. He had people who did that kinda thing. But My Dad? Oscar’s only brother? He loved getting down in the dirt.I remember one spring my Dad wanted to build a vegetable garden. He lived in an apartment above a big barn on a farm in Long Island, New York. I used to drive up from Baltimore, Maryland, and visit him in his little place on the top floor. My Dad had painted all the walls different bright colors; purple, yellow, orange. For his dining-room table, he had found a huge old wood spool that the phone company had used for wrapping telephone wire. He laid it on its side, and that’s what we ate on. His kitchen table was an antique foot-operated sewing machine.There was a dog kennel in the barn downstairs, which was a lot of fun when the volunteer fire department sirens would go off in the middle of the night, and the dozen or so dogs would start caterwauling.Along with the dogs, there were also horses residing in the barn below. Well, it wasn’t like Smarty Jones or Seattle Slew were living there. This was a working barn, with working horses. And when you have horses, you usually have horse flies. So in the upstairs apartment my Dad put fly strips on the ceiling.In case you’ve never lived above a barn with horses and horse flies; fly strips are basically rolls of sticky paper that unravel and hang from the ceiling. When flies would fly by, they’d get stuck to the paper. Since the ceiling at my Dad’s apartment was slanted and low, whenever you walked by, the paper would stick to your hair. This wasn’t a problem for My Dad, who had no hair. But for us long-haired teens, it was a big problem.I had a hairdo that resembled all three guys in the Jimi Hendrix Experience put together. Whenever I walked by these fly strips, my hair would get stuck, and I’d have to call for my Dad to cut me loose. So there were all these fly strips hanging from the ceiling, with dead flies and clumps of hair stuck to them.The other thing you have when you have horses downstairs? Fertilizer, to put it politely. The apartment had a certain aroma that they rarely use in aromatherapy. With all that free fertilizer, my Dad decided to create his garden. He wanted to border the garden with railroad ties; so one day he borrowed a pickup truck, and we drove to a deserted area of the Long Island Railroad.My Dad couldn’t just go to the Home Depot and buy wood borders. He had to go find old railroad ties. He couldn’t just go to a furniture store and buy a dining-room table, he had to go find a big old wood spool. He couldn’t buy a kitchen table at IKEA, he had to use an old sewing machine. He couldn’t just find a normal place to live, he had to find a place on top of a barn with a kennel and horses and ceilings that were so slanted that you had to walk around crouched over like Groucho Marx or Quasimodo.My Dad had it in his head to find railroad ties to border his garden. We found a stack by the side of some abandoned railroad tracks. The railroad ties smelled like creosote, and weighed what seemed like a ton. We put the back gate of the pickup truck down. We were able, the two of us, to get one railroad tie onto the bed of the pickup truck. The only problem was - the railroad tie was hanging off the back of the pickup.We drove off and when my Dad went over a bump, the end of the railroad tie closest to the cab of the truck would rise in the air, and the other end that was hanging off the back of the truck would hit the ground. It was like a see-saw. A dangerous see-saw. My Dad pulled the truck over.Then he had a brilliant idea. He wanted me to get out of the truck and stand on the end of the railroad tie that was close to the cab, using what little weight I had to keep the railroad tie from flying up in the air. He told me to hang on to the roof of the truck for stability. Brilliant.
My Dad was a tough and gruff guy, an Italian who started off really poor, grew up on the streets of New York, and forged quite a life for himself. He was a lawyer. He worked for the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. He wrote speeches for Vice President Hubert Humphrey. He helped start the Peace Corps. He was a professor of philosophy and literature at the State University of New York in Old Westbury, which was about 15 miles from the barn.My Dad yelled a lot. He laughed a lot, too, but he had a temper. I found it hard to say “no” to to my Dad; so I got out of the truck and stood on the end of the railroad tie, facing forward, holding on to the roof of the cab for dear life. The first bump we hit, I shot into the air like a rocket. It seems kinda funny now. It wasn’t real funny to me back then. I was terrified.That’s when I thought it might be best to prop up one end of the railroad tie on top of the cab of the pickup, and close the back gate to hold the other end inside the bed. And that’s the way we rolled. We ended up getting four railroad ties, and made a huge square outside of the barn. We shoveled horseshit for hours from the barn into the garden.That garden was incredible. We had Brussel sprouts the size of cabbages. Everything grew to amazing proportions and tasted incredibly fresh and delightful. When I think of vegetables, I always think of that garden. And how I almost died to get it built.GRILLED VEGETABLE PASTA SALADI like to grill. I like pasta. I like vegetables. So - I thought - why not combine all three? That’s when I came up with this recipe. I put the “j” back in genius with this dish. You’ll want to serve it at room temperature, but add the mozzarella balls when the pasta is hot, so the balls get gooey, so to speak. Fusilli pasta works best.I cut the onion into large slices, and the orange bell peppers, too, because they’re easier to grill and flip that way. When they’re done, I chop ‘em up into smaller, bite-size pieces. Also, the cherry tomatoes only need about five minutes on the grill, just to heat ‘em up.Serves four; or one teenage kid who’s been shoveling horseshit in the sun for hours.
IngredientsA bulb of garlic, the root end cut offExtra virgin olive oil1 small zucchini, scrubbed, ends snipped off, sliced in circular slices1 small yellow summer squash, prepared the same way1 small eggplant, prepared the same way2 orange bell peppers, stems and seeds removed, cut in large slices1 Vidalia onion (or any sweet onion except purple/Spanish), sliced into large circular slices2 dozen cherry tomatoesA dozen small balls of mozzarella½ cup pignoli (pine nuts), toasted to a golden brown in a dry pan over medium heat — you can also use sliced almonds, toasted the same wayBasil leaves, a large handful (a cup) – save a few whole leaves for garnish1 tablespoon of balsamic vinegar1 pound of fusilli pastaFreshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheeseSalt and freshly ground pepperNon-stick cooking spray (optional)Here we go…Make sure your grill surface is clean. A little non-stick cooking spray on the grill surface will help keep your vegetables from sticking. Be careful! Don’t spray it into the fire.If you’re using a charcoal grill, light the coals, and let them burn for 20 to 30 minutes, or until the coals are ash-gray. You don’t want the fire to be too hot, or you just end up burning the vegetables. If you’re using a gas grill, put the heat on medium.Take the bulb of garlic. Slice the root end off. Put the whole garlic bulb on top of a piece of aluminum foil. Drizzle it with olive oil, about a teaspoon. Wrap it up, and put it on the outside part of the grill – the place with the least heat – and let it slow-roast for the whole time you’re grilling.For the pasta, get a large pot, fill it with water, and let it come to a boil.Now for the vegetables. Put them all on a large platter. Drizzle with olive oil, about a tablespoon, make sure they’re all lightly coated. Sprinkle with a little salt and fresh cracked black pepper. Then flip ‘em over and do the same on the other side – drizzle with a little olive oil, and sprinkle with a little salt and pepper.Put all the vegetables on the grill, except the tomatoes. Let everything grill for about 5 to 7 minutes, depending on the heat of your grill, then turn ‘em over.Put the tomatoes on the outside of the grill. Grill all your vegetables for another 5 to 7 minutes.
Remove the vegetables from the grill, and place them on a large platter. Cut the onion and the orange bell peppers into bite size pieces.For the pasta, when the water is a-boiling, add a few tablespoons of kosher salt, and then add a pound of fusilli. Follow the directions on the box. Two minutes before the pasta is supposed to be done, start tasting. Bite through a piece of pasta, look at the center. If it is chalky, it is not done. Keep tasting every 2 minutes until it tastes right, not too chewy. When the fusilli is al dente (firm to the bite) drain, put it in a large bowl and drizzle with a tablespoon olive oil, and toss.Take your garlic bulb out of the aluminum foil, make sure it’s cool enough to touch, and grab the bulb by the top. Squeeze the cloves out through the bottom, right onto the pasta. Mick ‘em up.Add your grilled vegetables, give them a stir.Add your mozzarella balls and toss gently.Add the toasted pignoli – save some for sprinkling on to each plate.Take the basil leaves (save a few for each plate for garnish), and snip ‘em with scissors into small pieces right onto the pasta. Toss gently.Add a little more olive oil if you like and toss again - gently.Add the balsamic vinegar (about a tablespoon or so to taste) and toss once more.Dish it up! Make it look nice! On each plate, add a couple basil leaves, sprinkle a few toasted pignoli on top, and add a little freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese on top, if you like. And…
MANGIAMO!!!
Grilled Salmon with Marsala and Merci, Philipe!
Grilled Salmon Marsala with Grilled Vegetables in World War II
My Dad told me that when his platoon was going across France behind General Patton in World War II, the towns they liberated were really grateful. How grateful?In one town, as they went past an exuberant, cheering crowd, a woman grabbed my Dad, dragged him into her bedroom and made love to him right then and there.Now that’s gratitude.Before the war, my Dad was drifting. He went to St. John’s College in Annapolis, Maryland. He wasn’t a good student. They put him in charge of the college café. He took some money out of the coffers, and in a valiant effort to try and double the cash, lost it all in a late-night poker game. He was asked to leave the school.Soon after, he joined the Army and went to Europe to fight in World War II. It was a hellish and brutal experience that made my Dad a man. His father, Romollo, died of a heart attack while my father was away at war. They were close; he couldn’t go back for the funeral. It was one of the loneliest times of my Dad’s life.After the war, he went back to St. John’s. He became a good student. He graduated. He went to law school. He became a lawyer. He did all of this with no money — he was the son of poor Italian immigrants.He became a member of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights. He helped start the Peace Corps. He wrote speeches for Vice President Hubert Humphrey. He became a professor of philosophy and literature.World War II, the toughest time of his life, turned out to be his proudest moment, the turning point that changed his life in the best way possible.
My Dad was in the XVth Corps; they followed General Patton’s 3rd Army through France, liberating town after town. One of the towns the XVth Corps liberated was Lunéville, a small town in northeastern France, about 50 miles from the German border. Lunéville was still being bombed and strafed by the Germans. My Dad was patrolling the streets one day, when he heard a German Stuka approaching. Stukas were small bombers, two-seaters that also had machine guns. My Dad saw a one-armed Frenchman, frozen with fear.My Dad ran over, grabbed the Frenchman, and pushed him to the ground and covered him, bombs exploding, bullets flying. When the Stuka passed, the guy thanked my Dad, and insisted he come to dinner. My Dad spoke French; he had acted as an interpreter for the Army on quite a few occasions. He accepted the invitation. That night, my Dad had dinner with the Frenchman and his wife in their modest home. They sat and drank plum brandy after dinner as the Frenchman, a former captain in the French Army in World War I, told stories. He was a decorated war hero who had lost his arm in World War I. The German army had recently ransacked his home, taking his car and guns and war medals.Things got quiet when the captain started talking about his daughter, Jacqueline. He started crying as he explained that Jacqueline had been visiting a friend in a nearby town when the D-Day invasion took place and all hell broke loose. He hadn’t heard from her since. He feared the worse. He wanted to try and find his daughter, but the Germans had taken his car and guns. The Frenchman showed my Dad a photo. She was beautiful. My Dad offered to see what he could do to bring the daughter back. The Frenchman and his wife were ecstatic.My Dad left and went back to the makeshift barracks. He told the story of Jacqueline to his buddy Frank. He told Frank that he had offered to try and rescue Jacqueline. Frank thought my Dad was crazy. Or drunk. Or both.The next day, my Dad dragged Frank to see the French captain. My Dad told him they’d need a map, the address of the place Jacqueline had last visited, a letter from the captain so Jacqueline would know who they were, and the photo. The French captain gave them everything plus a 5,000-franc note for Jacqueline.My Dad and Frank left, and went back to the barracks. They were both on a two-day leave. Frank reluctantly agreed to help. But they didn’t have a jeep. They went over to the nurses quarters after sundown, figuring there might be a few male visitors who might have “borrowed” a jeep to get there.Frank and my Dad found a jeep and rolled it down the hill and started it. It had a mounted machine gun between the seats. The headlights had been blackened into little slits, and were of little use. They drove in the night. It started to rain. The windshield had been removed, so visibility was low. There were small pockets of German soldiers still in the area, and there were rumors of German soldiers dressed as civilians.My Dad and Frank were trying to get to Heudicourt-sous-les-Cotes, a small town about 60 miles away where Jacqueline had last visited. The rain and the lack of visibility slowed them down; they made it halfway there, soaked to the bone and dead-tired. They slept on the floor of a roadside house that belonged to a Frenchwoman who let them doze in front of her fireplace, so they could dry off and rest.The next day they made it to Heudicourt. They went to the address and showed the woman the photo and the letter. She explained that Jacqueline had caught a ride a few days before to stay with an uncle in Verdun, a small town 25 miles to the north. She gave them the address, and my Dad and Frank took offVerdun is close to the German border. It had recently been liberated by the Allies, but was still being attacked by the Nazis.
Frank and my Dad made it to Verdun, and found Jacqueline at her uncle’s house. My Dad gave her the letter and the 5,000-franc note. She started crying. Then she packed a small bag, said goodbye to her uncle, and my Dad put her in the back of the jeep and covered her with a blanket. There were still clusters of German soldiers roaming about. My Dad and Frank took off, Frank driving, machine gun mounted between them, Jacqueline in the back, bouncing around under the blanket as the jeep flew down the small country roads.They stopped at a town called Metz to gas up at an American motor pool. The MPs warned them about groups of German soldiers. As they were getting ready to take off, Jacqueline poked her head out. The MPs saw her. Before they could react, Frank floored the jeep and drove like mad to Lunéville . They got there at midnight. Frank dropped off my Dad and Jacqueline at her house and took the jeep back.Jacqueline ran inside and there were tears and laughter and hugs and shrieks of joy. My Dad stood in the doorway. The one-armed Frenchman kept pumping his one good arm in the air, crying and screaming, “Merci, Philippe! Merci, Philippe!”GRILLED SALMON MARSALA AND GRILLED VEGETABLES
I was at my Dad’s house when I concocted this recipe. It was Memorial Day weekend. He lives on top of a mountain, in the Catskills of New York. It’s incredibly beautiful. It’s also incredibly isolated - which can make you crazy after a while. Just look at me.When my Dad first got the place, he wanted it to be rustic. And that it was. It was just a square, cinderblock two-story structure that looked more like a garage than a cabin. The ground floor was well, it was the ground. It was dirt. The second floor was unpainted plywood, and there was a gas stove up there, and that’s where I slept.The stove is what we used for heat. For the whole place. Keep in mind; it gets down to below zero in the winter. There’s snow on the ground from November until March. And there was no plumbing. None. There was an outhouse, and it was pretty scary; especially late at night, when you had to walk 50 yards through the snow to go to the bathroom. That’s the way my Dad wanted it. Rough. No frills. No phones. No TV.That didn’t last very long. The thought may have been romantic, but there’s nothing romantic about getting up in the morning and walking across the frozen tundra to go to the bathroom in what is really just a hole in the ground. A stinking hole.And now? My Dad has three bathrooms, all indoors. The one on the second floor has a claw-foot bathtub with a view of the mountains. He has a big screen hi-definition TV, a satellite dish that gets a thousand channels, and the whole house has wireless internet. He has a phone. He even has a cell phone now. Now my Dad is all plugged in, hooked up, and well connected, which is a good thing, especially during the brutal winter months.
Rat Tail Ridge is a great place to grill in the summer, when it’s cool and breezy on top of that mountain. You’ve got a beautiful view, quite breathtaking. Batu loves it up there.Note: the salmon steaks I used were about an inch and a half thick. Keep in mind that thicker pieces of salmon take longer, and thinner pieces take less time. Also, some grills run real hot, some not-so-hot. No wonder it took me so long to get this recipe right. But I finally nailed it.Also, trim your asparagus. Grab an asparagus spear. Hold the top end in between the forefinger and thumb of your left hand, and hold the bottom end with the thumb and forefinger of your right hand, and bend until it breaks. Throw away the stalk end.There are two kinds of Marsala—sweet and dry. Sweet is the way to go. Sweet!Ingredients:For the sauce1 cup sweet Marsala (a wine from Sicily) or sweet vermouth¼ cup extra virgin olive oil¼ cup fresh squeezed lemon juice (use ripe, soft lemons, or Meyer lemons—remove the seeds)1 tablespoon chopped fresh oregano, plus a couple sprigs for garnish (you can use a teaspoon of dried oregano if you can’t find fresh)2 cloves of garlicFor the salmon and vegetables4 salmon steaksA dozen small potatoes cut in half (I used purple potatoes–found them in a local market)A bunch of asparagus (16 or so), trimmed6 Roma tomatoes cut in half length-wiseExtra virgin olive oilKosher saltFresh ground black pepperA small bunch of fresh chivesA handful of fresh basil leaves1 tablespoon of balsamic vinegarHere we go…Add all the sauce ingredients (except the garlic) in a small bowl. Mix. Put the garlic in a garlic press, and squeeze it into the sauce—you can also mince the garlic if you don’t have a press. Put the sauce in a small pan over low heat, and let it reduce while you grill.Rinse off the salmon steaks, pat dry with paper towels, and drizzle both sides with olive oil. Then give a shake of salt and pepper on each side.Keep your vegetables on separate plates. Take the potatoes, drizzle with olive oil, add salt and pepper, and make sure they’re coated well. Do the same with the asparagus, and the tomatoes – but be gentle. Don’t mangle your ‘maters.Heat your grill up! We want it to be medium heat; if it’s too hot, things will burn.The potatoes take the longest, about 20 minutes. Put them on first, cook for 10 minutes (depending on the heat of the grill) and then turn ’em over.Put the asparagus and the salmon on the grill, and cook for about 5 minutes. After 5 minutes, turn over the asparagus and the salmon.Add the Roma tomatoes to the grill, flat side down.Cook the asparagus, salmon and tomatoes for 5 minutes. Don’t turn over the tomatoes!Remove everything to a gorgeous platter.Use a scissors and snip some fresh chives on top of the potatoes.Snip some fresh basil on the tomatoes.Drizzle a little balsamic vinegar on the asparagus.Dish it up! Put a salmon steak on a plate. Take the reduced Marsala sauce and drizzle some on top. Add some asparagus, potatoes, and tomatoes. Garnish with a fresh oregano sprig.MANGIAMO!!!!!