Guest post - rustic Italian cooking

The world is a smaller and often better place for social media.

Here is a story of how we met one of our followers in real life, discovered they also know someone else we know, James at Cabrito Goat Meat and persuaded them to come up with a recipe which bound us all together…………….

A few years ago I was on a quest to buy Made in the UK or Made in Italy; not an easy task by any means, but while searching for UK manufactured products I came across a family run, independent business in rural Shropshire that made beautiful iron pans called Netherton Foundry. As a food blogger and keen home cook, I love discovering new kitchen utensils and ingredients so it was a perfect match for me: I ordered an oven safe fryingpan, intending to make a tarte tatin.

Fast forward a few years, and I still have to make that tarte; but since then, I have been following Netherton Foundry on their social channels, seeing how they have expanded their range and successfully obtained the trust of chef and industry experts.

After an initial occasional exchange of messages and 'likes' - we started 'chatting' about motherhood and kids, making the connection more personal than just about pans.

And on the final day of 2018, we realised (still via social media!) that we happened to be at the same time in the same place, coincidentally - the stunning Cotswolds village of Broadway. We quickly arranged to meet up for coffee in the local deli, which was such a great opportunity to put faces behind 'handles' and yet another proof, if I needed another one, that good friendships can come out of socials. I was delighted when they asked me to provide a regional Italian recipe for their website, making in one of their pans.

Kid goat ‘cacio e ova’

This recipe is found in a few variations all over Southern Italy, from the mountain areas of Abruzzo to the green sea facing hills of Cilento and the inner lands of Campania. It is a warming, satisfying, wholesome dish which uses kid goat, a type of meat commonly found in Italy. In the UK, Cabrito Goat Meat sells ethically reared goat meat; if you can’t easily buy, lamb would work well too.

Serves 4

1kg kid goat meat: a mix of cutlets (ideally) then ribs and diced

2 cloves of garlic

1 small red onion, sliced

¼ white onion, thinly sliced

1 twig of rosemary

good quality extra virgin olive oil

2 free range eggs

1 tin of garden peas, drained

1 tub of pancetta cubes

1/5 lt stock (we used organic vegetable)

Salt & pepper to taste

Half glass of dry white wine

50gr grated, good quality Parmigiano Reggiano / Grana Padano (or pecorino if you like something stronger)

the juice of ½ lemon

In a small pan, sauté the pancetta with a little olive oil and the finely sliced white onion. Once browned, add the drained peas and let them cook for about 20 minutes, adding water a little at a time to prevent them from drying out. Add a knob of butter towards the end for an extra layer of flavour.

Once ready, set aside. Add two generous table spoons of olive oil to your Prospectorpan, two cloves of garlic (peeled but whole) and the sliced onion, with a twig of fresh rosemary. 

Once golden, add the diced meat and the cutlets, letting them brown on a high heat. Add the wine and let it evaporate fully, then turn the heat to low, add a little of the previously prepared stock and partially covered with the lid to let the meat cook. Keep adding the stock little at the time to avoid the pan from drying out and the meat sticking to it. After about 30-45 minutes the meat should be tender (depending on the size of the pieces). Add salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste.

Whisk the eggs with the grated cheese and set aside.  Remove the lid and add the peas, let the stew cook further adding some more stock if needed. Finally, just before serving, add the whisked egg mixture and mix well so that the egg will cook but not solidify like for an omelette; add the lemon juice too at this point.

Serve immediately with roast potatoes or mash and a slice of good sourdough bread to mop up the sauce.

Note: the sourdough was cooked in an oven safe frying pan; it works great with bread too! The recipe used is pain naturel by Weekend Bakery

Read more from Federica on her blog  http://www.pastabites.co.uk and follow her on Instagram @pastabites and on twitter @federilli

www.netherton-foundry.co.uk

A recipe for falafel from our friend in Germany

How to cook Falafel in a Netherton Foundry spun iron pan

Thorsten lives in Germany and is a great friend of Netherton.  He has an impressive collection of our cookware.

He has been kind enough to share his pitta recipe with me - one for another day - as well as this super falafel recipe.

If you have tried making Pita, also called arabic flatbread or "Khubz", with a Netherton Foundry Kitchen Companion, you probably wondered about how to fill the nice pockets. Here’s a suggestion that is quite traditional and can also be eaten as a main dish, meat substitute or even a side dish: Falafel!

Falafel is very popular in the Middle East, especially in Lebanon, Israel and Egypt (in Egypt they are called “Taameyya” and are made with fava beans, not chickpeas). They are often sold as street food, and falafel booths are quite as popular as maybe Fish’n’Chips in Britain or Currywurst in Berlin.

Here is a version that you can make in your Netherton Foundry spun iron pan:

Ingredients:

6oz (170g) dried chick peas

1 onion

5 cloves garlic (use more or less according to taste)

1 bunch coriander (or parsley, but coriander is MUCH better)

1 tblsp ground coriander seeds

1 tblsp cumin

2 tsp salt

1 tsp freshly ground black pepper

1½ oz (45g) Bulgur wheat (or whole grain wheat flour)

To make the falafel fluffy, you may add

1tsp baking powder OR

1 slice of toast OR 

Both

Preparation

1. Soaking the chickpeas

Put the chickpeas in a bowl and cover them with plenty of water. Let soak overnight.

2. Prepare the falafel dough

Drain the soaked chickpeas with a strainer and transfer them into a food processor.

Add onion, coarsely chopped, garlic cloves, coriander sprigs coarsely chopped, spices, salt and Bulgur.

After you added all the ingredients into the food processor, close it and mix for half a minute.

With a spoon or spatula, scrape any dough adhering to the side walls off and put it back into the food processor. Mix again. Repeat several times until you get a homogenous, but slightly grained texture of the dough.

That’s it! You can keep the falafel dough in the fridge up to one week, or freeze it. So, if you plan a larger party, you can make the dough in advance!

3. Frying time!

Take your Netherton Foundry spun iron pan and pour vegetable oil into the pan until the bottom is well covered with oil (about 2-3 mm).

Put the pan on medium heat and wait a few minutes to let the oil get hot.

In the meantime, form small falafel patties, about ½ inch (1 – 1 ½ cm) thick, and about 2 inch (5 cm) in diameter.

If there is an Asian shop or an oriental market in your vicinity, you may consider getting a falafel maker / falafel scoop. They come in different sizes and shapes, sometimes they form little patties, sometimes they form rings. The size and shape is not important, but they usually have a spring-operated plunger that pushes the falafel patty out. This helps a lot and makes forming the falafel a lot easier.

You can of course also form the patties by hand, with a cookie cutter, or any other way you like. Try to make them with a similar thickness, so that they have the same cooking time. You can also use a burger press and create “Falafel Burgers”! Sometimes people even won’t recognize that they have no meat in their Burger. If you do that, be careful while removing the patty from the press, it breaks a lot easier than meat patties.

I used a falafel scoop to make little patties of about two inch (5 cm) in diameter. Just drop them in the pan and fry on both sides until golden brown.

Serve with Tahini sauce, or stuff them in the pita you made with your Netherton Foundry kitchen companion or casserole, or use them as a main or side dish.

This recipe is suitable for vegetarians and vegans!

Thank you Thorsten

You can find Thorsten on Twitter @Der_SMU