My aunt caught these babies in Oregon.

When Tom Sawyer, Huck Finn, and another equally naughty but less famous friend decide to run away and camp out, they are as obsessed with pirates as children are today.  After sleeping overnight on a small island, they catch trout, catfish, and perch which they fry up over a campfire along with the bacon they had brought along for breakfast. The boys are thoroughly delighted by the result.

My Dad used to catch me baby trout, my mother dredged them in flour, salt, and pepper, and I'd devour them fried up for breakfast. We never used bacon though. The great thing is, you can take some bacon on a camping trip and it won't spoil right awa,y since it's cured. Then you have grease for frying and great additonal flavour, especially if you get peppered bacon. 

Not fishing this summer? Row over to the seafood counter at your grocers and buy trout, catfish, or even sole.  Fry some flavourful bacon, remove from the pan, and use the grease to fry your catch (or purchase). 

Serve with cornbread and honey or molasses.

Lucretia Borgia, in the HBO series "The Borgias", starts out as an innocent, coddled but lovable and loving, who we see slowly made worldly by her society and her family. In one scene her mother, using the delicacies at hand, explains to her how she can marry one man and carry on with his brother who she prefers, thereby enjoying both "figs" and "torrone".

Torrone, the delicious honey and nut confection, can certainly be made at home, but it's rather troublesome with double boilers, candy thermometers, and much stirring. Buy house-made at your local Italian deli or bakery or packaged in pretty boxes at an import store.

Dried Figs in Red Wine and Basil

About 2 cups Chianti, Zinfandel, or an Argentinean sangiovese

3 tablespoons honey

1 pound dried figs with the tops picked off

2 or 3 leaves of fresh basil or 1/2 teaspoon dried basil

Add ingredients to a saucepan.

Cook slowly over low heat for about an hour until the figs are tender and the wine is greatly reduced and honey like in consistency.

Cool.

Serve with a cookie, over ice cream or with whipped cream, sweetened ricotta, or crème fraiche.  Or alongside torrone or course.

Another history-ish series that I adore is "The Borgias", with Jeremy Irons as the Borgia Pope. Historical accuracy gives way for great, gruesome story telling. I think writer Neil Jordan may have decided to throw in every single act of treachery the Borgias were ever accused of whether or not any proof exists. The sets, costumes, and hair are fantastic. Great acting, particularly by Irons and Holliday Grainger as Lucrezia, overcomes the mediocre acting of the Borgia sons.  Gina McKee looks like she is about to burst out laughing in a bedroom scene.

Sadly, for my purposes, much of the food depicted in the Borgias is poisoned! There is also a "dinner" depicted that is the most gruesome you can possibly imagine! But the characters' excitement over the latest technology--- the two-pronged fork for dining--- is priceless.

I've dressed up the Lenten sardines that Pope Alexander faithfully eats. The recipe is from Lorenza de' Medici's "Italy Today the Beautiful Cookbook".  Pope Alexander wouldn't dream of eating anything from the hand of a Medici family member. But we safely can. 

1-pound sardines beheaded and boned,

1 yellow onion

½ cup olive oil

3 tablespoons white wine vinegar

1-tablespoon oregano

Heat the oven to 400.

Reduce the onions until soft and fragrant,up to 30 minutes.

Add to the sardines, which you have opened flat in a baking dish.  Cook for ten minutes. 

This is a true fish lovers dish, as sardines taste... well...fishy. A strong wine is called for.

In honour of film maker Les Blank, who died last week, a garlic lovers delight, inspired by his film "Garlic is As Good As Ten Mothers". 

As many cloves of garlic as  you can stand, coarsely chopped,one part

Whole or slivered almonds, coarsely chopped, one part

Green oliives coursely chopped, two parts

Fresh ground pepper

Combine to taste and serve on crackers or bread.  It's delicious on hot buttered toast and great with goat cheese. 

Eat Pray Love (2010 USA)  

Julia Roberts, Javier Bardem, and Richard Jenkins were directed by Ryan Murphy from the book by Elizabeth Gilbert.

A newly divorced and completely miserable American woman visits Italy, India, and Bali to find herself.  That's all very nice, but let's us just cut to the food, which she finds in great abundance in Italy.  "You American girls, when you come to Italy, all you want is pasta and sausage," declares her landlady.  She downs nose-tickling capucinni and napoleons and many Roman specialities such as artichokes ala guida, along with eggplant, spaghetti Bolognese and carbonara, and linguini con vongole. She also learns the concept of "dolce far niente," the sweetness of doing nothing (except eating). Finally her Italian improves so that she can order an entire meal in that language. Included in that meal is saltimbocca.

Saltimbocca

8 thinly pounded veal scaloppini

8 slices Parma ham (prosciutto)

8 fresh sage leaves or some dried sage if need be

4 Tablespoons butter

½ cup white Italian wine (optional), the rest you can drink

fresh ground pepper to taste

Heat the butter in a sturdy skillet.

Brown the veal quickly on both sides, no longer than five minutes total.

Place on a platter.

Deglaze the pan with wine, then pour over the veal topped with a slice of proscuitto and decorated with a whole sage leaf or sprinkled with dried sage.

Pepper to taste. 

You can add salt if the salted butter and ham are not enough. 

Serve with the wine that you used to deglaze.

Homely Stargazy Pie

Stargazy Pie

Children love the idea of foods with funny names. I love foods with funny names. So my theme for awhile will be delicious dishes with amusing names. The English take the cake when it comes to such things. Bubble and Squeak, Cock-a-Leekie, Roly-Poly Pudding, Toad-in-the-Hole, Spotted Dick, and Eton Mess are some of the most famous examples. But delightfully, there are many others. And many of them figure prominently in children's books. My favourite of all, name wise, is Stargazy Pie. It just sounds so dreamy and romantic. Something the Shelleys may have dined on with Lord Byron.  But the truth is prosaic. They probably never tasted it since it's a Cornish dish and regional food stayed regional in those days. But the dish is not without romance. In Mousehole, Cornwall December storms prevented the fisherman from going to sea and the villagers were near starving. Finally, one brave soul attempted to fish, risking his life, but he was successful. He shared his catch with the village and they made fish pie just before Christmas. The pie appears in the lovely children's book, "The Mousehole Cat" by Antonia Barber in which a cat with her own point of view relates the tale.  Stargazy Pie also appears in  "Pie in the Sky" British television police-foodie-comedy starring the late Richard Griffiths.

The traditional pie, made with pilchards or sardines is probably a bit much for American tastes, but I've revised it, changing the fish to the ever-popular salmon and used headless sardines.  The point of the pie is to place several whole sardines with their heads sticking out of the pie as if they were gazing upward.

Stargazy Pie

1 or 2 yellow onions

1 or two potatoes

Salt, pepper, dill

Skinned, boned, salmon fillets,

A prepared piecrust or puff paste

Butter

Litter the bottom of a greased pie plate or baking dish with chopped or sliced onions.

Peel and thinly slice a potato or two.

Sprinkle with salt, pepper, and dill,

Place boned, skinned fillet of salmon on the vegetables.

Season and place a couple knobs of butter on the salmon.

Cover with a lightly rolled piecrust or puff paste.

Cut ½ inch slits and place the sardines in the slits to appear swimming.

Paint the crust with cream or egg wash.

Bake at 400 for 30 minutes til golden brown.

Serve with hard cider.