The word Mediterranean dredges up images of the Monte Carlo Grand Pre, white sandy beaches and James Bond for some people. I think of food when I hear anyone mention The Mediterranean. I was born and raised in the San Francisco Bay Area and my father was from Palermo Sicily. He and my mothers love for buying, preparing and sharing food shaped who I and my children are today. One of my earliest memories as a child was watching them make cannoli shells for Sunday’s supper.
Lets talk about what goes into the foundation of this style of cooking out. Some basic staples are olive oil, garlic, fresh herbs and spices, good balsamic vinegar, nice wines and smoke from the cooking fuel. The ingredients for our meals are whatever’s in season. We usually prepare more grain and organic vegetable dishes cooked over a naked flame than red meats. I use a lot of seafood when it’s fresh and chicken that’s antibiotic free and raised without hormones. Getting you to eat an organic diet is not our motive. We use organic ingredients because they taste better but you can use corporate farmed produce and meats in any of these recipes.
BBQ or Cookout
The phrase Bar-B-Que is closely tied to slow roasted meats like ribs, beef briskets and pork shoulders smothered in sauce. We love southern style BBQ as much as anyone but lets face it, it’s not a path to a healthy life. We will feature slow roasted meats in some of our meals that are prepared on a rotisserie with an unprocessed fuel like wood. We have been at this for twenty years and have developed a cooking station in an open fire pit. By no means is this a necessary tool for making these recipes. You can do most of this on a kettle type BBQ like a Weber. Better yet, buy a patio fire pit and retro fit a grill to it. The first meal I cooked over an oak fire was on the ground with grill on four threaded rods to hold it above the flame. It cost me 40.00 dollars.
Because most people don’t have access to a wood fired oven we will save pizza for another day. We used to own a pizzeria 30 years ago and love everything about pizza, from the fresh mozzarella to the crust. We make it in our home oven three or four times a year, mostly in the summer and fall when we have tons of homegrown tomatoes and basil. We will feature some bread items that we grill and eat with humus or an eggplant or olive tapenade.
The key philosophy to preparing these types of meals is to keep it simple. Less is more and quality is king.
