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Two kitchens! I was impressed by someone’s two OVENS in her huge kitchen. She was a phenomenal baker, among other things.
It's an ethnic thing around here--mostly Italians, but also Greeks, Lebanese, and the Eastern European folks.
With Italians in my neck of the woods and where I grew up, that second basement kitchen is the workplace where the magic happens. The one upstairs is traditionally more for show; the kitchen where only coffee and dessert are served. God help the man or child who tries to make a mess in *that* kitchen!
I'm in a lot of houses 'round here due to my work and the old-school basement kitchens that I come across (and coal cellars that have long since been converted to rudimentary wine cellars/distilleries for homemade wine and grappa) are some of my favorite things to find in a house. It's nice to think of all of the wedding cookies that were baked, sausages stuffed, sauces stirred, and pasta that was shaped or rolled out in those basements.
One house that I was in had *three* kitchens in a house that had always been a single family residence and had been in the same family since it had been built. And yes, the family was Italian.
Last edited by Formerly Known As Twenty; 08-29-2022 at 06:59 PM..
The best way to get good Italian food is to have an Italian friend. I have one. Two kitchens in her house and everything. She gets the vapors at the idea of someone using a jar of sauce (as I do). I thought she was going to have a heart attack when I told her about the bf with his ketchup on spaghetti.
All I have to do is mention that maybe I'll pick up a jar of a GOOD sauce, and she'll open her freezer and give me some of hers.
I am not sure what pasta she uses. I have to ask her.
Ketchup on spaghetti?!? Oy. Guessing that a.) he's not Italian and b.) this dish is some sort of comfort food perhaps based in a food memory for him. If so, gets a pass on both counts. Can't judge someone on his or her choice of comfort foods.
Cincinnati chili over spaghetti (ew) and jarred chopped garlic (both heresy and sheer laziness, imo) are both bad enough, but I think that *that* one takes the cake, lol.
Last edited by Formerly Known As Twenty; 08-29-2022 at 07:18 PM..
Ketchup on spaghetti?!? Oy. Guessing that a.) he's not Italian and b.) this dish is some sort of comfort food perhaps based in a food memory for him. If so, gets a pass on both counts. Can't judge someone on his or her choice of comfort foods.
Cincinnati chili over spaghetti (ew) and jarred chopped garlic (both heresy and sheer laziness, imo) are both bad enough, but I think that *that* one takes the cake, lol.
Yeah, he's of Ukrainian descent and Canadian to boot. After a lifetime of living in New Jersey, I was shocked to realize how little Italian food there is to be had in Ontario. Actually, I have been told that there is very good Italian food in Toronto, but in NJ, there is good homemade Italian to be had in BYO dining rooms in the back of most pizza places, and you can't swing a cat without hitting such a place, and I get up here and all I've got is a chain with stupid stereotype commercials (everybody saying "Budda Bing" and talking in Brooklyn accents for Pete's sake! I cringe when the commercials come on).
He ate totally different food. Sausages (found out a difference between Canadians is that we say kielbasa or kielbasy and they say and spell it Kolbassa). Fried fish. Peameal bacon and cheese sandwiches. Something called "cottage roll" that tastes just like corned beef only it's pork. You boil it for an hour or so and then eat it with mustard and mashed potatoes. I bought "homemade meat loaf" from the Polish deli up the street, and it turned out to be a mix of beef and ground-up kolbassa.
And then...there is stujenitz, which I am sure I am not spelling correctly because these Eastern European-words are very stingy with vowels, but that's how you say it. It can be Ukrainian, but his late wife was Polish and she is the one who taught him to make it. You get pork and beef bones with meat on them and you boil them for hours and hours. Foam forms on the top and you skim it off. Then you let it cool, pull out the bones, pick off any remaining meat, and into the fridge it goes overnight. What you end up with is this sort of cold, jellied soup with bits of meat in it, and then you scoop some into a dish, add salt, pepper, and white vinegar, and eat it with a spoon. And sadly, even though I was totally grossed out by this, I tried it, and it's really, really good.
Anyway, when I was first seeing my bf, I came back to NJ and told my friend, who is an old Jewish woman from the Bronx who married an Italian man, about the spaghetti with ketchup, and she said, "That's the only way I had spaghetti when I was a kid. We put ketchup on it. We didn't know from sauce."
I notice a lot of similarities between the Eastern European and Jewish foods, leaving out the pork part, of course, but that's probably because so many Jews lived in those countries. Cabbage rolls are a thing to the Ukrainians. His sister makes them with a sour cream mushroom gravy. Oh, and his sisters get together a couple of times a year and make dozens of homemade perogies and freeze them. They are much better than the store-bought ones, but I never in my life knew anyone who made their own perogies. And yes, I know perogi is the official plural. Borscht is another Eastern European thing. I made some. There are variations on it.
Cincinati chili (whatever that is) over spaghetti does sound gross. Chili and pasta just doesn't go.
I have bought the jarred garlic out of laziness, but it doesn't taste the same and it doesn't break down the way fresh garlic does. There are always these hard little bits, it seems. I like fresh garlic.
Yeah, he's of Ukrainian descent and Canadian to boot. After a lifetime of living in New Jersey, I was shocked to realize how little Italian food there is to be had in Ontario. Actually, I have been told that there is very good Italian food in Toronto, but in NJ, there is good homemade Italian to be had in BYO dining rooms in the back of most pizza places, and you can't swing a cat without hitting such a place, and I get up here and all I've got is a chain with stupid stereotype commercials (everybody saying "Budda Bing" and talking in Brooklyn accents for Pete's sake! I cringe when the commercials come on).
He ate totally different food. Sausages (found out a difference between Canadians is that we say kielbasa or kielbasy and they say and spell it Kolbassa). Fried fish. Peameal bacon and cheese sandwiches. Something called "cottage roll" that tastes just like corned beef only it's pork. You boil it for an hour or so and then eat it with mustard and mashed potatoes. I bought "homemade meat loaf" from the Polish deli up the street, and it turned out to be a mix of beef and ground-up kolbassa.
And then...there is stujenitz, which I am sure I am not spelling correctly because these Eastern European-words are very stingy with vowels, but that's how you say it. It can be Ukrainian, but his late wife was Polish and she is the one who taught him to make it. You get pork and beef bones with meat on them and you boil them for hours and hours. Foam forms on the top and you skim it off. Then you let it cool, pull out the bones, pick off any remaining meat, and into the fridge it goes overnight. What you end up with is this sort of cold, jellied soup with bits of meat in it, and then you scoop some into a dish, add salt, pepper, and white vinegar, and eat it with a spoon. And sadly, even though I was totally grossed out by this, I tried it, and it's really, really good.
Anyway, when I was first seeing my bf, I came back to NJ and told my friend, who is an old Jewish woman from the Bronx who married an Italian man, about the spaghetti with ketchup, and she said, "That's the only way I had spaghetti when I was a kid. We put ketchup on it. We didn't know from sauce."
I notice a lot of similarities between the Eastern European and Jewish foods, leaving out the pork part, of course, but that's probably because so many Jews lived in those countries. Cabbage rolls are a thing to the Ukrainians. His sister makes them with a sour cream mushroom gravy. Oh, and his sisters get together a couple of times a year and make dozens of homemade perogies and freeze them. They are much better than the store-bought ones, but I never in my life knew anyone who made their own perogies. And yes, I know perogi is the official plural. Borscht is another Eastern European thing. I made some. There are variations on it.
Cincinati chili (whatever that is) over spaghetti does sound gross. Chili and pasta just doesn't go.
I have bought the jarred garlic out of laziness, but it doesn't taste the same and it doesn't break down the way fresh garlic does. There are always these hard little bits, it seems. I like fresh garlic.
Your man's redemption (heh) lies in those Eastern European roots, it seems! (That's one third of my own heritage). Eastern Europeans have some excellent eats; homemade pierogi *do* knock the socks off Mrs. T.'s, don't they? And as I'm partly of northern Italian descent, cabbage rolls are part of my culinary heritage, too, although we do them up in a light tomato sauce with plenty of garlic.
He's forgiven his ketchup on spaghetti sins. Besides, to my way of thinking, pierogi are a form of stuffed pasta/dumpling and plenty of Eastern Euros also have those basement kitchens (perfect for making homemade pierogi, kraut, and kielbasa) so perhaps he's Italian in spirit without knowing it.
So far as Jewish food traditions are concerned (really, there should be entire threads devoted to this topic as it's fascinating), Jewish food has always had a chameleon-like ability to adapt the local cuisine to their own kitchens with the necessary adjustments made to make it fit in with Jewish dietary laws. It's was interesting to hear your friend's story of why her family put ketchup on spaghetti at her childhood table. It does make sense in its way. I'm assuming that her in-laws took took her in hand when she married her husband and taught her their food traditions to add to those from her own childhood.
Partner's daughter prefers jarred garlic (out of sheer laziness, lol) and I give her no end of ribbing about it when we cook together. Always end up peeling and chopping fresh garlic as I jokingly give her the side eye from time to time while doing so. At least she likes to pinch pierogi and roll gnocchi with me!
Last edited by Formerly Known As Twenty; 08-30-2022 at 09:34 AM..
Garlic: this topic in itself deserves it's own post
I personally only use fresh garlic bulbs. I never use jarred and even avoid the handy dandy peeled ones in bags.
The thing is... do you realize a lot of our garlic comes from China? At least here it does. China is the biggest exporter of the stuff.
There is a blurb that a lot of China garlic is treated with chemicals to retard sprouting... so that they seem fresher by the time it crosses the globe to us.
I once bought garlic and noticed that it seemed juicier and definitely fresher and more "garlic'y". Upon returning to the supermarket I found out that this garlic was grown in the good ol USA. Much better quality and definitely worth a small premium over the commonly found cheap China garlic.
Garlic: this topic in itself deserves it's own post
I personally only use fresh garlic bulbs. I never use jarred and even avoid the handy dandy peeled ones in bags.
The thing is... do you realize a lot of our garlic comes from China? At least here it does. China is the biggest exporter of the stuff.
There is a blurb that a lot of China garlic is treated with chemicals to retard sprouting... so that they seem fresher by the time it crosses the globe to us.
I once bought garlic and noticed that it seemed juicier and definitely fresher and more "garlic'y". Upon returning to the supermarket I found out that this garlic was grown in the good ol USA. Much better quality and definitely worth a small premium over the commonly found cheap China garlic.
A neighbor gave me some garlic that she regularly gets via mail from an organic farmer. I was amazed at how much better it tasted than any store-bought garlic I’d had. It was almost nutty-sweet, not at all desiccated, and loaded with garlicky goodness. I gotta wonder why the US would buy garlic from other distant countries when we can grow it well right here.
Garlic: this topic in itself deserves it's own post
I personally only use fresh garlic bulbs. I never use jarred and even avoid the handy dandy peeled ones in bags.
The thing is... do you realize a lot of our garlic comes from China? At least here it does. China is the biggest exporter of the stuff.
There is a blurb that a lot of China garlic is treated with chemicals to retard sprouting... so that they seem fresher by the time it crosses the globe to us.
I once bought garlic and noticed that it seemed juicier and definitely fresher and more "garlic'y". Upon returning to the supermarket I found out that this garlic was grown in the good ol USA. Much better quality and definitely worth a small premium over the commonly found cheap China garlic.
I agree about the need for a garlic thread. I've taken to buying Kroger's fresh peeled garlic and freezing it. It comes in five bulb-sized mini-packets. I can use two or three cloves and reseal the packet. The garlic is easier to mince frozen, and I haven't noticed a major difference in the flavor.
Before trying the peeled garlic, I would put the cloves in a skillet to warm them up just enough so that when they cooled, the peel comes right off. That did cause a slight difference in flavor, but in a good way.
I do prefer using the frozen peeled garlic.
My current irritation with Kroger is that they have rearranged their products again. There used to be a whole section of Amore pastes in metal tubes--garlic, sun-dried tomato, pesto, anchovy, and maybe a couple of others. Now there are no Amore pastes at all, only Cento tomato paste with the other tomato pastes. It's irritating, because just a small squirt of a paste added as much flavor as you needed.
I've also discovered that feta and Roquefort cheeses freeze nicely too. I bought a huge slab of feta at Sam's, thinking that because it's crumbly anyway, it would probably freeze well. It did. So when I got a half-pound wedge of Roquefort reduced to $6, but couldn't eat it before it spoiled, I put it in the deep freeze. It was great for salads and sauce too.
Sorry for going off topic. I should have started the garlic thread!
Your man's redemption (heh) lies in those Eastern European roots, it seems! (That's one third of my own heritage). Eastern Europeans have some excellent eats; homemade pierogi *do* knock the socks off Mrs. T.'s, don't they? And as I'm partly of northern Italian descent, cabbage rolls are part of my culinary heritage, too, although we do them up in a light tomato sauce with plenty of garlic.
He's forgiven his ketchup on spaghetti sins. Besides, to my way of thinking, pierogi are a form of stuffed pasta/dumpling and plenty of Eastern Euros also have those basement kitchens (perfect for making homemade pierogi, kraut, and kielbasa) so perhaps he's Italian in spirit without knowing it.
So far as Jewish food traditions are concerned (really, there should be entire threads devoted to this topic as it's fascinating), Jewish food has always had a chameleon-like ability to adapt the local cuisine to their own kitchens with the necessary adjustments made to make it fit in with Jewish dietary laws. It's was interesting to hear your friend's story of why her family put ketchup on spaghetti at her childhood table. It does make sense in its way. I'm assuming that her in-laws took took her in hand when she married her husband and taught her their food traditions to add to those from her own childhood.
Partner's daughter prefers jarred garlic (out of sheer laziness, lol) and I give her no end of ribbing about it when we cook together. Always end up peeling and chopping fresh garlic as I jokingly give her the side eye from time to time while doing so. At least she likes to pinch pierogi and roll gnocchi with me!
You know, before I met the Uke, I thought that cabbage rolls WERE Italian, because the only ones I knew of were Italian-style ones in NYC delis, sometimes made with Italian sausage.
And oh yes, my Jewish old-lady friend makes wonderful sauce and Italian specialties. She likes to cook, I like to eat, we both like to drink red wine, and she lives in the same townhouse complex (we are both on the condo board) so it works out well. I do cook for her occasionally, too, but since I'm in a little better place financially, I would sometimes treat her to dinner out somewhere if there was somewhere specific I wanted to go and wanted company.
I love it when people's cuisines make their way into non-traditional families. I have a friend whose mother was Cuban. She would host these dinners for family and a few friends, and make a garlicky pork roast, potatoes, and her mother would make wonderful black beans and rice. One time her aunt, the mother's sister, was at the dinner. At the end of our table was something in a casserole dish that I tried, a noodle dish with apples and cottage cheese, etc., and I'm thinking "isn't this a kugel?" So those of us at that end of the table said, "Hey, who made this? It's really good!" My friend's Cuban aunt jumped up, all smiles and told us what was in it, and I said, "But isn't this a Jewish dish?" She said in her Cuban accent, "Oh yes. My mother-in-law taught me to make that. My last name is Klein, didn't you know?"
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