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07/23/2001 Archived Entry: "Answering E-mail"

I get E-mails sent to me at WOR by the hundreds. In fact, I get so many, it has become impossible for me to even read all of them. It’s up to Becky Bennett, my producer, to sort through the comments, questions, requests, recipes, and suggestions I am sent daily. Sometimes I answer a few of them on the radio. Here are some that may have general interest. My new Food Maven resolution is to post as many of these as I can. You never know, you may have the same question.

Q. When I make red sauce I put my sausage and meatballs in raw and let them cook in the sauce. Now I want to add chicken. Is it necessary to cook the chicken first? Should I remove the skin? Also, if I put the chicken in raw, about how long do you think I need to let it cook? I keep the meatballs and sausage cooking in the sauce for about 4 hours.
--Michele G.

A. To start, I think you are cooking those sausage and meatballs for far too long. They must give the sauce a nice flavor, but I am sure they are so overcooked after 4 hours that they fairly crumble under the pressure of a fork. I think your sauce is cooked too long, too. Unless you are making a vast quantity, enough to feed a couple of dozen people (maybe you are), 2 1/2 to 3 hours (tops) is all the sauce should need at a slow, steady simmer. Even then the meatballs and sausage would be overcooked. I’d put them in only for the last 2 hours, at most. (I have several versions of Neapolitan ragu, which is what you are making, in Naples At Table.

As for the chicken, chicken breasts still on the bone should not take longer than 40 minutes or so to cook. Off the bone, 30 minutes should be sufficient. Any longer and they will become very dry. Chicken thighs and legs can take the heat for about an hour. Skin or no skin? Since the skin will end up flabby and unappealing unless it is browned first, I’d remove the skin before cooking the chicken in the sauce.


Q. My wife and I are long time fans and avid listeners. A friend told me that you found the greatest lobster rolls in Kennebunk, Maine. We are leaving Friday morning for Ogunquit. I would really love to know where these “great” lobster rolls can be found.
-Rob R.

A. You’d think I’d remember the name of the place, but all I remember is the location. It is easy to find. It’s the shack – stand-up counter service only, unless you count the park bench nearby – at the little bridge as you enter Kennebunkport from the south. Park your car in town, which is all around you, and walk over.

Q. Please help! I am looking for the best chocolate desserts in NYC. Taste and presentation are both important. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.
-Carrie B.

A. This is the kind of question I can’t possibly answer, certainly not by email. One reason is that with very rare exception I hate naming “the best” of anything. Have I tasted every chocolate dessert in NYC? Certainly not, and that would be the only way I could determine a best of anything. Another reason this question is impossible to answer is you don’t say if you want these desserts in a restaurant or in a bakery. Are you eating out or at home? Are you going to go to a restaurant just for dessert? Are you willing to perhaps eat an expensive meal just to have a great chocolate dessert? How much are you willing to spend for this chocolate dessert?

I mean, you can go to La Bonne Soupe, one of my sponsors and a very inexpensive French restaurant, and order a fabulous, classic, spongy chocolate mousse with no obligation to have anything more – okay, maybe a cup of coffee.

You can go to Metrazur on the east balcony of Grand Central Terminal and, with no further obligation, have a great warm chocolate cake with ice cream – I think they call it a chocolate terrine. You can go to The Four Seasons, one of the city’s grandest restaurants, and spend $150 a person for a dinner that ends with an incredible piece of chocolate cake. How about a chocolate tart from City Bakery at 3 West 18th St (just off Fifth Avenue, phone: 212-366-1414). It’ll be gorgeous and sublime. (Now, I am willing to say that you will find “the best” croissant in New York here.) You can take that chocolate tart home or eat it there. Etc.

My final answer: Please call Food Talk and we can talk about it.


Q. I’m looking for a recipe for stuffed zucchini. I’d appreciate any help you can give.
--Pat

A. Here’s another learning experience for you all. Tell me: With what do you want these zucchini to be filled – ground meat, bread, rice, other vegetables, some combination of these? You get the picture. What sort of flavorings? There are Italian recipes. I have one made with tuna that was dropped from “Naples At Table,” but I’d be happy to supply it. Or you can use the outline for the stuffed and fried eggplant that did makje it into Naples At Table. There are meat-filled and vegetarian Middle Eastern recipes. In tomato sauce or yogurt sauce. All-American recipes. Mexican recipes.

My final answer: Give me more information.


Q. I believe you have a favorite tunafish. Which is it?
--Anonymous Tuna Lover

A. This one is easy. At the supermarket, I buy Bumble Bee solid light packed in olive oil. That’s not chunk light, which is mushy, but solid light which is chunky. The Bumble Bee comes in a can horizontally stripped in red, white and green, the colors of the Italian flag.

Progresso is another excellent brand, but much more expensive than Bumble Bee and not really much better. Other Italian imports are Genova and Pastene, both excellent, firm, flavorful tunas, but also expensive.

At Coluccio & Sons, the Italian import store I go to in Bensonhurst, on 1214 60th Street (between 12th & 13th Avenues, phone: 718-436-6700) here in Brooklyn, I have been buying Flott, packaged in Sicily. By the case, it is an excellent buy.

I eat a lot of tuna -- probably too much -- so I don’t get too extravagant. However, my friends at Esperya.com sell extraordinary tuna from Sicily, at extraordinarily-high-but-maybe-worth-it prices. Click on “Seafood” when you get to the home page.