Tasty Recipes from Recipe Wizards

What’s in a name?

Sometimes an unhealthy dash of hysteria.

Just in case you missed the news flash: You can’t get swine flu (now referred to as H1N1 virus) from eating pork because it is not a food-borne illness. To prove it, Kansas Gov. Mark Parkinson ate a grilled pork loin outside the state Capitol in Topeka.

“I think we’re starting to bounce back as far as consumer confidence,” says Diane Slater, director of communication for the Missouri Pork Association, based in Columbia, Mo.

Although pork producers were understandably unnerved by the recent news coverage, national polls found 93 percent of consumers who eat pork reported no change in behavior or attitude.

The Star’s Pork Cutlets With Warm Florentine Bean Salad features quick-cooking, lean and tender “cutlets” that will get dinner on the table in a matter of minutes. But, says Pam Johnson, director of consumer communications for the National Pork Board: “It’s not a standard cut. What it refers to is a really thin cut of meat.”

The cutlets are served with wilted spinach, a leafy green packed with iron and vitamins A and C. We added cannellini beans, a creamy, white Italian kidney bean with a thin skin that allows them to easily absorb the savory and nutritious flavors of garlic, fennel and basil.

Shopping and preparation tip: If your store does not typically sell “cutlets,” ask the butcher tocut some for you. Or, as a substitute, buy 1 pound thin, boneless, loin chops or pork tenderloin. Slice tenderloin crosswise into pieces. Pound chops or slices until about \-inch thick.

PORK CUTLETS WITH WARM FLORENTINE BEAN SALAD

Makes 4 serving

2 teaspoons olive oil, divided

1 pound boneless pork cutlets

2 cloves garlic, minced

1 onion, chopped

1 fennel bulb, trimmed, halved and thinly sliced

1/8 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes

1/8 teaspoon pepper

1/8 teaspoon salt

1 cup reduced sodium chicken broth

1 (15-ounce) can cannellini beans, rinsed and drained

6 ounces fresh spinach leaves (about 6 cups), washed and tough stems trimmed

1 tablespoon fresh minced basil

2 teaspoons fresh-squeezed lemon juice

Heat 1 teaspoon olive oil in large skillet over medium-high heat. Add pork cutlets and cook 2 to 3 minutes on each side, or until browned. Remove pork from skillet and set aside.

Add remaining oil to skillet. Add garlic, onion and fennel and cook, stirring frequently, over medium-high heat, 2 to 3 minutes or until vegetables are just crisp-tender.

Arrange pork over vegetables. Season with crushed red pepper, pepper and salt. Add broth and beans. Cover and cook over medium heat, 2 minutes or until beans are hot and liquid is boiling. Add spinach and basil; cover and cook 2 to 3 minutes or just until spinach is wilted and pork is cooked to medium doneness and is slightly pink inside. (Do not overcook.)

Spoon vegetables and pork into a deep platter. Blend lemon juice into remaining liquid in skillet then pour juices over pork and vegetables.

Per serving (about 3 ounces cooked pork, 1 1/4 cups vegetables and 1/4 cup liquid): 302 calories (29 percent from fat), 10 grams total fat (3 grams saturated), 67 milligrams cholesterol, 25 grams carbohydrates, 31 grams protein, 315 milligrams sodium, 8 grams dietary fiber.

Recipe developed for The Star by professional home economists Kathryn Moore and Roxanne Wyss.

Each season, the newest cookbook titles reveal the hottest trend in cooking, and this year it’s all about barbecuing. Here’s a look at what’s new this spring.

Who wouldn’t be impressed with a book that arrives in an oversize matchbox with matches on the cover? “Barbecue” by Thomas Feller (Hamlyn, $24.99) gives no indication as to who Feller is or where he comes from, other than a listing that says the book was first published in France in 2008 under the title “Barbecue” by Hachette Livre. The photographs are so tempting, it really doesn’t matter about Feller’s background. Eighty recipes range from marinated rib of beef to marshmallow and strawberry kebabs. There also are Mediterranean barbecues that feature souvlaki, squid and cherry tomato kebabs with pastis, with sides of Lebanese tabbouleh and bean tsatsiki with mint. For the vegetarian barbecue, Feller shows how to make potatoes baked in the embers with cottage cheese, and grilled eggplant with pesto.

-The most comprehensive grilling book to debut this spring is “Weber’s Way to Grill” by Jamie Purviance (Weber, $24.95). This step-by-step guide is not about absolute right or wrong when it comes to issues like gas versus charcoal, direct versus indirect heat or grilling with the lid on or off. It’s about paying attention to details as basic and significant as salt.

Purviance gives detailed instructions for checking doneness of meat, what to do when foods stick or flare-ups happen, and how to get great results with a smoker.

-Two Kansas City pitmasters have teamed to put all their expertise into “America’s Best BBQ 100 Recipes from America’s Best Smokehouses, Pits, Shacks, Rib Joints, Roadhouses, and Restaurants” (Andrews McMeel Publishing, $19.99). Ardie Davis is founder of the American Royal International BBQ Sauce, Rub and Baste Contest. He’s also known as Remus Powers, Ph.B. Paul Kirk is the operator of Baron’s School of Pitmasters and has won 475 cooking and barbecue awards.

This book is about the people who make the barbecue. Food tastes better when you know the people and stories behind the recipe, the authors say.

-”Serious Barbecue” by Adam Perry Lang (Hyperion, $35) isn’t for the hurried cook who simply wants to make a meal. Lang owns Daisy May’s BBQ U.S.A. in New York City and is the meat maestro at Carnevino in Las Vegas, and his book reflects his obsession with great meat. Lang shows how to make crisp and unctuous pork belly as well as Asian pork meatball skewers.

-”Fred Thompson’s Grillin’ With Gas” (Taunton Press, $19.95) says it’s OK to use gas over “real” fire. Most people cannot taste the difference, says Thompson, best known for his book “Barbecue Nation.”

-The BBQ Queens Karen Adler and Judith Fertig have written nine cookbooks that focus on barbecue and grilling. Their newest is “300 Big & Bold Barbecue & Grilling Recipes” (Robert Rose, $24.95) and it’s filled with ideas for making sauces, salsas, vinaigrettes and marinades, along with grilled clams, scallops and sea bass.

-The staff at Cook’s Country magazine visited barbecue shacks all over the country searching for the best barbecued beef, steaks and chicken. Then they tested and perfected those recipes for the back-yard cook. The editors of “Best Grilling Recipes” (America’s Test Kitchen, $29.95) say that grilling and barbecuing might seem easy, but it goes a lot better when you know the basics.

-Kansas City pitmaster Ardie Davis also has two small books that give expert tips on smoking and grilling. “25 Essentials: Techniques for Smoking” and “25 Essentials: Techniques for Grilling” (The Harvard Common Press, $12.99 each) are handy little books that would make ideal gifts for Father’s Day. In the grilling book, Davis shows how to plank-grill, fire roast, and grill in the fireplace. The smoking book is about smoke-baking, high-heat and paper-bag smoking, and smoke roasting.

-”Great Year-Round Grilling in the Southeast” by Ellen Brown (Lyons Press, $19.95) takes a look at the grilling styles in the Southern and Gulf Coast states. Brown, founding food editor of USA Today, lives in Providence, R.I., and is the author of nine cookbooks, including $3 Meals. The recipes in her grilling book reflect the ethnic heritages that are blended with those of the original settlers in the Southeast. This book is for the cook who is looking for more upscale, rather than down-home, recipes.

Here are recipes from the latest round of barbecue cookbooks.

Paper-bag smoking is a favorite way to smoke pork butt. Place a partially smoked pork butt in a paper grocery bag and finish cooking by slow-smoking it. The paper absorbs some of the grease and keeps the meat from drying out. This is not a recipe for the gas grill.

BUTT IN A BAG

3 tablespoons freshly ground black pepper

1 teaspoon fine sea salt

5-pound bone-in pork shoulder

2 cups wood chips, soaked in water and drained

Barbecue sauce of your choice, optional

Mix pepper and salt together, and rub it on all surfaces of pork. Set meat aside while you build the fire.

Fill charcoal chimney with briquets, set chimney on the bottom grill grate, and light, or prepare a fire in your smoker. Oil grill grate.

When coals are ready, dump them into the bottom of grill, and spread them evenly across half. Scatter wood chips on hot coals. Place butt on indirect-heat side of the grill across from the coals. Increase temperature to 350 degrees by opening bottom vents on grill. When smoke starts to rise, close grill lid. Place a candy thermometer in lid vent. Smoke 30 to 45 minutes to get the bark started.

Reduce temperature by closing the vents until you’re at 225 to 250 degrees. Smoke the pork 4 hours. Place the meat in a brown paper grocery bag large enough to hold it, fold ends over to close it, and return it to the same place in the smoker, opposite the fire. Add more briquets if necessary, and close lid. Continue smoking for 2 to 4 more hours or until tender. Check for tenderness by pulling a piece of meat off and tasting it. The mark of a shoulder done to perfection is when you can remove the blade bone by pulling it out with your hand.

When the shoulder is done, set it aside in a pan to rest for 30 minutes, then move it to cutting board. Serve it Southern-style pulled (stringy portions torn off by hand), Kansas City-style thick sliced, or chopped. Some barbecuers like to mix in a little tangy barbecue sauce as they’re chopping, especially if the pork is still a little fatty. Transfer to a platter and serve.

From “25 Essentials: Techniques for Smoking” by Ardie A. Davis

SALMON GRILLED ON ONE SIDE ONLY

4 tablespoons soy sauce

3/4 cup olive oil

6 slices salmon fillet with skin, about 5 ounces each

Freshly ground black pepper

Mix soy sauce and oil in a dish and marinate salmon in it for 1 hour, turning frequently.

Light barbecue, place grill grate to heat over flames, and when you have nice hot embers, lay salmon on grill, skin side down. Cook 10 to 12 minutes, seasoning with pepper, and serve immediately. Makes 6 servings.

From “Barbecue” by Thomas Feller

TUBE STEAKS WITH PICKLED ONIONS

1 small white or yellow onion

1 small red onion

1/2 cup cider vinegar

1/2 cup distilled white vinegar

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1 tablespoon kosher salt

2 teaspoons celery seed

1 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes

8 all-beef hot dogs, about 1/4 pound each

8 hot dog buns

Yellow mustard

Ketchup

Trim off ends of onions. Cut each onion in half lengthwise. With a very sharp knife, cut onions into paper-thin slices and place in a shallow, non-reactive dish, such as a glass pie plate. In a medium bowl, combine vinegars, sugar, salt, celery seed and red pepper flakes. Whisk thoroughly to dissolve sugar and salt. Pour vinegar mixture over onions and stir to coat them evenly. Set aside at room temperature for about 3 hours, stirring onions occasionally. Drain onions and set aside.

Using a sharp knife, cut a few shallow slashes in each hot dog. Prepare the grill for direct cooking over medium heat. Brush cooking grates clean. Grill hot dogs over direct medium heat, with the lid closed as much as possible, until lightly marked on the outside and hot all the way to the center, 5 to 7 minutes, turning occasionally.

Place hot dogs in buns. Squeeze your condiment of choice alongside each hot dog and top with pickled onions. Serve warm. Makes 8 servings.

From “Weber’s Way to Grill” by Jamie Purviance

Topped with a sliver of bell pepper, slumgullion is a mix of ground meat, macaroni, sauce and spices, but the ingredients can be as individual as the cook.

Before my dad got his medical practice going and finally grew an actual income, we kids were growing up pretty poor.

I remember a few lunches that were alarmingly skimpy. Dinner was more substantial, thank goodness, but most often was a simple thing concocted of inexpensive ingredients. Spaghetti was popular, as was chicken. After all, there were many stomachs to fill and not much money.

Our mom often cooked a dish she called slumgullion. I was ashamed to eat it, since, in my child’s mind, I thought it was what people who lived in slums ate.

Many years later, for the heck of it, I looked up the word in “Food Lover’s Companion” and was shocked to find it. Here’s the definition: “This slang term originated during the California Gold Rush and described dishes (usually stews) made from leftovers.”

California Gold Rush? We lived in Miami. Not only was our mom using the word incorrectly, I was misinterpreting what it meant in a societally influenced kind of way.

Anyway, her slumgullion was actually darn good. She’d sauté onion in oil, add ground beef and tomato sauce, stir it around, let it simmer and ladle it over slices of white bread. Filling, you see, and cheap.

In today’s column for beginning home cooks, let’s upgrade slumgullion and add new ingredients to round it out. It’s an easy, quick dish, and this tweaked version carries a few taste-and-texture surprises.

Note: This column’s mantra is “Quality in, quality out.” To that end, instead of using packaged hamburger, we asked the butcher to coarse-grind a black Angus beef chuck cross rib steak, and used that instead.

The meat weighed a pound, but you can go up to 1 1/4 to 1 1/2 pounds, depending on how meaty you want this dish.

One-pan dinner

Prep time: 15 minutes

Cook time: If you do a couple things simultaneously, about 30 minutes

Serves 4 to 6

This is your ingredients and shopping list; use it as a guideline to brands and prices, no matter where you shop. This time out, we bought our groceries at Bel Air, 8787 Elk Grove Blvd., Elk Grove; (916) 685-2225.

INGREDIENTS

1 pound premium ground beef (see note above; ours was $4.49 a pound)

1 large shallot (3.99 a pound)

1 orange or red bell pepper ($3.99 a pound)

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 16-ounce package imported Fasolino elbow macaroni ($1.79)

1 jar Cajun’s Choice Creole seasoning ($2.49)

1 24-ounce jar Barilla mushroom-garlic pasta sauce, divided use

Splash of cheap red wine (we found a bottle of discounted syrah for $6)

1 jar Raley’s-brand capers ($2.38)

1 box Sun Maid golden raisins ($3.69)

1 package pine nuts ($7.59)

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Nearly fill a large pot with water and put it on high heat.

2. Meanwhile, peel and mince the shallot; and wash, seed and core the pepper, then chop it up.

3. Pour some olive oil into a large pan and put it on medium heat. Add the shallot and pepper, and saute until they’re semi-limp.

4. Add a bit more than half the bag of elbow macaroni to the boiling water and cook it for half the time the directions on the package say to. Drain and rinse in cold water. Since the pasta will soon cook some more as it simmers with the meat, you don’t want to first cook it all the way done. The macaroni should not be too undercooked (hardish and gummy), nor should it be too soft. It should be firm, but not rock-hard.

5. Add the ground beef to the pan; break it up with a wooden spoon and mix it together with the bits of shallot and pepper.

6. When the ground beef has been browned, pour off the liquid and return the pan to the stovetop. Reduce heat to low. Sprinkle on whatever seasonings you like (garlic powder, kosher salt, freshly ground pepper). We used all-purpose Cajun seasoning.

7. Add about two-thirds of the jar of tomato sauce and a healthy splash of red wine. Stir gently.

8. Add 2 or 3 teaspoons of capers and a couple handfuls of golden raisins; stir.

9. Add the macaroni; gently stir all the ingredients together. Cover the pan and simmer for 10 to 15 minutes over low heat.

10. Fill your bowls and sprinkle pine nuts on top.

Question: What other optional ingredients can I use?

There’s no limit – just be sure to add liquids (the wine, the tomato sauce) as you add solids (chopped broccoli, thin carrot coins, whole green olives). You can even substitute shredded or cubed roast pork for the ground beef.

The kitchen can be a daunting place. For inspiration and guidance, we consult Saveur, Gourmet and Bon Appétit magazines and their informational Web sites – www.saveur.com, www.gourmet.com and www.bonappetit.com.

Our favorite how-to magazine, though, is the Brookline, Mass.-based Cook’s Illustrated (www. cooksillustrated.com), whose staff is devoted to demystifying the cooking process. That includes very helpful step-by-step illustrations of basic techniques.

Cruising through recent issues, we saw this sampling of articles: basic vegetable preparation; “updating” chicken noodle soup; brand-name comparisons of skillets; a knife primer; taste-tests for maple syrup, olive oil and packaged black pepper; and test-kitchen results and recipes for pork schnitzel, garlic shrimp pasta, Swedish meatballs and French toast.

Subscribe at (800) 526-8442 or online.

Another great source: What is confit? How does a garlic press work? For answers, go to www.oodleboxtv.com, a multi-topic Sacramento-based site brimming with “oodles” of how-to videos.

Click on “Eats & Treats” for videos in which local experts demonstrate how to make al-dente pasta, cedar-planked salmon, from-scratch tomato sauce, appetizers and the ultimate tuna sandwich. Also, learn how to sharpen kitchen knives and butterfly a chicken breast. It’s all good.

Stuart Leavenworth, our Chef Apprentice, will occasionally share an Oliveto recipe. Today it’s a sugo – a rustic and intense meat sauce that is spooned on meat dishes at the Oakland restaurant. Chef Paul Canales developed this version for home cooks.

The recipe involves a lot of work and time, but the payoff is huge. The final sauce can be frozen in ice-cube trays and used for months. Try it on pork scallopine, pork chops or roast pork. If you don’t like pork, try it with other cuts of meat, such as scraps of lamb or goat.

Pork sugo

Prep time: 35 minutes

Cook time: 3 hours, 45 minutes

Makes about 1 quart

INGREDIENTS

4 ounces pancetta, thinly sliced

1 pound chicken legs and or thighs, cut into 2-inch pieces with a cleaver

2 pounds pork leg (dark muscle) or shoulder meat, cut into 1-inch pieces

1 1/2 teaspoons salt

1/2 teaspoon black pepper

1 medium red onion, thinly sliced

1 small carrot, thinly sliced

1 medium bay leaf (Mediterranean variety)

3 cloves

2 quarts homemade meat broth or store-bought substitute

INSTRUCTIONS

Place the pancetta, chicken and pork meat in a heavy-bottomed sauce pot (14 inches in diameter by 9 inches high works best for us in the restaurant) and begin rendering over medium-high heat. As the meat renders fat and liquid, raise the heat to high and add the salt and black pepper.

As the liquid begins to evaporate, the meat will begin to brown. At this point, pay close attention to the pot and adjust the heat down to medium. Be careful to stir the pot only to facilitate building the foundation of residues on the bottom of the pot. Remember, you are working for the residues stuck to the bottom as opposed to nicely browned meat with a clean-bottomed pot.

This initial process should take about 30 minutes, at which time you should add the onion, carrot, bay leaf and cloves, and reduce the heat to medium-low. Continue cooking the mixture until the onions are translucent and the carrots are soft, about 10 to 15 minutes.

Next, begin the deglazing process by raising the heat to high, adding a couple of ladlefuls of broth and scraping the bottom of the pot with a wooden spoon. As the residues come free, continue cooking over high heat until the liquid begins to reduce to a glaze and form another foundation. At this point, add a few more ladlefuls of broth. Repeat this process 2 more times.

After the final reduction, add the remaining broth, bring to a boil, then reduce the heat to low, achieving a very lazy simmer. Cover with parchment paper and cook for about 2 hours.

To finish the sugo, pass the contents of the pot through the medium dye of a food mill into another pot, taking care to press all the liquid from the solids and scraping any residues from the bottom of the food mill. You should be left with a dry, fibrous mass in the food mill and luxurious, silky sugo in the pot.

While you will have more sugo than needed for a single dish, the rest can be frozen in ice cube trays, with the cubes reserved in a freezer bag.

A joyous lemon drop

The Joy of Cookies in the K Street Mall sold a lemon- drop cookie that was moist on the inside and kind of crunchy on the outside. Most of the recipes that I can find call for you to flatten the cookie and dip it in sugar. Does anyone have a recipe that is more like those served at Joy of Cookies?

– Sheila Beswick, Lincoln

Broken glass torte, anyone?

In the early 1960s, I did a lot of entertaining and made a dessert called broken glass torte. It was made with several flavors of Jell-O, made with less water than called for. They were cut up and folded into a fluffy sauce made of whipping cream and pineapple juice. It was then chilled in a tube pan coated with vanilla wafer crumbs. When it was served, the slices were thin enough to let some light through the Jell-O. It was very pretty. Does anyone have this recipe? Thank you.

– Pat Ronten, Rancho Cordova

Grilled polenta

Prep time: 15 minutes

Cook time: 35 minutes

Serves 4

Though Lennie Nickels-Carlson moved from Sacramento to Honolulu about five years ago, she never misses an issue of The Bee’s Food & Wine section. She loved the grilled polenta topped with tomato ragu served at Ettore’s European Bakery & Restaurant in Sacramento and was hoping for its recipe or one similar.

Although we haven’t received Ettore’s recipe, Connie Lane of Penn Valley shares this recipe for the grilled polenta. She suggests using your favorite marinara recipe or jarred marinara sauce to top the polenta.

Note: The prep time does not include the 3- to 24-hour chill time for the cornmeal mix before it is grilled.

INGREDIENTS

1 2/3 cups water

1 tablespoon butter

1 tablespoon brown sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

3/4 cup cornmeal (coarse-ground, package says “polenta” on it)

1 cup cold water

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon olive oil

INSTRUCTIONS

Line a 9-inch round baking pan with foil, extending foil over edges. Grease foil and set aside.

In a medium saucepan, bring 1 2/3 cup water, butter, brown sugar and 1/2 teaspoon salt to a boil.

Meanwhile, in a small bowl, stir together cornmeal, 1 cup cold water and 1/2 teaspoon salt. Slowly add moistened cornmeal mix to boiling water, stirring constantly. Cook and stir just until mixture returns to a boil. Reduce heat to low. Cook uncovered about 10 minutes or until mixture is very thick, stirring occasionally.

Evenly spread the cornmeal mixture into prepared pan. Cool and refrigerate for 3 hours or up to 24 hours.

Using foil, lift cornmeal mix from pan and gently cut into eight wedges. Generously brush wedges with olive oil and grill directly over medium-hot coals for about 10 to 15 minutes or until golden, turning occasionally.

To serve, lay two grilled wedges on a plate and cover with your favorite marinara sauce.

Per serving without marinara sauce: 178 cal.; 2 g pro.; 27 g carb.; 6 g fat (2 sat., 3 monounsat., 1 polyunsat.); 8 mg chol.; 583 mg sod.; 1 g fiber; 3 g sugar; 32 percent calories from fat.

Garlic blue cheese soup

Prep time: 30 minutes

Cook time: 30 minutes

Serves 6

Gail Nelson of Sacramento cut out a soup recipe from The Bee some time ago that contained a lot of garlic and blue cheese, among other ingredients. She lost the recipe and was hoping we could track it down. We had another reader who was also looking for this recipe.

This is the recipe our readers were looking for. It comes from Cris McKone, a cooking instructor at the Sacramento Natural Foods Co-op.

INGREDIENTS

2 tablespoons olive oil

30 whole cloves of garlic (about 3 heads), peeled

3/4 cup dry sherry

1/2 cup brandy

5 Yukon gold potatoes, peeled and diced

1 quart chicken stock

2 teaspoons hot pepper sauce such as Tabasco

2 cups heavy whipping cream

6 ounces Gorgonzola or other blue cheese

Kosher salt

Freshly ground black pepper

1 tablespoon chopped chives

INSTRUCTIONS

Heat oil in a large saucepan over medium-low heat. Add the whole garlic cloves to the pan, decrease the heat to low and cook until cloves are tender, about 10 to 15 minutes. Slowly and carefully add the sherry and brandy, slowly increase the heat to high and reduce the liquid by half, 2 to 3 minutes. Add the diced potatoes and chicken stock, and cook until the potatoes are tender.

Transfer the soup to a large bowl and purée in batches in a blender, then return the soup to the pan. Add the hot pepper sauce and cream, and cook over low heat until the cream almost comes to a boil. Whisk about 4 ounces of the cheese into the soup. Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Ladle the soup into soup bowls and garnish with the remaining blue cheese and chives. Serve hot.

Per serving: 577 cal.; 13 g pro.; 32 g carb.; 38 g fat (25 sat., 11 monounsat., 2 polyunsat.); 132 mg chol.; 862 mg sod.; 2 g fiber; 5 g sugar; 59 percent calories from fat.

HOW TO CONTACT THE MAILBOX

If you have recipes in reply to Mailbox reader requests, or questions or comments, write to: Mailbox, c/o Taste, The Sacramento Bee, P.O. Box 15779, Sacramento, CA 95852. You also can e-mail twatson@sacbee.com or fax (916-556-5625). Please include your full name, your city and phone number.