THE NEXT HOLIDAY MEAL

 

Déjà vu? No, this turkey roulade is perfect for your next dinner party.

That holiday is over, but there are more to come. Ideally, I would have posted this recipe way before Thanksgiving, but I didn’t really plan that far in advance. So, after-the-fact—but in plenty of time for the next batch of holidays—here is an elegant way to serve a turkey breast. 

The boneless breast is butterflied and rolled around a stuffing with figs and chopped nuts. If you’re using a larger turkey breast, simply increase the quantities of stuffing ingredients. The stuffing mixture can also be used for chicken breasts or butterflied pork loin. 

I served the turkey roulade for a small Thanksgiving dinner, accompanied by roasted brussels sprouts, sweet potatoes and a mushroom-sage “dressing,” made with quinoa instead of the usual bread. The special treat was fresh cranberry sauce, the American berries brought by a visitor from the U.S. 

Butterflied turkey breast rolled around a fig stuffing roasts in about one hour.

Turkey with fairly traditional sides--roast sweet potatoes with orange juice and Sherry; roasted brussels and broccoli, and, instead of bread dressing, quinoa with mushrooms, onions, celery and sage. And cranberry sauce! (Thanks, Amanda, for bringing fresh cranberries from the U.S.) 

Make pan gravy with a little Sherry added to the drippings.

Turkey Breast Roulade with Fig Stuffing

Rollo de Pavo Relleno de Higos

The recommended internal temperature for cooked turkey is 165ºF, but I find that turkey breast that has been butterflied is done at 150ºF. Longer roasting will make dry meat.

The turkey doesn’t quite brown in this roasting time. I sprinkled the top with a little pimentón to add color. Another idea is to add a glaze with honey or sugar that will brown nicely. 

The fig compôte used in the stuffing is made from dried figs that have been stewed in water (no sugar) until soft, then pureed. 

I used rendered ibérico panceta fat (see last week’s blog for more about panceta) to sauté the shallots and baste the turkey, adding a very special flavor, but olive oil can be used as well. 

Fig compôte, goat cheese, rosemary, ham, nuts.

Serves 4.

1 ¾ pounds boneless turkey breast

Salt

Freshly ground black pepper

3 tablespoons rendered pork fat or olive oil

1 shallot, finely chopped

½ teaspoon chopped fresh rosemary

½ cup fresh bread crumbs

1 tablespoon dry Sherry

2 ounces chopped goat cheese log (1/2 cup)

2 tablespoons chopped ibérico ham or bacon

3 tablespoons fig compôte or puree

1 tablespoon chopped walnuts

1 tablespoon chopped parsley

Sprigs of fresh rosemary

¼ cup white wine or Sherry

Pimentón (paprika)

Add cheese to hot pan.

Place the turkey on a cutting board. Slice horizontally through the thickest side without cutting all the way through. Open the piece of meat up like a book. If one section is much thicker than the other, again slice horizontally and open up the flap to make a slab more or less rectangular. Sprinkle with salt and pepper and allow it to come to room temperature.

In a small skillet heat 1 tablespoon of the fat or oil. Sauté the shallot on medium heat until softened, 4 minutes. Add the rosemary and the bread crumbs. Fry briefly, stirring to mix the crumbs with the shallots. Add the Sherry and cook another minute. Remove the pan from the heat and stir the chopped cheese into the hot pan. Add the ham or bacon, the fig compôte, walnuts and parsley. Season with salt and pepper.

Spread filling and roll up the turkey breast.

Spread the crumb-fig stuffing on the opened slab of turkey breast. Roll the turkey up, enclosing the filling. Secure the roll with skewers or kitchen twine. Place it in an oven pan. Spread remaining fat or oil over the surface of the turkey. Place sprigs of rosemary on top. 

Preheat oven to 400ºF. 

Spread rolled turkey with fat or oil before roasting.

Place the turkey in the oven and roast 15 minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 350ºF and roast 15 minutes more. Pour over the wine, baste the turkey with pan juices and sprinkle the top with pimentón. Return the turkey to the oven until done (internal temperature of at least 150ºF tested on an instant-read thermometer), 20- 30 minutes more. 

Remove from oven and allow the turkey to rest at least 10 minutes. Remove skewers or twine and slice crosswise. (Make gravy, if desired, with pan drippings, stock, a slosh of Sherry and cornstarch to thicken.)

More turkey recipes, some suitable for leftovers:

Turkey Breast Stuffed with Spinach.

Turkey with Quick Pepitoria Sauce.

Andalusian Stew with Turkey.

Turkey Breast with Sour Orange Marmalade.

Turkey Meatballs in Gazpachuelo Soup.

Microwave Turkey Breast Adobo.

And, stuffed pork  loin: Pork Loin with Fig Stuffing.

PARTY LEFTOVERS

 How do you plan for an open house? Even with RSVP on the invitations, I did not have an accurate count of how many would show up for my afternoon gathering. I definitely over-catered. I bought too much wine (a not-too-expensive Rioja crianza red and Rueda Verdejo white). Many guests brought wine and most preferred beer for afternoon imbibing. The mojitos secos, a minty, non-alcoholic drink, and a bright hibiscus punch also proved popular. Wine keeps. Only the ice is gone forever. 

As I had houseguests, we easily finished most of the leftover food. The Moroccan-style eggplant dip and the potato salad were the most popular dishes. The muy tipico remojón of oranges, onions, olives and cod didn’t “sell” too well. (See last week’s blog for recipes.) 

And the ham—that ham! My jamón ibérico de bellota goes on and on. It’s my breakfast treat, with toasted molletes, olive oil and tomato, or tapa-time snack with fino Sherry. 

I bought way too much bread. Most is stashed in the freezer, to be used as needed. Maybe it will find its way into turkey stuffing. Unopened packages of regañás (crunchy crackers) will keep. 

I cooked twice as much lentils as needed for the lentil salad that I served at the party. I needed to use them up. I also had on hand a whole cured panceta (pork belly), a bonus gift that came with my ham order. Lentils + panceta = lentejas a la riojana, to be served, of course, with Rioja tinto.  

Leftover cooked lentils, sofrito and crisp-fried panceta add up to Rioja-style lentils. Served with a leftover Rioja Tempranillo crianza red wine.

Rioja-Style Lentils

Lentejas a la Riojana

The lentils can be cooked in advance then finished with the sofrito and panceta before serving. Instructions for preparing panceta and cooking lentils follow.

Use rendered panceta fat or fat plus olive oil to make the sofrito. You can use prepared tomato sauce instead of the grated fresh tomatoes in the sofrito. I used sautéed piquillo peppers, leftover from my party menu, instead of red bell pepper in this recipe. Use the carrots that have cooked with the lentils. My lentils were cooked with wheat berries, a nice addition. 

Sliced panceta.

Serves 6.

4 cups cooked lentils

4 tablespoons panceta fat and/or olive oil

1 cup chopped onion

1 green pepper, chopped

1 red bell pepper, chopped

3 cloves chopped garlic 

1 teaspoon smoked pimentón (paprika)

3-4 plum tomatoes, grated

¼ cup white wine

2 cooked carrots, diced

Cooked potatoes, diced (optional)

Salt

3 ounces panceta, sliced or diced

3 ounces sliced chorizo

Panceta fat, to serve (optional)

Bring the lentils to room temperature if they have been refrigerated and place them in a pan.

Heat the fat/oil in a skillet. Sauté the onion, green and red peppers and garlic until they are softened, 4 minutes. Stir in the pimentón. Add the grated tomatoes and fry until tomatoes give off their liquid. Add the wine and cook off the alcohol. Add the diced carrots and potatoes, if using. Cook the sofrito 5 minutes. 

Crisp-fried panceta.

Stir the sofrito into the lentils. Taste and add salt as needed. Cook the lentils gently for 10 minutes. (Add water if needed.)

In the skillet, fry the sliced panceta and chorizo until panceta is crisped. 

Serve the lentils. Divide the pieces of panceta and chorizo between the servings. If desired, spoon a little of the fat in the skillet over them. 

Spoon on extra flavor--panceta fat.

To cook the lentils:

Best for this recipe are the tiny green or brown lentils (verdina or pardina) or similar French ones such as Puy. Wash the lentils. Soaking is optional. The lentils will cook much quicker if soaked for 8 hours before cooking. Drain them and place in a large pot.

Lentils can be cooked in advance, cooled and refrigerated until ready to proceed with the recipe for Rioja-style lentils.

1 pound small green or brown lentils, soaked and drained

8 cups water

1 bay leaf

1 onion, quartered

2 carrots, peeled

2 potatoes (optional)

2 teaspoons salt

Place the lentils in a large pot and cover with 8 cups of water. Bring them to a boil and skim off the foam that rises to the top. Add the bay leaf, onion, carrots, potatoes, if using, and salt. Bring again to a boil. Lower heat so the lentils just simmer gently. Cook, covered, until they are tender, 45-60 minutes. Add additional water as needed so the lentils are always covered with liquid. Discard bay leaf and onion. If they are not to be used immediately, cool the lentils and refrigerate them in their cooking liquid.

For the cured panceta (pork belly):

Panceta is pork belly or unsmoked bacon (pancetta in Italian). It is dry-cured with salt, garlic and pimentón. According to the label, it can be kept in a cool place up to two years. It may be presented in a slab or rolled. 

In theory, cured panceta can be eaten without cooking, but it’s much more palatable if roasted or fried so it’s crisped and some of the fat is rendered out. It also can be added directly to soups and stews. 

Rendered panceta fat, great for cooking.

Sliced or diced and fried panceta (torreznos) is classic with pasta carbonara. Try it tossed with vegetables (brussels sprouts!), shrimp, scrambled eggs, salads, legumes of all sorts. The fat that cooks out of the panceta can be used in cooking—fry eggs in it, make smashed potatoes, baste a turkey.

Pork fat is a saturated fat. However, it is no more unhealthful than butter. My piece of panceta comes from acorn-finished pigs of the ibérico breed (cerdo ibérico de bellota). This fat is partially a monounsaturate, like olive oil. 

Preheat oven to 350ºF.

Place the rolled panceta on a cutting board, fat-side up. Use a sharp knife to score the fat. Make slits about ¼ inch deep. This helps to render the fat as the panceta roasts. Place the panceta, fat side down, in a heavy oven-safe pan. Roast it 30 minutes.

Very carefully pour or ladle off the rendered fat into a heatproof bowl. Turn the panceta fatty-side up. Raise oven heat to 425ºF. Return the panceta to the oven and roast it until the fat begins to bubble and crisp, 15 minutes. Remove. 

Slice the panceta and serve hot or room temperature. Crisp the slices in a skillet, if desired. Store the unused panceta tightly covered and refrigerated. Store the reserved fat, covered, in a cool place.

More recipes from La Rioja:

Rioja-Style Shelling Beans.

Potatoes Riojana.

More lentils:

Don Quixote's (Vegetarian) Lentils.

Lentils with Spicy Dressing.

More recipes with panceta:

Bean Pot with Fennel and Pork Belly.

Home-Made Chorizo Sausage.

Zamora-Style Rice with Sausage and Panceta.

Madrid-Style Cocido.

BIRTHDAY PARTY

A superb 100 percent ibérico ham from Extremadura, ready to share with guests for my birthday party. (Photo by Marina Caviese.)

 

This birthday seemed an occasion for something special. For me, the “something special” was ibérico ham, 100 percent ibérico de bellota, from a free-range pig, finished on acorns in the dehesa of Extremadura. 

Once the ham was ordered and on the way, I decided I should have a party to share the goodness. I invited old and not-so-old friends and family from near and far. As this is olive-picking season, I said on the invitations that it was an “olive picking party.” I planned a merienda de aceituneros—an olive pickers’ lunch. 

The menu:

Ibérico ham from Cárdeno, Fuentes de León, Extremadura. (Not coincidentally, I have been up close and personal with these ibérico pigs, back in 2006, on a visit to the dehesa while doing an article about ibérico ham. It is fabulous ham.) I served the ham with bread, grated tomato and olive oil so guests could make a typical pan con tomate y jamón.

Not everyone eats ham!

Cheese board with fresh goat cheese, aged sheeps’ milk cheese, membrillo (quince paste) and crackers.

Dips and dippers:

Atascaburras, a La Mancha dish of mashed potatoes, salt cod, garlic and olive oil, and chopped walnuts. (Recipe here.) Served with regañás, crunchy olive oil crackers. (Recipe for regañás.)

Blue cheese dip with yogurt and Sherry, served with endive leaves and carrot sticks.

Zeilouk, an eggplant dip that’s not baba ghanoush. This Moroccan salad (recipe here.) with cumin and lemon is good with pita crisps (recipe here.). Plus, two kinds of olives, nuts, etc.

I served the dips outside on the patio. The sun was so strong we had to move the table into the shade! (Photo by Marina Caviese.)

To accompany the ham:

Patatas aliñadas, a potato salad with olive oil and Sherry vinegar dressing (recipe here.) The only extra I added was fennel pollen, gathered from wild fennel that grows around my olive grove.  (I decided against that Olive Pickers’ Potato Stew that I featured here a few weeks ago. It was much too warm for a hot dish.) (Photo by Marina Caviese.)

Pipirrana de Jaén, a chopped tomato salad from Jaén, the Andalusian province that is the largest olive oil producing land in the world. This pipirrana (recipe below) is a little different from the one I’ve published here before. If my party had a theme, it was definitely olives and olive oil.

Remojón, a salad of sliced oranges, cod, onions and olives, dressed in olive oil. We added bits of pink grapefruit to the oranges and used (packaged) smoked cod instead of the usual salt cod. (The recipe for orange and cod salad is here.)

Sautéed piquillo peppers. Inspired because I had several cans of piquillos in the cupboard. They were sautéed in olive oil with onions and slivered garlic. 

Lentil salad (above) with walnuts, green onions, tomatoes, lemon, dill and olive oil. We garnished the salad with ruby-red pomegranate, which is in season right now. (The recipe is from The Turkish Cookbook by Nur Ilkin and Sheilah Kaufman). This dish and the potatoes were vegetarian--not everyone eats ham!

I had help in the kitchen in preparing the food for the gathering. Three friends came from the U.S. to spend the week in Mijas with me. 

Party prep in my kitchen. From the left, Donna Gelb, Amanda Clark, Donna Ellefson and myself. Amanda and Donna E are friends from college days (Northwestern University, Evanston, IL, 1960). Donna G, a cookbook author and recipe developer, and I met through the International Association of Culinary Professionals. We've been travelling and cooking together for quite a few years. (Photo by Leo Searl.)

I couldn't have done it without these guys, grandson Leo on the left and my son, Ben Searl. (Photo by Marina Caviese.)

Ben is becoming an expert ham slicer! He's following instructions in the illustrated book, Slicing Spanish Ham by Pilar Esteban. 

Josh shows daughter Selma how to spread tomato and olive oil on the bread before topping it with thinly sliced ham. 

The kids at the party have a go at thrashing olives off the trees. (Photo by Louise Cook.)

Siena and Selma show me the olives they've helped to pick. Good work! (Photo by Donna Gelb.)

Time for cake! This one is a sugar-free, olive oil fig spice cake. My friends have decorated it with flowers instead of candles. (Photo by Marina Caviese.)

What a happy birthday! (Photo by Donna Gelb.)

Chopped Tomato Salad, Jaén Style

Pipirrana de Jaén

This rustic country salad—typically made by olive pickers—can be made with fresh tomatoes or, if tomatoes are not in season, with canned tomatoes (preferably, home-canned ones). If using fresh tomatoes, peel them before chopping. I easily peeled a quantity of tomatoes with a vegetable peeler. You also can drop them into boiling water for about 1 minute, then slip the skins off. 

The salad is usually made in a dornillo, an olive-wood bowl. Otherwise, make the dressing in a mortar and mix the salad in a bowl. 

1 teaspoon coarse salt

2 cloves garlic

2-3 small green peppers (Italian frying pepper)

3 hard-boiled eggs

¾ cup extra virgin olive oil

3-4 pounds ripe tomatoes, peeled

Canned tuna

Place the salt in a mortar or wooden bowl with the peeled garlic. Crush the garlic to a paste.

Cut one of the peppers into pieces and add to the mortar. Grind and crush until it becomes a paste. (This is easier if the pieces of pepper are placed skin-side down, so you’re crushing the fleshy inside.) Separate the yolks from the cooked eggs (save the whites). Add the yolks to the mortar and crush. Gradually stir in the oil to make a smooth dressing.

Peel the tomatoes and chop them. Chop the remaining green peppers and the reserved egg whites. Combine in a bowl with the dressing. Add additional salt to taste. Cover and refrigerate until serving time. 

Garnish the salad with chunks of canned tuna before serving.

I'm perched in an olive tree, picking olives, a few days after my 80th birthday. Tomorrow I'll take all the olives to the mill and, hopefully, come home with new olive oil. That makes it a happy birthday!