Hello and welcome back to Five Things I Ate! This week, we make a mini-misu and put mascarpone on everything. Check out past posts here, and please follow my Instagram @fivethingsiate.
Cascatelli with Mascarpone tomato sauce at home
You can get mascarpone at most large grocery stores, but don’t buy it from Whole Foods (it’s oddly runny there.)
Mascarpone is magic cheese – it tastes like heavy cream in a cloud-like, solid form. Not only is it key in tiramisu – see below – a spoonful of it transforms the plainest marinara sauce into a rich, delicious vodka-like cream concoction. It’s a great weeknight dinner shortcut. All you have to do is add a dollop onto the hot sauced pasta (I like to sizzle some aromatics in olive oil before warming up the sauce in the same pan, and also adding a handful of parmesan flakes for a salty contrast), and give it a stir just until the sauce turns creamy, but leaving a bit unmixed so you can taste the sweetness of the dairy in each bite.
Cascatelli pasta at Trader Joe’s
Here’s the pasta, available at Trader Joe’s and elsewhere.
As both a food nerd and a media nerd, I was very excited to score a box of Cascatelli at Trader Joe’s. For those who don’t listen to way too many podcasts at once, Cascatelli is a new pasta shape whose invention was documented on the Sporkful podcast. It claims to be innovative on three fronts: "Forkability" - how easy it is to get a pasta shape on your fork and keep it there, "Sauceability" - how well a sauce sticks to it, and "Toothsinkability" - how satisfying it is to sink your teeth into (source: Wikipedia). That’s a lot of hype for a box of pasta. How did it taste? Well, considering that I almost polished off a one-pound package in less than a week, it’s definitely tasty. That being said, it behaved an awful lot like campanelle to me, although an improved version. It suffered less from the issue I always have with campanelle, which is that the beautiful ruffled edges always fall off, and I enjoyed the extra textured surface. The whole experience ends up feeling like eating bits of lasagne edges, which I do not hate.
Tiramisu for two (or four, probably)
Adapted from NYT Cooking
A few weeks ago, I tackled tiramisu for the first time – or should I say, tea-ramisu, and now I can’t imagine life without having a little bit of tiramisu in the freezer for a treat. So, I used the leftover mascarpone from pasta-making to make a small batch to tide me over for this week. It’s very easy to halve this recipe from the NYT Cooking app, and when you do it fits perfectly into a 3-cup rectangular pyrex pan. For the espresso, I brewed about 6oz (or 2 3-cup moka pots) of very strong coffee. But you could simply google a recipe for classic tiramisu and halve (or quarter) it. Apparently a classic Italian tiramisu does not contain cream, and instead uses raw egg yolks and raw whipped egg whites, but I like the taste of whipped cream, so I don’t mind this slightly Americanized recipe. I also whip the egg yolks and sugar over a pot of simmering water, to slightly pasteurize it, because it’s fun and why not. The only thing I would not do is skip the liquor – in my opinion, you really need that kick – and I prefer to use Amaro or marsala wine.
NA-Bee cocktail at Osamil
5 W 31st St, New York, NY 10001
I always forget that Koreatown is smack-dab in the middle of Midtown. That is, until I walked into Osamil at happy hour to meet a friend, and found it to be a bustling watering hole for bros in button down shirts. I sometimes have a hard time believing that business bros actually exist, thanks to a career exclusively in nonprofits and academia. It’s like when I lived in Park Slope for three years above a daycare but literally never crossed paths with a child, because I keep the hours of a vampire. In addition to bros, Osamil was also filled with a very pungent scent of… not Korean food, but smoky, eye-watering incense. It was like the restaurant was trying to pretend that this was not a Korean restaurant, but in fact, a yoga retreat. Anyways, I didn’t come here to write shit about Osamil, because I actually had a great time catching up with a friend there, but I just really needed to set the scene for you. The nice thing about being in Midtown after all, is that the booze is very good. For the past two years I have been craving a perfect, egg-white topped, sour-based cocktail, and at Osamil, I was finally satisfied. The NA-Bee was a beautiful shade of butterfly pea purple, and lemony without being too sweet. It was also topped off with an edible flower, which I definitely “ooh’d” at.
Happy Friday iced vanilla matcha boba at home
Here’s the type of tapioca pearls you need.
Did you know that you can make a Fancy Tea Drink – the kind that costs $6 at the boba chain – in under 10 minutes at home? I almost never order boba in my drinks when I order out, because it always seems too hard. I’m a strong believer that boba, unlike pasta, should not be served al-dente. Thankfully, it’s incredibly easy to make fresh boba – in fact, it’s as simple as boiling pasta, and even quicker. All you have to do is bring a small pot of water to a rolling boil, and stir in about two tablespoons of tapioca pearls (black sugar is my favorite) and cook for 3-5 minutes, until the desired texture is achieved. Drain and rinse with cold water, stir in a tablespoon of agave nectar or maple syrup, and you’re good to go. Add that to the bottom of a tall glass, and meanwhile shake a teaspoon of matcha with a cup of ice and 4-6oz of cold water. Pour that on top of your boba carefully. For the piece de resistance, froth 2-3oz of cold whole milk, or just shake vigorously in a jar. Pour slowly over the top of your drink, and give it a lil’ stir-stir.
Enjoy,
Soph
P.S. I’ll be on vacation (!) next week so there won’t be a newsletter.
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