Spotlight Dishes and Diary Entry

Tonight's Spotlight Dish is the perfect finish to the perfect summer meal. Torta di Susina. This recipe comes from Cesare Casella's Diary of a Tuscan Chef and I have included it so that you can try it at home.

We will be having Torta di Susina which tonight is a baked peach tart with lemon pastry cream. "Peach?" You may ask. Yes, peach. Although the recipe calls for Plums we came across the most delicious peaches from Locust Grove, and could not pass them up.

Torta di Susina-
Plum Tart
Serves up to 8.

1/2-3/4 cup pastry cream
1 pastry crust
1 1/2-2 cups tart plums, sliced, (do not skin) *as we have tonight, you can substitute fresh peaches or kiwis or another fresh, thin-skinned fruit.
2 tablespoons sugar

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Spread the pasty cream inside the pie crust creating a layer 3/4 inch deep. Arrange the plums in overlapping circles on top. Sprinkle the top with the sugar and cover with aluminum foil. Bake for 30 minutes. Remove the foil and bake for another 10-15 minutes. The tart is ready when the crust is golden brown and the fruit curls slightly at the edges. Serve the tart warm or at room temperature.


Our second Spotlight Dish tonight is Maiale con Peperoni. (Pork with Peppers) Which is pork tenderloin marinated with rosemary, sage and red pepper flakes.The pork is a Pasture-fed Duroc Pig from Good Farm in Kansas. It will be sautéed with Stokes Farm roasted red green and yellow peppers and Thanksgiving Farms young onions and capers, with garlic, and white wine, and finished with sage and rosemary. The recipe comes from Cesare Casella's The Diary of a Tuscan Chef, and we have included it so that you can try it at home.


Maiale con Peperoni
Pork with Peppers
Serves 4

2 tablespoons chopped fresh rosemary
2 tablespoons chopped fresh sage
1/2 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes
4 boneless center cut pork chops each 1 inch think
3 bell peppers, one each of red, yellow, and green. Halved and seeded.
4 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
2 cloves garlic, crushed
1/2 medium red onion, sliced
1 tablespoon drained capers
salt and fresh ground black pepper to taste
1/3 cup white wine

Mix together half of the chopped herbs and red pepper flakes and rub them into the pork chops. Wrap the meat in plastic wrap and refrigerate it for 48 hours. (If you don't have the time to marinate it, the dish will be less flavorful but still good.)
Preheat the broiler. Place the peppers, skin side up on a broiler pan. Broil the peppers, watching them carefully. When the skin blackens, turn them over, until they are black on both sides. It will take about 10 minutes. Remove the pepper and place them in a closed plastic bag for 5 to 10 minutes. Rub off the skins and slice the peppers into thin strips.
pout 2 tablespoons of the olive oil into a large frying pan. Add the garlic and onion and cook over medium heat until the mixture colors lightly, about 5 minutes. Add the other half of the herbs, the sliced peppers and the capers. Season with salt and pepper and cook for ten minutes. Remove from the heat, and keep warm.
In another large frying pan add the 2 remaining 2 tablespoons of oil and the pork chops. Saute the chops over medium heat for 7 minutes on each side. Add the salt and pepper and white wine. Continue to cook until the wine reduces completely, about 5 minutes. Add the pepper mixture, warm through, and serve.