Cooking Italian

I got another new cookbook. This one is very special, as it has recipes that all include salame, prosciutto, and other Italian meats. My parents gave it to me for my birthday and I love it. Going through it and looking at all the recipes was like feeling my grandmother leaning over my shoulder and talking about the food she had growing up. I can see her and Nonni (my great-grandmother) making things like these recipes all the time. I would love to get more Italian cookbooks. I wish there was an Italian equivalent to Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking; if there is, I've never heard of it (then again, my Italian family cooked from the mind and the heart, not from a recipe in a book).

This 144-page cookbook has inspired me. I currently don't have the time or the kitchen space to do as much cooking as I now want to. School unfortunately has to come first, which is why I treasure my cooking time on the weekends. And my kitchen isn't conducive to all the cooking  from scratch that I want to start doing. My sister actually has the best term for my kitchen: galley. No dishwasher and little counter space means that making one meal results in an odd dance with Scooter and I competing for a flat surface and a disaster of dirty dishes--all of which we have to clean by hand--after the meal is ready. I've put up with this set-up for almost three years, but I'm hoping that we can get a bigger place (with a dishwasher!) by the time I finish my program. Because once that I happens, I plan to spend a year cooking almost nothing but Italian food--including homemade pasta--like my mother, and her mother, and the other Italian women in my family have done.

But in the meantime, I continue as I have done and cook on the weekends and experiment with different recipes. And with that, I have two recipes to share: pasta with lamb shanks (from my crock-pot cookbook) and "melting moments" (from my English tea book). Let's start with the lamb.

What you'll need:
3 Tbs. olive oil
4 lamb shanks (4-5 lbs total)
2 large carrots
1 medium red onion
4 cloves garlic, sliced (or 1-2Tbs. garlic powder)
1 14.5-oz. of dark beer (Guinness works well)
1/2 c. tomato paste
2 14.5-oz. cans chopped tomatoes, with their juice
2 Tbs. fresh rosemary, chopped
2 tsp. fresh oregano, chopped
salt and pepper to taste
1 lb. penne pasta

What you'll need to do:
1. Heat the olive oil in a large skilled over medium-high heat. Add two of the lamb shanks and cook until browned on all sides. Remove and place on a plate. Repeat with the last two shanks.
2. While the lamb is cooking, slice the carrots into 1/3-in slices. Cut the onion into small chunks. Once the lamb has finished cooking, add the vegetables and the garlic to the skillet and saute until softened. Remove from heat and add to a medium or large crock pot. Lay the meat on top.
3. Over medium heat, carefully add the beer to the skillet. Bring to a boil and scrap up any bits stuck to the skillet. Add the tomato paste and the cans of chopped tomato. Bring the skillet to a boil, then reduce heat to medium-low and let everything simmer for 5 minutes. Pour the sauce over the lamb and vegetables and cook on the LOW setting for 6-8 hours. Meat should be tender and almost falling off the bone.
4. Boil a pot of water and cook the pasta as directed. Remove the lamb from the crock pot and pour the sauce into a large saucepan. Bring it to a boil, lower the heat, and let it simmer to thicken (the original recipe had less sauce so the recommended time was 10 minutes--if you follow this version of the recipe, I would increase it to 15 or 20).
5. Serve the lamb and sauce over the pasta with a red wine or a dark beer.

Once you've eaten as much lamb as you can, finish the meal with some fresh fruit and these light cookies.

What you'll need:
5 Tbs. lard (Crisco shortening works well)
6 Tbs. sugar
1 egg
1 1/4 c. self-rising flour*
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
dried coconut

What you'll need to do:
1. Preheat your oven to 375 degrees and grease a baking sheet.
2. In a medium mixing bowl, beat the lard and the sugar together with an electric mixer. Add the egg and mix completely. Add in the flour and vanilla extract, using a spatula to fold it together.
3. Once you have an even batter, roll the mixture into small balls. Roll in the coconut, and place finished balls on the baking sheet.
4. Bake for only 10 minutes. Cookies will be soft. Let cool for a couple of minutes, then transfer to a wire rack to finish cooling.
*can substitute with 1 1/4c. all-purpose flour, 1 1/4 tsp. baking powder, 1/2 tsp. salt, and 1/4 tsp. baking soda

Enjoy!