Linguine with Tomatoes and Brie

For our family, this pasta marks the start of High Summer: those hazy, lazy days when all we do is sit around eating piles of fresh tomatoes and sipping Campari and Proceseco.

Linguine with Tomatoes and Brie is beyond luxurious. The tomatoes, brie, olive oil and pasta water form a creamy, earthy sauce that's cut by the bright acid from the tomatoes and cheese, and spiked with fresh basil and black pepper. (And, in practical terms, if you'd like to take a break from Caprese salad, this will check all of the same boxes while giving you something delightfully different).

NOTE ABOUT "THE SILVER PALATE COOKBOOK": The Silver Palate Cookbook by Julee Rosso and Sheila Lukins was the cook book that introduced me to the idea that meals could be artistic, playful, and even seductive. When I was a kid, I would flip through this cookbook imagining glamorous dinner parties with friends and romantic country picnics with Luke Perry. Some of the recipes in the Silver Palette now seem dated, and the flavors are a bit heavy handed, but many recipes, like their famous Chicken Marbella are absolute classics. Linguine with Tomatoes and Brie is an update of their "Linguine with Tomatoes and basil" only I cut way back on the raw garlic and oil, upped the tomato, and added some pasta water. I think these changes take this recipe from the chunky 80s to a more nuanced palate of the 2020s.

NOTE ABOUT TOMATOES: Linguine with Tomatoes and Brie can only be made once those thick, juice, enormous tomatoes grow in abundance. You cannot make this with grape tomatoes or grocery store tomatoes! Don't try! It won't even come close. To make this, you need those almost squishy tomatoes whose skin is ready to burst and whose juice spills out on the cutting-board.

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Linguine With Tomatoes and Brie

Serves 3 as a main and 5 as a side. Easily doubled. Time: 15 minutes, plus 2 hours (hands off) to marinate and then 30 minutes to boil water and cook pasta. Special equipment: none. Adapted from Linguine with Tomatoes and Basil from Silver Palate Cookbook, 1979

Ingredients

• 4 large very ripe tomatoes (about 1.5 lbs)

• 1/2 pound mild brie cheese COLD

• about 1 cup basil leaves, plus 4-6 large basil leaves set aside for garnish

• 1 medium-large clove of garlic

• 1/2 teaspoon diamond kosher salt, (plus more for pasta water and to finish)

• about 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

• 1/4 cup medium-good quality extra virgin olive oil

• 1/2 pound linguine pasta

• 2-4 tablespoons pasta water

STEP ONE

Using brie right from the fridge, cut of as much of the brie rind as you can without loosing too much cheese, then cut brie into roughly 1 inch cubes and put into a large, heat safe serving bowl. Next, cut tomatoes into large, bite size pieces and add to brie along with any tomato seeds and juices. Mince garlic and add to bowl and then cut basil into strips and add to the bowl as well. Pour 1/4 cup olive oil over the whole thing, sprinkle salt and pepper over top. Cover bowl with plastic wrap and set aside at room temperature for 2-3 hours. On a hot day 1-2 hours will do, on a cooler day you might need 3 hours. Over the next few hours the brie will melt and the tomatoes will macerate becoming soupy, and the whole thing will smell divine. I highly recommend sampling just to see how things are progressing.

STEP TWO

Bring pot of salted water to boil and then cook linguine to desired donness. Remove 1/4 cup of pasta water, and then drain pasta. DO NOT RINSE PASTA. Add drained pasta to the bowl with the tomatoes, basil and brie.

STEP THREE

Allow pasta to melt the brie, and then gently begin to toss the pasta and sauce together. Add about 2 tablespoons of pasta water and toss again. You should now have a rich sauce and all but the largest chunks of brie will have melted. Add a splash more pasta water if needed. Garnish with torn leaves of fresh basil and more black pepper. Serve right away. Pairs well with some bread to sop up the juices and a bright lemony summer salad.

Linguine with Tomatoes and Brie can be stored in a covered container in the fridge for about 3-4 days.

Homemade All-Purpose Chicken Stock

To repeat the Monty Python joke I quoted a few weeks ago: canned chicken stock is, "like making love in a canoe."It's f-ing near water." Not that I haven't used the canned stuff or that I won't ever use it again, but nothing comes close to real chicken stock. So, if you can find the time, making it is "worth it" because quality base ingredients make simple meals so much more delicious. If you make stock now, you can make simpler yet more delicious meals later.

This recipe is for an all-purpose chicken stock. This is the one that you can use for decadent cream sauces, pots of beans or grains, braising pot roast or pork butt, or emergency chicken noodle soup. What makes this an all-purpose stock is that I don't use garlic, or tons of carrots and onions, or tons of salt. I use a few carrots and onions and a tiny bit of salt to build the flavor profile of the stock. If you use too much of those ingredients, then they can dominate your stock and then dominate whatever you are using your stock for. That said, please don't get overwhelmed by all the variations in stock/broth making. If you add a clove of garlic to your stock, you'll still like it.

Think of stock and broth recipes like chocolate chip cookie recipes. Some are certainly better than others but almost all of them are delicious and your life is always better with home made cookies just like your life is better with home made stock. Because there are so many different tweeks to a basic stock recipe and I don't want anyone to get overwhelmed, I've included variations and suggestions at the END of this recipe instead of before the recipe. I want you to make this stock, and I don't want you to get caught up in the details. The details are fun to play with, but ultimately are not that big of a deal.

Note about Uses: Use your stock in Cheery Cherry Rice, Refried Beans, Lentil Soup, pasta sauces, quick soups, when making pot roast, or braising pork or beef. If you don't make your own beef stock, I find that using 1:1 ratio of home made chicken stock with canned beef stock is far superior to just using canned beef stock.

Note about Equipment: You'll need 2 large pots (Ideally an 8 quart pot and a 6 quart pot), and a larger strainer. Optional but recommended: silcone babyfood freezer tray(s) either 1.5 ounce or 3 ounce size. I have some from WeeSprout but any brand will work. If you have a true stock pot and enough room in your freezer, please feel free to double this recipe.

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Homemade All-Purpose Chicken Stock

Makes about 4-5 quarts of stock. Takes about 4 hours to make.

Ingredients

1 four-ish pound chicken and neck. Save giblets and heart for another use OR 2-3 chicken carcasses with some meat (see note below)

2 large organic onions and skins, quartered (only outer onion skin removed or remove all of the skin if your onion is not organic).

2 large stalks celery leaves included chopped into 4-5 inch pieces

2 large organic carrots washed tops can stay on (or regular peeled and washed) cut into 5 inch peaces

2 bayleaves (optional)

Handful of parsley stems and leaves

1/2 teaspoon whole peppercorns

1 teaspoons salt (optional)

STEP ONE

Add all your ingredients to your largest pot (8 quarts or larger). Fill pot with water until it comes close to covering the top of your ingredients. Heat pot over high heat and bring to a boil. You'll then see grey scum rising to the top of your stock. Turn the temperature down to low. Use a spoon, or slotted spoon, to remove as much of the greyish scum as you can without removing the fat. This is called skimming your stock. I am not a neurotic skimmer. The scum can affect the taste/mouth feel of your stock, but if you're not making a fancy french soup with a clear stock, you probably won't notice. Just get as much as you can easily scoop out without losing the fat.

STEP TWO

Adjust the heat to bring your stock to a low simmer. Cook either uncovered or partially covered with a lid cracked over the pot. (depending on how much water you have in your pot and how much you want your stock to cook down). I prefer to cook mine with the lid off so that I can have a more concentrated stock. If your chicken rises to the top and pokes out of the water, feel free to poke it back under the water. BUT, try to avoid stirring your stock! Stiing it can emulsify the fat into the broth and can stir in any of that grey scum which you might have missed.

STEP THREE

OPTIONAL: If you're using a whole chicken, and you'd like chicken breast or thigh meat for chicken salad or sandwiches, then after one hour, carefully remove your chicken from the stock pot and slice off the breast meat and (using tongs) pull off the thigh meat, and then return chicken to pot.

STEP FOUR

After 3-4 hours turn the temperature off under your stock and remove from heat. Get out another large pot or very large metal bowl and set a strainer on top of it. (See photo below). Very carefully pour your hot stock through the strainer and into the next pot. Set aside the chicken carcass and veggie remnants.

STEP FIVE

Chill your stock. The faster you chill your stock, the longer it will last. I like to rinse out my larger pot and make an ice bath in the bottom of my larger cooking pot and then set my smaller pot with the stock in the ice bath. Once the ice bath has warmed, remove the cooling stock and refereshteh ice bath. I will repeate this 2-3 times. The stock should now be cool enough to cover and set in the fridge to finish cooling or to be divided for storage. Stock will keep for 5 days in the fridge or about 6 months in the freezer.

STEP SIX

Divide your stock into appropriate containers for storage. I use 3 and 1.5 ounce silicone baby food containers to freeze my stock and then I pop them out and put them in bags. I can fill about 8 trays worth with 1 pot of stock. I just store the rest of the stock in the fridge and empty and refill my containers each time they freeze. I cannot recommend silicone baby food freezer containers highly enough. I think they work so much better than ice cube trays or plastic quart containers. These are like bags of gold in my freezer.

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NOTES ABOUT INGREDIENTS AND VARIATIONS:

• Salt: I add a tiny bit of salt to my stock because I believe that salt should be layered in and build complexity along the way. That said, I only add a small amount of salt to make a low sodium stock because I don't want to accidentally over-salt anything I'm adding the stock to.

• Garlic: I don't add garlic to my chicken stock. I love garlic, but I love to add it fresh to anything that I'm making. You can add garlic to yours, but I just feel like it makes my stock taste a little bitter and overpowers the sweet onion and sweet chicken flavors

• Browning your Veggies Before Cooking: If you would like a browner/toastier tasting stock, please feel free to brown your veggies in the bottom of the pot with a tablespoon of oil before adding your chicken, herbs, and water. I like this method for making chicken soup, but I find that not browning the veggies leaves their flavor a little gentler and makes for a more versatile stock.

• Roasting your Chicken bones before using: You can absolutely do this, but I'd save this kind of labor for when the weather is cold and you're making soup.

• Free Range Corn Fed Chickens: If I can find them, I really like to buy chickens that are free range and cornfed, their fat has a nice yellow color (although, like egg yolks, that can be faked by adding marigolds).

• Stock vs Broth: Stock is technically made of bones and a broth is made of meat and bones... This has some of the meat removed part way through. Call it what you like.

• Onion Skins: the reason people leave onion skin on when making stock is to add color!

• Fat Cap: I leave the fat on my chicken stock because there's not that much fat in chicken (as compared to pork or beef), and a little fat adds to the flavor. If you want a clear broth, you can remove the fat cap after your stock cools in the fridge and the fat can be saved for roasting potatoes or root veggies.

• Using Chicken Bones vs Whole Chicken: In the winter, when I'm roasting chicken every few weeks, I will freeze the chicken carcasses. When I do this I actually don't pick my chickens completely clean after roasting. I like to have a bit of the meat to flavor my stock! When I have 2-3 carcasses I will make stock. If I don't feel like I have enough meat left on those carcasses, I'll add a chicken breast or some chicken wings to the pot as well. I don't usually roast chickens in the summer, so if I need stock when it's hot out, I like to use a whole chicken and then remove the breast and thigh meat half way through so that we can have chicken salad for dinner.

Fresh Cherry Berry Slushies

This fresh slushie was first concocted by my son Alex. We had a giant box of cherries and he got to thinking that slushies might be the perfect way to use them. He was right, and we are all so grateful.

If you're looking for a slushie made with frozen berries, please see this strawberry post. If you're looking for a version made with fresh berries, you're in the right spot. You can use strawberries or cherries for either version, although you may want to play with the flavor seltzer that you use based on your berry choice. The world is your seltzer-slushie-cherry. Go nuts!

Note about Pitting Cherries: Since these cherries are going into a blender, there's no reason to be gentle about pitting them. Simply spread them on a rimed baking sheet, squish them with the bottom of a bowl, and then pick out the pits and stems. You'll save a lot of time and your hand won't cramp the way it does when you use a pitter.

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Cherry Berry Slushies

Equipment: high power blender. Makes 5 small or 3 large slushies.

Ingredients

1 pound cherries, pitted

1 can (12 ounces) chilled black cherry seltzer (we like Polar brand)

3 tablespoons sugar or to taste

2-3 cups of ice

STEP ONE

Add all the ingredients to the blender and blend until chunks of ice and cherries have achieved desired consistency. Taste and adjust the sugar, and add more ice or seltzer to desired consistency. Enjoy right away!