Waiter! There’s a Trout on my Plate

MATTHEW0 COMMENTSFROM THE LUNCH BOX, REVOLUTION

Jul 24

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Zucchini Blossoms with Porcini

Summertime is in its full expression here in Washington as it is all across the northern hemisphere. And in the latest missives from our European Blogger Señor Sebastian Puig from Barcelona, revelations show that the season hasn’t been lost on him. He and his family have been busy eating their way through Umbria, Greece, and Barcelona, and Puig has his latest missive to share with us: River Nera mountain trout for lunch!

Talk about A Lunchbox Blog Post worthy of the revolution I’d hope to start!

The images he sent captured my imagination as I disappeared like so many of Pinochet’s enemies into daydreams as I sat at my office daydreaming about how wonderful it would be to be on holiday on a Mediterranean island with my daughter and husband.

At this point in today’s blog post, just below you’ll probably see a big empty white space. Refresh your browser (because WordPress has a hell of a time with embed codes, apparently! Sheesh!) and see Snr. Puig and his family dining in Greece at a trattoria that seems to be a seafood paradise. While this food doesn’t grab me, particularly, at moments 1:50 you can see his Pixie-haired angel Stassa leading table conversation like a champ and at 3:30 our guest blogger toasts you (I’m sure, wishing we could all be there with him and the clan)! AS NOEL COWARD ONCE SAID in his song “Mrs. Wentworth Brewster,” I believe, “Life is for the living!” 

Check out this video of Puig's life in Greece: https://vimeo.com/45315433

Not surprisingly, Puig’s lunches are nonpareil affairs.

For those of you who have been as neck deep in the the NEW YORK TIMES REVIEW OF BOOKS as I have, it may surprise no one that this trout post got me thinking about Ernest Hemingway. I’ve been entranced by trout since reading Hemingway’s Nick Adams stories as a very impressionable teen. I mean, really, one good read of the Nick Adams stories or The Sun Also Rises, and what boy wants to live in one place when you could catch and kill just about anywhere in the world? You’d never go hungry:

“Nick cleaned them, slitting them from the vent to the tip of the jaw. All the insides and the gills and tongue came out in piece. They were both males; long, grey-white strips of milt, smooth and clean… He washed the trout in the stream. When he held them back up in the water, they looked like live fish…’Good,’ he said, ‘They’re nice and fresh. I repacked them in ferns.’”

At any rate, Snr. Puig wrote me the other day with an outstanding proposition:

Grechetto in all its Glory

“Although we are on the Greek island as usual for the summer, I had a lecturing

gig in a charming little Italian hill town in Umbria last weekend, and I have

some food and wine observations to offer if you’re interested. The usual

fabulous pasta, plus, in the interior of central Italy, a menu based on the

fresh mountain trout that swims by in the River Nera.”

I thought I’d take him up on it.

And so without further ado, (and as you all know, I love my ado), Snr. Puig’s latest installment:

Sauteed Chicory with Mountain Trout

Waiter, There’s a Trout on my Plate!

Last week on a brief work trip to a small hill town in Umbria (Yes, I know how lucky I am!), friends suggested an excursion into the Valnerina–the green, green valley outside of Terni. Even in the broiling heat of mid-summer (100 degrees!), the heart of the Umbrian Appenines was lush and verdant.

One of the area’s best-known towns gave its name to the Italian sport of norcineria, or as one website defines it, “the noble and ancient art of processing pig meat.” But when Norcia was suggested as a destination, I reminded my hosts that I eat only as high up the food chain as seafood and fish, and that the much-exalted charms of prosciutto are lost on me. Thus, an alternative plan popped up: a stop in the small town of Schieggino, where I could sample the local trota di torrente.

In Schieggino, we stumbled into a restaurant whose menu is based not exclusively, but almost entirely, on the fresh mountain trout that swim by in the river Nera for which the Valenerina Valley is named. Osteria Baciafemmine was like a dream come true for a pescatarian. Its name means something like “Kiss the Ladies,” although after visiting its website I’m still not sure why.

I had a veggie first-course, a perfectly presented bowl of pasta al dente tossed with porcini mushrooms and fresh zucchini blossoms. The homemade spaghetti had a very funny name: mosso culo, which describes the movement of the buttocks of the chef who rolls the noodles out on a floured board in the kitchen. Quite an image!

Sheesh! Sylvan Meadows on Gossamer Wings

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But the revelation of the first dishes was my friend Nikos’ primo piatto: a raw slice of trout served over thinly sliced apples and topped with a sauce of rich local yogurt. Italian trout sashimi! What a perfect cold dish for a hot summer day.

But my secondo nearly knocked me out. My trout, fresh as if it had just jumped through the window from the nearby Nera, arrived boned and covered with a salty sauce of local truffles. On the side, I ordered what turned out to be a man-sized portion of sautéed chicory, green, flavorful and with just a slightly bitter bite, cooked ever so slightly with lots of garlic and a green olive oil.

Sebastian Puig in Umbria's River Nera

All of it was served on hand-painted central Italian ceramics, was sold at a reasonable price, and was presented with a smile and that sense of proud ownership of the server who lovingly described and delivered each dish. Ah yes! And then there was the crisp white local wine: from Grechetto that was as fine and refreshing as any Orvieto classico I’ve ever tried.

THE RESTAURANT’S WEBSITE has some recipes–yes, you carnivores–for meaty dishes!

- See more at: http://www.alunchboxblog.com/mountain-trout-hemingway-would-be-proud-of/?preview=true&preview_id=3808&preview_nonce=2e12ec7c92#sthash.goTTZKDA.dpuf