“Every restaurant in San Francisco is just serving figs on a plate . . . do something to your food,” said the abrasive New York chef David Chang in a recent interview.
Yes, but how much should you to do to it? Does the perfect ingredient — the perfect fig, tomato or scallop — need nothing but a little salt, pepper, a few minutes on the grill or in the frying pan, followed by a dash of olive oil and lemon juice, or does it need something more? Chang’s explosively flavored food is obviously manipulated — brined, confited, marinated, smoked — and overlaid with a complex and assertive but perfectly balanced battery of seasonings.
At the other end of the spectrum is chef Andrew Carmellini of New York’s Locanda Verde. Given the chef’s Italian background, the seasonings are fewer, and the food’s flavor profile is cleaner, but it’s just as satisfying as Chang’s.
On a recent trip to New York, we were so excited by Carmellini’s food that we ate at Locanda Verde three times in six days. Every dish we ate — except a pedestrian “My Grandmother’s Ravioli” — impressed us with the feeling that the chef not only took great care in sourcing the best ingredients but did just enough to the ingredients to make the flavors sing.
One of the dishes that we most enjoyed was a crostino of broccoli-raab pesto with a little stewed eggplant and buffalo mozzarella. The pesto had the brilliant green color and unctuousness of a good basil pesto, as well as a touch of bitterness to give it some complexity. The eggplant and the mozzerella were the best and freshest to be found, but there was an unobtrusive depth of flavor that came from the toasted foccacia it was served on — not an ordinary foccacia, but a foccacia laced with thinly sliced pieces of prosciutto.
Carmellini’s broccoli-raab pesto is great on crostini, as a sauce for chicken, beef or fish, or tossed like basil pesto with linguine. I’ve taken the liberty of adding a pinch of pepperoncini to bring out the flavor of the broccoli raab — like any good Italian cook would.
John Broening cooks at Duo and Olivea restaurants in Denver.
Broccoli Raab Pesto
Makes about 2 cups.
Ingredients
1 bunch broccoli raab
2 teaspoons minced garlic
1/2 cup grated parmesan
1/2 cup toasted almonds or pine nuts
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
Pinch chili flakes
Salt and freshly ground pepper
Directions
Cut off the bottom 2 inches of stem from the broccoli raab.
Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Blanch the raab for about 2 minutes. Shock in a bowl of ice water, and drain well.
Roughly chop the raab; add the remaining ingredients, and pulse in a food processor to a coarse paste. Refrigerate covered until ready to use.
