Involtini di Pesce Spada

Soaking dried goods back to life 69 recipes

• Fully submerged with room to swell: the level is well above everything at the start and still above it at the end.
• Given the full time, and judged by what is in the bowl rather than by the hours on the clock.
• Tested at the CENTRE of the largest piece, cut or pressed. Anything with a hard dry core will still have one after cooking, because the outside softens first and stops the water getting further in.
• The soaking water was dealt with on purpose: kept because it holds flavour, or thrown away because it holds what should not be eaten, but never simply left undecided.
• Drained before it is used, so the dish does not silently gain all the water that came with it.

Where it goes wrong Too little water, or too little time. The pieces swell until they are packed tight against each other and the ones in the middle never fully take up water; they will not soften later in the dish either, so the finished plate has hard pieces scattered through it.

Grilling over live coals 77 recipes

• The fire was ready before the food was: coals evenly covered in grey ash with no flames licking through and no raw smoke coming off, and a hot zone and a cooler one both available.
• The grate was hot and clean when the food landed, and the food released cleanly from it when the time came to turn rather than tearing away.
• Marks are browned, not burnt: deep colour where the metal touched, with no carbon flaking off and no soot transferred onto the food.
• The interior reaches its target with a thin gradient, not charred outside and cold within, and not driven through by a flare-up.
• What comes off the fire smells of fire and food only: no raw wood smoke, no fuel, nothing acrid at the back of the nose.

Where it goes wrong It went on over live flames instead of settled coals, so the outside charred bitter in the flare-ups while the middle stayed cold, and everything on the plate tastes of soot.