New Year in Italy means lentils. In Rome, they say those who eat lentils and grapes at New Year conta quatrini tutto l’anno (count coins all year long). It is the magic of their form. Shaped (a bit) like coins, lentils are an augury of wealth and happiness: the more you eat, the better your fortune the following year. It is a tradition upheld in much of the country, although different regions have different ways of eating lentils and have different accompaniments – particularly good are the fat cotechino sausages of the north.
So, deck your dining table with these Italian inspired recipes.
Lentils with Italian sausage
Serves 4, generously
Ingredients
500g small brown lentils
6 tbsp olive oil
1 white onion, finely chopped
1 garlic clove, finely chopped
1 carrot, peeled and finely chopped
1 celery stick, finely chopped
2 bay leaves
1 precooked cotechino, heated according to instructions, or finest quality pork sausages
Salt and black pepper
Directions
1 Wash the lentils. Boil the kettle. In a large, deep frying pan, warm the olive oil and add the onion, garlic, carrot, and celery and fry gently until soft.
2 Add the lentils and bay leaves and then cover with at least 5cm of water and cook at the gentlest of simmers until the lentils are tender, but still with just a little bite – which will take anything from 20–40 minutes (be careful: lentils turn from tender to mush quite quickly). Keep tasting and add more water if the pan looks dry. By the end of cooking, the water should have been almost completely absorbed. Season.
3 Heat the cotechino according to instructions (which usually means putting it in simmering water to re-heat for 30 minutes). Once ready, cut off the corner and tip the juices into the lentils and stir, then tip on to a warm platter. If you are using regular pork sausages, brown them in a little oil, then pour over a third of a bottle of wine (red, white or rosé) and put on the lid so they cook in a steamy braise for 20 minutes. Once they are cooked, take off the lid, raise the heat and let the juices reduce into a sticky gravy.
4 If you are using cotechino, slice it thickly or simply lay your sausages on top of the lentils. Serve with mostarda (mustard fruit) relish or poached quince (see below).
Poached quince
Makes a large bowlful
Ingredients
1kg quince
1 unwaxed lemon
250g sugar
6 cloves
6 black peppercorns
300ml white wine
Directions
1 Wash, peel, core and cut the quince into eighths. Using a peeler, pare away a strip of lemon zest. Put the quince, zest and all the other ingredients in a large pan, then top up with 300ml water. Bring to the boil, then reduce to a simmer for 40-60 minutes or until the quince is tender, but holding its shape.
2 Lift the quince from the liquid into a serving dish. Continue simmering the liquid until it has reduced to a syrup thick enough to coat the back of a spoon, then pour it over the quince. Allow it to sit for a few hours, or preferably a day, before eating. Keeps for several days.
Baked apples with mincemeat and cream
Serves 6-12
Ingredients
12 small dessert or baking apples (such as russet, cox or Bramley)
100g butter
200g mincemeat
Cold thick cream, to serve
Directions
1 Set the oven to 180C/350F/gas 4. Find an ovenproof dish that will accommodate all the apples, then rub it very generously with butter.
2 Remove the cores from the apples, keeping the apples whole, then score each apple around the middle, cutting through the skin, but not too deep, then arrange them snugly in the baking dish.
3 Stuff the empty cavity with mincemeat and dot with a tiny knob of butter, pushing it into the mincemeat with your fingertip.
4 Bake for 40 minutes, or until the apples are soft. Allow them to cool slightly before serving warm with cold thick cream.
Chocolate and chestnut cake
Serves 8
Ingredients
250g dark chocolate (70% cocoa solids)
250g unsalted butter, cut into cubes
250g roasted and peeled chestnuts (vacuum packed are fine or you can roast and peel your own)
250ml whole milk
4 medium-sized eggs
125g caster sugar
Directions
1 Grease and line a 25cm cake tin (the springform type is good) and set the oven to 170C/335F/gas 3½.
2 Break the chocolate into pieces, then melt along with the cubed butter in a small saucepan over a low flame.
3 In another pan, warm the milk and chestnuts together until the milk is nearly boiling. Remove the pan from the heat and mash the chestnuts into a paste in the milk with a potato masher or blend with an immersion blender.
4 Separate the egg yolks from the whites and beat the yolks with the sugar in a large bowl. Fold the melted chocolate and butter into the yolk and sugar mixture, then stir this into the chestnut and milk puree to create a gloopy batter.
5 In another bowl, whisk the egg whites until they form stiff peaks and then fold them into the rest of the ingredients.
6 Tip the mixture into the lined tin – carefully. Bake for 25–30 minutes, or until it has just set but still has a slight wobble.
7 If you want to serve the cake warm, let it cool a little and then very gently release the tin and slide it on to a plate. Do this carefully, as it will still be very soft, delicate and mousse-like. If you leave it to go cold it will set firm. Serve with thick cream.
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