In the Flesh

Yesterday some friends were passing through Knoxville on their way to Memphis from Winston-Salem, North Carolina so of course I invited them to have supper here and stay the night. Actually, I didn’t know him but I’ve known her for about five years — we’d just never met I the flesh before.

This is old-hat for me. I’d guess that over the past 15 or so years I’ve met over 50 people that I first got to know on-line. But Angela was nervous about it and her husband, Frank, was downright skeptical about the whole idea of making friends on-line — much less planning on staying the night with a “stranger.” Some folks just don’t understand how genuine friendships can be based on e-mail.

Our minds are constructed in such a way that we automatically form mental pictures of people we know even if we’ve never seen them. Apparently we require some sort of visual image to hang our knowledge, suppositions, and opinions of them on. And no one I’ve eventually met in person has ever looked or sounded at all like I expected, which isn’t particularly odd. What is odd — at least the first few times — is how quickly after that initial meeting the other person’s actual physical and, especially, vocal character completely supplant the fictional image you’ve carried around for so long. Within a few short minutes they’re as familiar as they would have been if you’d always known them in person.

As it turns out, Angela is much prettier and more elegant than I’d imagined and has a gorgeous and genteel tar-heel accent — characteristics that completely belie the quirky and somewhat warped sense of humor I knew she possessed. Frankly I was expecting someone a bit more country. And speaking of Frank, he turned out to be a quiet and rather taciturn man with a wickedly ironic sense of humor. They were perfect foils for each other.

They didn’t know exactly when they’d arrive — between 5:00 and 7:00, they thought — so I needed to fix a meal that would hold well. Neither of them are foodies, although Angela has an appreciation of food. She warned me, though, that Frank is fairly conservative about what he eats. I decided to make pasta Bolognese.

I’d never made it before — never even eaten it — but it’s long been on my list and everybody likes spaghetti so I figured Frank would be Ok with it. I used Marcella Hazan’s recipe in Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking as the base, but tweaked it a bit. For the pasta, I had some Papardelle that I’d been looking for an excuse to serve and this seemed a good time.

I fixed a salad with raspberry vinaigrette to go along with it and for dessert I made gingerbread cake that I served warm with a sherry sauce. It was all good and we finished off the gingerbread for breakfast this morning before they left.

Ragu Bolognese
Serves 4.

2 tbls olive oil (you can use all olive oil or all butter, here)
1/4 c onion — finely chopped
1/4 c celery — finely chopped
1/4 c carrot — finely chopped
2/3 lb minced or coarsely ground beef
1/3 lb minced or coarsely ground pork
1 tsp salt
ground black pepper
1 c whole milk
1 c dry white wine
1/8 tsp nutmeg
15 oz whole canned tomatoes — roughly chopped, with their juice
2 tbsp tomato paste
2 tsp anchovy paste
1/2 lb parpardelle
2 tbsp butter
Parmigiano

Heat olive oil in a sauté pan over medium heat. Add onion and cook until translucent — about 3 minutes. Add celery and carrot and cook another two minutes. Increase heat to medium high and add beef and pork, season with salt and pepper, and cook stirring as needed, until no pink remains.

Reduce heat to medium low and add milk. Simmer until little or no liquid remains. Add nutmeg and white wine and simmer until little or no liquid remains. Add tomatoes, tomato paste, and anchovy paste, stir to mix thoroughly, reduce heat to low, and simmer for three hours. (Note: the sauce should just barely bubble.) Stir occasionally and add water as needed to prevent mixture from drying out. However, at the end the ragu should not be runny.

Cook pasta and toss with butter. Serve with freshly grated Parmigiano.

We had a great time and, because Angela is a photographer and wanted to see how I take my food pictures, I got some photos before having to clear the dining table so we could eat.

Try this ragu with…
Grape & Rosemary Focaccia
Roasted Garlic Bread
Roasted Cauliflower

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