Zacusca

First time attempting zacusca. I got this recipe from my grandmother years ago - the paper is yellow by now - I had never tried it.

Had to get stuff I never had in my kitchen - a meat grinder, sunflower seed oil (basic oil in Romania) - I was not sure what peanut oil will do to the taste.

Here is the recipe - I made a quarter of the regular portion - quantities in US measurements - it is a pain every single time to translate from kgs to lbs.

- 2 lbs eggplant (I got the small Italian version)
- 1 lb red peppers
- 1 lb tomatoes (nice and ripe)
- 1/2 lb onion (yellow)
- 1/2 lb oil (sunflower oil)
- 1 hot pepper (I got jalapeno at the store - being the first time I bought jalapeno I must have picked it wrong - it was not spicy at all)
- 5-6 garlic cloves (this was not in my grandmother's recipe - but I found it in Radu Anton Roman's cook book - I have the actual book - but there is some pdf on the internet as well http://rapidshare.com/files/5087389/Carte_bucate_Radu_Anton_Roman.pdf)
- ground pepper (wish I could tell how much - Romanian recipes are notorious for saying - as much salt and pepper as it takes ;)
- salt (plenty of it)
- 1 bay leaf
- some cayenne pepper if it needs to be spicier (since I didn't have luck with the hot peppers)
- paprika

Now onto the preparation:
- Bake eggplants - in Romania we used to put the directly on the stove one eggplant per burner - very messy - plus - I have an electric stove - so not the same effect as gas. So I opted for baking - 350 F - on a baking sheet - I turned them a few times - takes about an hour to bake.

- Let eggplants cool off in the sink - then peal and set on a wood board to drain - these eggplants were unusually dry - I found in another cookbook that they should be draining for 3 hours. Anyway - they drained while I prepared the other vegetables - which took plenty of time.

- First put the onions through the meat grinder. Meat grinder stuck in about 30 seconds - need to make the onion pieces smaller. Unstuck the grinder - now we're moving - but the onions look all mushy and all the liquid is coming out of them). Ok - what now - picked up the phone and called my grandmother - she said I need to cut the onions by hand - hmmm - I said of course - then decided to move forward with the onion mush - first strained it to get rid of some of that liquis - heated up the oil and put the onion mush

- Red peppers - cleaned and diced - put through the meat grinder - my grandmother used to first bake them then peal them then put the through the grinder - talk about adding another hour to the preparation

- Tomatoes - they need to be first pealed - so set a pot with water and salt to boil - drop tomatoes in for about minute or until you see the peal cracking. Peal them and cut the green part out - then dice them - I use this dicer from Williams Sonoma - I bought it a couple of months ago and it is probably the most used item in the kitchen. Keep all the juice and meat from the tomatoes.

- Now onto frying - heat up half of the oil in a thick bottom pot (dutch oven worked - the second most used item in my kitchen), first fry the onions on medium heat with the bay leave and fresh ground pepper until translucent. Add peppers - fry for a few more minutes - if the oil is absorbed add some more. Then add tomatoes (with the juice) and the eggplant (put the eggplant through the grinder first). Add the garlic puree (put the garlic through a garlic press). Add the remaining oil. Bring to a boil - lower the heat, cover and let simmer for one hour - need to stir frequently so it will not stick. Taste a couple of times while it cooks and add more salt and pepper if necessary. I also added a little cayenne pepper for a little kick.

- Let it cool off and fill out the jars. My grandmother made these to last the whole winter - so there was a whole ritual around filling out the jars so the zacusca will keep (I got all the details again on the phone today) - I skipped that since I didn't make enough to last all winter - so I am just storing it in the refrigerator.

- All together a 3 hour adventure - plus a 50 minute phone call to Romania while dicing tomatoes. For my first zacusca - pretty good. The conversation was worth it - parts of it went like - you prepare tomatoes the way you prepare them for tomato paste - like I ever made tomato paste :)

The last thing I needed were canning jars. I headed to my new favorite store - Williams Sonoma - the sales woman laughed - said it was too late in the year to get canning jars - she went through the same thing last year - apparently they only sell canning jars in the spring - I guess I was not prepared for this year :) I will be ordering my canning jars in the winter next year.

I was tempted again by the pepper mills - but $80 seems totally outrageous. It almost makes you look at the $26 pepper mills as being reasonable ...