Treat of the Week: A Weekend Feast

This weekend was excellent from the standpoint of food.  Bertie and I went to visit my parents and we all enjoyed a magnificent feast.  The meal began with my mother’s homemade braciola (pronounced brah-jole) and polenta.  We haven’t had this in quite some time, so I was particularly happy about it.  Braciola (sometimes inaccurately spelled braciole) is an Italian dish wherein a tender beef roulade is filled with cheeses, herbs (and sometimes spinach and pine nuts).  It’s smothered in a magnificent, chunky tomato sauce.  My mother let this delicious dish simmer in its sauce in the oven in a cast-iron pot which made it all the more tender and glorious.

Polenta is a dense paste of cornmeal which has been boiled (usually in stock).  Sometimes this is served as it is, but often, it is formed into patties or into a load which is sliced and either fried or baked.  I love my mother’s polenta.  She takes the slices and bakes them topped with fresh herbs and mozzarella and Tuscan cheese.  This was served with the same amazing sauce in which the braciola had been baked.  Fresh spinach rounded out the meal.

But, the treats didn’t stop with the main course.  For dessert, we enjoyed a new recipe.  My mother had prepared a beautiful coffee cake—baked in a mold.  This sour-cream-based cake was swirled (by created three layers within the mold) with cocoa, coffee and cinnamon.  Dusted with powdered sugar, it was tender with a gorgeous texture and rich with an elegant mocha flavor.

Yes, it was a very good weekend indeed.