Christina Cooks: Back to the Cutting Board

There's so much debate about olive oil.

Should we use it, not use it?

Well, let's discover the truth before you demonize this ancient food that's responsible for the health all over the Mediterranean.

Today on Christina Cooks.

Funding for Christina Cooks is provided by: GreenOnyx, producers of Wanna Greens A tiny but nutrient dense fresh green vegetable.

Wanna Greens can be added to any meal, snack or dessert.

Fresh greens.

Wanna Greens.

Additional funding provided by Finamill.

The flavor of freshly ground spices and dried herbs with refillable, swappable pods.

Finamill.

And by Mauviel, creators of copper, stainless and steel carbon cookware for professional and home cooks.

A story of passion since 1830.

And by Suzannes Specialties Offering a full line of alternative, vegan and organic sweeteners and toppings.

Suzannes Specialties.

Sweetness the way Mother Nature intended.

And by Jonathans Spoons.

Individually handcrafted from cherry wood, each designed with your hand and purpose in mind.

Additional funding provided by: Hi, I'm Christina Pirello, and this is Christina Cooks, where each week we take fresh, seasonal ingredients and whip them into amazing dishes.

Will they all be plant based?

Yeah.

Will they all be delicious?

Absolutely.

Now everyone's had scampi.

Some version of it.

Some involve shrimp, some involve lobster.

And none of them are healthy usually because there's so much saturated fat that kind of overwhelms the wonderfulness of olive oil.

We're going to make a healthy one today.

We're going to take some extra virgin olive oil, about a couple tablespoons.

Generous.

Be generous because we're going to be cooking mushrooms.

And mushrooms will soak up the oil.

And then in place of butter we're going to use avocado oil which is a high heat oil, mild flavor, very buttery.

And it's going to give you all the satisfaction of butter without affecting your veins and arteries.

Because let's face it, saturated fat is not exactly high on the list of things that are good for your heart health.

Saturated fat is linked to so much heart disease, and is a contributing factor to the reason that heart disease is a leading killer of men and women in our country since the 70s.

Since the 70s!

We're clearly doing something wrong.

A dish like this will start to take you down the road to heart health.

We're going to be using garlic first.

And garlic is not only delicious and dramatic.

We sliced it to give it a stronger taste because if you've had scampi, you know it's very garlicky.

But we're using garlic because of its anti-inflammatory properties, which also contribute to heart health and will help in the digestion of the fat of olive oil.

The next thing to go in will be onion half moons.

Now, onions are easy.

When you cut an onion, it practically tells you how it wants to be cut.

These little grains in the onion right here.

These.

It's practically cut by number.

So you take your knife and you cut along the grain of the onion.

You see how my half moons are holding together?

Look how nice that is.

That's because the onion has told us it likes to be cut this way.

Believe me, I listen when my vegetables talk.

And now that we have onion and garlic in the skillet, we can turn on the heat.

Remembering, of course, that there's extra virgin olive oil in this skillet, so you don't want to turn on the heat until the oil's in the pan.

Not because you can't cook with high heat, but because you don't want to compromise the flavor.

So we're going to add a little squirt of salt.

Now I like my scampi to be spicy.

So we're going to add some chili pepper next.

Mushrooms are pretty mild so I tend to go heavy on the hot spice.

You don't have to.

The next thing to go in are shiitake mushrooms.

Once this starts to sizzle.

Now shiitake mushrooms, even though we're talking about fat today shiitake mushrooms are notorious for helping to create flexibility in the veins and arteries, lower cholesterol, and reduce blood pressure and relax tension along the sides of the neck and down the backs of the legs.

That's what mushrooms do.

Mushrooms are one of the most valuable foods that we can eat, and they love to be cooked in olive oil because they soak up that flavor and all those polyphenols, and it becomes an incredible heart healthy dish.

Now we have a little sizzle going.

So now we start to sweat the onions.

Now with this dish you have options.

You can sweat them like this.

Meaning just leave them in the pan and let them sort of soak up the oil.

You can saut for a little bit and let them sweat.

And as soon as they're shiny with oil, you can just sort of let them sit in the oil and absorb all of the flavors the hot spice, the salt, the garlic and sort of create a layer.

And then we'll add one more shiitake mushroom.

and you just want to thinly slice them like that.

Remembering that shiitake mushrooms have been used for literally thousands of years in Chinese medicine because there are spores right underneath the rim of the cap of the mushroom.

And those spores are what create heart health by helping to lower cholesterol and blood pressure.

Mushrooms go in.

And now, because mushrooms are powerful for our wellness, but also Clark Kent when it comes to flavor, we're going to use a little bit of white wine.

If white wine is not your thing, you can use broth, or just maybe use a little more spice to help to season the mushrooms.

Now we give them a good stir, and when the mushrooms are shiny with oil, really shiny with oil, they're going to start to release their juices into the pan and you need to cook them now covered over like, I'm going to say a medium low heat until they're really, really soft and beginning to brown.

And in about 7 to 10 minutes, these mushrooms will be perfectly cooked to serve as scampi.

So the mushrooms are just about ready.

We're going to season them up with a little bit more salt.

Because mushrooms again are really mild.

And we really want these to have a nice flavor.

Not salty but rich.

And while I finish them up because when you add salt, when you're cooking at the end, make sure that you cook it a little bit longer so the salt becomes part of the dish and you don't just taste salt.

You know, the other thing to remember too, is a dish like this not only will be delicious, but the way it will contribute to heart health because it has no saturated fats, and not all saturated fats are bad.

And experts are kind of conflicted about how much saturated fat harms our heart health and how much doesn't.

The one thing they do agree on is the less the better, and that cured meats should be a thing of the past.

But other than that, they're kind of really not so sure.

I'm sure that we shouldn't be eating any unless it comes in the form of peanut butter.

But since experts aren't, I don't want to give you bad information.

So our mushrooms are ready.

I mean, they are ready.

So we're going to add to them.

We're going to take it off the heat and add to them some parsley leaves for freshness and... some wolffia to give us some green nutrient density.

I'm going to give this a stir one more time to incorporate the fresh parsley leaves.

And the wolffia, because mushrooms are pretty brown too.

And we're serving them over rice.

So it's brown.

And then what we're going to do is take the scampi and put some over the rice.

And then around the rice so that you still see that it's mounded with rice, but that you've got these lovely cooked mushrooms and you can see they're shiny and rich looking.

You could do this over pasta as well, but I sort of like the nutrient density that we're getting with a whole grain.

So there you go.

You have a perfect mushroom scampi.

And it's a lovely main course served with a lentil soup.

This would make a perfect meal.

I'm so excited to share all of this with you today.

I'm here with Emilio Mignucci, my dear friend and the owner of Di Bruno Brothers here in Philly.

And in my world, you're like the Italian food guru.

Oh.

You're sweet.

I always come to you and I want to know about something or hear about something.

And today, I want to talk to you about olive oil.

I know that people think olive oil is olive oil, but every region has a different oil.

And I want you to talk about we're going to talk about four regions totally, but why are they so different?

Well, it's all about terroir.

It's all about the regions and the harvest.

That's the biggest factor that plays into it.

Most people believe that a greener olive oil is the best olive oil, but that's not necessarily true, right?

The greener ones are the unripened olives.

They are, so... the point is that, you know, like in Tuscany, the first one that we're going to taste, that olive oil gets picked early in the harvest, usually by the end of August, - Early September.

Yeah.

- That early?

And you get a greener, darker, more golden green hue.

It's just a beautiful olive oil that is very spicy.

- But I use a Tuscan oil a lot in my cooking because I like that strong flavor.

- Bold, intense, spicy, very, very grassy.

- And you get that burn from, - What do you call that?

- That burn.

The oleocanthal.

- I always forget that.

- is the chemical, triterpenic acids.

That's what that is.

And then as we chew, the thing that I find the most shocking about olive oil is that people demonize it in our world, not realizing that it is the healthiest fat that you can add to your diet.

- It's the easiest to digest.

It helps with brain development.

It's anti-inflammatory, and you know, - Cleanses veins and arteries.

It does.

And it keeps your joints and your... the rest of your body fluid.

And we won't even get into skin and hair because - think Sophia Loren.

Yes, for sure.

And this one's from...?

This is, an Umbrian olive oil picked a little later in the harvest.

Four weeks later.

- Okay.

- Late September.

Early October.

And you see, the color starts to get a little, - Little more yellow.

Yeah.

Golden.

Not really yellow.

- Exactly.

Golden.

And so it's going to be a softer flavor.

You're going to see that spiciness tone down a bit.

That's the best description.

Softer.

- Yeah, 100%.

- It really is.

- Wow.

- A Lot softer of an olive oil.

Beautiful.

And now this will make my Sicilian husband happy.

(laughter) It makes us happy.

We have Sicilian relatives in our family.

- Oh, so good.

- We go there often enough.

And this is picked later in the harvest.

- Okay.

- November.

You know, so late October, early November.

-So really late.

- And its much more buttery.

Yeah.

Very, very late and more golden in color.

- Oh, much more.

- You know?

And so the flavor here is more artichoke, grassy, not spicy, peppery grassy, But there seems to be almost like, um... a creaminess.

Oh, yeah.

Absolutely.

Because as the olives age or ripen or mature on the, on the tree, they develop more butterfat or more richness to them.

And that's where that comes from.

And the last oil is a surprise.

I'm actually filming in Puglia this whole season.

Fantastic.

And this is a Pugliese oil - that I want you to talk about.

- What a region.

because they produce the most oil - They produce the most oil... - In Italy, they tell us.

in all of Italy, in Puglia.

And quite frankly, often enough, you'll see this is more along the lines of the Umbrian olive oil.

- So, picked, um... yeah.

- Yep.

Soft.

But also extremely buttery tasting.

Yeah.

So fatty.

Rich.

And, you know, because they grow so much, you know, the most olives in all of Italy, like, people will buy olives from them and blend their olives into their blend.

- So good!

so that it adds fattiness and richness.

And that's where you go if you want something just really buttery.

- Its almost creamy.

- Oh yeah.

- So good.

And then the last thing I want to ask you quickly is if someone's in a supermarket buying olive oil, what's the best bet?

What should they look for?

What's the best bang for their buck?

Look for estate olive oils.

- So from the same farm.

- From the same farm, from families who produce it, just like you do with wines.

Always look for, the symbol on the back - that shows IGP or protected.

- That its protected.

- Because they really regulate.

- They regulate it intensely.

- Okay.

- Intensely.

And that is a great olive oil.

So you make an investment in something great and you are doing something really, really nice for small families around all of Italy.

- That's true.

And it's worth the investment of what, would you say, between $17 and $25 for good oil?

Yeah.

But if this is the fat you're cooking with, you're investing in your heart health and in your brain health and in your joint health, so... - Its better than going to the doctor.

Its cheaper, too!

Emilio, thank you as always.

- Grazie!

- Its my pleasure.

And now you know, olive oil is worth the price.

(Italian music plays) I'm here in Puglia, in the olive oil capital of the world.

Just look at those trees.

The oldest tree in Puglia is 3500 years old.

As in 3500.

These are probably between 1000-2000 years old.

Meaning they could have been planted by the Romans.

And they still produce olives and oil.

They refer to it as liquid gold because it's so nutrient dense.

It's loaded with antioxidants.

It can help prevent Alzheimer's, heart disease, stroke.

It has polyphenols.

The most powerful antioxidant is called oleocanthal.

And you can only find it in olives.

It can help to regulate type two diabetes.

It can help you to eat less.

It's nature's perfect food when it comes to medicine.

And yet, in my country, in America, we demonize olive oil.

In a culture of ultra processed foods, this is the tree you're going to demonize?

This is the food that we're going to say, no, no, no, no, no, don't eat olive oil, don't eat olive oil, don't eat olive oil.

I think we need to rethink that idea and consider in how many ways you use olive oil.

It is the only oil in my house.

Extra virgin olive oil from an estate.

Can you buy that oil?

You can.

If you're buying a vat in a big box store for about four US dollars, you're probably not getting really good olive oil.

But if you're willing to spend a little more on a good estate oil, your health will change.

Your cooking will change.

Pretty much your life will change.

So before you throw the olive oil out, as we say in Ireland, to throw the baby out with the bathwater, rethink the kind of olive oil you're using.

Get a really good one and cook yourself happy and well.

(Italian music continues) In my kitchen I use olive oil for just about everything.

Honestly, if my hands feel dry after being in dishwater for too long, I put olive oil on them.

I use olive oil all the time and I use extra virgin really good oil in desserts.

I love to use extra virgin olive oil and you're thinking, Wait, do your cakes taste like salad dressing? They do not.

I am not sure how it happens, but this beautiful, fragrant oil becomes non-existent except for the tender crumb that you get in your desserts.

So we're going to make a crostata, which is a pressed crust with some marmalade on top.

And I'm going to make a crumble topping for that.

So we're going to start with the crust.

This is farro flour.

It's very soft, very nice.

It makes a very tender crust.

If you can't get farro flour use, uh... whole wheat pastry or sprouted whole wheat.

A little salt, which will make it sweeter.

I know, but that's what it does.

And next, the star of the show, olive oil.

We're going to use about a third of a cup to start.

If you want a tender crust And who doesn't?

You really want to use more oil than water.

Now, some people do this part with a fork.

I tend to not do that.

I do it with a spoon or whatever spoon I've started with.

If I started with a fork, I continue with a fork.

The thing you don't want to do at this stage of your crust is to mix with your hands.

And the reason you don't want to do that is because the oil of your skin gets in with the flour and creates a tough crust.

So when you put the fat in, you want to keep your hands away from it as much as possible.

So you see how it's coming together largely with just the oil.

And you clean your spoon off when you need to, and you just keep mixing to pull it together because it's farro flour, particularly farro, I don't have to worry about over activating the gluten because I'm mixing.

Usually with a cake, you say as soon as the ingredients come together, stop mixing because you don't want the gluten to get too active and suddenly your cake is tough.

In this case, I don't have to worry about that.

Okay, so this is about as together as the oil is going to bring it.

You can see the texture is like wet sand or like there's peas in here.

You get this nice sort of texture to your flour.

Now we'll add water.

And you want to add your water very very slowly, almost by the tablespoon.

Because once your crust comes together, it comes together.

If you make your dough too wet, first off you're going to have to add flour and you may as well throw it out and start over, because now you'll have a crust that could double as a doorstop.

Not what you're going for.

It's not a good look.

So you can see we've added very little water, maybe two tablespoons maybe, maybe?

Now we take the crust.

Now you get to touch it.

Now you get to play.

Not a lot, but you get to pull it together.

And what you should have at this point is a smooth ball of dough.

That's extremely pliable.

Look at this.

But also look at my hands.

There's no dough, so it's perfect.

Now we're going to take an oil pie plate.

And you're going to begin using your knuckles to press the crust out toward the rim.

And as you do this.

What you're trying to achieve is that the crust is even in thickness, so that as it bakes, you don't have part of it doughy and part of it too crunchy.

And it doesn't have to be pretty because it's going to be covered.

But now you just sort of feel around and you'll know if your crust is perfect.

Don't you love it when chefs on TV say, oh my goodness, this is perfect?

Well it better be, youre on TV.

Good lord.

All right, so... now we're going to take some fruit sweetened strawberry jam.

And put a nice thick layer.

I don't know if I'm going to need this whole jar or not.

Try to leave a little bit of a rim at the edge.

If you don't, you don't.

But if you can, try to leave about a quarter inch at the edge of the crostata, and a really good jam like this one will have whole strawberries floating around in there, and that just adds to the fun.

I think we need a little more.

It is, after all, strawberry.

So I've used a good cup of preserves.

And now for the last step.

Youre gonna take some walnut pieces.

And some almond flour.

And some olive oil.

And we're going to mix this together to create a crumb topping that gets sprinkled over the top of the strawberry jam.

And this is going to be goopy.

And I think I'll add the rest of this almond flour.

I have to honestly say as I'm doing this, you know, I, I was a pastry chef for some years, and I read, you know, recipes for pastry all the time, and it all sounds like it's a chemistry class.

At the end of the day, pastry is largely about passion and very little to do with alchemy.

Yes, you have to do some measuring, but not so much that it makes you crazy.

If you love to bake, you'll be able to bake.

Now using your fingers, you just crumble this on top.

Make sure you leave some of the jam showing because it's pretty and you want your crostata to be beautiful.

You could also, if you're feeling particularly ambitious, make a lattice crust across the top.

Those are very nice too, but I reserved those for special, special special occasions like holidays, because a lattice crust is a little bit more work than I want to do like, on a Wednesday when I'm making dessert.

This is a simple every day, serve this to any company that might come to your house crostata.

It's going to go into the oven at 350 for about 25 to 35 minutes until you see the rim of the crust golden brown and the jam is bubbling.

Wait till you see this.

(Italian music plays) So here is our beautiful crostata with an olive oil crust.

So listen, listen.

Don't listen to all of the so-called experts who tell you not to eat olive oil.

It's one of the healthiest foods and it's been used by humanity since ancient times.

So what are you waiting for?

Let's get back to the cutting board, and I'll see you next time.

on Christina Cooks: The Macroterranean Way.

Funding for Christina Cooks is provided by: GreenOnyx, producers of Wanna Greens Organic and sustainable, Wanna Greens are grown in a completely closed, indoor environment.

At Wanna Greens, we believe in the benefits of fresh greens for people and the planet.

Additional funding provided by Finamill.

The flavor of freshly ground spices and dried herbs with refillable, swappable pods.

Finamill.

And by Mauviel, creators of copper, stainless and steel carbon cookware for professional and home cooks.

A story of passion since 1830.

And by Suzannes Specialties Offering a full line of alternative, vegan and organic sweeteners and toppings.

Suzannes Specialties.

Sweetness the way Mother Nature intended.

And by Jonathans Spoons.

Individually handcrafted from cherry wood, each designed with your hand and purpose in mind.

Additional funding provided by: You can find today's recipes and learn more by visiting our website at christinacooks.com and by following Christina on social media.

Learn how to add delicious plant based dishes to your daily diet with the companion cookbook VegEdibles.

Featuring more than 80 easy-to-make recipes To order your copy for $32.95 plus handling, call 800-266-5815 or visit christinacooks.com.

Add Back to the Cutting Board and get both books for $55.95 plus handling.