Upside-Down Pear

As near as I can tell, I was 20 or 21 before I had pancetta, in a salad at Casbah. If I had it before, it made no impression on me - but I suspect I hadn’t, since it didn’t feature in my native cuisine, and it tends to stick to more upscale restaurants than my poor student self usually frequented.

For all that I loved its salty tang, I never cooked with it until recently. It is entirely possible that I shall go to hell for neglecting it so long. It was the pancetta that smoothed away the bitterness of the rapini; it was the pancetta that gave texture to the polenta. And it was the pancetta that was left over because we’d bought a pound but barely needed a third of that.

Tonight I used another third of it in risotto - diced fine and browned, then removed before making my usual mushroom risotto with thyme, and stirred in & sprinkled over at the end.

O lift me from the grass! I die! I faint! I fail!

Crispy and chewy, the perfect salt counterpoint to the creamy rice and soft mushrooms - perfection, bleeding flavor onto my tongue.

In other news, Nat writes about Cafe de Olla.