4 PM FIX: ITALIAN SAUSAGES AND GREEN PEPPERS

Ciao'd while watching the Olympics and feeling like a lard---.

Photo: Reyn Reeser

Photo: Reyn Reeser

RECIPE

ITALIAN SAUSAGES WITH GREEN PEPPERS

This dish is the epitome of Italian street food.  Visit a fair or Italian event in the Northeast and you will most likely find a vendor serving sausages with sweet green Italian frying peppers on crunchy submarine rolls. In this recipe, I call for serving the bread alongside the peppers. Choose your method and go for it!

Serves 4

2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil4 sweet or hot Italian sausages
4 garlic cloves, crushed
1 medium onion, thinly sliced
5 Italian frying peppers (also known as cubanelles) or 3 green bell peppers
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
Crusty bread, for serving

In a large skillet, warm the olive oil over medium heat.  Add the sausages, cover, and cook, turning occasionally, until brown on all sides, about 10 minutes. Uncover the skillet, add the garlic and continue to cook until the sausages are cooked through, about 10 minutes more. Transfer the sausages to a plate.

Add the onion and stir to scrape up the brown bits on the bottom of the pan. Cover the skillet, and cook, stirring and turning occasionally until the onions begin to brown on the edges, about 5 minutes. Add the peppers, cover the skillet, and cook until tender, about 10 minutes. Season with salt and pepper, to taste.

Return the sausages to the skillet and cook until heated through, about 3 to 5 minutes. Serve with the bread.

Follow

4 PM FIX: BISTECCA ALLA FIORENTINA

An authentic Florentine T-bone steak is cut from a Chianina cow and aged for about a week. Though Chianina beef is lean, it's prized for its rich flavor and balanced texture (perhaps due to the Chianina's grazing locale in Siena, Arezzo and environs). Since we do not breed pure Chianina cattle in the United States, purchase the best steak you can find. The meat should be 1 to 1 1/2 inches thick and weigh 1 1/4 to 1 3/4 pounds. Ask for a porterhouse steak as this is the larger of the T-bone steaks. It's essential that the steak is grilled over very high heat (charcoal is best) but a cast-iron grill pan works, too...

Read More