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FOR THE LOVE OF PASTA

MARCH 2013
EVOO with Fresh Herbs
IN THIS ISSUE
SWEEPSTAKES

 
Win a box of 3-meals plus a 3-bottle gift pack of our olive oil.

Two chances to win: Week of March 4; and week of March 8

Find A Store Near You
FAN PHOTO OF THE MONTH
Fan photo of the Month Paul Stiehr

Grilled Chicken Sandwich

Congrats to Paul Stiehr, who posted this photo on our Facebook page. Paul said he "washed an Italian loaf" with our olive oil before putting it on the grill. He also used our oil to make a spread for the sandwich. Paul has won a bottle of oil. You can win this month's contest by sending us a photo showing how you use our oil. Put "Fan Photo" in the subject line and send it to the email address below, or post it on our Facebook page.

[email protected] 
FACES AT THE RANCH
Felipe Romero at Silver Oaks Release Day

Meet Felipe

Felipe Romero is a key member of our marketing team. Felipe is pouring our oils for guests attending the Silver Oak Cellars "Release Day" Party. The event celebrates the winery's release of its Napa Cabernet.
JOIN THE NEW FOOD & STYLE CLUB
Broccoli Rabe Viviane Bauquet Farreu

A Virtual Cooking School

Viviane Bauquet Farre, our featured chef, has launched her new Food & Style Club. You'll receive seasonal, gourmet-yet-simple recipes on an almost daily basis. Step-by-step cooking videos, photos, and wine pairings are included.

 Click here to check it out
SPRING IS ON THE WAY
Artois September 2011
Greetings! 

Signs of spring abound! In particular, we've begun to spot early bud development on some of our more "mature" trees. Eventually, that will transform into new growth shoots. Meanwhile, we're keeping tabs on the moisture levels in the soil. We want to know when to begin watering the trees as they awaken fully from their winter slumber.

Knowing that we'll be busy on the olive ranches, we'll want simple dishes we can prepare with little effort in our kitchen. Pasta is perfect. And it's a natural partner for good California extra virgin olive oil.

We like to use our oils to make a variety of pastas. We use our Limited Reserve, for example, to make a fabulous garlicky pasta, aglio e olio. The dish allows our Limited Reserve - which you can still order - to shine.

We also use Everyday, Arbequina, Arbosana, and Miller's Blend to make a wide variety of pastas sauces - from a peppery and cheesy dish known as cacio e pepe, to pesto and white clam sauce.

It's hard to find anybody who doesn't like good pasta. It's been around for a very long time. "Fads may come and go, but the appeal of pasta has endured even the Atkins died craze," Giuliano Hazan writes in his book Thirty Minute Pasta (Stewart, Tabori & Chang, 2009).

We've compiled a variety of pasta recipes below. They deliver plenty of flavor ... without a lot of effort. Our kind of dish for this time of year.
Our Favorite Pasta Recipes
Spaghetti  with Olive Oil and Pan-Fried Jalape�os

Spaghetti with olive oil, garlic and pan-fried jalapenos Viviane Baquet Farre, of foodandstyle.com, calls this "my New World take on Spaghetti Aglio e Olio." She recalls sharing the legendary Italian pasta with her husband, in Venice. "The pasta was tossed with fruity olive oil, garlic (loads of it), red pepper flakes and salt - nothing more," she says. Viviane's take is spiced-up with jalape�o peppers instead of red pepper flakes. "As the jalape�os pan-fry, they become mellow, smoky, sweet - infusing the oil and the pasta with all their spunkiness." Viviane recommends our Everyday Fresh or Miller's Blend oils to make this pasta.

Click here to see the recipe
Spaghetti with Olives, Capers, and Anchovies
Spaghetti with olives, capers and anchovies Guiliano Hazan, the son of famed Italian cookbook writer Marcella Hazan, says this dish is "a tomato-less version of the classic Puttanesca sauce, hence the name Bianca, meaning 'white.'" Hazan substitutes thick bread crumbs for the tomatoes to hold all the flavors together. The recipe appears in his book Giuliano Hazan's Thirty Minute Pasta (Stewart, Tabori & Chang, 2009). You could use our robust Arbosana or Miller's Blend oils to give even more punch to the flavor.

Click here to see the recipe
Puttanesca Sauce
Puttanesca sauce Classic puttanesca sauce is a tangy, somewhat salty sauce made with ingredients typical of Southern Italian cuisine: tomatoes, olive oil, olives, capers, and garlic. It's a legendary partner for spaghetti. The sauce also can be paired with baked or saut�ed shrimp or fish fillets.Various, colorful accounts exist of how spaghetti alla puttanesca came to be. Many versions, like this one, call for anchovies. This recipe comes from Rao's Recipes from the Neighborhood (St. Martin's Press, 2004), by Frank Pellegrino. Use our Everyday Fresh oil to prepare the sauce.

Click here to see the recipe
Pasta with Roasted Cherry Tomatoes and Fresh Basil
Pasta with roasted cherry tomatoes and fresh basil This dish is "rustic in flavor and presentation" and centers around caramelized cherry tomatoes. It appears in Diane Rossen Worthington's Seriously Simple: Easy Recipes for Creative Cooks (Chronicle Books, 2002). "Many varieties of small tomatoes are available almost year-round," writes Worthington. "I like to use red cherry tomatoes or the smaller grape tomatoes." Try our fruity Arbequina oil to make this dish.

Click here to see the recipe
Pasta Pomodoro
Pasta pomodoro Another vintage Italian dish. This rustic pasta showcases tomatoes. Here, canned tomatoes are used, allowing you to prepare this pasta  year-round. This version comes from the Italian-style family restaurant in New York,  Carmine's. "To be really, really, really good, pomodoro demands lots of oil," Michael Ronis and Mary Goodbody write in Carmine's Family Style Cookbook (St. Martin's Press, 2008), where the recipe appears. "We use a quarter cup of olive oil for four servings, which puts our pomodoro right over the top." Use our Everyday Fresh or fruity Arbequina oils.

Click here to see the recipe
Linguine with Shrimp and Arugula
Linguine with shrimp and argula Shrimp is a favorite in our kitchen. And it's a great partner for pasta. Here, the shrimp is paired with arugula. "Arugula is well known as a salad ingredient, but it's peppery flavor can really spice up pasta, too," Frank Pellegrino writes in Rao's On the Grill (St. Martin's Press, 2012), where the recipe appears. Add another subtle layer of pepper by giving each plate of pasta a finishing drizzle of our peppery Miller's Blend oil.

Click here to see the recipe
Creator of Delicious Food and Lovely Photos
Viviane Bauquet Farre
Viviane Bauquet Farre Viviane Baquet Farre is the creator of the food e-magazine foodandstyle.com. There, she publishes gourmet-yet-simple recipes and gorgeous photos. The recipient of an Advanced Certificate in Wine and Spirits, Viviane also suggests wine pairings with her dishes. Viviane's recipes are inspired by seasonal ingredients and local farmers, and have been featured in Vegetarian Times and on BonAppetit.com and Saveur.com. (Saveur crowned Viviane's site one of the "Best of the Web.") She's also a regular contributor to the popular website TheDailyMeal.com.

Viviane's new project is Food & Style Club, where members receive seasonal recipes with step-by-step video instructions on an almost daily basis. A native of a French island in the South Pacific, Viviane has been an avid cook since 6. After moving to the United States and enjoying a successful career as a fashion designer, Viviane turned her attention full-time to creating and sharing food.

What's your earliest food memory?


I became aware of food (and passionate about food!) around the age of 6. I would run to my grandmother's kitchen as soon as school was over to see what she was concocting - and, of course, to help.

How do you come up with ideas for new dishes?

Seasonal vegetables and fruits are my muses. They always inspire new recipes - more than I could ever have time to experiment with in my lifetime!

How do you like to use California Olive Ranch extra virgin olive oil in your cooking?

The Everyday oil is perfect for saut�eing and oven-roasting - it adds a ton of flavor to any dish I cook it with. The Arbosana is my favorite oil for making vinaigrettes and for drizzling. It's deep and has a little punch that's quite addictive. The Arbequina shows up in my Spanish-inspired recipes; but I also adore to drizzle it over grilled artichokes.

What's your best piece of advice for home cooks?

Vegetables are Mother Nature's little jewels. They offer a marvelous kaleidoscope of textures, colors and flavors that can enhance any meal. So dive right in and explore cooking with them.

What basic advice would you give on how to pair wine with food? Orecchiette with wilted spinach, chickpeas and piment�n Viviane Bauquet Farre

While of course there are many factors to consider, I would say the most important one is to pay attention to the acidity (or lack thereof) of the food. Then pair it with wines that complement that acidity. For example, with a salad, you'd want to select a wine with juicy acidity. The acidic vinaigrette will go very well with a crisp wine like a Sauvignon Blanc or an Albari�o, both of which have great acidity. A butternut squash soup, on the other hand, is not at all acidic and will need to be served with a less-acidic wine, like a Pinot Blanc or a warm-weather Chardonnay.

What do you like to eat when you're too tired to cook?

A bowl of pasta with a ton of leafy greens saut�ed with garlic and chili pepper flakes... then I drizzle the whole thing with a fruity olive oil (the Arbosana is my favorite here!). You can't beat that.

What's in your home fridge?

At this very moment, goat milk (for making fresh goat cheese), Greek yogurt, broccoli rabe, Brussels sprouts, purple potatoes, fresh herbs, Meyer lemons and Fuji apples.