Easy Sunday Italian a la Marketman

A few weeks before Christmas, a neighbor sent over a head of puntarelle, an Italian green that’s related to chicory with a unique, slightly bitter taste. We were headed on a trip a day or two later, so we had to eat it pronto and this is the simple Italian lunch we put on the table. It’s been two years since I’ve had any puntarelle, here, also sent by the same generous neighbor, M. We just washed, cleaned and sliced it before an hour long rest in an iced water bath, then dried and dressed with an anchovy, olive oil and lemon dressing.

I made a really quick clam sauce pasta from canned (GASP!) clam meat I bought at S&R. I don’t know what came over me but I bought a couple of tins of canned chopped clam meat, and you know what? It wasn’t too bad at all! I know it’s best to use fresh whole clean clams but sometimes that’s a tall order in Manila, and I was intrigued by the shortcut, and have use bottled clam juice for other purposes before. So I jazzed it up/doctored it with white wine, some herbs and good olive oil, and the resulting dish was more than edible, we nearly finished the entire serving between the two of us! Sometimes, lazy is good. :)