The 'timing' for this recipe is just ‘right’ . . . The 1st reason is that it’s getting so much colder so it’s time for some homey-hot-heavy comfort food. The 2nd reason is that the culinary mind that imagined and transformed this initial recipe and presented it in the 90’s to the American public is the French (and later American too) chef Pierre FRANEY.
He left us twenty years ago, at the age of 75, on October 15th 1996, while giving shipboard cooking demonstrations on the RMS QUEEN ELIZABETH 2. He was cooking until the end.
This recipe is a readaption and inspirational tribute to this great man . . .
Mr. Pierre Franey came to Paris as a very young man and later moved to New York, which lead to a multitude of opportunities in adition to his experience as an aspiring and then top chef. He began writing the food column for the New York Times with Craig Claiborne, later on hosted several television shows and authored many books.
I discovered him as a teenager watching cooking shows on public television channels. Along with Jacques Pépin (who is still among us), he was one of the few French chefs who made us discover French cooking in a simple way and with a still lingering charming French accent as they spoke in English. Those years, I had discovered and was fascinated by other chefs who specialized in French cuisine and had television shows too : the American phenomenon Julia Child (of course), Maîté (Marie-Thérèse Ordonez) in France with her traditional south-western cooking, Jean-Pierre Coffe … Thank-you to all.
We’re all familiar with ‘macaroni and cheese’ whether from a box that you add milk to, heat up and stir or home-made on the stovetop or as a casserole baked in the oven. In some countries, the beefy mixture is replaced with pork (as cured ham), the sauce is most often a béchamel sauce or a mornay sauce (which is a béchamel with cheese and sometimes egg too).
In Greece, we have PASTITSIO (that many of you are unfamiliar with). You’ve all heard of MOUSSAKA right ? Well this is the other oven-baked casserole, like a lasagna, that they make in Greece (and also Italy, Malta, Cyprus, Egypt) but with a béchamel or mornay sauce without the cheddar cheese and often spiced with cinnamon too … (it's just another beef & pasta & bechamel casserole and maybe i'll publish that recipe too one day).
Many readaptations and variations are possible with this type of dish. You can use different meats, you can combine different cheeses (I add cottage cheese to the beef mixture for that tangy taste and evaporated milk instead of regular whole milk for a deeper taste). You can use different tubular pasta (I can’t find large elbow macaroni here so I use serpentini). You can also play around with the vegetables and seasonings. To deepen the flavour, it’s good to add some fermented sauces like Worcestershire sauce (which I have but I like to combine anchovies and beef concentrate and marmite, you can also try it out with miso paste or soy sauce) …
You understand right ?!
It’s just a casserole you know, that will be assembled beforehand so just keep adding stuff and tasting and adjusting to your taste before sliding it into your oven and I’m sure it’ll be delicious whatever you do (or almost) . . . :)
