Cooking with Hurricane Irma, Part IV: Going Green: a Riff on Salsa Verde

I, non-Italian, cook a mean roasted pork thing, slathered with ground fennel and coriander seed and white peppercorns, an Italian dish dubbed “Forever Roasted Pork” in Michael Chiarello’s Travigne cookbook. And I also see definite correlations between that meltingly soft meat and Southern barbecue, between mechoui and other long-roasted meat dishes from around the world.

The sauce? Anything piquant will work.

I recommend this green sauce, discovered by accident when – while scrounging in the vegetable bin – I came up empty on parsley, but sallied forth with two large bunches of crisp fresh cilantro and a handful of scraggly scallions.

Salsa Verde, Italian-Style

2 large bunches fresh coriander leaves (cilantro)

1 bunch scallions, green part only, roughly chopped

4 garlic cloves, mashed in a mortar and pestle

1 Tablespoon Dijon mustard

1 Tablespoon red wine vinegar

1 1/2 Tablespoons capers

1/2 teaspoon Kosher salt

1 teaspoon coarsely ground black pepper

1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil

Toss everything but the olive oil into your food processor or blender and whirl until a coarse paste ensues. With machine running, slowly pour in the oil until you have smooth sauce.

That’s it! This sauce tastes great on all sorts of grilled meat and pasta, too.