When he died in 1991 of heart failure at a young 46, food enthusiasts around the world already considered Felipe Rojas-Lombardi to be a towering figure. Born in 1945 in Peru, Lombardi worked as an assistant to James Beard and was the founding chef of Dean & Deluca. Lombardi is credited with introducing the tapas concept to American society.
And tapas is always there in the 250 recipes of this book. There are main courses to be sure, but even they can be offered in smaller portions alongside some complementary companion. The dishes are offered in chapters for:
- Ceviches
- Escabeches [think of ceviche with the lemon and lime gone, replaced by vinegar]
- Empanadas
- Tamales
- Seafood
- Poultry & Rabbit
- Meat
- Vegetables & Grains
- Desserts
Let’s consider a typical recipe: Caldudas or Chilean Empanadas. The dough is flour, butter, egg yolks, vinegar and water. The filling is much more complex: onion, ground beef, oregano, raisins, olive and eggs combined with beef stock. There is nothing worse than a simple empanada, one just filled with some strips of dried chicken [I ate one yesterday sadly at a farmers market]. There can be glory in a small package when you sample a recipe like this one, laden with contrasting but never competing flavors.
Other empanada recipes are presented for beef, pork, chicken, lamb, duck, cod, tuna, shrimp, vegetable, spinach, corn, and cheese. I know, these titles do not excite. But the recipes, the recipes themselves do shine. For example, the spinach empanada has slightly more than mere spinach: bacon, jalapeno, onion, nutmeg, feel, clove, mace, tarragon and mozzarella. Ah, now you hear spinach but you wisely think twice.
And, yes, empanadas may be small but these pocket bombs of flavor do demand time and effort. The ingredient lists here are long, the number of steps is long, the enjoyment is very long.
Turn the pages here, sift recipe-by-recipe and you’ll been tempted to stop, to shop, and to cook. Here’s a random sampling of ideas I found by just stopping every 30 pages or so in the book:
Chicken Escabeche with onions, serranos, bay leaves, cayenne, celery, bell pepper and that vinegar
Duck Empanadas with juniper berries and cilantro
Chicken Tamales with bacon, bacon fat and hominy
Calves Feet and Peanut Soup with jalapeno, mint, parsley, carrot and leek [it’s still meat, do not panic]
Trout with anchovies and jalapeno
Mussel Salad with Fresh Fennel
Roulade of Goose
Beef and Rice Cakes [two layers of rice with spice ground beef in between]
Grilled Venison in sherry with cloves, cumin, and garlic
Potatoes with a Sweep Pepper and Hazelnut Sauce
Grilled Pineapple in Rum Sauce
How grand are these recipes? Why do you think this book is titled "The Art?" Even today, South American cuisine in one of those “other” cuisines that we too rarely sample or study. Our culinary enjoyment can only be expanded by the recipes in this volume. Lombardi died before this book was even published, but he would be thrilled to know that these authentic recipes are being used and very much enjoyed today.
I just finished a four-course tapas lunch that Suzen arranged for a Cooking by the Client. It was an all‑Lombardi meal and I relished every bite. Lombardi’s legacy is rich, still pertinent, and still yours to sample and to marvel.