Ok. So we got a Jamie Oliver cookbook for Christmas. Apparently I raved so much about Jamie's Italy that it was decded we couldn't live without another. One of the annoying things about Jamie O. is that he is often not very precise with his recipe measurements. I can figure out what a 'good glug' of olive oil but what the heck is a nob of butter?

It's a phrase only ever used to describe a piece of butter and isn't a precise measurement - depends on what it is being used for. In context it might be 'Fling a knob of butter in the pan and heat to a sizzle before you saute' - the actual size would therefore depend on what was being cooked. Maybe about the size of a walnut (in shell)

I imagine the derivation might be from a size of cupboard door knob or drawer? Just guessing.

Jamie's whole style of cooking is a bit approximate and slang - lots of whooshing and 'bish, bash , bosh (there you are) - very 'geezer' Essex boy, which is what he is.

if you buy any italian cookbook, you will find the smae style of measuring. The idea is that the ook does not need to tell you how much a "knob" or a "noce" of butter is: you must already know!

If I read that, I'd use a Tablespoon. Of course I have no idea what you are making, but, that is where I'd start.

Given my relationship with butter, you might wsant to ignore this advice!

I don'0t know about US tablespoons, but a tablespoon of butter is not a "noce". A noce is the exact right amount to cook the food in, and is proportional to the type and amount of food you need to cook.

In this case it was for gnocchi with braised oxtails. He finishes it off with sage leaves and brown butter (seems like overkill but who am I to turn my nose up at buttah?) I think the nob in this case would need to be more than a tablespoon. LOL

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US tablespoons

Alice - a US tablespoon (and a Canadian one for that matter) is 15 ml (to be precise . . .14.7867648 ml).

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Originally posted by JDeQ:
I think the nob in this case would need to be more than a tablespoon. LOL

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a US tablespoon

I think Jamie takes revenge for all of us Europeans who found themselves contemplating a tablespoon in one hand and a stick of solid butter on the other and not knowing what to do.

In US measurements, there are 8 T. in a "stick" or "cube" of butter.

Please forgive me, but I do think most US cooks are too obsessed with exact measurements nowadays. My mother watched my paternal grandmother over and over so she could write down the exact quantities that instinctive cook Gran used. Gran fished flour out of a huge bin using a coffee cup and mother took the flour and measured it in measuring cups. I get it, I really do, but then when you get to the liquids, one day is dry and you need more and the next day is wet and you need less. Salt in Italy is saltier than it was in the US. Your butter has salt in it, mine doesn't. You may lurve anchovies, another may admit one fillet and not one more in the broccoli sauce.

A noce is a walnut, and Gran used many walnut sized pieces of butter. A glug is a glug. If yours is bigger than mine, it's OK with me.

I am almost totally won over to scales. It would be total except that the battery just died in mine so I must starve or use cups.

I'd just like to see more people get to the point where they joyously fling flour about the kitchen and rub the excess fats into their hands, all the while just knowing what they are making will be a delight. It just may be my mission in life.

Palma does it, even if she does know how many slices of butter there are in a stick.

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I think Jamie takes revenge for all of us Europeans who found themselves contemplating a tablespoon in one hand and a stick of solid butter on the other and not knowing what to do.

In the UK, we don't use tablespoons to measure butter and sticks are entirely incomprehensible! We use weight (ounces or grammes) though very rarely actually weigh it - a pack of butter used to be 8 ounces, now 250gm, so we all learnt just to mark out 1/2 or 1/4 as needed (and just go a bit approximate with the newfangled grammes - most people happily mix and match). Volume, except for liquid, isn't really understood as a method, generally.

A knob of butter is a bit of butter, and I think I feel an appropriate tongue twister coming on...

Betty Botter bought a bit of butter.

"But," she said "this butter's bitter. If I put it in my batter, it will make my batter bitter."

So Betty Botter bought a bit of butter better than the bitter butter and she put it in her batter and it made her batter better.

So 'twas better Betty Botter bought a bit of better butter.


My father could do that one at great speed with never a slip!

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Originally posted by JDeQ:

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US tablespoons

Alice - a US tablespoon (and a Canadian one for that matter) is 15 ml (to be precise . . .14.7867648 ml).

Well, you see: I have a hard time thinking how one can measure a solid in volume. Solids are weighted, when not eyeballed! ^_^

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Originally posted by Judith in Umbria:
I am almost totally won over to scales. It would be total except that the battery just died in mine so I must starve or use cups.

I worked around this risk. I bought a mechanical scale: its sentisitivity is lower, so my measures are always about 10-20 grams approximate, so one day I cook 100 grams of spaghetti and the dish is overflowing and I am not able to finish it, the next I weight the same amount of pasta and the portion is just about right to make it a full meal (with some veggies to garnish it). But it never-ever stops working!

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Originally posted by Judith in Umbria:
Please forgive me, but I do think most US cooks are too obsessed with exact measurements nowadays.

Judith,
I am with you. I do not use measurements, I am all bunch, good sized splashes and some...but all the students of my cooking classes ask me for measurements.
I am more for experimenting and eye sizing.

I use exact measurements for baked stuff. Oh, I started to weight the pasta, but that is for dietological reasons

Personal sizing actually allows you to make a recipe more...yours.

I never avoid cooking a recipe that includes raisins -ewwww- I'll do the recipe and avoid the raisins! Voilà!!

You are correct, Judith.
I READ a recipe, but then always adjust it to my tastes...more of this, less of that, I don't have any of this, but I DO have that, etc.

I experiment less with baking, except for flavorings. I may add an extra vanilla bean or more lemon zest, but not the basic ingredients.

Alex, no raisins? I chuckle because the town where I grew up was the "Raisin Capital of the World". Raisins everywhere in everything.

The only time i like raisins is when Keith -my US friend- makes stuffing. Other than that....

Ale, I like to show them how much it looks like, because if I use a wide pan I might need more oil than their narrow pans.

You might like raisins more if you put them into a jar with rum or brandy and use them like capers. Only my kid won't eat drunken raisins (and bananas and anchovies and tuna and ....)

Palma, although you never get photographed with a white nose and stains all over you, I knew you were a flinger.

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and use them like capers

what? in the puttanesca sauce????

No, you fish them out with a fork! Although I might actually try a puttanesca with grappa raisins, now that you mention it. Sounds kind of Tunisian to me.

(Doesn't everybody fish capers out with a fork and eat them?)

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Originally posted by Judith in Umbria:
No, you fish them out with a fork! Although I might actually try a puttanesca with grappa raisins, now that you mention it. Sounds kind of Tunisian to me.

(Doesn't everybody fish capers out with a fork and eat them?)

Only the vinegar type, Judith and actually only the bigger fruits with the stem still on that is now used as aperitivo along with some kind of white sparckling nectar.

To cook is usually better to use the capers preserved in salt...rinsing them well under running cold water.

Going back to the original question, this is actually I like JAime Oliver's cuisine because it is simple, very sense and personal taste driven and because it makes seems as actually everybody can cook, if they can get a hold of good ingredients without being chefs.

I consider the instinctuality into measurements a plus more than a minus.

And now my recipe for tonight:
Pesce sanpietro or rombo _whatever I will find- all'acquapazza.

Get a large enough pan for your fish, add 2 fingers of water and bring to boil, add one carrot sliced, a couple of celery stalks diced, one leek sliced a couple of carlic cloves slightly crushed and some cherry tomatoes cut in two, add the fish -cleaned inside and out- whole on the "crazywater". Cover with a lid.

Turn it after 5 minutes of cooking and let cook for 5 min more.

Portion it on a plate and serve it with some of it's sauce.

Side dish could be artichockes sauteed for 10 minutes total with olive oil and garlic and a bunch of chopped parsley.
Or semiroaster cherry tomatoes, still hanging on the stem -actually as easy as good: get a branch of cherry tomatoes (Pachino here) get the grill plate very hot and cook the cherrytomatoes still attached to the stem 5 min on either side and season them with EVOO, salt and eventually some herbs like oregano or thyme.