Pasta Amalfitano
Fresh Basic Pesto Recipe
Ingredients:
2 cups of chopped fresh basil
½ cup grated cheese either Parmagiano or Romano (Do not use shelf stable type)
½ extra virgin olive oil
¼ cup of toasted pignoli nuts
1 clove garlic
¼ tsp salt
Procedure:
1. Wash and then coarsely chop the basil.
2. Toast the pignoli in a small skillet for a few minutes until lighty browned. Do not burn!
3. Add grated parmagiana or romano cheese, garlic, olive oil and salt
4. Blend together either in blender, food processor or an immersion blender.
It is ready to serve. Or you can put in fridge to be served later but be sure to layer top of pesto with olive oil to keep the basil from turning dark. Pesto is served mixed in with pasta. Of course, pasta “al dente.”
Pasta Amalfitano
Layer 825 MAIN Marinara, Pesto and Ricotta drizzle with Extra Virgin Olive Oil and serve over your choice of pasta al’dente!
White Bean (Cannellini) Soup
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Easy and quick to make and so delicious!!
Ingredients:
1 can of cannellini beans
½ cup of 825 MAIN Marinara Sauce
2 bay leaves
2-3 shallots
a clove of garlic (crushed with the palm of your hand)
1 quart of vegetable stock or chicken stock
1 piece of Parmigiana cheese rind
Extra virgin olive oil
Chopped parsley
Procedure:
- Chop the shallots in small chunks, not too fine.
- Put in a pot the shallots, garlic in a pan with 2 tablespoons of Olive Oil and saute until shallots are soft and garlic is lightly toasted.
- Add bay leaves, 825 MAIN Marinara Sauce, Parmigiana cheese rind, and beans with the stock.
- Bring to a boil and then lower the heat to a simmer. Cook for 20 mins.
- Add salt to taste if the stock is unsalted.
- Serve with a spiral of olive oil and some chopped parsley.
Understanding Olive Oil
For the past five years, I have been doing seminars for our local farm market. I concentrate on sharing inside information that I have learned from my passion for food. This year I decided to investigate olive oils from around the world. With all this hype on olive oils lately what do we really know about them?
So, let me share how it came to be that I am so passionate about olive oil. As you probably know by now if you have been following my blog entries, my parents came from Italy to the US in the late 1950’s. So, while growing up we would often go to Italy to visit our relatives. My dad came from the town of Monte di Procida while my mom was from the island of Ischia. Both overlooked the bay of Naples. There is one memorable experience that made a real impact and was the catalyst for my passion for food. I must have been around 10 years old. My Nonna handed me an empty green bottle and asked me to go to the corner store ‘Rosarios’ to fill up the bottle with olive oil. My chest filled up with self-importance with this chore. Never been allowed to walk to ‘Rosarios’ by myself before, I relished this task. That may be why I paid extra attention to Nonna drizzling the thick green oil over the tomatoes we were going to have for lunch. I noticed that when she put it back in the cupboard, she placed it next to a clear bottle of oil. I asked Nonna why she had 2 bottles of oil. She explained to me that the clear bottle is used for frying and the green oil is for everything else. That afternoon I took notice on how delicious the tomato salad was. That taste of olive oil was embedded into my memory. When we came back to the US I often wondered why we didn’t have that same olive oil. When I moved out of my parents’ home I was on a mission to find a comparable olive oil. So, while my friends were all tasting their first beer I was tasting olive oil.
You think I am weird? Recently I had the occasion to ask my son who went to Italy to visit with his grandmother at the age of 10 years old what he remembers most about that trip. I had been talking to my cousin who resides in Italy and her kids to this day talk about when Josh went to visit. It was 19 years ago, so I wondered if my son even remembered. And this is how I know that he is my son. He said that he still thinks about that delicious tomato and tuna salad that my cousin made. He still is searching to find that same taste! And I believe it’s the olive oil.
The reason both he and I are so crazed about this olive oil is that it wasn’t until the 1980’s that extra virgin olive oil was even made available in America. In the 1980’s the International Olive Oil Council started sponsoring and promoting research about the healthy “Mediterranean diet.” This coincided with the Slow Food movement emerging from Turin, emphasizing the European style artisanal approach to crafting food products. Finally, olive oil was distributed in the U.S. It was successful marketing of olive oil that contributed to the olive boom! Because of the wide marketing campaign of healthy olive oil, consumption of olive oil worldwide from 1990 to present blew up. The US consumption increased by 250%. The United Kingdom increased by 763%. Consumption in Italy Greece and Spain increased minimally because it was always part of their diet. So, Olive Oil business has become a gold mine and everyone wants to get in on it. So, that’s why you see so many more countries involved in growing olive trees and making oil.
As I have been talking to people and reading up about olive oil, I realized that many Americans although knowledgeable about the health benefits of olive oil, don’t know what a good olive oil is supposed to taste like. For that matter, Americans may not realize that to have health benefits it has to be unrefined extra virgin olive oil. We have all become so accustomed to the cheaper supermarket big chain olive oils that we have no idea what a good olive oil is even supposed to taste like. Our palates have become accustomed the bad characteristics of Olive Oil as typical. That’s why I have this need to share with you what I have learned about Olive oils and what you may be missing out on!
Good Characteristics of Olive oil are the following:
Fruity, Bitter and pungent (the peppery characteristic you feel at the back of your throat. Olive oil should taste fresh and not heavy and oily.
The bad characteristics are:
Fusty from olives that are gathered in piles. Musty when olive is stored in humid environment. Sometimes metallic if it comes in contact with prolonged contact with metal during storage. And the most common is rancid. It has gone bad. Almost like the taste of stale crackers that are made with fat. Olive oil only has a shell life of 2 years. But once it’s opened you need to use it within a month or two.
During my seminar, we tasted olive oils from around the world. So, to understand what we tasted I went over a few things that are important when picking out an olive oil.
There are several factors that impact the taste of olive oils. So, that by understanding what you like will impact what country olive oil you will gravitate to.
- variety of olives used
- location and soil condition
- environmental factors and weather. 2 years ago, Italy had a disease that affected many olive groves. This past year Spain has been having lots of rain that impacted the olives groves where production was at an all-time low. You will see a rise in the price of Spanish olive oil.
- Olive ripeness. Green olives are bitter while ripe olives are fruity
- Timing of the harvest. If you wait too long the olives get too ripe and will bruise causing the olive oil to not taste good.
- Length of time between the harvest and pressing. The longer the wait between harvest and pressing the more the olive gets damaged and bruised yielding a terrible olive oil. That’s why estate olive oil is so much better. They go directly from the tree to the press. The bigger national olive oils will collect olives from all over and transport them to a manufacturing plant. The olives get too ripe and acquire mold. They are cheaper because it is mass produced but the olive oil is not very good.
- The very best oils come from small producers who have complete control over their orchard, the harvesting of the fruit, the pressing of the olives, and the storage and eventual bottling of the product. Ripe olives are easily bruised…
- Additionally, the press and the bottling facility must be readily available, ideally on the farm itself. Ripe olives are easily bruised and must be held in small containers before pressing in order to avoid being squeezed by their own weight and begin deterioration. A controlled environment with ultra-sanitary conditions is paramount. The pressing process must be accomplished in the briefest time possible.
- Pressing technique. The best oils are pressed within a few hours, and certainly not to exceed 24 hours after the harvest, any delay beyond this time frame has a detrimental effect on the quality of the oil. The pressing to extract the oil must happen quickly and at a controlled temperature of (ideally) of less than 80 degrees F.
- Packaging and storing.
- Being a fruit, olives contain natural antioxidants that protect the plant during its lifetime. When the olive tree is very old it contains more of these antioxidants. This is one of the reasons that olive trees are often hundreds of years old and create antioxidant rich products
Estate olive oils – are the cream of the crop. They are produces using olives from a single farm. The olives are usually handpicked and then pressed and bottles at the estate. In Italy, they are called DOP. These olives oils are more expensive.
Blends – two types of blends are either blends from different countries or olives from diverse areas of one country are combines. The bulk blended oils are the most economical but are still high quality.
Color –
- Green comes from unripe olives and are slightly bitter.
- Emerald tinged have fruity, grassy and peppery that dominate the food that you use them on.
- Golden color is made from ripe olives. Golden olive oil has a milder, smoother buttery taste without bitterness. These are good with foods that you don’t want overshadowed with olive oil taste.
Acidity –
To start with, if you purchase quality EVOO the acidity level is already low at no more than .8% (That’s less than 1%) Acidity levels are determined solely by the variety of olive and by production methods. Some olives have a naturally higher acidity level. If they are not harvested with care and quickly processed into olive oil they will have even greater levels. Some on the other hand have lower acidity to start but if they are not harvested and processed properly the levels will increase. This is why olives from the same variety and the same grove can produce different grades of olive oil. If the olives are picked and pressed within 24 hours, as all of the ones in my line are, they will never have acidity levels greater than the required .8%. If oils are blended, as is done routinely with lower grade and refined olive oil it can produce lower acidity levels and then be passed off as “extra virgin”.
So long as the oil is real EVOO (and many are not even though they claim to be) there is no reason to choose based on acidity. It should be based on taste and what one wants to do with the olive oil
Refined Olive Oils
Only about 30 percent of all olive oil production ends at extracting the oil from the olives. Refining involved using solvents and high heat to neutralize the tastes of the oil. This allows producers to use olives that are not in the best condition, and blend from oils from a wide variety of sources (even countries) because the bad tastes resulting from oxidized olives and the mass production process are chemically removed. When you see “Pure Olive Oil” at the store, or a bottle that says simply “Olive Oil,” “Genuine”, “Light”, “certified”, these are refined. Refined has no antioxidants! So, they don’t meet the criteria for International Olive Oil healthy diet.
HOW TO TASTE OLIVE OIL
Tasting olive oil straight is the best way to judge its quality. Pour a little in a small glass and warm the glass in one hand, while covering it with the other. Now put your nose into the glass to sense the aromas. Hopefully, it reminds you of things like fresh olives, grass, bananas and apples. Hay, cardboard, vinegar, mud and mustiness are some of the aromas that indicate an olive oil has gone bad.
STORING OLIVE OIL
You can keep unopened olive oil in a cool, dark place for up to two years (high quality olive oil will last longer than one that wasn’t great to begin with).
Once you open the container, the oil begins to degrade much faster. A good rule of thumb is to use it within a few months after opening. Keep the bottle tightly capped and away from heat and direct light. The best strategy is to use olive oil often, and go through it quickly.
Extra virgin olive oil and wine also share the same “enemies:” heat, oxygen and light. Olive oils have a relatively short shelf life and once the bottles are opened and exposed to oxygen, the oils will naturally begin to break down and lose both their organoleptic and nutritive properties. Freshness therefore, becomes a huge issue, although older oils can still be excellent cooking oils. Storage after purchase is also important. If possible, extra virgin olives oils are best stored in a cool, dark place like a cabinet. Do not store or display your oil on or near your stove or on a window sill.
What is Extra Virgin Olive Oil?
- the oil must come from fresh olives that were milled within 24 hours of their harvest.
- it must be extracted by mechanical means, not from heat or chemicals. It’s called unrefined.
- They must not be treated chemically in any way.
- Being a fruit, olives contain natural antioxidants that protect the plant during its lifetime. When the olive tree is very old it contains more of these antioxidants. This is one of the reasons that olive trees are often hundreds of years old and create antioxidant rich products.
- Extra virgin oil is, in fact, fresh olive juice.
Extra-virgin olive oil (cold pressed) is the best.
But how do we know if it is the real thing and not a fraud olive oil?
7 Tips for Recognizing Real Extra Virgin Olive Oil
- Do not buy light olive oil or a blend; it isn’t virgin quality.
- When extra virgin olive oil costs less than $10 a liter it may not be real.
- Only buy oils in dark bottles, as this protects the oil from oxidation.
- Look for a seal from the International Olive Oil Council (IOC)
- Look for a harvesting date on the label.
- Olive oil can get old and rancid. A simple test for a “good” olive oil is to taste a little on a spoon. Not rancid, real olive oil will have a fruity taste in the front of your mouth and a peppery taste in the back of your mouth.
- How about the fridge test as stated by Dr Oz? He said that when you put a real extra-virgin olive oil in the refrigerator, it will become thick and cloudy as it cools completely. That is not a for sure test (some oils made from high-wax olive varieties will even solidify) according to a Fridge Test
Olive Oils from Around the World
When buying olive oil, you’ll see varieties from all over the world. Most of the world’s supply are grown in Spain, Italy and Greece. Traditionally olive trees have been located in countries surrounding the Mediterranean Sea because they need hot summers and mild winters. But now other countries are participating in the production of Olive Oil which includes other oils from California, France, Turkey and even Israel!
HOW TO TASTE OLIVE OIL
Tasting olive oil straight is the best way to judge its quality. Pour a little in a small glass and warm the glass in one hand, while covering it with the other. Now put your nose into the glass to sense the aromas. Hopefully, it reminds you of things like fresh olives, grass, bananas and apples. Hay, cardboard, vinegar, mud and mustiness are some of the aromas that indicate an olive oil has gone bad.
How to Pick a good Olive Oil
- Look on label that it says Extra Virgin Olive Oil ( Cold pressed or first pressed labels are just marketing terms. All extra virgin olive oils are the first pressed and no heat is added
- )Europe has strict standards set by the International Olive Oil Council labeled as IOC. Thy insure that olives are processed soon after picking and that it passed the laboratory and IOC sensory tests.
- US doesn’t belong to IOC but has the USDA which as similar practices but not as strict
- You cant accept that a bottle of extra virgin olive oil by its label. You need to look for certification that it was produced and processed in same place.
a) PDO Protected Designation of Origins. Certificate that oil was produced and processed in same place.
b) DPO or DOP Italian version of PDO
c) AOC French version of PDO
d)PGI Protected Geographical Indication – not as stringent as PDO but it does mean that one stage of production, processing or preparation took place in one geographical region.
e) US Standards NAOOA North American Olive Oil Association same as IOC for the US.
COOC California Olive Oil Council Seal – means it has gone thru laboratory and sensory tests.
f) Harvest date tells you month and date olives were picked and Olive oil have a 2 year shelf life for certain olives. But some olives in olive oils are best consumed within 12-18 months after harvest time.
g) Best Before or Use by dates if it doesn’t have harvest date
5. Bottles– don’t pay attention to fancy glass bottles but just notice if bottle is either opaque or tinted. They keep olive oil from being oxidized caused by light. Clear glass is a warning that olive oil may oxidize quicker and flavor is ruined.
6. Storage– store olive oil in a cupboard away from heat and light
7. Organic Olive Oil– free from chemical fertilizers. BUT! Olive trees in general are very hearty and they require little to no pesticide to grow. Totally unlike our apple crops! But most growers outside of US do not use any chemicals on their olive trees. But if you worry then Organic is certified
8. Types of Olive Oils on the market
- a) Extra Virgin Olive Oil – Few flavor defects, Vigorously tested for purity and quality. Free acidity level of less than .8%. The low amount of processing means the olive oil type retains more polyphenols and anti oxidants than anyother types.
- b) Virgin Olive Oil – free acidity less than 2% Minor Flavor alterations
- c) Refined Olive Oil – Treated with heat and chemicals. Tastes neutral. Tastes less like olives than virgin oils. Free acidity is less than .3%
- d) Olive oil – sometimes labels as pure or classic. Acidity level is less than 1%. It’s a blend of 15-25 % virgin olive oil with refined olive to eliminate flavor flaws.
- e) Light olive oil or extra light Olive oil- acidity level less than 1% a mix of 5-10% virgin olive oil with refined olive oil. These aren’t labeled light because of calories. Light in terms of flavor and then have the least antioxidants.
9. Color – Don’t be fooled by color! High quality can fall between pale yellow to dark green. It depends on olive type, harvest time, growing region and climate
10. Cooking with EVOO – can cook at moderate temperatures. Save the higher quality of extra virgin olive oils for drizzling!
See our White Bean (Cannellini) Soup recipe.
Sfogliatelle (say what?)
I grew up in a big Italian family where English was not spoken in the house. My big Italian family consisted of not only my parents but also my grandparents, 7 aunts and 7 uncles, all of whom were Italian immigrants just entering the US. I was the first born American in our family. As much as they reasoned that they wanted the children to all speak Italian, I believe it was more because no one knew a word of English. I started learning English when I began school. But it was not until I took Italian in college that I realized that whatever language I was speaking at home was not Italian! It was not only a mixture of Italian and Napolitano dialect but it was also consisted of English words said with a thick Italian accent. I soon realized that so many words that I thought were Italian were actually English mispronunciations. For instance, we lived in Poughkeepsie, but my Italian family insisted we lived in ‘Pookeepzz’. The Italian teacher corrected me when I said river was translated to riviera in Italian. Riviera is a riverbank. But my big Italian family were trying to say Hudson River in English and they would refer to it as Riviera. And then whenever we visited my grandmother, she would offer us kids ‘gookeez’. No such word in Italian! They were speaking English and were offering us cookies! I even thought that sandwich in Italian was san-gweecio. I did not even realize I was saying san-gwich when ordering at the McDonald’s drive thru until my children brought it to my attention. After that I made sure I said SSSaaaannndddwhich while they snickered in the background. When I think back to all the times my dad brought us to Italy to visit the family, it is no wonder my cousins had no clue what we were saying. So basically, we did not speak Italian and we did not speak English.
There was one time in fourth grade that my mother went to pick up my report card from Sister Mary Regis’ class. I was an overall good student, but the teacher complained to my mom that my English could be better. My mom was perplexed and asked her what she meant. She proceeded to tell my mom that I should be able to pronounce ‘th’. My mom explained that I never learned the ‘th’ sounds because it is not in the Italian language. With a stern voice Sister Mary Regis said, “You live in America and Teresa needs to speak proper English!” After that I made sure to pronounce all the ‘th’ words correctly while developing a stutter with every ‘th’ word.
It was not until years later that I got a good handle on the ‘th’ sound minus for the occasional confusion with tong and thong. We were in Italy and I was 13. My Italian cousins and I were sitting on the beach with their friends. They all found great joy in having me say three thirty and three thousand over and over. They were laughing hysterically. For some reason hearing me pronounce the ‘th’ sound made for a quite entertaining afternoon for them. It is no wonder that I still stutter over an occasional ‘th’ word.
Alright already! I admit it I have the occasional speech issues leftover from my childhood. But! I can say sfogliatelle perfectly! And even my children can say it right. I made sure that they were able to pronounce words properly in the language they were speaking in. I know this to be true because there was one time while in college my daughter and her college friends visited an Italian Bakery in Bridgeport, Connecticut. Everyone ordered either eclairs or cannoli. When it became my daughters turn to order, she ordered her favorite sfogliatella in the proper Italian pronunciation. The Italian shop owners did a double take and immediately focused all their attention on my daughter asking her name. Their eyes glimmered as she told them her name was Adriana. “Aaaahh, what a beautiful name! You are Italian!“, they rejoiced as they lovingly served her a delicious sfogliatella on a golden plate. ……wink wink
What is sfoglialtelle?
Sfogliatella is a crispy clam shaped pastry made from dozens of thin layers of dough and filled with a citrusy sweet mixture of ricotta and semolina. They are a symbol of the city of Naples in Italy. What makes them so uniquely special is that as crunchy as the pastry is on the outside, the inside filling is a complete reverse and so smooth. Sfogliatelle are best served warm with the perfumes of the candied fruit and the cinnamon adding to the experience.
Legend has it that this pastry was invented in the 1600’s in the Covent of Santa Rosa on the Amalfi Coast. The Mother Superior, Clothilde, had some leftover semolina soaked in milk. So instead of wasting it, the Mother Superior, made it into a sweetened filling mixing it with ricotta and placed it into dough shaped like the monk’s hood. It was so delicious that the convent began selling it and the rest is history.
Wherever the Italian immigrants from Naples settled they brought their love of sfogliatelle to share. So it has come to be that when you go into an Italian Bakery anywhere in New York, they are most likely offering the Sfogliatelle. As famous as the Sfogliatelle Riccia (crunchy pastry) is, there is also less known variety as the Sfogliatelle Frolle ( smooth pastry). I have been trying to make Sfogliatelle Riccia in the last few years experimenting with different flours to get the perfect texture. I found the best flour to use is the 00 flour. If you can’t find 00 flour, pastry flour is a good alternative. The most time consuming part of this recipe is preparing the dough from a pasta roller. I used the kitchen aide mixer with the pasta roller attachment to get the dough as thin as possible and rolled it into a log. If you enjoy a challenge this recipe is very rewarding!
Sflogliatelle Ricci
(makes about 16)
Dough
Ingredients:
- 1 pound 00 flour
- 0.25 teaspoon salt
- 2 teaspoons honey
- 0.75 cup + 1 tablespoon water
- 8 ounces unsalted butter
Filling
Ingredients:
- 2 cups whole milk
- pinch salt
- 5 ounces (generous 3/4 cup) semolina
- 7 ounces (1 cup) ricotta cheese
- 4 ounces (generous 1/2 cup) sugar
- 2 egg yolks
- 3 ounces (about 1/2 cup) candied citrus peels or candied cherries, finely chopped
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
Procedure for the filling:
- Pour the milk into a medium saucepan and add the salt.
- Bring the mixture to the boil. Sprinkle in the semolina, whisking gently all the while to keep lumps from forming.
- Cook the mixture for 2-3 minutes until it thickens to a paste-like consistency.
- Remove it from the heat, pour it into a bowl and allow it to cool.
- Meanwhile, press the ricotta through a fine mesh strainer, again, to eliminate lumps.
- Combine all the ingredients in a bowl….…and stir them together.
- Cover the filling with plastic wrap and put it in the refrigerator until you’re ready to use it. It will store up to two days.
To make the Sfogliatelle:
- In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the dough hook attachment combine the flour, the salt, the honey and the water.
- Let everything mix on medium speed for a good 10 minutes.
- Note that the dough will be kind of dry and crumbly. It will not form a ball. That is fine.
- Transfer the dough to a wooden board and start putting all the crumbs together to form a ball.
- Start kneading the dough until the ball comes together and it feels supple and smooth. The kneading process will take about 10 minutes.
- Coat the dough with a thin coat of lard, wrap it in plastic paper and let it rest for 1 hour at room temperature.
- If you have a long table roll out a sheet of wax paper at least 9 feet long. Otherwise, no worries, do it in shorter length.
- After 1 hour, take the dough and divide in half.
- Take one half and leave the other half in the plastic paper.
- Attach the pasta roller to your stand mixer or use any other pasta roller that you may have. Set the roller to the widest setting.
- With your hands flatten the dough as much as you can and begin to the pass it through the roller. The first few times the dough will rip, not to worry, keep folding the dough and keep passing it through the rollers. Eventually it will no longer rip and the dough will become smooth and velvety.
12. Once you have a sheet that is nice and smooth, set the pasta roller to next to the thinnest setting (on the Kitchen Aid I set it to 8).
13. Pass the dough through the roller and be careful to catch the thin layer of dough that will come out Once you catch it, gently deposit it the sheet of dough on the wax paper that you laid on the table.
14. Starting from one end, put some lard on your fingers and spread it over the entire surface of the dough. Do it gently as you do not want to rip the dough.
15. Once you have covered the entire surface with lard, start from one end and begin to roll the dough into a log as tight as possible until you reach the other end. If you table isn’t 9ft. Just keep attaching the shorther lengths until you have a log about 2 1/2 inches thick.
16. Apply a coating of lard over the entire log, wrap it in plastic paper and store it in the fridge.
17. Repeat the same process for the other half of the dough.
18. Refrigerate overnight or for at least 5 hours.
19. Pre-heat the oven to 400F.Take each log and cut it in slices of a little less than 1/2 inch. Take each slice and with your thumb press all around toward the center of the dough so that it spreads and forms a cone
20. Fill each cone with two teaspoons of filling, close the end and place on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.
21. Once you have made all the sfogliatelle, bake them for 27-28 minutes.
22. Once they cool, you can optionally sprinkle them with powdered sugar and serve them.
Buon Appetitto!
My Brilliant Mamma
Since we are stuck at home, we have been watching the HBO series My Brilliant Friend. The show was created from Elena Ferrante’s four Neapolitan novels. The story line is about two girlfriends and the difficulty they experienced as women living in the 1950’s in Naples, Italy. My Brilliant Friend is the name of Elena Ferrante’s first novel. The show is not only spoken in Italian, but also in the Neapolitan dialect with English subtitles. Some of the scenes were even filmed on the island of Ischia located in the Bay of Naples. My sister lives there now and is also the island where my mom and her family grew up. I have read the first of Elena Ferrante novels, and had started reading the second book which I could not bring myself to finish. For some reason I decided to force myself to watch the HBO series during this quarantine. I thought that listening to the Neapolitan dialect would bring me comfort. As I watched the series, I realized why I stopped reading Elena Ferrante’s books. Her books are painfully too familiar.
My mom was born in 1936 and moved to the US in 1955. My Brilliant Friend series is also set in the 1950’s. Mamma told me so many stories during her upbringing. My mom was the oldest of seven siblings. Her father was away as a medic during the war, and afterwards he went away again in search of a better place for his family to live. The family struggled whenever he was away. As a young child my mom was forced to grow up fast and strong. Her mom desperately relied on her. Mamma had to do a lot of things that would seem way too much for a young child to do. But her mom had no choice while taking care of 6 younger children. I listened to my mom and her stories of all the things she had to do, I just could not fathom the gravity of the situation until I heard the desperation of my grandmother’s words.
One day as my Nonna (grandmother) stirred sugar into a cup of espresso she, told me of a time when she went to speak to her priest before Nonno (grandfather) went away to Argentina in 1949. My Nonna was the holiest person I have ever known. Her whole life was guided through the Lord and the Holy Spirit. She went to church every day. I knew that faith got her out of the darkest moments of her life. That day over espresso, she recollected a dilemma she experienced in minced words that I could not quite understand. I leaned forward so I can fully comprehend what she was trying to tell me. Her face was cringed in pain and her voice stammered as she tried to reveal her secret. My Nonna did not speak any English and she told me this in the Neapolitan dialect. Although I am basically fluent in Italian, some of the words, she used I never heard of. With my eyes wide, my mouth agape and at full attention, I listened. She proceeded to tell me that during the time before Nonno left for Argentina she went to confession to ask the priest for guidance. But I did not get it! I just nodded to reassure her I was listening. To this day I still wonder what she was trying to tell me. I did not understand the words she used to tell me what the priest had said. How can I understand? I cannot even imagine what it was like living during that time, in that place, under those circumstances? All I can tell you is what I saw in front of me as Nonna closed her eyes and lifted her hands as if in reverence and said she found out she was pregnant with her only son, her 7th child as Nonno sailed off to Argentina. Nonno met his only son 3 years later when he finally came back from Argentina.
My Nonna was so burdened with her husband away, a child on the way, and 6 other children to feed, that she had no one else to rely on but my mom. Nonna kept all her other children under close watch. They did not have the freedom that my mom had to freely move throughout the island. My mom’s siblings were not allowed to go anywhere. My grandmother was extremely strict with them. I grew up understanding that Nonna was protective and overbearing. I used to hear whispers that my mom, as a child, was arrogant and spoiled. I often wonder if Mama’s sisters could have been jealous of her. But as I am rethinking about it now, how could they have not felt that way about my mom. They watched my mom have the freedom that they wished they had.
Because of this responsibility, my mom ended up developing a strong character. My grandmother needed her to be that way. Money was so tight, and the family was starving. The money my grandfather would send from Argentina was not enough for the 8 of them. My grandmother would say to my mom…Here is 2 lire and a shopping list. See what you can do. As challenging as it was, my mom would embrace the task. She became good at bartering with the market people to get as much as she could with the little money that she had. Mamma was proud to go back home with everything on the list and watch intently to see if she could erase the worry off my grandmother’s face. Mamma was industrious too! Mamma proudly told me of the time she had to travel to Forio, (a town on the other side of the island) to learn how to make baskets. Nonna gave her enough money to buy all the material, too! When she got back home, she taught her mom and her sisters to make the baskets too. They all worked hard to make baskets to sell to the tourists. Another time, while my mom was out and about the town, a tourist asked where she could find a laundress. Mamma piped up that her mom is a laundress! Mom’s quick thinking added another monetary opportunity to put food on the table. Mamma told me countless stories of how it was when her father was away.
That is how my brilliant mamma became who she was. But just as much as my mom had let go of her childhood, my grandmother also had to let go of some of her motherly instincts for the family to survive.
I think about those times now as we all struggle with this pandemic. How strong my mom and her family had to be to endure all those hardships back then. I am confident that we all can overcome this hardship at this time! After all it is in our genes to overcome!
Grilled Chicken Marinated with Mint Pesto
This dish is a family favorite! I can remember my grandfather starting the grill. He didn’t use charcoal just wood in a barbecue pit. The mint pesto was made with his own white wine vinegar which was way stronger than commercial vinegar. He used it whole chicken or fish. My version is adapted to make it a quick meal on your stove top. Enjoy!
Ingredients
2 Boneless chicken Breast pounded so it the same thickness throughout
½ cup fresh mint leaves
¼ cup of extra virgin olive oil
¼ cup of white wine vinegar
½ tsp of salt
2 cloves of garlic
Procedure
- Blend the mint leaves, EVOO, vinegar salt and garlic together until just about chopped. Not smooth though. Blend for a few seconds to get all the ingredients in a rough chopped look.
- Add the mint pesto to the chicken to marinate for a half hour.
- Preheat a cast iron pan on high heat on the stove top.
- Grill chicken in a cast iron pan. With heat set to medium. Flip to cook both sides. The length of time that it takes depends on the thickness of the pounded chicken. It could be anywhere from 10 minutes to 20 minutes.
Buon Appetito!
Easter Monday – Pasquetta
Despite having all these limitations set in place, I hope you all were able to enjoy your Easter and Passover celebrations. Practicing social distancing, I did manage to carefully carry on one Easter tradition. I made several Italian Easter Pies and dropped them off to our children, my sister and my mom. Today is Easter Monday and it has always been celebrated throughout the world. Even the White House used to have its own Easter Monday tradition with The Egg Roll on it’s the grounds. But this year, this epidemic has made us all reminisce about Easter and Passovers and how it used to be.
Growing up, my mom always referred to the Monday after Easter as Lunedi in Albis (Monday in White). But as a national holiday throughout Italy, it’s called Pasquetta (Little Easter). After the somber week of reflecting on Jesus dying for us and rising from the dead the Italians get together informally on the Monday after Easter. They head outdoors to enjoy the spring sunshine and warm breezes with family and friends, packing up the leftovers from the Easter feast into picnic baskets.
In 1972 my dad wanted us all to experience Easter in Italy. We jetted out from NYC to Naples with a stopover in London on the brand new 747! The trip wasn’t as glamorous as it sounds, though. Having problems with connection flights we ended up staying 2 overnights in London. Two days of constant running between airline counters trying to get a flight to Naples was exhausting! Unfortunately, we ended up missing part of Holy Week. I was 13 years old and besides the memorable flight, there were a couple of other memories that stood out to me during our trip to Italy.
One memory was that I noticed how proud all the women were of their Panettones (Easter Bread) or as Napolitano’s call it, casatiello. The process was a huge undertaking because each of the matriarchs of the families baked enough for all their children, the children’s families and even the children’s in-laws. Each family we visited during Easter week made sure to bring us to a special room where all the panettones were rising. The women in their kerchiefs and aprons made elaborate gestures of removing the blankets to show off the many pans of bread. This really piqued my curiosity and I asked my mom why all this drama about the rising of this bread. She said they made their own yeast and it took longer to rise. I remember thinking this bread was almost like Christ rising from the dead in three days. Is this why they all make Easter bread? So, after all the waiting the bread was ready to bake and we got to enjoy it on Easter Sunday and Monday.
The second most memorable experience was Easter Monday, La Pasquetta. My brother and I, along with my cousins had a picnic in one of Monte di Procida’s vineyards. We brought dyed hard-boiled eggs, prosciutto and provolone cheese, bread, the Easter panettone, bottles of water and even a bottle of wine. I enjoyed it all! Well except for the panettone and the wine. The pannetone was dry and sweet. Now that I remember correctly, my brother and my cousins ate the panettone with the wine. Hmmmm? Maybe that’s why my brother was rolling down the hill like an Easter egg. I wasn’t a wine drinker back then. I didn’t like it. Imagine that? I grew up drinking water with wine mixed in. Forbidding underage drinking wasn’t a thing in the Italian culture. Wine on the table was the norm. Kids drank diluted wine. I did not acquire a taste for it. When I finally turned eighteen in 1976 (the drinking age back then), it didn’t phase me. If I wanted a drink, I could have had it long before I was 18. So possibly the panettone didn’t taste as good to me because I refused to dunk it in wine! My taste buds changed as I got older. I love panettone now! Especially when it’s dunked in wine!
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I have attached a recipe for Cornetti (Italian croissants). I am still daydreaming of sitting at a bar enjoying a cappuccino while dunking a cornetto. The Italian Cornetto and the French Croissant look similar but actually very different.
1. The cornetto is much sweeter than the French croissant. The Cornetto contains more sugar, while the French version contains more butter, which makes it so much greasier
2. The cornetto is softer compared to the French croissant, which is crispier.
3. Italian cornetti usually have fillings. They are filled either with pastry cream, marmalade, honey, or chocolate (I love the ones filled with pastry cream!), while the ‘cornetto vuoto’ (an empty cornetto) is the pastry without any filling. The French version doesn’t traditionally have fillings.
I tried a couple of different recipes for cornetti but this is my favorite. I used brown sugar because I didn’t have can sugar and it still came out perfect. The texture is just what a remember about them. Not greasy at all. I didn’t fill these with pastry cream but next time I will try filling them!
Cornetti (Italian Croissants)
Basic Dough
• 1 cup of water
• 1 tbs of honey
• ¼ cup of cane sugar or brown sugar
• 1 egg
• 1/3 cup melted butter
• Zest of 1 lemon
• 1 cup of flour
• 1 cup of oo flour
• 1 envelope of yeast (preferably brewers yeast)
• 2 tsp of sugar
For the layers
• ¼ cupof cane sugar or brown sugar
• 1/8 cup of melted butter
For the finishing
• 1 egg yolk to brush before cooking
• Warm honey to brush after cooking
Directions
1. In a bowl, add the flours, the envelope of brewers yeast and the two teaspoons of cane sugar that will serve to activate the yeast. Mix all the ingredients.
2. In another bowl pour the warm water and then add and a tablespoon of honey.
3. Into the bowl with warm water and honey, add the brown sugar, the grated lemon peel, the melted butter and the egg.
4.Mixing it all together with a fork, add the flour a little at a time.
5. Continue to work the dough with your hands and add the flour, until we get a dough with an elastic consistency.
6. Put the dough in a bowl, engrave in a cross with a knife and cover with cling wrap. Let the dough rise in a warm place, until the volume doubles, it will take about 2 hours.
7. After it rises lightly work the dough and to form a long log. Divide it into 8 equal loaves of about 4 ounces each.
8. Prepare the pastry by rolling out the loaves to form 8 discs about 2mm thick (very thin!)
9. Spread the loaves one at a time, with the rolling pin and brush the melted butter and sprinkle the cane sugar on the surface. Continue laying out and overlapping all the discs.
10. After fixing the last disc we stretch with a rolling pin to get a round pastry, about half a centimeter thick (less than ¼ inch thick)
12. With a pizza cutter make 8 wedges and a small incision in the center of each wedge. Roll up the wedges to form the croissants and fix them in the baking tray, covered with parched paper. Cover with clingwrap and leave to rise for about 20 minutes.
12. Brush with egg yolk and bake in a 350 degree preheated oven for about 20 minutes.
13. As soon as you take the cornetti out of the oven , lightly brush them with warm honey!
14. And don’t forget to dunk it in a cappucino. Or maybe wine! hiccup!
Un’Caffe! Please!
In my last blog post I shared how disappointed I was that I couldn’t go visit my sister this spring. I must tell you as much as I so wanted to see my sister there was one other thing that I was so looking forward to. I have been dreaming about it! I am drooling right now as I think about it. No! It’s not Italian men!
It’s the coffee! Some of you know that I went to Italy this past fall. For some reason I became obsessed with the espresso. Every morning I had a cappuccino. In the afternoon I had an espresso after lunch. In the late afternoon I had a macchiato. By late afternoon I became very fluent with my Italian or so I thought as I hysterically waved and greeted every person I came across. I need to admit to you all that I have a caffeine problem. For some reason it makes me talk nonstop. My daughter always knows. When I go into a fast-long-winded story, she scolds me as I am panting out of breath, “You had coffee. Didn’t you?”
But! OMG! The coffee that was enjoying every day while I was in Ischia was delicious! It wasn’t acidic or burnt tasting. It was so smoooooth and creammmmy! And I am not talking about the cappuccino. Just plain espresso is thick and creamy. They only fill those little espresso cups half-way. That’s why at the coffee bars in Italy there are no seats.
- People go in.
- Stand at the bar with no stools.
- Order un’caffe.
- Down the espresso.
- Share a greeting with the barista and fellow coffee drinkers.
- Out the door they go!
The morning is the only time the cappuccino is enjoyed by Italians. They won’t drink it after 11. If you order a cappuccino during the day, they will exclaim, “Pffttt Americano!”. I was very careful not to order one because I wanted to be inconspicuous ( yeah right, as I hysterically wave and greet)! But I did order a macchiato. The macchiato was heaven! There was a little but more in the cup than espresso with a thick foamy caramel colored top. Not like a cappuccino at all. The cappuccino is served in a large cup with a 3/ 4 filled cup of white foam. The macchiato is served in an espresso cup with ¼ of the cup filled with a dark caramel colored foam. Such a thick and creamy espresso drink. If I had my way I would have asked for a triple. I don’t think my sister, her husband and the rest of the people in the bar would have been happy with me.
Ever since I got back from Italy, I keep searching for the perfect espresso drink. I tried all the chains from low end to high end. I went directly to coffee roasters to try their espresso, restaurants that tout their espresso drinks, and bakeries. I even bought high end coffee beans and would grind them myself. I just can’t replicate that delicious taste. I started researching and reading. Some say it’s the way they roast the coffee bean. They said that in the US we over roast the coffee bean to get the bean extra dark which is a mistake. Others say it’s the water.
As I sit here with my cup of espresso made with my moka pot, dunking an S shaped Italian cookie into the espresso, I pretend I am gazing at the Mediterranean Sea alongside my sister. I really do miss her so. Maybe it wasn’t the espresso. I think it was my sister’s company!
Italian S Cookies
Ingredients:
2 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
2 eggs
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon grated lemon zest
Egg Wash
1 egg yolk
1 teaspoon milk
2 teaspoons demerara sugar for sprinkling on egg wash
Directions:
- Preheat the oven to 350℉.
- Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper.
- In a medium mixing bowl, sift together flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside.
- In a large bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, whisk the eggs on medium-high speed until nice and frothy (about 3-4 minutes).
- Slowly add sugar. Continue to whisk until well combined and slightly thickened (about 2 minutes).
- Add the oil, extract, and the zest. Combine well.
- Add the sifted dry ingredients and mix with wooden spoon until well combined, dough will be soft.
- Scoop dough with medium sized cookie scoop and drop on a lightly floured surface (about 2 tablespoons).
- Roll out each piece in a 4-5 inch strand about 1/2 inch in diameter.
- Place on parchment-lined cookie sheet and form into an S shape.
- Brush tops of cookies with egg yolk mixture.
- Sprinkle with demerara sugar
- Bake for 15-17 minutes or until bottoms are lightly browned (this is a pale cookie).
- Transfer cookies to wire rack to cool.
Let’s bake while we wait!
It’s been such a whirlwind of a few months. I am writing this blog post today sitting at my desk. But if all was right with the world, I would it to be sitting under a lemon tree on the Island of Ischia in Italy with my beautiful sister. In January while the news from China was just coming out about the Coronavirus, my daughter and I oblivious to the severity of the situation planned a fun trip to trip to Europe. Our first stop was to be in Lisbon, Portugal and then we were flying to Naples to finish our trip visiting my sister Giovanna who lives in Ischia. Alas, a few days after I booked the trip the news started to get more and more serious. My daughter, my sister and I started to become obsessed with watching the news. It was the strangest thing. Like a snowball rolling down a hill this coronavirus epidemic was becoming bigger and bigger each day. We didn’t even need to make the decision to cancel the trip. Every week the flight kept changing. First the flight’s destination was changed to land in Rome instead of Naples. Then as Italy put in more restrictions the flight’s destination was changed to Lisbon. Finally, 5 days before we were to leave all flights were suspended.
As we followed whatever was going on in Italy, we knew it would be a matter of time that we would be the doing the same thing here in the states. When US advised us to limit our gatherings to 10 people, I hurried up and finished my sauce deliveries not knowing if they were going to close travel between states like the provinces of Italy. I even made a last run to stock up my grown children who live in Connecticut and Westchester with the 825 MAIN Marinara Sauce, 825 MAIN Pizza Margherita Sauce and pasta.
Because I was so preoccupied with keeping up with the news and tying up loose ends, I inadvertently forgot about St. Josephs Day on March 19th. Not only is St. Joseph the national Italian holiday for Father’s Day but we always celebrated the holiday because Joseph was my dad’s name, followed by my son and husband whose middle name is Joseph. We all celebrated by making zeppole. aka Sfingi di San Giuseppe, aka Cream Puffs.
Since I am settling in at home now, I am catching up with my baking. So, I made St. Josephs Cream Puffs! Here is an easy recipe that I used for the Cream Puff and the Pastry Cream. I hope you enjoy making it and eating it as much as my husband and I did! Stay safe while we are making history!
Cream Puffs
Ingredients:
- 1 cup water
- 8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 1/2 teaspoons granulated sugar
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- 3 to 4 eggs, plus 1 egg for egg wash
Directions:
- To make the cream puffs: Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F. In a large saucepan, bring the water, butter, salt, and granulated sugar to a rolling boil over medium-high heat. When it boils, immediately take the pan off the heat. Stirring with a wooden spoon, add all the flour at once and stir hard until all the flour is incorporated, 30 to 60 seconds
- Scrape the mixture into a mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. Mix at medium speed. With the mixer running, and working 1 egg at a time, add 3 of the eggs, stopping after each addition to scrape down the sides of the bowl. Mix until the dough is smooth and glossy, and the eggs are completely incorporated. The dough should be thick but should fall slowly and steadily from the beaters when you lift them out of the bowl. If the dough is still clinging to the beaters, add the remaining egg and mix until incorporated.
- You can use a pastry bag fitted with a large plain tip, pipe the dough onto the baking sheet lined with parchment paper, in 2-inch diameter rounds or balls. But I used a tablespoon and dropped the dough on the baking. Whisk the remaining egg with 1 1/2 teaspoons water. Brush the surface of the rounds with the egg wash to knock down the points (you may not use all the egg wash). Bake 15 minutes, then reduce the heat to 375 degrees F and bake until puffed up, and light golden brown, about 20 minutes more. Try not to open the oven door too often during the baking. Let cool on the baking sheet.
- To fill the cream puffs, place a pastry tip on your finger and poke a hole in the bottom of each puff. Or you can slice the cream puff and insert pastry cream by a spoon.
Pastry Cream
Ingredients:
- 2 cups milk
- 1/2 cup white sugar
- 1 vanilla bean, halved lengthwise or 1 tsp of pure vanilla
- 6 egg yolks
- 4 tablespoons all-purpose flour
- 4 tablespoons unsalted butter
- 1 pinch salt
Directions:
- Place the milk, half the sugar and the vanilla bean in a saucepan over medium heat.
- Combine the egg yolks and the remaining sugar in a bowl and whisk until light in color. Add in the flour and the salt, mix to combine.
- When the milk just begins to boil, remove from heat and remove vanilla bean.
- Very slowly dribble the hot milk into the yolk mixture, stirring all the time. When about half of the milk has been added, place all the yolk mixture into the saucepan over medium heat.
- Using a spatula or a whisk, mix the pastry cream as it heats, making sure to reach all the corners of the pan when you stir. Bring the mixture to a boil. Let boil for about 1 minute, stirring constantly. The mixture will be thick.
- Remove from heat and add the butter. Strain if you wish for a smoother cream. Place into a bowl and cover directly with plastic wrap to stop a skin from forming on the cream. Chill and use within a few days.
Tour of Northern Italy’s Pasta and Sauces
These past two weekends I enjoyed giving seminars to the customers of Adams Fairacre Farms in Poughkeepsie and in Wappinger Falls. During the dreary winter months in January and February Adams Fairacre Farms gives the customers an opportunity to learn and enjoy some interesting subjects! I was invited to share what I know as well. So I gladly jumped in the fun. I decided to bring everyone on a tour of Northern Italy’s pasta and sauces. Not only did I set the mood with Italian music I set up the props. On display was a painting of Tuscany set on an easel. The table was set with an vivid Italian table cloth set with grapevine baskets filled with oranges. Incidentally my grandfather made the huge basket from the vines from his vineyard. A separate table was set up with my portable kitchen. My wonderful husband and daughter helped serve while lots of customers came to experience the fun event. It was so fun that I decided to share with you all the fun facts and experience of this Tour of Northern Italy Pasta and Sauces. But let me start off with some of my observations with our American pasta culture versus Italian. Let me say I am an American in an Italian restaurant family so I am fully aware of our American pasta culture. But when I go to Italy the differences are so obvious. Is one wrong and the other right? No! It’s just a cultural difference. But it’s fun to compare!
Some Pasta Facts
I will start off with talking about some misconceptions we Americans have about pasta.
Americans seem to think that pasta to be good must be made freshly by hand.
1. Best way is made by an Italian grandmother using a rolling pin
2. or by a machine that some of us have in our kitchen
3. or ready-made fresh pasta that we can find right here at Adams.
Americans think of dry pasta or in Italian (pasta secca) found in boxes and plastic bags as substandard.
But no! In Italy most Italians eat dry pasta that comes out of a box! An exception is the northern region! In Northern Italy fresh pasta is quite popular and most families make their own.
Fresh Pasta Facts
Northern Italy uses more fresh pasta than Southern Italy
Fresh pasta is usually made from softer wheats, though some durum semolina can be mixed in, and some is made with just durum, but that takes a lot of strength to work with.
In the south, some fresh pasta is made with just flour and water, but in the north it is almost always made with flour, eggs, salt and water. If it is to be used for stuffing, as in ravioli, a little milk is sometimes added.
6 major differences with the way we make pasta in the US
- We overcook the pasta
According to Italians the biggest mistake that we Americans make is overcooking the pasta. We all know what aldente is. But pasta must be served as soon as it is drained. It gets a little crazy at my house when we drain the pasta. My husband dishes out pasta. I sauce it. The kids pass out the dishes. We must be fast! Pasta is very important.
2. Cook in too little water
But another problem with making pasta is using too little water. A pound of pasta should be cooked in 5 quarts of salted water vigorously boiling. Too little water stews the pasta making it gummy and overcooked. Believe me, I too am guilty of this. Sometimes I am too lazy to go to the cupboard and get the big pasta potout thinking it’s just my husband and I. It’s a big mistake. The pasta doesn’t cook evenly and the pasta sticks together.
Cooking the perfect pasta.
- Make sure its 5 quarts of water per pound of pasta.
- Bring to a boil.
- Add 2 tablespoons of salt.
- Place pasta in boiling salted water
- It will quickly come to a boil again.
- When pasta is done. 5-6 minutes (more for thicker pasta less for thinner like spaghettini or angel hair.
- Remove and drain but not too thoroughly. Save 2 ladles of pasta water
3. Adding Oil to water
When you add oil to the cooking water for pasta will only make the pasta slippery and harder for the sauce to get absorbed into the pasta. Your pasta will lack the flavor of the sauce.
4. Huge Portions
When it comes to eating pasta, Italians are very measurement conscious. And it’s a very easy formula to follow: 100 grams (3-1/2 ounces) or less of pasta per person.
It is never a heaping portion like one you would expect in the States.” In the ’90s, Los Angeles Italian restaurants routinely served pasta in giant bowls, each portion enough to feed three or four.
The point of the dish is not the sauce but the pasta. There should be just enough sauce to coat each strand lightly. There shouldn’t be puddles of sauce congealing in the bottom of the dish.
5. Oversauce the pasta
A way to get the most flavor into the pasta about a minute or 2 before it’s done strain it. Saving a ladle of pasta water then toss it in with the sauce and a ladle of the pasta water. Let it finish cooking on the stove. And then quickly serve it. This is called “pasta saltata in padella”. But some further explanation of the sauce. They don’t call it sauce or salsa. They refer to it as condimento or condiment. The condimento is just about a ¼ cup per serving
6. Too much cheese on pasta
Cheese is just a scant teaspoonful per serving. In Italy the waiters come and quickly grate a little cheese on the pasta. In our restaurant if the waitstaff weren’t attending each table to grating the cheese they would go and try to sprinkle a teaspoon of cheese. But typically, the waitstaff we be grating and dumping loads of cheese on top of pasta!
Authentic Italian cooking is an art of simplicity and balance. It’s recognizing that less is often so much better than more. AS I often talk about in my seminars. Just like my sauces the 825 MAIN. It’s very simple. But it’s about the quality of the ingredients. I am very picky about the ingredients. As you will find out as I continue…… And as we try the different pasta and sauce for each region in the northern part of Italy you will begin to understand what I am talking about.
So, let’s get to the fun part. I am going to cover 4 northern regions of Italy. I am picking a pasta that is popular in that area with a sauce or I should say condimento of the area.
Piemonte
Agnolotti/Tortelloni
Most commonly crimped, square-shaped and stuffed with meat, agnolotti (or ‘priest hats’) is the primary pasta of Piedmont, in the northwestern region of Italy. Located in the lush-green foothills of the Alps and the Apennines, and surrounded by a wooded wilderness, Piemontese cuisine is typically tinged with the musky aromas of its mountainous backdrop. Perfect for poaching, agnolotti can also be added to a broth, but are best pan-fried in a sage and butter sauce and finished off with a dusting of white truffle.
For this recipe I use Rana brand of Tortelloni. They are a fresh pasta found in the dairy section of Adams. I used the Cheese Tortelloni and also the Spinach and Roasted Garlic Tortelloni. I have to say I was partial to the Cheese one. I put it in a very simple butter/sage sauce. The recipe follows. But the highlight of this dish is the shaving of truffles. In the Poughkeepsie Adams Fairacre Farms I was able to order a fresh black truffle that came from Burgundy, France. While in Wappingers I had available the revered White Truffles that were sold in jar. The truffle products are sold in the pasta section in the Wappinger store. If you would like to read about some Truffle Facts continue on while the recipe follows.
Truffles
Truffles are quite unique in feature that separates them from other common fungi. Truffle has a rounded, below the earth fruiting body that can be lobed, with shallow to deep furrows and has yellowish, tan to dark brown skin. The interior is solid, white, marble like in white species and black in black species with narrow, white veins that tend to radiate from the base. Mature specimens possess a pungent, rich smell.
Several species of tuber (truffle) mushrooms found naturally in the dense forests of Northern Hemisphere, especially Italy, Balkans, and France.
The black perigord (French black) truffle (Tuber melanosporum) is mainly found the wooden forests of Southern Europe. They feature mottling pattern with streaks of white veins. They are the most sought after by the chefs all over the world for its very aromatic flesh.
Other important black species are black summer truffle (T. aestivum) and Burgundy truffles (T. uncinatum) are also prized for their culinary values.
The white truffles (T. magnatum) are the largest of truffles and found in the Northern Italy. White truffles are also highly accolade by the chefs for their powerful fragrance likened to mould, garlic, and smell of cheese.
Some other species include those found in the US such as Oregon black truffle (T. gibbosum), Oregon brown truffle are also noted for their culinary values. Pecan truffle (T. lyoni) is found in the southern part of United States near the pecan tree cultivation.
Truffle harvesting
ruffles are grown the wild close to oak, poplar, hazelnut, elm, pecans and beech trees. Mature truffles develop odors and emit volatile organic compounds and pheromones that attract wild animals. Truffle hunters search for them from autumn to winter with the help of trained dogs in these wooded forests. In the past, hunters used to rely on pigs to sniff out these prized discoveries. Problem was, the pigs loved to eat them. In the 70’s they stopped using pigs. These days, well-trained dogs who don’t care for the taste are used for foraging.
Reasons why Italy has best truffles
1. IT’S THE HOME OF THE WORLD’S BEST TRUFFLES
There are dozens of varieties of truffles in the world, but Italy’s white truffle is one of the most elusive, most delicious and most expensive. It’s found only from September to December and in just the right conditions, growing on the roots of trees under layers of damp leaves and dirt.
2. IT’S ALSO THE HOME OF THE WORLD’S MOST EXPENSIVE TRUFFLE
In 2007, two of the family’s hunters – Luciano and Cristiano Savini – unearthed a 1.28-kilogram (2-pound, 13-ounce) truffle that sold at auction for a whopping USD 330,000. That price is recognized by Guinness World Records as the most money ever paid at auction for a white truffle. You can check out a replica of the truffle at the headquarters. Fun fact: The dog that found the original was 14 years old.
White truffles are a rare delicacy: The short season for the mushrooms, the stratospheric prices ($2,000 a pound is not uncommon) and the intense aromas and flavors make this mostly something for the world’s super rich. Shaving a few grams of a white truffle on a dish such as risotto can send the price at a restaurant soaring into the triple digits.
Selection and storage
Fresh truffles are usually sold in the areas from which they are harvested. Choose firm, fleshly truffles, without bruises.
In the markets one can choose dried truffles in airtight containers. Other novelty products such as truffle flavored sugar, salt, truffle honey, truffle oil, etc can also be found in the supermarkets. Truffles canned in water are also available in some stores.
Eat them as soon as possible. To store, place them in the fridge fresh up to 1 week. Place cut truffles in an airtight container and cover them with Madeira or white wine. Canned truffles that are cut and covered with Madeira or a little oil for a month.
Once at home, use them early. Place them in cool dry place in a wooden basket away from sunlight and moisture. Keep in the fridge for a few days, in a paper bag or a dish covered with a clean cloth.
Preparation and serving methods
Truffle’s rarity in the nature makes them the most expensive items to use liberally in the dishes. Their usefulness counted just as gourmet food and to some extent as appetizer. Do not wash truffles -rub them gently with a soft brush. Cut them in slices, slivers, cubes or shaving.
Agnolotti or Tortelloni del Plin
Ingredients:
Package of Rana Tortelloni
1 teaspoon salt, plus more for pasta water
8-10 tablespoons butter
10 sage leaves
1 cup grated Grana Padano
1 fresh white truffle (optional!)
Procedure:
- Bring 6 quarts of salted water to a boil. Add the fresh agnolotti/ tortelloni, stirring gently, and cook them for 3-4 minutes or until the agnolotti are bobbing on the surface of the water.
- Meanwhile, melt the butter in a saucepan over medium heat. Lay the sage leaves in the pan and heat until the butter is sizzling gently. Toast the leaves for about 1 minute, then remove them.
- Add 1 cup of water to the butter, then swirl the pan and simmer for about 2 minutes, reducing the liquid by half. Keep the sauce hot over very low heat.
- Drain the agnolotti and add them to the sauce in the pan. Toss and cook them for about 1 minute over medium heat until the sauce is bubbling. Remove the pan from the heat, add the grated cheese.
- Optional: Shave fresh white truffles over the pasta!
Lombardia
Farfalle
Universally recognized as the ‘bow-tie’, farfalle borrows its name from the Italian word for ‘butterflies’. Despite its intricate design, this good-looking variety remains the signature pasta of the northwestern Italian region of Lombardy. Habitually blended with beetroot, spinach or squid-ink, farfalle is also available in an array of brilliant color combinations to include the vivid hues of the Italian flag. Owing to its sauce-holding-abilities, this pasta is best served with a simple tomato and basil concoction.
The Adams Fairacre Farms in Poughkeepsie has Delverde Bow ties but the Adams in Wappingers has colorful artisanal Farfalle (bowtie) Pasta called Tarall’oro. This dish is highlighted by my own 825 MAIN Marinara!
Farfalle ala 825 MAIN Marinara
Ingredients:
1 jar of 825 MAIN Marinara
1 cup loosely packed fresh basil leaves and then very thinly sliced
1 lb. dried farfalle pasta
Grated Parmagiano Reggiano cheese
Procedure:
- In a 10- or 11-inch sauté pan, heat the jar of 825 MAIN Marinara over medium-low heat, stirring occasionally, until sauce is heated. Remove from the heat.
- Sprinkle on the basil and stir to combine thoroughly.
- While the sauce is warming up, bring a large pot of abundantly salted water to a vigorous boil and cook the pasta until al dente. Drain it well.
- Toss the pasta with three-quarters of the sauce and divide among individual serving bowls.
- Spoon a little of the remaining sauce over each serving and sprinkle on the cheese, if you like.
Emilia Romagna
Strozzapreti: (larger version of Cavatelli)
Strozzapreti, (or ‘priest-choker’), is a hand-rolled variety of pasta from the northern Italian region of Emilia-Romagna. Its dubious name origin is unclear; one legend suggests that ‘Strozzapreti’ stems from the story of the gluttonous priests who choked on their pasta as a result of their insatiable appetite, another claims that housewives ‘choked’ the dough in such a rage, violent enough to ‘choke a priest’. Irregular in size and shape, strozzapreti is the larger version of cavatelli (‘little hollows’), and is made of flour, water, parmigiano-reggiano, and egg whites.
The Cavatelli that I used is in the frozen food section of Adams those are made with ricotta cheese, eggs, flour, and salt.
Sauce is Adams marinara, mozzarella cheese, and grated cheese.
Cavatelli ala Adams Marinara Sauce
Ingredients:
1 jar of Adams Marinara Sauce
1 lb. of cavatelli or if you are lucky to find the larger version called Stozzapreti
Small ball of fresh mozzarella cut into chunks
Lots of grated Parmagiana Reggiano cheese
Procedure:
- In a pasta pot , heat the jar of Adams Marinara sauce over medium-low heat, stirring occasionally, until sauce is heated. Remove from the heat.
- Start a pot of salted boiling water for spaghetti.
- Add cavatelli/strozzapreti and cook according to directions
- Drain pasta saving a ladle of pasta water
- In pasta pot add the cavatelli adding a ladle of Adams Marinara Sauce and a ladle of pasta water.
- Add Mozzarella and grated cheese
Veneto: Venice
Venetian Bigoli – The bigoli are a type of long pasta, which looks like a big spaghetto; they’re from Veneto, but they’re quite common and popular in the Eastern Lombardia. The name “bigoli” seems to result from the dialect term “bigàt” which means “worm” with regard to the shape of the pasta.
Bigoli in salsa
Bigoli in salsa, long pasta cooked in a tasty fish sauce, is the only inclusion of pasta in the city’s traditional cuisine
Bigoli are a kind of pasta made with semolina flour (semola di grano tenero), salt, and water. They are like thick spaghetti, and similar to Tuscan pici or bringoli. The name is also used for a kind of wholewheat spaghetti typical to the town of Bassano del Grappa in the north of the Veneto and so these are also sometimes used. Normal spaghetti would works well if it’s all that you can find. In fact, in many Venetian restaurants today, spaghetti are served as bigoli. Most letter L ls are not pronounced in Venetian and so you will often see the word written as it’s said: bigoi.
Salsa
Salsa is the general word for sauce, but in this dish it refers to something very specific. The condiment is made from three ingredients only: white onions, water, and salted sardines or anchovies. White onions are a speciality of the town of Chioggia in the south of the Venetian lagoon. Sardines and anchovies are native to the Venetian lagoon. Although the sardine is the traditional ingredient of this dish, it really doesn’t matter which one you use. The two are very similar indeed and in Venetian have almost identical names. Sardine is sarda and anchovy sardon.
This dish was the most time consuming. It takes an hour for the onions to melt down before you add the anchovies. I saved this dish for last because it is very aromatic and has a long lasting taste and I didn’t want to corrupt the tasting of the other pastas. It’s the most different and not a popular dish in the US. I was pleasantly surprised that the customers really enjoyed this dish!
I also need to add that cheese if served in Venice is a huge No No! But we are in America and we can do whatever we like! I used La Bella fresh spaghetti for this dish since it was the most similar to Bigoli.
Bigoli in Salsa
Ingredients:
2 white onions, finely chopped
2 TBS of extra virgin olive oil
water
25 salted sardine or anchovy fillets
1 pound of bigoli or fresh thick spaghetti
parsley, finely chopped
black pepper
Procedure:
- Place the onions in a large frying with EV olive oil.
- Cook on a low heat seating them until so soft that they are falling apart adding a little water so as not to color the onion. You are almost melting the onions! Takes about an hour.
- Finely chop the sardine/anchovy fillets and add the fish to the pan
- Stir until the fish has dissolved in the into the onion mixture.
- Continue to cook for about five minutes.
- Bring a pan with 4 quarts of unsalted water to the boil.
- Cook the bigol/ spaghetti according to the manufacturer’s instructions.
- Using a slotted spoon, transfer the pasta to the frying pan with the sauce in it.
- Mix the pasta into the sauce, adding a little of the cooking water if necessary, and then serve topped with chopped parsley and plenty of ground black pepper.
Thank you for taking the journey through Northern Italy’s pasta and sauces! Buon apetitto!! I cant help but be Italian when I talk and talk and talk…especially with my hands!!
Tradition
According to the Cambridge Dictionary the definition of Tradition is a way of acting that people in a particular society or group have continued to follow for a longtime.
This past year I struggled with finding my path. As you have noticed I really slacked off with keeping up with my blog and my recipes. I am not sure what has happened. I think with the marriage of my last child maybe I lost myself. I lost who I was and started thinking that I needed to slow down. But I found I am not comfortable with this new me. In my quest to find myself again I realized that maybe I need to go back and reflect on how things used to be.
I found a picture of my great grandfather on my mother’s side. He was a fisherman along with his brothers on the island of Ischia in Italy. The Amalfitano men made a living as fishermen. Unlike most other Ischitanos living on the island the Amalfitano brothers stood out by their tall muscular stature. They had a good life until World War 1 and the Spanish Flu of 1918. The soldiers coming home from the war brought with them the Spanish Flu and it spread to so many Ischitanos! It was a deadly flu. It is said that by the spring of 1919, the influenza pandemic had sickened an estimated one-third of the world’s population and may have killed as many as 50 million people. And Ischitanos were part of that statistic. The townspeople couldn’t keep up with individual grave plots and ended up having to have mass burials. My great grandmother became one of those casualties leaving behind a husband and four children. Soon things leveled off and my great grandfather remarried. He continued his fishing business with his family and life went on. My grandmother became of age and she married starting her own family. Soon afterwards WW2 hit, and my grandfather went off to serve as a medic leaving his family behind to struggle. The island of Ischia entered another sad time as they dealt with food and water shortage. Families struggled as the heads of household were off to fight in the war. After World War 2 ended Ischia struggled economically. My grandfather looked to move to another country for a better life for his family. He tried out Argentina for 3 years hoping to bring his family there, but Argentina’s economy crashed, and my grandfather soon came back to Ischia. Instead of feeling defeated he continued his dream of making his family’s life better and made plans to move to the United States. In 1955 he moved half of his family to Marlboro, New York. My grandfather along with my mom and two of her sisters worked to make enough money so that they could bring my grandmother and the rest of the siblings to join them in the US.
Even though the family moved to the US, they continued to follow their Italian traditions. One of the traditions they never forgot was fishing. Even though my grandmother and grandfather settled inland away from the ocean they couldn’t let go of the love for the sea. I don’t how they found this place in Norwalk, Connecticut but they did! With the little bit of English that they knew they found a place to rent a motorized rowboat and go fishing in the Long Island Sound. Many of my summer memories included going to Norwalk, CT to go fishing with my grandparents. My dad grew up on the mainland of Italy, but his town was a small mountain surrounded by water on three sides so he too enjoyed fishing. It was a huge family excursion with 3-4 boats getting rented. We brought steak sandwiches and we always included spaghetti pizza. Once I got married and had children my dad also introduced my children to fishing on the Long Island Sound in Norwalk, CT.
Life got busier and we no longer went on fishing excursions. But just a few years ago a restaurant was recommended in Norwalk, Ct and my husband and I and our children went to try it out. When I arrived, I immediately recognized the spot even though the dock, bait shop, and boat rentals were no longer there. But now a beautiful seafood restaurant took over the spot.
So, as the old year is left behind and a new year is started, I rethink my purpose in life. Maybe I need to go back to my roots. To go forward, one must go back first and ponder. This past week my husband and I took the family out to dinner to the seafood restaurant in Norwalk. I handed them all pieces of paper from the oldest to the youngest (who happens to be my granddaughter Emma) to write down their dreams for the new year. I thought what a perfect place to ponder our dreams. As I looked out to sea, I thought of my grandfather who never gave up his dream to make a better life for his family. He didn’t succeed at first but that didn’t stop him. I sat and looked around the table and I realized that I really am living my best life surrounded by my family. The least I can do is to not give up my dreams! And you know what? In order to fulfill our dreams, we must never forget where we came from and who we are. I want to wish you all a Happy New Year! May all your dreams come true! Tradition! It’s the fuel to follow your dreams!
Spaghetti Pizza
My mom always made spaghetti pizza for our picnic when we went fishing in Norwalk, Connecticut. Here’s our recipe. There are quite a few versions of it. My grandmother would make a sweet variety. While my Zia in Monte di Procida would make a savory one and sprinkle it with a bit of sugar on top. But I thought I would share my mom’s version which my kids also love! One time when my son was three he got all excited when he saw my mom making it and got all excited thinking we were going fishing!
Ingredients:
1 pound of cooked spaghetti al dente
1/2 cup grated cheese
1/2 cup of cubed prosciutto
1/2 cup of cubed fresh mozzarella
1 1/2 cups of shredded dry mozzarella
1/2 pound of cubed Auricchio Provolone
3 eggs
1/4 cup of Grape seed oil or corn oil. I like to use grape seed oil.
Procedure:
1. Mix all the cheeses and the proscuitto
2. Beat eggs and add to pasta to mix.
3. Add the cheese and prosciutto mixture to the pasta
4. Heat 1/4 cup of grape seed oil in a skillet
5. Add pasta mixture to pan and spread out tucking the cheese inside the pasta.
6. Let fry about 10 minutes or more until you can easily slide spatula underneath the spaghetti feeling that it’s crispy.
7. Flip the pizza over and cook 10-15 minutes long until the other side is crispy.
8. Take out of pan and let sit on paper towel to drain some of the oil and then serve!