Kevin72

Croccante? Similar to peanut brittle but with almonds instead. You could make sfogliatelle, little pastry/cookie things that travel well. Or even an assortment of Italian cookies.

I'm recycling intros again, using the writeup I did for Abruzzo originally back in '05. In cooking from Abruzzo on his show, Mario Batali pointed out that the descriptor "forte e gentile" (strong and kind) is often applied to the Abruzzese character, but was also a perfect descriptor of the cuisine as well. These two seemingly contrasting terms play out a number of ways in the Abruzzese cooking traditions. Abruzzo is commonly considered where Northern Italian cuisine meets Southern Italian cuisine, using the qualities of both. Also, Abruzzo has a wild contrast of geography: gentle, herb blanketed meadows, rocky beaches and coastline with a wealth of bivalves, and steep, staggering, snow-capped mountain heights. This contrast in geography translates to a contrast in the cooking styles and ingredients: subtle herbs from the meadow top seafood caught at the coastline, but then this condimento is used for polenta and finished with chilies to create a more robust, rib-sticking dish necessary for living in the mountains. Abruzzo combines the very best of pasta traditions as well: it is home to the Rustichella, Del Verde, and De Cecco pasta factories, three of what are often cited as the top brands dried pasta in Italy. Yet even with so much top-quality dried pasta, the Abruzzese do not shy away from handmade pasta traditions: there is the region's unique maccheroni alla chitarra, sheets of semolina pasta that are rolled over a wired instrument that cuts the dough into square-shaped noodles. Finally, Abruzzo is home to the Scuola Alberghiera, a 400 year old hotel management and cooking school in Villa Santa Maria. Chefs from this school have been employed throughout the ages in Rome, Naples, and as far away as Russia, giving Abruzzo a reputation for turning out top-quality chefs. So here is another contrast: the refined, professional level cuisine of a cooking school 4 centuries old against the robust, rustic cuisine of isolated mountain villages making the most of their meager supplies through long, cold fierce winters. One famous food-centered tradition in Abruzzo is la panarda. As usual with writing on Italian cooking traditions and customs, you’re hard pressed to find two authors who agree on origins. Marlena di Blasi gives the quite plausible explanation that la panarda has its origins in the slaughter of the village pig, when all would come by to contribute to helping butcher the pig and put it up for the winter. As a sort of communal rite of passage, the villagers would smear a piece of bread (pane) with some of the rendered pig fat (lardo) for a simple snack to mark the occasion. Thus the fusion of the two terms, pane e lardo, to eventually through the ages become panarda. Then of course, Anna Teresa Callen, in her all-too-brief-for-an-Abruzzese description of the event, specifically dismisses this history. Regardless of its humble roots, la panarda has over the years become a Herculean feast still observed (but less and less frequently) in the small mountain towns of Abruzzo to mark major celebrations: a birth, a wedding, a family reunion, anything. The typical number of courses for a panarda starts at 30, usually averaging out at 40. And you have to at least try them all, or you risk severe insult to whichever family that made the dish you refused. Family feuds lasting generations have begun this way. Le virtu is a soup made on or near the start of May. The idea, according to di Blasi, is to clean out one’s larders from the winter and combine all the dried beans and bits of salumi left over with the first crops of spring. It's getting balmly down here already, but I'd imagine our northern posters with winter storms still fresh in their memories may want to give this a spin. Chief reference besides the usual suspects (Batali, di Blasi, Culinara): Food and Memories of Abruzzo: Italy's Pastoral Land, by Anna Teresa Callen. As I said in the Marche thread, this book presents some frustrations in that it isn't always entirely specific to the region and offers recipes from Emilia-Romagna and Venice, among others. Still, her framing device for the cookbook: an autobiographical account of her upbringing in Abruzzo amongst her immediate and extended family, her travels elsewhere, and ultimate appreciation for and return to her homeland, makes for charming reading. As long as you go in looking at it more as a general Italian cookbook (despite what the title implies) and less as a specific regional treatise, it makes a good addition to your cookbook collection. Poor Molise, recently independent from Abruzzo, is often entirely left out of literature on these two regions. From what I gather, as an even more mountainous inland region than Abruzzo, it uses alot of goat for its meat basis. A few authors have a approximated its cooking to that of the mountainous parts of Campania, which it borders.

He makes them "his", certainly, with a little twist here and there, but you can just tell that was his prime source in doing those shows. And, looking over his regional writeups on mariobatali.com, he specifcally cites her as a definitive resource in getting to know the region.

Except that he gets most of his recipes from Calen's book. Which is good, because he really distills the most essential and unique recipes from the collection. I was thinking about the conversations you and I have had over the years about this topic, Judith. I remember once that you made the excellent observation that the hardest regions to really capture a sense of are the poorer ones, or the ones where the cooking is its most simple. The recipes don't jump out because they seem so basic and universal: spaghetti with anchovies for instance. I'm sure this is a good, satisfying dish. But imagine it in some dockside shack of a trattoria, served with shimmering anchovies just a few hours out of the ocean . . . I'd imagine it would be like nothing you've had before. And there's nothing wrong with these more simple or basic recipes, but there has to still be something unique in the larger collection. Another prime region-specific cookbook I can think of is Flavors of Puglia by Nancy Harmon Jenkins. Now, in my opinion, cooking doesn't get more sparse and basic than it does in Puglia, and there are many recipes in the book that you could find in any other Italian cookbook anywhere: stuffed mussels, spaghetti with clams, and yes, fish in tomato sauce. But yet at the end of the book, you still have a sense of the cuisine as a whole and understand the simplicity of the recipes or why they are so simplistic. You still get recipes like lamb braised with dandelion greens, or fried pasta with chickpeas, or dried fava puree. There's no stray recipes for ragu bolognese or risi e bisi recipes (which you'll find in Calen's Abruzzo book, unfortunately). You get a pure, undiluted sense of the region.

Good points about the thread and the cookbook, FM. I think the reason why this cookbook has become the central "theme" this month is because that's really all there is out there for this region, or at least what's most readily available in the US. And I also think you've hit on why I haven't been too motivated to get the book: the recipes strike me as somewhat generic and more pan-Italian than uniquely Marchigiani. I've probably belabored this point by now, but it's irksome to me when you get a region-specific cookbook and then have to sift through recipes not from that region. It'd be one thing just to package a book like that as being more pan-Italian and I'd be okay with it and happy with the recipes if they took that bent instead. But if I get a region-specific book, particularly on a little-known region, then I'm looking for a real sense of the food and cuisine. Look at Downie's Cooking the Roman Way cookbook, or Schwartz's Naples at Table, or of course Kasper's Splendid Table: you get an absolute sense of the cuisine and what makes it special and unique. Yes, there may be some recipes "shared" by other regions, particularly in Rome's case, but Downie makes a good case for why it's included or what makes it "Roman". I'm not sure how much of this applies to FT's book, though thumbing through it a couple times casually, I get that impression. This is unfortunately also going to be the case, in my opinion, with the main cookbook for Abruzzo next month: Calen's Food and Memories of Abruzzo.

Is this our eG first dinner party related to the regional theme we've all been exploring? How fun! Pontormo, the mussels do sound great. Hazan has a somewhat similar recipe in Marcella Cucina that involves a similar technique. It's been a while since I made it, but if I recall correctly half the mussels are pureed with tomato sauce and the cooking juices as well as basil. The sauce was very "buttery", but also had a nice spicy kick to it.

We decided to head here Saturday night. Service continues to be a standout here: very helpful, professional, and attentive. I had the carpaccio antipasto and the tortellini with crab for the main; my wife had an artichoke salad and pork chop for her main. Good, solid, reliable food, though again maybe just a little on the underseasoned side, particularly my wife's chop. I think Nikola's in Plano gives it a run for it's money, food-wise. Still a pleasant evening and I always love the design of the room.

Totally agree. But then of course that brings us back to the problem of having to contend with all the bones, scales, etc. that goes with the soup. It may be anathema to a Marchegiani fisherman, but there's just no appeal to me in having to stop after every spoonful of soup to pull bones out of your mouth. And I've also tried to make the stock seperate, using fish carcasses and whatnot (that's what I did for the previous soup in the link I posted) and I just find all that to be way too much production. As an aside, but I've heard that the best fish to use for these soup is scorpionfish or, failing that, the very boney red mullets, which I'd imagine can be found fairly easily in NYC, no? Franci: Wonderful bread and pores! Love that little nugget of cheese in there!

I was trying to keep it smaller in scale (heh?). If you look at the last time I made fish soup on that link I posted, it literally filled a Le Creuset pot to the very brim. My wife is averse as it is to seafood leftovers and is even more so now that she's pregnant, so I wanted to make only enough for dinner that night with maybe one helping for leftovers. After I had bought all the non-fish items, I just decided that they were more than enough on their own. Truth be told, to me it always seems like the shellfish and whatnot are the real flavor punch to a seafood soup. If you use fillets, they just sort of fall apart and are kinda bland, and if you use whole fish, then you have bones, the errant scale or two, and flabby skin to contend with. Plus the expense!

The dish I most strongly associate with the cooking of Le Marche is their brodetto or fish soup. Of course, not only does every region in Italy have their own fish soup, but it's even more micro-regional than that with each town (or hell, even each family) having a particular twist or technique that makes it their own. Waverly Root's long discourse on brodetto in the Le Marche chapter of The Foods of Italy left an impression: see here for some details. As I mentioned in that post, though, despite getting a bug to make fish soup at least once a year, I almost always wind up a little underwhelmed. So this time I decided not to be so ritualistic about it. I only knew that I was going to make it "Le Marche style", in as much as that term can be used, by having saffron in it and using vinegar. Once at the market, I decided that there in fact wouldn't be any fish in my fish soup (shellfish soup?) and decided to make it from shrimp, calamari, mussels, and scallops. Also, rather than make it really soupy, I'd use less liquid and almost make it more of a stew, I guess. So, I cooked onion, chilies, and anchovies in some olive oil until they were softened. Then I added and cooked off some vinegar. Then tomato paste and got it toasty. Then a large pinch of saffron. I added some frozen fish stock that our Central Market sells from their seafood department along with some white wine and bay leaves. In went the calamari, and this all cooked for about twenty minutes. Next came the shrimp and mussels, and when the mussels had opened, I added the scallops and another jot of vinegar last, cooking them for maybe two minutes. Off the heat, I swirled in a mixture of chopped parsley and garlic. And I gotta say, this one hit the spot. The ingredients in such concentrated form really did come out: you could taste the saffron in there, the sweetness of the tomato paste, and the nice zip of the chilies and vinegar cut right through the soup. My most enjoyable brodetto in a while. Oh, and I made whole wheat flatbread for my wife to eat alongside, since you can't have fish soup and not have some kind of bread on the side for all the juices.

Say, that does sound good. Thanks for the shout out! Any reason to stuff them vertically instead of splitting them lengthwise and making boats? I still haven't been able to bring myself to buy the Le Marche book; I've thumbed through it a couple times at the bookstore but no recipes really jump out and grab me.

Baccala, or at least the kind usually available stateside, isn't as pungent as it apparently was back in the day. In fact, if you get the kind sold in the wooden box at Central, it's partially reconstituted already. Sorry I haven't been contributing so far this month. My wife has recently been diagnosed with gestational diabetes so we're both adapting to a new, pasta and bread-free diet. But Judith, great meal and pics!

I tried San Dor for lunch yesterday. I wanted to order one of their flat noodle dishes, but the server told me that it would be 20 minutes to make and recommended a crispy noodle with brown sauce dish instead. Without thinking, I agreed, then once it was served remembered that I don't like these crispy noodle dishes. My wife, however, did order the crispy chicken dish. That's quite a feast! Perfectly moist and well-seasoned. I wouldn't mind giving this place another go, but as of right now I liked the Szechuan place a little better. Also, the grocery store continues to build up its stock. The freezer section was sparsely populated at first but is now pretty well filled up. There's whole eel in there, pork casings for sausage, frozen anchovies . . .

I definitely I agree; I used end of summer softshell clams that were skimpy and rubbery and full of sand. But now? This time of year? Oooh baby.

I'd deconstruct it a bit further, maybe, and caramelize the onions (and anchovies) separately, then cook the cod with this mixture, potatoes and tomotoes with white wine quickly, like 400 or so for 20-25 minutes, covered with foil. Omit the milk; I think it would be lost in the translation here.

What a nightmarish concoction this looks like! All those jaws poking out of the liquid and fish heads . . . I assume this is the stock base, correct? Does it get strained or pureed into the base? In Marcella Hazan's first book, her Adriatic fish soup recipe calls for ample fish heads which are then pureed and passed through a food mill. Interesting how it looks like there's mackerel in there, too, which I've always seen as being too strong and oily to make an effective stock.

I agree. I never understood this step. But otherwise, this recipe has become a Christmas dinner primo that gets demanded every year and is one of my very favorites. ← This method earns a rebuke from American Way, the American Airlines magazine, of all places. They coincidentally have a writeup comparing the gnocchi recipe of 5 cookbooks and Mario's gets zinged for this unecessary added step. Guiliano Hazan's won, with some tweaks taken from the 2nd place winner.

Off to a promising start already! Thanks everyone for adding your input and experiences.

Sounds good! Please share any further insights you can gather from his intro, as well.

Well, congratulations. I am secretly cursing you under my breath of course! Seriously though, glad they worked out and they do indeed look much more like the version Mario's made on his shows. So, did you use a KitchenAid or some other electric appliance to extrude them? I'd think that semolina dough would be even harder to extrude than bigoli (though Hathor's recipe above uses it?). Which was in part why I let the dough rest: I was worried if it was too stiff it'd blow my motor out going through the grinder. Mario has, however, made pasatelli with the extruder before: a mixture of breadcrumbs, parmigiano, eggs, parsley, and scant flour extruded directly into hot broth.

In the home stretch! Abruzzo and Molise will be covered in April and Basilicata and Calabria will be a double-header in May.

March brings us the cooking of Le Marche, another little-known and explored region of Italy in cookbook literature. I myself don't know too much about the region so this intro entry will be unfortunately brief. Situated below Emilia-Romagna on the Adriatic coast, Le Marche borrows elements of its cuisine and cooking from its northern neighbor, according to Waverly Root in The Foods of Italy. It also, in my opinion, shares some similarities with Umbria to the west, particularly as you go inland: lots of game and particularly game bird cooking. It does seem to be a little "hotter" to me, however, and seems to use more chilies in its cooking than the spartan Umbria. Famous dishes: Vincigrassi, which Root describes more or less as a cucina povera variation on lasagna Bolognese. Instead of a luscious ragu bolognese, this dish uses a ragu of organ meats and giblets, as well as mushrooms from the countryside. Olives Ascolana are large green olives, stuffed with a mixture of spiced salami and then breaded and fried. Like other Central Italian regions, porchetta is cooked here, and there is an interesting trend of cooking many non-pork dishes en porchetta, that is, stuffed with fennel, rosemary, and garlic. So you can find rabbit, snails, mussels, and calamari en porchetta. Finally, along the coast there are many famed variations on brodetto, the seafood soup or stew of the region, often utilizing saffron. Root gives a wonderful account of this dish in his book. Resources are again, fairly limited, though there is Cucina of Le Marche by Fabio Trabocchi which was just released last October. I'll try and check it out this month.

I agree. I never understood this step. But otherwise, this recipe has become a Christmas dinner primo that gets demanded every year and is one of my very favorites.

Le Marche. Are you not supposed to let the dough rest? I made it in the morning and then ran it through that night.

I know, I know. I'd been fascinated forever by them, also and I don't think I'd have been swayed from making them either. But maybe look around and see if you can find different recipes from the one Mario gives, in case that was the culprit. And maybe be prepared to just make them into whole wheat fettucine.