Pontormo

N.B. I found a source in English for origliette that describes the Sardinian treat as braided nests dipped in honey. It sounds as if the pastry also appears at Lent.

FESTA DI SAN GIOVANNI BATTISTA After dark on the 24th of June in Florence, fireworks puncture the moist, mosquito-filled air in celebration of the feast day of John the Baptist, the patron saint of the city whose baptistery served briefly as a cathedral, and surrounding piazza, a burial ground and site for wedding processions and civic ritual. In the late Middle Ages, when preachers were taught to deliver sermons in the vernacular, that is, Italian instead of Latin, embellished stories from the lives of the saints were one of their most popular sources for making the dusty bones in reliquaries come alive. Thus, they heard that the Baptist leapt in the womb of his mother when Mary told her of the impending birth of her own child, so eager was he to meet and play with his younger cousin. And in my favorite story from the Dominican Cavalca, Salome dutifully presented the severed head of the Baptist to her mother after his death. Herodotus, in evil delight, held it up to her face, and when just about to kiss its lifeless lips, the mouth of the Baptist formed an "O" and blew, knocking her down, dead. While Florentines may claim a special bond with the biblical martyr, Saint John the Baptist is popular throughout Italy where ecclesiastical tradition honors him on two separate dates in the liturgical calendar, marking his birth and his death. Evoking Christmas and Easter, this unusual practice signals the prominence of his cult. The most joyous of these two events occurs on June 24, a date that coincides with the beginning of summer, and thus, draws from traditions that date much earlier than the rise of Christianity. These annual feast days are another way to revitalize an early cult each year, and of course, food is involved. This makes sense in terms of the bounty of the season, the diet of locusts and honey that sustained the Voice Crying in the Wilderness, and the banquet where Salome danced, and thus, sealed the tragic fate of the saint. This thread is started several weeks before June 24 to invite you to plan ahead or offer what you know about Italian culinary traditions on this feast day. For those of you who own Molto Italiano, Mario Batali offers a recipe for pasta that is served in Puglia on the eve of the feast day, or June 23. And for those of you who are cooking the foods of Sardegna in June 2006, please note that there are at least two dishes you might wish to prepare. In Budoni, fried pastries called origliette are served on the feast day, of course, coated with honey. ORIGLIETTE Flour (1 Kg) Suet (strutto) (1.5 Kg) 3 eggs Oil for frying Honey (dark, such as chestnut or buckwheat) Combine the first three ingredients to form a dough, then cut into narrow strips slightly less than an inch (two centimeters) wide to form the traditional shape (neither specified nor pictured). Fry these in hot oil and dip them in honey that has been heated in a pan until it foams. N.B. This is my own rough translation a very imprecise recipe, so there may be errors. Cf. conversion charts such as one provided on Chocolate & Zucchini. Since this involves more than 7 cups of flour (2.2 pounds), you might wish to make a MUCH smaller batch. The Sardinian comune of Fonni honors John the Baptist as its patron saint and bakes a special bread called "cohone e vrores" on a day also known as the day of flowers. On the morning of June 24, the loaves are blessed at the high altar of the fifteenth-century titular church. In the evening, an image of the saint leads a procession "su cohone 'e vrores," or as one source notes, with "a crown of focaccia" decorated with the image of a flower, nests and birds which is believed to protect the town from illness.

But Sandy, there's no cornichon foam in the photo on the left. No syringe in the background on the right. ETA: BZ did say that he doesn't feel comfortable baking....

Gorgeous food, Elie! While you really seem to have a gift when it comes to preparing anything with flour (I am recalling your watercress pasta at the moment), I am wondering if you had any problems with the semolina or advice for handling eggless, fat-free dough. It seems that certain regional threads inspire us to cook the same dish, such as maro when we were in Liguria. It looks as if malloreddus are the hit of Sardinia. Molto Italiano is a bit inconsistent about listing regions and their dishes in the index. In the case of Sardinian specialties, there are only two grouped together even though the book includes more, such as fregole with clams. * * * For the record, the woman who sold me Pantaleon as a Sardinian cheese was mistaken. No wonder this Spanish-sounding word could not be found in any Sardinian web sites. * * * The recipes in Marlena de Blasi's recent book on Southern Italian food are extremely interesting and often distinctive; she features recipes not found elsewhere instead of faithfully including familiar dishes just because they're representative. It looks as if she gets a bit impressionistic at times, creating recipes based on regional traditions that are not, strictly speaking, "authentic." However, they ALL look worth making and are definitely within the spirit of the region, using traditional combinations of ingredients and techniques. There are two from Sardinia that I intend to make later in the week. I was also interested in the discovery that pastries, cookies and other forms of baked desserts ARE traditionally served at the end of Sardinian meals, and not just separately for breakfast, Sunday visits, or quick trips to the bar for coffee.

that joke was the pits. ← Apricot of your feedback, there, there!

Plumbing threads seems fruitful, if only for a kernel of a story.

Marlene, I highly recommend this. As I said, it just overwhelmed my rhubarb sauce, but was very, very good. I also liked the concept of uniting two rival cities with my Kansas City rub and St. Louis-style ribs. Peace out.

FYI: About a week ago I made rhubarb jam with crystallized ginger, and then prepared a BBQ sauce from that (using standard ingredients, such as sweet onions, garlic, vinegar). This was slicked over a rack of St. Louis style ribs that had been marinading with a dry rub. Results? Quite tasty, though I am sure the wonderful dry rub overpowered the sauce. I also think that I should have made either a rhubarb chutney, or roasted some of the rhubarb to mix with just a little bit or something sweet plus chopped Jalepeno, red onion, etc. for a salsa. In other words, you really couldn't tell there was rhubarb in the sauce. Any suggestions or feedback are/is welcome.

A different kind of question: Anyone else not getting their copy of Gourmet in a timely fashion? Still haven't received the June issue. May's came well into the second week. April was late too. I just started subscribing again via the complimentary deal with Jessica's Biscuit and sense a pattern here. I have called the service in Boulder, CO. In the interest of keeping this thread on track, please just send a PM if you've been noticing the same thing, sharing your location (city or state) if you feel comfortable doing so. Thanks.

How many people make vegetable terrines these days? Eat kiwi fruit? Make focaccia? Whip up a chocolate mousse? Use their copy of The Silver Palate Cookbook?* * * * As a nation, the United States gets more of my respect these days for the range of so-called ethnic or foreign cuisines that people outside those traditions prepare, buy or eat. It took a lot of blondes to make salsa more popular than ketchup, opinions of bottled vs. fresh product and the ambiguity of the word "salsa" aside. Yet, one thing that annoys me sometimes, or simply perplexes me at others, is the idea of the food trend. The notion of "retro" food is tied to the fact that things go in and out of style. For example, bleudauvergne might pipe up and say that she's in the middle of layering leek greens over a mold and there's a pile of orange, red, yellow, white and green vegetables on the counter to go into the terrine. A resident of Milan would be amused to see osso buco mentioned as a retro dish. It's made all the time. Same with focaccia, a relatively flat raised bread, dimpled and oil-slickened that appeared in pages of cooking magazines and on tables in Iowa back in the eighties through part of the nineties until somehow ciabatta became the new focaccia. Focaccia is just a fact of life throughout much of Italy and, I dearly hope, always will be. * * * Something else that puzzles me is how food becomes retro even when there is no evidence that it's slipped out of style and made a come-back. Take macaroni and cheese. That's a little easier to gauge because it's also comfort food, associated with youth by generations that don't cook as much as their grandmothers did, including celebs who hang out in fashionable LA restaurants that become famous for their Fabulous versions of crusty mac & cheese. Then there's meatloaf. Families never stop making it at home, but it's suddenly got the aura of sleek Art Deco chrome and Diner cache draped over it like so many strips of bacon. Same with the Shepherd's Pie at this little place (that used to be?) close to Harvard Square. The Brit side of my family makes it year round year after year. Staple. All three examples that I've given are comfort foods, but there might be other categories. * * * Another matter has to do with health. I remember a conversation back in the 80s when Anastashia declared, "Who eats bacon anymore?" Two of us dressed her down, of course, but I do know that I bought far less back then than I do now when it is, for the most part, free of sodium nitrates. (No sneers, please. I know what you are going to say.) So for me, bacon is retro. *I haven't touched that book in years, yet it is a touchstone for the foods that were fashionable in its time (1980s). I don't think it's as dated as Craig Claiborne's NYT cookbook where some of the recipes (vichyssoise, salmon mousse, casseroles recommended for dinner parties) do smell faintly of tarragon and mothballs, but I turn to that quite frequently for basic information, a few core recipes and general good sense.

Bravo, MrBigJas! The ravioli look so impressive, doubly so since you rolled them by hand! I hope your efforts were appreciated. So the semolina flour DID work after all? I confess that after Shaya's experience, I was in agreement with his cautionary remarks. I actually made the same thing very late Tuesday and froze it, however, I think they're just fine, nothing truly memorable and probably due to both substitutions and omissions. I used a round cookie cutter to shape them and as I mentioned in the Ligurian thread, this made the process a lot quicker than it had been using the twee ravioli mold that produced my superior artichoke ravioli. The "official" name is Culingiones and I consulted several sources to make them. Ada Boni provides the most traditional recipe and I have to admit I overlooked the request for the pinch of saffron which I really should have included. (I love paella, but otherwise would live happily ever after without risotto Milanese, etc.) A pinch would not have bothered me and might have added SOMETHING. Actually, what I should have ignored is the recipe by Anna Martini since it's rather dull. I suspect this regional cookbook is just not very good; I consulted the flap that says something to the effect that the dishes have been passed down for generations and updated for the modern cook. Had I read that in the library, I might have put it back on the shelves. I used a bunch of chard and another of beet greens. I forgot to pick up a young Pecorino cheese and somehow got it into my head that I read that Ricotta Salata is used to fill pasta. Since it is mild and is made from sheep's milk.... As you'd imagine, though, the chalky texture was less than ideal during the spoon and fill stage. I also had fewer eggs than I needed since I had made two different fillings for dough with three cups of flour and only five eggs in the house. I would have liked the filling more had I sauteed the chopped greens in butter with minced onion and a little garlic before adding an herb and/or the saffron since the pinch of nutmeg just didn't perk up the greens enough. They were pretty. I did like the round shape, the dough and the light tomato sauce with basil were both good. This was dinner, no secondo, though I agree, the chicken was great. (I was surprised by the lack of browning, too, but had prepared a Mexican pork stew in the oven a while ago that was based on similar principles and loved the results.)

Agreed. I did mine in stages and after making enough artichoke ones to eat for the night, I went back to kitchen and finished up the Sardinian ones at around 1:30 am...so took me about 2 1/2 hours to form them, place them on trays in freezer in shifts, box them.... On other hand, I also have to say I also don't like recipe all that much. Ada Boni and one other cookbook I took out from library have a recipe for something that begins "cu..." that is much like stuffed pasta Chufi prepped earlier in this Ligurian thread: heavy on greens, fair amount of cheese, and 2 eggs...which I cut back to a little less than 1 out of necessity...just enough to bind. Shaped with a round cookie cutter (or glass), the process is also much, much quicker than ravioli.

Shouldn't this discussion be in the Sardinian thread? I agree about flour to egg. 1 cup to one egg, says Queen Marcella. Add about 1 t of milk to every cup of flour when stuffing pasta. I did that, but added an additional egg yolk which helped enormously.

Actually, Hathor, I thought I just replied to MrJs, but must have hit the wrong button. Something about going back and forth between changing diapers and chopping greens...which was not true. Seriously, though, since the situation was nothing like uncooked stuffing inside a raw turkey, I thought it would be okay except for the fact that I had prepped the greens the night before, moisture was building up, and the stuff had been sitting on the counter when the oven was on. After three years of chocolate mousse in my high school French club, I am not usually all that nervous about uncooked eggs; cf. comment re dough. However, I did get a second wind and just wanted to get the task over. Making something probably very similar to what MrJs is about to attempt tonight, it went relatively quickly. In bed in time to get a full four hours sleep before the construction crew next door arrived and began its racket.

Since asparagus will be in our farmers's markets for at least another week or two, I am bumping up this thread for yet another exhortation today. I seem to be having a string of remarkable luck after a period of fine, okay or just boring food. At any rate, in this thread, the Zuni Cafe Cookbook came up as one of the California/Waters type of book that has disappointed. I defended it, but confessed to have prepared only eight recipes from it. Number nine revived my enthusiasm: Asparagus Soup with Rice and Pancetta Each spring I always make asparagus soup at least once. As someone mentioned earlier in this thread, the once favorite vegetable inspires burn-out after so many years. This is especially true of cream-based asparagus soup which I always insisted had to go with buttermilk cornbread. THIS soup, on the other hand, is perfect if you've got a good batch of chicken stock in the freezer along with slices of pancetta. The only change I'd make, with a nod to therese, is to use a Vidalia onion. (I like the fact that this cookbook includes weights for ingredients, BTW.) The onion is softened slowly in olive oil. Then add stubby white rice along with good stock. While that simmers, saute tiny bits of pancetta in more olive oil along with thin diagonally slivered asparagus. The local purple stalks mixed with green (Michael Pollan: "Did you know 70% of the world's asparagus is shipped from China?'' ) are lovely and retain their color since they are cooked very briefly. When ham bits become crisp-edged nuggets, the whole schmiggle gets dumped into the stock along with coarsely ground black pepper. Boil for 1 minute. Ta da. No need for bread, so there's room for seconds. Nibble some slightly aged Sardinian cheese. Couple of green French olives. Honor the Franco-Italian roots of Judy Rodgers' culinary awakening. Wonderful.

I wonder if the chef traveled, read the same recipe or was simply inspired. BTW, Shaya, the fibrous content I mentioned was visible when I scraped out the processor "bowl." It was not at all tactile. The texture, as filling, was soft, not at all stringy.

I'll send a PM w/ the published recipe if you don't have access to this book. I forget how I cooked the artichoke since I prepped it over the weekend & didn't follow the recipe there, but I believe I used white white, a little lemon and Ligurian olive oil. I trimmed the heck out of the thing and processed it twice, first alone and then last night with the leeks. Yes, there was a little--as in teeny tiny bit of--fibrous content, but that would not not be an issue if smaller (or admittedly, squeaky new, just picked globes) varieties of artichokes were used. The leeks, thyme, butter, nuts--just everything together, along with a very light white wine--honored the artichoke with more subtle elegance than I am showing now. And yes, your love of artichokes is quite evident.

Pizza, that is what I suggested earlier. We know your native tongue is Italian. Help us out with the sailor's collar, please.

Kevin, I just mended the link. Very simple, quick and good. Thanks for references on bread.

Liguria continues to be fun, even in June. Last night I made a truly wonderful example of this region's special talent in the preparation of all things green: Ravioli di Carciofi al Profumo di Timo . Great name for a dish, no? The recipe is in Flavors of the Riviera by Colman Andrews. In confess that when I made stuffed pasta for the first time in at least a decade while we were exploring Lombardy, I was disappointed with the dough. Anna del Conte includes a traditional recipe that incorporates water, a way to compensate for the preciosity of eggs. This time I used an Emilia-Romagnan dough, adding an extra yolk and a tablespoon of milk as per advice of Marcella Hazan, and was happy with the results. The filling consists of artichokes and leeks that are stewed and dumped into a food processor. I cooked the vegetables separately on different days and would like to think that made a difference. I also added a little fresh thyme to the leeks as they softened. Egg, a couple of spoonfuls of ricotta, Parm, S & P. After the ravioli are done, they are sauced with crushed pinenuts that are sauteed in butter until warm and slightly colored, along with plenty of fresh thyme. Delicate. Absolutely delicious. You have to make this, too. After all those heady, rich, golden battered, deep-fried or otherwise assertive artichokes we prepared while in Rome, this dish demonstrates how different regions can be in the treatment of one of the most perfect plants to grow on Earth even if it is plated like an armadillo.

Well, I made my first Sardinian meal, although it will have to be reported in stages since I actually ate a Ligurian primo with a Sardinian secondo...and a light white Rioja since Iberian/Spanish influences on the region's cuisine are noted. The Sardinian primo was frozen to be consumed tonight. Ravioli di Carciofi al Profumo di Timo This was extraordinary, really one of the best things I have cooked this year and a perfect complement to the dish that followed. I will post a brief note in the Ligurian thread and urge you to try it some time. I thought I had grown tired of artichokes, but this restored my faith in them. Pollo con Finocchio, Olive e Vino Bianco served as the main course. The photograph of the raw ingredients on the Rustico web site does no justice to the dish which is beautiful roasted with browned chicken flesh (NOT skin), little black olives and luscious chunks of soft fennel, transparent after soaking in all the pan juices, olive oil and wine. Absolutely perfect with good, crusty bread to soak up what the fennel did not. While fennel appears in numerous late medieval illuminated manuscripts whose text is devoted to health (Tacuinum Sanitatis), it was not the sweet variety of the vegetable that was cultivated in Italy at a later date.* By the sixteenth century, it appears in Scappi's numerous menus for banquets, and apparently enjoys great popularity in Sardinia. Ada Boni also offers a Sardinian recipe of sardines with fennel. One of the beauties of this dish is that all the ingredients are cut up ahead of time and left to marinade, something that can be done the night before and then popped into the oven the next day as soon as it's heated. What I appreciated is the inclusion of the fennel fronds, although I'd advise buying at least one extra fennel bulb to add since it's the best part, and reserving some of its fronds as garnish. Melone d' Atene for dessert, followed by just a little Stracciatella di lampone (Haagen Dasz). *"Fennel (Feniculus)" at http://metamedia.stanford.edu/traumwerk/in...%20,(Feniculus), consulted June 7, 2006.

1) Carlo Middione (turns out he's USA born & raised, the son of a Sicilian father) provides the same story about marinara, although he has the sailors do the cooking. 2) Puttanesca: the women are prostitutes between tricks, not wives.

It's after nine at night and I don't feel like stuffing all the rest of the pasta. I already have incorporated raw egg (approximately 1) into the remainder of one filling that contains chopped, cooked greens and cheese, one fresh, crumbly and the other aged and grated. I know my unrolled pasta dough is fine, but am I endangering anyone's health and building up an evil bacteria farm if I leave the rest of the filling in a bowl as is and fill the remainder of these guys tomorrow?

In fact, the Dizionario dell'Opera lists "una marinara" as one of the roles in the eighteenth-century libretto for Rameau's Hippolyte et Aricie. The word "un marinaro" used for seafarers seems to enjoy currency even though in recent usage "una marinara" has come to signify a type of pizza or style of preparation in Italy as described by Anna Del Conte among others. The puzzle of the use of "marinara" for an all-purpose vegetarian tomato sauce in N. America--and according to at least one Sicilian writing in English--in Italy remains. Lack of any reference to this usage in the first edition of her reference book may be tied to the fact that the Northern Italian was living in the UK when she wrote. The term "collo alla marinara" also suggests that "alla marinara" can mean "of the sea" as a feminine form following a masculine noun. I think I am going to make a salad with arugula now. (Edited to add content & correct typo.)

"Marinara" is feminine form for "of the sea" (il mare, masc.) and not "of the sailor" (marinaio) or even "fisherman" (pescatore) let alone female sailors, fishers or their wives (pescivendola/e based on the assumption that they sell what their men bring in). Since the phrase modifies the dish, it seems to act as an adjective modifying a noun, perhaps, with the word "salsa" understood? However, I don't think this is a correct explanation (see below). I understand the source of confusion and do not know the answer. For what it is worth, a sailor's collar on a blouse or shirt is a "collo alla marinara" so someone with more linguisitic expertise might be able to fill us in.