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I'm currently reading Antonio Carluccio's Pasta:
"Pennoni Giardiniera"
"I have to include this recipe, because it has become very well known, at least in Carluccio's restaurants. Some years ago the personnel at the Ealing Carluccio's in London asked me if I could create a vegetarian dish with pasta. I went immediately to the kitchen, where I found enough zucchinis and spinach to make a dish, matched them with pennoni (large pasta tubes from Puglia), and this is it. It has been on the Carluccio's menu since then, and each time it is ordered, it collects approximately 75 cents (50p) for charity. It has been so successful in those eight intervening years it has collected almost a million pounds!"
I wonder if anyone ever told Carluccio that Parmesan's not vegetarian?
Anyhow I was under the weather tonight and was not sure at all about dinner. But once I had it in front of me it was lovely: grilled pork chop, tater tots, thirty second green beans. Applesauce with fresh ground mace, enough to induce a seizure. Or at least hiccups. Waiting for the anti-spasmodic pill to take effect.
I posted the above some while ago and I owe an apology. According to Bugialli, parmesan was traditionally soured with cardoons, not animal rennet, and is still done so for the Jewish community in Italy.
That being said I rather doubt Carluccio is serving vegetarian parmesan in London.