A Book in Progress:
"From Table to Table"

Excerpts From Stories and Anecdotes of Italian Culture, Food, Friendship and a Few Other Things

To be on the safe side, I would like to begin these pages with a disclaimer. Most things written  here are my subjective opinions and observations. They should, and will be, countered, contested, contradicted, questioned, elaborated on, repudiated, refuted and at times acknowledged, the sum of which means that they are genuinely Italian.

Every culture is the sum of its parts, the vast universe of Italian traditions, food and wine, more so than most. Its love and loyalty to family, its climate and its history  are all woven inseparably  into the same  cloth, and  I realize that it’s impossible to include a description of it in one book, or one hundred books.

From “Table to Table" is a rambling collection of stories, musings, anecdotes and recipes, with some tips on how to avoid a few of the basic mistakes that we foreigners make in this remarkable country. Much of the advice is gathered from conversations at countless meals at home and in restaurants, during lessons in the kitchen, and on outings and walks with my dear Italian friends, whom I affectionately call, " Amici Dell'Ambrosia."

Francis Mola

Nyköping Sweden 2025

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Discovering  Vasto

Vasto is a town on the Abruzzo coast bordered by the sea on one side and shielded by the high  peaks of the Apennine Mountains on the other. There is a pronounced local loyalty among the town’s residents. They consider themselves, firstly,  Vastese, secondly, Abruzzsese, and thirdly Italians, in that order.

 My wife Kersti and I were on a leisurely trip with the intent of eventually finding a second home, and through the years, had traveled along both Italian coasts in search of it.

Looking back, I think that Vasto had found us, rather than we found it, proof  that that it is the insignificant decisions that influence our lives more than the monumental ones:  a theoretical flapping of a sparrow’s wings that change the course of the winds. In this case, the course of our lives changed by turning off the highway in order to find a place to eat.

We were travelling  on the  Adriatic Highway, the two lane road that passes through Vasto and follows the  coast connecting the northern and southern parts of the country. When you are traveling, it is usually the rumblings in your stomach that tell you when to stop. Heeding them, we parked on a public lot overlooking Vasto’s long stretch of beach and the open sea beyond. Kersti, wondering if it was okay to leave our car there, struck up a conversation with a parking guard who was on her daily route, and who seemed as interested in the view, as she was in checking for parking violations. When she returned, thinking about the reputation that parking guards have, I  said,  “Unbelievable! If the parking guards are this friendly in Vasto, how nice are the other people?

After lunch, as I remember, it was my favorite, spaghetti alle vongole, we walked through the Old Town’s lanes and alleys, under its arched passages and along its panoramic paths.  Wandering through  the “Centro Storico” we were immediately smitten by its genuine character, almost as though it was the quintessential southern Italian city, direct from the imagination of a Hollywood film producer. That afternoon, we not only ate a good lunch; we found a city of museums, archeological sites, restaurants, cafes, churches, and interesting architecture a short walk from one of the best beaches on the Adriatic coast. As fate and chance would have it, we also found a home.

Often what you regret most in life are the things that you could have done but didn’t do. Kersti and I lived a full life, but at the same time felt that there was still room for the inspiration and spice of something new. It is often so, that while searching for one thing, you stumble across another. We went looking for a house. In the end, we found not only a house. We found a different life style and new friends who shared their rich culture with us.

My years in Vasto have confirmed my feelings that the Vastesi are some of the most compassionate and generous people that I have met. Whether I greet people on the street, talk to shopkeepers, or need a helping hand, I am  greeted with courtesy, a kind word and a smile, proof that the Vastesi truly embody the motto of Abruzzo , “Forte e Gentile” – strong and kind.  

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Vasto, Déjà Vu

It feels like I've been here before.

The sun rose from the sea over Vasto into a cloudless sky, as though the bells from the town’s ancient churches had woken it from its slumber. I kept my eyes closed, I think, as much to hold onto the dream I was having, as to keep out the blinding light. The high pitched clang that came from the nearby steeple of Chiesa di San Giuseppe, on the town square, called the devout to mass. Our house shook as the great bass bells of the nearby cathedral of Santa Maria Maggiore, chimed in as if in competition for the souls of the faithful. When they quieted, only the discreet ringing from the other, lesser chapels and churches could be heard in the distance.

I was still in that indistinct realm between sleep and waking, when the mind can play tricks, and wondered if I hadn’t been here before. Was it the gravitational pull from the gnarled roots of my family tree, or was it my Italian ancestors calling to me after all these years?

A circle had closed. My father’s family fled from the poverty of Southern Italy with a dream of finding a better life in America. I returned a hundred years later following a different dream.

Vasto, Casa Giardini in the Old Town

Ancient footsteps everywhere

Our house, Casa Giardini in Vasto's Centro Storico, is surrounded by a twisted warren of narrow alleys, arches and ancient passages. If you stretch out your arms when you walk through the stone paved lanes, you can reach out and touch the walls of the buildings on both sides, some of which are built on the reticulated stone foundations of Roman houses and aqueducts that date back 2000 years. As you walk past the remains of marble pillars and the intricate mosaics of the well-preserved baths on the via Adriatica, you might hear the footsteps of those who had gone there before you, and feel the shapes and shadows of thousands of years of history.

In the mornings, I wake up to the clang of church bells and the seductive aroma of espresso coming from the kitchen, and the smell of salt air drifting through my open windows. In the evenings, I watch the aerial acrobatics of the swallows that fly over the Giardini D’Avalos, nimbly darting and swooping in order to catch insects. When I look out over the bay at night, the lights from the fishing boats float in the darkness like a band of pearls that is indistinguishable from the stars.

The first time my wife Kersti walked across Vasto’s main square, Piazzi Rosetti, built over a Roman amphitheater that could hold 20,000 people, and named for the Vasto son, poet and writer Gabrielle Rosetti, she remarked, “ I’m going to love this town. “ The piazza has a statue of a poet in its center, instead of a warrior king.”

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Palazzo D’Avalos and Castello Calderesco:  A Look Into a Past Age

 If any building or place is synonymous with Vasto, it is the Palazzo D’Avalos.

If you were to ask any Vastese what the most significant symbol of their city was, Palazzo  D’Avalos would probably be their answer.

The palazzo’s panoramic position overlooking the sea, makes it the central and most visible landmark in Vasto’s Centro Storico. Seen from the beach below, or the coastal highway, the former home of the noble family D’Avalos, that ruled Vasto from 1440 until the late 1700s, dominates the silhouette of the old town.

This palace from the 14th century, built with the symmetry and proportions of  Renaissance architecture, was a colossal structure by the standards of the time. It was not only a residence for Vasto’s ruling nobility, but a symbol of their wealth and power, meant to imbue admiration and respect in their underlings and impoverished feudal subjects. The walls of the southern façade still have remnants of the original decorative embellishments, windows, and masonry.

Today, the town of Vasto is a more than three hundred years removed from the harsh conditions of the feudal society that dominated rural life in Italy. Palazzo D’avalos, once a seat of power and aristocratic  opulence, is now the center of the cultural and historical life of his part of Abruzzo.

The palazzo, and its well-tended Neopolitan garden, typical of the time, now provides the picturesque hub for the majority of cultural events in Vasto. There is a continual agenda of conferences, weddings, civic meetings, book presentations, recitals and international engagements.

Besides being the heart of the  historical center of Vasto, the palazzo is an archeological museum that highlights the town’s past as a Roman municipality and houses a collection of art and artifacts from Vasto and Abruzzo’s various historical periods.

Note: Surrounding the palazzo on two sides is a brick wall that is 700 years old. Does anyone build with bricks now? Will these sheet metal and poured concrete buildings of the 21st century be standing 70 years from now, let alone 700.

Castello Calderesco

 A fortress that protected Vasto from invasion from land and sea.

The medieval walls and turrets of Castello Calderesco, from the 14th century, like the Palazzo D’Avalos are entwined with the historical identity of Vasto.

Medieval Europe was a continent of monarchs and noblemen, whose realms were divided into principalities and city states. These areas both large and small, ruled by kings or local lords, had their own set of laws, and taxes. Instead land being divided by fixed lines, borders were often marked by natural features. Rivers, mountains, or the sea, separated territories or countries whose boundaries were a cause of continual strife, raids and plundering. For protection, towns grew up around castles that were often fortified by walls and armaments to repel invaders. The Caldora Castle was built both for protection, and as a palatial residence by the Marquis Jacobo Caldora, and then added on to by the D’Avalos dynasty when Vasto came under their rule. 

Today along with the castle and its turrets, and its three remaining towers, the ancient gates though the city wall, Porta Catena and Porta Nuova, still remain as they were five hundred years ago.

 The castle is privately owned and the towers are used as private residences.

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The Burden of Preserving Landmarks for Future Generations

Italians excel at blending the modern and the traditional. Think of a Ferrari parked near a church from the 10th century or a Roman wall from the first. It is a culture that manages to preserve its past without shuttering itself from the future.

Among Italy’s gifts to the world are its architecturally unique buildings, paintings, mosaics, sculptures and frescoes, but their beauty and cultural worth also presents the government with some of its greatest burdens and challenges.

When we reflect on Italy’s cultural treasures of art and architecture, we think of  Pompei and Venice, the cities of Florence, Rome, Naples and Bologna, the picturesque towns on the Amalfi coast, and the works of the masters Michael Angelo, DaVinci and Caravaggio. But the true essence of Italy’s art and architectural treasures, are not only housed in its world famous museums and magnificent cities, but found in its hundred thousand churches, and the exquisite fountains and sculptures on its piazzas and in its parks. Wherever you might look in unexpected places, you can find the forgotten art and embellishments that are hidden in narrow alleys and the nooks of ancient walls.

The magnitude and quality of Italy’s art is unique in the world, and a short walk in the historical center of any village or town, reveals treasures, that in any other country or place, would be worth a special visit.

An Italian’s connection to the past, when art was considered the literature of the illiterate poor, is still present in modern Italy. There is an unspoken pride in the vast artistic accomplishments that are inseparable from the nation’s self-image and soul.

Italy has more UNESCO Heritage sites than any country in the world, and with them, comes a heavy financial burden. Along with these extensive and priceless works of art, historical buildings and towns, follows a responsibility to maintain and conserve them for future generations of Italians, and the peoples of the world.

These treasures, the scale of which is enormous, require vast sums of money for their upkeep. The dilemma of the Italian government, is finding a way to prioritize them, when the pressing needs of society and repairing an aging infrastructure, outweigh the financial benefits that tourism brings to the country.

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Amici Dell' Ambrosia

From Table to Table" is an informal collection of stories, anecdotes and recipes, and also a few tips on how to avoid some of the basic mistakes that we foreigners make when visiting Italy. Much of the advice comes from my Italian friends, whom I affectionately call, "Gli Amici Dell'Ambrosia."

Anatomically speaking the heart is next to the stomach, and when you sit down to a meal with my friends, the stomach was the heart. I called them “The Amici di Ambrosia” because many of our meetings were in some way a celebration of cooking and the good things in life. The international restaurant bible, “Le Guide Rouge de Michelin” was very prestigious and its recommendation and stars sought after, but when we shopped or went out to eat together, we joked with one another and asked how many stars the restaurant or shop had in the Guide d’Amici di Ambrosia. The recommendation of my discerning and knowledgeable friends was, in my eyes, the most reliable.

The "Amici" are bound together by the undefinable chemistry of friendship and the moments of conviviality that are central at the table. They are people who consider good food and good wine, not only sustenance, but an homage to life.  

You don’t have to look any farther than their kitchens to find the ethos of Italian culture. Despite Italy’s enormous treasure of historical monuments, archeological sites, poets and artists, it is the cuisine and the variation of its regional dishes that is synonymous with the soul of the country. 

If you are having  a conversation with any Italian, it seems that the subject of food will quickly arise. And it is no different when my  friends meet.  I have always found their love of food and all that it symbolizes appealing, and admired the fact that they met often, for no other reason, than to enjoy a meal and be in each other’s company.

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  The Province of Abruzzo. Forte e Gentile

Traditionally Apennine shepherds and  Adriatic fishermen, the people of  Abruzzo are known as being both strong and kind.

Abruzzo stretches from the provinces of Marche in the north to Molise in the south. To the west  Abruzzo has a natural border to the province of Lazio that is created by the  formidable peaks of the Apennine Mountains. The Adriatic Sea forms its eastern border. Outside influences came late, and for centuries Abruzzo was one of  Italy's most isolated regions, until the 1970's, when an autostrada was built by constructing a series of tunnels and viaducts through the mountains. 

The motto of Abruzzo, Forte e Gentile ( Strong and Kind), could be an expression used, not only to describe its people, the hearty mountain dwellers that supported themselves by raising sheep, but also its fishermen and farmers, and the snowcapped peaks and sea that shaped them.

The identity of Abruzzo, that traditionally brings to mind its mountains and alpine landscapes, is also one of fertile fields and an expansive agriculture, where olive groves and vineyards stretch from its sandy beaches to the foothills of the Apennines. Abruzzo is one of Italy’s major producers of wine and oil and through its isolation has kept much of its traditional life intact.

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Trabocco - A utilitarian construction that turned farmers and land-dwellers into fisherman.

A striking sight on  Abruzzo’s long stretch of coast, are the historic trabocci, ancient fishing platforms built on stilts and extending out into the sea. These rickety fishing piers resemble modernistic driftwood sculptures with long wooden arms reaching out into the deep, fish rich pools of the coastal waters. The arms were used to lower and raise large nets by an intricate system of pulleys and ropes, and have withstood the pounding of the Adriatic’s waves for hundreds of years.

The trabocci  enabled people from the villages and farms along the coast, to supplement their diets and incomes by fishing, without having to own a boat or expose themselves to the unpredictability of the weather and dangers of the open sea. When you pass a trabocco, it’s easy to let your imagination take you back to a time before fish farms and the indiscriminate plundering of the world’s oceans by factory boats.

Today many of the trabocci have been restored and repurposed into upscale restaurants that serve delicacies from the bounty of the Adriatic, and wine from nearby vineyards, accompanied by swooping gulls and the swell of the sea. If you pass a trabocco, or are visiting one for a meal, take a moment to think of the people who needed them for a vital part of their sustenance. 

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Brodetto Vastese, Fish Stew From Vasto

Like the rest of Italian cuisine, the true delicacies of Abruzzo stem from the food of  poor farmers, shepherds and fisherman.

Brodetto Vastese is a dish inseparable from the history the Abruzzo coast, the town of Vasto and of the trabocci, the elaborate fishing piers that rise like rickety sculptures from the coastal waters.  The fishermen who used them, would sell or barter the most sought after fish from their catch, for other goods, food stuffs and supplies, and keep the less desirable small fish for their family’s consumption.

These tasty fish, shrimps, mussels, langoustine, squid, octopuses and rays would be boiled together in a rich tomato broth in a clay bowl, and eaten with thick slices of toasted bread. Like much of the fare from the hearths of the poor (cucina povera),  Brodetto would become a signature dish of the long Abruzzo coast

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An Abruzzo Heritage the Transhumance

The Transhumance, a tradition that can be traced back to Roman times, is the seasonal migration of sheep from their summer grazing grounds on the slopes of the mountainous Gran Sasso area of Abruzzo, to winter grazing on the lowland pastures of Molise and Puglia. In the spring, the shepherds and their flocks returned to their mountain habitat. This annual movement of livestock has now been replaced by modern animal husbandry. What remains are some stretches of the traturri, (the historical drovers trails) and the food of the shepherds, arrosticini (skewered lamb) that like brodetto from the coast, is one of Abruzzo’s local specialties.                                                      

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 Sapori di Italia - From Nonna to Nonni

Italian cooks won’t  make simple things complicated thinking that they will better.

These are stories about what and how to eat, in a country where culinary tradition thrives, and people know what they like without any deviation. When driving in Italy, you can break the rules with a fair amount of forbearance,  however, it is not advisable in the kitchen.

Love and respect for food is a thread that is woven throughout the culture. Sit at a table for more than ten minutes and you end up talking about food: it’s the vortex that pulls everyone in, and when I first heard the expression, “In Italy you don´t eat to live. You live to eat,” I never considered how seriously that could be taken.

Through years of eating the excellent home cooking of the “Amici”,  I’ve found that there is an emphasis on ingredients, tastiness and variety, rather than polish and artistic refinement.  Improvisation is frowned upon, sometimes quietly and sometimes not. The Amici's cuisine doesn’t wander too far from  the past. Mama's cooking is still the golden standard, even if there is a little tinkering now and then.

That doesn’t mean that the fare is constrained by nostalgia. People feel that family and traditional recipes are perfect as they are and don't need improvement.  The recipes are timeless and have been tested and passed down over the decades and centuries. 

Still, in different families and villages, it seems, that no two dishes are made in the same way, and everyone insists that their version is the right one, but with one thing in common. There is an underlying philosophy that simple food is the best food. Let a few well-chosen ingredients shine through.

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Olive Oil

For many Italians, the trifecta of fresh olive oil, a slice of good bread and a sun warmed tomato directly off the vine, is their unadorned favorite, and maybe the essence of the simplicity of the Italian kitchen. 

On my way down to the beach every day, I pass the twisted and gnarled trunks of olive trees, some of them hollowed out and split by time and weather, as if they are standing on two legs in the sloping, fertile soil that reward their ancient roots with  nutrients and water. I imagine that these trees whose silvery green crowns soften the rolling  Adriatic landscape, might have been planted four or five generations ago, and  have been carefully pruned and tended to produce fruit as bountiful as they did 150 years ago.

On a nearby hillside is Monte Vecchio, The Old Mountain,  where my good friend Giancarlo has a grove that faces the morning and afternoon sun, and is cooled by the salt breezes that blow in from the sea. This climatic combination produces an exceptional oil that is favored in Vasto. The Vastesi prefer the bitter, spiciness and sweet aroma of oil from the traditional olive varieties that grow in these older groves, as opposed to the types that are cultivated commercially with more abundant harvests that are the corner stone of the region’s agricultural economy.  

Olive trees are the oldest cultivated trees known to man and there are at least 700 known varieties, 80 of which are cultivated in Abruzzo. Each type has a distinct aroma and flavors.  Abruzzo holds a position as one of Italy’s most productive olive regions thanks to its geographical and environmental position. The hills that gently slope to the sea from the snow-capped peaks of the Apennine Mountains, are ideal for the cultivation of olives, and has fostered one of Italy’s richest olive-growing heritages.

A hundred kilos of olives gives about 10 to 20 liters of oil, the taste of which is dependent on the stage of the fruit’s ripeness. The harvest season stretches from October to January. Olives that are harvested early are still green and give less, but tastier oil. Olives that are harvested later are darker in color and give a more abundant and mellower oil.

To understand the proportions of oil to tree, my friend Cristina estimated that her family uses about sixty liters of olive oil a year. That amount is equal to the harvest of three or four trees.

Olive oil, unlike cheese or wine, doesn’t get better as it ages. The first pressing is titled Extra Virgin and meets strict requirement regarding taste, aroma and coloring. Oil that fails to meet any of those requirements is titled Virgin and is suitable for cooking. Any other quality is not suitable for culinary purposes.

Olive oil changes taste from farm to farm , season to season, but a rule is, the fresher the oil the better: the absolute tastiest within a few hours of pressing. Oil should be stored dark and cool. A typical extra virgin oil won't remain extra virgin grade for longer than a year after it's pressed. After one year it is not considered extra virgin, but is suitable for other culinary uses. 

Note:

Olive oil not only has health benefits. Among all the oils and fats that are used for the preparation and production of food, olive oil is at the top of the list ecologically.

 Olive Oil is the Foundation That  Italian Cooking is Built On.

Another friend, Anna was at the stove, hovering over a pot of soup made from the stems of artichokes that she had stuffed and that she would serve as our meal’s second course.  She is an exceptional cook and I’m always interested in her recipes. As usual, wanting to glean some of her culinary secrets, I asked how much oil she used in the broth. She made a gesture with her hand as though she was pouring. “This much,” she said, and then with a broad smile raised her hand again.  Holding her elbow up high she turned her head away and said, “and then this much.”  I understood that it was a lot, but never seemed to be too much. 

Some tips:

Ask which harvest, late or early

The fresher the better

Store it properly- dark and cool.

 A Caveat

Olive oil is the most falsified food commodity in the world, and at times, far from the liquid gold that the label promises. Beware of inexpensive oil in the supermarket that can be blended with low grades of oil from many different countries, or sometimes blended with cheaper vegetable oils, such as sunflower and rape seed.

The label on the bottle often says, European Union, Italy, Spain or Greece.  Inferior oil that crosses borders from non- EU countries are known to be mixed into these oils. There are also labeling frauds such as mis-titling an inferior oil that doesn’t live up to the quality specifications of extra virgin or virgin. 

Qualities

An average Italian consumes about 15 liters of olive oil a year.

All oil for the table and cooking is cold pressed.

Extra virgin oil passes all the tests for color, taste and aroma.

Virgin is also from the first pressing but of a lower quality.

Green olives from an early harvest gives the oil a stronger flavor.

Later harvests, when the fruit darkens, gives a mellower oil.

Extra virgin is eaten with bread, on legumes and salads, and with fish.

Virgin  oil, which is of a slightly lower quality, has a higher tolerance for heat and is used in cooking. 

The nutrients in extra virgin olive oil have been found to benefit numerous health conditions, including heart disease and diabetes.

Photo, Amphora from Rome

Olive oil was a vital commodity in the Roman Empire that stretched from North Africa, the Mediterranean provinces and even to England. It was used not only for nutrition, but for lamp oil and medicines.

Oil was transported throughout the empire in clay urns called amphorae, each containing about 70 liters. The man made hill in Rome, Monte Testaccio is now an archeological site, containing approximately 25 million used amphorae. The hill is 35 meters high and has a circumference of 1500 m.

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 Un Piccolo Aperitivo a Casa di Donato e Carla

The word simple or small regarding food is never meant to be taken literally.

A meal with Carla and Donato was always special and something to look forward to.  As luck would have it, Carla telephoned in the morning and said that Donato was preparing a “small “aperitivo that evening.

We arrived first as usual, because our clocks and habits were still regulated by Swedish time and custom. The table was set for ten on the veranda outside of the main kitchen, that was bordered by an olive grove sloping down towards the sea. The trees were planted by Donato’s grandfather, and added to, through the years, by his father.  While we were waiting for the other guests to arrive, we drank prosecco and ate fresh bread with a tangy, peppery oil from the latest harvest, a combination which in itself, would have been a satisfying meal.

The guests arrived according to a more leisurely time table than the precise Skandinavien, and as they did, the dishes that would comprise this “little” aperitivo began appearing on the table.

First the trays of meat: ventracina, prosciutto locale, mortadella from Bologna, the cheeses came out :pecorino, asiago and cache cavallo, and the wines flowed: Montepulciano rosa, Rosato and Trebbiano from a nearby winery.

The  warm dishes were brought out. First a frittata with asparagus and potato, and then a pizza rustico, made with an egg mix, several cheeses and sausage, baked in a double pie crust, with side dishes of vegetables and rice.

No “small” aperitivo is complete without fruit. Donato was out earlier in the day and picked several kilos of perfectly ripe cherries and apricots, but apologized that the peaches weren’t from his garden.

It’s common that guests bring a bottle of wine, liqueur or some kind of small treat. One thoughtful guest stopped at the bakery and bought a tray of cakes and pastries which was the meal’s dolce, the last course that we somehow found room for, together with a small cup of espresso. 

So, as the evening began with a drink, so did it end, with homemade limoncello made from lemons from our host’s garden.

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Herbs and Spices

No spice sharpens the taste of food like hunger.

In cooking unlike carpentry or mechanics, a millimeter is not a millimeter, or a gram is not a gram. There are no fast measurements. Amounts in recipes should be seen as guidelines. Tomatoes taste different every day, salt is not always a consistent chemical depending on it type and origin, and all ingredients have different strengths and tastes. I’ve bought oregano in Calabria that is three times as strong as that I’ve bought neatly packaged in the supermarket, and the same goes for every other ingredient that might end up in one of your dishes.

The secret in the purity of tastes in Italian cuisine is no secret, but obvious and known to every Italian cook. Always use freshest ingredients of the highest quality and extra virgin olive oil. Spices must know their role and should  never overpower the main components, but subtly accent or enhance them.

The quality of the ingredients and their tastes should be what highlights the dish. Spices should be tamed in the broth or the sauce.  The food is stripped to its essential ingredients and balanced to enhance dishes rather than overpower them.

The variation in Italian cuisine is not the result of elaborate spicing, but rather in the availability of a huge variety of vegetables, meats, cheeses, breads and pasta.

The most common spices in the Italian kitchen are parsley, rosemary, oregano, sage, bay leaves, black pepper, and thyme. Basil is perhaps the best known and most popular herb in Italian cuisine. There are misconceptions about garlic. It isn’t used as much in genuine Italian cooking as much as in Italian American cuisine. In the Italian kitchen a hint of garlic is always enough.

There is also a trinity of ingredients that are used throughout Italian cuisine as the base for many  soups, stews, pasta sauces, and when braising meats and poultry. It is a flavor base called the sofritto and is composed of celery, parsley and carrots, finely chopped and sauteed in olive oil. When you shop at the fruit and vegetable markets of Vasto, this combination also called odori, is given to you without charge as a courtesy.

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Tomato Trivia and Facts

Did you know? The tomato that is central in Italian cooking,  came to Italy from the Peruvian Andes of South America, by way of the Spaniards in the 16th century.

The tomato is a fruit and not a vegetable, and at first was thought to be toxic.

The plants grew best in Southern Italy and in the 18th century were incorporated into the region’s cuisine.

Naples was the birth place of tomato sauce and tomato based recipes.

The tomato was thought to be an aphrodisiac. The French called it the pomme d’amour (love apple). 

The tomato became an integral part of cucina povera, the food of the poor, whose diets were mostly vegetarian.

Your local supermarket might only have three or four types, but there are approximately 10,000 varieties worldwide.

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Some Cheeses of Vasto and Abruzzo

In Italy the conservation of milk by adding bacteria or rennet to curdle it, and process it into cheese in its various forms, is a craft that dates back to pre- Roman times. Of the thousand or so cheeses that are native to Italy’s mountains, plains and coastal regions, here are five of the most common artisanal types found in Abruzzo.

Caciocavallo, a semi-hard  cheese that is one of the most common in  Southern Italy. The name "Caciocavallo “cacio = cheese, cavallo = horse” in English. The traditional method of ageing the cheeses was by tying them together and hanging them over a beam, as you would saddlebags on a horse.

Pecorino ( pecora = sheep)  A hard cheese that was brought to the Abruzzo coast by mountain shepherds on the annual sheep migration south (the transhumance). photo chapel in Campo Imperatore, a mass before the journey south

Scamorza- Akin to mozzarella a but a little firmer, another soft cheese that is typical of southern Italy. It is  made from the same cow's milk base as mozzarella but is firmer and drier.

Ricotta di pecora, ( pecorino ricotta) is a soft cheese made from sheep’s milk

Caciotta d'Abruzzo: a soft cow's milk or sheep's milk cheese

For the Italophile – Here are some other common protected Italian cheeses that are well known internationally.  provolone, parmesano reggiano, grana padanao, gorgonzola, mozzarella, ricotta

Some Common  Vasto and Abruzzo Wines

Wine isn’t for reserved for special occasions, or a luxury in Italy. It is served with most meals, a part of everyday life, and inseparable from the cuisine and culture.

Like anything else, wine is only as good as the material you are starting with. The main grape variety  used in the red  wines of Abruzzo is the Montepulciano, which is also the base for many of the best Italian red wines, and grows and matures exceptionally well in the rolling Abruzzo terrain.

As much a part of the regional identity of Vasto as its relationship to the sea and its bounty, are the vineyards and olive groves that surround it and stretch from its long beaches on the Adriatic to the foothills of the Apennines.

Pecorino - A fruity white wine made from  Pecorino grapes.

Trebbiano - A white wine made from Trebbiano grapes grown in the Abruzzo region.

Montepulchiano d Abruzzo, is a red wine made from the Montepulciano grape grown in the vineyards surrounding Vasto, and is the most common grape in Abruzzo wine making.

Cerrasuola- is a little darker than a rose. The name means cherry red. Cerasuolo d'Abruzzo is rose’ style wine made from the Montepulciano grape.

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Breaking  Bread

The English words company and companion, are derived from the Latin words com and panis. Com means together. Panis is the Latin word  for bread. Eat bread together, so significant of the Italian culture where friends can sit at the table together for hours .

The Italians love of food  comes not simply from what they eat, but the ritual of how they eat it. Food is a way of life in Italy; far more than mere sustenance, and sitting with family or friends at the table is the most important part of the day.                         

The Amici have a casually affectionate manner with each other. Most of them have known one another since childhood, or their student days. A meal  together with them is not simply eaten for sustenance; it is a seamless melding of necessity and pleasure, an everyday homage to life, family and friendship, where the ceremony begins with Prosecco and ends with a small cup of thick espresso. Survival instinct dictates that you live according to the rule, “eat a little of a lot.”  You have to pace your eating, because a meal with them  begins around eight- thirty or nine in the evening, and could take two to three hours. It would be unusual if it didn't include antipasti de mare, antipasti de terra, primo, secondo, insalata, formaggio, dolce, frutta, white and red wine, amaro, grappa or limoncello. 

There was never any reference to empty calories or nutrition. There were no fads here, kelp and kale and Atkins and whatnot. We always eat what is in season with good olive oil, and the Amici, and people in general, were slim and in good form. You might think that their bodies would be a testament to their love of food, but they were more a reinforcement of the soundness of the minimalistic Mediterranean diet.  

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Cibo Mediterraneo , The Mediterranean Diet

The Mediterranean diet is true slow food, unprocessed and  representative of the Italian lifestyle. There is a focus on a diversity of seasonal legumes, vegetables, greens, beans, fruits, cheese, and in Vasto what the sea has to give. The three P’s, pasta, potata and pane are the staple starches. Meat is eaten in smaller portions, and a  glass of wine accompanies most meals. Olive oil is the main source of fat used in the preparation of food and as a condiment, and has been proven to have significant health benefits. The Italians are consistently, at the top, as are the other Mediterranean countries, of the W.H.O.’s statistics of health and longevity.

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Sepino

A good meal will hopefully not only fill your stomach, but give you an experience  to look back on with satisfaction. 

We called ourselves the  Friends of Ambrosia for a reason, and besides the common ground of our politics and philosophical similarities, we all had a love of food and cooking. We might take a Sunday outing together to a mountain village just to eat arrosticini (lamb kebab) there because it was the best in Italy, or to some other distant village because the wine or cheese was exceptional.

I reminded one of the Amici of a trip that we had made together a few years before to Sepino, a Roman archeological site in the mountains on the ancient route to Rome, not far from Campo Basso. She had difficulty in recalling the day until I reminded her that it was there we ate that magnificent “tagliatelli al tartufo" and then the memories flooded. The ruins of the ancient settlement were a marvel, but our lunch in the local trattoria more so.

Sepino is an  Archaeological site in Molise near the town of Campo Basso. It was once a thriving Roman meeting place on the traturro (sheep migration trail) and its stone paved streets, the foundations and walls of its buildings, majestic gates, mason work and Roman amphitheater are all well preserved.

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A Gas Station Italian Style

Most countries have really good food, but you won’t find it at a gas station.

The first time that I stopped at an Auto Grill was when I was  crossing the Apennines on the auto strada, on the way to Vasto. There I learned how Italians ate when they were on the road, and that they were discerning diners even when they were eating at a rest stop. Was the Auto Grill we stopped at a gas station, grocery store or a restaurant? It was all of them, but definitely the latter.

Inside was a microcosm of Italy living up to its reputation as being culinarily obsessed. Lined up along the walls and in the aisles were racks of wine, beer, bottles of olive oil, pasta in all shapes and forms, salamis, sausages, prosciutto crudo, cotto and other salumi, oval balls of Provolone, wheels of Parmesano Reggiano, other diverse cheeses, jars of preserved fruits, pickled artichokes, coffee, limoncello, cantucci, amoretti, chocolate, nuts, candy, toys, stuffed animals and electronic paraphernalia.  This ordinary road stop was a composite of an Italian deli, enoteca, souvenir shop, café and quality restaurant. Oh yes; there were also a dozen gas and diesel pumps outside. 

Once in  the restaurant, we met travelers standing at the counter taking a hurried cup of coffee, and passed a pizzaiolo as he was taking out a newly baked pizza from the oven. We walked past stacks of freshly made panini with melodious names like Bufalino, Rusticella, and Reginella.

Even at a road stop on a mountain highway in Italy, you could always expect to get an acceptable meal. It didn’t matter where or when. That day the restaurant was serving gnocchi al pomodoro, lasagna and two different types of pasta, several vegetable dishes, and if you were tempted, you could choose a chop or steak for grilling from a chilled display.  Of course, this was Italy, where if you wanted, wine was served with your meal.

While I was deciding whether or not to take one or both pasta dishes, maybe even a bit of lasagna too, because it looked so good, the woman in front of me who was deliberating with the server about the details of the pasta marinara that was on the menu, asked the cook to come out and show her the brand of pasta they were using before she placed her order. 

 This was Italy, a foodie paradise and the Italy I love.

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Thoughts On My Cooking

“Cooking well doesn’t mean cooking fancy.” Julia Child 

Everyone can eat, but learning how to cook requires some work. When you are fairly proficient in the techniques, of cutting, chopping, slicing, dicing, frying, boiling and roasting, when you know  your temperatures and combinations, and are friends with your ingredients, learning the rest, like everything else, is dependent on the questions you ask, how you listen to the answers, and practice. Consequently, I’m a curious and inquisitive student in other peoples kitchens and always enjoy having guests for dinner.

My cooking is eclectic. Swedish, American, Indian, Chinese, Italian. I’m flexible, and rather than follow recipes as though they were written in stone, I use them as a guide. However, when it comes to Italian cooking, I improvise with caution. Italian cooking is regulated by unstated rules understood by everyone.

For me, a millimeter is a millimeter in carpentry or mechanics, but not always in cooking. There are no precise measurements. Spices have different strengths, no two salts have the same intensity, some meat is tough and some tomatoes are bitter. The rule is: keep it simple. Learn the techniques, and learn how to compensate and salvage a dish if you make a mistake.

 The quote “To err is human,” is applicable to most situations, unless you are cooking for Italians, then to err can be embarrassing. I was a person used to taking risks, calculated ones that is, but when I cooked for my group of friends for the first time, I wondered if the root of my confidence was experience or naivete.

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My Thoughts on Wine

 To put the Italian's casual and knowledgeable attitude to wine in its proper perspective, a friend tells the story of stepping off the school bus after a morning at kindergarten and running up the alley to their apartment. When she saw her mother waiting on the balcony, she cried out, “mama I’m thirsty!  Vino e aqua!

Italy is a country where wine is a  beverage that accompanies every meal and is expected to be good. I’ve have never heard a discussion of a wine at the table. If it was exceptional, or came from a friend,  the only comment might be “ Buona.” I smile when I read all the influencer articles with recommendations about what to drink and what vintages are in fashion, because they're neither reliable nor relatable to individual tastes.

I asked a Vasto vintner who had recently returned from California’s Napa Valley, what he thought about the wines that were produced there.  Knowing that I was born in the U.S., he said diplomatically, in case I might feel some loyalty towards them, “I suppose you could get used to them.”

 Swirl, Sniff, Sip and Slurp - Wine Tasting

An aspect of the discussions  about the subtleties of fine wines is an implied boast that says “ I  have the  financial means that permits me to buy expensive wines.

The American obsession with wine can be seen as a class marker, as though if you spend enough you could buy sophistication. To some it might seem much classier to drink expensive wine with its overtones of the luxury and refinement of chateaus, and aristocratic dusty wine cellars, rather than other alcoholic drinks that hint of noisy pubs and bars .

There is a question that is always being tossed around. Is wine tasting a science or a subjective analysis? A knowledgeable friend after tasting a wine I brought for a dinner we were eating together, sniffed, sipped it, swirled it around in his glass to aerate it, then held it up to the light to judge its color. He took another small sip, rolled it around against the roof of his mouth, and took a short breath through his nose. I waited for his opinion. Instead of the expected babble about aroma, balance body and finish, he asked, “How much did it cost?” “Five Euros,” I answered. “An excellent wine,” he replied.

My host didn’t have a need to sound sophisticated. He was not only an experienced sommelier. Like many men of his generation, his grandfather according to family tradition, placed a drop of wine on his tongue while he was still an infant implying, “this drop is as important as the holy water that the priest will anoint you with at baptism.” "Judge the wine by what you like and its basic components. Everyone’s palate and expectations are different,” he explained. “If you like it, it is good.”  A lesson:  the price is not always related to quality.

One useful aspect of understanding wine is knowing how to pair the qualities of a specific type with the food that it is being served, enhancing both.

The three basic components of wine:

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An Understanding of the Bliss Point

When eating an Italian meal, a palate that expects salt, sugar and fat, or creamy sauces, is in for a disappointment.

The "bliss point" recipes that many western chefs, industrial food producers and fast food restaurants adhere to, incorporate the use of the perfect ratio of salt, sugar and fat. It’s a rich combination designed to stimulate the pleasure sensors of the brain, and give the eater a sensation of immediate gratification. They are engineered to manipulate the eater by encouraging them to take more. These unhealthy foods have become addictive and have resulted in a health catastrophe. 

 On the other hand, traditional  Italian food, and the Mediterranean diet in general is considered “clean food," where a few specific ingredients of high quality are paired in such a way that their separate tastes are preserved and high-lighted. In the cross cultural collision between the intentional bliss point taste sensations of normal American restaurant fare, and recipes in general, where the taste enhancers of fat, sugars and carbohydrates dominate, many diners might be disappointed in Italian cuisine with its emphasis on maintaining the integrity of a few ingredients. 

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From Street Food to Elite Food, Reflections on Fine Dining

“ Good food is very often, even most often, simple food.” Anthony Bourdain

The memory of a great meal can last a lifetime, but if you go searching for the perfect meal, or the food of the Gods, you probably will never find it. With some luck though, there are other small, earthly pleasures that are waiting to be discovered. I found one at the three star Michelin restaurant Il Reale, in Castel di Sangro, tucked into the foothills of the Apennines.

Usually, my restaurant of choice, is a neighborhood trattoria that serves traditional, robust local cuisine, in a relaxed atmosphere, where the  kitchen has a touch of mamma or nonna. But my visit to the renowned restaurant Reale, consistently rated among the top ten best in the world, gave me the same feeling of being a welcome and special guest as I had at a local hostel, without the pretensions that often accompany the exclusivity of fine dining.

At first, I was skeptical about eating there, despite their uncontested reputation for excellence. How can you improve on Italian cooking, with its recipes that have been used and tested through generations, and how could I, in good conscience, wait three months for a reservation, and then pay ten times more for a meal than I would have paid at one of Vasto’s many excellent restaurants? However, my apprehensions were unfounded. Restaurant Reale, in the hands of the world famous chef Nico Romito and his excellent staff, took me on an exquisite culinary journey.

In  Reale’s impeccably restored 16th century convent, I sampled dishes from the tasting menu prepared with a minimalistic purity of ingredients that came from the surrounding garden and fields, and ate bread that was baked in its stone oven from strains of wheat that had a thousand year history. The meal’s different courses were presented with flawless attention to detail, including an explanation of their components and origin.

At Reale, there was a focus on every aspect of the dining experience, where the techniques and the creativity of the chef, who like any gifted professional, made the complicated appear elegantly simple.

The maximum of Michelin stars awarded to a single restaurant is three. Reale has three.

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The Integrity of the Italian Kitchen : An Explanation of DOC, DOCG, and DOP 

If wines , cheeses breads and recipes aren’t protected by Italian and European Union law, they are protected and preserved by a fierce local loyalty to custom and tradition.

Italy has approximately 300  registered wines, and 350 registered types of cheese, and a few thousand other varieties of traditional cheeses, at least 400 different shapes of pasta, about 350  types of bread, at least a dozen protected and registered forms of prosciutto, countless types of other cured meats, salamis and sausages.

The rich traditions and diversity of Italian cuisine are easy to understand, if you consider the geography of Italy and its history. Italy is a country that is 1,300 kilometers long,  bordered by the peaks of the Dolomite Alps in the north, and stretches to the  island of Sicily in the south. It is a country surrounded by the sea on both sides,  with the Apennine mountains in the middle, blessed with  fertile plains, and a culture that dates back thousands of years. 

 Can a tourist ever say that they have been to Italy and eaten Italian food?  It’s an impossibility to  describe and do justice to the thousands of regional dishes that comprise Italian cuisine and the customs surrounding their preparation and presentation. Just as difficult a task, is to try and make an account of the virtually limitless number of sauces and vegetable preparations that vary from, town to town, village to village, and from family to family.

DOC Wines

Controlled Designation of Origin (DOC): or in Italian  Denominazione di Origine Controllata . guarantees that the wine in question is of high quality and meets strict production standards, including the variety of grape , where they are grown, and the wine making techniques.

DOCG : Denominazione di Origine Controllata e Garantita (DOGC), The wines with the label DOCG on the neck of the bottle are more exclusive than the DOC wines and are subjected to an additional set of strict regulations  regarding their history, geographical area and quality.

DOP 

Denominazione d'Origine Protetta | Protected Designation of Origin. The DOP label guarantees that  cheese, prosciutto, olive oil, and a myriad of other products are produced, processed, and packaged in a specific area and made by traditional methods. Examples of the best-known products that have received D.O.P certification are Grana Padano cheese, Parmigiano Reggiano cheese,  Aceto Balsamico ((balsamic vinegar), from Modena,  Arancia di Ribera (oranges), Capocollo di Calabria (pork salumi),  Culatello di Zibello ham, Fontina cheese, and Mozzarella di Bufala cheese.  

Prosciutto Crudo

Did you think that prosciutto crudo was synonymous with the city of  Parma on the Po River? There are many different types of Italian cured ham, and there are millions of campaniles ( local patriots ) that would not hesitate to tell you that the prosciutto in their region is the best.

Prosciutto is a ham that is cured by thoroughly washing, salting, and slowly aging leg of pork in an environment with controlled temperature and humidity. The process takes months and produces, a soft, rich prosciutto with a distinct flavor depending on its region of origin, the race of pig and its diet. Here are several of the most well-known types of  prosciutto crudo, produced under the D.O.P. regulations, and a little of  their history.

Prosciutto di Parma

Perhaps the best known prosciutto, is Prosciutto di Parma from the area of Parma along the Po River, in the province of Emilia Romagna.  This delicate ham has been made in the same way since the days of the Roman Empire, and represents one of the best known foods of the  Italian culinary tradition, and sets the standard for Italian cured hams and meats. Only traditional  breeds of pigs are used in the production of Prosciutto di Parma and  must come from the  northern and central Italian regions. Parma ham’s special taste comes from  their diet of grains and cereals and the whey that is left from the manufacture of Parmigiano Reggiano cheese.

Prosciutto San Danielle

Prosciutto San Danielle comes from the region of Friuli-Venezia Giulia  between the Dolemite Mountains and the Adriatic Sea in the hilly area around the town of San Daniele in the province of Udine.  Prosciutto di San Daniele is sweeter and darker in color with a more delicate flavor than other varieties of prosciutto crudo and is cured using only local sea salt.

Prosciutto di Norcia

In the province of Norcia in the mountainous regions of Umbria, , the tradition of pig breeding and the curing of meat dates back to Roman times.  The different types of Prosciutto that are produced there are aged slowly, from twelve months up to two years and are famous for their delicately spiced flavor.

Culatello di Zibella  from Emilio Romagna

Regarded as the best of the of Italian hams, with a tradition dating back to the 14th century, Culatello di Zibello is one of the most prized products of Emilia Romagna. It is  made only in Parma and in a few nearby villages, from pigs that are indigenous to the area. It is tender and rich in flavor, cut from the best part of the whole fresh ham, and  cured with a mixture of salt, pepper, garlic and dry white wine. It is then packed into a pig’s bladder, and tied with twine like a salami. This careful and time consuming process, combined with quality ingredients, contributes to its high price.

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Prosecco

There are certain things that are synonymous with Italy and they all begin with the letter P. Pasta, Pizza, Pane, Prosecco, Parmesan, Prosciutto

Ai Scalzi” literally translated from Italian means “bare foot, “and is the name of a trattoria near Canal Grande in Venice.  I sat at a table under its awning and jotted down a story about shoes that was inspired by its name and some childhood  memories.

The waiter, who a half hour before, had served me cappuccino, saw my note pad, smiled,  and asked me what I was writing, and I said that I was writing about shoes. Explaining the restaurant’s name, he said philosophically, Ai Scalzi is the right place to think about shoes,” and added, with a glint in his eye that I couldn’t interpret, “Shoes are like a window to the heart”  as though I was sitting at an ashram meditating, and not a Venetian restaurant sipping a cappuccino.

“May I bring you something else ” he offered, and added with Italian grace, “Now that it is almost noon, perhaps you would like some Prosecco? ”  Of course I would. Who would say no to viewing Venice over the rim of a chilled flute of its famous sparkling wine.  I was enjoying a moment in the sun, and Prosecco is a wine for the moment.

Serving

How to impress your friends but at the risk of being pretentious.

If you're a serious drinker of Prosecco, the Italian sparkling wine, suitable for every occasion, here  are a few  tips. In the event you have friends  over for an  aperitivo, or just a pre-dinner drink, impress them  with your ability to serve  your sparkling wine properly.

Firstly,  go up market.  Go to an enoteca and see that you buy DOCG, and then explain what DOCG is and its importance.

Second, hold a little discourse on “la gabbietta, “the wire cage that prevents the cork from sliding out under pressure.)  It is the same on all sparkling wines and always takes exactly six counterclockwise twists to remove.

Third, give a demonstration on how to  open the bottle. Hold the cork in one hand and twist the bottle, holding it, at a 45 degree angle with your thumb over the cork. Never let the cork pop out and the wine run out of the bottle; let the gas out gently to preserve the bubbles.

Lastly, serve it well chilled in a fluted or stemmed glass, tipping it at an angle and slowly filling it to 2 cm. under the rim.

“Cin, Cin”

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Some facts about Italy’s famous sparkling wine.

The traditional grape used in Prosecco is called  “Glera,” and it’s use for wine dates  back to Roman times. 

The Glera grapes are pressed and then fermented into a base wine then fermented twice, the second with sugar and yeast to create its effervescence.

The origin of the sparkling wine was in a small town called Prosecco near Trieste, on the border of Croatia. 

The Prosecco Region surrounds Venice from the Adriatic Sea to the foot hills of The Dolemite Mountains.

Prosecco is the best-selling Italian wine in the world, more bottles of Prosecco are sold globally than even French Champagne.

Good news for dieters. One glass of Prosecco has around 80-90 calories compared to red wine which has around 120-125 calories.

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Pasta

What is simpler than harvesting wheat, milling it into flour and mixing it with water? Did Marco polo bring pasta to Italy from China where it had been eaten for centuries? Did  Arab traders take it to Sicily from North Africa, or was it already eaten during the times of the Roman Empire? And does it matter who was first, and where this iconic food originated, because, we are all thankful to  the Italians, who gave this magical fare to the rest of the world.       

What would a life, or a meal be without pasta.  If you asked an Italian, they might quote Federico Fellini, Italy’s renowned film makare. ( La Dolce Vita - The Sweet Life )".  “Life is a combination of magic and pasta," he said.

Italian cuisine without pasta is unthinkable.  It's the fuel that keeps Italy going and it’s difficult to imagine an Italian meal without it in some form. The average Italian consumes an impressive 23 kilograms of pasta annually, fresh and dried, in countless shapes, sizes and textures with a huge variety of fillings and sauces.

When the pasta is of good quality, the rest of the magic is in pairing the right shape correctly with a good sauce.

Each type and shape of pasta, is designed for a specific kind of sauce. As an example, a heavy sauce clings better to the ridges on rigatoni. Thin strands of spaghetti do the same for lighter smoother types of sauces.  Here is a  simple guide to some common pasta  types and their sauce pairings, knowledge that an Italian nonna, housewife, or cook imbibes with their mother’s milk, but we foreigners have to learn.   

Long  thin pasta =  Thin lighter, smoother or delicate  types of sauces like marina or oil based sauces like mussel or vongole cling easily to the thin strands of spaghetti.

 Long  wide pasta = For Alfredo or creamy sauces, broad pasta shapes like tagliatelle or fettuccine are best. Pair long, ribbon pasta shapes such as tagliatelle, pappardelle or fettuccine, with rich, meaty sauces.

Tubular pasta =  For example, penne, ziti, and rigatoni ( ridged pasta ) are versatile shapes that fit well with thick or chunky vegetable or meat sauces like Bolognese. They also go well together with creamy sauces.

Small pasta = Casarecce for light sauces. Orecchiette has a concave shape that is perfect  for scooping up rich and creamy cheese sauces or chunky tomato sauces. 

Very small pasta = For example, pastine and orzo, are very small pasta shapes that  disappear in a typical pasta sauce, but  are ideal in soups and broths.

Pasta mista =There is one pasta dish that combines all of the above. Traditional Pasta mista, (mixed pasta) is from a time when dried pasta was sold in bulk. Pasta mista is typical of the Italian cucina povera, that is well-known for making a satisfying meal from ingredients that might otherwise be thrown away. Traditionally pasta was sold loose and the broken and damaged bits that were less desirable, were sold by weight as an inexpensive alternative, and used to fill out soups, bean, potato and vegetable dishes. Today different forms of  pasta mista can be found packaged on supermarket shelves.

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 Who Produces the Best Pasta?

If there is one brand of pasta that is synonymous with Abruzzo and Vasto, it is Di Cecco from the town of Faro San Martino, tucked into the foot of the Maiella mountain. This world famous pasta is made from  two high quality ingredients, duram wheat from the fields of the Abruzzo hillsides and the mineral rich water from the snow fed mountain springs of the Maiella Massive.

However, pasta aficionados might enthusiastically point out that DiCecco pasta, excellent as it may be, is surpassed by another pasta from Fara San Martino.  Artisanally produced pasta from the small Cocco factory, is still made in the same way that its founder, the Pastai Mastri  Domenico Cocco did a hundred and fifty years ago, and his knowledge has been passed on to his descendants who have the same sense of pride in their product.  

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Tips and Trivia

Pasta started out as a cucina povera food, predominately in the south where it was made without eggs and simply with flour and water. Traditionally, pasta was the staple of the south and the north ate rice and polenta. 

Spaghetti  Chitarra is a Vasto favorite. It gets its name from a wooden frame that is strung with metal wires. Sheets of pasta are pressed down with a roller, and then the wires are "strummed" so the strands of pasta fall through. Spaghetti  Chitarra is often served with vongole, olive oil, and pomodorini datterini (cherry tomatoes).

Cook all pasta al dente in lots of well salted  water. An Italian cook will tell you, “ that the pasta water should have the same salinity as the sea.” And importantly, the pasta is always mixed into the sauce to coat it well.

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Choosing a Restaurant, A Few Useful Suggestions 

Le Guide Rouge de Michelin is very prestigious and its recommendation sought after by gourmet chefs and high-end restaurateurs, but when we shopped or went out to eat, I joked with my friends and asked how many stars the restaurant or shop had in the Guide d’Amici di Ambrosia. The recommendation of my discerning friends was, in my eyes, the most reliable.

Sometimes a restaurant isn’t anything more than a place to eat. At its best, it's a place where we share and make memories, a place that not only nourishes the body but the spirit. If you have been to Italy and come home and say that the food was  unimpressive, you might have had bad luck or made bad choices. In Search of the perfect restaurant? Use your eyes, nose and intuition, plus a little common sense. In every city, village or town, there are small trattorias and restaurants, with unremarkable exteriors, but where you can find remarkable food. 

Often it’s a growling stomach that dictates where we eat. When we are hungry, human nature wants us to find food quickly. It can lead to bad decisions and to bad choices. Instead, look  for a restaurant early in the day before you are hungry and will settle for almost anything. Book a table if you can, and then do your sightseeing and go back.  Walk  a few blocks in from the tourist traps and away from the generic menus and rush of sightseers. Take a side street or back alley, step away from the seafront or the majestic view.  It is not always the price of the meal you pay for.  A view or a central location means  higher rent and increased prices. 

Follow some advice from the renowned chef Jaques Pepin: Go in look around , are you pleasantly received, how are the tables set? Is the restaurant clean?  Are the bathrooms clean? Cleanliness is synonymous with pride, not only in the premises, but also in the meal. 

My personal preference is a trattoria, with a dozen or so tables, where the cook comes out and explains what dishes they are serving that day, or the menu is hand written on a blackboard. 

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What to Look For Before You Choose a Restaurant

My friends are appreciative and knowledgeable gourmands, and on all subjects concerning food, they have their individual preferences and opinions. When they go out to eat, they want to eat food that's as good as or better than the traditional meals they have eaten all their lives. They  understand the dishes that are being served and feel they know how they should be prepared, and will not hesitate to give their opinions, if they feel that something  does not come up to standard. Here are a few guidelines that I’ve learned from them. 

Avoid places with plasticized menus, translated into different languages, and be especially wary if they have photos and too many choices. The risk is that  the ingredients come from a freezer and not the local market.

Look for a menu that is posted outside the entrance door. It tells you much more about the restaurant than its location and its facade. 

 A restaurant that serves only a half dozen primi and as many secondo is a safe bet, as that number is what the average restaurant  kitchen can reasonably prepare  from scratch.  

 A chalk board  with a hand written menu can be a good indicator of a restaurant  with a selection that follows the seasons and availability. Even better, the cook comes out and tells you what he is making that day.

Ask someone to help you find a restaurant that serves local and regional dishes with seasonably available ingredients.

Choose a restaurant with Italian hours only usually 12:00 pm to 3:00 pm, and 8:00 pm to 11:00 pm. Restaurants that are open all day usually cater to tourists, and sacrifice quality for speed.   

House wine is usually local or regional and of good quality at a sensible price.

Avoid places with a hawker standing outside enticing tourists to come in.

Don’t trust trip adviser.

A good omen is when you walk past a restaurant at 7:00 PM., before it opens for customers, and see the personnel sitting together having dinner. It conveys the feeling of teamwork and conviviality.

And finally open your ears and eyes. Not only does the menu speak to you, if you see only Italians, the cuisine is more likely to be authentic. Local people won’t hesitate to criticize a meal, or service if they are dissatisfied.

At the Table

There isn’t a dress code. A jacket and tie aren’t expected or required. It is understood that everyone knows what appropriate dress and behavior is.

You aren’t required to order several courses.  

Eat your pasta when it comes to the table, even if the other members of your party haven't received theirs.

When you have booked, the table is yours for the evening. You won’t be rushed out after you’ve finished your meal.

You don’t have to ask for the bill. In most restaurants you pay the cashier, who has your table and bill noted and tallied.

Pay "A la Romana" It is common to divide the bill equally.

Credit cards are always accepted, but cash is everyone’s friend.

Tipping is not required and is included in the coperto - service charge.

Have you spilled oil or sauce on your blouse or shirt? In most restaurants you will find talcum powder and a brush in the lavatory. 

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Dessert?

What is better to top of a good meal than a slice of rich, velvety tiramasu, dusted with cocoa. Tiramisu is popular around the world  and like cannoli has become synonymous with Italian cuisine and its many desserts. There are quite a few variations on its bottom of coffee drenched savoiardi biscuits and  creamy mascarpone filling, but making it is fairly uncomplicated, and always appreciated. I've always found my friend Nunzia's traditional recipe to be best.

Here is her recipe.

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Gelato

Ice cream is one of those small earthly pleasures that Italy is so famous for, and you should take every chance you get to experience it.

Italians seem to have an unbreakable bond to ice cream. If there was a book titled,” The World According to Ice Cream Lovers,” the first chapter would be “A Day Without Ice Cream is a Day Lost.”

Of course, there is a lot more to life than ice cream. Life has relationships, children, joys and sorrows, work and rest, but what would life be without that creamy goodness.

So-Maybe after you’ve eaten that satisfying restaurant meal, and that classical tiramisu, or crema catalana or that velvety panacotta doesen’t tempt you, finish up with an amaro or a chilled limoncello, and then go out into the seductive Italian night, listen to the pleasant chatter of the people as they take their passeggiata, and find a suitable gelateria.

If pasta is the fuel that keeps Italy moving, ice cream ( gelato) is the elixir that nourishes its spirit. It is the universal feel- good food that transcends race, religion, politics and origin, and speaks a language that everyone, from toddlers taking their first steps, to centenarians nearing their last, understands. Whether you eat it cupped or coned, it is one of those undeniable Italian pleasures, and  one of the few topics that everyone agrees upon. 

Do like the Italians do after an evening meal, 'Fare una passeggiata.' 

Take a walk through the town square, which is  done more socially than for exercise, and translates roughly as, "take a leisurely stroll. " Passegiata is a traditional cultural institution throughout Italy, and is an opportunity to greet friends and acquaintances. What's the best thing to do while on your after dinner walk?  Visit a gelataria and take your walk with an ice cream cone in hand, or with a cup of your favorite flavors, find a bench or someplace to sit, and enjoy the evening.

 Some flavors to tempt you.

vaniglia - vanilla

cioccolato - chocolate

fragola - strawberry

limone - lemon

 melone - melon

 frutti di bosco - fruits of the forest

 nocciola - hazelnut

 stracciatella - vanilla with chocolate pieces

bacio -chocolate with whole hazelnuts, Nutella

 pistacchio - pistachio

And my favorite, ciliegia -  cherry

If one flavor doesn't seem to be enough because there are so many to choose from,  order a scoop on the bottom, a different in the middle, and a third on top.

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Cibo Locale – Small Scale Seasonal  Produce 

Small scale consumption is based on personal relationships and social interaction between the buyer and the seller. Small scale is having respect and solidarity with the cook and the diner in the amiable atmosphere of a local restaurant. It is an appreciation of  the farmer who brings his produce to the market. It might be knowing the person who butchered the hog and made the sausage, and using oil and drinking wine that comes from the groves and vineyards that surround your town. Small scale is buying bread from the neighborhood baker, purchasing fruit and vegetables from the local market stalls, and supporting  artisans and businesses that are the life blood of any town or village.

Ever since my first trip to Italy many years ago, I have been struck by the fact that the Italian people have managed to preserve the uniqueness and diversity of their culture. Where ever you are, from the cliffs and valleys of the Dolomite Mountains in the north, to Sicily in the south, or if you walk through the lanes of a remote hill village, or the alleys and streets of Naples or Rome, you can’t take more than a few hundred steps without seeing at least one bakery, salumeria, pescheria,  fruit stand, or any other number of small specialty shops.

How Italians shop for ingredients, therefore, is one of the most important parts of their cuisine. Fresh or artisanal ingredients are the vital core of Italian cookery, and you can’t expect to find them in a chain supermarket, shipped from around the world, where vegetables are put in ripening chambers and wrapped in plastic, and cattle and poultry are fed hormones to speed their growth.

All you have to do is compare a sun warmed tomato, fertilized naturally and ripened on the vine, with a hot house tomato fed by a  nutrient solution and grown under lights, then de-greened and ripened  in a warehouse chamber with ethylene gas to understand the difference. 

Facing the reality that there are many foods that supermarkets overlook, because of a short shelf life and an inability for farmers to harvest them mechanically,  I feel, that there is a generation coming that won’t experience anything other than food from large scale, industrialized producers.

A Caveat

Will small scale traditional agriculture and local production  of food stuffs, that gives us such high quality ingredients, disappear  when a generation matures  that doesn’t have a traditional connection to the land? If this happens, there is also the strong possibility that there will be an incremental change in traditional cuisine , as older generations recede, and trends and influences from other parts of the world  seep in.  As they disappear  international supermarkets  with industrial produced vegetables, cheeses and meats will replace the small scale artisanal, that gives Italian food its superb ingredients.

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Small Scale Not Only Food 

The Hardware Store - Ferramente Forte

The  dozen wood screws, I bought last time I was in, were neatly wrapped in a sheet of newspaper torn from La Stampa, instead of packaged in a zip-lock plastic bag.

You might walk past this small hardware store tucked into a corner of Piazza Rosetti  without noticing it. The only hint that there was a business there is an unpretentious sign that reads “ Ferramente Forte”. When I walked through the door for the first time and into the dimly lit store, it was as though I entered a cultural time machine that transported me back to an earlier era, before franchises with a standardized inventory or internet shopping existed. I found a place of hidden treasures where I could get a key painstakingly made to fit an uncooperative lock, a can of varnish or paint , a brush, a trowel, a latch, or just some good advice.

In Ferramente Forte’s diverse array of stock, there was almost anything you might need in the way of hardware and tools for your home, stacked and displayed in the same way they might have been six or seven decades ago, when the current owner Vittorio Forte's grandfather started the store. 

Inside those walls  were  memories of a rapidly disappearing age, when shopping was on a personal level. Like treasures from a buried time capsule, those well-ordered shelves  were as far from the sterility of a modern home improvement store as you could get, and when you bought something, if there was a need, you could get advice about how it was to be used, or the recommendation of a tradesman who could help you.

* Ferramente = Hardware 

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Pane                                            

"Give us this day our daily bread:"  A prayer from a time when bread was a staple food, instead of a spongy filler wrapped in plastic.

No feeling can compare to that of setting foot in a small neighborhood bakery in the morning and breathing in the sweet scents of fresh bread!  

Good bread is a simple food with simple ingredients: flour, water, yeast and salt and it is  said, that this simple food is the reason that civilization exists in the way we know it today. But in a supermarket in the Western World, it’s difficult to find a commercial loaf of bread that would sustain life for any  amount of time.  The differences between an artisanal bakery’s bread made by traditional methods and an industrial loaf have to do with quality, taste and nutrition.

If you compare a list of ingredients for an industrial loaf of bread, to that of an artisanal loaf, you will inevitably notice a big difference in the length of the lists and the amount of chemicals used. Bread from artisanal bakeries is made  from flour, water, sourdough and salt.  industrial bread, on the other hand, contains about a dozen additives, including not only preservatives, but acid regulators, emulsifiers, flour improvers, flour treatment agents, bleaching agents, and sometimes  coloring.  Add to that, the hard milling of the wheat to make the flour that is used in these breads, destroys the  natural vitamins, so synthetic ones are added. Instead of twenty-four hours, an industrial loaf rises in twenty minutes.  Since the industrial method favors quantity and speed rather than quality, the dough needs help from a large portion artificial gluten, which is known to cause allergies in many people. An artisanal loaf takes time. It ferments  slowly and uses a better quality of wheat with natural gluten, which helps the bread rise and hold moisture. The superior nutrition and taste of a hearty artisanal bread is created during the long proofing time.  In this case simplicity is best!

Photo- Stanici

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My Bread 

Mola, is the Latin and Italian word for millstone- Maybe a fitting name for someone who enjoys baking.

Pane Caserecccio from Casa Mola, My Recipe

Bread is the center of Italian cuisine. There are hundreds of types of bread in Italy that vary from region to region and from baker to baker.

Bread, one of the most ancient of foods, is just a  simple combination of milled wheat, water and leavening.   I started baking  more than fifty years ago when I had difficulty finding bread that was both healthy, satisfying and tasty. Instead of the “staff of life,” the only bread that I found on the grocery store shelves, wasn’t the nutritious staple that has sustained people through the millenniums, but something that resembled moist sponge cake wrapped in plastic.

What makes a good bread?  Quality flour, slow fermentation and an understanding of the process.  Learn the craft, practice, experiment, and you’ll be able to bake any type of yeast bread.

My recipe for one large loaf.

Ingredients:

400 g. stone ground flour with a high protein and gluten content ( *hard winter wheat types as opposed to softer spring wheat)

200 g. stone ground whole wheat or rye  flour

5 grams fresh yeast

400 g. water

20 g. salt

The Dough:

Dissolve the fresh yeast in the water.

Slowly blend the flour mixture and salt to a dough. It will be somewhat sticky and loose. (The dough will come together as gluten forms during proofing.)

Cover the bowl with a damp cloth or plastic film and place it in the refrigerator for one hour.

Remove the dough from the fridge, stretch it and fold it under, repeating the process 5 or 6 times. Return it to the fridge for approximately 10 hours.

*After removal, repeat the folding procedure, form the dough into a ball and place it in a flour dusted proofing basket at room temperature for the final rise, until it doubles in volume. Approximately 4-5 hours.

Baking

I bake this bread in a thick bottomed cast iron pot with a lid.

Preheat the oven including pot and lid at 250 degrees for about 30 minutes.

Flop the formed bread into the preheated pot. Score the bread across the top to facilitate an even rise,  and bake for 20 minutes.

After 20 minutes remove the lid, and bake for another 20 -25 minutes.

The loaf is ready when it is golden brown and when you tap it, it gives off a hollow sound.

*Winter wheat varieties have better baking properties. They hold more water during fermentation and proofing and make a loaf with better structure and volume. 

*Advantages of a long fermentation:  the bread will be easier to digest, be tastier and its vitamins and minerals are more easily absorbed by the body.

Some Useful terms

Proofing basket- Helps a loose, high hydration dough, maintain its shape during the final rise. 

The more yeast the shorter the fermentation time. Most cookbooks have  bread recipes that use 25 to 50 grams of yeast for a bread with 600 grams of flour and 400 grams of water. These doughs are kneaded in a mixer in order to form the gluten strands that hold moisture and give the loaf structure. 

Fermentation –The first rise

Proofing - The second rise after the dough is shaped into a loaf.

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Carciofi from Cuppello

Each town across Italy has its own regional dishes that represent the very best of local produce and recipes. Try to find out what they are in the region or town that you are visiting. Ask what is in season, and where it is served. 

Regardless of the season, I am always amazed when I travel, whether it’s to a large city or  a  mountain village, when I stumble upon a festival honoring the region’s produce or delicacies. There always seems to be an event or holiday to  celebrate  them, or sometimes, the specialties themselves are reason enough to celebrate.

Cuppello is a village outside of Vasto in Abruzzo whose fertile fields are famous for their prized artichokes. The growers there harvest and sell over three million every year throughout Italy, and every April the town's chamber of commerce celebrate them with a festival that fills the streets with both  residents and visitors. When they are in season  you can eat pasta with carciofi ragu as well as one of the most popular local dishes, artichokes stuffed with a mix of cheese and eggs. Local restaurants serve a soup with artichokes and beans, and in the street stalls during the festival you can find  them in omelets,  grilled, boiled, baked or in lasagna or a delicate soup made from the stems. (Season – March to April)

Recipe from Anna – soup from the stems

Recipe - Carciofi Ripiene

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Carcioffi,Vasto and Cuppello 

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   Coffee         

Coffee came to Italy from Egypt and the middle east in the 16 th century and became so popular, that it was considered a Devil’s brew and condemned by the Catholic Church.  Legend has it, that the Pope Clement VIII tasted it, blessed it and exclaimed, “This drink is so delicious  it would be a pity to let the infidels have exclusive use of it."

According to Catholic dogma, the Pope who is the leader of the Church, is infallible regarding statements concerning doctrine and Church law. In 1650 divine  protection from making a mistake, was obviously even extended  to such temporal issues as coffee. 

And since then, drinking coffee  has been a special part of the Italian culture, to the extent that there are 15 billion cups of espresso brewed and served in the Republic every year, by an estimated 250,00 professional baristas.

Coffee Etiquette – How to drink coffee like an Italian.

The normal Italian coffee drinker stops at a café, orders a caffe’ normale , mixes in a spoonful of sugar and downs it in three gulps standing at the bar, followed by a small glass of water.

There is an understated sophistication  to the Italian way of brewing and drinking coffee. Like the cuisine, their attitude is, keep it uncomplicated. Let the quality of the ingredients speak for themselves. 

When you order coffee in Italy the term espresso isn’t used. You simply ask for caffe’ or  caffe’ normale.  A macchiato is an espresso with a dollop of steamed milk. An americano or caffe’ longo is an espresso with a little hot water added. If you ask for a latte, the Italian word for milk, that is just what you are going to get, a cup full of milk. 

 Simple is best in the Italian culinary world and coffee is no exception. Italians  are coffee purists, and there aren’t any alchemic short cuts that change poor ingredients to good ones. The beans should be of good quality and darkly roasted and the brew a little bitter with a brown froth or crema. If you drink coffee in Milan in the north, or in Palermo in Sicily, the quality and taste are the same.  An Italian scoffs at the idea of foreign coffee chains adulterating their coffee with spices and  flavored syrups, something they consider a sacrilege.

 Many cafes have a few small tables, inside or outside, and it's a pleasant way to meet friends. For a slightly higher price, patrons can sit for a while and relax while drinking their coffee.  When you order, you can go in, or a server will come out to you.  To make a perfect morning, order a cornetto with your cappuccino.

 When you are finished you pay the cashier. As in other restaurants tips are not expected.

The Water Divide

A small glass of water is usually served with your coffee. Do you drink it before or after your coffee? There are two schools of thought.

Before- Water cleanses the palate, preparing it for the aromas and tastes that are to come.

After- Caffe’ Normale is strong and bitter and drinking a glass of water afterward enhances and balances its flavor and cleans your teeth and breath.

For obvious reasons, your companions might prefer that you do the latter.

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Aperitivo

Aperitivo (also called aperitif in French) is a small meal or snack eaten in the early evening. It is enjoyed  by Italians everywhere, and comes in many forms, depending on where in Italy you are. 

The same cafes that serve coffee in the mornings and afternoons, often serve an inexpensive aperitivo between six and eight p.m., that consists of an alcoholic beverage often with a small  assortment of cheeses, bruschetta, crostini, small sandwiches, chips and antipasti. For a price that is a little more than what you would pay for a drink alone, you can sit an hour and watch passers-by as they slowly take their evening passeggiata.

Open the Stomach

The experience of taking an aperitivo isn’t only  a cultural ritual, it is one of those social occasions that is meant to slow us down a bit after a hectic day, and that makes an Italian evening so memorable. The word  aperitivo is derived from the Latin aperire, (open) and the drink and small array of finger-food is meant “to open” the stomach before dining, or simply put, it is an appetizer before your real dinner begins at eight or nine o’clock.

There is also a more substantial variation, and is a hybrid combining aperitivo and cena (dinner) a meal that is called an “apericena,” that includes more substantial dishes. 

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Cappuccino at One O'clock? Or - The Customer Isn't Always Right.

What does good coffee need? Assuming that is made with the correct amount of water, brewed at the right temperature, made from beans that are properly roasted and of the right quality, and in the Sicilian town of Corleone, just as important, serving the right kind of coffee at the right time of day.

An Italian would never order milky, sweet cappuccino after eleven o’clock, but that deadline wasn’t carved in stone, and in some places, there could be exceptions for tourists who didn’t know any better. But I was in Corleone, in the heart of Sicily, where the inhabitants obviously took their coffee drinking very seriously, and where the threshold for breaking that rule was low. Unspoken rules are a thorny maze for a traveler, and some cultural lessons are learned empirically, that is to say, the hard way. When I ordered a cappuccino at two o’clock in the heat of the Sicilian afternoon, the barista's facial expression wasn’t one of tolerant understanding for the idiosyncrasies of tourists, or did he take the time to patiently explain to me that civilized people drink spitzers or light beverages after 11 o’clock. Instead, he rolled his eyes and put his forefinger, middle finger and thumb to his head in imitation of a pistol. His eyes narrowed to slits and his jaw tightened when he snarled, “Cappuccino, NOW,” I quickly apologized, remembering that this was Corleone, where tempers had a reputation for being short. With self preservation in mind, I didn't need further explanation, and  quickly decided that I'd like a lemon soda.

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   Pizza

“Man shall not live by bread  alone.” From the gospel of Matthew 4:4. 

Italy has given many gifts to the world, but the most known and loved is Pizza. Not Latin, the fundament on which many languages are built, not its Renaissance philosophers and masters in painting and music, not its world heritage treasures, sculpturers, inventors or explorers, but a simple flatbread that was made and eaten by the poor. 

If I were  to generalize, I would say that the meal of choice when people go out in the evening with family or friends, is pizza.  It’s relatively inexpensive and difficult to make in a normal oven. Another reason is, with the exception of pizza, people feel that restaurant fare never quite  measures up to what is prepared in most home kitchens.  

At the Table

Your server hands you a menu and then stands hunched over his or her order pad, waiting for you to make a decision. You pour over it for the third time, overwhelmed by at least a dozen choices. Hmmm. Would it be some type of pizza rosse, or maybe a quattro formaggi from the pizza bianchi column, or maybe a pizza speciali, with prosciutto, or maybe one with anchovie or salsice ?  The perfect pizza though, is the one you like, and it’s different for everyone. 

A diner could be a bit overwhelmed with so much to choose from, but I never have to look at the menu. For me, it’s a classic Neopolitan Margherita, elegantly simple, with San Marzano tomatoes, buffalo mozzarella and fresh basil leaves, topping a supple bottom with a puffy, airy, crust.  

The history of the Pizza that is at the top of every Italian pizzeria’s menu.

In 1889 a Neopolitan pizzaiuolo baked three different pizzas for the visit of King Umberto and Queen margarita to the city. The Queen's favorite was one with  the colors of the Italian flag—red from tomato sauce, white from mozzarella cheese and green from basil leaves. The story goes  that this combination was named The Pizza Margherita in her honor.

What to Drink

When you imagine Italy, you might think of vineyards on rolling hills, stemmed glasses and carafes filled with rich red or shimmering white wine, but when you are sitting in a crowded pizzeria, you'll probably see people drinking something that you didn't expect.

One thing that surprises a foreigner, is that Italians probably won't drink wine with their pizza, and it’s not unusual to see a pitcher of biera alla spina ( beer from the tap) on the table. The crisp, tartness of the beer compliments the richness of the pizza's tomato and cheese, without compromising or detracting from their tastes. 

Another surprise might be, seeing diners while waiting for their orders to arrive,  digging into a starter of French fries, or vegetables that have been lightly dredged in flour and deep fried. 

And one more surprise- If you ask for your pizza to be sliced, pizza is unsliced in Italy, your server might come to the table with a scissor or even a pruning shear. 

Pay the Check , Pagata Alla Romana

One major difference between Italian restaurants and those in other countries, is that when you are finished eating in an Italian pizzeria or trattoria,  you are not rushed to pay the bill and leave. When you've finished your meal, had your coffee and amaro or limoncello, and are ready to go, you or someone in your party goes to the cash register, usually the designated mathematician in the group, and divides the bill equally. Tipping isn't usual or required, and is included in the service charge. 

Wood fired oven or Electric. An expert opinion.

“When the moon in the sky hits your eye like a big pizza pie, that’s amore.”

There is a collective zest for food, and pride in its preparation, that is unique  to the Italian spirit. I unexpectedly experienced that one evening at a pizzeria in a seaside village in Campania, where it seemed that the pizzaiola there was much more interested in giving me a proper memory of his village, than baking me a pizza. “ My pizzas are good” he said, before I sat down, but if you want the best, go to my friend across the square. He bakes his in a traditional brick oven." He placed  his forefinger to his cheek and said, "They are "ottimo.”

Imagine someone saying that while taking your order at a Pizza Hut. ( American fast-food pizza chain )

The Classical Neopolitan Pizza, From Neopolitan Street Food to Cult.

Flour, salt, yeast and  passion

If you were to walk through any Italian city, town, or village, through its lanes and alleys, past shops and stores, bakeries and  markets, it won’t take you long to find a pizzeria. In Italy finding a good pizza is as easy as ABC, but finding a great pizza, one that’s worth eating down to that last bite of crust, and still want more, requires that you go to Naples. At least that’s what the il Napolitano will tell you.

In Naples  pizza isn’t just a food but a cultural symbol, and a part of its  identity. It is made from a handful of quality ingredients, and with its roots deep in its history. Accordingly, in 2017, Neopolitan pizza was designated a  *Unesco "Intangible Cultural Heritage".

In order to make a true Neopolitan style pizza the list of requirements that help to preserve its traditions are stringent and overseen by the Associazione Verace Pizza Napoletana, AVPN, The True Neopolitan Pizza Association. 

Note: Pizza in Naples is taken seriously. The AVPN document for the making of a true Neopolitan pizza comprimises 28 pages, meticulously covering size, preparation, ingredients, leavening and proofing, type of oven, and wood used to fire it, baking temperature, toppings etc. 

* The Intangible Cultural Heritage  designation, is an important factor in maintaining and preserving cultural diversity in a world of growing globalization. 

Some tips on how to eat pizza like a native.

One— Order a beer and some french fries while you look at the menu and choose a topping

Two—Get a knife, scissors or garden shears ( in Italy you get pizza unsliced )

Three- Cut the pizza into wedges

Four- Fold a slice from the outside corners or, eat it like a native , fold from the middle, one side over the other

Five- Tilt the slice so the toppings flow into your mouth- okay to make appreciative noises, including slurping

Six - Alternative to five. Bend the front corner and take a bite.

Seven - Enjoy

Eight- Ask your dinner companion if he/she is going to leave that uneaten slice on the plate.

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Pasta 

What is simpler than harvesting wheat, milling it into flour and mixing it with water? Did Marco polo bring pasta to Italy from China where it had been eaten for centuries? Did  Arab traders take it to Sicily from North Africa, or was it already eaten during the times of the Roman Empire? And does it matter who was first, and where this iconic food originated, because, all pasta lovers are grateful to  the Italians, who gave this magical fare to the rest of the world. 

Pasta is the fuel that keeps Italy going and it’s difficult to imagine an Italian meal without it in some form. The average Italian consumes an impressive 23 kilograms of pasta annually and Italian cuisine without pasta is unthinkable.  Pasta is the heart of the rich Italian culinary culture and is eaten in countless shapes, sizes and textures with a huge variety of fillings and sauces.

What would a life, or a meal be without pasta.  If you asked an Italian, they might quote Federico Fellini, Italy’s renowned film maker. ( La Dolce Vita - The Sweet Life )".  “Life is a combination of magic and pasta," he said.

The word Pasta, the  mixture of water or egg with flour, literally translated into English from Italian,  is the word for paste. When the paste  mixture is  kneaded and  rolled out, the dough becomes the base for hundreds of shapes and variations.

What do you think of  when Italian pasta comes to mind? Is it long short, tubular, flat,  homemade, artisanal, fresh or dried? Everyone recognizes spaghetti, lasagna, penne, fusilli, ravioli, fettuccine. A person might spend a whole lifetime looking for all the others and never taste them all.  

When the pasta is of good quality, the rest of the magic is in pairing the right shape correctly  with a good sauce.

Each type and shape of pasta, is designed for a specific kind of sauce. As an example, a heavy sauce clings better to the ridges on rigatoni. Thin strands of spaghetti do the same for lighter smoother types of sauces.  Here is a  simple guide to some common pasta types and their sauce pairings, knowledge that an Italian nonna, housewife, or cook, imbibes with their mother’s milk, but we foreigners have to learn.  

Pasta Shapes

Long  thin pasta =  Thin lighter, smoother or delicate  types of sauces like marina or oil based sauces like mussel or vongole cling easily to the thin strands of spaghetti.

 Long  wide pasta = For Alfredo or creamy sauces, broad pasta shapes like tagliatelle or fettuccine are best. Pair long, ribbon pasta shapes such as tagliatelle, pappardelle or fettuccine, with rich, meaty sauces.

Tubular pasta =  For example, penne, ziti, and rigatoni ( ridged pasta ) are versatile shapes that fit well with thick or chunky vegetable or meat sauces like Bolognese. They also go well together with creamy sauces.

Small pasta = Casarecce is suitable for light sauces. Orecchiette has a concave shape that is perfect  for scooping up rich and creamy cheese sauces or chunky tomato sauces. 

Tiny pasta = For example, pastine and orzo,  are very small pasta shapes that  disappear in a typical pasta sauce, but  are ideal in soups and broths.

Pasta mista =There is one pasta dish that combines all of the above. Traditional Pasta mista, (mixed pasta) is from a time when dried pasta was sold in bulk. Pasta mista is typical of the Italian cucina povera, that is well-known for making a satisfying meal from ingredients that might otherwise be thrown away. Traditionally pasta was sold loose and the broken and damaged bits that were less desirable, were sold by weight as an inexpensive alternative, and used to fill out soups, bean, potato and vegetable dishes. Today different forms of  pasta mista can be found packaged on supermarket shelves

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Tips and Trivia

Finally, cook all pasta al dente in lots of well - salted  water. An Italian cook will tell you, “the pasta water should have the same salinity as the sea.” And importantly, the pasta is always mixed into the sauce in order to coat it properly.

Spaghetti  Chitarra is a Vasto favorite. It gets its name from a wooden frame that is strung with metal wires. Sheets of pasta are pressed down with a roller, and then the wires are "strummed" so the strands of pasta fall through. Spaghetti  Chitarra is often served with vongole, olive oil, and pomodorini datterini (cherry tomatoes).

If there is one brand of pasta that is synonymous with Abruzzo and Vasto, it is Di Cecco from the town of Faro San Martino, tucked into the foot of the Maella Mountain. This world famous pasta is made from  two high quality ingredients, duram wheat from the fields of the Abruzzo hillsides, and the  mineral rich water from the mountain springs. The dough is then pressed through bronze forms that give the finished product a slightly rough texture that helps the sauce cling to it.

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Cucina Povera

"Cucina Povera"  is not only a based on a simplicity of ingredients and a method of cooking.  It tells a story about, poverty, struggle, and necessity and the food  that sustained people through dark times, and its relationship between the past and the present. 

Cucina povere was a method of survival in a society that was structured around a strict feudalistic system. Peasant farmers and serfs worked for the nobility and wealthy land owners. They paid their rent and debts with a large portion of their crops and produce.

Living under a system that was akin to slavery, the poor were forced to make do with the meagre resources that were available, and turned what was inexpensive, or would otherwise be wasted, into a tasty meal. Meat was not eaten much by the poor, as it was beyond their means. If they had any animals, they would have been used as valuable sources of milk or eggs that could be consumed in the home, turned over to the land owners, sold or bartered. If meat was used in cucina povera it was mainly offal which the poor could afford, as these came from the parts of the animal rejected by the rich.

Cucina Povera is a food tradition that comes from  meagre resources and scarcity. The poor were forced to make do with what they had, and turned what was inexpensive, or would otherwise be wasted, into a tasty meal. Meat was not eaten much  by the poor, as it was beyond their means. If they had any animals they would have been used as valuable sources of milk or eggs that could be consumed in the home, sold or bartered. If meat was used in cucina povera it was mainly offal which the poor could afford, as these came from the parts of the animal rejected by the rich.

Cucina povera is sprung from the underlying philosophy : use what you have, cook it with love and care, and turn what might otherwise be wasted into a meal. Its influence on Italian cuisine is characterized by the use of a few ingredients, allowing the natural flavors and freshness of each one to shine through.  But cucina povera is not only an homage to rustic cuisine and the people that ate it.  More than that, it tells the story of an impoverished people’s daily struggle to feed their families. Everyone who enjoys Italian food, owes a debt to the stone hearths and primitive kitchens of these people that worked the land and fished its waters.

Sustainability

The essence of subsistence farming is being able to get the most from small parcels of land, and is the true basis of “cucina povera.” But subsistence farming was not only producing enough food to use in the household, with a little left over to barter for other goods, but ensuring that the land would be productive year after year. Every small farmer knew that different crops replenished the soil: for example, legumes: beans, lentils, peas and chickpeas, restored nitrogen that was needed by other plants. Ideally, there was a continual mix of plants that complemented each other, either at the same time, or alternating over several harvests. Farmers followed practices that had been refined and passed down through generations. Crop diversity was an age-old method of sustainable agriculture. Farming methods that depleted the soil would have deprived new generations of a source of income and food to feed their families.

There was a  need to supplement the diet during, and after winter, with green vegetables until other legumes, vegetables and fruits ripened. Greens are a fundamental part of Vasto’s cucina  povere. They took up little space in the garden and replenished the soil.

Turnip greens chicory spinach, green beans

The five quarters of the animal, making delicious food from waste.

The meat dishes of cucina povera follow the tradition of making delicious food from what otherwise would be discarded. For the poor, every part of the animal has value. The blood and the brain, the feet, the tail, the tongue, the intestines the trachea and the spleen and the lungs and heart are utilized.

Historically, when animals were butchered in the  Roman Empire, the division of the meat was made following a simple scheme.: The first and best quarter was  reserved for the highest classes, the second one was for the clergy the third for the middle classes, and finally the fourth quarter was for the soldiers. The poor could afford only the offal and the waste, that was euphemistically called the fifth quarter, and that with imagination and skill they turned into delicious meals.

Even pasta has a logical beginning in the tradition of cucina povera. What was simpler for the poor than mixing wheat flour with water, shaping it by hand, and  drying it in the sun?                                                      

For many, the trifecta of  fresh olive oil, a slice of good bread and a sun warmed tomato directly off the vine, is a simple favorite, and maybe the essence of cucina povera. 

Some of Vasto’s Traditional Recipes -From Generation to Generation

                                                                         
With the spread of convenient processed foods, it’s important for younger generations to look back and understand the origin of the food they eat,  and how it represents a long tradition of artisanship,  history and subsistence agriculture. Otherwise, there is a risk that an important part of their heritage is will be lost.  

 From the Sea to the Table, Recipes                                  

A good meal is a synthesizing of the present and the past,  where its tastes  bring  back  uncomplicated memories of  childhood  and  family. 

The true soul of Italy resides around the table. If you said to one of my Vasto friends that your favorite dish was “spaghetti alle vongole” they will smile in approval,  as if the thought brought back memories of special moments on the beach, of salt air and harmonious dinners with family and friends. It is a seafood dish elegant in its simplicity and echoes of the sea. However, another favorite, brodetto, a hearty fish stew, is the real culinary pride of Vasto and coastal Abruzzo. It’s a delicacy with several different kinds of fish, octopus, squid, shrimp, langoustine, clams and mussels in a tomato broth, oven cooked and served bubbling hot in a clay bowl. If there is a heaven, it might be found at a table, eating  this fare with my friends. 

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 Eat a little of a lot.

Eating is a necessity; cooking is an art.

Perhaps, the most genuine Italian experience, is when you are invited to someone’s home for dinner. If you have that good fortune, here is some useful advice.

At the right moment, discreetly ask what is being served, or if you don’t, assume that just when you think dinner is over, there will always be more coming.  If possible follow the rule, ”Eat a little of a lot.”

Dinner usually begins around eight or nine in the evening. Remember that for many Italians, it is the main meal of the day. Breakfast might be a cornetto and coffee, lunch perhaps a sandwich or slice of pizza.  When you come from a culture where people eat dinner at five or six, if you haven't eaten by eight, you are famished. 

Pace yourself. An Italian meal is served slowly, one course on the table at a time, and depending on the meal's composition, each course might be accompanied by a different wine. 

When the antipasti comes, you will always be tempted to take a little extra, because it is so delicious  and you are very hungry. You are still hungry when the pasta comes, because your stomach hasn’t told your brain that it is getting full, and at the urging of the hostess or host you politely take a second portion, and yet another glass of wine, forgetting that there is still the meat course with a contorni usually of vegetables or salad, followed by  the cheeses, fresh fruit, maybe two or three different sweets, coffee and a digestive. 

Buon appetito!

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Dinner with Pino and Lucia

There were smells that seeped out of the oven and from the pots on the stove. Anatomically speaking the heart was next to the stomach, and when we all sat down to a meal the stomach was the heart.

I saw that the genius of  Italian cooking was like a form of alchemy in its combination of simple ingredients to make an unforgettable meal. It wasn't art on the plate with a sprig of this and a squirt of that for decoration intended to seduce the diner. The secret is its honesty, a cuisine speaking of places and origins, not only the bounty of the fertile fields and hillsides but food enriched by the generous spirit of the Italian people. 

Whenever the opportunity arises, I try to glean new recipes from whoever is cooking, or at least pick up a few tips. I stood in the narrow, utilitarian kitchen of our hostess for the evening, Lucia, and watched her as she prepared one of her specialties, “risotto di zucca,” pumpkin risotto, a deceptively simple and elegant dish, but one that requires patience and attention. As usual, I learned more by observation and osmosis than I did by listening to her instructions, rendered in melodious, rapid Italian, most of which sailed on past me. She lowered the flame on the thick bottomed pot and stirred Arborio rice into the bubbling oil, then added the vegetable stock that she had made earlier, a little at a time, until the rice was bathing in a milky bath of starch. She stirred adding more stock, repeating the procedure a half dozen times as the grains absorbed the liquid, and in between tended to the thick slices of pumpkin sprinkled with oil and a touch of  garlic and rosemary that she had simmering on another burner. 

When they were soft she mashed them with a fork, and mixed them into the rice and then added more of the vegetable stock. As the ingredients blended, the rice changed hue, from a light yellow to pale orange.   She stirred for a few more minutes, scraping from the bottom up, unhurried and watchful so that it didn’t stick: if the flame was too high and the rice swelled too quickly it would lose its creamy consistency and became pasty and heavy. As she stirred I remembered some useful advice “a perfect risotto should flow smoothly from the pot like lava down a mountain side."

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 Giancarlo's Brodetto Recipe 

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Spaghetti alle Vongole recipe of Lucia

Pino had been diving for vongole all morning and had brought up three or four kilos, enough for the ten people who were coming for dinner that evening. I came early and was in the kitchen drinking Prosecco and watching Lucia as she steamed them, asking questions, and taking a few from the pot as we talked.  As I ate  those fresh vongole, their  mild taste and smooth, delicate, texture  reminded me of the sea that they had come from and my mind drifted back to my childhood, gathering shell fish at low tide with my father. I remembered wading through the shallow water and digging my toes into the sand and mud feeling for clams, or looking for the little spurt that shot up where the water had left the bottom exposed, signaling that there was a longneck buried a few inches below. We took the choicest cherry stones, opened them and ate them directly with only the sea water as a condiment. We sorted the others after size,  clams for stuffing, grilling, steaming and eating on the half shell.

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Fare la Scarpetta 

Any Italian remembers making the "little shoe"  by going into the kitchen before Sunday lunch was ready, breaking off a crust of bread, and  dipping a piece of bread  directly into the pot of tomato sauce. 

 When there is salsa left on the plate it is common practice to break  a piece of bread and wipe it clean. It is called “fare la scarpetta,” make the little shoe.  A friend told me that the expression originated in a time when people were so hungry that they could eat the souls of their shoes. I heard another version that says "That a crust of bread mops up the sauce from the plate, like the soul of a shoe that scrapes along the ground."  Whatever its origins, “Fare la scarpetta” was a ritual that is an essential part of cucina povera: clean the plate and don’t waste anything. 

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Balsamico di Modena 

Good food and good  stories follow each other.

We ate and chatted, warmed by the fire in the stone hearth and by the wine. My friend Franco, a charming and knowledgeable raconteur with an abundance of anecdotes about food and cooking, reminded us that the risotto we were eating, was a dish from  his home region in Northern Italy, where the best risotto rice  was grown. If you are from the region Emil Romagna, you take its culinary delicacies seriously. To spark the conversation, he implied among this group of Southern Italians, that nowhere in Italy, meaning the civilized culinary world, could the food equal that of his native Modena and the towns and villages of the Po River valley. 

He gave as an example, balsamic vinegar, one of Modena's many delicacies. He described the first distillation when the juice from choice grapes is concentrated. Then he  elaborated on the annual transfer of the must, painstakingly filled into smaller sized casks of oak or acacia as it was reduced over the years, and the decades, due to the slow dissipation of vapors through the pores of the wood. The "acetaia" as it is called is aged, not as you might imagine, in a sheltered and regulated wine cellar, but in the attic under the eaves exposed to the changing temperatures of the seasons. As the volume of the liquid decreases, its density and fragrance increase until it reaches puberty after twelve years and can legally be titled tradizionale, but sixteen years of aging is preferable, and after twenty five years it is darkly thick and syrupy, superbly mature, and can be titled “extra vecchio”.  "You don't rush balsamico" he said.

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Tortelinni, Modena or Bologna? as related by Franco

Pasta is the heart of the Italian culinary culture and tortellini is the heart of  it in  Emilia-Romagna. There, it seems to be a summation of the Italian peoples love and understanding of food, its origins, and its preservation. 

We were going to be ten or twelve for dinner that evening. We sat around the table, preparing tortellini with ingredients for about a thousand squares. Gianna who has filled and twisted tortellini since she was a young girl sitting at the table alongside her mother, said to me as she was rolling out the pasta, "Francis your job will be to cut the squares. Before it was my father’s job, and you like he, understand that a millimeter is a millimeter."  As we sat and worked, Franco related the legend of tortellini’s origin.

A Rivalry

Both Bologna and Modena, claimed to be the home of tortellini, one of the best known pasta dishes from the region of Emilia Romagna. They couldn’t decide which village it originated in, so as a compromise, unusual as it may be concerning Italian food, they decided that it came from a village between the two towns.  The story is that a beautiful woman, legend has it that it was the renowned Lucrezia Borgia, took a room in the local inn, and as she was dusty and tired after her travels, asked the inn keeper to warm water and draw a bath. After he filled the tub, he closed the door and smitten by her beauty, peeped through the key hole to watch her undress, but all he could see was her navel. Disappointed at not getting a better view, he went down to the kitchen to continue cooking her dinner. Enchanted by his beautiful guest, he rolled out his pasta dough, filled it and began forming it.  When he looked down at his work, he saw that his fingers had lived a life of their own, and had made replicas of the woman’s navel, the only part of her that was visible through the keyhole.

Note: The "Dotta Confraternita del Tortellini" is a society with for the preservation of tortellini. Its seat is in Bologna

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Gianna's Tortellini and Brodo Recipe Handed Down From Nonna Silvana

 The tastes you remember from your mother’s table stay with you the rest of your life. Gianna’s mamma Sylvana,  made tortellini not only for her family but gave it to friends and neighbors.  It was her hobby, like some older women crochet or knit and supply the family with scarves and mittens, Sylvana kept her fingers busy with the pasta that was the pride of Emilia Romagna.

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" Only Barbarians eat tortellini in tomato sauce." Franco

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Cheese and Fish ?

Nothing should overwhelm the fish! And nothing can mitigate the cultural blunder of destroying the delicate taste of freshly caught fish with cheese.

Most Italian recipes are deceptively simple and a decent cook may bend the culinary rules a little, but should be careful about blatantly breaking any of them, or being too creative. As we navigated through the lavish array of courses one evening and came to the primi piatti,  consisting of a delicate “pasta al triglie e zuchini,”  pasta with mullet and squash, I was curious about what gave the sauce it’s creamy texture and asked “was there parmesan in the recipe". The person alongside me said, "NO, NO, NO" as though it might have been forbidden to mix cheese and fish by some well known national edict. "A cook never mixes fish and cheese." "Why not," I asked? “Cheese will destroy the delicate flavor of the fish.”  I accepted her opinion, without argument because I knew the rule, but in this case was not convinced. 

Later that evening, still curious, and trusting my palete, I asked my host if there was parmesan in the sauce. He winked and said out of earshot from the other guests, "poco."

 Some of Vasto’s Traditional Recipes -From Generation to Generation

With the spread of convenient processed foods, it’s important for younger generations to look back and understand the origin of the food they eat, and how it represents a long tradition of artisanship, history and subsistence agriculture. Otherwise, there is a risk that an important part of their heritage is will be lost.

With a ten kilometer stretch of beach along the Adriatic coast, and with a long tradition of fishing, seafood is a common staple in the local diet of Vasto and the main ingredient in many dishes, paired with a  variety of vegetables, sauces and pasta.

What are the qualities that make a good cook? Cooking well requires organization, attention to detail, patience, and just as important the desire to bring people together. It is said that a good home cook is a nurturer and uses food as a way to show their affection, give comfort, and create a bond among family and friends. 

Nunzia's Recipe For Cacio e Uovo 

Donato's Recipe for Cavatelli alla Pescatrice Vastese

Mario's Recipe for Zuppa di Cozze with Foccacia

Christina's Recipe for Pasta con Pistachio

Spaghetti alle Vongole recipe of Lucia   -

 Concetta’s recipe for Piselli con Sepia -                                            

Giancarlo's Brodetto Recipe – A strong link to the sea  when - farmers leave their fields and cast nets                                     

Mario's Recipe for Zuppa di Cozze with Foccacia

Some of My Recipes

A recipe from my grandmother Maria Agnello.

Tomato salsa , a Southern Italian staple and the best known of the Italian pasta sauces.

Neopolitan salsa pomodoro-

A marinara sauce with tomatoes, basil, garlic and  onion.

The ingredients:

50 ml. olive oil

1.5 kilo seasonally ripe tomatoes, preferably San Marzano, chopped into centimeter squares

1 large onion- finely chopped

3 cloves of crushed garlic

Fresh oregano

1 dec. chopped basil

2 bay leaves

Add water depending on cooking time.

Salt to taste

An alternative to fresh tomatoes is 1 kg. canned San Marzano tomatoes and 500g, tomato passata

Heat the oil in a in thick bottomed pot over medium-high heat. Add the onion and garlic and  fry them until they are soft. Add the tomatoes, basil, oregano bay leaves. Bring to a simmer, cover and cook stirring occasionally for about 30 minutes. Salt as needed.

To make a meat sauce, cube 1 kg. stew beef, spare ribs and pork.  Add them to the sauce with an additional 5dl. water or beef stock. Slow cook together for about one and a half hours or until the meat is tender.

Use the same procedure for meat balls, but add only 2dl. extra stock or water.

Do as the Italians. The pasta with tomato salsa is served as the first course, sprinkled with grated pecorino or parmesan cheese. The meat that was cooked in the sauce is always served after the pasta as the second course.

Polpette alle Maria Agnello, Maria's Meat balls

500 g. mixed dubbel ground chop meat,  half beef, half pork

30 – 40 g. grated pecorino or parmesan cheese

1 dl. milk

1 medium egg

1 dl. fine bread crumbs

Chopped parsley or several tablespoons chopped onion, golden fried

A handful of raisins

Mix the milk and breadcrumbs with the beaten egg. Let the mixture swell.

Mix all the ingredients, form them into balls about 3 cm. in diameter. Fry them lightly, add to the sauce and cook them for about 30 minutes.

Note: Like othe meats polpetinni are served as a second course.

Buon Appetito    

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Mandel Cantucci di Casa Mola, Everyone’s Favorite

225 g. 00 flour

2 medium eggs

100 g. sugar

100 g. almonds

35 g. butter

1tsp. baking soda

1tsp. vanilla extract or equivalent, or the zest of one orange

Beat the eggs and mix in the sugar, melted butter and vanilla extract.

Stir in the almonds.

Mix the baking powder and flour and fold into it the egg mixture.

Knead the dough until it comes together and divide it into three  equal parts.

Roll them into lengths of approximately 25 cm.

Bake for 25 minutes at 200g. cen.

Remove from the oven and slice them diagonally in 1 cm. pieces.

Spread the sliced cantucci on your baking sheet and put them back in the oven  for another 5 minutes at the same temperature.

Makes about 30 pieces.

Note: Another name for cantucci is biscotti, which means twice baked.

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My Recipe for a Classic Pizza Margherita di Casa Mola

This is how I make “Casa Mola’s”  Friday night pizza. I’ve done it this way for many years. Neapolitan style pizza isn’t complicated, but like learning any skill, it takes some practice and a little patience. Even if it doesn’t come out perfect every time, it will always be delicious.

The ingredients for two 25 cm. Pizza Margaritas

300 g. strong flour 00 grind, 12% protein

200 g. water = 65% hydration

1.5 – 2dl. marinara sauce, fresh basil leaves, 250 grams mozzarella or other cheese

5 g. fresh yeast

5 g. salt

Tools: A bowl, a thick pizza stone or pizza steel, a pizza peel  and dough scraper

The steps:

1.  Combine the flour and salt in a  bowl.

2.  Gradually add the flour to the dissolved yeast mixture, mixing it well until it comes together into a soft, sticky dough.

3.  Cover the dough and put it in the refrigerator to rise slowly for about 12 hours ( after 1 hour stretch and fold the dough several times)

4.  After the first slow proofing, remove the dough from the refrigerator, stretch and fold it again 4 or 5 times, cover it and let it continue to proof at room temperature for an additional  6 to 8 hours. ( When it is ready, the dough  should have risen to 2-3 times its original volume )

5.  Form the dough into two balls, place them in olive oil coated bowls and cover them with a damp cloth. Let the dough rest in a warm place for 20 to 30 minutes.

6.  Sprinkle some flour ( preferably semolina ) onto your bench or baking board. Using  your fingers press out each piece of dough into a round shape from the center outward creating a thin bottom and the cornice that will rise and become the outer crust.

7.  Spread marinara sauce evenly over each bottom, distribute the mozzarella, drizzle  a little olive oil over them.

8.  Preheat the oven to its maximum temperature 275 c. to 300 c. with the pizza stone or steel high up under the grill element for at least ½ hour.

9.  Bake each pizza under the grill for 5 minutes, then switch to the normal oven setting with top and bottom heat for approximately another five minutes.

10.  Decorate with fresh basil leaves.

11.  Serve

For me, the traditional Neapolitan pizza reflects the simplicity and tradition of Italian cookery. Don’t drown your pizza in too much sauce or laden it with too heavy, or too many toppings. Let a tasty bottom and a few choice ingredients shine through.

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         Schwartzwald Tårta - A Cake From the Black Forest

It was Kersti’s birthday and the bakeries didn’t have her favorite cake, so I learned how to bake it. My recipe uses traditional ingredients, but I form the nut- meringue bottoms a little thicker and a little softer.  This dessert from the Black Forest takes some time to make, but anything good, is worth waiting for.

The ingredients:

Hazel nuts ( 250 gram )

Egg whites ( 6 medium eggs )

Icing sugar ( 3.5 dec. icing sugar )

Whipping cream ( 7-8 dl. )

Bakers’ chocolate ( 125 gr. )

Icing sugar ( 2 dl. )

The Steps:

Bottoms

Set the oven to 175°C

Toast all the nuts (both for the bottoms and for the filling) on ​​a baking sheet in the middle of the oven for about 10 minutes. Rub the skins off the nuts with a towel.

Grind the nuts in an almond mill, even the nuts that will be used in the cream filling.

Beat the egg whites until they are stiff with an electric mixer to make a meringue. Towards the end, add the icing sugar, a little at a time.

Carefully fold the ground nuts into the meringue and spread a third of the batter on a buttered and floured cast iron pan ( 20 cm.) or on baking paper cut to the same size, and bake for about 10 minutes, one at a time. The bottoms should have a slight golden color and be a bit soft. (Yield 3)

 Filling

Whip the cream. Mix half of the whipped cream with the ground hazelnuts and additional icing sugar.

Spread a third of the nut cream on one base.  Place the next base on top and spread nut more nut cream, repeat for the third, and then place the fourth on top.

 Topping

Spread the remaining whipped cream (without nuts) on top and around the edges of the cake.

Sprinkle a few tablespoons of ground hazel nuts on the top.

 Melt the chocolate in the microwave or over a bain-marie. Spread a thin layer of chocolate about 30x30 cm. on a sheet of baking paper.  Cool and cut into squares to decorate the sides, and spires to place on the top, creating the image of mountain peaks in a bed of snow.

The Italian variation is called Torta Foresta Nera and is based on rich chocolate sponge cake  instead of hazelnut meringue bottoms.

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Is it Fresh?

The hidden gems are just that. They are hidden.

My friends " The Amici" ate often at inconspicuous restaurants in the hill villages or in town,  places that didn’t need to call attention to themselves with kitschy décor or advertising. These gems were often hidden behind a plain or even shabby façade like a 1920’s speakeasy with no indication that it was a restaurant other than, perhaps, a discreet recommendation from Guide D’Italia over the door. As often as not, there wasn’t a fixed menu. While the waiter poured Prosecco, the cook might come out and exchange pleasantries with the patrons. He described each course that he was serving that day and what he recommended, or gave an account of the fish that were in the nets that morning.

On one of those occasions, when I unintentionally wandered into a thorny, cultural briar patch, I asked  the chef who was explaining what he was serving that day, how fresh the fish was. I quickly regretted my mistake, realizing that my  question might have been considered an impertinence. With a fleck of a smile in his eyes, he slid his frameless spectacles down the bridge of his nose and replied, “If the fish is not flopping around when it comes into the kitchen, it is not fresh.”

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Everyone is an Expert

Italy is a country where even the weather is described in culinary terms.  A friend said, “There is a little snow today, like a sprinkling of parmasano over the pasta.”

Don't be surprised, if you  find dog food that is pressed  into the shape of penne rigate, or when a taxi driver, while making normal small-talk, gives you a lecture on the evils of over cooking pasta, or which prosciutto was best, or  which regions  had the best oils and cheeses. Everyone seemed to be an expert on food and how it should be eaten, and they revealed their knowledge  willingly. When you met a friend or acquaintance, they could  talk as readily about one of their recent culinary experiences as the weather.  However, I’ve found that discussing food is a subject where no one agrees, and where no one answer is the right one.  Not only do recipes differ from region to region, and village to village, but from family to family. 

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Do’s and Don’ts from my Italian Restaurant Survival Manual

For once I was innocent!

If someone catches you breaking spaghetti before putting it in the cooking pot, or God forbid, cutting it while it is on the plate, you might be banned from the country for life. Not long ago, I was eating a superb neopolitan  “ spaghetti alle  vongole”  in a traditional working man’s trattoria in the Spanish Quarter in Napoli. Towards the end of the meal, there wasn’t any bread left on the table to sop up the remaining sauce “fare la scarpetta “as you say in Italian. Not wanting to waste any of it, I used my knife to push up some sauce, with a few remaining strands of spaghetti, onto my fork.  While I was doing that, the cook came out of the kitchen.  When he saw me, he mistakenly thought that I was cutting my spaghetti with a knife and burst out laughing. Pointing to me, he said in a clear voice that rang through the restaurant,  "Guarda! Look! He eats spaghetti like an American!“

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Volare

The most well-known Italian song is undoubtably, Volare. Once while  visiting Venice, I heard a gondolier sing it with a touch of humor, using Italian words that any tourist could recognize.  He sang: “spaghetti-oh-oh, lasagna-oh-oh, mozzarella, oh-oh-oh-oh.” His rich tenor reverberated over the canals and through the stone lined passages, and everybody who heard his verses had a good laugh. Most Italian glossaries had a whole section that was dedicated to the explanation of the most common foods, so he could have sung an opera using their names and never have to repeat himself.

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Cannoli Siciliano

After a day of climbing with friends through the dusty and sometimes dangerous lava fields to reach Mt. Etna’s summit, we stopped on the way down  for refreshments at the refuge located at its base. The cannoli lined up  in the chilled display looked tempting and my companion Franco asked the barista if they were good here, as we were leaving Sicily the next day and hadn’t eaten any of the island’s specialty. This would be an impertinent question in any other place, but quite a normal one in Italy and especially Sicily, and the young man answered, “You have asked me, and I must honestly say that I cannot recommend them,” and explained that, "eating cannoli in the middle of the summer would be a disappointment." “Cannoli should be eaten in the spring, he told us, after the sheep have grazed on the newly sprouted grass and their milk is sweet and rich and makes the best ricotta." To console us he began scooping up the lemon ice that is loved by all Sicilians and said “ it would be my pleasure to treat you to our “granita” without charge, instead. It is excellent and is more suited to this warm weather.”

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Ventracina del Vastese

On my travels through Italy I’ve learned that the way in which food is prepared is regional and that there is an immense pride in the local cuisine. It doesn’t matter where you come from, you regard  your village as having the best meats, or cheeses, hams, oil, wine or bread. 

 Italian cooks have a tendency to believe that the way they prepare food is the right way and are often critical of recipes from another region or town” There is a  term for that loyalty, (campanilismo) campanile= bell, ) that symbolizes pride in the place of your birth. Roughly translated the  expression means, “ Comradery that comes from going to the same church, or living within hearing distance of the church bell.”

I once heard one person say to another, with a final thrust of the verbal sword as their discussion over ingredients and preparation of a local specialty became more heated, "What do you know about food! You come from….... "

Santa Chiara Market in Vasto is built over the ruins of the ancient Santa Chiara Cloister, a fitting location, when you consider that the shopping there was done with a reverence bordering on the religious. The seafood came from nets that were hauled up from the nearby Adriatic a few hours before, fruit and vegetables came fresh from the fields and orchards that surround the town, wine and olive oil came from local vineyards and groves, and the cheese and meats that hung in the stalls were locally cured and butchered.                                                       

Ventracina, the pear shaped salami that the Vasto region is famous for, had recently won a prestigious national award for its excellence. One Saturday morning, as we were leaving the market, we said to an acquaintance that we met on the way out, that we had bought some Ventracina, mentioning its recent national award. He brushed his forehead with the gnarled fingers of someone who was used to hard work, and exclaimed, "MANNAGGIA!"  and said in the no-nonsense way that Italians sometimes have when talking about food, “That award was a very unfortunate mistake. It was given to Vasto by people who know "niente" about good salami. NOW in my village, we  make real Ventracina." And of course he was right.

There is a permanence in Italian food. Renowned as the nobility of Italian salami, the best Ventracina is made in the hill villages outside of Vasto at the foot of the high mountains of the Maiella massive, where it has been  prepared by hand for hundreds of years.  Regarding Ventracina salami, where that tradition speaks for itself, a native of the medieval Apennine villages of Guilmi and Caruncio will scoff at the notion that anyone else knows the proper way of making Ventracina.

Today in these Abruzzo villages, the slaughter of the  pigs is still done by small local butchers, who cut the best meat from the thigh, shoulder and loin and mix it with chunks of fat from the pig’s under belly,  hence the name ventri, meaning belly. The meat and fat are mixed with salt, sweet or hot pepper and fennel seeds. It’s then pressed into  pig’s bladders that are washed in water mixed with vinegar and salt. When they are stuffed  with the meat mix, the bladders give the sausage its characteristic shape. They are then double tied, coated with lard and hung to ferment and  mature for at least three months, ideally in a room heated by an open hearth.   

Photo Carrunchio + Nora – Describes her grandparent’s cottage where ventracina was hung to cure in front of the hearth.

Giancarlo describes his maternal grandparents farm and the slaughter of swine 

                                     *****  

Cooking for Italians peels away all pretensions. You either get it right or you don’t. So here's some advice. Don't argue wine with someone whose house is surrounded by vinyards, and who had a few drops of it placed on his tongue while he was still an infant.

You were usually in somewhat safe territory when you paired wine with a meal, if you kept to the usual red with meat, white with fish, but I felt that attitudes were changing from the traditional, and mistakenly thought that the wine I chose one evening was not that unconventional.

 We were hosting Italian house guests, and I was cooking Swedish.  Our dinner began with an appetizer made from crayfish tails in a mix of creme fraiche, red onion, caviar and dill on rye bread squares that I had baked and pan fried in butter. As a second course, I served an acceptably creamy sea food risotto with North Sea shrimp, and as the main course, served filet of pork garnished with sautéed chanterelle mushrooms, fresh from the forest. To accompany the meal, I had chilled several bottles of Pinot Grigio, a fruity and refreshing white wine, that in my opinion, suited the summer temperature and served it with the first two seafood courses, and even felt that it  would be suitable with the pork.

One of the guests, who was the group’s designated wine aficionado, came into the kitchen holding the Pinot Grigio and apologetically said,” Francis scousa, but this wine shouldn’t be served with the pork filet." I didn´t protest or say that I liked its tart, fruitiness and that there was a changing attitude toward whites. Nor did I have the inclination to discuss or to defend my choice of wine with someone, who not only had strong preferences and a firsthand knowledge of the intricacies of the beverage, but probably got his first taste when his father or grandfather put a drop of it on his tongue when he was an infant.

 Not so much to rectify my mistake, as to make a quiet statement, albeit with a touch of provocation, I brought up several bottles of the red Tuscan, Brunello di Montalcino, one of the premier Italian wines. As I was putting the final touches on the evening’s dinner, my discerning guest came back with the unopened bottles and again in the vein of instructing me, said, “Scousa Francis,” this wine isn’t suitable either.  Already knowing the answer, I asked, “Why not?”  “Of course, Brunello is molto buono,” “excellent, but it is very intense and will overwhelm the pork.” And he was right on that score also, but I already knew that as I climbed the cellar stairs.

Looking back on that evening, Pinot Noir would probably have been better, but mistakes are always an opportunity for learning.

                           ********

                         Cacio e Uovo

Discussing a recipe or the food that was served was often  a vortex that pulled in everyone.

Not long ago, I was sitting at the table with friends eating a first course of “cachio e uovo,” egg, bread and Peccorino cheese rolled into balls and cooked and served in a light tomato salsa. Always curious, and wanting to learn, I asked about the consistency of the bread or breadcrumbs used in the mixture. After a lively discussion with contradicting opinions, my friends couldn't reach a consensus as to which bread to use, let alone how  coarse or fine it should be grated, which proved my point that recipes were like family heirlooms and differed not only from region to region, or village to village, but from family to family.

Nunzia's Recipe For Cacio e Uovo 

                           ******

Nunzia's Recipe For Tiramisu

What is better to top of a good meal than a slice of rich, velvety tiramasu, dusted with cocoa. Tiramisu is popular around the world  and like cannoli has become synonymous with Italian cuisine and  its many desserts. There are quite a few variations on its bottom of coffee drenched savoiardi biscuits and  creamy mascarpone filling, but making it is fairly uncomplicated, and always appreciated. I've  found  Nunzia's recipe to be best.

Here is her recipe.

                             *****

              Prosecco in the Maternity Ward

There  always seems to be something new to discover about Italian cultural traditions and etiquette.

I’ve always been in awe of the festive way that Italians observed birthdays, weddings, anniversaries, and the plethora of holydays and holidays that dot  their calendar. I found out, that even a maternity ward, could be a place for a celebration, and that the focus on family, friends  and food  was written into the Italian DNA.

 I was in for a surprise  one evening when we came to the hospital to visit a friend who had just given birth. It was the first time we had done so in Italy, and we were expecting there to be a subdued calm, with only a few other visitors. But this was Southern Italy and not Sweden, and instead of being greeted by a  nurse at the reception desk, urging us to put on shoe guards and sanitary robes over our street clothes, we were ushered into a brightly lit room with a folding table set along one wall laden with snacks and cold cuts. A lively gathering of well-wishers and relatives were enjoying the food while saluting the newborn, his tired mother and proud father with raised glasses of Prosecco.

                                          *****

Parmesan in the Soup? 

Unaware of the nuances of correct restaurant etiquette , I asked a waiter once for some grated cheese to sprinkle in the steaming soup he had just brought to the table.  When he said "Assolutamente no" without apology, I asked why. He could have said something snide about tourists or foreigners, or explained some basic culinary rules, but instead, he arched his impressive eyebrows, put his thumb and forefinger together and drew them in front of his face. "The cook will kill me!" Of course, there was the possibility that he was exaggerating, even if crimes of passion were seen in a different light in the Mediterranean countries, but I got the message.

If my soup was supposed to be showered with parmesan, my knowledgeable waiter would have put it out on the table, or in this upscale restaurant, grated it directly into my bowl.   If he didn’t, I realized after that, it was best not to ask for it, the reason being that Parmesan or Pecorino  would not enhance the flavor. My soup was considered to be already seasoned properly and not in need of improvement. In the eyes of the chef, I would either destroy his preparation, or was insulting him by  suggesting that the dish that was in front of me needed cheese to improve its flavor,

                                            *****                                                 

   Leftovers

There are such beautiful encounters between language and food. 

I have several meters of shelves devoted to cook books. They are often the source of my bed time reading before turning out the light. Cookbooks have been the standard gifts to give to me, along with aprons, baking tins, knives and general cooking gear. I suppose as well as they fuel one of my hobbies, the givers might expect a culinary return on their investments.

Italian food is not national, but regional. If you have eaten in an Italian restaurant in England or the U.S. or any other country outside of Italy, the food can be classified as Italian inspired. As with most regional Italian dishes, there are as many recipes as there are cooks. 

“What goes in your mouth is more important than what comes out,” she said, correcting one of her unruly children at the table. Mange!

Looking at the two sorts of pasta that were being served for dinner I longed for the metabolism of my teen years.

I was looking over her shoulder while she was making risotto, slowly, pouring and mixing a little broth at a time with the rice. Coming from the coast she said, "It is ready when the rice slides down the sides of the pot like waves lapping the shore.

A  friend commenting on the light snow that had fallen in the night, said, "It was like a sprinkling of parmesan on the pasta."

We sometimes make life and friendship a bit too complicated. I have a fond memory of seeing two men exchange greetings while waiting for a bus. They sat on a stone bench and both were similarly clad in the uniform of Italian octogenarians: grey gabardine trousers, and light blue nylon shirts, as though they had stepped out of an old Italian film. One man opened a shopping bag and took out a few long, fuzzy, green fava beans. “From my garden, the last of the season” he said, and handed them to the other man. “Grazie,” he replied, and I heard the sound of the pods snapping as he broke into them and removed the beans one by one. I watched the two strangers sitting in the morning sun eating fava beans like children sharing a bag of candy.  

Regarding the Italian preferences regarding food, as in Zen Philosophy, simplicity is at the core. I asked a friend, who is  an adept and experienced, cook what her favorite meal was.  “ A sun warmed tomato from my garden, with a drizzle of good olive oil on a slice of fresh bread. It doesn’t have to be more complicated,” she said.

Our lives are like a soup made from what we have in our cabinets and refrigerators - a little bit of this and a little bit of that - some happiness, some sadness, some good some bad, opposites that in the best of cases give life balance, like spices that complement each other.

Fine dining is a privilege you pay for. You know it when you see it:  small portions on large dishware and elaborate descriptions that border on the ludicrous. Italians are people with large appetites. I’ve  seen restaurants with fashionably square plates and small portions, and they are not so popular.

So much of cooking is preparation, choosing ingredients, intuitively knowing what fits together. Then there is the technical part, knowing how to slice and dice, pare and peel,understanding the relationship between time and temperature, the importance of being organized and keeping a clean kitchen, what fits together and what doesn’t.

Good advice. Serve what you know, don’t experiment when you have guests.

I’m old enough to remember how meat, poultry, fruit and vegetables used to taste, before mono culture and industrial agriculture made them unprofitable.

What affects the sense of taste? Essential ingredients are mood, hunger, company and presentation.

I grow tomatoes every summer, just to remember what tomatoes used to taste like.

I often cook for my friends who are political liberals and humanists, but culinarily conservative. I’ve often said to cook for them you have to a good portion of confidence or lot of self-deceit.  

What I lacked in culinary education I made up for with ample portions of curiosity and inquisitiveness mixed in with some aptitude.

I’m not quite sure if you can serve Italians a meal without a pasta dish. After all these years, when I’ve prepared a dinner with rice or another starch, I sometimes wonder if my guests eat some pasta when they get home.

Food is a catalyst that not only nurtures, but binds people together and stimulates friendship.

 A friend said to me that the dinner table is the best place to educate and foster your children 

                               *****

The  platters were cleaned and the participants  talked about the meal the next day. Even if I wasn’t going to get mentioned in Gambero Rosso. It might have been confidence or self  deception, but I knew our friends would ask me to cook for them again, in itself, an adequate compliment.

I was visiting Venice with Italian friends and one morning over coffee and a robust Italian breakfast, consisting of several biscuits instead of one, my host said, “Oh by the way, I’ve invited some people for dinner tonight. I told everyone that you were a wonderful cook and that you wouldn´t mind throwing something together for us.” Before I could back out, everyone around the table agreed in chorus, giving me no time to make excuses as to why I couldn’t. All I could think of were the problems: strange kitchen, were the knives sharp, what would I cook and where would I find all the ingredients that I needed? None the less, a little flattered, I graciously accepted the challenge. Just then, the idea of me cooking for people that had high standards, and that I had never met, seemed plausible.

What followed was a pleasent day of sightseeing,  on my host's sloop, sailing through the lagoon, stopping  at the islands of Torcello, Burano and Murano. As the day progressed, I was wondering when we were going to turn back, so I could shop, wash, slice, dice, pare, mix, blend, grill, fry, boil and roast, and for every hour that slipped past and every historical sight we saw, I removed a dish from my planned  menu. We anchored in the lagoon and after a long lunch and obligatory riposo, and then later in the afternoon an aperitivo on Murano, I realized that I was only going to have a few hours to prepare for the evening. I was beginning to feel the first quiet signs of panic.  This was going to be a “catch what catch can meal.” I changed the menu again, scaling it down even more, and decided on a few  dishes from the traditional Swedish smörgåsbord.

When we finally docked, I quickly found what I needed, in the well stocked local market. Of course, I’d break the rigid Italian rules for preparing fish, and there was the chance that my rich Scandinavian menu wouldn’t suit the Italian pallet. but I was following the culinary rule, “ when you are in a hurry, stay with what you know.” 

Starter = Toast Skagen - shrimp mixed with caviar in a bed of mayonnaise  blended with thick sour cream, finely chopped red onion and topped with sprigs of dill served on  slices of buttered dark bread toast with the crusts removed.

First course = The two types of pickled herring from the supermarket at home in Sweden, firm one inch chunks in a marinade of onion, peppercorns distilled vinegar and sugar served with knäckebröd (flat, hard baked rye bread cakes). The herring would be washed down with shots of Swedish Absolut Vodka (available, surprisingly, in the supermarket)

Second = Thinly sliced poached Norwegian salmon with a sauce  made from light Dijon mustard, vinegar, honey and thick Greek style yogurt whipped lightly to aerate it.

Third = Jansson’s Frestelse, potatoes sliced in thin strips and layered with anchovies along with diced onion and butter covered in thick cream and baked in the oven until the potatoes are soft and have absorbed all the liquid.

Fourth =  Swedish meatballs  köttbullar, small meatballs about fifteen millimeters in diameter made from equal mixtures of double ground pork and beef, with a little diced red onion, egg, bread crumbs and cream, fried in butter.

Dessert would be simple= strawberries were in season and were part of the Swedish mid-summer tradition, so it was a quickly frozen strawberry semi-freddo on a mirror of  strawberry glaze, decorated with strawberry slices and mint leaves.

We’d drink cold Birra Morretti. Wine wasn’t a traditional Scandinavian beverage. Beer would suit the menu nicely and Moretti's crisp, malty taste, would mellow some of the heaviness of my menu.  Vodka shots, according to tradition, would go with the pickled herring, which along with the knäckebröd, would give the meal an authentic touch.

Because I cooked that evening, I had the honor of being “capo di tavalo,” and sat at the head of the table. I sat close to the stove so that I could oversee the dinner. After each course I heard, “very good, buono, complimenti” and the poached lax and dressing were a success, as were the potatoes with anchovies and cream.

How did my dinner go? I survived. The  platters were cleaned and the participants  talked about the meal the next day. Even if I wasn’t going to get mentioned in Gambero Rosso, I knew our friends would ask me to cook for them again, in itself, an adequate compliment.

                                           *****

                                         Part Two      

                              Other Tables

Well Done?

The meat and produce in a restaurant, are usually delivered on Thursday for the rush on the weekend, by Monday they are on  the way out. Thinking about what the late gourmet chef Anthony Burdoin wrote about the freshness of meat, he said, "restauranters loved customers who asked for their meat well done, which meant that they could serve cuts that were a bit spoiled and no one would know the difference.  But this was not the case when  an Italian friend  had taken foreign guests to an exclusive restaurant to seal a business deal. When the "anatra arrosto" (roast duck ) came to the table, and while the server was carving the perfectly roasted bird, one of the guests thought that it was under-cooked and wanted it broiled a little more. He called back the server, and  asked him to take it back to the kitchen. The server patiently explained that the duck was prepared correctly. When the guest insisted, the cook came out personally. With undisguised annoyance, he said, " The duck is already dead! I suggest you try the restaurant farther up the boulevard. They will gladly kill it for you one more time!" 

                                                *****

Kabul 1972 Long Before the Taliban

I was accustomed to sitting among day laborers and craftsmen, seeking out the utilitarian places where they ate, because the portions were big and the prices small. In a back alley in the bazar of  Kabul, I found a stall that served lentil soup and the ubiquitous Afghani flat bread, naan. Believing that my meal would cost three Afghanis, ( at the time about twenty¨five cents) I ordered and sat down among sinewy, unshaven men in collarless tunics, worn under vests of coarsely woven wool. When it was time to pay, the cook said my lunch would cost me five afghanis. I pointed to the sign, that I thought read three. When I insisted, the cook leaned over the counter, and as if it was decided in advance, two men came up behind me, so close so that I could smell lentils and onions on their breaths. The cook said something and held up six fingers, and I understood the  price had increased. When the buzz in the stall quieted, and the other men's attention focused on the pending entertainment, my survival instinct kicked in and I quickly agreed to the new price.  Discussion ended. Principles were one thing, a pummeling over the price of  lentils in one of Kabul's back alleys was another.

                                                  *****

A Gourmet Meal in an Unusual Place

I was hiking east of Kathmandu  with hopes of  getting a good look at Mt. Everest. I felt that  my back-packer’s budget didn’t allow  the luxury of a guide, so when I found a map at the government tourist office, frugality and confidence in my abilities, won out over common sense, and I struck out alone. Before long, I joined a group of  Sherpas who were on their way back to their village. I  walked and climbed  with them in the thin air on narrow paths carved out of the mountain sides, sharing their food and resting with them in the evenings.

After a few days, my  companions took a route to the north and pointed out a trail in the direction of Everest, the same one that Edmond Hillary took twenty years earlier  on his way to conquer the mountain.  After a few hours, the  trail  ended on the edge of a deep canyon, the damaged rope bridge that spanned it hung  vertically, swinging in the wind and banging against the opposite wall. I had difficulty finding my way in the rocky terrain when I tried to find an alternate path. It was getting dark,  a fall or twisted ankle could be fatal, and as the landscape became increasingly desolate,  I admitted to myself that I was lost and would have to spend the night in the open.

It took two days to circumvent the gorge. I spent the  nights curled up in my sleeping bag under a canopy of stars that seemed so close that I could reach out and touch them, and in the mornings,  watched the rising sun as its glow illuminated the snow covered peaks in the distance. I couldn’t fully appreciate the beauty though, because the growling of my empty stomach reminded me of the fact that I was lost and hungry, and no one knew where I was.

With a little luck and a lot of determination,  I came to the village that was my goal.  As a reward, I got a view of the world’s highest mountain with its jagged, snow covered peak silhouetted  against a cloudless sky. In the days that followed  I would be transfixed by the sight,  but  just then, what  I appreciated much more ,was  my first food in three days. Hunger is the best spice and that meal is etched into my culinary memory.

Sitting by an open hearth  with a family that took in trekkers I ate : fresh potatoes roasted in the coals of a juniper wood fire with cottage cheese fermented  from jak milk,  slices of grilled porcini mushrooms,  sprinkled with chili and salt, and a spicy curry made from lentils and barley eaten with a traditional fluffy wheat bread.  After the meal, I drank  Nepalese tea, seasoned with salt and jak butter. 

It was a dinner worthy of a Michelin star.

                                                ****

Taj Mahal Hotel, Bombay 1970

A Twang of Conscience

I was visiting Bombay, and after months of living on a simple village fare of rice and lentils, I lwas looking forward to a luxurious evening in the famous restaurant at the Taj Mahal Hotel. However, it turned out that my bad conscience and  guilt were the wrong spices for my planned meal.

On my way to dinner, I walked through Bombay’s back alleys and side streets past families in rags living on the streets. With outstretched hands, they asked only  for a small sum, just enough to give their children a bowl of rice. That walk turned out to be a bad appetizer.  

The stark contrast between India’s poor and rich was painfully obvious to me when I had to step over and around men sleeping on the marble stairs in front of the hotel’s opulent dining hall. Two attendants dressed in spotless white livery, white turbans, matching white gloves and barefoot, opened the carved wooden doors leading to the dining hall.  When I entered, the sea of light from its crystal chandeliers, and the care-free diners oblivious to the poverty only a few meters from their table, startled me as though I had inadvertently stepped into a scene from Colonial India. 

I turned in the doorway and made my way back down the stairs over and around the sleeping men, found a street stall, and sitting on a backless bench polished smooth by countless diners, ate a humble meal of chapatti and curried vegetables.  

                                                  ******

Forest Gold

 Among all of the wild plants and fruits of the jungle, honey was the most sought after, and men of the indigenous tribes were masters at climbing to the roof of the forest and risking their lives for their favorite food. Immune to the stings of the agitated bees they climb fifty meters or more in order to pull the hives from hollow tree trunks. 

 After months of travelling through the deserts of north Africa and then down into the continent’s steaming jungles, Kersti and I continued our trip on the Congo River  with a Greek trader whose boat was carrying a cargo of beer up river to Kisangani in the Eastern Congo. We slogged upstream 1500 kilometers deep into the remote interior of the continent, on a river that was so wide that at times you could barely see the opposite shore, and at others so narrow that our boat seemed like it would be swallowed by an unbroken wall of green.

We  brought a little breath of the outside world to the thatched hut villages that we passed on our way upriver. We were a diversion in the unchanging life of the jungle. villagers came out to the narrow strip of shore to watch us pass, waving and chanting. Children swam out a bit to get our attention, and fishermen paddled their dug-out canoes to intercept our boat and hitch a ride upstream, or sell whatever fish or fruit that they might have. One peddler while holding on to our gunwale  haggled  with one of the crew over a  beehive dripping with honey,  complete with dead bees and their larvae.

We found a battered tin bowl in the galley and pressed out the honey with our hands. We  picked out dead bees and bits of wax, and crushed the cells between our fingers and palms so that the sugary liquid ran out.

I filled a frying pan with palm seed oil, sliced and quartered thick, green, fibery plantains and fried them golden brown  over a kerosene burner and  poured the honey over them while they were still sizzling.  If there was ever a review of jungle delicacies, fried bananas and fragrant rain forest honey would be at the top of any list.

                                                    ****

A Good Try But Not Fully Acclimatized

 I had not exactly gone native, but after having lived in India for almost three years, I felt that I still needed to prove to myself that I was truly acclimatized. So, looking for some kind of personal validation, I asked Mrs. Mani my cook, to serve ragi mudde, firm round balls the size of a tennis ball, made from the millet that gave good yields from the stony, dry plains of Kolar District, and was a staple in the local villages. 

"What will people think of me if I feed you this,”  she lamented in her Tamil blended Kannada. As if I hadn’t already done enough strange things, she shook her head and asked, “why would you eat this simple food when I can make you rice with mutton or chicken every day.

She placed them in front of me on my tin plate and pretended not to watch as I chewed and chewed. No matter how much curry I soaked them in, they still tasted like brown lumps of coagulated dough that stuck to the roof of my mouth. For my unappreciative and untrained palate, ragi mudde’s firm, gluey consistency reminded me of the oatmeal  from my childhood that was left standing too long in the bottom of the pot, and that I sneaked into the trash bin when my mother wasn’t looking.

To Mrs. Mani’s satisfaction, I  gave up after a few days, and went to back eating  her excellent meals.  She never said, “ I told you so,” and  only gloated a little, if you don’t count her hearty laugh when she shared the story of my fiasco with her daughters.

                        Mrs. Mani