My Italian food
“Sancrau”, the assonance with “sauerkraut” is clear and this is indeed a cabbage dish: Savoy cabbage cooked with garlic, anchovies and vinegar.
I have not been able to ascertain whether this is the Italian version of sauerkraut (as some sources claim) or if the name is just a coincidence – however, a savoury, robust dish this is for sure. Continue reading “Sancrau (braised cabbage with anchovies and garlic, from Piemonte and Liguria)”
A long but highly rewarding, sumptuous cold months dish (forgive the bad pictures). It takes about 8-10 hours cooking on a very low oven and there is some prep to be made the day before; once done, it must be let to cool down and then the meat is taken off the bone and the sauce reduced. The dish must rest for 24 hours and only then the most voluptuous sour- sweet condiment is added to the meat: as I said, not a last minute dish, but an intriguing one, firmly rooted in Italian “special occasion” home cooking. Continue reading “Lepre in agrodolce con cioccolato, arancia candita e pinoli – Sour-sweet hare with chocolate, orange peels pine nuts”
“Blessed be the stuffed peppers! what a clever thing they are!…What are they made of? Not much: peppers, bread, a couple of aubergines cooked ‘fungitiello‘ style (i.e. deep fried), a handful of capers and Gaeta black olives, some anchovies and, let’s not forget, a pinch of oregano and parsley, a clove of garlic and few bits of tomatoes. And from these humble ingredients, a masterpiece is born: one of those dishes that makes your mouth water just thinking about them. Continue reading “I peperoni imbottiti alla napoletana (Neapolitan-style stuffed peppers)”
This is the savoury version of scarpaccia, that unusual courgette cake from North Tuscany I described in the previous post; in fact savoury scarpaccia is regarded as the original dish by Tuscan food authority Paolo Petroni, whose recipe I used as a template (the sweet version, he says, came later). Continue reading “Scarpaccia salata di Camaiore (savoury and custardy courgette cake from Camaiore, Tuscany)”
This is a lovely old-fashioned dish worth reviving. Think of a sformato (singular ) as the Italian, more substantial version of a soufflé. Generally, sformati (plural) are made with chopped-up cooked vegetables, eggs (yolks and whites separated, the whites beaten to stiff peaks) and Parmigiano, all bound with a thick béchamel sauce. Continue reading “Sformato di piselli (unmoulded pea pudding )”
Italian home cooking 