Cucina Italiana by 149750

Table of Contents Introduction......................................................................................................5 What do we mean by ‘Italy’? ............................................................................7 A very brief history of Italian cuisine.................................................................9 When you think of ‘Italian’ food, what do you think of? .....................................9 Case study: Spaghetti Bolognese ................................................................9 Pizza.......................................................................................................... 10 Pasta ......................................................................................................... 11 Tomatoes .................................................................................................. 12 Lemons...................................................................................................... 13 Olive oil...................................................................................................... 13 Italy and its cuisine are fundamentally regional .............................................. 14 Case Study: food from Sicily ...................................................................... 14 Case study: food from Puglia ..................................................................... 15 The Italian diaspora and its influence on Italian food ..................................... 16 Cultural appropriation .................................................................................... 16 Common features of Italian cooking............................................................... 18 The structure of the Italian menu ................................................................... 19 Antipasti..................................................................................................... 19 Primi .......................................................................................................... 19 Secondi ..................................................................................................... 19 Dolci .......................................................................................................... 19 Contorni ..................................................................................................... 19 Pane .......................................................................................................... 19 Salse ......................................................................................................... 19 Formaggi ................................................................................................... 19 The recipes.................................................................................................... 21 Antipasti ........................................................................................................ 23 Acciughe, Peperoni e Mozzarella di Bufala Campana ................................ 23 Cipolla di Tropea all’ Insalata ..................................................................... 25 Primi .............................................................................................................. 27 Fresh Fettuccine ........................................................................................ 27 Fettucine Aglio, Olio e Bottarga ................................................................. 31 Green apple risotto .................................................................................... 33

Penne with Spicy Goatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Cheese and Hazelnut Pesto............................... 35 Secondi ......................................................................................................... 36 Calamari Ripieni ........................................................................................ 37 Chicken Fricassee, Cacciatora style.......................................................... 39 Coniglio all`Agrodolce e Lampascioni........................................................ 40 Quaglie Marinate Arrosto .......................................................................... 43 Contorni ........................................................................................................ 44 Pepperoni Arrosto e Aglio ......................................................................... 44 Spinach SautĂŠed with Olive Oil and Garlic ................................................ 47 Couscous .................................................................................................. 49 Carciofi Stufati........................................................................................... 51 Pane ............................................................................................................. 53 Pizza Margherita ....................................................................................... 53 Ligurian Focaccia ...................................................................................... 57 Salse ............................................................................................................. 61 Salsa di Pomodoro .................................................................................... 61 Dolci.............................................................................................................. 63 Tiramisu .................................................................................................... 63 Formaggi....................................................................................................... 65 Asiago ....................................................................................................... 65 Pecorino Fresco ........................................................................................ 65 Parmiggiano Regiano ................................................................................ 65 Gorgonzola ............................................................................................... 65 Acknowledgements ....................................................................................... 66 Bibliography .................................................................................................. 66 Sources for Recipes .................................................................................. 66 Interviews .................................................................................................. 67 Background Information ............................................................................ 67 Appendix 1: Interview questions .................................................................... 69

Introduction The first person I have ever interviewed was Fiorella Cristofoli. I was terrified! I needn’t have worried, because she gave me very useful information. Fiorella is slight, spry, chatty and stylishly dressed, but with a practical apron, which the rest of the staff also wear. While I was interviewing her, she was also busy with cooking what looked to me like fishcakes. Fiorella is the third generation of her family living in the Netherlands. Her grandparents came to The Netherlands in the 1930s with the first generation of Italian immigrants to the country. Her grandfather set up an import business to serve the needs of his homesick fellow immigrants and later started a business supplying basic Italian food, wine and parmesan. Fiorella took over the business from her father, who had followed his father into the Fiorella, interviewee for my project trade. In my long interview with her, as part of the research for this project, she said that despite being third generation Dutch, she was “raised in a very Italian environment”. “We have always been close to Italian food,” she said, “and that keeps you close to your roots.” She added “and that even passes on to the next generation, in my son.” Fiorella’s main food influence was her mother. She comes from a family of six, with four children, and “everyone was allowed to have their own version of their favourite dish.” Italian meals are very much family affairs, she emphasised. When asked to name a single favourite dish, she looked pained, thought aloud for a long time and just couldn’t settle on anything, except maybe dishes with pasta from the area around Bologna. So, despite being Dutch, speaking fluent Dutch, living in The Netherlands and having a successful Dutch business, she still feels close to her Italian roots. Like most people with Italian ancestry, however, her allegiance is as much to the region of Friuli, in north east Italy, where her ancestors lived and where she still has family. Fiorella’s fantastic food shop in Piet Heinstraat is a gold mine for lovers of rare Italian ingredients, the walls lined with jars, bottles, pots and packets of delicious things and a deli counter, with cheeses, hams, sausages and homemade dishes. My family and I often go there for the fresh pasta stuffed with truffles, spinach, cheeses and walnuts.

In many ways, Fiorella’s story is the story of Italian food, grounded in regions, based around family cooking and made with perfect ingredients. She is also part of the huge Italian diaspora, which has done so much to introduce Italian cuisine, in all its diversity, to the world. Cosimo Zaccaria is the second person I interviewed for this project. When we meet, he talks very fast in perfect English with an Italian accent. He has greying hair, rides a fast motorbike and lives above a tattoo parlour on the same street as Fiorella’s shop. Cosimo was born in Puglia. He was raised there until he was 18, and then he moved to Bologna, and lived there for ten years. He worked in London for the European Medicines Agency, then when it moved to Amsterdam, he came to live in The Netherlands. Cosimo Zaccaria and his daughter – Interviewee Cosimo’s main food influence, like Fiorella’s, was his mother. Despite having left Puglia when he was 18, he is still full of stories and knowledge about the region. He has many strong opinions about Italian food. In our interview, he said “I don’t like Italian fast food.” It was on the topic of people replicating Italian food in other countries and not making it properly. He says that it is very important for Italian food to be properly made, with the correct ingredients. This is a common belief among Italians. As for me, I’m half British, half Dutch, with no Italian ancestry and no connection to Italy at all. I’ve been to Italy twice. Once when I was too young to remember much about it, and once on a school trip to Rome and Naples. On that school trip, my friend Nona and I frequently came past stands where they were selling little bags of roasted chestnuts, and we bought them often. Chestnuts, I later discovered, used to be very common as food among poor people, and now, in winter, roasted chestnuts are a treat. Anyway, I was hooked! Like most kids, I love pizza and pasta, but from my little glimpse of Italy, I knew that there was much more to Italian food than these famous dishes. This project is about my journey of discovery in Italian food.

What do we mean by ‘Italy’? Soon after I started my research on Italian cuisine, I realised that “Italy” and “Italian” are much more complicated ideas than the superficial images that come to mind. What is true of Italy, is doubly true of Italian cuisine. Before diving into the cuisine, therefore, we need to step back and ask ourselves what exactly is Italy? Italy is actually a pretty recent country, at least within the borders we recognise today. I looked at the website visualcapitalist.com, where they had a timelapse video about “2400 years of European history”. In 230BC, Rome had control of Italy. After the Roman Empire fell, different regions of Italy were taken over by many different empires, kingdoms, and city states. This of course, had a lot of influence on Italian cuisine, as the food from the different cultures spread throughout Italy. Venice, for example, which was once just a small fishing port, became a big trading power, and exported and imported goods all over the Mediterranean and further afield to the Far East. This brought new ingredients and culinary influences to Venice and its power ensured that these influences spread to other parts of Italy. The regions of Italy formed, broke apart and reformed many times before they forged the Italy we know today. Italy unified on March 17, 1861. If someone asked you where you came from, you might say England, The Netherlands, Italy, or another place in the world. Would you tell them your country of birth or the country you lived in at the time? Would you tell them the name of a country, a city, a town, or a village? Both of my interviewees had complex answers to this question. But both of them had links to a specific region of Italy, for example Friuli or Puglia. Cosimo even mentioned the village he comes from and emphasised how different it was to other nearby villages. Why did they refer to a specific region, rather than just Italy? According to the Encyclopedia Britannica, “many Italians, particularly older ones, are inclined to think of themselves as belonging to families, then neighbourhoods, then towns or cities, then regions, and then, last, as members of a nation!” So, although both of my interviewees think of themselves as having Italian heritage, it makes perfect sense that they remain attached also to the ancient regions that they come from. As we shall see, understanding the history of Italy and the distinctiveness of its regions is key to appreciating the diversity and richness of Italian cuisine.

A very brief history of Italian cuisine We don’t know much about Italian cuisine before ancient Rome. The ancient Roman empire already had dishes including staples of the modern Mediterranean diet. For example, wine, olive oil, bread, vegetables, beans, and cheeses. “As the Roman Empire conquered different areas, the spices and ingredients of these lands were incorporated into Roman cuisine.” After the Roman empire fell, Italy was conquered many times by different groups, such as the Visigoths, the Byzantines, the Arabs, the Normans and the Huns. They each left a strong mark on Italian cuisine. Sicily was occupied by Arab Muslims, and they introduced many different spices and fruits into Italy. This is also when dried pasta was developed. During the middle ages, religion also played a big part in Italian cuisine. Christians started many dietary restrictions because they associated many different foods with sin and sexuality, for example, the apple from original sin. They cut down on the amount of meat they ate, because of their religion, and therefore, fish, bread, cheese, egg, legumes, and fruit began to rise in popularity. During the Renaissance, trading increased between countries, and new foods were introduced to Italy. During this time, food became “a source of enjoyment and cultural exchange” One of the foods introduced to Italy in the Renaissance was the tomato, brought to Italy from Spain, who were ruling Naples at the time. The tomato became a staple in Italian cuisine. In 1861, Italy reunified, and the flavours from different geographical regions of Italy became part of Italian cuisine. Italian food has been shared all around the world and become a cultural influence. Modern Italy is actually a really young country.

When you think of ‘Italian’ food, what do you think of? I don’t know about you, but when someone said Italian food to me, I used to think of pizza and pasta. It turns out that pasta is indeed quite ancient, and every part of Italy has its own kind of pasta. Pizza, on the other hand, is an invention from Naples. It was only after Italian immigrants to America popularized it there that it became truly common everywhere in Italy and pretty soon everywhere in the world. As we shall discover, there is much, much more to Italian cuisine than these two categories.

Case study: Spaghetti Bolognese I had heard that Spaghetti Bolognese is actually an American dish. The Bolognese sauce comes from Italy, where they would have it with fresh tagliatelle, while the Americans have it with dried spaghetti.

In my interview with Cosimo, I asked him about Spaghetti Bolognese. He told me that “Americans eat spaghetti with meat.” He added “It’s probably the most famous dish in the world, but if you go to Bologna, they do it the proper way.” He explained that the Americans also don’t make the Bolognese sauce properly. In Italy, Bolognese sauce is the same sauce that you would have in Lasagna. In the past, when I went to Italy, I always wondered why there were so many restaurants that don’t have Spaghetti Bolognese. After the interview with Cosimo, I understood it. He told me that in Bologna, where Bolognese sauce comes from, you don’t actually get Spaghetti Bolognese in restaurants. You would get it the Italian way, so you would eat ragu the proper way, with tagliatelle, a type of pasta. During the course of the interview, he said that “It’s very important that the sauce becomes one thing with the pasta. Italians become horrified when you get the pasta, and on top you put the sauce. No! You never put pasta like this, and then the sauce. It is one dish.” Spaghetti Bolognese is an American twist on what would be Tagliatelle with Bolognese ragu in Italy. In America, like I said earlier, they don’t make the sauce properly, like they would in Italy, and they put the sauce on top of the pasta, instead of making it as one incorporated dish. So, is Spaghetti Bolognese an Italian dish? Well, yes and no. Italians from Emilia-Romagna, the region of which Bologna is the capital look down on it, but the components are very much Italian. Lots of originally Italian dishes have been adapted and edited in this way over the decades. I researched the history of a few very well-known Italian dishes and ingredients, which are discussed below.

Pizza In the late 18th century, Naples was one of the biggest cities in Europe. Because it had such a big population, many of the inhabitants of Naples fell into poverty. The poor people in Naples needed food that was cheap. Pizza was sold by food kiosks who carried big boxes. They would cut the pizza into sizes suiting the customer’s appetite, or their budget. They were always very simple. Italian food is known for being very simple. They were made using ingredients that were easy to find and had loads of flavour. Not everyone liked pizza. In 1831, Samuel Morse, who was the inventor of the telegraph, said that pizza was a “species of the most nauseating cake … covered over with slices of pomodoro or tomatoes, and sprinkled with little fish and black pepper and I know not what other ingredients, it altogether looks like a piece of bread that has been taken reeking out of the sewer.” In the 19th century, the first cookbooks ignored pizza. This changed after the unification of Italy. A popular apocryphal story says that the pizza margherita

was named after Queen Margherita, wife of King Umberto I. It says she and King Umberto I were visiting Naples, and they were given three pizzas. The third one, a pizza with tomatoes, mozzarella, and basil, was her favourite. It is said that this changed the popularity of pizza, because it was something that a royal family would eat. It brought pizza to the same level as pasta and polenta. Pizza still took a long time to leave Naples. Tourism is what really made pizza a typically Italian dish. Tourists were interested in Italian cuisine, and restaurants across Italy began to offer food from other regions, including pizza. It quickly became used all over Italy and new ingredients began to be used, because customers were now willing to pay higher prices. In 1905, because of Italian emigrants, the first pizzeria opened in New York, called Lombardi’s. It was quickly adapted by Americans to fit the local tastes, needs and identities. “Shortly after the US entered the Second World War, a Texan named Ike Sewell attempted to attract new customers to his newly opened Chicago pizzeria by offering a much ‘heartier’ version of the dish, complete with a deeper, thicker crust and richer, more abundant toppings – usually with cheese at the bottom and a mountain of chunky tomato sauce heaped on top of it.” This is, in my opinion, like putting milk in before the cereal! On the other hand, it’s another example of Italian dishes being innovated.

Pasta It is likely that pasta came from ancient Asian noodles. There is a common belief that pasta was first brought to Italy by Marco Polo in the 13th century. In the book, “The Travels of Marco Polo”, he mentions a plant that produced flour. This was possibly a breadfruit tree. The Chinese used this to make a meal that was like barley flour. This meal was used to make dishes that were like pasta. One of those was “lasagna”. Marco Polo’s original text doesn’t exist anymore, so his book relies a lot on retellings written by different authors and experts. It is unlikely that Marco Polo was actually the one to introduce pasta to Italy. Noodles actually existed in Asia long before Marco Polo visited China. They already produced noodles thousands of years ago. Noodles travelled westward from Asia. It is unclear how exactly pasta reached Europe, but there are many theories about it. Some people believe that the Nomadic Arabs were the ones to bring early forms of pasta to Europe.

When noodles reached the Mediterranean, the process of pasta making changed, and durum wheat is now the ingredient used, because it has loads of gluten and has a long shelf life. Dried durum wheat pasta lasts indefinitely, so it is very helpful to store. Pasta became very popular in Italian culture because it was so affordable, versatile and had such a long shelf life. During the first large diaspora in the late 19th century, Italian immigrants brought pasta to America, and it became very popular in the States as well.

Tomatoes Contrary to popular belief, the tomato is not actually from Italy. They were originally found in Ecuador, Peru, and northern Chile. When they migrated north, the Mayans and Aztecs modified them, so that they were larger and tastier. The Aztecs named it ‘tomatl,’ which is where the name ‘tomato’ comes from. When the Aztecs were defeated by Hernan Cortes, the Spanish conquistador, the Europeans learned about it. In 1548, the first tomatoes reached Italy. People associated them with aubergines. They didn’t really know how to properly prepare tomatoes, because they didn’t want to learn about the food from the people they conquered. This is why it took a long time for tomatoes to become a popular part of Italian cuisine. People also didn’t trust vegetables from the renaissance. They thought they were poisonous. The Italians thought of the tomatoes as the ‘devil’s fruit,’ because of their red colour, and the fact that they thought they were poisonous. The wealthy class in Italy were the first to try tomatoes, because they were more experimental with the food that they consumed. Because of cultural and dietary change in the 18th century, the tomato began to gain more popularity. People began to realise how nutritious tomatoes were when they were properly prepared. In the 19th century, some of the famous dishes that used tomatoes began to become part of Italian cuisine. The tomato became a symbol of Italian cuisine. The red part of the Italian flag also helped its popularity. Italian immigrants to America spread Italian cuisine and the tomato globally.

Lemons The origin of lemons is unknown, but it is believed that they first grew in northeast India, Burma, or China. The lemon arrived near southern Italy during the time of Ancient Rome. They werenâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t widely used until the 15th century, in Genoa, the capital of the Italian region, Liguria. In 1493, the lemon was introduced to the Americas by Christopher Columbus. The Spanish conquest also helped spread lemon seeds. It used to mainly be used for medicine and as an ornamental plant.

Olive oil Olive trees have to mature for 15 years before you can get good olives, and then they can produce good quality olives for 65 years, and they can live for hundreds of years. Italy is known to produce the best olive oil in the world. Olive trees were introduced in Sicily by the Greek diaspora in around 800. When the Greek lost control of Italy and the Roman Empire took over the Mediterranean, olive oil production began in Italy. When the Roman Empire fell, the olive oil industry was nearly destroyed, and around that time, butter was also introduced to Italy. Olive oil still survived, though, because it was important in the catholic church. The religious communities helped to keep olive oil going. Today, olive oil is a strong staple of Italian cuisine.

Italy and its cuisine are fundamentally regional As I have already mentioned, it is only very recently that it has been meaningful to talk about ‘Italian food’. Italy is, in truth, a confederation of regions that each has its distinctive characteristics. The style of cooking in the different regions of Italy depends on lots of things. For example, history, geography, trade, climate and local plants and animals. If they are on the coast, the focus of that region will be seafood, and if they are more inland, by mountains, the focus will be on meat. In the cooler north of the country where cows are common, the usual cooking fat is butter, whereas in the hot south of the country, olive trees flourish, and olive oil is the food of choice. Until quite recently, very mountainous areas were difficult to cross, and therefore the food that you could get there was limited to food from land, and less seafood. Now, of course, with trading and the terrain being easier to navigate, more mountainous regions are able to get other influences on their cooking, creating more variation in those regions. Food from Venice and Sicily is as different as food from France and Turkey. In fact, Cosimo told me “in many ways, the food of Puglia is more similar to the food of Greece and Turkey than to the food of northern Italy.”

Case Study: food from Sicily Sicily is Italy’s largest island. It has many influences from the countries around it, bringing plenty of new culinary styles into Italy. It has Mount Etna and Stromboli, both volcanoes. The two volcanoes, of course, made it a turbulent place to live, and made the people of Sicily very resourceful. Vegetables play a strong part in their cuisine. Sicily has loads of vineyards, orange and lemon groves, almond trees, and olive farms. The Sicilians also love sweet food, and their pastries and candied fruits are world famous. Whenever it is the season for oranges, you can find freshly squeezed orange juice in nearly every coffee bar in Sicily. They also use oranges in savoury dishes. For example, Insalata di Arance, which is an orange salad, usually with shaved fennel, extra virgin olive oil from Sicily, olives, salt, and pepper. Sicilians have a relaxed attitude to life, which is reflected in their cuisine. Sicilian food is very simple, like the rest of Italy, and they mostly use local ingredients. Sicily is also known for its street food.

Case study: food from Puglia Cosimo Zaccaria was born in Puglia, a region in the south of Italy, the “heel of the boot”. He was raised there until he was 18, and then he moved to Bologna. In my interview with Cosimo, he told me that “It is a poor region, surrounded by sea. It has sun for at least eight months of the year, it’s flat, It’s very agricultural, It’s very strong for vegetarian food and for wild vegetables, like chicory and rocket. The rocket has a totally different flavour from the one you buy.” He also said that “there’s lots of fish, grapes, watermelons. There are 60 million olive trees, some of them a thousand years old.” He said that there were many influences on Puglian food from Greece, Turkey, Persia, the Romans, and the Mesopotamians. He told me that “these days, regional foods are being mixed up. In Puglia we eat pizza, which is from Napoli.” When I asked him if he could name a dish from Puglia, he said “can I do two?” During the interview, he kept coming back to that question, because he continued to come up with more dishes. The dishes he mentioned were “Orecchiette”, and he said that “It’s handmade with semolina”. He also mentioned sun dried fava beans and told me that “they’re cooked for many hours with vegetables or it can be served with ragout.” He also mentioned Panzerotti and Braciole. He explained that in Puglia, “even when you change from one village to the next, you have different recipes.”

The Italian diaspora and its influence on Italian food Italian restaurants are features of cities from Kyoto to Reykjavik. Why is this? The first big Italian diaspora in Italian history happened in 1880 – 1940. This was because of the rise of fascism in Italy. Most of the emigrants went to the Americas. This started loads of unskilled jobs and the mass migration of Italians, searching for “work and bread”. The second big Italian diaspora started after the end of World War II and ended in the 1970s. Millions of Italians moved outside Italy. "These together constituted the largest voluntary emigration period in documented history. Between 1880-1980, about 15,000,000 Italians left the country permanently.” Currently, there are over 5 million Italians living outside Italy, and 80 million people that claim Italian ancestry. There aren’t many Italian diaspora in The Netherlands, but Fiorella’s family is part of it, and Cosimo is an example of an Italian who has moved abroad for work but might decide to return. The immigration of Italians to countries outside Italy has helped to spread Italian food worldwide, and it is a big reason for the fame of Italian cuisine today.

Cultural appropriation There is a big debate going on about something that is called “cultural appropriation.” Cultural appropriation is what they call it when you take an element of another culture and use it without the permission of the people from that culture, and without being of that culture. Many people argue that this is a bad thing. They say that you are using it for your own benefit, even though it is not yours to use. They would consider it as the same kind of thing as if you rented out someone else's house for your own purposes. Jamie Oliver shared a recipe for ‘jerk rice’ at one point. He received loads of backlash, because people thought it was cultural appropriation, and that it was bad. One person, an MP called Dawn Butler, wrote a tweet directed at him. In it, she asked him “do you actually know what #Jamaican #Jerk is.” She also said “Your jerk Rice is not ok. This appropriation from Jamaica needs to stop.” Many people agreed with her. Jamie later said in a statement that he was just calling it that to show where he got his inspiration from.

On the other hand, you could say that cultural appropriation is actually a good thing. One person said, “If Jamie Oliver isn’t allowed to make Jerk chicken because it’s cultural ‘appropriation’ she’s going to go mad when she finds out about ‘Jamie’s Italy’”. If you think about the thing I mentioned earlier, about when a Texan called Ike Sewell made a version of pizza, in which he put the cheese under the tomato sauce. This is another example of cultural appropriation, and it could be considered as a good thing, because it’s just someone putting a creative twist on something and making it unique. As part of my interview with Fiorella, I asked her how she felt about cultural appropriation, where non-Italians cook Italian food. Her response was “I think it’s great! I think it’s a good thing.” “I think it’s wonderful that people are willing to try different things.” She added “My business wouldn’t survive if people weren’t willing to try foreign foods.” She also said “If a shop with Dutch specialties would open in Italy, I’m not sure how many clients you would have. I mean, I’m sure people would appreciate the different cheeses, but pickled herring, more tricky!” On the topic of Jamie Oliver, she seemed to be a big fan. She explained that “Jamie Oliver really opened up the Italian kitchen to everyone in Holland, especially for my generation. He introduced many ingredients that people weren’t familiar with. Proper olive oil and good quality imported ingredients.” I also asked Cosimo about this. He said “In a way, I’m a bit sad to see that. You go to Paris. In the main squares, there are Italian restaurants.” He added “Italian food is famous because it’s easy! It’s about simplicity. The ingredients are very good. You take a fish from salty water, and the sea has done everything for you. You just need to grill it. It’s all about quality. If you draw the quality from Italian food, it’s not really nice.” On the other hand, he also said “I like the idea, that very good ice cream, Italian ice cream is now available in The Netherlands.” He finished with “It’s the first time I get this question. I don’t know how I feel about it. If it’s done properly...but I don’t really like Italian fast food.” In the course of our interview, Cosimo emphasised how the food of Puglia has been influenced by numerous different countries. He mentioned the French, the Spanish, the Greeks, the Persians, the Romans, and even before the Romans, the Mesopotamians. He said that in many ways, Puglian food is more similar to Greek or Turkish food than to that of the north of Italy. He said that he does think that it’s important to make variations on Italian food, and that you should always be improving. In conclusion, I think that cultural appropriation is good. I think it is good that people try out new things from other countries, like Italy. It helps to spread knowledge of different cultures. I do agree with Cosimo, when he says that Italian fast food is not great, and you should still use the proper ingredients. I agree that you should go with the simplicity of Italian food when you make it.

Common features of Italian cooking Before I finally get to the recipes, I wanted to emphasise that there are three things that seem to be common to Italian food from all regions. 1. Ingredients. The Italians have a strong focus on fresh, local ingredients. Both people I interviewed said that the ingredients are fundamental to a good Italian meal. They said that if there is one bad ingredient, or an ingredient that is missing, it will ruin the whole meal. 2. Simplicity. Most Italian recipes just have a few ingredients. As long as theyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;re good, thatâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s ok. 3. Family. Both Cosimo and Fiorella emphasised that Italian cooking is very family based. Both were influenced by their mother, and both have passed on their love of food to their children. Fiorella told me that her family had one cookbook that had all the old family recipes in it, and they used that.

The structure of the Italian menu When I started this project, I looked at lots of different cookbooks and websites, and I quickly realised that there is a typical structure to an Italian meal. That is “antipasti,” “primi,” “secondi” and “dolce.” These are the Italian words for starter, first main course, second main course, and pudding. You can also get “contorni,” which means side dishes, and “formaggi,” which is cheese. In my interview with Fiorella, I asked her about this, and she told me that 15 or 20 years ago, she would always cook in this structure, but now, it is changing, and you can easily go to an Italian restaurant and get one dish. When I interviewed Cosimo, he said that “food is really, really important. You sit down and eat something together. We have long lunches and dinners.”

Antipasti Antipasti is the equivalent of the starter. In the past, when you got an antipasti, it showed that you were wealthy, because the poor usually only ate pasta.

Primi Primi is the first main course. This is a usually a pasta or risotto dish.

Secondi Secondi is the second main course. This will usually consist of fish or meat, sometimes with a side dish.

Dolci Dolci is the dessert. In Italy, they don’t have a strong focus on dessert. You will usually just have cheese, fruit, gelato or sorbet.

Contorni Contorni means side dishes. You can often also have this as an antipasto. This is usually a vegetable dish, and it is usually used on the side when you have a secondo.

Pane Pane is bread. Italians often eat this at the very start of the meal. They also use it to wipe any remaining sauce off their plates. Pizza is also a type of bread.

Salse Salse means “sauces”. This would go with the pasta, or the other components of the meal, and is often scooped up with bread.

Formaggi Formaggi is cheese. This is often served at the end of a meal, and often replaces the dessert.

The recipes The recipes in this book are not original, but they are sourced. I have used various cookbooks and websites. I researched and wrote the introduction to each recipe myself. I cooked all the recipes myself and served them to my family, and the photos that I show are photos of my own results. I tried to choose a mix of recipes that illustrate regional variations, different techniques, traditional and modern interpretations, and recipes from Italian diaspora. I have chosen recipes from each category of a full Italian meal, as well as contorni, pane, salse and formaggi.

Antipasti Acciughe, Peperoni e Mozzarella di Bufala Campana Anchovies, Peppers and Buffalo Mozzarella This recipe came aboutâ&#x20AC;?, writes Francesco Mazzei, â&#x20AC;&#x153;when I was playing about with some of my favourite ingredients.â&#x20AC;? Mazzei is from Campania, in the south of Italy, where ingredients like the famous mozzarella, made from the milk of water buffaloes, peppers, anchovies and capers are abundant. It is a good example of how Italian cooking uses few ingredients, each of which is really good. Ingredients (for 4)

Method

4 Romano peppers (about 600g)

On a very hot griddle pan, grill the peppers until the skins are blistered and charred. Transfer to a container, cover and leave to steam and cool.

70ml extra virgin olive oil, plus extra to serve 12 tinned anchovy fillets, plus 2 tbsp oil from the tin 4 tsp red wine vinegar 400g mozzarella di bufala, at room temperature, roughly torn

Meanwhile, make a dressing by whisking together the olive oil, anchovy oil, vinegar and some salt and pepper. Remove the skin, seed pod and inner ribs from the peppers over a bowl so that you save all the juices. Cut the peppers into wedges and mix them with the dressing and the reserved juices. Season. Place the peppers in a large serving dish, scatter over the mozzarella, then top with the anchovy fillets, caper berries, drained onion rings and basil. Drizzle over a bit more olive oil.

50g caper berries 1 small Tropea red onion (about 50g), thinly sliced and placed in ice water Handful of basil leaves Salt and pepper

Cipolla di Tropea all’ Insalata Caramelised Tropea onion salad Tropea onions are a special kind of red onion that look like shallots. They are only available for a short part of the year, in late summer and I was lucky to find them in our local vegetable shop. One of the typical features of Italian food is the use of really great, fresh, seasonal ingredients, so I was pleased to find such an unusual ingredient to work with. Another interesting ingredient, which I found in Fiorella’s shop is ‘motto costo’, which looks like balsamic vinegar but is sweeter. Ingredients (for 4)

Method

600g red Tropea onions, peeled and halved lengthways

Place the onions, cut-side up on a board and dust with the icing sugar. Leave to one side until the sugar has melted onto the moist surfaces.

1 tbsp icing sugar

1 - 2 tbsp Red Onion Jam (optional)

Heat the oil in a non-stick frying pan over a medium-high heat. Add the onions, cut-side down, cover with a lid a bit smaller than the size of the pan to press the onions down and cook until the sugar has caramelised and the onions are golden. Remove from the heat and leave the onions in the pan for about 10 minutes.

100g pitted Italian black olives

Meanwhile, in a bowl, whisk the ingredients for the dressing and put to one side.

15g pine nuts, toasted

Separate the onion ‘leaves’, transfer to a dish and toss with the dressing. Scatter over the black olives and dot the onion jam around the plate. Scatter over the pine nuts, chives, and black sesame seeds.

1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil

8g chives, roughly chopped 1 tsp black sesame seeds For the dressing: 2 tsp motto costo (grape must syrup) or balsamic syrup. 2 tsp red wine vinegar 4 tsp extra virgin olive oil Pinch of salt

Primi Fresh Fettuccine Fresh pasta is made from soft wheat flower and whole eggs. Traditionally it is rolled between a wooden board and a long wooden rolling pin and produces flat noodles, which are very clingy and absorbent. It can also be rolled on a pasta machine, but this produces less absorbent results, according to Mario Batali. He recommends that you shouldn’t use fresh pasta with oil-rich tomato or vegetable sauces, because they would soak up too much oil and the noodles would be greasy. You could serve it with a small amount of rich ragu, or use it to enclose a rich ricotta mixture and sauce it with melted butter and sage. According to the respected Italian food expert, Marcella Hazan, “the homemade pasta that enjoys uncontested recognition as Italy’s finest is that of Emilia-Romagna, the birthplace of tagliatelle, tagliolini—also known as capella d’angelo or angel hair, cappelletti, tortellini, tortelli, tortelloni and lasagne.” This recipe comes from Marcella Hazan. The basic recipe for fresh pasta is the same for most pasta shapes. The differences come in the way in which it is cut or shaped. Basic pasta contains just two ingredients: flour and water. There isn’t even any salt, so the water in which you cook pasta needs to be very salty. Samin Nosrat recommends making it “as salty as the sea”. With only two ingredients, it is important that they are good. It is best to use Italian ’00’ flour and fresh eggs.

Ingredients

Method

(makes enough for 4)

Because no one can tell in advance exactly how much flour one needs, the sensible method of combining eggs and flour is by hand, which permits you to adjust the proportion of flour as you go along.

450g â&#x20AC;&#x2122;00â&#x20AC;&#x2122; flour 4 large eggs

Pour the flour onto a work surface, shape it into a mound, and scoop out a deep hollow in its centre. Break the eggs into the hollow. Beat the eggs lightly with a fork for about a minute. Draw some of the flour over the eggs, mixing it in with the fork a little at a time, until the eggs are no longer runny. Draw the sides of the mound together with your hands, but push some of the flour to one side, keeping it out of the way until you find you absolutely need it. Work the eggs and flour together until you have a smoothly integrated mixture. If it is still moist, work in some more flour. Knead the dough. Push forward against it with the heel of your palm, fold the dough in half, give it a half turn, press hard against it with the heel of your palm again, and repeat. When you have kneaded it for a full 8 minutes and the dough is as smooth as a babyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s skin, it is ready for the pasta machine. Cut the dough into four pieces. Set the smooth rollers on the pasta machine to their widest setting. Feed one of the pieces of dough through the machine. Fold it in half and feed it through the machine again. Repeat this operation 2 or 3 times, then lay the flattened strip of pasta over a towel on the counter. Repeat with the other balls of dough. Close down the rollers by one notch. Return to the first strip of pasta and feed it through the machine again. Repeat with the other strips. Close down the rollers by another notch and repeat the previous operation. Continue narrowing the opening until it is on the fifth setting. Fit the cutters onto the pasta machine. Feed each strip through the wider cutter. Hang the tagliatelle on a drying stand. It can be used immediately or left to dry for a while.

Fettucine Aglio, Olio e Bottarga Homemade fettuccine with garlic, oil and bottarga

The original recipe, by Francesco Mazzei, recommends dried linguine as the pasta but I decided to make fresh fettuccine on a pasta machine. It worked very well! This recipe is interesting because it takes a dish which is common from all over Italy, dried pasta cooked and tossed with oil and garlic, and makes it more interesting by adding chillies, which is common in the cuisine of southern Italy and bottarga, the dried roe of grey mullet, which is typical of Sardinian cooking. Mazzei is an Italian chef in London and this is another good example of how the Italian diaspora is developing and expanding Italian food. Ingredients (for 4)

Method

2 garlic cloves, thinly sliced

Put the garlic and chillies into a saucepan with 2 tablespoons of the olive oil over a medium heat and fry until the garlic is golden brown.

2 red chillies, thinly sliced 3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil I portion fresh fettucine (see above) 80g bottarga, grated Small bunch parsley, chopped

Bring a pan of salted water to the boil, add the fettuccine, and cook until al dente, about 4 minutes. Stir 100ml of water from the pasta into the pan of garlic. Drain the fettuccine and add it to the garlic and chilli and cook for another minute. Add half the bottarga, the parsley and the final tablespoon of olive oil and stir to get a creamy sauce. Add more pasta water if necessary. Transfer to a heated serving dish and sprinkle the rest of the bottarga over the top.

Salt

Green apple risotto At first this dish sounds both a bit disgusting and, other than the risotto bit, not very Italian. It’s from Mario Batali, a chef of Italian extraction who was born and brought up in the USA and who works in New York. He says: “much to my surprise, I learned it is, in fact, a traditional first course in the fall, when apples are at their apex in the Venice region.” All risotto fits into two different styles, the difference between them being consistency. The first style is slightly stickier, and it is often found in Piedmont, Lombardy, and Emilia-Romagna. The second style is known as all’onda. It is found in Venice and it is the looser and runny style of risotto. When Italians eat risotto, they usually spread it around on their plate to get rid of the steam.

Ingredients (for 4)

Method

1 litre chicken stock

In a medium saucepan, heat the chicken stock to a simmer and then reduce the heat to very low.

60g unsalted butter 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil 1 large red onion, finely chopped 2 Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored and cut into 1cm slices 400g arborio rice 250ml dry white wine 30g parmesan, grated plus extra for serving Small bunch flat-leaf parsley, finely chopped

In a large sauté pan, heat 30g of the butter and the olive oil until melted together. Add the onion and cook over medium heat until soft but not browned, about 5 minutes. Add the apples and rice and cook over medium heat, until the rice has a pearly, opaque appearance. Add the wine and simmer until it has evaporated. Add enough warm chicken stock to cover the rice and cook until the level of the liquid goes below the top of the rice. Continue cooking, adding stock and stirring constantly, until most of the stock is gone, 15 to 18 minutes. The rice should be tender but still retain an al dente bite. Stir in the remaining 2 tablespoons of butter, the grated cheese and the parsley and season to taste with salt and pepper. Serve immediately with additional grated cheese on the side.

Salt and pepper

Penne with Spicy Goat’s Cheese and Hazelnut Pesto In my interview with Fiorella, she told me that “every sauce asks for a different kind of pasta”. This recipe, by the American born Italian chef Mario Batali, is a good example of the innovative interpretations of Italian cuisine being made by second, third and later generations of Italian immigrants, using high quality ingredients from the places in which they live. It uses dried pasta instead of fresh pasta. Dried pasta is made from 100% durum flour, which is high in protein and low in starch. It keeps its shape when it’s cooked al dente, which means ‘so as to be firm when bitten’. Because dried pasta is pressed through metal dies in special machines, it is pretty solid, smooth, and hard for liquid to penetrate. Because of this, it is usually served in sauces that have olive oil, shellfish, or firm vegetables as a large role in the recipe. The pasta stays clean and firm and doesn’t soak up too much liquid. Ingredients (for 4)

Method:

225g penne

Place the basil, garlic, red pepper flakes, and hazelnuts in a food processor and pulse 3 times to start the chopping process.

1 portion of hazelnut pesto (see below) 110 fresh soft goat cheese, at room temperature

Turn the machine on and drizzle in the olive oil in a thin stream. Season with salt. Bring about 6 quarts of water to a boil and add about 2 tablespoons of salt.

Hazelnut pesto: 40g fresh basil leaves, lightly packed, washed and spun dry 2 garlic cloves 1 teaspoon hot red pepper flakes 30g hazelnuts 125ml extra virgin olive oil salt

Cook the penne according to package instructions until tender but still al dente, and drain well. Transfer the pesto to a 12- to 14-inch sauté pan. Whisk in the cheese until smooth. Toss the penne into the pesto mixture and stir together over very low heat for 1 minute, until thoroughly coated. Pour into a warm serving dish and serve

Secondi

Calamari Ripieni Stuffed Calamari Stuffing things is something they do often in the south of Italy, and this is a southern Italian classic, according to the Italian chef Francesco Mazzei, who lives and works in London. The origin of stuffed calamari is unknown. Some cite it as Sicilian, some say it is from the Amalfi peninsula, and others say that it is from Naples. You can find stuffed calamari all over Italy and around the coastlines. Every region puts a different twist on the recipe, for example, in Liguria, they often include cooked spinach in the stuffing, and in Sicily, they may add ingredients such as anchovies and caciocavallo cheese. Families all over Italy also change it to their liking - In Italy, cooking is very family based.

Ingredients (for 4)

Method:

120g frozen petit pois

Preheat the oven to 200Â°C/fan 180Â°C/gas 6. Blanch the peas in boiling water for 30 seconds, then drain well.

20 medium squid (around 1.6kg), cleaned and gutted but keep the tentacles (ask your fishmonger to do this for you)

Put 8 of the squid and the egg whites into a food processor, and pulse until they are roughly chopped. Add the peppers, blanched peas and chives and continue to pulse until you have a coarse mixture.

3 medium egg whites 200g Romano peppers, cut into 5mm dice 10g Chives, chopped 20 sturdy rosemary sprigs (optional) 1 garlic clove, with skin, halved 1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil 100ml white wine 400ml Tomato sauce (see page 45) 250ml fish stock

Use this mixture to stuff the remaining calamari, keeping some space free at the top. Place a piece of the tentacles at the end of the filling and close the calamari with a rosemary sprig or toothpick. Trim the other end of each calamari to create a tiny hole and keep the filling from bursting out when cooking. Heat a large heatproof baking dish over a medium heat and fry the garlic in 1 tablespoon of olive oil. Add the calamari and fry for a couple of minutes until browned, then pour in the wine and let it evaporate over a medium-high heat. Add the tomato sauce and the fish stock, then transfer to the oven for 20 minutes. You can check the filling is cooked through by sticking a toothpick in the centre of the filling; it should feel hot when you touch your lips Serve immediately with Italian bread to dip into the tomato sauce

Chicken Fricassee, Cacciatora style Marcella Hazan’s wonderful book ‘Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking’ was a big help in my research for this project. A lot of her recipes are family ones and much less ‘fancy’ than those from cookbooks written by restaurant chefs. Every family in Italy that has a hunter, which is nearly every Italian household, has their own variation on this recipe. Cacciatora just means hunter. They usually consist of a chicken or rabbit fricassee with tomato, onion, and other vegetables. Ingredients (for 4 - 6)

Method:

A 1.4 to 1.8kg chicken, cut into 6 to 8 pieces

Wash the chicken in cold water and pat thoroughly dry with cloth or paper towels.

2 tablespoons vegetable oil

Choose a sauté pan that can subsequently accommodate all the chicken pieces without crowding them. Put in the oil and turn the heat on to medium high. When the oil is hot, turn the chicken in the flour, coat the pieces on all sides, shake off excess flour, and slip them into the pan, skin side down. Brown that side well, then turn them and brown the other side. Transfer them to a warm plate, and sprinkle with salt and pepper.

Flour, spread on a plate Salt Black pepper, ground fresh from the mill 15g onion, sliced very thin 160ml dry white wine 1 sweet yellow or red bell pepper, seeds and core removed and cut into thin julienne strips 1 carrot, peeled and cut into thin disks ½ stalk celery, sliced thin crosswise 1 garlic clove, peeled and chopped very fine 150ml canned Italian plum tomatoes, chopped coarse, with their juice

Turn the heat back on to medium high, put in the sliced onion, and cook the onion until it has become coloured a deep gold. Add the wine. Let it simmer briskly for about 30 seconds while using a wooden spoon to scrape loose the browning residues on the bottom and sides of the pan. Return the browned chicken pieces to the pan, except for the breasts, which cook faster and will go in later. Add the bell pepper, carrot, celery, garlic, and the chopped tomatoes with their juice. Adjust heat to cook at a slow simmer and put a lid on the pan to cover tightly. After 40 minutes add the breast and continue cooking at least 10 minutes more until the chicken thighs feel very tender when prodded with a fork, and the meat comes easily off the bone. Turn and baste the chicken pieces from time to time while they are cooking. When the chicken is done, transfer it to a warm serving platter, using a slotted spoon or spatula. If the contents of the pan are on the thin, watery side, turn the heat up to high under the uncovered pan, and reduce them to an appealing density. Pour the contents of the pan over the chicken and serve at once.

Coniglio all`Agrodolce e Lampascioni Sweet and sour rabbit with pickled lampascioni This was definitely the most complicated recipe I attempted for this project. Many people are squeamish about eating rabbit, but my family has it a lot. It tastes a bit like chicken. According to the recipeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s author, Francesco Mazzei, it reflects the Moorish influence on southern Italian food. One of the most interesting ingredients in this dish is lampascioni. They taste a bit like very mild pickled onions but are in fact wild hyacinth bulbs. I found them for sale in Fiorellaâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s shop.

Ingredients (for 4)

Method:

3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil 1.8kg rabbit, jointed into 8 pieces (ask you butcher to do this for you and to give you the liver, heart, and kidneys) 50g ’00’ flour 1 celery stick, finely diced ½ fennel bulb, trimmed and finely diced ½ onion, finely diced 75g shallots (about 1-2), finely diced 1 garlic clove, finely chopped 80g carrots, peeled and finely diced 30g sun-dried tomatoes, finely diced ½ tsp fennel seeds 500ml red wine vinegar 50g molasses sugar 2tbsp tomato purée 1 litre chicken stock 100g pickled lampascioni, Borretane or other wild onions 75g small black pitted olives

Heat 2 tablespoons of the olive oil in a large casserole over a medium heat, dust the rabbit with the flour, then add to the casserole and cook, stirring frequently, for about 8-10 minutes, until evenly browned. Remove with a slotted spoon and set aside. Add the celery, fennel, onion, shallot, garlic, carrot, sun-dried tomato and fennel seeds to the casserole, stir well, cover and cook over a low heat for about 5 minutes, until the onions are starting to soften. Stir in the vinegar, sugar and tomato purée and simmer, stirring occasionally, until reduced to a thick paste. Return the rabbit pieces to the casserole, pour in the stock then transfer to the oven. Bake for 20 minutes. Add the pickled wild onions, olives, sultans, marjoram and thyme and season to taste with salt and pepper. Bake for a further 15 to 20 minutes, until the rabbit is cooked through. Heat a small frying pan with the remaining tablespoon of olive oil over a high heat and fry the liver, heart and kidneys for a few seconds on each side, until golden brown. Arrange the rabbit pieces and offal in a serving dish, pour the sauce over the top and garnish with the pistachios and toasted pine nuts.

40g sultanas 1 marjoram sprig, chopped 1 thyme sprig, leaves only, chopped 25g pistachio nuts, chopped 30g pine nuts, toasted Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

Quaglie Marinate Arrosto Roast Marinated Quail Francesco Mazzei recommends doing this dish on a barbecue but I cooked it under the grill in our oven and it worked very well. He recommends serving it with a simple salad and it is so rich that nothing else is needed. Ingredients (for 4)

Method:

8 quail, 160 - 180g each Spatchcock the quail and put them in a large nonmetallic dish or sealable container that fits all the quail in one layer. 50g sultanas 5g smoked paprika 5g thyme 50ml extra virgin olive oil 175ml Passito di Pantelleria, Marsala or Greco di Bianco wine 2tbsp red wine vinegar sea salt and freshly ground black pepper For the mashed potato 4 large Cyprus potatoes (800g - 1 kg)

In a bowl, mix all the remaining ingredients and pour over the quail. Cover with cling film or a lid, place in the fridge and leave to marinate overnight. The next day, preheat the oven to 200Â°C/fan 180Â°C/gas 6. Wash the potatoes well then cut a cross in the top of each. Place on a tray and bake for 50 minutes to 1 hour, until soft. Set aside while you cook the quail - they should stay warm. Preheat a grill on its highest setting. Lift the quail out of their marinade (reserve the marinade) and place, bone-side up, under the hot grill for 10 minutes. Turn them over and continue to grill for 15 minutes until golden. Meanwhile, reheat the reserved marinade. To check the quail are cooked, cut along the breastbone and check there are no bloody juices (or use a thermometer pushed into the fleshy part and check it reads 75Â°C). Set aside to rest for 5 minutes. Scoop the insides of the potatoes out into a bowl - they should be fluffy like mashed potato. Season with salt and pepper, then divide among warm serving plates, pile a quail on to each plate and spoon lots of the hot marinade over the top.

Contorni Pepperoni Arrosto e Aglio Roasted Romano Peppers and Garlic Romano peppers are used in recipes all over Italy. They belong to the Solanaceae or nightshade family. They are found all over the Mediterranean and are also called Ramiro peppers and Sweet Pointed Peppers. They are used a lot in fresh and cooked applications, mainly for roasting and stuffing. They are known for being sweet and full of flavour, and are used as a substitute for bell peppers when one wants to make the dish have more flavour. Romano peppers can be used in many different ways. They can be used in salads, salsas, bruschetta, sandwiches, sauces, soups, stews, chilis, pasta, ratatouille, and casseroles and also as stand-alone side dishes. They can be used in roasting, grilling, sautĂŠing, and frying. This variety of pepper was made through selective breeding of original pepper varieties, which were introduced from the new world in the 15th and 16th century. This recipe has been changed a little bit from the recipe I found in the cookbook, but only in a small way. I didnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t add the seeds, which the original recipe said to do, and instead of yellow tomatoes, I used red ones, which doesnâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t change the taste. The reason the cookbook I used suggested yellow tomatoes is that it adds more colour to the dish and makes it look nicer, which is a big thing in Italian cooking.

Ingredients (for 4)

Method:

1.2kg Romano peppers

On a very hot griddle pan or barbecue, grill the peppers until the skins are blistered and charred. Transfer to a container, cover with cling film and leave to steam and cool.

10g parsley, roughly chopped 10g marjoram, roughly chopped 10g chives, roughly chopped 100ml extra virgin olive oil 1 garlic clove, with skin, halved

Remove the skin and inner ribs from the peppers. Tear the peppers into strips lengthways and place in a bowl. To make the dressing, mix the fresh herbs with the olive oil, garlic, oregano, and capers. Add the cherry tomatoes to the peppers and toss with the dressing, some salt and pepper and the olives. Transfer to a serving dish.

Â˝ teaspoon dried oregano 1 tbsp salted capers, soaked overnight 200g cherry tomatoes, halved, or quartered if large 1 tbsp pitted black olives sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

Spinach Sautéed with Olive Oil and Garlic This dish from Marcella Hazan is so simple it hardly earns the title ‘recipe’. It is, however, traditional. As Hazan writes, “if a single Italian vegetable dish deserves to be called classic, it is this version of spinach, which epitomizes the simplicity, directness, and heaviness that know no regional barrier and characterize good home cooking throughout the nation.” Ingredients (for 4)

Method

1kg fresh baby leaf spinach

Soak and rinse the spinach in several changes of water, unless you buy ready-to-cook spinach, in which case you can skip this step. Cook the leaves in a covered pan with one tablespoon of salt to keep their colour bright and no more water than clings to them from their soak. Cook until tender, which will only take a couple of minutes. Drain well and set aside.

Salt 2 large garlic cloves 55ml extra virgin olive oil

Put the garlic and olive oil in a sauté pan and turn on the heat to medium high. Cook and stir the garlic until it becomes coloured a nut brown, then take it out and discard (it will have given its flavour to the oil). Add the spinach, tasting and correcting it for salt. Cook for two minutes, turning it over completely several times to coat it well. Transfer to a warm platter and serve at once.

Couscous This is the only recipe in my book that isn’t adapted from a recipe in a book or online. We eat it often as a family, to accompany anything from fish to lamb to rabbit. According to Francesco Mazzei, “couscous isn’t a food one normally associates with Italy, but…southern Italy has a very strong Moorish heritage and that food intimately ties the two sides of the Mediterranean…in Sicily, the fine corn-yellow wheat grain is very much a staple ingredient.” Ingredients (for 4)

Method

200g fine couscous

Put the couscous in a glass bowl with a lid, add the olive oil and a large pinch of salt and barely cover with boiling water. Stir and cover the dish with a lid. After about five minutes, all the water will have been absorbed. Fluff up the couscous with a fork and set aside.

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil, plus extra 1 red onion 1 Romano pepper Juice and zest of one lemon A small bunch of fresh mint

Chop the red onion into small dice and put it to marinade in a small bowl with the lemon juice. Chop the Romano pepper into small dice and roughly chop the mint leaves and lemon zest. Once the onion has marinated for at least 15 minutes, add it to the couscous, with the other ingredients. Mix thoroughly and season to test with salt and pepper. Serve at room temperature.

Salt and pepper

Carciofi Stufati Stewed Artichokes There are hundreds of Italian recipes for artichokes, like this one from Francesco Mazzei, and many Italians would agree with him when he says, “I absolutely love the thistly vegetable.” It is important for this recipe to use small violet artichokes, not the big, green globe artichokes that are the commonest in shops. They have an inedible, furry ‘choke’ at the centre, which will literally make you choke if you accidentally eat it. Ingredients (for 4)

Method

Juice of one lemon

Mix the lemon juice into a bowl of cold water. Clean each artichoke by picking off the outer leaves until you reach the tender, pale yellow ones. With small artichokes, there shouldn’t be a furry ‘choke’, but sometimes it has started to grow, in which case scoop it out with a spoon and discard. Peel the tough skin from the stalk (which is edible). Place immediately in the bowl of lemony (acid) water, to stop the cut surfaces turning black.

6 small artichokes (about 150g each) 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil 500ml white wine 1 litre vegetable stock (from a cube is fine) 200g fresh or frozen peas 120g spring onions, sliced 20 g pecorino cheese, grated 10g mint, roughly chopped 10 g flat-leaf parsley, roughly chopped 8 tinned anchovy fillets

Heat the oil in a saucepan over a medium heat and fry the garlic until golden, then lift out the garlic and put to one side. Add the drained artichokes, increase the heat to high, season with salt and fry, stirring from time to time, until nice and golden. Pour in the wine and stock, add the reserved garlic, and let the liquid cook and evaporate slowly. After 6-7 minutes add the peas (defrosted if using frozen) and the onions and continue to cook for about 4 minutes, until the artichokes are tender (taste a leaf to check). Remove from the heat, then add the pecorino cheese, herbs, anchovies, and breadcrumbs. Stir and allow the mixture to cool to room temperature. The artichokes will reabsorb most of the liquid.

20g fresh sourdough breadcrumbs, left out at room temperature to go stale Salt

Pane Pizza Margherita In his cookbook, ‘Mezzogiorno’, Francesco Mazzei said, “Where would Naples be without pizza? Or rather, where would the world be without pizza?” Pizza has a very long history. Flatbreads with toppings were first made by the Ancient Egyptians, Romans, and Greeks. The modern birthplace of pizza is Campania, a southwestern region of Italy, which was home to the city of Naples. The poor Neapolitans needed inexpensive food that didn’t take too long to eat, and pizza worked for that. Those pizzas had toppings such as tomatoes, cheese, oil, anchovies, and garlic. Pizza was actually little known in Italy, outside Naples, until the 1940s. Pizza became well known in America before then, because immigrants from Naples were making pizzas there. Although they weren’t trying to make a culinary statement, the people of America became intrigued by pizza relatively quickly. After the second world war, pizza reached Italy again, from America. “Like blue jeans and rock and roll, the rest of the world, including the Italians, picked up on pizza just because it was American”. Authentic Italian pizza has a thin crust and a light coat of tomato sauce so you can also see enough of the other toppings. If you have the time, you should let the pizza dough rest in the fridge overnight, because it will then develop acidity and improve the crust a lot. This is a Margherita pizza. A popular apocryphal says that when queen Margherita, the wife of king Umberto I, visited Italy after the unification of Italy, she was served three pizzas. Her favourite was one with tomatoes, mozzarella and basil. Because of this, they decided to name it after her. You should also feel free to add other toppings and make it your own, like I did when I made it. You can also make a ‘calzone,’ which is a folded pizza, or a ‘pizza Bianco,’ which uses crème fraîche instead of tomato sauce. Ingredients (for 4)

Method:

For the dough:

For the dough, mix the flours, yeast, and salt together in a large mixing bowl. Gradually add the water, mixing well to form a soft dough. Turn the dough out on to a floured work surface and knead for about five minutes, until smooth and elastic. Transfer to a clean bowl, cover with a damp tea towel and leave to rise for about 1 ½ hours, or until doubled in size (ideally leave it overnight).

225g ’00’ flour, plus extra for dusting 225g strong bread flour 7g fresh yeast or 3g fast-action dried yeast 15g salt 250-300ml water

When the dough has risen, knock it back (punch the air out), then knead again until smooth. Roll into a ball and set aside for 30 minutes to 1 hour, or until it doubles in size again. The time it takes to prove will depend on the temperature in your

For the topping: 1 x 400g can peeled plum tomatoes 1tsp dried oregano 3tbsp extra virgin olive oil 2 mozzarella balls, about 125-150g each handful of basil leaves 40g Grana Padano cheese Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

kitchen; the warmer the place, the quicker the prove. Meanwhile, prepare the topping. Pass the tomato through a vegetable mill. Add the oregano and oil, season with salt and pepper and set aside, alternatively put the ingredients into a mini food processor and blend until smooth. Preheat the oven to 250°C/fan 230°C/gas 9. Divide the dough into four balls and roll each out on a lightly floured work surface until 20-30cm in diameter and about 5mm thick. Spread the tomato sauce all over each pizza base. Cut or tear the mozzarella in rough slices and finish with basil leaves and some shavings of the Grana Padano. Lightly flour a baking sheet(s) with ‘00’ flour. Bake the pizzas (you will have to cook them in batches) for about 8 - 10 minutes, depending on the thickness, until the base is crispy. Finish with more basil leaves.

Ligurian Focaccia Every region of Italy has its own typical bread. This one is originally from Liguria, in the north-west of the country. Like many Italian recipes, however, it has gone global and you can find it in many bakeries and delis in The Netherlands. The recipe is by Samin Nosrat, who is an Iranian American chef and writer. She did part of her training in Italy and she went back there to learn how to make traditional Ligurian focaccia, for her series Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat, which is on Netflix. Ingredients

Method

For the dough:

In a medium bowl, stir together water, yeast, and honey to dissolve. In a very large bowl, whisk flour and salt together to combine and then add yeast mixture and olive oil. Stir with a rubber spatula until just incorporated, then scrape the sides of the bowl clean and cover with plastic wrap. Leave out at room temperature to ferment for 12 to 14 hours until at least doubled in volume.

2½ cups (600 grams) lukewarm water ½ teaspoon active dry yeast 2½ teaspoons (15 grams) honey

Spread 2 to 3 tablespoons oil evenly onto a 18by-13 inch (46-by-33 cm) rimmed baking sheet. 5 1/3 cups (800 grams) When dough is ready, use a spatula or your hand to release it from the sides of the bowl and fold it all-purpose flour onto itself gently, then pour out onto pan. Pour an additional 2 tablespoons of olive oil over dough 2 tablespoons (18 and gently spread across. Gently stretch the grams) Diamond Crystal Kosher salt or 1 dough to the edge of the sheet by placing your tablespoon fine sea salt hands underneath and pulling outward. The dough will shrink a bit, so repeat stretching once or twice over the course of 30 minutes to ensure ¼ cup (50 grams) extra- dough remains stretched. virgin olive oil, plus more for pan and Dimple the dough by pressing the pads of your finishing first three fingers in at an angle. Make the brine by stirring together salt and water until salt is Flaky salt for finishing dissolved. Pour the brine over the dough to fill dimples. Proof focaccia for 45 minutes until the dough is light and bubbly. For the brine: 1½ teaspoons (5 grams) Diamond Crystal Kosher Salt ⅓ cup (80 grams) lukewarm water

Thirty minutes into this final proof, adjust rack to center position and preheat oven to 450°F (235°C). If you have a baking stone, place it on rack. Otherwise, invert another sturdy baking sheet and place on rack. Allow to preheat with the oven until very hot, before proceeding with baking. Sprinkle focaccia with flaky salt. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes directly on top of stone or inverted pan

until bottom crust is crisp and golden brown when checked with a metal spatula. To finish browning top crust, place focaccia on upper rack and bake for 5 to 7 minutes more. Remove from oven and brush or douse with 2 to 3 tablespoons oil over the whole surface (donâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;t worry if the olive pools in pockets, it will absorb as it sits). Let cool for 5 minutes, then release focaccia from pan with metal spatula and transfer to a cooling rack to cool completely. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Salse Salsa di Pomodoro Tomato sauce Italian tomato sauce is, of course, produced all over Italy. Tomato sauce is used in many Italian recipes. The tomato is hard to trace in history, but from what we know, the first tomatoes were brought to Europe by the Spanish conquistadors from Peru in the early to mid-sixteenth century. The first written account of a tomato in Italy was in 1548 in Tuscany. It’s surprising, considering how often tomatoes are used in Italian food, that they were first used in Italy quite recently. People used to treat tomatoes with suspicion because they thought they were all poisonous. For a good Italian tomato sauce, you should use very ripe tomatoes - The Italians find this very important - and add very little liquid at the beginning to make the sauce thick and rich. This means you will have a good, concentrated tomato flavour and then you can thin the sauce to any consistency. If you have the choice, you should use the plum variety of tomato because it has fewer seeds, more firm flesh, and less watery juice. It cooks faster because it has less liquid to boil down, giving a fresh, clear flavour. There are also other varieties of tomatoes in Italy that are used for sauce. In Rome, you can get a variety, which is locally called casalini, and another variety, from campania, called pomodorini napoletani. Ingredients

Method:

(makes about 775ml) 300g white onion, very finely sliced 4tbsp extra virgin olive oil 1kg ripe good-flavoured tomatoes (preferably on the vine), roughly chopped 2 garlic cloves, chopped 20g basil leaves sea salt

Put the onion into a saucepan with half the oil and let it sweat slowly over a low heat for about 15 minutes until it’s soft (do not allow it to colour). If it looks as though it might catch, add a splash of water to the pan. Add the tomatoes and season with salt. Leave to simmer over a low heat for about 45 minutes, until the tomatoes are thick and rich, adding a little water if the level of the liquid gets too low. Remove it from the heat. Put the remaining oil in another pan with the garlic and cook over a low-medium heat. When it’s almost golden brown, add the basil leaves and stir. Pass the oil through a sieve into the cooked tomato sauce. Whisk the sauce to break up the tomatoes. If it’s too thick, thin it with a little water, ideally some pasta cooking water. Pass the sauce through a wide-holed sieve resting over a bowl, and use the back of a ladle to extract the smooth mixture. Check the seasoning and add more salt if necessary.

Dolci Tiramisu This dish originated in Treviso, a town near Venice. It has gone viral and must be on the menu of virtually every Italian restaurant on earth. For good reason, because it is delicious! Fiorella told me “I don’t like making tiramisu. Perhaps because it ruins my nails?” I can confirm that is true. Ingredients 300g Savoiardi finger biscuits 500g marscapone 4 large eggs, separated 100g caster sugar 300ml espresso coffee 2 tbsp Marsala Unsweetened cocoa powder

Method Make the coffee using an espresso machine. Add 2 tablespoons of Marsala wine (that’s optional. If you are making tiramisu for children, don’t use it) then set aside and let it cool. Separate egg whites from yolks and remember that, in order to whip the egg whites stiffly, there should not be any trace of yolk. Take a bowl and whip the egg whites until stiff. When ready, set aside. Now, in another bowl, whisk the egg yolks with the sugar until pale and smooth, 3 to 5 minutes. Add the mascarpone cheese. Whisk the mixture slowly with an electric mixer. Now fold in the egg whites with a spatula. Mix slowly until it’s smooth and creamy. Now dip quickly Savoiardi biscuits into the coffee. Don’t keep them in the coffee too long, otherwise your tiramisu will turn out soggy. Then put the biscuits in a single layer, to cover the bottom of a ceramic or glass dish about 30cm x 20cm. Spread the mascarpone cream on top of the Savoiardi. Add another layer of Savoiardi and then cover with more mascarpone cream. Finally sprinkle with cocoa powder. Let rest 3 hours in the fridge before serving (even better if you make the tiramisu the day before and leave it to rest all night long in the fridge). You can add chocolate flakes on top according to taste.

Formaggi Doing justice to Italian cheese would need a whole project in itself. As with pasta, bread, sauces, vegetables and all the other elements of Italian cuisine, each region has its own specialties. In the cooler north, where cows are raised, famous cheeses like Parmesan (Italians call it Parmiggiano) and Taleggio are found. On poorer land in the central mountains, where sheep are more common, we find cheeses like Pecorino. The hot, sunny south, where water buffaloes can thrive, is the home of mozzarella, loved by pizza fans everywhere. The photograph on the left shows four cheeses that we bought from Fiorella’s shop and ate with a pot of homemade red onion jam and some sourdough bread. I chose them to represent a range of flavours and textures, from mild and a bit rubbery (Asiago), to stronger and quite hard (Pecorino), to hard, crumbly, and strong (Parmiggiano) to soft and pungent (Gorgonzola).

Asiago Asiago is a special kind of cow’s milk cheese that is only sold in the Veneto foothills in Italy. It used to be made from sheep’s milk. The two types of Asiago are Asiago Pressato and Asiago d’allevo. Asiago Pressato is fresh cheese and it has a smooth texture. Asiago d’allevo is matured for longer and it has a crumbly texture. Depending on the ageing of Asiago, it can be used in many ways. It can be used for grating, melting, slicing for in salads, sandwiches, soups, pasta, and sauces.

Pecorino Fresco This cheese is young and smooth. It has an intense and almost sweet flavour. It can only be produced in Tuscany under controlled process. It is good as a dessert cheese.

Parmiggiano Regiano Parmiggiano Regiano is made from raw, unpasteurized cow’s milk. Its flavour is sharp and intense, and it also tastes slightly fruity and nutty. The texture is slightly gritty. A fresh Parmiggiano Regiano is smooth, while an older one would have a more granular texture.

Gorgonzola Gorgonzola is a type of blue cheese. When young, it is soft and creamy, and slightly acidic. When it is older, it is stronger and piquant.

Acknowledgements I would like to thank Fiorella Cristofoli and Cosimo Zaccaria for letting me interview them. Many thanks to my dad for teaching me many culinary skills throughout the cooking process. I’d like to thank my mum, for helping with the final edits to make my cookbook look professional. I would also like to thank my personal project supervisor, Mr Wright, for guiding me through the project and giving me loads of helpful advice.

Bibliography I used a wide variety of sources for this project. For the recipes, I used three cookbooks and two websites, all of which are listed below. For background and different perspectives on Italian cuisine, I conducted two in-depth interviews with Fiorella Cristofoli and Cosimo Zaccaria. I supplemented my background research with extensive internet searches. All direct quotes are in quotation marks and where I have drawn on published material, I have referenced it in an endnote.

Sources for Recipes Batali, Mario. Simple Italian Food: Recipes from My Two Villages. C. Potter, 1998. Hazan, Marcella. Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking. Alfred A. Knopf, Inc, 1992. Mazzei, Francesco. Mezzogiorno: Southern Italian Cooking. Penguin Random House UK, 2015. Nosrat, Samin. “Ligurian Focaccia.” SALT FAT ACID HEAT, www.saltfatacidheat.com/fat/ligurian-focaccia. “Tiramisu Authentic Italian Recipe.” Recipes from Italy, 8 Oct. 2019, www.recipesfromitaly.com/tiramisu-original-italian-recipe/.

Interviews Fiorella Cristofoli Cosimo Zaccaria

Background Information “Asiago.” Cheese.com - World's Greatest Cheese Resource, www.cheese.com/asiago/. Avey, Tori. “Uncover The History of Pasta.” PBS, Public Broadcasting Service, 26 July 2012, www.pbs.org/food/the-history-kitchen/uncover-the-historyof-pasta/. Batali, Mario. Mario Batali Simple Italian Food: Recipes from My Two Villages. C. Potter, 1998. Choi, Alvin. “History of the Tomato in Italy and China: Tracing the Role of Tomatoes in Italian and Chinese Cooking.” Noodles on the Silk Road, 3 July 2018, scholarblogs.emory.edu/noodles/2018/07/03/history-of-thetomato-in-italy-and-china-tracing-the-role-of-tomatoes-in-italian-andchinese-cooking/. Cucina ToscanaCucina Toscana has been Salt Lake City's finest Italian restaurant for over 10 years! “The Cultural Influences on Italian Cuisine.” Cucina Toscana, 31 Aug. 2019, toscanaslc.com/blog/the-culturalinfluences-on-italian-cuisine/. “Discover Parmigiano Reggiano DOP.” Eataly, 3 Sept. 2020, www.eataly.com/us_en/magazine/eataly-stories/discover-parmigianoreggiano-dop/. “Gorgonzola.” Castello, www.castellocheese.com/en-us/cheese-types/bluemold-cheese/gorgonzola/. Hazan, Marcella. Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking. Alfred A. Knopf, Inc, 1992. “History.” Italian Made, 22 June 2017, www.italianmade.com/olive-oil/history/. “Italian Diaspora.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 30 Sept. 2020, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Italian_diaspora.

“Jamie Oliver's 'Jerk Rice' Accused of Cultural Appropriation.” BBC News, BBC, 21 Aug. 2018, www.bbc.com/news/newsbeat-45246009. “Land.” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., www.britannica.com/place/Italy/Land. Lee , Alexander. “A History of Pizza.” History Today, 7 July 2018, www.historytoday.com/archive/historians-cookbook/history-pizza. “Lemon.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 22 Oct. 2020, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lemon. Mazzei, Francesco. Mezzogiorno: Southern Italian Cooking. Preface, 2015. Nosrat, Samin. “Ligurian Focaccia.” SALT FAT ACID HEAT, www.saltfatacidheat.com/fat/ligurian-focaccia. “Pecorino Toscano Fresco.” GourmetFoodStore.com, www.gourmetfoodstore.com/tuscany-pecorino-toscano-fresco-12752. read, EUROPEFEATUREDPLACESTRAVEL·5 min, et al. “Italian Notebook: The Story of Sicilian Food as a Cultural Way of Life - Culture.” Ist, 10 Dec. 2014, www.thecultureist.com/2014/05/08/story-of-sicilian-food-culture/. “Red Romano Chile Peppers.” Information, Recipes and Facts, specialtyproduce.com/produce/Red_Romano_Chile_Peppers_14231.php. Routley, Nick. “Animation: How the European Map Has Changed Over 2,400 Years.” Visual Capitalist, 10 July 2019, www.visualcapitalist.com/2400years-of-european-history/. “Stuffed Squid, an Italian-Style Recipe - Sanpellegrino Sparkling Fruit Beverages.” , An Italian-Style Recipe - Sanpellegrino Sparkling Fruit Beverages, www.sanpellegrinofruitbeverages.com/intl/citrus/italian-foodrecipes/stuffed-squid. “Tiramisu Authentic Italian Recipe.” Recipes from Italy, 8 Oct. 2019, www.recipesfromitaly.com/tiramisu-original-italian-recipe/. “The Tomato's Journey from Peru to Italy to Nellino's Sauce.” Nellino's Sauce Co., nellinos.com/the-history-of-the-tomato-in-italy.html. Turim, Gayle. “A Slice of History: Pizza Through the Ages.” History.com, A&E Television Networks, 27 July 2012, www.history.com/news/a-slice-ofhistory-pizza-through-the-ages. “Unification of Italian States.” U.S. Department of State, U.S. Department of State, history.state.gov/countries/issues/italian-unification.

Appendix 1: Interview questions 1) Were you born in Italy, and if so, which region? - Do you feel Italian or more from [region]? 2) What do you think is distinctive about food from [region]? 3) If there was one recipe from [region] that you would recommend, what would it be? 4) What do you think are the most important influences on food from your region - geography, immigrants, trade, the sea? 5) And what were the biggest influences on you as you came to enjoy food? Was it your parents/grandparents? Were you taught about food at school? 6) Do kids in your region of Italy, or Italian kids generally love a lot of food, or are they also into pizza and cake? 7) How did you come to live in the Netherlands? 8) How does your experience of food here differ from that in Italy? 9) Changing the subject a bit, I noticed that Italian recipe books are often organised around the ‘typical’ meal structure. So, Antipasti, Primi, Secondi, and so on… - Is this how Italians actually eat, and if so, do they always eat like this? 10) Does it make sense to organise my project around these headings? 11) Focusing on one kind of food, pasta, I notice that there are hundreds of kinds of pasta in this shop. Why are there so many types of pasta? 12) What is your favourite, and why? 13) Which do you think is better, and why, fresh or dry pasta? 14) I heard that spaghetti Bolognese is an American variation. From what I understand, it used to be ragout in Italy, and it wasn’t originally meant to go with spaghetti. What do you think about this? Do you think it is Italian?

15) Some of my generation talk about ‘cultural appropriation’ as a bad thing, but others say, ‘imitation is the sincerest form of flattery.’ - How do you feel, as an Italian, about the fact that Italian food has been exported all over the world? 16) Is cultural appropriation a bad thing in the context of food? 17) In the end, do you think there is such thing as Italian food, or is that just the name for lots of different styles of cooking?