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Hello again, Ek. Maybe you could just drop by the Rizzoli bookstore (I assume it still exists; my last trip to NYC was over 20 years ago) and have a look at it before taking the leap.
I think you've realized in the course of some of our discussions that I'm a bit of a cynic, so you might not be surprised at my off-the-top-of-my-head evaluation of a book I've never seen. It looks like more of a coffee-table book than a "serious" book about Roman cooking. I would distrust any author who suggests that fried artichokes are a specialty of Trastevere; they are called carciofi alla giudea (artichokes in the Jewish manner), so I think it's fairly evident that the Ghetto and not Trastevere would be the first place to look for them. Of course, lots of restaurants that are not in the Ghetto also make them and make them well, and some of them might even be in Trastevere, but Trastevere is <b>not</b> where they are at home. Second, I would not trust an author who suggests drinking Orvieto in Rome. I'm sure you know as well as I do that Orvieto is in Umbria... A Roman, I think, would be much more likely to drink a Frascati or something from the Colli Albani. Until fairly recently (well, maybe until about 20 or 30 or more years ago), Italians drank local wines. Period. No Roman would order a red from Piedmont or a white from the Veneto (or from Umbria) unless he was trying to impress his dining companions. And besides, Orvieto has a tang or something (I can already see Franco shuddering, if he drops by again...) that I personally am not very fond of. My wine tastes were formed way back when, when my Roman friends and I always had the vino della casa, which probably came from an uncle or a friend of the owner of the trattoria. It was totally unpretentious and very easy to drink. Basta! You will, I hope, check in again before you leave, but in case you don't, buon viaggio e buon appetito! |
ek, hello - I wouldn't pay the price for a Diane Seed book. Personally, I have her "best selling" 100 Pasta Sauces cookbook, and I can confirm that it is the worst cookbook I have. I've only kept it because she has done some interesting research work on old recipes, but don't ever try to cook along her instructions - the result won't be Italian pasta, but (without intending to offend anybody, sorry) BRITISH PASTA. Brrrrr.
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Eloise, no shuddering on my behalf. I completely side with you. For me, Italian white wines are more or less inexistent, i.e. I don't drink them, with the notable exception of wines made of the Verdicchio grape (from le Marche). Other than that, Italian wine, for me, is red, and white wine is French, Austrian, or also German.
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...not to forget (which I almost did) the excellent white wines from New Zealand (and yes, I've managed to send this thread around the world, once more!).
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Franco, hello again, and Happy New Year. How was the oxtail terrine? (I hate to admit it, but I still haven't tried your coda alla vaccinara recipe. It's laziness, I know...)
Your white-wine preferences are evidently much more sophisticated than mine. As I mentioned in my message to Ek, I prefer a nice quaffable white without any pretensions whatever. So I tend to drink the humble Italian whites that you seem to dislike. Chacun à son goût! |
It's great to be in touch with both of you, Eloise and Franco, in the new year. Eloise, I have to agree with you. First of all, the high price is a tip off; I am sure the book is just chock-full of mouthwatering photos which partly account for the price. But after Franco's description of the recipes, well, enough seed....ooops enough said. Rizzoli still has their store on 57th Street, I believe, and I might drop by to have a look at the book. But your points are well-taken. I certainly try to stick with the local wines, to go along with the regional food so why an Orvieto? Maybe it is the white grown cloest to Rome that most people are familiar with. Silly reason to tout it in her book about Roman food. I will stay mainly with those Lazio wines; I think they even have some decent reds from the Aprilia zone (I've only read this, not tried any..)
I have to say that I am no expert, but I am quite fond of the Tocai Friulano whites that I first sampled in the Venice bacari. Of course they are pricey here in NY and that kind of defeats the idea of these type of wines, I think, but there you are. And the other night I ordered a carafe of wine in a very, very good Italian restaurant here in NY; I know that Franco will shudder (again..) but it was a Grillo from Sicily. Very cheap here and it was quite tasty. Now that I have your attention, here is something I am curious about: I was reading about the Feast of the Seven Fishes and learned that eel is one of the dishes on traditional menus. Now, I think there is a well-known preparation from Livorno (I may be all off base here, not sure). I have had eel in Japanese restaurants where it is cut up in tiny pieces and served on rice, but I have never had it in any other sort of dish. And frankly, the sight of those long, black snakey things is kind of creepy. SO: Is eel a common dish in various regions of Italy? And what does it taste like? I send my best wishes for a happy and healthy 2007 which I hope will bring further provocative discussions and lots of interesting and tasty eating. |
Ek, thanks for your good wishes, which I reciprocate very sincerely.
As for the eel, we'll have to hope that Franco returns and tells us about it. Coward that I am, I've never had it in Italy. But I did just Google >ricetta anguilla<, and there seem to be quite a few Italian recipes for it. If you're interested in the history of Italian cuisine, a rather quirky book about it is Waverley Root's "The Food of Italy", first published in 1971. It's not really a history per se, but he does wander from village to village tasting the local specialties, many or most of which, I'm afraid, probably no longer exist. |
P.S. About Tocai Friulano, which I also enjoy. I read only a few days ago in the paper that the European Union in its wisdom has listened to Hungary, which says it has the right to the name Tokai (spelled with a K), and has forbidden Italy to use Tocai. It must henceforth be called simply Friulano. I'm of Hungarian origin, but I'm on the Italian side on this one.
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Eloise do you know that I have a copy of Waverly Root's book right here on my shelf and had completely forgotten about it. You must excuse me while I dig it out now and take a peek. But while I am gone, I am posting a link which I just found during my eel research(!!) and that I think you might enjoy. You have to scroll down to get to the Italy portion..fascinating.
http://www.slowfish.it/img_sito/pdf/...ommunities.pdf Oh, I did hear about the Tocai imboglio..I also read an interesting article about the Hungarian Tokai in the NY Times recently, which I will also link for you: http://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/27/di...mp;oref=slogin |
I'd like to add an easy day trip Ostia. Here's the web site: http://www.ostia-antica.org/
It's really cool to walk around these ancient ruins since Pompeii is further away. We took the train and it was very easy. Your hotel could help you with the train. Enjoy Rome, it's a magical place! Ciao, Amy |
Ek, Thank you for the link to two interesting articles. Let's give credit where credit is due: The Italians seem to be doing more to preserve their food products and preparations than most other countries. Mind you, there are some Italians who scorn SlowFood as being too "popular" a movement. You might have read an article that appeared last year? the year before? in the New Yorker, about an elderly man and his daughter who are growing threatened heritage fruit varieties in, I think, Umbria. They were quite down on SlowFood. I did, some time ago, try to find the article on the New Yorker Web site, but no luck...
As for the Tokaji (which, shame on me, I misspelled), the part of the intro that talked about sweet wines being a nice thing for the holidays reminded me that that is another Italian habit that I have adopted. I always buy a good panforte (Corsini is the best one imported here, in my opinion) and a half-bottle of vinsanto. Some of them are in the same high price ranges as some of the Tokaji Aszu mentioned in the article, but I found one by Frescobaldi that was affordable and good. You can, of course, also have just cantuccini, the dry almond biscotti, and dip them in the wine. It's obviously more of a winter than a summer thing... (I suspect that Amy only read the title of this thread. It was nice of her to suggest Ostia Antica, of course, but she must have missed the parts about chicken penises...) |
Eloise, I agree with you about the Italians and the prreservation issue. I would LOVE to read that article from the New Yorker. If you happen to have the date and it is not too long ago, I could look in my library.
I am interested in the panforte. I just googled it and saw the photo and it looks delicious. I have always been getting panforte and pannettone mixed up. We got a pannettone (from Verona) as a gift for the holiday and although I was not enthusiastic at first bite, half of it has already been demolished. (!!) It is verey nice with a dollop of creme fraiche. I know that this is a popular holiday item because my Italian store has them literally piled floor to ceiling before Christmas. Incidentally, Mr. Lou di Palo, the owner of the NYC store in which I do my "Italian" shopping, and who has done so much to transmit the joys of the cuisine to me and to many others, is the subject of a profile in this month's issue of Gourmet magazine in an travelog on the hams and cheeses of Alto Adige. The entire issue is devoted to Italian food and unfortunately I am getting very cranky right now because I cannot find my copy. I love biscotti. And speaking of vin santo, I had the fortune to be able to sample a few Italian sweet wines that I had not heard of: Recioto de Valpolicella, which are made similar to the Amarone process but are very sweet. And at the same tasting, we had Brachetto di Asti, a red sparkling wine that I thought would be perfect for the holidays. Now..we need to gather more info on the eeel issue....and I need to dig up my copy of January Gourmet....... |
Just a brief note: I just spoke with my fishmonger, who happens to be of Sicilian heritage and runs a great establishment here in NYC. He told me that they sell eel every holiday season for the Feast of the Seven Fishes but that at other times of the year there is no demand for it. He went on to say that eel will be placed on the endangered list this year so he may not be selling it at all; it has apparently been overharvested to satisfy Japanese demand. He also said that he takes the black skin off and that it is very mild and not fishy at all but rather creamy in texture.
Menu from a New York City "Roman" restaurant (Lupa) that details dishes included in the "la vigilia" feast of the seven fishes: http://www.luparestaurant.com/specialevents.html |
Hello both of you, thank you for your nice wishes, and may you, too, have a happy, and healthy, 2007!
ek, thank you for the fascinating slowfish link - it already contains most of what I have to say on Italian eel. Eel is a sweet water fish, normally, but lives also in brackish water, where it develops way better and becomes a true delicacy. I also like the "normal" sweet water eel, but eels from the lagoons on Italy's eastern cost are incomparably superior. I didn't know about the Lesina lagoon in Puglia, mentioned in that slowfish list, but I know the - equally mentioned there - eels from the lagoon of Comacchio (valli di Comacchio), east of Ferrara. They're just GREAT, and one of my best Italian restaurant recommendations is (Eloise: no danger of overfloating this place and this village with tourists - increasing their number by, say, 3000 percent would lead to a total of little more than 300 tourists per year): first of all, pack your insect repellent spray, then go to Comacchio, follow the one-way street into the village center, turn right at the stop - opposite the church, there is one restaurant (I don't recall the name). Make GENEROUS use of the insect repellent (you've never seen so many, so big, and so aggressive gnats), sit down and enjoy the best eel you're likely to have at any time and any place in your life. The best dish is the grilled eel that slowfish mentions for that other lagoon, the one in Puglia. Btw, eels are also common on the fish market of Venice, though I don't recall to ever have seen a single eel dish on any Venetian restaurant menu. Generally spoken, eels are extremely fat fish, especially the skin, that's why it is so wise to prepare them on the grill (it's delicious to eat part of the grilled skin, but not all of it - simply too fat). For any other dish (there are wonderful eel stews, e.g. in red wine, a Spanish preparation, or with porcini, an invention of the great cook Antonio Carluccio), the eel must be peeled, like your Sicilian fishmonger would do it, ek. Note: it's ALWAYS the fishmonger who peels the eel - a VERY difficult work almost impossible at home (fishmongers have special electric eel peeling devices). Another wonderful eel preparation is smoked eel, common in central Europe. Or the salmon-eel-pike-truffle pie for which I've got an old recipe... Btw, eels are extremely quick, and extremely aggressive - if they are being sold alive (as would be the perfect method), and the fishmonger has to kill them before your eyes, I've seen more than one fishmonger with bleeding hands because the eels would bite him so badly. Just one word on Waverley Root - THIS is a brillant author, I adore his books (e.g., there is an equivalent to the above mentioned Italian book on the different regional French cuisines). |
Hello, Ek and Franco.
Ek, I told you we needed Franco to tell us all about eel in Italian cooking! I’m not sure I have become an instant convert, but I certainly know as much about it now as I am ever likely to know. Whether I make it to the restaurant you have recommended, Franco, is another question again... It’s interesting that we all know and like Waverley Root. I had to laugh, though, looking at the Lupa menu, to see misticanza there. I would not have known what it was had I not reread Root’s chapter on Roman cooking last night. (If I’ve ever seen the word on a menu in Rome, I’ve either forgotten or never asked for an explanation.) I don’t know Root’s book on French regional cuisine - Italian cooking speaks to me much more - but I once gave a copy of his encyclopedia of food to friends. Unfortunately, I only had a few hours to glance through it before giving it away. I was surprised to see that Lupa’s prices are quite reasonable - no more than one pays (in cheaper Canadian dollars) in a better Italian restaurant here. But is all that business about calling for reservations on a specific day starting at 10:00 a.m. really necessary? The floor-to-ceiling boxes of panettone before the holidays are a familiar sight at my Italian grocer’s as well. I’m not sure I would like the fancier ones introduced fairly recently - the ones with layers of chocolate cream and so on - but I love the original version with candied orange peel and raisins with my morning cappuccino. There’s a tiny hole-in-the-wall Italian pizzeria that I have frequented for years, chiefly because they make wonderful plate-size, thin-crust Roman pizzas (as well as some pasta dishes), and they give me a lovely (original) panettone during the holidays. Ek, I hope you’ve found your copy of the January Gourmet in the meantime. I read the article about Lou di Palo, and I shall reread it. While my Italian grocer carries a huge variety of Italian goodies, many of them flown in every week, it’s too busy an establishment to dispense much in the way of advice. For me, it’s “at the ends of the earth”, so I tend to go only to stock up on holiday goodies, there being a lesser but still adequate Italian grocer much closer to home. Perhaps if I went more frequently and at a less busy time of the year, they’d be more prepared to share their wisdom. And I’m sorry, Ek, but I no longer have the copy of the New Yorker with the article about Italian heritage fruits in it. I used to save my New Yorkers, but when they threatened to take over most of my living space, I started to pass them on to a friend who has no more space to keep them than I do. I’ll try to do another search on the New Yorker Web site. Franco, we didn’t pick up on your “invitation au voyage” to New Zealand - I for one know too little of its wines - but I look forward to seeing what corner of the world you send us to next. And Ek, your Roman report is surely only a few weeks away and will, I am sure, offer ample material for discussion. Cheers to both of you. |
Eloise, I forgot to answer your kind oxtail terrine question. Well, it was terrible, but it was - and I'd like to stress that, in this very thread! - not fault of the oxtail, which was excellent, but of that Burgundian recipe: the oxtail combined with way too much carrots, and the carrots cooked to death. Much as I love Burgundian cooking, normally, but this one was really no promotion for Burgundy...
A proposito "invitation au voyage" - I'm actually intending to send this thread "home": culinary side trips from Rome! Though Amy has missed the chicken penis discussion, her re-proposal of Ostia Antica suddenly made me aware that we didn't talk about Al Monumento, or did I, too, miss some parts of the discussion? Al Monumento is a small, and very basic, osteria in the village center of Ostia Antica - just the kind of eating you, ek, seem to be looking for: hearty, traditional, and very good. They're specializing in fish, and much of their traditional fare is from Emilia-Romagna - where the grand- or grandgrandparents of the present owners came from, several decades ago. |
You are both absolutely amazing! I don't even know how to respond to this cascade of fascinating information. Eloise, I did find my magazine. Now, mind you, I stopped at DiPalo last week to pick up a small amount of ricotta, a bag of farro, and a small amount of mascarpone. And I waited exactly in line for ONE HOUR. Granted, this was a few days before New Year's, but there is no way on earth that I would have done this at any other establishment. While waiting, I was introduced to Sean Wilsey, who wrote the article as well as a recent memoir about growing up in a...shall we say "dysfunctional" family. Sean had stopped in to say hello to pay his respects so it was quite a thrill for me to comment on the Gourmet article and ask Lou if the cowbell (see article) was hanging in the window. (Answer: YES). Anyway, during that hour I received what amounted to a dissertation on various Italian foodstuffs. And tastes are freely handed out by Lou or his brother. Eloise, I tell you this little store is one of the best things about New York for me. I almost have to invent things that I need in order to justify a visit.
To answer the question about Lupa: Yes, people do call exactly 30 days in advance for that and for his other restaurant, Babbo. Which kind of defeats the whole idea of trattoria dining. But it is a nice, casual place with very friendly staff and good food and no pretensions, of which we have too much in this neck of the woods. I see that I have to be on my toes with the two of you. I have only scratched the surface of the Latium chapter in the Root Italy book; last night I was tempted to post agaiin here just to exclaim my joy in re-discovering such a treasure. I actually have the France book as well, but like the Italy book it sat, lonely and unvisited and gathering dust for years. This shall no longer be the case in the ekscrunchy house. Franco, thank you for the absolutely fabulous eel dissertation. I will have to squirrel away a can of insect repellent for the day I go calling in Comacchio. You know that eel-pike pie rings a bell..I must have read about it in a dusty food history book. But you have now infected me, not only with the pajata and oxtail bug, but the eel virus. Although I feel bad about subjecting sweet Paulie, the fish man, to those jaws, I think I have to put eel on my list. Better still, I will seek it out on a menu someplace where the original appearance is fully disguised. The barbecued eel sounds superb; I think this is somewhat akin to what I have had in sushi places. Thank you for the Al Monumento recommendation. I hope that we have time to get to Ostia. Now that time is drawing near, a week sounds like such a short time. On Monday we have reservations for the Scavi Tour so highly recommended here. I just read about a food market not far from the Vatican Museum; I wonder if either of you can comment on Via Andrea Doria and the market there. Well, I must take my leave because, after seeing Mario Batali prepare Fegato alla Veneziana on television, I bought some beautiful calves liver and will now begin the hour-long slow cooking of the onions that will form the base of the dish. I am very excited about this. Franco I am truly sorry about the oxtail. That will teach you for ignoring the recipes we posted here!!! |
Greetings. Franco, I too am sorry about the oxtail terrine. I would merely reproach you for not using an Italian instead of a French recipe. It’s surprising, though: One does not normally associate the French with overcooked vegetables; it’s more of a British failing. My advice: Stick with Italian recipes! Not simply because you’re Italian, but because Italian cooking is so much better, more natural, more “real”.
Speaking of “real”, Ek, the Trionfale market at Via Andrea Doria is considered, by the folks over at SlowTrav, to be more “real” than the “touristy” one at Campo de Fiori. Here’s a thread from SlowTalk and another description that I found: http://slowtalk.com/groupee/forums/a...61102607/inc/1 http://www.theculturedtraveler.com/A...P2002/Rome.htm Sometimes I get very annoyed with the good folks over at SlowTrav. Why is it more “real” to meet the local butcher in a Tuscan hilltown than to look at the Fra Angelico frescoes in Florence? Why is it more “real” to take an apartment in Monti rather than in the Campo de Fiori/Piazza Navona/Pantheon area? That happened to be where my Roman friends lived, one of them, for heaven’s sake, on the Piazza della Rotonda! Born and bred in Rome, he would have found it passing strange to have a bunch of (mostly) Americans tell him he was not a “real” Roman. Particularly since most of these holier-than-thou folks couldn’t put together an Italian sentence to save their lives! End of rant. It’s probably true, though, that prices are lower at Trionfale than at Campo de Fiori. I’m sure Franco can tell you more about Trionfale than I can. (And maybe he will also let slip where he hangs his hat in Rome... We know about La Rosa di Venezia in Venice, but we know nothing about his favoured location in Rome.) But à propos of the Vatican area: I’m probably telling you something you already know, but the entrance to the Scavi is at the left of St. Peter’s Basilica as you face it, and the entrance to the Vatican Museums is a fair hike around the Vatican walls to the right of the Basilica. And Trionfale is north of the museum entrance. When you say you have Scavi reservations on Monday, do you mean <b>this</b> Monday? You have no idea how much I’m tempted to take the next plane to Rome! But worry not, the taxman is seeing to it that I cannot give in to the temptation. I’ve reread the Lou DiPalo article in Gourmet. I can see now that there’s an essential difference there between his shop and my Italian grocer: Busy as he may be, he takes the time to speak to his customers (and “customers” seems almost too crass a term). When I first read the article, I didn’t realize that I would have a personal connection, however tenuous, to Mr. DiPalo and concentrated more on the cheese and speck of the Alto Adige. But how terrific to meet the author of the article and to chat with him for an hour! I haven’t looked up his memoir yet, but I shall. And it was only when you mentioned Babbo that I realized that Lupa was one of Batali’s restaurants. Duh! That makes the reasonable prices all the more surprising. The second search of the New Yorker Web site was no more successful than the first, I’m afraid, but as a consolation prize I offer you this article by Jane Kramer about cookbooks: http://www.newyorker.com/critics/con...05crat_atlarge I’ve only skimmed it so far, but it looks delightful. And something leads me to suspect that you and she might be kindred souls when it comes to cookbooks... P.S. Franco, you are generously enlightening us about Italian cooking; may I also ask you for linguistic help? There is a word that I have only ever heard from the Sicilian girls at my beloved agriturismo. When they put a plate down in front of me, they say “Buon ...” and then a word that starts with “po” or “pro”, has a V in it, and ends in “eccio”. I haven’t been able to find it in a dictionary, neither a bound one nor an online one. I don’t think it’s purely Sicilian, because it doesn’t really sound like the “Sicilian” that Andrea Camilleri uses to write his Montalbano books. So what is it? The question is driving me around the bend, and any information will be very gratefully received. Cheers to you both. |
Dear Eloise, You are really a marvel. Thank you for posting those links. I would have to agree about the Campo dei Fiori bashing and the whole attitude reflected in the Slowtrav post. So if you rent an apartment near Via Andrea Doria, for example, and do your shopping there, you are having a "real" as opposed to a "tourist" Roman experience. Oh, please! Some tourists do not like to recognize that they are....well, tourists. I certainly have seen "real" Romans shopping at Camp dei Fiori. I wonder what the visitors to New York would say about me, walking around midtown, where I live...maybe I am not having the real New York experience living here! I will tell my butcher and fish man that they are not "real," either!!! Excuse me while I snatch the real estate section from the paper and check the downtown listings!!!
Yes, I am leaving TOMORROW. So I will not right now take the time to respond and chat with you about the rest of the (always) fasincating subjects that you touch on. Once I get my last minute packing done (actually all my packing becaue i have not started yet and get a bit crazed trying to whittle down the piles of things stacked up in the living room...I will check back with you..) So, goodbye for now, Eloise. You are truly a pleasure. And yes, we will have to continue our sleuthing to discover the Secrets of Franco!! Franco, are you listening?? |
Ek <b>tomorrow!!!</b> What can I say?
The graceful thing to say is, of course, buon viaggio! Enjoy, enjoy! The truthful thing I have to say is that I'm green with envy... |
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