Dear {NOMEUTENTE}
Next month it will be summer, I hope in the concrete too because I’m really longing for authentic dry, sauna hot, with sheer sun burning the asphalt and everybody idling about in the shade. I don’t like this fall-like spring and I hope it says goodbye soon also because I would like to exchange views with renowned pasta chefs to find an answer to a question which always remains unsettled to me: why do all like rice salad, even though the rice is often overdone or, worst, still half-cooked because parboiled, while pasta salad is almost never appreciated?
Maybe it’s a problem of my palate or my memory. I remember delicious cool/warm pasta with fresh tomato, basil and hard ricotta cheese, but nothing really similar to a salad. There is no party, birthday party or buffet with rice salad and pasta salad where the first one is left over and the second one is eaten up. It is always the opposite, even if the rice is seasoned with pieces of flabby cheese, small slices of Vienna sausages, maize, small onions full of vinegar, dry stoned black olives, seed oil and a little more. Why can’t we find exciting pasta salads? This is going to be the challenge of my summer.
Paolo Marchi
Texts by Gabriele Zanatta
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Cracco, Baronetto and the anarchy of burnt tagliolini In the last brood of fantasy dishes of the Cracco restaurant we left outstanding the explication of the caption Tagliolini made of burnt wheat flour with raw sausage and radish sauce in the picture. To sum up here the ratio of the dish in a few words is not enough (we would need the Treccani encyclopedia to summarize the work about pasta done over 11 years by Carlo Cracco, from the Pickled egg spaghetti to the Rigatoni with Lentiscus mastic and raw porcini mushrooms). However, we try to do it with Matteo Baronetto: «Already 8 years ago», the sous-chef tells, «we had tried to burn the wheat flour by stirring it continuously in a nonstick pan. Then we made the classic dough using this flour with eggs and adding a bit of cocoa for the color and prepared our Burnt tagliatelle alla chitarra with white asparagus and raw cuttlefish».
On the contrary the burnt wheat flour, mainly used in Apulia (Pietro Zito is the most renowned ambassador) is already ‘burnt’ because it is obtained by grinding the wheat grains remained on the ground after burning the stubbles: «If our self-made dough was little elastic, this flour gives on the contrary perfect flexibility. And about the recipe: «We wanted the tagliolini to be used more as a seasoning. Raw veal sausage with radish reminded me of pork with horseradish. As an alternative we also use sea-urchins to create a sea play, give the scents of an iodized waterline, like green seaweeds on rocks». The tagliolini never changes, here a dressing among dressings, thrown ruffled with a gesture claiming brutality and instinct against the Euclidean logics of many colleagues who often forget taste behind geometry: «This dish is not beautiful to see but what counts is that it is good. Because the chef shall not only deal with long cooking and reasoning». |
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The (grandpa) ziti by Anthony Genovese «There are gloomy days which give the blues... You just want to go back to your bygone days and catch hold of somebody...». To Anthony Genovese, two Michelin stars at the Pagliaccio in Rome, that somebody is his grandpa Giuseppe Fosso. Born in San Lorenzo (a small village in the province of Reggio Calabria) and pastry-chef in Messina, at the end of the Fifties he decided to move to France with his wife, always preserving the pride and traditions of the region Calabria as a remedy to the little transalpine hospitality of the Post-War period.
At home they used to kill pigs, prepare the capocollo (salted and smoked pork meat taken from the neck), soak “u piscistoccu” (stockfish) in a basin of water. Anthony, during his French childhood, knew the region Calabria only through the scents of his grandparents’ kitchen and the tough sound of the Reggio Calabria dialect. From this mainly olfactory memory “Remembering Grandpa Fosso” originated: ziti with stockfish and ‘nduja oil. A nostalgic tribute to his roots, a simple and absolute pasta interlude in the usual gastronomic Esperanto of the Roman restaurant.
Stockfish (attention, not salted dried codfish which is something different) is cooked with a little water in a terra-cotta pot with capers, anchovies, oregano, spring onion and diced potatoes (all then whisked to obtain an emulsion). The ziti is whipped with the cooking water and then served on top of the emulsion accompanied with the stockfish and garnished with dry tomatoes and chopped pistachios, again sweet and familiar “words”. Great raw materials – there is the hand of Renzo Fantucci from La Tradizione, well-known dispenser of quality in the Capital City – for an inviting and tactile dish, very Calabrese-style but without the need for subtitles, well-defined and evocative like the most beautiful and involving memories.
Federico De Cesare Viola
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Two forkfuls at Ciccio Sultano: the pre-pasta Pasta, as we have already seen mainly with Davide Scabin, «can be also a first course». In Ragusa Ibla instead we have discovered the existence of pre-pasta, a Limbo between entrees and first course, a passing through non-pasta and real first courses, two forkfuls that are prelude to delicious windings. Like the dish in the picture, in the menu of the restaurant Duomo, that is called Our spaghetti with sour cream, Leonforte black lentil, pigskins and raw red crayfish with its corals.
While conceiving it Ciccio Sultano wanted to match the abundance of baronial cooking to more popular traditions: «Pasta with sour cream is a Bourbon tradition coming from France but also popular in Spain» he tells «The plebeian side comes from the pigskins and the lentils that, like many legumes, recall swine-notes. Then there is the crayfish worked raw with chili pepper, oil and water: it gives an iodized accent». Conceptual contrasts, chiasmuses of tastes and consistencies.
However, it is that “our” before spaghetti that makes us prick up our ears: «We have been making fresh pasta for 12 years: spaghetti, paccheri, mezzi paccheri, busiati... all shapes having quite a dry consistency». Supporting vocals in the spelling of all first courses. Like the Mezzi paccheri which arrives in a soup with noble shellfish, maccù (a sort of purée) of dry broad beans, yellow pumpkin and crunchy wheat: «The pasta dough is machine-made and worked using the kneading process which gives out the gluten. The pasta is then extruded using our bronze die, that I had made expressly for us by a company in Merano, and molded according to the required shape. I like rigatoni a lot because it better collects sauce». Roberto Benigni, who has recently visited Ibla, has appreciated a lot the Pasta with sardines our way (with the saffron from Mirabella Imbaccari) «’An architectural expression to honor’, he told me», Sultano recalls. Those from the New York Times instead liked a lot his Pasta with cuttlefish ink. |
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“Pentolo”, the solution to cook pasta like rice Among the many beautiful and delicious things seen during the last edition of the event Strade della Mozzarella in Paestum there was also this s-padella (pan), which will be soon shown also at the Festa a Vico, with a diameter of 80 centimeters and weighing 40 kilos, presented by Francesco Diamante, telephone +39.328.7004796. He comes from Apulia and in Martano, near Lecce, he is the marketing manager of the company Sprech specialized in fabric and tension structures, telephone +39.0836.574840, and since February also in the Pentolo, the pan to cook pasta like rice, placed in perfect balance and ready to be used following the typical movement of the pendulum.
A beautiful Italian story even though many people think of a pan for paella when seeing it, so shocking Francesco Diamante who markets it and Giuseppe Lolli who has conceived it: “In Italy cooking is in such a bad state that even operators don’t distinguish a perfect utensil to toss spaghetti by sautéing it”.
Among other things Lolli is also a seeker of truffles from Salento as well as owner and culinary mind of the Bakè in Torre dell’Orso, telephone +39.338.8822318, a name which recalls his first love, kebab. For the time being Pentolo is produced in three different sizes, 55, 80 and 120 centimeters; the sizes 90 and 100 cm will soon arrive together with a couple of tricks to ease its use. In fact, it weights nothing when hung to its supports but it becomes impossible to lift when detached, for instance to wash it up. If you love tossed pasta this is your solution.
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At the Fornello, the fusillo is from Avellino The fusillo mania is spreading (see the above news). In Apulia too. Antonella Ricci and Vinod Sookar, the chefs/married couple of the Fornello da Ricci in Ceglie Messapica (Brindisi) spent a couple of days shut up in their kitchen, surrounded by dies, to study interpretations and matchings to the fusillo from Avellino, a durum wheat semolina fresh pasta quite spread in the region Campania and perfect, thanks to its long spiral shape, to be matched to any kind of sauce.
The study, presented at Cibus, has taken into consideration the four seasons. Let’s stick here to the spring-summer season: «Measuring about 10 cm in length», Antonella explains, «we have thought to an interlacement with cuttlefish cut into julienne strips since this mollusk gives its best in terms of consistency in the seas of Taranto right in this period. We have twisted it with peas and sea-urchin emulsion, another early produce of this region and season».
There is also a second option/recipe: «To match the fusillo and the Sant’Anna French beans which don’t flatten since they are even longer, thanks to their 20 centimeters. In this period we sauté them with 3 different tomatoes: the regina, thick skinned solanaceous variety having a lively orange color that is picked here to make a reserve of sauce for winter; the tomboloni, beautiful, round and fleshy tomatoes and finally the widespread sanmarzano». To know the fall-winter interpretations, head to Ceglie: a publication explains everything in minute detail. |
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Let’s make it using the knitting needle: the busiati Some time ago we have related of the knitting needle fusillo the Neapolitan chef Agostino Iacobucci used to purchase from an over eighty years old lady in Gragnano. However, the habit to wrap treads of fresh pasta around a knitting needle isn’t at all a peculiarity from Campania.
The tradition is very lively in Sicily too, so much that over the last few weeks we have forked it twice. The first one again at Ciccio Sultano. In the menu of the Duomo the dish is called Fusilli from the Madonie Mountains with leg and cutlets of “aggrassatu” lamb, vegetables and Dop cheese from Ragusa «In Western Sicily it is called busiati because of the crochet-hook hole around which big fettuccelle are wrapped. Here we call it Fusilli from the Madonie Mountains because we are chauvinists», he jokes, «however I always use only the crochet-hook number eight».
We forgot to ask the size used by Francesco Reina, sous-chef from Trapani of Christoph Bob, the chef who has just opened a restaurant in the Monastero Santa Rosa, on the Amalfi Coast: «I prefer a small stick rather than a needle», Reina explains while wrapping his fresh pasta (picture) «what is important is the use of the right flour. I have chosen the senatore cappelli whole meal durum wheat one, which is biological and stone grinded by the Molino del Ponte in Castelvetrano, which I use only for this shape. At the time being we cook it with capuccetti (baby cuttlefish), tomatoes del piennolo and egg-plants perfumed with basil». The Busiati (or maccheroni made with the needle) with Trapanese style pesto (agghiata trapanisa in Sicilian dialect) is a dish that cannot be missed. Tourists at the Egadi Islands have been advised. |
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RECIPE/Lemon tagliolini by Masayuki Kondo Lemon tagliolini with caciucco sauce and shellfish by Masayuki Kondo, chef at the Locanda del Pilone in Alba. In the dish there is the hand of Antonino Cannavacciuolo of the restaurant Villa Crespi in Orta San Giulio (Novara), supervisor also of the restaurant in the Langhe.
Recipe for 4 persons
Ingredients
for the dough
250 g 00 flour
125 g semolina
3 lemon peels
1.5 g white of egg
about 100 g of water
salt
for the sauce
8 g lemon peel
extra-virgin olive oil, salt
for the caciucco
300 g fish fumet
40 g peeled tomatoes
120 g scorpion fish or gurnard fillets
80 g squids or calamaries
50 g clam cooking water
50 g mussel cooking water
Basil, oil, garlic, salt, extra-virgin olive oil
for the shellfish
4 red crayfish
4 prawns
10 g cocoa butter
salt
Procedure
for the dough
Work all the ingredients into dough in the planetary mixer for 10 minutes. Put in a vacuum bag and let to rest for about 1 hour.
for the caciucco
Put the fumet, peeled tomatoes, squids in a pot and cook for about 30 minutes. When the squids are well cooked add the fish fillets, clam and mussel water and basil. Cook again for about 10 minutes. Whisk the liquid adding salt, pepper, oil and garlic to taste. Pass through a strainer. Go on cooking until reaching the required density.
for the shellfish
Clean crayfish and prawns. Cut them by half lengthwise. Cover with cocoa butter, and half-cook in the nonstick pan with salt.
for the sauce
Warm up water, extra-virgin olive oil and salt in the pan. Reduce to half. Add the lemon peel.
To plate
Boil the pasta, drain it, put it in the pan with the sauce and whip. Give the shape using the ring. Warm up the caciucco and place it on the dish. Place the ring in the middle of the dish and then remove it. Place the shellfish on top of the pasta and decorate with herbs. |
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RECIPE/Ravioli with dandelion by Sergio Vineis The Ravioli with dandelion and raisins dressed with pea cream and lemon scented butter by Sergio Vineis, chef of the Patio in Pollone, in the province of Biella. The bitter root of dandelion balances the sweetness of the other ingredients. A fresh and spring dish.
Recipe for 6 persons
Ingredients
for the dough
250 g flour
8 yolks
for the stuffing
300 g dandelion
35 g chopped onion
50 g butter
150 g ricotta cheese
80 g Parmesan cheese
35 g raisins
2 yolks
salt qs
for the sauce
100 g peas
30 g fresh cream
for the butter
lemon peel
50 g butter
Preparation
for the dough
Work the flour with the yolks into an elastic dough.
For the stuffing:
Clean the dandelion removing most of the root without eliminating it completely. Parboil. Fry onions gently with butter until soft, add coarsely cut raisins and slightly stew; then add the previously chopped dandelion, have it dry and sauté for a few minutes. Let it cool down. Add the ricotta cheese, yolks, Parmesan cheese and salt to taste.
for the sauce
Parboil the peas, pass them in the pan with oil and finally add the cream; then whisk. Keep warm.
for the butter
Melt the butter and add the grated lemon peel.
for the pasta
Thinly roll out the dough, slightly wet with little water, prepare small heaps of stuffing about the size of a hazel-nut, put over another thin layer of dough and give the shape with a ring. Cook in plenty boiling water.
Finishing
To plate put a bit of pea cream on the dish, place the ravioli on top of it and complete with lemon perfumed butter and grated Parmesan cheese.
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Sea cucumber and soya spaghetti: heaven Braised sea cucumber with soya spaghetti, outstanding and troubling dish by Dong Zhenxiang, excellent chef-patron of four restaurants in China, three in Beijing and one in Zhengzhou. Gala dinner on Monday, May 21st at the Jules Verne, the Alain Ducasse’s restaurant on Paris Tour Eiffel. Accompanied by the “2000 SAINT-EMILION premier grand cru classé - Château Cheval Blanc servi en magnum“, cashmere at the nth power. I wrote on the menu: “This is heaven”.
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