Dear {NOMEUTENTE}During the first meeting of the Forum della Cucina Italiana, last Tuesday at Cascina Triulza at Expo, when the FoodAct of which you can read here and here was presented, Davide Scabin said something that I hope in time will be understood and absorbed by all those that have the challenge promoted by the minister for agricultural policies Maurizio Martina at heart: “We have never codified Italian cuisine which is in fact the result of regional and local cuisines. Why don’t we find the most important one hundred recipes and code them so that they can be replicated all over the world?”.
I know well that family cookery books abound, more or less focused on regional cuisine, and the same goes for the interpretation of single chefs but this is not what the chef from Combal.zero in Rivoli, Torino, had in mind. Davide mentioned the case of pasta, how do you make carbonara? to mention a rather recent classic, as it dates back to after the second world war. The answers could reach 60 millions, one per each Italian. It’s not a question of creativity which we are never missing, but of mistaking what we like for the general rule.
Scabin also said: “We need to fight the widespread Italian sounding around the world with the accuracy of our most established recipes”. In other words: how can we say that Spaghetti with meatballs are not Italian if we, in the first place, don’t put an order between the basic and creative interpretation? This detail should not be neglected: many jump into innovation (improvisation) because they don’t know the Italian culinary grammar.
Paolo Marchi
Content by Gabriele Zanatta, Identità Expo photos by Brambilla/Serrani |
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The five years that changed pasta  London, one night in May 2010: Davide Scabin (in the photo) entered the world of dry pasta. He did so by slamming the door behind him, crossing the edge of “what was not yet imagined". He barged into it with a menu with 8 totally pasta-based dishes, with a presentation proving the versatility of this product, ingredient, mass, "play dough" (were my father Valentino to read these terms...). We have gone places since then, in just a few years. And at last one can see lots of pasta in the menus of important restaurants.
It is true, summer is the season for evaluations but I don’t dare doing any. I just want to recall five important moments that have marked each of the five years following that day. In fact, the moments that would deserve a mention are many more: from the spaghetti tasted in Tokyo to the much worse yet worthy of a mention ones on the Austrian Airlines. Here they are:
2011
Cold spaghetti with squid ink by Master Gualtiero Marchesi during an evening of sharing in Erbusco.
2012
The visit to Gragnano in June for "'a Pasta". Inspirations for a pasta-maker, a unique chance to meet Stefano Bonilli and share the pasta made by Don Alfonso Iaccarino.
2013
A solo dinner at Agostino Iacobucci’s i Portici in Bologna with his capellino (to think that I thought it was a format for Americans!).
2014
Rigatino with clams, mussels and smooth clams by Andrea Berton because it was delicious and made me win a bet.
2015
The end of Identità di Pasta at the congress in Milan: Bottura, Vegliani, Di Martino and Felicetti sharing a pot of pasta from the lesson given by Massimo. Moving.
Let’s get on with the work.
Riccardo Felicetti |
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Scabin and the physics’ law of creativity There’s not much one can do about it: 5 years after the first revolutionary wailings regarding dry pasta were made by Davide Scabin, after that night in a cellar in London, it’s always the chef from Rivoli who drags the rebellious people in the first line, with their chest out. His latest blitz was in late June, on the first floor of Identità Expo.
The most relevant observation of every recipe presented during the lesson is that «Revolution is always based on what exists, that is to say on tradition». As in the Bombolone di pasta (photo), «A play-dough made with over-cooked blended pasta, leavened, fried and moulded in the shape of a krapfen. A lipo-repellent filled with Roman-style endive, anchovies, unpeeled clove of garlic, chilli pepper and dampened on top with a fondue of Grana Padano». Beyond all poetry, it was a true blast.
Then there’s the famous pasta cooked in the pressure cooker, a theme launched at Identità Milano last February. The sequence for amatriciana: «Cold cooker, raw, cold pasta, tomato, white wine, unpeeled garlic, guanciale. All this in the pressure cooker for 12 minutes at the highest power, with the highest flame available at home». The palate doesn’t notice any difference though your wallet will: «You waste much less water. Imagine the savings if you’re thinking of restaurants seating hundreds of people every day». And the anxiety also disappears: «Once the perfect cooking is reached, you don’t need to drain the pasta immediately, not to lose the al dente, it can be kept in there for 3 more minutes». The perfect doses? Here they are: «500 g pasta, 650 g tomato purée, 500 g water, 150 g white wine, 130 g guanciale, 200 g grana - or 130 pecorino – and half a fresh chilli pepper». Celestial cooking? No, this is a human, too human recipe.
After the carnival fried spaghetti with squid ink covered in sugar, the squid carbonara, black&white, here come the spaghetti preserved in oil in a glass case, «that is to say a Piedmontese burnia», a final coup de theatre, «you can enhance them even after quite a few days, adding your preferred sauce».
Scabin finally outlines the mathematical formula for cooking: Avantgarde (or Creativity, or Future) is obtained by dividing the square root of Tradition by the multiplication of Technique per Technology». We explained it here.
GZ |
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Marianna Vitale: ramen “alla puttanesca” For her lesson at Identità di Pasta at Expo, Marianna Vitale from restaurant Sud in Quarto (Naples) presented a very Italian recipe though looking towards the East: a pasta “alla puttanesca” to be eaten using sticks. Since «Naples is a large pot in which we put the pasta», the recipe had to be inspired by the local culinary tradition.
The puttanesca sauce is already mentioned in some texts from the 19th century: «I was thinking about how the first pasta “alla puttanesca” could be, certainly cooked in lots of thick sauce, served with the paired ingredients, though not blended, to be eaten using one’s fingers or, in order not to get burnt, with their natural continuation, that is to say sticks».
The custom of transforming pasta into a soup is also Neapolitan. So the Felicetti capelli d’angelo dive into a Virgin Mary cocktail made with triple tomatoes, a pillar in the kitchen of the chef from Campania, here presented in a triumph of varieties, from the sweet datterini to the more acid cherry tomatoes through the sapidity of the piccadilly tomatoes. «Why add sugar to the sauce if I can use an already sweet tomato matched with a more acid one?», is the rhetoric question asked by the chef.
The flavours of the sea, however, are the real crown jewels of Vitale’s cooking, so anchovies preserved in oil enrich and thicken the sauce. The lime zest refreshes and speaks to the nose before it does to the palate together with the always present parsley, strictly broken with her hands. Powdered black olives, bread and capers cover the vermicelli, served in a bowl and made noble thanks to marinated anchovies and garlic sprouts. The chef’s touch: three drops of Hollandaise sauce for a trip to the Seventies.
Succulent and tasty, this dish gives the same satisfaction one had as a child, when spreading red spaghetti all around the kitchen. But it could also be a gourmet substitute to the most sinister packaged ramen to which one just needs to add boiling water. The powders get rehydrated in the tomato and in three minutes the pasta is ready. The same time necessary for industrial packaged food, yet with a fine dining result.
Valeria Senigaglia |
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The Costardi Bros: fusilli as a main course  Fusi...llone is the creative name the Costardi brothers chose for their pasta Felicetti with rabbit and stewed peppers. It recalls cold fusion and results in a warm pasta that melts your heart. According to Christian and Manuel «Pasta has a huge unexpressed potential and for us it is pure fun. Rice is love and respect while with pasta we dare experimenting more».
Far from their element, rice, and from the regional tradition of fresh pasta, the duo from Piedmont counts on childhood memories and a “must” for their grandmother Sandra: Rabbit with stewed peppers. «We were inspired by the aromas typical of a Sunday lunch when we’d eat Rabbit with stewed peppers or Chicken cacciatora, two recipes you ate and then sweated for 15 days», says Christian, who continues «we chose rabbit because peppers are in season and they are more suitable to be eaten cold».
While there’s no mention of dry pasta in the tradition of Piedmont, peppers and rabbits from Carmagnola are typical of the Savoy territory and are the dominating flavours in this dish, to which they add fresh thyme and anchovies preserved in salt, also typical regional ingredients. The pasta, instead, loses its main role and becomes a bread to pair with the meat sauce and to use to scoop the vegetable cream. Finally, the magic touch is given by the acidity offered by a few drops of timorasso vinegar, made with an increasingly popular indigenous grape variety, added right before service.
On the palate the dish is fresh, with a persistent yet non-invasive taste; the colour is intense, just like the taste and recalls a risotto alla milanese, «because we had to put at least a little risotto» the Costardi brothers confess. The pasta format was also well chosen, as it finely blends with the pepper cream.
VS |
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RECIPE/Dal Degan and the dark side of the summer  The recipe by Alessandro Dal Degan introduces us to a dark world, something unique during the summer season, so rich in colours and shapes. «In the mountains», says the chef from restaurant La Tana in Asiago (Vicenza), «we find a great quantity of dark coloured products which at first glance could remind one of the autumn. Among these, there are different types of mushrooms: trumpet mushrooms – as in our recipe – but also russulas, mani nere or, changing genre, some types of lichens, berries, some leaves, wild juniper which ripens and becomes black in this period».
These products develop anthocyanin, which our microclimate favours enormously. Hence the name of the recipe The dark side of the summer. «This dish is in fact very simple: spaghetti with mushrooms in which the structure and austere taste of trumpet mushrooms are contrasted by the sour and pungent taste of the fermented juniper and of the watercress leaves. These add freshness and a very light spiciness».
The dark side of the summer
Recipe for 4 people
Ingredients
250 g very fresh black trumpet mushrooms
3 cloves of black garlic
1 white spring onion
roe deer jus
25 g extra virgin olive oil
280 g spaghetti grezzi cav. Cocco
mountain butter
fir gems
dry porcini aromatised bread
tender watercress leaves
10 g grated asiago stravecchio cheese (over 24 months’ maturation)
fermented wild juniper
Method
Clean the mushrooms thoroughly and cut them roughly. Finely chop the onion. Quickly sauté the onion and add the mushrooms, add the white wine, leave it to evaporate then gradually cover with water. Cook for around 3 hours on a very low flame.
Add the roe deer jus and the finely chopped fir gems. Cook the pasta in lots of salted water for 3/4 of their cooking time, drain, pour into a pan with the sauce made with the mushrooms and continue the cooking to your liking, adding some hot water from time to time. Cream with the asiago stravecchio cheese and a very small knob of mountain butter. Dish out and cover with the breadcrumbs made with mushroom aromatised bread, some drops of fermented juniper and finish with the watercress leaves. |
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RECIPE/ Panero’s Arabian spaghetti  «Spaghettino Felicetti Mare nostrum is inspired by the Mediterranean Sea», says Enrico Panero, chef at restaurant Da Vinci at Eataly Firenze, «so not just Italian products but also Arab, for instance, representing the current and past great contamination going on between the countries facing by this sea. A meeting of cultures which, in my opinion, can only improve and enrich our tradition».
The recipe: «On the base of the dish there’s a cream made with roasted aubergines with toasted sesame cream and oil, giving a unique aroma. The spaghettino is totally cooked in the pan, with fresh spring onion, chopped ginger, coriander, light courgettes and their flowers, and at the end of the cooking it is mixed with a cream made with raw calamari, cleaned and blended. It is dished out in a nest shape and garnished with lemons preserved in brine. A summer dish, rich in Arabian scents». Which received much praise on the occasion of the menu for Identità Expo.
Spaghettino Mare Nostrum
Recipe for 10 people
Ingredients
for the aubergine cream
600 g dark aubergines
30 g toasted sesame cream
15 g sesame oil
1 lemon
salt to taste
for the pasta pasta
850 g Spaghettino Monograno Felicetti
500 g fresh calamari
400 g light courgettes
10 courgette flowers
1 bunch of fresh coriander
1 ginger root
150 g fresh spring onion
100 g lemons preserved in brine
50 g white sesame
Method
For the aubergine cream, carve them and roast them in the oven at 200°C for 15 minutes. Take their pulp and make an emulsion with the other ingredients. Clean the calamari and blend them while raw, so as to obtain a fine cream. Cook the spaghettini in a pan with water, the sautéed spring onion and ginger, the flowers cut in julienne and the diced courgettes. Mix with the calamari cream. Dish out in a bowl with the aubergine cream on the base, a nest of spaghettini and garnish with toasted sesame seeds and lemon in brine. |
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RECIPE/ Torsiello and the mountain impepata  How can you successfully transfer the flavours of the sea to the uplands of Valva (Salerno)? This is what Cristian Torsiello of Osteria Arbustico, in the Valle del Sele wondered. «I asked myself this while I was eating mussel impepata», says the chef, «I found the answer thanks to Neapolitan gnocchi, a fun format of dry pasta which cooks very well».
Neapolitan gnocchi, mussels, green pepper and courgette centrifuge juice
Recipe for 4 people
Ingredients
250 g Gentile Neapolitan gnocchi
35/40 medium sized mussels
4 courgettes
80 g green pepper in brine
120 g fresh cream
1 g gelespessa
basil
dehydrated parsley flowers
extra virgin olive oil
Method
Open the mussels in a pan with garlic, oil and a ladle of water. As soon as they start to open, remove the mussels and leave them to cool. Keep the liquid to a side and filter it. Blanch the green pepper a couple of times and then leave it to cool. Blend it with very little water until you obtain a paste. Squeeze it in a cloth and add the fresh cream to this extract, adjusting the intensity of the pepper.
Centrifuge the courgettes after removing their inner part, strain the juice and in a saucepan put oil and garlic and then the juice and cook for just one minute, then remove the garlic and adjust the thickness with the gelespessa. Now cook the pasta for 6 minutes and then finish the cooking in the mussel cooking water with a few basil leaves. Once the cooking is finished, add the mussels so they warm up again. Dish out adding the centrifuge juice and the pepper sauce directly on the dish. Finally sprinkle the dehydrated parsley flowers. |
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RECIPE/Gorini: sea snails and fusillotti «This recipe», Gianluca Gorini, chef at Le Giare in Montiano (Forlì-Cesena), “surprise chef of 2015” for us at Identità Golose goes straight to the point, «is inspired by the memory of how at home and in general in the seaside tradition of the Adriatic coast, sea snails are usually prepared, that is to say stewed with tomato, garlic and wild fennel».
Gorini has always loved this way of preparing sea snails: «I wanted to enhance a recipe by trying to serve them in a new way, with additional shades of flavour. With regards to the classic recipe, I used bergamot instead of lemon, as it has a more pungent and balsamic aroma. I also added infused star anise to give some extra freshness. I mixed this sauce with the pasta and then finished the dish with marinated bergamot zest which, on top of the aroma and the balsamic notes, adds persistence. The marine fennel finally recalls, in a fresh and delicate way, the iodine and brackish notes of the sea and helps to clean the palate».
Fusillotti, sea snails and bergamot
Recipe for 4 people
Ingredients
200 g fusillotti
1 kg sea snails
1 bunch of wild fennel
1 clove of garlic
1 star anise
1 fresh bergamot
250 g peeled cherry tomatoes
1 bergamot marinated in salt and sugar for 60 days
1 bunch of marine fennel
Extra virgin olive oil, dry chilli pepper, salt from Cervia
Dry white wine, white wine vinegar
Method
Clean the sea snails with cooking salt under cold running water. In a casserole tin, sauté the garlic clove, the zest of the bergamot without the white part, some sprigs of wild fennel and a little chilli pepper in olive oil. Add the sea snails and add lots of white wine, let it to evaporate and then sprinkle some white wine vinegar. Add the strained peeled cherry tomatoes and cover with cold water; bring to the boil and season with salt.
Simmer for 60 minutes, turn off the flame and leave the remaining fennel, the star anise and the bergamot zest in infusion for 30 more minutes. Remove the shells from the sea snails and continue to cook until the sauce has reached the right thickness. Finely chop the marinated bergamot zest. Centrifuge the bunch of marine fennel keeping a few sprigs aside for the garnishing. Cook the pasta in boiling salted water and leave it very al dente.
Finish the cooking in a pan with the sea snail sauce and mix until the texture is creamy. Place the bergamot on the base of the dish, the pasta, the warm sea snails and finish with the centrifuge juice and a few tops of marine fennel. |
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Ribaldone: mozzarella and sea urchins  Felicetti spaghetti with squid ink served with sea urchins and mozzarella, the first course with which Andrea Ribaldone, chef at restaurant I Due Buoi in Alessandria and executive chef at Identità Expo, cheered the collaborators of the Guida di Identità Golose 2016, who arrived at the temporary restaurant to celebrate the ninth edition, soon to be published. |
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