Though people often associate Italy with pasta and the orient with rice, this isn't quite accurate. Rice cultivation did originate in the Orient, but Arab traders introduced the grain to the Mediterranean basin about a thousand years ago, and shortly thereafter the Venetians began planting rice in the marshlands inland of their city. It did very well and those living in the marshy sections of Lombardia and Piemonte were quick to adopt it as well. As often happens with Italian crops, farmers bred local strains and now there are many, almost all short or medium grained. Though Arborio is the best known, there are also Sant'Andrea, Carnaroli, and many others, including Vialone Nano, which is grown in the Bassa Veronese and in the province of Mantova. This week's feature is dedicated to risotti made with Vialone Nano; aa052601.htm. The pic of the week is from far a field, the Island of Heimaey, looking towards mainland Iceland blcarda207.htm.

The heat is on, and Florence's Certosa

Returning to matters at hand, the temperatures have suddenly shot up into the mid 30s (C, that's 90s F) throughout northern Italy, and Florence's major hospital was overwhelmed by people suffering from heat prostration; the paper said they were setting up cots in the corridors of the emergency room. One option when it gets like this if you're in Florence is to visit Fiesole, the town just north of the city atop a high hill. Another is to visit La Certosa, the Carthusian monastery perched on a hill just past Galluzzo, on the way to Siena. It's a fascinating place; the Carthusians withdrew from the world to pray and work, following St. Benedict's rule with extraordinary vigor and producing spectacular handcrafts, in particular inlays. Each monk had a small apartment rather than a cell, with a room where he worked and took his meals, and another where he slept and prayed; the apartments are arranged around the main cloister, and since the hill is steep-sided the complex looks very much like a fortress. La Certosa is open to the public now because the Carthusians turned it over to the Cistercians in 1958, and the Cistercians are quite happy to give tours. They're free, though contributions are welcome, especially in light of the fact that the Italian Government is charging them a hefty rent to act as caretakers of a national monument.

And monument it is; it was founded in 1342 at the behest of Niccolò Acciaioli, chief advisor to King Roberto of Naples, and became quite wealthy thanks to donations from Florentine families (Artusi notes that one of the Medici Dukes was much smitten by their soup), accumulating a rich collection of artworks, most of which were confiscated and removed during the Napoleonic suppression of 1810. What remains? The building complex, which is remarkably peaceful and harmonious, and, for the artistically inclined, lots of renaissance frescos in the church of San Lorenzo and the Della Robbia medallions in the cloister.

Practicalities: It's open daily except Mondays, 9 to 12 and 3 to 6. To reach it, either drive, following the signs for Siena and the Firenze Certosa exit of the A1 highway, or take the 37 bus, which leaves from Piazza Santa Maria Novella. The visit will take a couple of hours, or more, if you want to relax and enjoy the peace and quiet. Last thing: Florence's bus company, ATAF, has put together an excellent site with detailed maps, timetables, and notes on the things to see along the bus routes. A good site to visit when planning a trip to the region.

Berlusconi Begins to Settle In

Looking in at the political scene, following the elections power is shifting from left to right; we now have conservative Presidents of House and Senate, and can expect an announcement of who will be filling the various ministerial posts in Mr. Berlusconi's new government shortly. One of his first actions will likely be a repeal of gift and inheritance taxes, neither of which will have much of an impact on the average worker (though they will make it easier for him to give away his holdings, thus disposing of the conflict-of-interest problem posed by his owning 3 of the 7 national television stations, as well as several influential print publications). The tax cut promised during the campaign would have had a much more significant impact for most Italians, but those who are handling finance are now saying it won't be as easy to achieve as they had thought. Why am I not surprised?

Maccheroni con le Sarde

Moving towards food, John recently wrote, "This may be a tough one as it goes way back and depends upon a young boy's memory. My Sicilian grandmother (paternal) in Brooklyn, NY was an excellent cook and I remember this dish. As best I remember, she mostly made it from scratch, but also bought it in a yellow (somewhat large, rectangular or oval) flat, can, from Progresso. I best remember that it had 'Milanese' in the title on the yellow can, and some major ingredients were, SARDINES AND FENNEL. I believe it also had pine nuts in the somewhat 'tomato based' mixture that was served over pasta. Ever heard of it? Any ideas?"

Actually, yes. It's one of the classic Sicilian pasta sauces, and was also one of the first to reach across the Straights of Messina and become known on the mainland; Artusi presented it to his readers more than a century ago, and here it is in English, from The Art of Eating Well (Random House), my translation of his book:

Maccheroni Con Le Sarde Alla Siciliana -- Maccheroni with Sardines, Sicilian Style

For this recipe I am indebted to a spry, spirited widow whose husband, a Sicilian, liked to cook the dishes of his native land.

• 1 pound (450 g) Neapolitan style long pasta (bucatini or perciatelli)
• 1 1/4 pounds (500 g) fresh sardines
• 6 salted anchovies (the whole variety you'll find at a deli counter)
• 2/3 pound (300 g) bulb fennel
• Oil
• 2 tablespoons tomato paste diluted in water, or 1/2 cup tomato sauce

Remove the heads and tails from the sardines, split and bone them, flour them, and fry them. Salt them well and set them aside.

Boil the fennel until it's fork tender in lightly salted water, drain it, and mince it.

Cook the pasta, drain it, and set it aside.

Clean and bone the anchovies, then set a frying pan with a quarter cup of oil on the fire and cook them, stirring them with a spoon to break them up. Add the fennel, lightly season the mixture with salt and pepper, stir in a half cup of tomato sauce or two tablespoons of tomato paste diluted with water, and simmer the resulting sauce for 10 minutes. Now that everything is ready, mix the sardines and the anchovy sauce into the pasta in a heat proof dish, heat the mixture through in the oven, and serve it hot.

This will serve 6 or 7.

TIME FOR AN ASIDE:
Artusi was from Emilia, north of the Apennines, and did filter his dishes to make them palatable to other northern Italians of a century ago, who would likely have wondered at pine nuts and raisins in a pasta dish, assuming they didn't flat-out refuse to try it. Ada Boni, who was Roman, didn't filter this particular recipe in presenting it in Il Talismano della Felicità in 1928. She does, however, say: "those unfamiliar with the secrets of this dish might think, upon reading the recipe, that a combination of such disparate ingredients would lead to a culinary dissonance; to the contrary, these dissonances combine to form a first-rate harmony." Pino Correnti, who is Sicilian, feels no need to apologize and doesn't tone things down at all. He calls for:

• 2 1/4 pounds (1 k) wild mountain fennel (you may have to use domestic bulb fennel)
• 1 1/4 pounds (500 g) fresh sardines
• 1 1/2 pounds (600 g) bucatini or perciatelli
• 2 onions, minced
• 6 salted anchovies, rinsed and boned
• 2 ounces (50 g) pine nuts
• 2 ounces (50 g) raisins, soaked in hot water
• 2 ounces (50 g) toasted almonds
• A knife-tip's worth of saffron
• Olive oil
• Salt and pepper

And he has quite a bit to say:

This recipe gathers the most exciting elements of Sicilian cuisine; its unmistakable flavor is equal to the fame it has garnered amongst lovers of fine foods the world over. We must defend this recipe from the Tomato Rain: to obtain the necessary color, there's already saffron. I have nothing against tomatoes, quite the contrary, but when they arrived from the Americas Sicily already had 2000 years of culinary history... To lay to rest any doubts, one need only turn to the recipe published by the great Pitré (one of the greatest Sicilian cultural historians) in 1886; on page 352 he says, "Pasta cu li sardi, maccheroni cooked and seasoned with saffron, and seasoned with a sauce made from onion, wild fennel (foenicum dulce gusto acuto, L.), fresh anchovies, raisins, toasted almonds and pine nuts. One pours the sauce over the maccheroni in a terracotta pot, covers the pot with a lid, and puts it in the oven with coals on the lid to brown the top as well. Many add other anchovies, split and laid out like tongues, over the pasta. This tasty pasta cu li sardi is the ideal of the Sicilian People, so much that when a person expects to eat well or earn some money, one hears, "Ammuccamu! Pasta cu li sardi!"

Now the dish is common throughout Sicily, especially Palermo, and is extremely popular to the west, from Cefalú to Agrigento. As we have seen, at the base of it all is wild fennel, which should be boiled in three quarts of lightly salted water; fish the boiled fennel out of the pot with a slotted spoon and use the water to cook the pasta as well. Wash the sardines, remove and discard their heads, and bone them, leafing a thin strip of flesh to keep the halves together like the spine of a book. Mince the fennel, which will then go into a sauté pan with a little oil, and the onion, anchovies, pepper, pine nuts, saffron (diluted in a little warm water), raisins, and half of the sardines.

Mix the resulting sauce well to make it homogenous. Now, boil the bucatini in the water you cooked the fennel in, drain them when they reach the al dente stage, and mix them with 2/3 of the sauce, in an oven-proof dish. Heat the remaining third of the sauce in a second pan, with a little olive oil and cook the opened sardines. Pour the sauce and sardine mixture over the pasta, and sprinkle the almonds over it all. Slip the pasta into a hot oven for 10 minutes to brown the top and meld the flavors.

Mr. Correnti notes that there are innumerable variations on the dish, but would rather not list any.

A printer-friendly version of all this.

Vermentino: A White to Look Out For

Winding down, a couple of years I wrote about Vermentino, a white grape that appears to have traveled from Spain to Sardegna and Corsica, from whence it reached the French and Ligurian coasts via sailors who brought home cuttings to plant. It's a fascinating varietal capable of producing wines of great finesse and elegance, and though those from Sardegna are widely known. However, Vermentini of Tuscany and Liguria were much more difficult to come by, to the point that one almost had to visit the area to find them (a trip well worth making, especially in the summer months; there are both the Valle di Luni and the Tuscan coast to enjoy.). This will likely change, however, now that the Vermentino vineyards Antinori has planted in Bolgheri are entering fully into production, and the company is exporting the wine. You should be able to find the Antinori Vermentino DOC Bolgheri 2000 both in Northern Europe and in the US (the 99 was released only in Italy), and if the new wine captures the attention I hope it will, other importers should begin importing other Vermentini as well. Sea breezes do marvelous things to Vermentino grapes, and the wine works very well with fish, vegetable-based pasta sauces and stuffed pastas, and white meats. If you like whites, seek out a bottle and try it.

This week's proverb is again Piemontese. A pensé mal a s' fa mal, ma a s'andivina: It's bad to think badly, but on the money.

A presto,
Kyle Phillips
Webweaver, About Italian Cuisine

The Cosa Bolle Index
PS -- Send a card from the Italian Cuisine Post Office, or browse the photos!

Subscribe to the Newsletter
Name	Email