To begin with, as I've said many times, Italian cooking in Italy is not particularly garlicky. There are people who revere the Noble Bulb, but the vast majority like it in moderation, for the simple reason that if you have garlic breath you'll make a dreadful impression on those around you, especially those of the opposite sex, and this is something few Italians want to do. There are, however, garlicky recipes in the Pantheon of Italian cuisine, and if you're one of those who firmly believes one can never have enough garlic, you'll like the collection of garlicky recipes I've assembled. The pic of the week is appropriate, given the heat that has arrived: people sunning on one of the spillways that once served to channel water to the paddles of a mill along the banks of the Arno in Florence .

Glory for Rome, and Horrors for the Cyclists

Returning to matters at hand, this weekend (June 17, 2001) the soccer (football for those of a European bent) season came to a close with AC Roma's victory over Parma, which allowed them to clench the Scudetto, Italy's title. Tremendous festivities throughout the Capital, which were all the sweeter for Roma's fans because they took the Scudetto from hated archrival Lazio, which is also based in Rome, though its supporters live around rather than in the city. Last Sunday (June 10) was supposed to have been happy, too -- an Italian was expected to win the Giro D'Italia, the round-the-country professional cycling race whose leader wears a pink shirt (this is why Italy's major sporting daily is pink) and the guy in second place was also Italian. However, the week before the finish, on the eve of the race's toughest Alpine leg, 400 Police officers raided the hotels where the cyclists were staying, knocking on all the doors occupied by team members, friends, hangers on, retainers, team managers and so on, while more policemen watched from outside. I don't think that even they expected quite what happened next: Boxes of drugs flying out the windows, together with syringes and vials that shattered in the parking lots. One officer had a syringe land on the visor of his cap, fortunately for him plunger end down, while two others caught one of the cyclists by the feet as he tried to leap from a window. There was a bit of everything, from portable labs for doing full blood workups to the whole gamut of steroids, stimulants, painkillers, growth hormones, and a great many vials whose labels were ripped off; the first thought was that they might be drugs that mask the traces left by some of the other things. Almost all of the stuff was found in the rooms of the team managers or other hangers on (including relatives), though Frico, who was in second place, had drugs in his room and was therefore expelled from the race and fired by his team.

As one might expect, there was a huge outcry, with much use of the word "shameful" by the press, coupled with tremendous disgust on the part of the fans. Some of the racers, on the other hand, complained about the police tactics and privacy violations, and threatened to stop the race. Excuse me? The raid was planned to coincide with the tough leg because suspect vials were found in the rooms where the racers stayed on the eve of a difficult early leg, and at that point the authorities began to wonder -- were racers helping themselves up the hills? The sheer volume of material found shows that the answer was yes, and that the practice was widespread. As for privacy violations, frankly, if an athlete is doped up he should get the book thrown at him -- on the same day this all happened a 14-year old amateur cyclist was hospitalized after drinking down a handful of pills given him by his coach. It's the pros who set the example, and if they're all juicing themselves up the amateurs will follow.

So how did things work out? The teams threatened to fire anyone who quit, so the race resumed, though to be frank nobody gave a damn. And now that it's over, about 70 people are under indictment, while the Italian cycling authorities have suspended all professional competitions until a code of ethics can be adopted. Let's hope the first provision be mandatory drug and blood tests, not just for the leaders, but for the teammates as well, because in many cases these slower guys need help to keep the pace set by the top cyclists. For those found guilty? Bye. Pros set the example for the kids, and even one 14-year-old who ruins his or her health in the pursuit of a medal (many of these drugs do serious, permanent damage) is one too many.

Politics: G8 and Exciting News about Olive Oil

Moving in another political direction, if the riots provoked by the antiglobalization people in Goteborg this week are any indication, the G8 summit in Genova at the end of June could become quite ugly. If you're going to be in Liguria, check the paper and avoid Genova during the meetings. No point in getting caught in the middle of things; in Sweden the demonstrators were throwing paving stones and the police were shooting back.

Also, some positive political food news: The EEU has closed the loophole that allowed unscrupulous olive oil producers to import cheap oil from elsewhere, mix it with local oil, and then sell the product as local oil. Now the labels have to say where the olives were pressed if the oil is to be identified as local or national, and since olives must be picked and pressed immediately, this closes the above loophole. The EEU has also reduced the allowable acidity for extravirgin oils. What does this mean for the consumer? That some of the cheap commercially produced extravirgin oils that are now labeled Italian will be relabeled Mediterranean, or simply extravirgin. With any luck their prices will come down as well.

Finally, a Few Recipes

To begin with, Anna writes, with regards to the Sicilian fennel and fresh sardine pasta sauce discussed last time,

You commented that the recipe for fennel, sardines and pasta, "might" sound weird, but hey! I am Italian-American and live in Texas. I grew up eating "pasta with finocchio". The difference is, we didn't have fresh sardines here, so we used the canned. We would cook the fennel, (not the bulbs or seeds, although, now I put the seed in everything for digestion and drink the tea also) in the "gravy", then put the sardines in to heat and simmer. The layers would be of pasta(with gravy, i.e. sardine, fennel) another layer of toasted breadcrumbs, pasta, gravy, etc... as many layers as you can desire! Most of my family usually only did it twice, then with a small topping of my namesake cheese... Pecorino.

Peperoni Ripieni Al Peperone e Formaggio -- Peppers Stuffed with Peppers and Cheese

And Paula writes,

My father's stepmother was Italian (Romano) and he said when he was a young boy, she used to make the best stuffed bell peppers with sliced boiled eggs, bread crumbs, and he thinks garlic, olive oil and grated cheese. His 75th birthday is coming up and I would love to be able to make them for him but I have not been able to find a recipe for this. Any help you could offer would be greatly appreciated.

I haven't found anything quite like what he remembers -- in particular, nothing with hard-boiled eggs, which may have been an addition his stepmother made to the recipe. I have, however, found this, which comes fairly close, and you could add some sliced hard boiled egg to it to give it that special touch. The recipe is from the Abruzzo-Molise area, and serves 6.

• 9 Bell peppers
• 2 ounces (50 g, a bit more than a half cup) day-old bread, crust discarded
• Olive oil
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 2 tablespoons minced parsley
• 2 basil leaves, shredded
• 1 cup (50 g) grated pecorino romano
• An egg, lightly beaten
• Salt to taste

Select the six prettiest peppers, cut away the stems, and scoop out the seeds and white ribs through the hole using a spoon. Wash them and dry them.

Slice the remaining three peppers fairly finely, after stemming, ribbing, and seeding them, and sauté them until soft and tender in just a little oil. Let them cool a little. Take a bowl and mix together the breadcrumbs, peppers and their juices, garlic, parsley, basil, cheese, and egg. Season the mixture to taste with salt and pepper. Preheat your oven to 360 F (180 C) and fill the peppers with the mixture. Put them in a baking dish, drizzle them with a little oil, and bake them until done; serve them hot.

This is it -- One could, if one wanted, increase the garlic slightly, and add hard boiled eggs to the mixture, while decreasing the amount of sautéed peppers lest there be too much filling.

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About Peppers

Tasty Fennel

Next, Emmiliene kindly sends this recipe for fennel, with the observation that it's perhaps not a traditional recipe but it's damn tasty!

Get fennel bulbs remove and keep aside the green bits at the top , cut them into wedges and throw them into a baking dish. Dot liberally with butter, add 4-5 sliced garlic cloves, and sprinkle the lot with freshly ground salt and pepper. Lastly douse with one wine glass full of white wine or vermouth. Get some baking paper, scrunch it up and wet it, then wrap it around the fennel. Then you just bake it in a fairly hot oven for an hour or so. The fennel almost caramelizes and the flavours are amazing!

It may be a cliché, but this is great with some pan-fried fish and a fresh tomato and basil salad to counteract the richness.

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About Fennel

Sarde a Beccafico

And finally, Lenore writes

Have a question: Have you ever heard of Sarde a beccafico (Stuffed sardines). This is very traditional Sicilian dish, where the cleaned sardines are served "open-face" filled with breadcrumbs, pinoli (pine nuts), passolina, sugar, and lemon juice. Many people add egg to the other ingredients to hold the filling together. The characteristic sour-sweet taste comes marinating the fish in lemon juice.
What I don't understand is how they can get all this in/on a little sardine? It's served open-faced. Okay, do you mix them all together like a paste? Or do you dribble it on individually? I don't know--sounded interesting though. Do I dare?

Of course you do. I haven't actually had them in a long time, but they are one of Sicily's signature dishes. According to Pino Correnti, they're now commonly served as antipasti, though he thinks they do better as a main course; he also notes that, like everything else in Sicily (and Italy, for that matter), they're quite regional. For example, the pinolo, raisin, sugar and lemon combination in the filling is more typical of Palermo. In Catania, on the other hand, they omit these, and also change the nature of the dish by sandwiching the filling between paired sardines, rather than folding up individual split sardines around ribbons of filling. They also fry, rather than bake their sarde. We'll follow Mr. Correnti's lead and begin with Catania:

Sardi a Beccaficu Catanisi

• 2 1/4 pounds (1 kilo) fresh sardines that are not too small
• For ounces (about a cup, or 100 g) bread crumbs
• 4 ounces pecorino pepato (Sicilian pecorino with whole peppercorns; use moderately sharp romano if need be), grated
• A minced mixture of garlic and parsley, to taste
• 3 eggs beaten, and two more, also beaten, for dredging the sardines
• 1 cup (100 g) flour
• A bowl of strong vinegar
• Olive oil
• Salt and pepper to taste

"Why are these sardines called beccafico?" asks Mr. Correnti, in Il Grande Libro D'Oro della Cucina e dei Vini della Sicilia, and goes on to note that Salvatore lo Presti, the renowned Catanian folklorist, says, in "Lo Stivale allo Spiedo" (Rome, Casini, ed.) that the beccafico is a gluttonous bird that loves figs, and therefore calling the dish sarda a beccafico is paying fishy homage to the bird with good taste -- so long as the boned, beheaded sardines are split, marinated in strong vinegar, and laid one atop the other, with between them the filling that has developed over the centuries.

While the fish are marinating in the vinegar, prepare a mixture of bread crumbs, grated pecorino cheese, minced garlic and parsley, and beaten eggs. Season all with salt and pepper and form little bits of the mixture into oblong balls which you will want to press between pairs of open sardines. Indeed, to the contrary of the custom followed in Palermo, in eastern Sicily Sarde a beccafico must always consist of two sardines, which become, as it were, lids for each other, with filling in the middle. In any case, once you prepared the sardines and their filling, dip them first in egg and then dredge them in flour, and fry them in hot oil until golden.

Superlative hot or cold.

A Variation:

The above are good, but they're not all. Around Messina and along the Ionian coast they make Sardi a Beccaficu O Sucu, Sardi a Beccafico with sauce, as follows:

Once you have made this sardines per the instructions above, slices onion with a little garlic and parsley, and sauté the mixture in a little oil. Season the mixture with salt and pepper, add the sardines, and chopped tomatoes to cover. Sauté the sardines, covered, and when the sauce thickens, remove them. To sardines will be a tasty second course, while the sauce will be perfect over spaghetti.

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Sardi a Beccaficu Palermitani -- Palermo's Sardi A Beccaficu

And here's the version from Palermo, which are sweeter and quite different from those made along the eastern side of the island:

• 2 3/4 pounds (1.2 k) very fresh, not too big sardines
• 6 ounces (150 g) bread crumbs
• 8 salted anchovies
• 2 ounces (50 g) raisins
• 2 ounces (60 g) pine nuts
• A bunch of parsley, minced
• Bay leaf
• The juice of a lemon
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• Olive oil
• Salt & Pepper to taste

Scale the sardines, remove their heads, bone them, and split them, leaving the two sides connected by a thin strip of flesh along the back. Wash them well and set them to drain. Sauté all but a little of the breadcrumbs in a skillet with the oil. When the breadcrumbs are well browned, transfer them to bowl and combine them with the raisins, pine nuts, anchovy fillets, and minced parsley. Check seasoning. Use the mixture to fill the open anchovies, folding the two halves together once you have filled them. Put the filled anchovies in a well-oiled pan, with their backs down, separating them with bay leaves. Dust them with the remaining breadcrumbs and sprinkle them with a little oil. Combine the juice of the lemon and the sugar, and sprinkle the mixture over the sardines.

Having said all this, Mr. Correnti neglects to say how to cook the sardines. I would roast them in a preheated 360 degree F (180 C) oven for about 10 minutes, or until done.

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This week's proverb is Ligurian. Vâ ciù l'inzegno che a forza: Brains are worth more than might.

A presto,
Kyle Phillips
Webweaver, About Italian Cuisine

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