Cosa Bolle in Pentola?
Vanna Marchi, Giorgio Perlasca, Octopus
& More
Being the 95th issue of Cosa Bolle in Pentola, your Italian Cuisine newsletter.
To begin with, the most recent feature on the site is dedicated to lamb: Given the tremendous number of flocks one sees when driving around out in the Italian countryside, one would expect lamb and mutton to be as important as sheep's milk cheese in the Italian diet. They aren't, however; though lamb is fairly common, especially in the south and especially in the spring, it lags well behind beef and chicken in popularity, while mutton is very difficult to come by, to the point that one wonders what becomes of old sheep. And the wine of the week is a light, delicate red from the hills of Florence.
Mages, or: Italiani Creduloni (La Nazione's headline about the below)
Returning to Cosa Bolle, when I am in the US and surf the channels late at night, I usually come across at least one televangelist working the audience; I recall one who managed to reinterpret one of Paul's letters to indicate that "God has nothing against wealth -- indeed (looking directly into the camera), he wants us to be wealthy," and followed the conclusion with a pitch. Italy does have some of this sort of thing, but there's a lot more magic -- people who do tarot readings, fiddle with Ouija boards, and so on, dispensing advice and magical fixes to those who call in via a toll (i.e. 900) number, or offering more substantial services in exchange for more substantial fees to be paid in cash.
One of the most popular scams is the sale of winning lottery numbers, and Vanna Marchi and her daughter Stefania, who got their start selling diet potions and hair creams over the airwaves a decade ago, were doing really well with it, because they had worked in a second angle: Hex removal. If a person called to complain that the lotto numbers hadn't worked, they sent back an "evil eye detector" consisting of a half cup or so of salt that the person was to mix into a glass of water. Failure of the salt to dissolve completely meant the Evil Eye, and since it's physically impossible to dissolve a half cup of salt in a cup of water everyone who took the test had the Evil Eye. At which point Vanna & Co. offered to remove it for a fee in the thousands of dollars; if a customer did pay, they kept him or her hooked by "discovering" new problems that required expensive magical cures, and threatening the most dire consequences if the person tried to back out.
Despite occasional complaints to the courts, primarily from relatives of the bilked, their business was growing, and they'd probably still be sending out their salt kits if they hadn't tried to strong arm a grandmotherly lady; rather than pay up she called the Striscia la Notizia, a satirical news broadcast that runs during prime time and has a huge audience. The directors told her to pretend to go along with Vanna's offer, attached a microphone to her phone, and dispatched a reporter with a camera crew. We therefore got to see it all, from the woman being told how to prepare for the magical rite (wear white pajamas to bed, among other things), followed the arrival of the guy who was supposed to pick up the payment, followed by her decision to back out, followed by Stefania's telling her over the phone that she'd never sleep soundly again because of the curses gathering over her head. Extortion is extortion, and not even the deafest of magistrates could ignore this; the wheels of justice began to turn, and now the whole Marchi clan is in jail. According to the Guardie di Finanza, they bilked about 300,000 people, to the tune of 33 million Euros, which is about 30 million dollars.
In a bizarre aftertwist, Vanna wrote to Fausto Bertinotti, the head of the far-left Communist Refoundation party; the letter was leaked to the press, and it turns out she was claiming political persecution: "I come," she wrote, "from a long line of True Communists, while the owner of the channel that ran the story about me (Silvio Berlusconi, the Prime Minister), is right wing," and added that the shut-down of her operation will put people out of work. No official response from Bertinotti, and considering the threats people are saying she used to keep them paying her, her lack of shame is astounding. On the other hand, if she had any shame at all, she wouldn't have been selling "sure fire" lottery numbers.
How big is the magic "business" in Italy, you wonder? According to the statisticians, somewhere between 7 and 8 million Italians visit magicians every year; 60% of the clients are women, on average 50 years old, and the majority never finished high school. The major problems? As one might expect, health, money, and love. Estimates of the number of magicians vary; according to Radio Maria, the Catholic Church's radio station, there are 40,000, while the magicians themselves claim to number 150,000, spread throughout the Peninsula, with a majority (50%) in the North. Big business, by any standard.
And how does this fit in with Italy's being a Catholic country? Well, actually; though the Peninsula has been Christian since the time of the Romans the Church has always had to deal with what are known as credenze popolari, old superstitions and traces of the older pagan religions, which survived primarily among the peasantry, especially in isolated areas. In particular there was (and is) a tremendous fear of the malocchio, the Evil Eye, and many immediately suspect it and take steps to remove it if their luck takes a turn for the worse. For that matter, they also take steps to ward it off; when I was a baby my parents took me to Enna, in inland Sicily (Dad was doing archaeological research), and the workmen at the excavation, devout Catholics all, told him that I should have an earring to protect me from malocchio.
Nor is the large number of magicians in the north (which is traditionally considered more advanced) surprising; during the 50s and 60s millions of poor southerners migrated north to take factory jobs, and their magicians simply followed them, joining those already present.
What is surprising is the hold these charlatans still manage to exert over people even today; one witch justified herself by saying "we give the desperate reason to hope," and that would be fine if they didn't also milk them dry; one of Vanna Marchi's victims turned to prostitution to pay her debts. With any luck, Striscia La Notizia's exposé will help keep others from falling into their clutches.
To the memory of Giorgio Perlasca
Moving in another direction, this is the time of remembering for Italian Jewish communities. For the occasion the Italian State television network produced a miniseries dedicated to Giorgio Perlasca, a card-carrying Fascist who happened to be in Budapest in 1944; the Hungarian government set up by the Germans was busily rounding up and exterminating Jews, proceedings which Mr. Perlasca decided just weren't right. So when Spain withdrew its ambassador to avoid giving the Hungarian puppet government recognition, he claimed to be a Spanish Consul, and proceeded to extend "Spanish" protection to more than 5,000 Jews; on many occasions he faced the Germans down, and at least once he literally pulled children out of their hands.
When the Hungaro-Germanic government fell he simply packed up and went home, and since he never talked about what he had done nobody knew about it until the mid-80s, when some of the people he had saved came looking for him to thank him. A rare combination of humility and courage.
A little more about the fate of the Italian Jews in the 30s and 40s.
Ocy Recipes
Turning to food, Janette writes, "I'm looking for a recipe for pickled octopus. My husband is a fisherman and occasionally catches ocy in his pots."
Here's a Puglian recipe for octopus pickled in vinegar, drawn from Alessandro Molinari Pradelli's Il Grande Libro della Cucina Italiana:
Polpetti nell'Aceto -- Octopus in Vinegar
- 3 1/3 pounds (1.5 k) baby octopus, cleaned (you could also use baby squid or cuttlefish)
- Fresh mint
- Garlic cloves, sliced
- Red wine vinegar
Wash the octopus, put them in a pot with water to cover, and bring the pot to a boil. When the octopuses have become tender drain them, pat them dry, and put them in a glass jar, interlayering them with mint leaves and slivers of garlic. Add vinegar to cover, shaking the jar to dislodge bubbles, cover the jar, and put it in a cool dark place. They'll be ready in a week's time and keep for several more.
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While we're on the subject of octopus, here's a Calabrian recipe for octopus salad that will be a nice antipasto, also from Mr. Pradelli's book:
Insalata di Polipi -- Octopus Salad
- 2 1/4 pounds (1 k) octopus, ideally small
- 2 cups (1/2 l) strong red wine vinegar
- 2 cups (1/2 l) water
- Olive oil
- 3 cloves garlic, minced
- 3 tablespoons parsley, minced
- Salt & freshly ground pepper
Clean the octopus, and put them in a pot with the vinegar and the water. Salt the pot, bring it to a boil, cover it, and simmer the octopus until it's fork tender.
Drain the octopus, trim the suckers (which are unpleasantly rubbery) from the tentacles, and dice the octopus, putting the pieces in a bowl (terracotta will look nice here). Season them with the minced herbs, salt and pepper to taste, abundant olive oil, and serve.
A note: this salad will keep for several days if you seal it in a glass jar.
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Cotto di Fichi & Cartellate
Winding down, Niki writes:
I am looking for a recipe you may be able to locate. I am a third generation Italian, my great grandmother used to make a dessert during the Holidays that my family loved and cannot seem to find anyone who knows what we are talking about. My grandmother died suddenly and never had the chance to teach anyone the recipe. It is a dessert, a cookie in some aspects but not really. It is not a cake. It is a bow tie (lightly fried dough in the shape of taralli) but was covered in fig sauce. All my mother remembers was that it took a long time for my grandmother to make the fig sauce and that it smelled the house up really bad. I remember eating them as a child and loving them.
I do not speak Italian and neither does my mother so when we say their name as we interpret it no one knows what we are talking about. I am going to give you the name the way I would pronounce it, maybe you could decipher it. The name is In gaten dats. Our family has roots in Calabria, Napoli and Bari. We are not sure what area this recipe comes from.
Luigi Sada discusses the cooking down of figs at length in La Cucina Pugliese, and since the procedure is lengthy and would smell up a house, the recipe may be Pugliese. To begin with cotto di fichi:
There are many recipes for producing this concentrate, which varies from town to town. Some, from dusty old manuscripts, include difficult-to-execute steps, while the results of other more recent versions might disorient the reader. I suggest the following, which was transcribed by Miccolis and has given me excellent results.
In the second half of the month of August select the ripest figs, put them in a pot, and when it's full set it over a fire, ideally wood (as opposed to coal), and cook until their volume is reduced by half. Pour the mixture out into a pillow case (or a finely woven muslin bag), tie the bag shut, and hang it from a nail or a tree branch for 24 hours, catching the drippings in a large bowl.
Next, press the figs to extract more juice; in the past they used a press made from two boards connected by a hinge, or by turning the figs out into a basket, covering them with a circular board, and setting a weight over the board.
When you have extracted all the juice you can, set it in a pot over a low flame and cook it for another 3-4 hours, by which time its volume will be further reduced and it will have thickened. At this point let it cool and transfer it to sterile glass jars; it will keep for months without deteriorating at all.
What to use this fig concentrate for?
Mr. Sada suggests Cartellate, which are also known as crustoli, frìnzele, ncartiddati (which somewhat resembles Nikki's in gaten dats)and scartagghiate:
These are, he says, the foremost Puglian, or, to be more precise, Barese sweet, the symbol of happiness, celebration, and fun. "We don't know the etymology or origin of this Christmas sweet," he continues, "though linguists and historians have made some suggestions. They're first mentioned in the Ospizio dei Pellegrini di San Nicola di Bari's registry of provisions, meals and Sunday expenses from 1762, as coming from the Bebedictine nuns of the Convent of Santa Scolastica, while the nuns mention them in a book that's a little more recent."
- 2 1/4 pounds (1 k, about 10 cups) unbleached all purpose flour (Italian grade 00, if you can find it)
- 4/5 cup (200 ml) dry white wine
- 2/5 cup (100 ml) olive oil
- More olive oil for frying
- 2 1/4 pounds (1 k) cotto di fichi
- Powdered cinnamon and powdered cloves
Combine the flour with the wine and the olive oil; if the dough is too firm, add a little warm water, and continue working the dough until it is smooth, soft, and elastic. Next, pinch off bits of dough and form them into little loaves, which you will want to roll out quite thin. Cut them into roughly 2-inch (4 cm) strips with a serrated pastry wheel; you should obtain strips that are about 11 inches (30 cm) long. Fold the strips in half lengthwise and press them together a bout a half an inch up from one edge, to obtain troughs (for want of a better term) that you should twist lengthwise, attaching the ends together to form wreathes that are 2-3 inches (5-8 cm) in diameter). Dry the wreathes for 10-12 hours, then fry them 4-5 at a time in hot oil, frying them only until they color.
Remove them from the oil with a slotted spoon and set them temporarily on a plate. Heat the cotto di fichi, being carful lest it boil and dip the cartellate into it 4-5 at a time, removing them after a few minutes and putting them on broad, low platters. If you want, you can dust them with finely minced cloves and powdered cinnamon.
Prepared this way they don't come out "plasticated," nor do they come out burned, the way they often do the pastry shops of other towns in the region.
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Cavezune -- Chickpea Ravioli
And finally, A few people have written asking for recipes for chick pea ravioli. Here's a recipe from the Gargano Peninsula, also drawn from Mr. Sada's La Cucina Pugliese:
- 5 cups (500 g) unbleached all purpose flour
- 1/5 cup (40 g) sugar
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- Cooked chickpeas, pureed
- Shaved dark chocolate
- A cinnamon stick, shredded
- Cotto di fichi or cooked down grape must
- Olive oil for frying
Combine the flour, olive oil, sugar, and sufficient warm water to obtain a firm, elastic dough. Roll it out into a thin sheet and use a large glass to make disks.
Lay a spoonful of the chickpeas in the center of each disk, together with some chocolate shavings, a little cinnamon, and a teaspoon of the cooked fruit or must. Fold the disks over the filling and tamp down the edges to obtain half moons, which you will want to fry until golden in hot oil.
Drain them on absorbent paper, and dust them with confectioner's sugar.
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This week's proverb is Calabrese: 'U mangiari senza vivari è tronari senza chiovari. Eating without drinking is like thunder without rain.
A presto,
Kyle Phillips
Webweaver, About Italian Cuisine
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