Wider than “angel’s hair” pasta but thinner than tagliatelle noodles, tajarin (tagliolini noodles in the  Piedmont dialect) were made in the Langhe and Monferrato area farmsteads, in the Piedmont region. From the 15th century, tajarin spread throughout Piedmont, as related in early chronicles. 

It is a festive dish, enjoyed mainly during important celebrations. The generous quantity of
egg yolks in this amazing pasta makes it a “rich” dish, not the best choice
during the working week. Purists consider tajarin to be genuine when it
is made with at least 30 egg yolks per kilo of flour.

I enjoyed tajarin in Alba, a town in Piedmont that is famous for its sophisticated cuisine and famous “white truffle”. 
The restaurant’s pièce-de-résistance was tajarin with white truffle
finely sliced with the special truffle slicer (done by the waiter at my table), tossed with Malga butter (a very fresh rich butter made in a shepherd’s cottage in the mountains). I made my own butter at home: I bought fresh whipping cream and put it in the bowl of a stand mixer, and whisked it at maximum speed until the fat content emulsified. Then I picked up the butter with wet hands and rolled it into balls which I plunged into a bowl of ice water. It only takes few
minutes.

Prep Time: 15 minutes | Cooking Time: 5 minutes | Total Time: 50 minutes | Yield: Makes 2 servings.

Ingredients

• 7 egg yolks (if the dough is too dry, you can add a few tablespoons of egg white)
• 2 cups (250 g) all-purpose flour
• 3 tbsp (40 g) butter
• 1 tin of crushed tomato 

Instructions

  On a wooden pastry board, pour the flour into a mound, make a hole in its centre and drop the egg yolks into it.

Mix by hand to make a dough that you are going to roll out using a rolling pin.

Let the dough sit for at least 30 minutes, wrap it in cling film or, even better, cover it in a glass bowl.

Roll the dough into a sheet about two millimetres (1/24-inch) thick. Let it dry for at least an hour and a half (depending on the season, in summer 15 minutes are usually enough. The sheet of dough must be dry enough not to stick when you roll it but still flexible to be rolled on itself without breaking).

Flour it lightly, fold a few times to form stacking layers and, using a knife, cut fettuccine about 2 millimetres wide (1/24 inch).

Boil them in salted water for a couple of minutes if they are fresh. If they are frozen, put them directly in the boiling water without thawing, and add a minute to cooking time.

Meanwhile, melt the butter in a pan, add the drained pasta and 3-4 tablespoons of cooking water, mix and serve. Slice the truffle directly on pasta in the dishes. 

These mini savoury panettoni are a bit time-consuming but not hard to do, you can decide whatever stuffing you love. The classic recipe included prawns with cocktail sauce, smoked salmon with cream cheese and chives and lemon zest. Or cold cuts and cheeses, or vegetarian fillings.

You can choose whatever filling you love.

Prep Time: 30 minutes | Cooking Time: 20 minutes | Total Time: 50 minutes (4 hours for cooling down) | Yield: Makes 6  servings.

Ingredients

• ¼ cup (50 ml) warm milk
• 13 g fresh baker’s yeast or 4 g dry active yeast
• 1 egg, beaten
• 3 ½ tbsp (50 g) butter, room temperature, cut in small pieces
• 1 cup (240 g) bread (Manitoba) flour
• 1/2 tbsp honey
• 25 ml water
• 1 ½ tbsp (20 g) white sugar
• Butter for the tin
• 4 tbsp fresh cream or an egg yolk + some milk for glazing

Preparation

Add the warm milk, honey, and water to the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a dough hook attachment on medium speed. Add the yeast and, after a minute, the egg.

Then add the flour, and when it is well mixed, add the sugar, and finally the salt. If the dough is too dry, add some water. The total time including the kneading of the dough takes around 15 minutes.

Let the dough sit in a deep bowl and cover with plastic wrap. If the temperature in your kitchen is around 77 F (25 C) let it rise for 2 hours. If your temperature is around 66 F (19 C) like in my kitchen, add half an hour.

After the dough has doubled, divide it into 6 balls and knead it, bending the folds under each ball.

Butter the muffin tin and place one ball in each hole. Let it rise again for 2 hours, covering with plastic wrap.

Modify the rising time according to the temperatures in your kitchen.

Pre-heat the oven to 350 F (175 C).  Using a pastry brush, coat the balls with fresh cream, or an egg yolk mixed with 2 tablespoons of milk. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes.

When the pannettoni reach room temperature, move to a cooling rack. They will be firm enough to be cut in thin slices the next day. Calculate making 5 cuts, top included. Fill the layers every 2 cuts, in order to make a sandwich. Choose your favourite canapé fillings. Once you have finished, make at least one vertical cut.

This creamed codfish version is another example of the extreme variety and richness of Italian cuisine: stockfish and salted codfish were introduced to Southern Europe centuries ago, and they were adapted to hundreds of recipes across the Mediterranean.

Creamed codfish is a delicate appetiser which exalts two typical ingredients of Northern Italy, codfish (also popular in all of Southern Europe) and polenta. Yellow or white, hot straight from a copper polenta pot, or sliced and grilled, polenta is an excellent and gluten free food that is delicious in every season.

Even if it is referred to as baccalà (salted codfish) in this venetian recipe, the fish used in this dish is stockfish. Venice was the first city in Southern Europe where stockfish was introduced by the nobleman Pietro Querini in 1432. This gentleman was bound for Flanders, but his merchant ship encountered a terrible storm off the western coast of France. The storm ravaged the ship, and the few surviving sailors, after weeks spent fighting the storm and cold temperatures for weeks, finally drifted on the Gulf Stream far across the North Sea. Stranded on an island off of Norway amid the small Lofoten Islands, they were found by local fishermen and spent months with the Røst inhabitants.

This dramatic incident was the origin of trade between northern Norway and Italy, which made the combination of Norwegian stockfish and Italian cooking possible.

This kind of preparation consists of cod fish dried on wooden racks, where cold-adapted bacteria matures the fish. The word stockfish is a loan word from West Frisian stokfisk (stick fish), possibly referring to the wooden racks on which stockfish are traditionally dried or because the dried fish resembles a stick.

Prep Time: 20 minutes | Cooking Time: 30 minutes | Total Time: 50 minutes (3 hours for cooling down) | Yield: Makes 4  servings.

Ingredients

• 300 g stockfish, already soaked
• 4 cups (I L) cold water
• 3 garlic cloves
• ¼ cup (50 ml) delicate olive oil
• 1/3 cup (100 ml) vegetable oil
• 3 black pepper grains
• ¼ cup (80 g) milk
• 3 juniper berries
• 1 bay leaf
• Sea salt

Instructions

A day before, infuse two chopped garlic cloves in the combined oils. Filter it and discard the garlic before using it. If you prefer, you can rub the bowl you are going to use the cream the fish with the peeled garlic.

In a pot, add the milk, water, pepper, bay leaf, juniper berries, and the stockfish.

When it reaches a boiling point, reduce the heat and let it simmer for thirty minutes. Turn off the heat and let it cool down in the cooking liquid, until it is room temperature.

Take the stockfish and crumble it, using your fingers, discarding the bones and the skin. Put it in a food processor and finely mince the stockfish.

Move the fish to a stand mixer fitted with a whisk attachment. While whisking, drizzle with the infused oil and a few tablespoons of the cooking liquid, alternating them, and add salt. The stockfish is ready when it has turned into a velvety and soft cream.

Store in the fridge and serve it cold on warm grilled polenta slices.

“Stoccafisso” is a particular way of preparing cod fish which comes from Germany where it is completely dried on a stick from which the name originates: stock (stick) and fisch (fish).

Pasta e fagioli (pasta and beans) is a very typical Italian soup, simple, easy, yet incredibly versatile, as it is prepared many ways all across Italy.

For thousands of years, beans have nourished people from every social class, but its richness in proteins allowed the survival of the most of population who could not afford meat. Every region and corner of Italy has a version of this kind of soup, the simplest soup. It is prepared with an incredible set of variations: with the trinity of onion, carrot and celery, the fundamental ingredients of the majority of Italian sauces and stews; just simply with sliced onion and tomato in order to highlight the flavour of the beans, or parsley, or rosemary. In every Italian town and family there is always the addition of a personal touch.

Yet, despite its modesty, it is considered a comfort food, nourishing, simple but heart-warming.

This recipe is the one I rely on as a Romagnola, and I used it to civilize my husband: he had never eaten beans and soups before meeting me, and since he was such a carnivore, my trick was to blend all the vegetables and add some pancetta or ham to disguise the vegetables. It was like a kind of weaning.

Nowadays, sometimes my pasta e  fagioli (the Italian for pasta & beans) is vegan: I often refer to a recipe I was given in Le Marche region by a restaurant owner/chef, which used just onion and tomato for his soffritto. Then of course you follow the recipe as usual. I always have a supply of frozen maltagliati (fresh egg pasta) in my freezer, but if I use dried pasta, I even create a vegan and even lighter dish.

If I am using fresh pasta which cooks quickly, I cook it in the soup directly, in which case some attentive stirring is in order or the pasta will stick to the bottom of the pot. If you prefer using dried pasta – you should  cook it separately and then add it to the soup.

The only tricky part of making this dish is remembering to soak the beans, which if you are me, can be quite tricky, but is most satisfying when you remember. Then you need to remember to cook them, at a gentle simmer for at least a couple of hours while you spend  your time reading everybody’s latest posts. You can use tinned beans. but then you will miss the water the chickpeas were cooked in which provides agreat stock for your soup.

Usually, in most cookbooks, the beans and the soffritto are cooked in 2 different pots, whereas, since washing too many dishes is against my religion, I use always the same one.

Prep Time: 10 minutes | Cooking Time: 40 minutes | Total Time: 50 minutes | Yield: Makes 4  servings.

Ingredients

• 250g dried chickpeas soaked overnight OR 700g fresh Romano beans
• ½ onion, finely chopped
• 2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
• 1 small carrot, finely chopped
• ½ celery stick, finely chopped
• 50 g fresh pancetta or pork jowl, diced
• ½ cup (130 g) tomato puree
• 4 tablespoons cup olive oil
• 6 cups (1.5 L) water
• 200g maltagliati pasta (fresh pasta) or ditalini

Instructions

In the pot, sauté the vegetables in olive oil, and after 2 minutes, add the pancetta or pork jowl. Cook for 5-6 minutes on medium-low heat.

When the soffritto is golden, add the tomato puree and simmer for 15 to 17 minutes. Add the beans and 4 cups water (1 L water). Season with salt and let it cook, simmering. It takes about 80 minutes if you decide to cook with a normal pot; if this is the case, I strongly recommend a cast iron pot. In a pressure cooker it takes 20 minutes.

In the cast iron pot, you’ll have probably to add the rest of the water, or even more. Just add it gradually. Preferably hot, or you will lower the cooking temperature and it will take longer.

When beans are cooked, remove a ladleful of beans with some liquid and blend with an immersion blender in a container and add it back to the pot. It will give the soup a creamier texture without adding cheese.

Add pasta and follow the indications for cooking time.

When it is cooked, let it sit for 3 minutes and serve.

In the trattorie of Florence I have heard shelled beans cooked in this way called “fagiouli all’uccelletto”.
(Pellegrino Artusi, Science in the Kitchen and the Art of Eating Well)

This recipe is a typical Florentine way to eat their beloved cannellini beans which have replaced meat for centuries. The name originates from the way small game birds were cooked in Tuscany, seasoned with a generous amount of sage.
The bean’s abundance in vegetable proteins and fibre has nourished Mediterranean populations for centuries. In these times of abundance, they are still quite appreciated.
Beans are an excellent side dish, but you can add sausages to the basic recipe and create an excellent traditional Tuscan main course.
There are many versions of this recipe, some include onion and seasoning. The recipe reported by our Romagna gentleman consists of sage and tomato, I personally love adding garlic.
The first recipe we find in the original cookbook of Italian cuisine is the one which considers beans as a side dish, excellent for accompanying stewed meats. In it, the beans are browned in a substantial amount of oil and sage, and later enriched with tomato sauce. I prefer to use a milder temperature and less oil.

Prep Time: 5 minutes | Cooking Time: 35 minutes | Total Time: 40 minutes | Yield: Makes 4  servings.

Ingredients

• 500 g beans, already cooked in water with a poached garlic clove, a sprig of rosemary and 3 sage leaves. Reserve the cooking liquid.
• 4 sausages
• 2 garlic cloves, peeled
• 1 tin of crushed tomato
• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• Sea salt
• 10 sage leaves
• A sprig of rosemary

Instructions

Put a pan on the stove with the oil, sage leaves and garlic. When the oil starts to sizzle, toss in the sausages and brown them, piercing them with the prongs of a fork in order to make them lose their juices.

When the sausages are golden, toss in the beans and season with salt and pepper. Add the tomato sauce to the beans with 2-3 tablespoons of their cooking liquid. Let them simmer for 15-20 minutes without a lid, take them off the stove and serve.

This risotto recipe is typical of Tuscany and Northern Italy, where asparagus is a symbol of Spring. I use a local asparagus variety that is smaller but tastier than bigger varieties. Risotto is a much appreciated first course on Italian tables, and while this recipe can be used with other vegetables, the main steps are the same.

The origin of this dish is quite ancient. News of the cultivation of rice in Italy date back to the 15^th century. Rice has come a long way, since it was domesticated from the wild Oryza rufipogon  grass  roughly 10,000–14,000 years ago the middle Yangtze and upper Huai rivers, as archaeological evidence points out.

In Italy, rice was an exotic grain introduced by the Arabs in Sicily, and later by the Aragon Dynasty during their domination of the kingdom of Naples. From there, it slowly spread north, to Tuscany and later to Lombardy, under the rule of Lodovico Sforza. Since the great Leonardo da Vinci was working at his court at the time, some Lombards like to think that Leonardo himself suggested transforming the Lombard marshes into rice paddies, but there is no historical evidence of it. What we know for sure, from diplomatic correspondence, is that rice was cultivated in Milan, and in 1375 Lodovico sent some sacks of rice to the Dukedom of Ferrara as a gift, in order to introduce its cultivation in Ferrara too.

The typical Italian rice is derived from the Japonica variety, more adaptable in the temperate regions of Europe.

In some way, this risotto with vegetables is a variation of more prestigious recipes, like the typical Milanese risotto with saffron, of which we have a recipe by Leonardo. As rice was still an exotic and expensive grain, it was eaten at the courts, and enhanced with other precious ingredients such as saffron, cinnamon, or the addition of savoury meat stock. It later developed into fantastic dishes such as Parmigiano risotto or the Champagne risotto.

Prep Time: 10 minutes | Cooking Time: 30 minutes | Total Time: 40 minutes | Yield: Makes 4 servings.

Ingredients

• 1 lb (400 g) asparagus, washed
• 12 oz (300 g) Carnaroli or Arborio rice
• 4 tbsp (60 g) butter
• ½ white or yellow onion, minced
• 2 cups (500 ml) vegetable stock, warm
• 3 tbsp grated Parmigiano
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• Sea salt

Instructions

Steam the asparagus for 10 minutes – they must be crisp.

Cut the tips and set aside. Chop the rest of the asparagus and set aside.

In a saucepan, melt 2 tablespoons of the butter and sauté the asparagus tips for 1 minute. Meanwhile keep the vegetable stock warm.

In another saucepan, melt 1 tablespoon of butter and 2 tablespoons of olive oil and  sauté the onion, stirring often, until golden and very soft, about 8–10 minutes. Add the rice. Stir until the grains become translucent, about 3 minutes. Add the asparagus (not the tips) and ladle in ½ cup of the  broth and simmer, stirring frequently, until completely absorbed, 5–6 minutes.

Cook the rice according to the package instructions, stirring and adding the warm vegetable stock in small ladles as needed.

When rice is cooked al dente, turn off the stove and add the rest of the butter, stir, add the Parmesan, stir, add the asparagus tips and carefully stir.

Cover the saucepan with the lid and let it sit for a couple of minutes. Serve.

The cuisine in Emilia-Romagna is permeated with sexual innuendos, expressed in its iconic stuffed pasta, tortellini. Local legends say that the creation of tortellini was inspired by the goddess Venus herself, who was spotted by an innkeeper while staying at his inn. Stricken by this vision, he rushed to the kitchen, rolled out a sheet of pasta and shaped it like the only part of his beautiful guest’s body he had seen from the lock. Today, the hole in the centre of a tortellino is still called “Venus’ navel”.

I follow my grand-grandmother’s recipe, who was from Modena, and made an all-pork stuffing, whereas in other parts of Emilia they prefer substituting pork loin with beef.

Tortellini are a typical Christmas dish in Emilia, but nowadays you can find them at any time during the winter season.

At Christmas, my family cooks them in a warm capon stock that I prefer preparing one day in advance, in order to refrigerate it in a smaller container overnight to remove the solidified fat from the top of the chilled stock. On normal Sundays, we have tortellini in our traditional meat stock (link).

Making tortellini is quite complicated and time-consuming, and it has always been a team effort. Traditionally, the entire family gathered around the “arzdora” (the mother, the real family boss in Ravenna dialect) to put the filling on the small squares of pasta and shape the tortellini. With their small fingers, women and children were the most capable when it came to sealing the tortellini.

In order to be efficient, the filling and the dough can be prepared one or two days in advance. I love using a piping-bag for the filling, and recently, a chef suggested I refrigerate the dough in a vacuum-bag, since the absence of air in the bag prevents oxidation and the dough from changing colour. Still, it is better to work as a team – at least two skilled people – in order to shape tortellini in time to prevent the sheet of pasta from drying.

Prep Time: 4 hours | Cooking Time: 30 minutes | Total Time: 5 hours | Yield: Makes 10 servings.

Ingredients

For the filling

• 3.5 oz (100 g) pork loin
• 1 tbsp dry white wine
• Sea salt and black pepper to taste
• 2 tbsp (30 g) butter
• 1 garlic clove
• 1 small rosemary sprig
• 2.8 oz (80 g) Parmigiano Reggiano
• 3 oz (90 g) Parma ham
• 3 oz (90 g) Bologna mortadella
• 2 eggs
• 1/8 teaspoon nutmeg, freshly grated

For the pasta

• 6 eggs
• 4 cups (500 g) all-purpose flour

For the capon stock

• 1 medium onion, peeled
• 1 medium carrot, peeled
• 1 celery stalk
• Half capon
• 3 parsley sprigs
• 4-5 black pepper corns
• 1 kg (2.5 lbs) various beef cuts used for Italian braised meat like beef tongue, tail, shin bones with meat, marrow bones and bones with a little meat on them, such as oxtail, short ribs, or knuckle bones (cut in half by a butcher)

Instructions

For the capon stock (one day in advance)

Place a large stockpot on the biggest burner. Fill with 4-5 litres/4.5 to 5.5 quarts of cold water (about two-thirds full) and add all the ingredients. Bring the water to the simmering point.

Gently simmer the stock, covered, for 3-4 hours, or even longer if you have time, topping up with water if necessary. Skim the white foam that bubbles to the surface with a slotted spoon.

Strain stock using a fine-mesh sieve and discard bones and vegetables. Let the broth continue to cool until barely warm, then refrigerate in smaller containers overnight. Remove solidified fat from the top of the chilled stock.

For the filling

Add the butter, rosemary, and garlic to a small pan, and sauté the meat. When the meat is roasted externally, add the wine and season with salt and pepper. Cook for five minutes and let it cool down. When it reaches room temperature, coarsely chop and put in a food processor with all the other ingredients. mince at maximum speed until the filling is perfectly blended and is pink in colour. Fill a piping-bag and keep in the fridge. Take it out and keep at room temperature an hour before using it, or it will be too hard to squeeze it out of the piping bag.

For the pasta

On a wooden pastry board, pour the flour into a mound, make a well in its centre and crack the eggs into it. Blend by hand, making a dough that you are going to smooth with a rolling pin.

Divide the dough into two halves, wrap them in plastic wrap and put in the fridge for a couple of hours.

Roll them out, remembering to sprinkle them with flour. Roll each ball of dough into a sheet about 2 mm (1/24 inch) thick.

Cut each dough into small 2-inch (5 cm) squares, and put little piles of filling in each  centre.

Fold the squares into rectangles enclosing the filling. Gently lift one of the long sides against the stuffing at a time, roll around your baby finger and overlap the two corners. Lay on a paper tray or a normal tray covered with parchment, make regular rows and avoid that they come into contact with one another or they will stick together.

Cook them in the boiling stock and serve them still fuming hot.

This Christmas Log, also known as Swiss Roll, originates from the French Bûche de Noël.

It represents the ancient tradition of burning a large log in the fireplace which started on Christmas eve and was supposed to last for the entire festive period, later replaced by this suggestive dessert. Nowadays, the different fillings for the sponge cake can vary from pistachio to tropical fruits. In the European tradition, we can find similar cakes all over the Western countries, such as in Spain with its Brazo de Gitano literally the Gipsy’s Arm, which probably share a very common concept.

Although it is not an extremely difficult recipe, it is fundamental to respect the temperature and cooking time for the sponge cake. If it dries out too much, it will be impossible to roll, and it will break.

Prep Time: 45 minutes | Cooking Time: 15 minutes | Total Time: 1 hour| Yield: Makes 6 servings.

Ingredients

For the sponge cake

• 5 eggs
• 1 pinch sea salt
• 1 tsp vanilla
• ½ tbsp (10 g) honey
• 1 cup (100 g) cake flour, sifted
• ¾ cup (140 g) white sugar

For the chocolate ganache

• 1½ cups (350 ml) fresh whipping cream
• 12.5 oz (350 g) dark chocolate, chopped

Instructions

Put a bowl in the freezer.

For the sponge cake

Pre-heat the oven at 425° F (220° C)

Separate the eggs, and put the yolks in the bowl of a free-standing mixer and in another bowl, whip the egg whites with a pinch of salt.

Add the honey, the sugar, and the vanilla to the yolks, and beat for 7 to 9 minutes with the whisk attachment.

Gently fold in the whipped egg whites in two batches using a large spoon, with large circular movements from top to bottom.

When it is well-mixed, add the flour in 3-4 batches. Pour the batter in a 12×15 inch (30×37 cm) baking pan, covered by parchment. Level it, creating a ½ inch (1 cm) layer.

Bake for 5-6 minutes until golden and firm.

While it is baking, prepare a film layer on the kitchen top, the surface must be larger than the one of the sponge cake.

When the sponge cake is ready, lay the top of it on the film, take the parchment off immediately, and sprinkle with 2 tablespoons of sugar, in order not to make it stick together. Roll it immediately, using the film to help your work, close and leave it in the film.

For the chocolate ganache

Put the cream on the stove and bring it to almost a boil. Switch off and pour the chocolate in it. Mix it with a whisk until chocolate will be perfectly melted.

Move to the bowl you take off the freezer and whip with an electric hand whisk for 10 minutes.

Spread half of the ganache on the sponge cake, except 1-inch (2 cm) from the border. Roll it again, cut a small piece which shall be connected to the log, in order to make a small branch.

Spread the rest of the ganache on the log and use the prongs of a fork to simulate the surface of a log.

Imperial soup has an Austrian origin, and was introduced to Emilia-Romagna by Marie Louise, Duchess of Parma, the second wife of the Emperor Napoleon I. As usual, this soup which can be traced back to Krinofel, went through a major process of adjustment to adapt to local ingredients. Yet, this recipe is “heretical” in a country where caconic recipes are considered with religious devotion: the traditional preparation includes semolina and butter, as Marcella Hazan shows in her Marcella’s Italian Kitchen, which my mum replaced with ricotta cheese.
This soup is therefore lighter and gluten-free, not a bad option for celiacs, still extremely tasty and comforting. Cooked and served in a sumptuous meat stock, it is a luscious dish, a festive delicacy once offered during the Christmas and Easter festivities, but now quite common at Sunday lunches.

Meat stock or broth (nowadays the distinction is quite blurred) is a very popular dish in Northern Italy. It is not only used for adding juices to roasted meats, stews and meat sauces during prolonged cooking, but it also creates wonderful dishes on its own. Northern Italy offers a wonderful variety of pastas created to be cooked and served in broth. There is a whole world of different stocks, made with vegetables, beef, chicken, or fumetto made with fish.

This is a family recipe, it includes hen and beef, and the Italian tradition provides many ways to reuse meats that have lost their juices in the stock.

In order to make a sumptuous stock, meats and vegetables are added to the stockpot when water is cold and left simmering for hours.

The traditional family recipes are very simple, you just need to use a very big stockpot, put the ingredients in it and cover with water. Then it must be put on the stove and left gently bubbling for a long period of time.

Now chefs have enhanced the recipe by cutting the onion into two halves and roasting it for few minutes in a non-stick pan. It adds a stronger flavour to the stock, as it extracts the essence of the vegetable.

Prep Time: 20 minutes | Cooking Time: 4 hours | Total Time: 4 hours and 20 minutes | Yield: Makes 2 servings.

Ingredients

• 1 medium onion, peeled
• 1 medium carrot, peeled
• 1 celery stalk
• 2 medium potatoes
• 3 cherry tomatoes
• Half hen or 2-pounds chicken wings
• 1 to 1.5 kg (2.5 to 3.5 lbs) various beef cuts used for Italian braised meat like beef tongue, tail, shin bones with meat, marrow bones and bones with a little meat on them, such as oxtail, short ribs, or knuckle bones (cut in half by a butcher)
• Makes 2.5 litres/10.5 cups

Instructions

Place a large stockpot on the biggest burner. Fill with 4-5 litres/4.5 to 5.5 quarts of cold water (about two-thirds full) and add all the ingredients. Bring the water up to the simmering point.

Gently simmer the stock, covered, for 3-4 hours, or even longer if you have time, topping up with water if necessary. Skim the white foam that bubbles to the surface with a slotted spoon.

Strain stock using a fine-mesh sieve and discard bones and vegetables. Let the broth continue to cool until barely warm, then refrigerate in smaller containers overnight. Remove solidified fat from the top of the chilled stock.

Freeze it in ice cube trays and add it to your risotto, stews and roasts.

Dogs love the boiled carrots, and can be given some of the beef bones. The boiled beef is recycled as a stew, in a dish called lesso rifatto or francesina. I add the hen to vegetable soups, to improve the texture.