STUFFED CAPON

Capon is a traditional Christmas bird in Europe. It is used either to make a very tasty but fat stock to accompany minestre, such as tortellini, or as a main course, usually stuffed. This stuffing is very simple. I had some cured meats leftover and I thought of giving them a second life. It is a very simple dish, and although there are other ways to cook it, for an Italian Christmas lunch, where there are also children who do not love exotic tastes and spices, this is the ideal cooking method.

Prep Time: 5 minutes | Cooking Time: 25 minutes | Total Time: 30 minutes | Yield: Makes 4 servings.

Ingredients

1 4lb (1.8 kg) capon, cleaned and trimmed
Fine sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

For the stuffing

12.5 oz (350 g) ground pork and beef
3 oz (90 g) Emmental cheese
3 oz (90 g) rolled pancetta
3 eggs
2 potatoes, boiled and peeled

For cooking

2 garlic cloves
½ cup (125 ml) dry white wine
30 g butter
4 tbsps. olive oil
4 sage leaves
A sprig of rosemary
2 ladles of chicken broth.

Instructions

Remove the giblets from the capon. Rinse out the cavity with cold water and pat it dry. Season it with salt and pepper.

Add all the ingredients to a food processor and mix. If you like the giblets, coarsely chop them and add to the stuffing.

Stuff the capon and sew the cavity. Put the capon in a big saucepan, brown the capon in butter and olive oil, with the aromatic herbs. Roast it for 20 minutes, then turn it on the other side and roast it for another 20 minutes. Add the wine and season with salt and black pepper to taste. Cook for two hours, basting and turning very carefully, to avoid the skin from breaking, adding some broth and cooking on a medium-low temperature.

To serve the capon, present it at the table whole, then carve it. Remove the stuffing in one piece if possible and slice it.

ALMOND COOKIES, THE TUSCAN CANTUCCI

These almond cookies are the quintessence of Tuscan food. They are extremely simple, and the goodness of this recipe relies on the choice of quality ingredients.

I always make them on a wooden board because I love the sensation of working with dough, even if it is easier to use a food processor.

It likely began as a bread-like dough, a natural sourdough that was at the foundation of all European cakes, enriched with eggs and honey or very expensive cane sugar and almonds, which were introduced to Italy by the Arabs, whose presence or contact was constant for centuries.

This is a common recipe in Western culture, with some differences due to regional variations, but these cookies are very popular, known as biscotti in North America, probably imported by Italian immigrants. The recipe is very similar all over Italy: in Sicily they are simply called almond biscotti, pepatelli in a more rustic version in the Southern region of Molise, but here the recipe is even closer to what must have been popular during the Middle Ages thanks to the presence of black pepper, orange zest, honey, and no baking powder.

I particularly love the Tuscan version because it offers a lactose-free dessert for my guests, and they are very low-fat, perfect if you need sugar to burn immediately

Prep Time: 10 minutes | Cooking Time: 40 minutes | Total Time: 50 minutes | Yield: Makes 90 pieces.

Ingredients

500 g (3⅓ cups) all-purpose flour
400 g (2 cups) white sugar
3 large eggs
60 ml (¼ cup) Vin Santo
15 g (1½ tbsp) baking powder
300 g (2 cups) unpeeled whole almonds

Instructions

Preheat the oven to 180° C (350° F)

Knead all the ingredients together and shape into 4 rolls about 30 cm (12 inches) long, and 5 cm (2 inches) wide. Place them on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. Bake them for 30 minutes. When cool, slice the logs diagonally. Spread the slices out and bake for 10 minutes

ONION SOUP, THE NOBLEST OF ALL

This onion soup sinks its roots deeply in Tuscan tradition, even though it only became famous when it was adopted by the French and became known as soup à l’oignon.

According to Tuscan tradition, the recipe includes the red Certaldo onion, whose reputation was so renown that it was quoted in Boccaccio’s Decameron.

Certaldo (link a Visit Tuscany) is not only Boccaccio’s birthplace, but also the location where this onion, which has been famous in Tuscany since the Middle Ages , grows. The father of the literary genre of the novella, which became the model for The Canterbury Tales, already celebrated this amazing vegetable in a novella where the main character was a monk called Friar Onion who narrates the abundance and fame of this vegetable. This red onion was celebrated later by Caterina de’ Medici, who exported the Tuscan onion soup to France with her Italian cooks.

Certaldo, which you might be familiar with, or may have heard of, is a town and comune in Val d’Elsa, in the Metropolitan City of Florence. This area grows an abundance of onions, more so than all of Tuscany, a food that was greatly influenced by those Friars, hungry men with a good appetite.

This onion is so important to this small town that it was even added to the town’s emblem in the 12th century – a red and white shield with an onion in the centre, and the motto “By nature I am both strong and sweet/ and am appreciated by both the rich and the workers”.

Every year this onion is celebrated in many country fairs in Certaldo, especially at the end of August, where I had the opportunity to eat the famous soup, made according to the simple Tuscan recipe.

Going back to the woman who contributed to making this very rustic recipe so famous, Caterina de Medici probably ate this soup with other ingredients that were very popular in the cuisine of Renaissance courts, which would likely be quite hard to accept for contemporary palates. While the “workers” probably ate the soup as it was cooked in the following recipe, the cooks of “the rich” enhanced it by adding almonds, sugar, verjuice (a highly acidic juice made by pressing unripe grapes used since the Middle Ages all over Western Europe), cinnamon and sugar, all remarkably expensive ingredients at the time.

Prep Time: 20 minutes | Cooking Time: 1 hour + 15 minutes | Total Time: 1 hour + 30 minutes | Yield: Makes 4 servings.

Ingredients

4 large onions, red if possible, finely sliced (a mandolin would be perfect)
5 tbsps. olive oil
1 litre (4 cups) water or broth (either beef, chicken, or vegetable)
8 tbsps. fresh pecorino cheese, grated
1 cup dry white wine
4 slices of Tuscan bread, possibly day-old, grilled

Instructions

In an earthenware or a cast iron saucepan, heat the olive oil and add the onions. Stir frequently to prevent burning, sauté until they become golden; this will take approximately 30 minutes. Then add the wine and simmer until it has evaporated by half, about 3-5 minutes. Add the stock and simmer for 40 minutes. If you like it thicker, add 1 tablespoon of flour before adding the broth and dissolve it well.

Arrange the bread slices in each bowl, ladle the soup on the bread, and sprinkle with the pecorino cheese.

TIP: if you want to make it more sophisticated, pre-heat the oven and pour the soup in 4 ovenproof dishes. Place the bread slices on top of the soup, instead of pecorino cheese, sprinkle the bread with gruyere cheese and place under the grill until the cheese melts to a crisp golden brown (about 3 minutes).

ROMAN-STYLE CHICKEN WITH BELL PEPPERS

This chicken with bell pepper recipe is truly a typical summer one. The lively colours of the peppers and tomato create a unique blend that you can really appreciate only if you can find fresh sun ripened vegetables.

It is a typical Roman dish, and there is a whole generation of Roman’s who are in their sixties that can still remember meals eaten on the beach, with their mums bringing this pot wrapped in a dish-cloth.

Nowadays, modern recipes add more ingredients, rosemary, sage and garlic in the chicken, and later bell peppers are added in the same pot.

I preferred following an “old school one”, I do not like the idea of adding rosemary and sage to peppers, I think that my recipe is simpler but better.

If you are interested in watching a short video shot in the 1960s, you’ll find some scenes interesting to watch. Do not even make the effort to try to understand it, the cook speaks with a “Roman dialect”, and do not even think of touching or biting vegetables and fruits in the market, or the police will fine you and the vendor… hygienic rules have changed a lot since then.

I love the idea of cooking the meat and the vegetables apart, and joining them in the last 10 minutes of cooking.

Prep Time: 30 minutes | Cooking Time: 2 hours | Total Time: 2 hours and 30 minutes | Yield: Makes 4 servings.

Ingredients

1 medium-size chicken, chopped into pieces
½ medium onion, finely chopped
3 bell peppers, red or yellow, chopped.
½ glass of white wine
7 tbsps. EVO oil
1 tin finely chopped tomatoes

Instructions

Brown the chicken pieces in a heavy pot with 4 tablespoons of olive oil. Once the meat is golden brown, add the wine and season the meat with salt and black pepper. Allow the wine to evaporate. It is important to add salt and pepper with the wine because it enhances the flavour and you use less salt. Wait until the wine has completely evaporated before adding the chopped tomatoes. Cook over medium low heat for a couple of hours with the lid on, and add some water or stock if needed.

In another pot sauté the onion with the remaining oil, and when it becomes golden add the peppers. Season with salt and black pepper. Cover with the lid and let it cook for half an hour. Remove the lid and let it cook for another 20 minutes, then add them to the pot with the chicken and cook meat and peppers together for 15 minutes.

ORVIETO, ITS CLIFF AND PIGEON BREEDING.

Orvieto is a beautiful Etruscan town built on a sheer cliff that is mainly composed of tuff and pozzolana, a soft material easy to excavate.

The Orvieto cliff was apt to being easily defendable thanks to its structure; meanwhile its inhabitants started to excavate its underground in order to obtain factories, storehouses and plants without distancing themselves from the powerful walls which defended the town.

Over the three thousand years of its history, the inhabitants bored more than one thousand cavities: I visited the widest, where there are the remnants of an oil mill and some millstones. Toward the interior of the cliff, the cavity is articulated in a series of rooms: among them, three Etruscan wells with their characteristic notches were workers who were excavating put their feet (pedarole in Italian). Another cavity, bordering with it, overlooks the cliff sides, and it is characterized by a great quantity of columbaria or dovecotes. These are rooms with a great quantity of recesses where pigeon could nest. This function is validated by the presence of water tanks and openings in the cliff edge to allow the pigeon keeper to give his animals liberty for purposes of exercise while allowing them to re-enter the house without special assistance from the keeper. At the same time, these houses are constructed to keep the pigeons safe from predators and inclement weather and give them nesting places in which to raise their squabs.

Pigeons were especially prized because they would produce fresh meat during the winter months when larger animals were unavailable as a food source. In the past wealthy landowners often had pigeon houses and there are still remnants of them in some European manor houses. Orvieto dovecots were especially useful in case the town were under siege and deprived of supplies of fresh food from the country nearby.

Prep Time: 15 minutes | Cooking Time: 1 hour + 35 minutes | Total Time: 1 hour + 50 minutes | Yield: Makes 4 servings.

Ingredients

2 pigeons about 10-14 oz. (300-400 g.) each.

For the stuffing

2 fresh Italian sausages, peeled OR 9 oz. (250 g.) ground pork generously seasoned with salt and freshly milled black pepper
2 tablespoons fresh Pecorino cheese, grated
1,5 oz. (40 g.) stale bread (Ciabatta-like), deprived of crust
1 egg
¼ cup milk
1 tablespoon fresh parsley, finely minced

For the cooking

3 garlic cloves
½ cup dry white wine
3 sage leaves
4 Juniper berries
2 sprigs of rosemary
3 tablespoons olive oil
2 slices pancetta

Instructions

In a small bowl, pour the milk and soak the bread in it. Squeeze the milk out of it, put it in a bowl with the meat, and mix it with all the other ingredients, using your hands.

Season the pigeons with salt and pepper and the Juniper berries lightly crushed, and then stuff them but not completely, since the stuffing will swell when cooking. Close the pigeon with a toothpick or needle and thread.

Pour the oil in a heavy saucepan and add garlic, rosemary and sage. Place the pigeons in it and pancetta on the pigeons. Pigeons tend to dry, so choose a saucepan that fits them perfectly, not too large.

Roast the pigeons in all their sides and simmer with the wine until reduced.

Make the pigeons simmer for about 1 hour, covered with the lid, and add some tablespoons of water if necessary.

Serve them still warm, cut in two halves. Great with mashed potatoes.

PORCHETTA-STYLE RABBIT, THE GENIUS FROM MARCHE

Porchetta is a typical dish of Central and Northern Italy. It consists of a whole pig, emptied, deboned and seasoned with rosemary or wild fennel, according to its origin.

According to the traditional way of making it, porchetta is seasoned with rosemary in Southern Tuscany, in Roman Castles area and other areas in Central Italy; in Northern Lazio, Umbria, Marche, and Romagna they prefer to season it with wild fennel, which gives it smell and taste absolutely unique.

Like the word parmigiana, in porchetta describes also the cooking and seasoning style for other meats, like the rabbit, in this case.

I bought a farmyard rabbit, for this dish. This was a summer dish since in August and September rabbits who were born in the springtime had reached the right weight. Nowadays, industrial agriculture has altered these natural cycles.

I have never tasted the famous porchetta in Ariccia, near Rome, which is seasoned with rosemary.

In Ravenna market, my family has always been buying porchetta from Marche, made by a gentle lady who prepares this fantastic product, together with ciccioli and lard, two products which are used so widely in our family piadine and focacce. The presence of the wold fennel, added with a gentle touch, gives an unmistakable note.

Prep Time: 10 minutes | Cooking Time: 1 h + 30 minutes | Total Time: 1 hour and 40 minutes | Yield: Makes 4 servings.

Ingredients

3 ½ pounds (1,5 kg.) rabbit, with its liver
1/2 cup roughly chopped wild fennel fronds, or a 12-inches branch of wild fennel, in chunks. If you cannot find it, replace with 1 tablespoon fennel seeds
4 oz. (100 g.) pancetta, roughly chopped
2 oz. (50 g.) lard, roughly chopped
6 garlic cloves
3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
2 glasses white dry wine
Salt and black pepper for seasoning

Instructions

Wash rabbit and liver with the wine. Season the rabbit (inside too) with salt and pepper.

Roughly chop liver, and sauté it in a pan with pancetta, 1 olive oil, 3 garlic cloves and 2/3 fennel, season with salt and pepper. Stuff the rabbit with it and sew it with needle and thread, in order to avoid the rabbit to lose the stuffing while cooking. Transfer the rabbit to a roasting pan with lard, 3 garlic cloves, oil, fennel, and bake for 1 1/2 hours at 350 F (180 C).

MEAT STUFFED GNOCCHI

The stuffing of this gnocchi is very similar to the one of Ascoli olives, a skilled mix of meats cooked in a soffritto, whose taste is made lighter by a touch of lemon zest. The only complicated phase is finding the procedure to fill the gnocchi; I think that using a piping bag makes the operation a lot easier.

It is quite hard not to find intriguing recipes in Italy: its regional cuisine is extremely rich and varied and, Marche region, not very known by mass tourism, offers us wonderful dishes with meat, vegetables, and fish.

In the near future, I am going to propose some Marche recipes: I learned to appreciate various dishes thanks to some sibling who introduced me to many treats. In addition, some trips in which I explored wonderful restaurants made me appreciate this region even more.

The scarce knowledge of the regional treasures contributed to maintaining an Italian atmosphere, not wretched by the mechanisms of great masses of tourists.

I have always been thinking that the real atmosphere of a country is much better seized in small towns, which tend to be more conservative and contribute to keeping the great Italian culinary tradition alive.

Now the region is living a new awakening, also as a reaction to the destructions caused by an earthquake, which stroke it in 2016: concerts like “Marche Rise Again” and new cycles of art exhibits propose a panoramic view of artistic treasures of the region, like, for instance, the cycle dedicated to Lorenzo Lotto.

Prep Time: 50 minutes | Cooking Time: 40 minutes | Total Time: 1 hour + 30 minutes | Yield: Makes 4 servings.

Ingredients for the stuffing

2,5 pounds (1 kg) white, russet or other starchy potatoes, steamed and peeled
2 cups (250 g.) pastry or “00” flour, plus more as needed
10 oz. (300 g.) mixed meats (chicken breast, pork, and veal)
3 egg yolks
1 carrot, finely minced
1 onion, finely minced
1 celery stalk, finely minced
½ glass of white wine
½ glass water
¼ organic lemon grated zest
1 tablespoon grated Parmigiano Reggiano or Grana Padano
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoons butter

Ingredients for the sauce

2 tablespoons olive oil
2 garlic cloves
14 oz. (400 g.) finely chopped tomato sauce
Sea salt

Instructions for making the gnocchi

Heat butter and oil in a saucepan and sauté the vegetables in it. When they are cooked, add the meats roughly chopped. Cook the meats, adding water and wine. Stir the meats and, when the wine has evaporated, cover with a lid and make the meats simmer for half an hour. When it is cooked, take the meats, draining them from the cooking liquid, and put them in a mixer.

Filter the cooking liquid with a sieve, and put it aside. Ground the meats in the mixer, then add the yolks, the Parmigiano, the lemon zest, and the cooking liquid. Mix again. Move the stuffing to a piping bag.:

While the meat is cooking, steam the potatoes for the gnocchi.

For making gnocchi, follow the instructions in this recipe.

Divide the dough into parts bigger than usual, since it must contain the filling. Stuff the gnocchi and close the little balls by rolling them quickly between the palms of your hands.

Lay the gnocchi on a paper tray previously sprinkled with flour.

Instructions for making the sauce

In a non-sticking pan, sauté garlic cloves in oil and discard them when golden. Add the tomato and make it simmer for 10 minutes.

Cook the gnocchi in boiling salted water for few minutes, it can be drained when it floats and poured directly in the pan with the sauce. I suggest using a pastaiola or draining them in batches, using a slotted spoon.

POACHED PEARS IN RED WINE

Poached pears in red wine are a delicious dessert, which joins the pleasure to eat fruit in an unusual way and the possibility to offer a dessert lighter than usual. It is free from animal products and indulges even the pickiest palates or our guests who suffer from food intolerances.

Pears, red wine, sugar and spices join in a magic blending which evokes winter and evenings spent in front of a fireplace. Traditionally they were cooked in the oven, in an Aga. The smell invaded all the house, but even now, even if we cook them in a pot, the scent which pervades all the house is heavenly. It recalls the atmosphere of Christmas Markets and the mulled wine you are served there

If you want to add a more personal touch to this dish, you could serve the pears on a bed of custard or Mascarpone sauce, and pour the wine reduction on it. If you also add some wild berries you could give a kick to a dessert that tends to be very sweet.

In restaurants in Emilia-Romagna, they are frequently served with a zabaione mousse.

Ingredients

4 pears ripe but firm
1+1/8 cup (300 ml.) red wine
4/5 cup (200 ml.) water
1 cup (200 g) white sugar
1 cinnamon stick
3 cloves
ONLY IF YOU LOVE IT:
2 star anises
2 cardamom berries, crushed

Instructions

Combine water, wine, and sugar in a heavy pot. Peel pears without discarding the stalk. Put apart.
Bring the liquid to boil and add the spices, stirring until sugar dissolves. Remove from heat. Add pears to cooking liquid. Return cooking liquid to boil. Reduce heat to low; cover and simmer until pears are tender, basting occasionally with cooking liquid if necessary, about 10-15 minutes. Using a slotted spoon, transfer pears to a bowl.
Strain cooking liquid; discard solids. Return cooking liquid to pot. Boil until reduced to a syrup. Chill until pears are cold. (Can be prepared 1 day ahead. Keep refrigerated.)
Pour syrup over pears. I suggest serving them on a custard or Mascarpone, joining also some berries in order to give a kick to a very sweet dessert.

Anise star and cardamom are not used very frequently: they can be replaced by 6 2×1-inch strips lemon or orange peel (colored part only).

CACCIATORA CHICKEN STEW

Cacciatora stew is one of those simple dishes which comfort you, above all if served with mashed potatoes on a cold winter day.

It is an incredibly rich and simple dish, the result is an amazing sauce in which you can plunge bread and collect it in the famous “scarpetta”. It is a gesture not be made in a restaurant, still the most of us would not resist the temptation. It is almost a moral obligation, none could waste such a treasure.

With some variations, this Tuscan dish is loved and prepared in all Italy. Some cooks add olives, they use dry white wine and no tomato, probably the version I am proposing is revised compared to it. Tomatoes appeared on the tables of Central and Northern Italy quite late, only in the second half of the nineteenth century, I guess that this addition was made more recently.

For the white version, follow the same recipe replacing the red wine with a dry white one and do not add tomato. Some also add pitted olives half an hour before the end of the cooking process.

The same recipe is used for the rabbit too, and the result is always excellent.

It is those of these dishes that represents Italy at its best: Mediterranean herbs, vegetables, wine. The frequent use of wine allows us to use fewer fats and keeping the meat or fish moist. In the meanwhile, it enhances the taste of the seasoning, letting us to use less salt.

Prep Time: 10 minutes | Cooking Time: 2 hours + 20 minutes | Total Time: 2 hours + 30 minutes | Yield: Makes 4 servings.

Ingredients

1 medium-size chicken, chopped in small pieces
1 medium onion, finely chopped
1 celery rib, finely chopped
1 medium carrot, finely chopped
2 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
2 sprigs fresh rosemary
3 sage leaves
2 bay leaves
2 oz. fresh pancetta, chopped in cubes
3 tablespoons EVO oil
½ cup red wine

Instructions

To cook, brown the chicken pieces in a heavy pot with the oil. Once the meat is brown, add the vegetables, pancetta, and herbs. Make the chicken simmer, cover with a lid.

Cook until the vegetables are golden, then add the wine and season the meat. It is important to add salt and pepper with the wine because it enhances the tastes and you use less salt.

Wait until the wine has completely evaporated in order to add the tomato puree. Cook for a couple of hours, adding some water or stock if needed.