comunità immaginate
April 14, 2023 11:18 PM Subscribe
Everything I, an Italian, thought I knew about Italian food is wrong (ungated) - The man I’m dining with is Alberto Grandi, Marxist academic, reluctant podcast celebrity and judge at this year’s Tiramisu World Cup in Treviso. (“I wouldn’t miss it, even if I had dinner plans with the Pope”.) Grandi has dedicated his career to debunking the myths around Italian food; this is the first time he’s spoken to the foreign press.
In my early twenties I worked one summer in the kitchen of a youth culture center with a weird Italian chef (as one example of his strangeness, he kept trying to bake pizza on tortillas, so he could wrap them up and eat like a burrito which in at least twenty attempt never came close to not falling apart every time he tried to wrap it into a burrito shape).
Despite his oddness, he was extremely skilled, and a fount of knowledge, to the point he was completely beyond what I could really understand. But one thing was exactly this, that most classic Italian food was recently invented, and that most of the touchstones of Italian cuisine were pedantic to the point of nonsense. To give one example, he said that “al dente” wasn’t a standard, but was interpreted differently in each village, and only with the dislocation of urbanization and the arrival of cooking shows on television did it come to have a set national meaning. And besides, real chefs knew that different dishes required that you boil your pasta for different lengths of time.
Anyway, I ate some absolutely delicious Italian food this summer, and learned a few culinary tricks, most of whom I’ve forgotten. Funnily enough, the delicious Italian food was mostly eaten by me and a few other staff members at the culture center, because the teens who were there for summer programs mostly just ate his absolutely horrific attempts at making hybrid fast food, like the aforementioned pizza burritos, but they loved the experience of eating those eldritch creations.
posted by Kattullus at 12:24 AM on April 15, 2023 [21 favorites]
Despite his oddness, he was extremely skilled, and a fount of knowledge, to the point he was completely beyond what I could really understand. But one thing was exactly this, that most classic Italian food was recently invented, and that most of the touchstones of Italian cuisine were pedantic to the point of nonsense. To give one example, he said that “al dente” wasn’t a standard, but was interpreted differently in each village, and only with the dislocation of urbanization and the arrival of cooking shows on television did it come to have a set national meaning. And besides, real chefs knew that different dishes required that you boil your pasta for different lengths of time.
Anyway, I ate some absolutely delicious Italian food this summer, and learned a few culinary tricks, most of whom I’ve forgotten. Funnily enough, the delicious Italian food was mostly eaten by me and a few other staff members at the culture center, because the teens who were there for summer programs mostly just ate his absolutely horrific attempts at making hybrid fast food, like the aforementioned pizza burritos, but they loved the experience of eating those eldritch creations.
posted by Kattullus at 12:24 AM on April 15, 2023 [21 favorites]
Grandi’s podcast DOI (only Spotify or Apple, currently) is generally delightful in its evidence-based iconoclasty. He recently compared the impact of a young northern Italian foodfluencer (Cookergirl) to that of Pellegrino Artusi, the first “inventor” of a cuisine that identified with the whole of (what was then still a very young) Italy, while attempting to graduate the art of cooking to something of a science. She’s absolutely level-headed and open to all the new potential that current ingredient possibilities can add to the Italian canon (as an example, a dash of soy gives a bog-standard pasta al pomodoro a definite umami leg-up, straight-up bettering the “original”).
posted by progosk at 2:17 AM on April 15, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by progosk at 2:17 AM on April 15, 2023 [4 favorites]
Unmentioned in the article but it gives me psychic damage every time i recall it: I'm older than the ciabatta bread (1982).
posted by cendawanita at 2:58 AM on April 15, 2023 [20 favorites]
posted by cendawanita at 2:58 AM on April 15, 2023 [20 favorites]
To give one example, he said that “al dente” wasn’t a standard, but was interpreted differently in each village, and only with the dislocation of urbanization and the arrival of cooking shows on television did it come to have a set national meaning. And besides, real chefs knew that different dishes required that you boil your pasta for different lengths of time.
The idea of non-mushy pasta is fairly old, early 19th century Cavalcanti did not like his maccheroni too "gommosi", and Artusi also preferred his spaghetti "durettini". How it ends up standardised throughout the country is definitely to do with centralised cultural communication (my suspicion is that there will have been precursors to this on the radio, or in advertising - Barilla had "al dente" in their corporate claim for years in the '80s - well before the phenomenon of TV-cooking).
How "bity" you like your pasta is of course an entirely subjective issue, and what cooking-time it requires will vary accordingly, but also depending on pasta make and shape (hardier flours make hardier maccheroni). In Italy the narrative on "al dente" generally tends to stereotype this to northerners choosing more-cooked (= less "bity") over a supposed southern bias towards less-cooked (= more "bity"), a typical example of geopolitical discourse favouring what's unlikely an actual cultural preference, and, if anything, likely a subtle mirroring of another overarching stereotypification of the relative poverty of the South "nobly" facing up to starker realities (fewer fuel-resources to dedicate to cooking), while the North laxly basks in its relative privileges (and worse, would imitate the French blasphemy of nouilles served as a meek, unflavoured "side" to any main dish).
This issue got a recent bit of renewed attention when the structural lock-in of domestic gas throughout Italy saw families exposed to wild wartime gas-blll inflation, and folks dusted of the scientific fact of pasta actually only requiring lower-than-boiling temperature to cook to any desired al denteness. Since even the hardiest pasta will not require more than a dozen-ish minutes of cooking, the argument went, surely it was enough to bring your pot of water to a boil, slide in the pasta, put on the lid and turn off the gas (giving just an occasional stir). That saves ten minutes of wasted gas - and how could the outcome be any different? (My personal experience with this: not a wildly mistaken ploy, though milage may vary.)
posted by progosk at 2:59 AM on April 15, 2023 [13 favorites]
The idea of non-mushy pasta is fairly old, early 19th century Cavalcanti did not like his maccheroni too "gommosi", and Artusi also preferred his spaghetti "durettini". How it ends up standardised throughout the country is definitely to do with centralised cultural communication (my suspicion is that there will have been precursors to this on the radio, or in advertising - Barilla had "al dente" in their corporate claim for years in the '80s - well before the phenomenon of TV-cooking).
How "bity" you like your pasta is of course an entirely subjective issue, and what cooking-time it requires will vary accordingly, but also depending on pasta make and shape (hardier flours make hardier maccheroni). In Italy the narrative on "al dente" generally tends to stereotype this to northerners choosing more-cooked (= less "bity") over a supposed southern bias towards less-cooked (= more "bity"), a typical example of geopolitical discourse favouring what's unlikely an actual cultural preference, and, if anything, likely a subtle mirroring of another overarching stereotypification of the relative poverty of the South "nobly" facing up to starker realities (fewer fuel-resources to dedicate to cooking), while the North laxly basks in its relative privileges (and worse, would imitate the French blasphemy of nouilles served as a meek, unflavoured "side" to any main dish).
This issue got a recent bit of renewed attention when the structural lock-in of domestic gas throughout Italy saw families exposed to wild wartime gas-blll inflation, and folks dusted of the scientific fact of pasta actually only requiring lower-than-boiling temperature to cook to any desired al denteness. Since even the hardiest pasta will not require more than a dozen-ish minutes of cooking, the argument went, surely it was enough to bring your pot of water to a boil, slide in the pasta, put on the lid and turn off the gas (giving just an occasional stir). That saves ten minutes of wasted gas - and how could the outcome be any different? (My personal experience with this: not a wildly mistaken ploy, though milage may vary.)
posted by progosk at 2:59 AM on April 15, 2023 [13 favorites]
Love this article, very eye opening. I knew a few of the what's thought of as classic Italian dishes weren't originally from Italy, and a few were more recent than one would expect, but I never realized quite how much of Italian cuisine is impacted by relatively recent times.
Now do garlic. The garlicization of anything/everything italian drives me bonkers.
posted by newpotato at 3:34 AM on April 15, 2023 [4 favorites]
Now do garlic. The garlicization of anything/everything italian drives me bonkers.
posted by newpotato at 3:34 AM on April 15, 2023 [4 favorites]
That podcast of his sounds so fascinating progosk! Hopefully much of it finds its way into the foodie discourse spaces of other languages too.
posted by cendawanita at 3:40 AM on April 15, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by cendawanita at 3:40 AM on April 15, 2023 [1 favorite]
The garlicization of anything/everything italian drives me bonkers
Yeah, that's another weird stereotipification that doesn't really match how the cuisine plays out in Italy itself. Yes, there are certain recipes that are garlic forward, but the vast majority absolutely isn't.
Italians would say French or Spanish cuisines is garlic-heavy, not their own. Garlic-bread is certainly not standard everyday Italian fare, as restaurants abroad seem to have peddled, and though it's a well-loved/obligatory ingredient in some popular preparations, more often than not its presence is actually more subtle than direct, with garlic often just browned during the initial cooking phase, but then eliminated altogether, and only rarely left present as a defining seasoning/flavouring.
It is a staple ingredient in many savoury preserves, and in some regions you can trace the use of it as more of a remnant of certain medicinal ideas i.e. in Tuscany it's an a priori ingredient with any mushrooms being cooked because it was once considered an antidote to potential mushroom poisoning. More contemporarily, in general it's now recognised as a homegrown circulatory coadiuvant.
So, you're right, though it's obligatory in pesto and salsa verde and on your pizza alla marinara, there's no carote alla spiritosa without it, and a spaghetto alle vongole wouldn't really work senza either, Italy's not Garlicland as it's sometimes been depicted, a pungent sememe ripe for a reasoned reckoning...
posted by progosk at 4:37 AM on April 15, 2023 [12 favorites]
Yeah, that's another weird stereotipification that doesn't really match how the cuisine plays out in Italy itself. Yes, there are certain recipes that are garlic forward, but the vast majority absolutely isn't.
Italians would say French or Spanish cuisines is garlic-heavy, not their own. Garlic-bread is certainly not standard everyday Italian fare, as restaurants abroad seem to have peddled, and though it's a well-loved/obligatory ingredient in some popular preparations, more often than not its presence is actually more subtle than direct, with garlic often just browned during the initial cooking phase, but then eliminated altogether, and only rarely left present as a defining seasoning/flavouring.
It is a staple ingredient in many savoury preserves, and in some regions you can trace the use of it as more of a remnant of certain medicinal ideas i.e. in Tuscany it's an a priori ingredient with any mushrooms being cooked because it was once considered an antidote to potential mushroom poisoning. More contemporarily, in general it's now recognised as a homegrown circulatory coadiuvant.
So, you're right, though it's obligatory in pesto and salsa verde and on your pizza alla marinara, there's no carote alla spiritosa without it, and a spaghetto alle vongole wouldn't really work senza either, Italy's not Garlicland as it's sometimes been depicted, a pungent sememe ripe for a reasoned reckoning...
posted by progosk at 4:37 AM on April 15, 2023 [12 favorites]
I come from a southern Italian (Calabrese) immigrant family, where my nona and nono had lived through the war. It's true my Nona was quite pragmatic, flexible and often cheap in her cooking - she loved e.g. Aldi cake mixes. They did grow a lot of things in their legendary garden and use fresh ingredients when they had them.
Now that I think about it, I'm sure my nona quite happily let me put tinned pineapple on my pizza when we made them in the homemade oven in the back yard. I confess I used to like pineapple on pizza as a kid.
posted by other barry at 5:23 AM on April 15, 2023 [3 favorites]
Now that I think about it, I'm sure my nona quite happily let me put tinned pineapple on my pizza when we made them in the homemade oven in the back yard. I confess I used to like pineapple on pizza as a kid.
posted by other barry at 5:23 AM on April 15, 2023 [3 favorites]
This was a wonderful article, well written and with humility and humanity. Thank you for posting, cendawanita.
History is written by the victors, isn't it? I used to interpret that as meaning "conquerers erase dangerous facts from history."
Maybe there is another interpretation, though - "survivor's culture becomes history."
As though, cultural history, like genetics, had bottlenecks where only a small number of stories made it through, and temporary traditions became lodged in the stories alongside the older ones.
posted by rebent at 5:46 AM on April 15, 2023 [4 favorites]
History is written by the victors, isn't it? I used to interpret that as meaning "conquerers erase dangerous facts from history."
Maybe there is another interpretation, though - "survivor's culture becomes history."
As though, cultural history, like genetics, had bottlenecks where only a small number of stories made it through, and temporary traditions became lodged in the stories alongside the older ones.
posted by rebent at 5:46 AM on April 15, 2023 [4 favorites]
Barilla had "al dente" in their corporate claim for years in the '80s - well before the phenomenon of TV-cooking).
" Possibly the first depiction of cooking by a cook on television occurred on 18 November 1936 on BBC."
"The first cookery show to be broadcast on television was the black-and-white Cookery (BBC), presented by British chef Philip Harben in his iconic striped apron, which debuted at 8.55 p.m. on 12 June 1946."
"James Beard's I Love to Eat, which ran for eight and a half months from August 1946 to May 1947, was the first standalone cooking show to be aired on television "
Cooking legend Julia Child introduced French cuisine to American cooks in 1963 with WGBH's pioneering television series, The French Chef.
Italian you say?
"On December 3, 1957, the first episode of Viaggio nella Valle del Po aired. In his search of genuine food, Mario Soldati put together a fabulous and, still to this day, mythological reportage in 12 episodes that the journalist, writer and director lead by going to visit the owners of trattorias, restaurants, asking for recipes and showing the backstage of professional and non-professional kitchens. "
Hmm, looks like cooking shows happened quite a bit earlier than the '80's.
posted by evilDoug at 6:12 AM on April 15, 2023 [1 favorite]
" Possibly the first depiction of cooking by a cook on television occurred on 18 November 1936 on BBC."
"The first cookery show to be broadcast on television was the black-and-white Cookery (BBC), presented by British chef Philip Harben in his iconic striped apron, which debuted at 8.55 p.m. on 12 June 1946."
"James Beard's I Love to Eat, which ran for eight and a half months from August 1946 to May 1947, was the first standalone cooking show to be aired on television "
Cooking legend Julia Child introduced French cuisine to American cooks in 1963 with WGBH's pioneering television series, The French Chef.
Italian you say?
"On December 3, 1957, the first episode of Viaggio nella Valle del Po aired. In his search of genuine food, Mario Soldati put together a fabulous and, still to this day, mythological reportage in 12 episodes that the journalist, writer and director lead by going to visit the owners of trattorias, restaurants, asking for recipes and showing the backstage of professional and non-professional kitchens. "
Hmm, looks like cooking shows happened quite a bit earlier than the '80's.
posted by evilDoug at 6:12 AM on April 15, 2023 [1 favorite]
Now I want a dive into where on the "authenticity matrix" various popular cookbook authors land. Maybe with axes like Ingredients, Preparation, etc.
Examples:
Marcella Hazan, of the famous three-ingredient tomato sauce. I like the sauce, especially for 1) the ease of preparation and 2) its usefulness as a base for additions (which, I know, runs counter to reason 1).
The Splendid Table, by Lynne Rossetto Kasper. Many of the best recipes in this work are elaborate, special-occasion affairs, but many are also humble. Some that I've served friends and family are not immediately identifiable as "Italian": no basil, no garlic, butter instead of olive oil, etc. She provides the provenance of the recipes, often tracing them back centuries. I want this one to be in the "highly authentic" quadrant of my matrix, partly because I love the book and my copy is signed, "For Awesome Caxton, the great cook - Lynne".
Anything by Lidia Giuliana Matticchio Bastianich, queen of Italian cooking on PBS.
The Silver Spoon, staple of Barnes & Noble.
Here's a couple of surveys of Italian cookbooks:
+ The Best Italian Cookbooks are the Classics, Saveur
+ Love Italian Food? 5 Essential Cookbooks for Your Collection, Serious Eats
posted by Caxton1476 at 6:47 AM on April 15, 2023 [3 favorites]
Examples:
Marcella Hazan, of the famous three-ingredient tomato sauce. I like the sauce, especially for 1) the ease of preparation and 2) its usefulness as a base for additions (which, I know, runs counter to reason 1).
The Splendid Table, by Lynne Rossetto Kasper. Many of the best recipes in this work are elaborate, special-occasion affairs, but many are also humble. Some that I've served friends and family are not immediately identifiable as "Italian": no basil, no garlic, butter instead of olive oil, etc. She provides the provenance of the recipes, often tracing them back centuries. I want this one to be in the "highly authentic" quadrant of my matrix, partly because I love the book and my copy is signed, "For Awesome Caxton, the great cook - Lynne".
Anything by Lidia Giuliana Matticchio Bastianich, queen of Italian cooking on PBS.
The Silver Spoon, staple of Barnes & Noble.
Here's a couple of surveys of Italian cookbooks:
+ The Best Italian Cookbooks are the Classics, Saveur
+ Love Italian Food? 5 Essential Cookbooks for Your Collection, Serious Eats
posted by Caxton1476 at 6:47 AM on April 15, 2023 [3 favorites]
I love this term from the article, "gastronationalism."
Authenticity is always in high demand and short supply. The complete fabrication of country music by A&R reps in NYC comes to mind as well.
Deep fakes have a longer history than we may assume.
posted by schmudde at 6:59 AM on April 15, 2023 [8 favorites]
Authenticity is always in high demand and short supply. The complete fabrication of country music by A&R reps in NYC comes to mind as well.
Deep fakes have a longer history than we may assume.
posted by schmudde at 6:59 AM on April 15, 2023 [8 favorites]
Now, about that ciabatta origin story...
The idea that a high-hydration, open-crumb, free-form loaf was invented in 1982 is at the very least incomplete. I know: what we call "ciabatta" was the outcome of an effort to create an Italian alternative to French breads. The formula and process may have been codified and branded at that point, yes. But I am certain its typical ingredients, their proportions, handling and shaping technique, etc. had already been in wide use prior to 1982.
What I wonder, and I hope to do some research later, is whether its distinctive crumb structure - large, irregular, iridescent, custardy holes - became easier to achieve with modern wheat, especially higher-gluten varieties as developed in North America.
Also, and this is pure speculation, that kind of bread seems an "urban", almost gentrified product. Maybe I'm over-applying a notion, but bread that is mostly air and almost entirely simple starch doesn't feel like the preferred loaf of, say, a farm family.
For comparison, here's a baker's experiment with "Modena Mountain Bread" from The Splendid Table. He converted it to a naturally-leavened bread, but the basic formula is the same.
posted by Caxton1476 at 7:05 AM on April 15, 2023 [2 favorites]
The idea that a high-hydration, open-crumb, free-form loaf was invented in 1982 is at the very least incomplete. I know: what we call "ciabatta" was the outcome of an effort to create an Italian alternative to French breads. The formula and process may have been codified and branded at that point, yes. But I am certain its typical ingredients, their proportions, handling and shaping technique, etc. had already been in wide use prior to 1982.
What I wonder, and I hope to do some research later, is whether its distinctive crumb structure - large, irregular, iridescent, custardy holes - became easier to achieve with modern wheat, especially higher-gluten varieties as developed in North America.
Also, and this is pure speculation, that kind of bread seems an "urban", almost gentrified product. Maybe I'm over-applying a notion, but bread that is mostly air and almost entirely simple starch doesn't feel like the preferred loaf of, say, a farm family.
For comparison, here's a baker's experiment with "Modena Mountain Bread" from The Splendid Table. He converted it to a naturally-leavened bread, but the basic formula is the same.
posted by Caxton1476 at 7:05 AM on April 15, 2023 [2 favorites]
The article also puts me in mind of the creation of pad Thai.
posted by zamboni at 8:29 AM on April 15, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by zamboni at 8:29 AM on April 15, 2023 [6 favorites]
Yeah, I was thinking about the pad Thai thing and that one nationalist saying he wanted an agency that policed Italian restaurants outside Italy in case they made something wrong. If they want a "national" cuisine for export they can make one. It's been done!
posted by fiercekitten at 8:52 AM on April 15, 2023
posted by fiercekitten at 8:52 AM on April 15, 2023
looks like cooking shows happened quite a bit earlier than the '80's
yes of course people had cooked on Italian TV before, but "al dente" being drilled like a mantra into the national conscience was achieved before cooking shows became the hegemonic force in cultural propagandatainment they are now. A lot of the Italian national project was achieved via TV, no doubt, but I was just focusing on the bityness thing the anecdote attributed specifically to cooking shows, while I'd wager there were other vectors involved.
posted by progosk at 9:05 AM on April 15, 2023 [2 favorites]
yes of course people had cooked on Italian TV before, but "al dente" being drilled like a mantra into the national conscience was achieved before cooking shows became the hegemonic force in cultural propagandatainment they are now. A lot of the Italian national project was achieved via TV, no doubt, but I was just focusing on the bityness thing the anecdote attributed specifically to cooking shows, while I'd wager there were other vectors involved.
posted by progosk at 9:05 AM on April 15, 2023 [2 favorites]
I always assume that whatever I think of most types of cuisines is just a caricature of what really represents said cuisines. Chinese food is the glaring example - your typical US Chinese food menu is very highly Americanized. Many restaurants will have a “secret” menu with authentic Chinese dishes, if you know what you’re looking for. I haven’t dug too far into it but I know that Italian cuisine is far, far beyond what we see in the typical Italian restaurant. The types of food that are made by everyday people for your typical weeknight lunch or dinner is far more representative of a national, and regional cuisine, as there are almost always regional favorites inside a country. We have fantastic Sonoran style Mexican food here, as this used to be a part of Sonora, and omg did I eat like a king when I was a kid with what the families of my friends cooked. There’s a lot of sub-cultures of Mexican food as well. Whatever you think is authentic may, or may not be. Just enjoy a good meal when the opportunity presents itself.
posted by azpenguin at 9:13 AM on April 15, 2023 [5 favorites]
posted by azpenguin at 9:13 AM on April 15, 2023 [5 favorites]
Wait a second. Does this mean all or our racist Italian stereotypes are wrong? That is a spicy meatball, indeed.
posted by slogger at 9:20 AM on April 15, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by slogger at 9:20 AM on April 15, 2023 [2 favorites]
Marcella Hazan, of the famous three-ingredient tomato sauce. I like the sauce, especially for 1) the ease of preparation and 2) its usefulness as a base for additions (which, I know, runs counter to reason 1).
I absolutely use it that way, especially in early summer when my basil plants are out of control and I am tiring of pesto.
posted by TedW at 9:29 AM on April 15, 2023 [1 favorite]
I absolutely use it that way, especially in early summer when my basil plants are out of control and I am tiring of pesto.
posted by TedW at 9:29 AM on April 15, 2023 [1 favorite]
I'm in Rome with my students right now! And they joke about how much I talk about food.
The thing is, Italian food is delicious and I don't give a damn about who invented it or when. We were just talking about how even a touristy snack bar we escaped into because of a sudden downpour had pizza made from scratch on the premises. Perhaps because it's cheaper than buying the frozen version.
There are of course tons of really bad food options in Rome, and other places in Italy.
posted by mumimor at 10:16 AM on April 15, 2023 [4 favorites]
The thing is, Italian food is delicious and I don't give a damn about who invented it or when. We were just talking about how even a touristy snack bar we escaped into because of a sudden downpour had pizza made from scratch on the premises. Perhaps because it's cheaper than buying the frozen version.
There are of course tons of really bad food options in Rome, and other places in Italy.
posted by mumimor at 10:16 AM on April 15, 2023 [4 favorites]
I have had the pleasure of spending some time in Italy, across various parts of that fine nation. the food is so incredibly varied and most of it very different from the stereotypes of Italian food I grew up with in NJ. It was a particular delight be be served home cooked meals, as some types of food aren't really served at restaurants or sold premade. like tigella modenese.
posted by supermedusa at 12:19 PM on April 15, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by supermedusa at 12:19 PM on April 15, 2023 [4 favorites]
If Paremgiano Reggiano is a recent innovation it is light years better than Wisconsin Parmesan (I’m looking at you Bel Gioso) in that it has a flavor
posted by Conrad-Casserole at 1:30 PM on April 15, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by Conrad-Casserole at 1:30 PM on April 15, 2023 [2 favorites]
It makes me so glad to see ignorant snobbery being coupled so gracefully to bigoted fascists. That being said, avoiding tomatoes in northern latitudes and smooth penne is an objectively smart move.
Many "traditional" French dishes are also of surprisingly recent origin. Tartiflette as we know it was only developed in the 1980s as a way to sell more Roblochon cheese. Chevre chaud salad is also a relative newcomer to menus.
posted by St. Oops at 1:52 PM on April 15, 2023 [4 favorites]
Many "traditional" French dishes are also of surprisingly recent origin. Tartiflette as we know it was only developed in the 1980s as a way to sell more Roblochon cheese. Chevre chaud salad is also a relative newcomer to menus.
posted by St. Oops at 1:52 PM on April 15, 2023 [4 favorites]
now back from dinner with the students, and since my earlier comment was a bit flippant, I'd like to expand.
The place we had dinner is very much based on the idea that they make traditional, Roman food at a high level. Their business model is authenticity, and I'm sure they would be angry with this article if they read it. I've eaten there regularly since the mid-1980s, and I can feel they are under some pressure compared to just a decade ago. Roman food culture is changing towards more diversity, a more international outlook and more experimental menus. It isn't necessarily very radical; for lunch, us teachers went to a younger type of restaurant and the twists to the "traditional" fare were tiny, but significant, it was mostly about attitude and atmosphere.
However, my students loved it, and it was an excellent dinner. It's interesting, while in my own generation, most 20-year-olds had limited travel experience, many of these kids have been all over the world. But their food experience is narrow in a very 21th century manner: they are obviously very well-versed in fast food. And most know Thai food, all variants of kebab, sushi and "Italian" food like spag bol, pizza and lasagna. But a lot have never eaten food made from scratch, either at home or in restaurants. And an other large group are dedicated foodies who have researched every option months before we went to Italy. Both groups loved the Italian food at this very old school restaurant. Not because it was authentic, but because it was good.
It is relevant to my course to talk about authenticity, history, materials, presentations and perception, so food is absolutely not a side issue. And the point is to observe and accept the fluidity of culture.
In each region of the world, there is a food culture. It is not a static form, cut in stone, but literally a moveable feast. That doesn't mean there aren't elements that are somewhat stable: local produce, work culture, narratives. But even the stable parts are not fixed. 500 years ago, there were no tomatoes or potatoes in Europe. But spices were used in far more applications.
I think there is great value to learning a handful of basic recipes, based on local produce. They are good if that is all you learn, and if you want to go further, you can.
posted by mumimor at 3:26 PM on April 15, 2023 [10 favorites]
The place we had dinner is very much based on the idea that they make traditional, Roman food at a high level. Their business model is authenticity, and I'm sure they would be angry with this article if they read it. I've eaten there regularly since the mid-1980s, and I can feel they are under some pressure compared to just a decade ago. Roman food culture is changing towards more diversity, a more international outlook and more experimental menus. It isn't necessarily very radical; for lunch, us teachers went to a younger type of restaurant and the twists to the "traditional" fare were tiny, but significant, it was mostly about attitude and atmosphere.
However, my students loved it, and it was an excellent dinner. It's interesting, while in my own generation, most 20-year-olds had limited travel experience, many of these kids have been all over the world. But their food experience is narrow in a very 21th century manner: they are obviously very well-versed in fast food. And most know Thai food, all variants of kebab, sushi and "Italian" food like spag bol, pizza and lasagna. But a lot have never eaten food made from scratch, either at home or in restaurants. And an other large group are dedicated foodies who have researched every option months before we went to Italy. Both groups loved the Italian food at this very old school restaurant. Not because it was authentic, but because it was good.
It is relevant to my course to talk about authenticity, history, materials, presentations and perception, so food is absolutely not a side issue. And the point is to observe and accept the fluidity of culture.
In each region of the world, there is a food culture. It is not a static form, cut in stone, but literally a moveable feast. That doesn't mean there aren't elements that are somewhat stable: local produce, work culture, narratives. But even the stable parts are not fixed. 500 years ago, there were no tomatoes or potatoes in Europe. But spices were used in far more applications.
I think there is great value to learning a handful of basic recipes, based on local produce. They are good if that is all you learn, and if you want to go further, you can.
posted by mumimor at 3:26 PM on April 15, 2023 [10 favorites]
Chinese food is the glaring example - your typical US Chinese food menu is very highly Americanized.
Or, rather, just as Italian-Americans did, Chinese immigrant populations adapted their recipes to the available ingredients and preferences of their new homes. I admit that cheap takeout moo goo gai pan is nowhere on my list of preferred meals, but it's not morally inferior to 番茄炒蛋/西紅柿炒雞蛋, and I suspect at least some people like it more.
posted by praemunire at 6:01 PM on April 15, 2023 [8 favorites]
Or, rather, just as Italian-Americans did, Chinese immigrant populations adapted their recipes to the available ingredients and preferences of their new homes. I admit that cheap takeout moo goo gai pan is nowhere on my list of preferred meals, but it's not morally inferior to 番茄炒蛋/西紅柿炒雞蛋, and I suspect at least some people like it more.
posted by praemunire at 6:01 PM on April 15, 2023 [8 favorites]
Tartiflette as we know it was only developed in the 1980s as a way to sell more Roblochon cheese.
St. Oops, I literally just came back from dinner with my parents and my brother's family, where my mom had prepared a tartiflette (first time for all of us). She used Camembert instead of Roblochon though. The kids weren't big fans, mainly due to the (comparatively) 'stinky' nature of the Camembert.
Us adults spent a good portion of the after dinner discussion looking up and talking about potential substitutes for Camembert, from both the recipe and from online discussion. Which included Roblocon which none of us had heard of. And then I get home and see your comment in one of the first things I read upon coming home. Strange, perhaps a slightly stinky, coincidence I guess... if not a product of BIG ROBLOCHON.
posted by mephisjo at 7:08 PM on April 15, 2023 [3 favorites]
St. Oops, I literally just came back from dinner with my parents and my brother's family, where my mom had prepared a tartiflette (first time for all of us). She used Camembert instead of Roblochon though. The kids weren't big fans, mainly due to the (comparatively) 'stinky' nature of the Camembert.
Us adults spent a good portion of the after dinner discussion looking up and talking about potential substitutes for Camembert, from both the recipe and from online discussion. Which included Roblocon which none of us had heard of. And then I get home and see your comment in one of the first things I read upon coming home. Strange, perhaps a slightly stinky, coincidence I guess... if not a product of BIG ROBLOCHON.
posted by mephisjo at 7:08 PM on April 15, 2023 [3 favorites]
I'm not sure you can get reblochon in the USA because it's conventionally made with unpasteurised milk. Maybe there are pasteurized versions that make it through customs. I can usually get it in Canada during autumn.
posted by Evstar at 7:28 PM on April 15, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by Evstar at 7:28 PM on April 15, 2023 [1 favorite]
Quebec in springtime here but it was this recipe from America's Test Kitchen (other than in the unseen 'more inside'), so that's probably why Roblochon wasn't instructed.
Another large part of our discussion was unpasteurised milks here and elsewhere!
posted by mephisjo at 9:42 PM on April 15, 2023
Another large part of our discussion was unpasteurised milks here and elsewhere!
posted by mephisjo at 9:42 PM on April 15, 2023
Since my status as an agent of Big Reblochon has been disclosed, allow me to endorse the tartiflette spin-off "croziflette" using the dried buckwheat pasta of the Savoie. Maybe the greatest grown-up mac and cheese you've ever tried.
posted by St. Oops at 3:00 AM on April 16, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by St. Oops at 3:00 AM on April 16, 2023 [1 favorite]
I realized I didn't particularly emphasize or even bring up the following point in the conversation about authenticity and how it looks like from where I am: accepting the fact that the spread of "Italian food" worldwide is a function of American cultural hegemony (or outright hegemonizing force of the US Navy quartermaster inventory), it's always going to be of interest for me to take part in the discourse because the way it plays out in the receiving culture is that it becomes a sign of how well-bred you are, if you accept that to be defined as, "knowing the ins and outs of the 'superior' culture". It's of a piece with global south anglophones policing our mutual grammars and the continuous angst of having to speak "good" English. I'm sure it plays out in similar fashion in minoritarian (by socioeconomic class or racialized groups)/immigrant spaces to the West, but it does play out a little differently back home with our elites as well (in one sense, if i can climb up this social ladder then i can access the global diversity quota etc etc), as then we're talking about the preoccupations of the majority group(s) to signal correctly. So stuff like this will always be interesting to me from that angle.
posted by cendawanita at 4:09 AM on April 16, 2023 [6 favorites]
posted by cendawanita at 4:09 AM on April 16, 2023 [6 favorites]
The food in Genoa is not the same as in Cosenza.
Oddly enough, there is apparently a Liguria-Calabria connection insofar as historical vs. modern mushroom preferences is concerned: the Calabrian traditions regarding which species were culturally favoured by the pickers among the superabundant mycoflora the Sila has always been known for (Lactarius "rositi" and "pucchiarielli", Suillus "vavosi", Laetiporus s., etc.) were entirely different to the habits of northerners, to the point that it was apparently only via resettled Ligurians in the 1950's (I'm not up on the historical detail, but potentially Calabrian workers returning from periods of economic emigration up North) that people began to pick B. edulis "porcini" (mainly to trade in them), for which previously there was no local custom/taste. So this kind of cultural updating also happens on an interregional level.
posted by progosk at 5:53 AM on April 16, 2023 [4 favorites]
Oddly enough, there is apparently a Liguria-Calabria connection insofar as historical vs. modern mushroom preferences is concerned: the Calabrian traditions regarding which species were culturally favoured by the pickers among the superabundant mycoflora the Sila has always been known for (Lactarius "rositi" and "pucchiarielli", Suillus "vavosi", Laetiporus s., etc.) were entirely different to the habits of northerners, to the point that it was apparently only via resettled Ligurians in the 1950's (I'm not up on the historical detail, but potentially Calabrian workers returning from periods of economic emigration up North) that people began to pick B. edulis "porcini" (mainly to trade in them), for which previously there was no local custom/taste. So this kind of cultural updating also happens on an interregional level.
posted by progosk at 5:53 AM on April 16, 2023 [4 favorites]
So, what does this all mean about going to Olive Garden and picking rdering the Tour of Italy?
Next, I suppose you’re going to tell me that there’s no Italian tradition of unlimited salad and breadsticks.
posted by Big Al 8000 at 5:58 AM on April 16, 2023 [1 favorite]
Next, I suppose you’re going to tell me that there’s no Italian tradition of unlimited salad and breadsticks.
posted by Big Al 8000 at 5:58 AM on April 16, 2023 [1 favorite]
@progosk Interesting about the porcini. In general the north uses more butter and milk than the Mezzogiorno. Oh and polenta.
posted by DJZouke at 8:51 AM on April 16, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by DJZouke at 8:51 AM on April 16, 2023 [2 favorites]
Thanks for this tasty mélange of experience, insight, research, and opinion.
@Conrad-Casserole, there are some tasty Wisconsin grating cheeses, in particular, Sartori's SarVecchio. Their Montamore is a mind-blowing cheddar with Parmesan notes, which I will defend as the Best Open-faced Toasted Cheese ever.
posted by Jesse the K at 11:48 AM on April 16, 2023 [2 favorites]
@Conrad-Casserole, there are some tasty Wisconsin grating cheeses, in particular, Sartori's SarVecchio. Their Montamore is a mind-blowing cheddar with Parmesan notes, which I will defend as the Best Open-faced Toasted Cheese ever.
posted by Jesse the K at 11:48 AM on April 16, 2023 [2 favorites]
Next, I suppose you’re going to tell me that there’s no Italian tradition of unlimited salad and breadsticks.
"When You're Here, You're Family" means we don't talk about why you haven't seen your cousin Vito around since that time he went ham on the salad & breadsticks.
posted by juv3nal at 5:06 PM on April 16, 2023 [3 favorites]
"When You're Here, You're Family" means we don't talk about why you haven't seen your cousin Vito around since that time he went ham on the salad & breadsticks.
posted by juv3nal at 5:06 PM on April 16, 2023 [3 favorites]
Next, I suppose you’re going to tell me that there’s no Italian tradition of unlimited salad and breadsticks.
I have a 1913 2nd class menu from the RMS Lusitania from 1913 (I'm sure you can google it). They offered salad - 'lettuce and tomatoes' and celery and radishes as appetizers. They also offer what we think of as 'Italian food' - spaghetti milanaise, so it had to be common enough around that period. If you look it up, there are tons of different milanaise spaghetti recipes, so who knows what that actually meant then.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:19 AM on April 17, 2023 [1 favorite]
I have a 1913 2nd class menu from the RMS Lusitania from 1913 (I'm sure you can google it). They offered salad - 'lettuce and tomatoes' and celery and radishes as appetizers. They also offer what we think of as 'Italian food' - spaghetti milanaise, so it had to be common enough around that period. If you look it up, there are tons of different milanaise spaghetti recipes, so who knows what that actually meant then.
posted by The_Vegetables at 8:19 AM on April 17, 2023 [1 favorite]
St. Oops, I literally just came back from dinner with my parents and my brother's family, where my mom had prepared a tartiflette (first time for all of us). She used Camembert instead of Roblochon though.
The idea of a tartiflette with camembert instead of reblochon just gave me a panic attack.
That’s it, I was just so stunned I couldn’t let it pass without comment.
Signed, a French person who doesn’t even like reblochon
posted by ohio at 12:16 PM on April 17, 2023 [5 favorites]
The idea of a tartiflette with camembert instead of reblochon just gave me a panic attack.
That’s it, I was just so stunned I couldn’t let it pass without comment.
Signed, a French person who doesn’t even like reblochon
posted by ohio at 12:16 PM on April 17, 2023 [5 favorites]
Re: the Lusitania menu: it’s no coincidence, methinks, that it a transport company was trying its hand at (re-)shaping the culinary landscape - we all know about the railroad’s reinvention of lobster, right? So their spelling it half French, “-naise”, like mayonnaise, is interesting, plus the fact that there is no such historical pasta recipe (Artusi has the well-known-to-this-day “risotto alla milanese” (saffron risotto), and “cotoletta milanese” (basically a schnitzel), but no other recipe attributed to Milan) makes that precisely one of those chimeric, experimental instances of inventing an new imaginary community…
posted by progosk at 12:17 PM on April 17, 2023 [4 favorites]
posted by progosk at 12:17 PM on April 17, 2023 [4 favorites]
Okay, I'm probably going to write way too much about this, since I inherited a tradition of Italian cooking (despite having no Italian ancestry).
> It wasn’t always like this. “The grandparents knew it was a lie,” Grandi tells me, finishing the last of his prosecco. “The philologic concern with ingredient provenance is a very recent phenomenon.”
Not just the grandparents. All the stuff he's talking about is stuff that is either obvious based on how I grew up (tortellini filling can be whatever and is based on what you have to hand) or are stories that I was told (carabonara is a WWII-era invention based on what supplies the US military is bringing in—my father's is still the best I know of, and he uses bacon, country ham, or pancetta, based on what he has). So I applaud Grandi standing up for the actual practice of the cuisine and not the fabricated delusions of fascists.
And 'Denominazione di origine' were always about protection of local industries and marketing. We have the same thing in the US with Copper River Salmon and a variety of others. Providers take pains to keep the quality bar high enough to not damage the brand, but there's plenty of salmon from the Copper River going into the general pool, too, and lots of parmeggiano reggiano being sold as gran padano alongside the same cheese being made elsewhere in Italy. There's a recently created Sicilian sheep cheese that directly competes with it as well (though I'm blanking on the name) that's simply lovely, though with a nuttier flavor. Modena's balsamic vinegar? There's great balsamic vinegar made all over the place. San Marzano tomatos make much of their volcanic soil, but I truly can't taste the difference between them and any other tomato grown in semi-arid, somewhat acidic soil and lots of sunshine (they do taste rather different than tomatos grown in, say, the Pacific Northwest of the United States).
> Many Italian “classics”, from panettone to tiramisu, are relatively recent inventions, he argues.
I have been to several restaurants in Italy that claimed to have invented it well into the second half of the 20th century. I'm sure they would be scandalized to be told that it was an ancient recipe.
> Both Cerami in Sicily and my grandmother in Tuscany remember eating lots of beans and potatoes — not ingredients typically associated with Italian cooking
This is where it gets interesting. The ingredients associated with Italian cooking in practice are: whatever you've got. After that, there's a certain logic, a set of templates to the whole thing. You start with a soffrito (that's a fancy name I didn't learn until I was in my 30's, because the idea of not starting with that was alien, so why would you name it?). It's going to have onions and carrots most of the time. In a dish with big, strong flavors, it will also have celery. In the right season and with a milder dish, like white beans, it will have leeks. Or it might have bell peppers. Any aromatic, moisture-heavy vegetable will do. Maybe some garlic, but not much in most cases (there are exceptions). And then there's specific paths and constraints that guide you from there. You cook it in an oil. In Italy it's basically always olive oil or butter because that's what you have. I often use canola these days instead of olive because the half the olive oil I have bought in the last couple of years has been rancid. If you can't get the ingredient, it drops out of the cooking. On the other hand, you'll find wakame in my salads and Japanese and Korean style pickles instead of the more Italian ones because I live in the Seattle area. I can get much better kimchi than I can the kind of pickled vegetables I would buy if I were in Italy. It's the logic of it that matters.
Take the classic ragu for something like spaghetti bolognese. It's a slow cooked meat sauce with tomato and wine. But given that, it has to go a certain way: you start with a soffrito, you brown the meat, and then, since you're going to be slow cooking the meat for hours in acids (wine and tomatos), you have to cook it with milk first or the meat gets tough and unpleasant. So you add milk, cook it down to protect the meat, and then add the acids. The meat isn't even carrying most of the flavor. Its fat provides umami, and the meat is providing fibrous material for the rest of the flavor to hang onto. You can replace it with anything else that will provide that base (brown lentils, for example). You could replace the acids if you wanted. Throw some cumin and coriander in at the soffrito stage, use diced turkey, keep the milk, and use citrus and pureed tomatillos and you'll get a very different themed sauce, but it's still, at base, the same sauce. Is that a sauce mentioned anywhere? Nope, I just made it up, but as soon as the tomatillos start coming in later this year I'm definitely making it, along with a big batch of fresh tortillas. And if I cooked it with an Italian grandmother she'd know right what was going on, and if I cooked it with a grandmother from the Yucatan, where it takes it flavor profile and ingredients from, she'd think I was crazy.
posted by madhadron at 9:44 PM on April 17, 2023 [6 favorites]
> It wasn’t always like this. “The grandparents knew it was a lie,” Grandi tells me, finishing the last of his prosecco. “The philologic concern with ingredient provenance is a very recent phenomenon.”
Not just the grandparents. All the stuff he's talking about is stuff that is either obvious based on how I grew up (tortellini filling can be whatever and is based on what you have to hand) or are stories that I was told (carabonara is a WWII-era invention based on what supplies the US military is bringing in—my father's is still the best I know of, and he uses bacon, country ham, or pancetta, based on what he has). So I applaud Grandi standing up for the actual practice of the cuisine and not the fabricated delusions of fascists.
And 'Denominazione di origine' were always about protection of local industries and marketing. We have the same thing in the US with Copper River Salmon and a variety of others. Providers take pains to keep the quality bar high enough to not damage the brand, but there's plenty of salmon from the Copper River going into the general pool, too, and lots of parmeggiano reggiano being sold as gran padano alongside the same cheese being made elsewhere in Italy. There's a recently created Sicilian sheep cheese that directly competes with it as well (though I'm blanking on the name) that's simply lovely, though with a nuttier flavor. Modena's balsamic vinegar? There's great balsamic vinegar made all over the place. San Marzano tomatos make much of their volcanic soil, but I truly can't taste the difference between them and any other tomato grown in semi-arid, somewhat acidic soil and lots of sunshine (they do taste rather different than tomatos grown in, say, the Pacific Northwest of the United States).
> Many Italian “classics”, from panettone to tiramisu, are relatively recent inventions, he argues.
I have been to several restaurants in Italy that claimed to have invented it well into the second half of the 20th century. I'm sure they would be scandalized to be told that it was an ancient recipe.
> Both Cerami in Sicily and my grandmother in Tuscany remember eating lots of beans and potatoes — not ingredients typically associated with Italian cooking
This is where it gets interesting. The ingredients associated with Italian cooking in practice are: whatever you've got. After that, there's a certain logic, a set of templates to the whole thing. You start with a soffrito (that's a fancy name I didn't learn until I was in my 30's, because the idea of not starting with that was alien, so why would you name it?). It's going to have onions and carrots most of the time. In a dish with big, strong flavors, it will also have celery. In the right season and with a milder dish, like white beans, it will have leeks. Or it might have bell peppers. Any aromatic, moisture-heavy vegetable will do. Maybe some garlic, but not much in most cases (there are exceptions). And then there's specific paths and constraints that guide you from there. You cook it in an oil. In Italy it's basically always olive oil or butter because that's what you have. I often use canola these days instead of olive because the half the olive oil I have bought in the last couple of years has been rancid. If you can't get the ingredient, it drops out of the cooking. On the other hand, you'll find wakame in my salads and Japanese and Korean style pickles instead of the more Italian ones because I live in the Seattle area. I can get much better kimchi than I can the kind of pickled vegetables I would buy if I were in Italy. It's the logic of it that matters.
Take the classic ragu for something like spaghetti bolognese. It's a slow cooked meat sauce with tomato and wine. But given that, it has to go a certain way: you start with a soffrito, you brown the meat, and then, since you're going to be slow cooking the meat for hours in acids (wine and tomatos), you have to cook it with milk first or the meat gets tough and unpleasant. So you add milk, cook it down to protect the meat, and then add the acids. The meat isn't even carrying most of the flavor. Its fat provides umami, and the meat is providing fibrous material for the rest of the flavor to hang onto. You can replace it with anything else that will provide that base (brown lentils, for example). You could replace the acids if you wanted. Throw some cumin and coriander in at the soffrito stage, use diced turkey, keep the milk, and use citrus and pureed tomatillos and you'll get a very different themed sauce, but it's still, at base, the same sauce. Is that a sauce mentioned anywhere? Nope, I just made it up, but as soon as the tomatillos start coming in later this year I'm definitely making it, along with a big batch of fresh tortillas. And if I cooked it with an Italian grandmother she'd know right what was going on, and if I cooked it with a grandmother from the Yucatan, where it takes it flavor profile and ingredients from, she'd think I was crazy.
posted by madhadron at 9:44 PM on April 17, 2023 [6 favorites]
well put, madhadron. what you've inherited - this sense of certain processes, combined with a certain context of ingredients and logics of combination - tracks very closely with what I (also non-Italian) have progressively discovered to be the Italian way (throughout various local variants of "traditional"). At the same time there are some specific taboos that are oddly used to reinforce this significantly versatile/open approach to making hearty/delicious food. That "Italian" has proved to be so exportable/successful I think is much more to do with this inherent flexibility than with any orthodoxy, whether that be in ingredients or minutiae of execution. That the storytelling side of the equation tends to bend origin stories into origin myths is a tendency that it's worth effort to keep a check on.
posted by progosk at 12:48 AM on April 18, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by progosk at 12:48 AM on April 18, 2023 [2 favorites]
The ingredients associated with Italian cooking in practice are: whatever you've got.
It's funny, yesterday I was thinking along similar lines: coincidentally both my daughter and I picked some ramps on our way home from work, and we talked about making pesto with some walnuts she foraged in the autumn, some local hard cheese and a fragrant hazelnut oil we always forget to use. The recipe/method will be Ligurian, but the food will be local to where we are.
I think what we can learn from Italian cuisines is to make simple (often cheap) food out of local and seasonal ingredients. From this perspective, insisting on using Parmigiano Reggiano if you live in Wisconsin is not optimal. But hey, you do you. I do have a lot of Italian products in my pantry. I can't find any other dry pasta that is as convincing. I nearly always have anchovy paste (but also will use fish sauce if I do run out), I have tinned tomatoes and tomato paste in a tube. With olive oil, I go for value for money, so that might as well be Spanish or Greek. We prefer Italian coffee roasts in our family, others may have other preferences.
In the season, I buy the best local produce, (or forage it), and that is what we (mainly) eat, along with those frozen vegs that are good. So we won't have a Caprese salad before August. What's now or in the near future are new potatoes, asparagus, peas, pointy cabbage, strawberries, different salad greens, fresh beans. I could mix our ramp pesto with pasta, potatoes, and fresh fava beans and it would be a meal for a king. I do define "local" a bit loosely. Just as one might buy fresh Sicilian fruit and Tuscan beans in Milan, I will buy asparagus from Germany and fish caught near Scotland. Until I build a greenhouse, I will be buying artichokes from France, too, because life without artichokes is not fair. (In the 19th century artichokes were grown in greenhouses here, so it is just a glitch that has to be repaired).
Why don't I just cook from our local traditions? Well, our local traditions were butchered by the government for a "national" cuisine in the early 20th century too. Not by fascists, but by a government eager to industrialize agriculture and export all of the good stuff: the bacon, the butter, the fruits (in the form of preserves) and the wheat (mixed with butter in butter cookies). And our democratic government was apparently more efficient at wiping out the local traditions than the Fascists in Italy were. I think this happened in many places, Thailand has been mentioned, it obviously happened under the Nazis in Germany.
That said, there are still some fine traditional recipes out there, my daughter just made a wonderful chicken and asparagus stew yesterday, and in the last 30+ years, lots of people have been working hard to find the original methods and recipes, including commercial beer, cheese and sausage makers. One of my plans for old age is to find the recipes of my great grandmother, who had a cooking column in a national newspaper around the year 1900. She was Orthodox Jewish, and I'm curious about how she squared that with writing for gentiles.
posted by mumimor at 1:38 AM on April 18, 2023 [4 favorites]
It's funny, yesterday I was thinking along similar lines: coincidentally both my daughter and I picked some ramps on our way home from work, and we talked about making pesto with some walnuts she foraged in the autumn, some local hard cheese and a fragrant hazelnut oil we always forget to use. The recipe/method will be Ligurian, but the food will be local to where we are.
I think what we can learn from Italian cuisines is to make simple (often cheap) food out of local and seasonal ingredients. From this perspective, insisting on using Parmigiano Reggiano if you live in Wisconsin is not optimal. But hey, you do you. I do have a lot of Italian products in my pantry. I can't find any other dry pasta that is as convincing. I nearly always have anchovy paste (but also will use fish sauce if I do run out), I have tinned tomatoes and tomato paste in a tube. With olive oil, I go for value for money, so that might as well be Spanish or Greek. We prefer Italian coffee roasts in our family, others may have other preferences.
In the season, I buy the best local produce, (or forage it), and that is what we (mainly) eat, along with those frozen vegs that are good. So we won't have a Caprese salad before August. What's now or in the near future are new potatoes, asparagus, peas, pointy cabbage, strawberries, different salad greens, fresh beans. I could mix our ramp pesto with pasta, potatoes, and fresh fava beans and it would be a meal for a king. I do define "local" a bit loosely. Just as one might buy fresh Sicilian fruit and Tuscan beans in Milan, I will buy asparagus from Germany and fish caught near Scotland. Until I build a greenhouse, I will be buying artichokes from France, too, because life without artichokes is not fair. (In the 19th century artichokes were grown in greenhouses here, so it is just a glitch that has to be repaired).
Why don't I just cook from our local traditions? Well, our local traditions were butchered by the government for a "national" cuisine in the early 20th century too. Not by fascists, but by a government eager to industrialize agriculture and export all of the good stuff: the bacon, the butter, the fruits (in the form of preserves) and the wheat (mixed with butter in butter cookies). And our democratic government was apparently more efficient at wiping out the local traditions than the Fascists in Italy were. I think this happened in many places, Thailand has been mentioned, it obviously happened under the Nazis in Germany.
That said, there are still some fine traditional recipes out there, my daughter just made a wonderful chicken and asparagus stew yesterday, and in the last 30+ years, lots of people have been working hard to find the original methods and recipes, including commercial beer, cheese and sausage makers. One of my plans for old age is to find the recipes of my great grandmother, who had a cooking column in a national newspaper around the year 1900. She was Orthodox Jewish, and I'm curious about how she squared that with writing for gentiles.
posted by mumimor at 1:38 AM on April 18, 2023 [4 favorites]
And 'Denominazione di origine' were always about protection of local industries and marketing.
aka rent-seeking
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 4:49 AM on April 18, 2023
aka rent-seeking
posted by GCU Sweet and Full of Grace at 4:49 AM on April 18, 2023
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posted by cendawanita at 11:24 PM on April 14, 2023 [4 favorites]