Julia’s Stories Make 2013 Zester Daily Top Picks, Site for the “Weird and Wonderful” in Food and Drink

 Posted by at 9:06 pm  5 Responses »
Jan 132014
 
Julia's Stories Make 2013 Zester Daily Top Picks, Site for the "Weird and Wonderful" in Food and Drink

Judging by the top picks of the savvy food crowd that reads Zester Daily, it looks like people just can’t get enough of Italian food. Good thing, because there are endless more tales to tell and dishes to make you smile, up my proverbial sleeve. Zester Daily is not any ordinary food publication, but a cooperative of experienced writers from around the world who bring you the fresh, the undiscovered, the “weird and the wonderful,” writes founder and editor, Corie Brown. Contributors don’t have to fit into any magazine template to sound and look like everyone else, or be muzzled […more…]

Sweet Potato Gnocchi: A New Dish for the New Year

 Posted by at 7:45 pm  2 Responses »
Dec 312013
 
Sweet Potato Gnocchi: A New Dish for the New Year

Nothing comforts more than these warm, plump nuggets of belly bliss when the frigid temperature sets in. It’s the season for tubers, and time for inventing new ways with the stalwart spuds.  Sweet potato gnocchi sparkle with color and brim with goodness, whether made with the traditional American orange-fleshed variety, or the exotic new Stokes purple that has turned up in some markets. For the details, see my latest article in Zester Daily. In the spirit of the season, I used both to accompany our holiday duck since orange is the ancient color of good fortune, while purple, symbol of peace and magic, has […more…]

Puritans and Pasta? A Fanciful Riff on the First Thanksgiving

 Posted by at 9:04 pm  1 Response »
Nov 252013
 
Puritans and Pasta? A Fanciful Riff on the First Thanksgiving

Who thinks Italians invented the first Thanksgiving dish? Calvin Trillin, that’s who. Read all about it in my latest article for Zester Daily, “How Pilgrims Almost Ruined Spaghetti alla Carbonara,” and while you’re there, find the original and genuine recipe for one of Italy’s most wildly popular (and simplest) pasta dishes of all, spaghetti alla carbonara. You can serve it as a first course – like the Romans do. Or if you aren’t a turkey fan, you can make it your Thanksgiving centerpiece. If not, make it any old time. Continue reading here…    

There’s Got to be a Morning After, or What to Do With the Turkey Carcass

 Posted by at 1:28 am  No Responses »
Nov 252013
 
There's Got to be a Morning After, or What to Do With the Turkey Carcass

With all the fuss about the Thanksgiving bird and all the sides, we too often neglect to talk about what to do with the turkey carcass. Personally, I look forward to it all year. Here’s why, as told to Molly O’Neill, who first published my recipe in her  Cook ‘ Scribble blog three years ago. It all started with my mother, who didn’t believe in passing lasagne or big bowls of macaroni and meatballs at the Thanksgiving table like many Italian-American families did when I was growing up in New York. She and my father were native Italians and she always […more…]

Readers Write: Victor Hazan on Marcella’s Pumpkin Love

 Posted by at 9:13 am  4 Responses »
Oct 312013
 
Readers Write: Victor Hazan on Marcella's Pumpkin Love

In response to my story in Zester Daily, Love and Zucca: Why Venice Adores its Pumpkin, a reminiscence of Marcella Hazan, sent from her husband, Victor… Bravissima. You have shined your knowledge and intelligence on an ingredient as unfamiliar to American cooks as it is sought after by the cooks of the Veneto. And by the Emiliani as well who use it to stuff cappellacci. Marcella substituted orange-fleshed yams, which come close to the zucca’s taste, and called them Cappellacci del Nuovo Mondo. Every year, when we had not yet installed an elevator and lived 82 steps above sea level, Maurizio […more…]

There is More Than One Way to Skin a Pumpkin

 Posted by at 10:20 pm  7 Responses »
Oct 272013
 
There is More Than One Way to Skin a Pumpkin

Around this time of year the food press sounds its perennial advice on pumpkin pie, but what is usually overlooked are the endless dishes, both sweet and savory, that you can make using edible pumpkins and squashes. Probably no one reveres the pumpkin as much as the Italians, and the Venetians in particular, the subject of my most recent article for Zester Daily, “Why Venice Adores its Pumpkins.” Read about the Venetians’ love affair with zucca, and find my heirloom recipe for savory pumpkin or winter squash stew with tomato, dry-cured olives, and garlic.  

Canal House Interprets Italian Cooking–With Deft

 Posted by at 12:50 am  2 Responses »
Oct 242013
 
Canal House Interprets Italian Cooking--With Deft

This is not the first time I’ve touted Canal House Cooking, but time and again, in the midst of our burgeoning American food revolution, the remarkable talent of the two women behind this homespun, deeply felt culinary venture, inspires. I first got to know Christopher Hirsheimer and Melissa Hamilton, the photographer-artist publishing team a few years back when they were photographing my book, Italian Home Cooking: 125 Recipes to Comfort Your Soul. While many gifted chefs are turning the American restaurant scene into a mecca that even the most discerning foreign traveler now marvels at, Christopher and Melissa have, instead, […more…]

Uprooted to Lancaster

 Posted by at 2:47 pm  9 Responses »
Oct 122013
 
Uprooted to Lancaster

Summer is my season. I can no more abandon my garden for a beach holiday than leave a bubbling pot on the stove to burn. I love watching my vegetables grow and the perennials exploding in the flower beds, putting on one gorgeous show after another. There are zucchini flowers to pick in the early morning, and sauces to be made when only fresh tomatoes will do; Romas to be oven-dried and frozen, and peppers to be roasted and put up for the winter. Autumn is a bittersweet time for the likes of me, invigorating and melancholy all at once, […more…]

How to Cook Rapini

 Posted by at 11:23 am  3 Responses »
Oct 072013
 
How to Cook Rapini

Some time back, I wrote a post, “When Bitter is Sweet,” about broccoli rapini, the Italian greens that have taken this country by storm since Balducci’s, the legendary Greenwich Village Italian grocery, imported them here in 1973. Because so many readers said they were relieved to finally learn how to cook them properly to soften their bitter edge, I decided to find out how and why the delicious Brassica, about which there is still such a mystique, was transplanted from the heel of the Italian boot to the farmlands of California. Here’s the update, complete with Andy and Nina Balducci’s […more…]

Lost Recipe, Mother of Spaghetti al Pomodoro, Found in Brooklyn

 Posted by at 2:36 pm  8 Responses »
Aug 232013
 
Lost Recipe, Mother of Spaghetti al Pomodoro, Found in Brooklyn

It’s not every day that you find a missing link to history–in this case, pasta history. Read about how I found a lost recipe, progenitor of the union of pasta and the tomato in, of all places, Brooklyn, New York. Then again, the site of the find was D. Coluccio & Sons, the iconic Bensonhurst Italian grocery. Maybe not such a surprise after all. After reading the new article, you may never again take for granted spaghetti and meatballs, or any other variation on the theme of pasta and tomato sauce. You wouldn’t imagine such a simple dish could be so splendid–and […more…]

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