Advice from an Italian grandmother

A LONG TIME AGO (decades, actually), the Italian grandma or nonna of my then-husband, Rick, gave me some cooking advice that I have never forgotten. So now it’s time to pass it on to you.

After you come home with your fresh vegetables from the store or market, she said, be sure to parboil them soon after (preferably the same day) so they stay green and crisp. This just means, have a good quantity of boiling salted water (don’t be sparing with the salt) and put your vegetables in just until they are crisp-tender. It’s helpful to have a bowl of ice water close by so you can plunge in the veggies before they get too soft. Then drain the water and store the vegetables in a bowl or container in the refrigerator, ready to use and eat.

The method makes vegetables last longer than uncooked ones in your fridge, so there’s less waste — no cutting off brown or rotten parts. When it’s time to eat them, you can just heat them up very quickly any way you like. Don’t overcook. Rick’s nonna liked to saute the parboiled broccoli in olive oil with some garlic and cayenne pepper.

I confess I have followed this advice only haphazardly over the years, but in the last year, after I decided to really commit to this practice, my parboil record really improved (hmmm, I’ve never used the phrase “parboil record” before).

As a great benefit, the vegetables look so inviting, that I’m sure I eat more of them. I like both the broccoli and the green beans, whether hot or cold, simply dressed with  lemon juice and salt.

It’s a great tip from a wise nonna. Now all you have to do is follow it.

For more on Rick’s nonna’s cooking advice see “Meatballs of Love,” (published in Salon 20 years ago!)

Taste of Sicilia

As we’re getting ready for a trip to Sicily, I was reading through a little travel journal I kept from a visit there eight years ago, when I went to research lemons. I came across this page with a tuna-lemon-olive oil salad with artichoke hearts and green beans that I made in a lemon orchard agriturismo above Sicily’s Lemon Riviera, on the eastern side of the island (we are going there again!). We usually had a kitchen in Sicily, so we could shop in the markets, and we ate some variation of this salad nearly every day we were there — and with tuna so good and produce so fresh and delicious, we never tired of it.

This salad (with variations) became a standard once we were home, too. You may have to substitute Meyer lemons or preserved lemons for the Sicilian lemon if you want to eat the lemon peel, but otherwise –except for the gorgeous views of Mount Etna and the Mediterranean — it translates well, especially in the spring.

I’m sure we always had bread or breadsticks with “My Sicilian lemon insalata (good for il prazo–lunch–or antipasta). The bottom line reads: “good with Etna red or white, iced tea or lemonade.”

Before the meal: an antipasto appreciation

Wow. I didn’t know very much about antipasto until last weekend when I was invited to an antipasto-making day with friends. I was visiting Cathy in California, and she and her dear friend Meg had organized this event with Christina, an Italian-American cook and singer. The idea was to make a big batch of antipasto and can it for holiday gifts and eating.

The timing was perfect. After all, in Italian, antipasto literally means “before the meal” (anti coming from the Latin ante, before, as in our word anticipation), so what better time to focus on the starters than shortly before that great feast of Thanksgiving?

Cathy filled me in on the basics: This was a grand antipasto of marinated vegetables and tuna, for special occasions. The recipe had been passed down from her Swiss-Italian family and her aunt Alice made it to serve on Christmas.

Aunt Alice's recipe

Christina also had an aunt (Mimi) who excelled at making the antipasto. Her family recipe came from the Le Marche region of Italy. It was also a special-occasion antipasto and was served at the wedding feast of her grandparents on September 25, 1911 — nearly 100 years ago.

Two batches of vegetables are brined overnight

The two recipes were remarkably similar in both ingredients and methods. Cathy and Meg had done a test run the weekend before and came up with a method combining the two.

We started the night before, cutting up vegetables. Celery, carrots, cauliflower and green beans, went in one pot;  pearl onions, red peppers and cucumbers in the other, and each had a different mixture of salt water brine to soak in overnight.

We drained and rinsed the veggies in the morning.

Meg and Christina discuss the best way to do this.

Now, artichokes, button mushrooms, capers, and green and black olives are added to the mix.

The whole mixture is cooked briefly in olive oil, vinegar, and tomato sauce, with a sprinkling of herbs.

 

 

Filling the jars with the marinated vegetables and sauce

Because we were canning these jars for a long shelf life, for food safety reasons we decided to buck tradition, and leave the tuna out, making this a vegetarian (vegan, really!) version. The tuna could be added once the jar is opened, before the antipasto is served.

Removing the jars after 15 minutes of the boiling water bath

Three happy cooks

But that wasn’t all —there were more good things to come! Namely, lunch (il pranzo), and more specifically, Christina’s fabulous gnocchi, prefaced by her gnocchi song and a demonstration. (I should have video, or at least audio here — maybe a link will be forthcoming, if someone else makes it.)

By the way, if you’re wondering how to say “gnocchi,” click here.

Christina made the dough with russet potatoes boiled in salted water till fork-tender, then cooled and peeled. Then she mounded up some flour on the work table, riced the potatoes (with a ricer) into squiggly shapes right into the mound of flour and bit by bit  incorporated the flour into the potatoes, sprinkling with some salt. Next, she drizzled beaten egg yolks over the mixture and gently shaped into a loaf, being careful not to overwork the dough.

The ratio: 2 pounds of raw potatoes, 2 cups all purpose flour, 2 egg yolks and salt to taste.

She rolled pieces of the dough into ropes, then cut them into bite-size gnocchi, pressed lightly with the tines of a fork. And we all rolled ropes and cut the pieces along with her.

Boil till they float right up and taste done!

Sauced with some delicious pesto....

And eaten outside in a beautiful garden -- if you're lucky enough to be in California!

Well,  back in the cold and gray Northwest, I still have a warm glow from the pleasure of cooking and eating with friends–as well as carrying on and adapting  Old World traditions.

It was a lovely preface to Thanksgiving, and as befits that holiday, I am feeling full of gratitude. Thank you Cathy, Meg and Christina–and happy Thanksgiving to all you readers, friends, cooks, and appreciative diners —

Toby