Aroma Cucina

Breaking News about Fruits & Vegetables: Is being healthy good enough?

 News Flash: Until fruits and vegetables taste good, and are affordable people won’t eat them.

 As soon as we land in Italy, we start eating more vegetables. 

The spring vegetables are in: tender purple artichokes, crisp peas, snappy fave beans, are mounded high in the market. A shopping bag full of freshly foraged greens is 3 euro.

 It’s not an effort, or a chore to eat more vegetables. It’s more about making difficult decisions: fennel or asparagus tonight?  They are as interesting as any piece of meat on the plate.

We sat with some American friends the other night and wondered why shopping at a NYC or Portland green market was so expensive. Why shopping at the green market was something you saved for special dinners.

 Italian markets are reasonably priced. How come? I’ve asked this question many times, in different places, and never gotten an answer that solved the riddle.

We went to a Food Policy talk in New York, and were told that the Greenmarket was no more expensive than any grocery store. In my experience, that’s simply not true.

Granted, the Union Sq Market in NYC, sells precious micro greens by the ounce, and I’m buying foraged greens by the bagful.  Then again, the Italian produce sellers are notorious for having a heavy thumb on the scale, so maybe that’s how they make up the difference.

Have you noticed? Food deserts have been in the news. Food deserts are neighborhoods where you don’t have decent grocery stores. Then the news comes out that food deserts aren’t the problem. Even when there are vegetables for sale, people aren’t buying them.

Preaching about the health benefits of fruits and vegetables works for some people, but desire is a far more powerful motivator.

How do we create the desire in people to eat more vegetables?  How do we make vegetables sexy and in demand? Who does PR for the artichoke? Who speaks for the carrot?  And silly, childish, cartoon vegetables are not the answer. And neither are shrill spokespeople who intone the wisdom of plant eating from a pillar of self-congratulation.

 Do you think if seasonality was reintroduced to our lifestyle, and we learned to long for the first peas of the season, that it would make a difference?  If peas (and men)  were bred for sweetness and tenderness, would they create a yearning; instead of peas that were bred for longevity and shipping, and who are more like a dependable but unexciting husband?  

 I think the moral of the story is: if the asparagus tastes good, we will eat it. I’m not sure what the moral of the story is regarding tender v. dependable husbands, I’ll let you work that out for yourself.

 

 

The Sensual Seduction of Fall

Mother Nature is giving us one last sensory overload before the dark and quiet of winter.  Colors are vibrant but tinged with decay. The air carries the scent of earth and smoke; the smell of sunlight and freshness is relegated to the back of the closet along with t-shirts and sandals.

Our Umbrian fall smells of abundance. Chestnuts, mushrooms, truffles, grapes, fresh olive oil, the last bits of the orto, the calming, restful smell of the heavy morning mists all beg you to slow down and get ready for winter.

It also means it’s time for us to go back to NY. I’m saving up all these smells so I have something to remember when we go back.

The prickly smell of wood smoke, that little tickle it makes in the back of the throat, this defines the smell of Montone once the days are cool and the nights long. It’s what people talk about when they remember Montone, ringing bells and wood smoke.  Some people still heat their houses and water with wood fires because they never joined the community gas line when it was put in, so we still need our wood cutters. The thunderous rattle of a tractor load of wood being dumped in front of Carla’s house is a famliar sound in town.

When I open the bottle that holds our freshly pressed olive oil, I’m back in the olive grove, I’m back at the mill inhaling that strangely euphoric smell. We were at the mill last week, and I swear that smell releases endorphins. Everyone is happy, the workers are smiling, the people waiting are excited to get their oil, there is a contagion of happiness and expectation.



Of course there is the earthy, sexy, urgent smell of truffles. Citta di Castello’s annual “Tartufi Bianchi”, “White Truffles” festival is an olfactory bacchanal. Greedy eyes and noses suck up the wanton wafts of truffle drenched air that linger and seduce as you walk by. “Hurry up, smell me, I’m perfect right now, eat me tonight.” You know the temptress truffle is right, and you empty your wallet and bring her home.


Building a fire and grilling meat seems like the proper way to welcome guests to dinner.  We’re drenching grilled bread with our fresh, bright, green olive oil, It’s time for sipping new wines, and then going back to drinking an aged wine because how much youth can one tolerate? 


My finger tips are blackened from cracking open roasted chestnuts, and cleaning fall artichokes; Jeff’s fingers are rough and grubby from cleaning out the orto.

I suppose it really is time for us to clean up, put on our fancy clothes and head back to city life. Of course, Raffaello is already packed and ready.
Viva la differenza!

Olio Novello Time is Here! 'Tis the season for fresh olive oil!

It’s olive picking time in Umbria. Olive picking, followed by pressing is fragrantly joyous; there is something comforting about knowing you will have oil. It means there will be food on the table and it will be good.

This past weekend, a small group of us were invited by Mario Ciampetti of Hispellum, Terre Rosse to participate in an olive oil weekend in Spello, Umbria. It was an eye-opeining experience to hear first hand why Mario is so committed and passionate about his particular olive oil.  Mario only grows and produces the ‘moraiolo’ olive, that is indigenous to Umbria. It’s a small olive, with a big pit, and big flavor.  He grows his olives under biodynamic conditions and believes that his oil speaks directly and passionately about where it comes from.

He is right. His oil is unlike any oil I’ve tasted before.  It is unique. The freshly pressed oil is an amazing bright emerald green color. When I first saw it on bread, I thought the bread had pesto on it, but it was just the oil. The initial flavor hints of artichoke leaves, and this eventually gives way to a spiciness that leaves a tickle in the throat.

Sunday morning Mario brought us to his olive grove to do a little olive picking. His experienced workers had already spread the nets on the ground. Thanks god, because net management is really a pain. It’s an ongoing battle to lay the nets so there are no holes or places for the olives to escape, and so you can channel those runaway olives to stream downhill into the crates.

The guys all got to use the ‘shaky’ machines to do their harvesting. Picture a long handled, long-tined pitchfork that does very fast 90 degree turns and literally shakes the olives out of the trees.
The girls were given small hand rakes to comb the lower hanging olives out of the trees.  That worked for me, it was a much quieter and more peaceful experience than going Olive Busting!

Olive picking is communal. My guess is that it has always been communal just by the nature of needing lots of olives, all picked at the same time. It feels like you are tapping into something mystical and eternal.

After picking our 143 kilos of olives, we headed down to the mill. The machinery or layout may change from mill to mill, but the process is essentially the same. Separate out the leaves and twigs. Wash the olives. Mash the olives into a paste, extracting the pits. Then a whirl around in a centrifuge to separate the water from the oil, and voila....extra virgin olive oil!  It’s a little more complex than that, and temperatures need to be carefully monitored, but that’s the basics.

I’ve said this before, but it is high time that chefs and cooks learn more about the olives in their olive oil. There are huge flavor differences from one variety of olive to another; from one region to another.
As part of the weekend experience, we had a guided tasting where we compared the Umbrian Terre Rosse oil to a Sicilian oil. It’s like the difference between tasting a merlot and a chardonnay...different planets, different reasons for using one or the other.

If you’ve read this far, you care about food.
So here’s your homework assignment...go out and taste olive oils. Pour a little bit into a cup, warm the cup with your hand. Then inhale deeply, take a sip, and bring some air into your mouth. Pay attention to what is going on in your mouth.  Now start imagining what dishes would work best with that flavor.

And if you are fortunate enough to find Terre Rosse olive oil..snap it up! You won’t be sorry..it speaks of wind swept hilltops, rocky soil, hot summers and cold winters. And you won’t be able to find this particular flavor anywhere else.

Grazie mille, Mario per un weekend incredibile!

Azienda Agraria Hispellum
Via Vitale Rosi 42, 06038 Spello (Pg) Umbria IT - Tel/Fax (+39) 0742 302274 - info@hispellum.com

Artichoke Festival at Aroma Cucina! Today: Cleaning the 'choke

 

They’re in season, so why not take advantage of this abundance? Besides, I’ve had enough people ask me, “How do you clean an artichoke?”  and “What can I make with an artichoke?” that I finally took the hint. So here’s to a week of celebrating the ‘choke!

I didn’t grow up eating artichokes; you probably had to live in California for that to happen. Jeff introduced me to the joys of dipping a leaf in garlicky mayonnaise and scraping the meat off with my teeth. He also tried to teach me to artfully arrange my spent leafs on the plate as he had been taught by a very prissy Protestant lady, but that’s just not my hedonist style.  Fast forward to Italy and I’m living in “carcofi “central... all shapes, sizes and colors of artichokes show up in the market in the spring and fall.
The most prevalent variety in the US is the large globe artichoke, although now and then you can find the smaller varieties. Saveur Magazine has an excellent gallery of photos of the different varieties, but regardless of variety, the basics of cleaning and prepping remain the same. 

Artichoke 101
What is an artichoke? It’s part of the thistle family thought to have been cultivated from wild cardoons.  The edible part is the flower head. Pay attention: I said thistle...and that means thorns, so you will get pricked at some point when you play with artichokes. 
However,  here is the real story of the artichoke. One day, Zeus was visiting his brother Poseidon, when he saw the gorgeous young Cynara and being a randy old god, he promptly seduced her. He did right by her though; he married her, and made her an immortal goddess. (And you thought Kate Middleton was lucky?  Ha!, She only gets to be a princess.)  Cynara got a little bored one day, and snuck home to see her mother, which thoroughly pissed off Zeus, who may have been feeling a little jealous that day. He promptly turned her into an artichoke plant, and she grew the thorns to repel the nasty old god.   You can draw your own conclusions.

How To Buy An Artichoke:

Look for a tightly closed, firm head. The outer leaves should feel firm and juicy, not dry and hard. If you can buy artichokes with their stem still attached, that’s a bonus because the steamed stem is delicious. A little bit of discoloration on the outer leaves is OK; a lot of discoloration could mean it’s rotten on the inside.

How To Clean an Artichoke:

You’ll need a sharp paring knife, a cut lemon and a bowl of acidulated water (either lemon juice or a splash of vinegar).
Remove the tough outer leaves; keep removing the leaves until you reach the layer where the petals feel tender. You will remove up to a third or a half of the artichoke, so don’t be alarmed at the amount of waste.
Remove the pointy, thorny tips of the leaves by taking your knife, and at a 45 degree angle, press down and slice off the tip. Done properly, you can make your artichoke looks like a crown. If it doesn’t, don’t worry, better luck next time.
If the artichoke is young, small and tender (and who doesn’t love young, small and tender??) you can eat it raw, or cook it whole.  If the artichoke is a little bigger, you may want to remove the interior, hairy choke and the prickly interior leaves surrounding the choke. (The little hairy bit is called the ‘choke’, aptly named.)
Cut the artichoke in half, carefully run the blade between the bottom of the hairy choke and the bottom of the heart. Lift it out and discard. Rub all of the cut, exposed areas of the artichoke with lemon to prevent discoloration.
Keep the cleaned artichokes in a bowl of acidulated water after they are cleaned.
Artichokes can be used to make a natural yellow-green dye. This means they may discolor your hands. If you are cleaning a load of them or don’t want dyed hands, a pair of latex gloves will do the trick.

Easiest Ways to Eat an Artichoke 

Raw Artichoke Salad: The artichokes must be young, small and tender, like the virginal Cynara herself.  Clean the artichoke, removing the hairy choke heart and thinly slice paper thin. Dress with extra virgin olive oil, fresh lemon juice, salt, pepper and shaved parmigiana cheese.

Steamed Globe Artichoke: Clean the outer leaves of the choke but don’t remove the heart.  Steam in salted lemon water until tender, approximately 25-35 minutes. Serve warm with a dipping sauce of garlic mayonnaise. Or try it Roman ‘pizzimento’ style, which is a small bowl of olive oil, splash of vinegar and salt and pepper for dipping. 

Buon'appetito!!! 

Tommorow: Braised Artichokes

The Tarocco: A Bloody Surprise

Another reason to love Italy: Tarocco blood oranges. 
Taroccos make sweet, low acid juice, which are perfect for your morning antioxidant, low calorie, breakfast of champions. Tarocco’s have the highest vitamin C content of any orange,  and are high in fiber.  How can something taste so good and be healthy when it comes in crazy Fred Flinstone vitamin colors?

The Tarocco, with it’s lumpy body and dark orange skin is a surprise every time you cut into one because you never know how ‘bloody’ it will be: the flesh can be barely streaked to completely blood soaked.
Apparently people have been grappling wih a flavor description for centuries.  In 1646 a Jesuit priest,  described the flavor as grape-like. Contemporary sources call it berry-like, with raspberry notes. Which sounds rather high falutin’. I just call it a damn good orange.

Because the flavor is mild and sweet, Tarocco juice is a tricky component for cocktails. We had the same issue with our tangerine cocktails; you needed something to tame the sweetness (and for the record, Green Chartreuse didn’t work at all).  It would probably make a refreshing spritzer with Campari and a bit of bubble water. Unfortunately, we’re so in love with them for breakfast, none have survived until aperitivo hour, but this could be fun to experiment with.

I’m also thinking it would make a lovely butter sauce for a white fleshed fish. Perhaps a roasted orata with blood orange butter could be on the menu for dinner tomorrow night?

The Tarocco, which means ‘beautiful’ in a Sicilian dialect, has been grown around the Mt. Etna volcano for at least 700 years, although it seems possible that these oranges came to Sicily with the Moors or a passing Spaniard.  It’s also known as the half-blood orange because it’s flesh isn’t completely bloody like the Moro or Sanguinello oranges.
 
The good news is you don’t have to come to Italy for them, they are available from California from February to May. It also looks like Local Harvest is offering them for sale, so you have a good chance of being able to sample the legendary Tarocco orange.

Warning: don’t wear white when juicing or eating these babies! However if you do need a costume suggestion for eating a Tarocco, I’d suggest something hot-blooded and Sicilian. The rest is up to you.

When To Be or Not to Be a Locavore

I will never be a committed locavore. I won’t give up:
mangoes
coffee
olive oil
tangerines
shrimp
wine

I could go on and on,  but you get the point. Doesn’t it make more sense to be an efficient-vore?  Certain things grow better in certain places. What am I going to do for high altitude coffee beans? Grow them on top of my kitchen cabinets because that’s the highest point around?

Things taste better when they grow in their proper environment. This is called terroir, and wine people will debate endlessly about whether or not you can taste the shale that covers the root of a particular grapevine. French and Italians will come to fisticuffs over whose truffles taste better. I KNOW our orto produces the best tomatoes in the whole world. And that’s because tomatoes taste best in season, sun ripened, plucked and eaten still warm. 

We need to know when to ship and when to stay  local. No one hands out medals for trying to force grow lettuce in a freezing cold upstate NY greenhouse in winter. It’s simply not efficient.

Shipping has become incredibly efficient. The reason civilization spread was an indirect result of wanting what someone else had. People wanted salt, and eventually they built a city near the salt collecting area and called it Rome. Spices traveled and so did culture. We traded...I make this, you grow that, we trade.

Sarah Murray’s book, The Moveable Feast is an absolute eyeopener as she explains the pure efficiency of shipping food. It’s full of stories about things that we now take for granted and weird moments in history. Like the Clipper ship races, where the ships would leave India and race to England, arriving within moments of each other. Or the fact that UPS truck routes are  set up so they have no left turns to save on fuel.

Read the book. Make informed decisions. I’m all for eating local, when it makes sense. But, when those mangoes are flooding Chinatown, and they taste this good, you know I’m going to be eating them!

How do you eat?

If organic celery costs $4.95 and regular celery costs .99 which would you buy?

• organic because I'm worth it
• how bad could it be?
• regular so I can save $4.00 and buy a bottle of organic water

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I know. I’m trivializing important food issues, but what goes on in the world of food media and marketing is really frustrating and demoralizing. Are we content to be treated as mindless children? walking wallets? elitist foodies devouring endangered species?
Or worse: have we lost our sense of humor?? 

Alice Waters included sharks fin in her wish list for a final meal and was soundly berated for being insensitive. Hell, I want some of those Ortolan little birdies that Mitterrand ate for his last meal. I want them...but I’m not getting them. People, could we please just get a grip?

Slow Food sent around a petition regarding Colony Collapse Disorder or CCD. It’s not about the collapse of the American colonies ...it’s about bees. Here’s the quote:  “The Environmental Protection Agency has the power to investigate and ban the pesticides thought to be responsible but, despite their own scientists' advice and under pressure from pesticides companies, they're dragging their feet.” [emphasis by Slow Food]

This is scare mongering. Slow Food is laying a blanket denunciation on all pesticides. If you go onto their various websites, there is now a more moderate tone suggesting there may be multiple reasons for CCD. But, that won’t get names on a petition, will it?

Whole Foods issued a cheery 5 step rating system for animal slaughter, only it’s more about making the consumer feel good,  than it is about being able to comply.
The reality is that it's a very bad idea to have bulls around that aren’t castrated. They get really feisty and will injure each other if a pretty Bessie happens to stroll by.
There are also the legal problems associated with on farm slaughter. Most states don’t allow it, or allow it only for at home consumption, or there are significant limits on the number of animals to be slaughtered. It is a state by state ruling. So, is Whole Foods only going to source from one state? One farm? Not likely.

And what is up with pigs and bowling balls?? Apparently it’s a wonderful thing to throw bowling balls in with the pigs so they have something to do. This is natural? Italian pig famers would laugh themselves silly. Then again, bowling isn't very popular in Italy. Maybe the farmers could start a trend.

People, we need to face some facts. There are lots of hungry mouths in the world, more on the way and we all need to eat. While slow, local and organic is wonderful, and the way I like to eat, it is a choice. I buy organic when I feel it’s worth it. 
So could we scale down the rhetoric and start coming up with some truly viable solutions?
And to the guys at Whole Foods and Slow Foods....don’t treat us like children. Talk to us about the problems, the challenges, the realities, and we’ll like you a whole lot better in the morning.

 

What's in your olive oil?

Even the most casual wine drinker probably knows the difference between a chardonnay and a white zinfandel.  If this is the case, why don’t the most passionate chefs or home cooks know more about their olive oil? Maybe the chefs know a brand name, but do they know what variety of olive is used?

The concept of terroir or terrain or terreno (French-English-Italian) is frequently discussed with grapes and wine; why not with olive oil? If sun, soil and climate affect a grape, it stands to reason it would affect the flavor of an olive and it’s oil.

Yesterday, I had a unique opportunity to discuss just this subject with Nicola Bovoli, a world renowned olive oil maker and oil taster. Nicola’s Vicopisanolio was selected by Gustiamo to be included in our Aroma Cucina CookVook Pantry Basket, so I jumped at the chance to listen to what he has to say about the oil he produces.

Nicola’s Vicopisano oil is made exclusively with the ‘frantoio’ olive. Frantoio olives are as identifiable  with Tuscany as the sangiovese grape and Chianti wine. The frantoio is a medium to large olive, known for producing a fruity aromatic olive oil. It could be considered a ‘global’ varietal as its grown in diverse places such as Australia, Argentina and California, but according to Nicola, don’t expect it to taste the same.  In fact, Nicola thinks the oil from Mendoza would probably taste more like Tuscan oil than the same oil produced in Umbria because of the difference in climate.
 
Vicopisano, located  between Lucca, Livorno and Pisa enjoys a particular micro climate where it benefits from the sea breezes, generally congenial weather and not a lot of natural pests like flies.  That being said, in December of 2009, Nicola lost 30% of his olive trees in two hours due to intense cold. So, like any other natural harvest, it’s  subject to the whims of Mother Nature.

Nicola tends to harvest his olives in early October which gives a totally different flavor than if they are harvested more mature. His oil has notes of artichoke, just cut grass, with a lovely balance of bitter and ‘piccante’.  Piccante means spicy, but to me it means that pleasant little tickle you get at the back of your throat when you taste this oil.

For his Vicopisano extra virgin olive oil, he uses only the frantoio olive because he feels that mixing olives gives the oil an ‘artifical’ flavor. He calls mixing the olives an ‘artificial intervention’.  As he describes it, he wants his oil to be exactly what nature wants to give us. Each year it will taste different, and each year he’s convinced it’s the best he ever tasted. This is pure zest for life speaking, an understanding that comes from sharing the seasons with the olives. There is something ‘connected’ about knowing that you’ve shared the same heat, rain and fog with these olives. Unlike wine that needs time to be aged, the oil is at its peak of flavor as soon as it’s pressed.

While this obsession with olive oil might be considered another example of food elitism, it’s not elitism as much as an expression of place and time. Nicola Bovoli has the good fortune to be in a place that produces extraordinary olive oil, and he wants to share his good fortune and have people understand what they are tasting. If that’s elitism, I’m all for it.

Next post: the nuts & bolts of harvesting, storing and using extra virgin olive oil.

Nicola’s Bovoli’s Olio Novello from the 2010 harvest is now available at Gustiamo.com and is part of the Aroma Cucina Pantry Basket that is filled with premium quality ingredients that will have you Cooking Simply: The Italian Way!

Holy Vegans! Locavores Divine! Rise of the Food Radical!

We’re back. Our re-entry into the U.S of A., into NYC, into Soho is  exhilarating, and more than a little dis-orienting. You come back into the ‘hood’ with fresh eyes, wanting to see what’s new, what’s still the same. 

Last year when we came back, blueberries were the new “lose weight, anti-oxidant, liberated radical foodstuff that will keep you young forever”.  The year before that is was pomegranates. I suppose the  jump the shark moment for pomegranates came when the POM people claimed drinking their POM juice would cure erectile dysfunction. Maybe they thought licking the sticky juice off of body parts was a natural cure?

This year it appears to be the deification of vegetarians presided over by those high priests The Vegans.  One of the silliest things I’ve read in promoting veganism was about the agony of a chicken laying an egg. Honey, get a grip. Go to a hen house. They cuddle up. They lay an egg. They go get something to eat. They’re chickens, there is reason they are called bird brains.

Another fringe cult that has blossomed into a full blown religion is the Holy Locavore. Has it crossed a sainted locavore’s mind that one of the earliest factors in civilizing our prehistoric selves was the creation of trade routes? Use some common sense, grow things that are native to your area, and trade for the stuff you can’t grow locally.

And what the hell is up with Stonyfield and their scary yogurt packaging?? They use Uncle Sam to scare us into eating organic?   The label ‘organic’ has been so abused, it’s literally meaningless, so I don’t appreciate being bullied by my yogurt carton first thing in the morning.

Let’s face it, nutritional science is a moving target. Once upon a millennium ago, sugar was considered a cure for the plague. More recently, margarine was the cure for high cholesterol, now it’s evil incarnate. Just a few months ago, a NYC bureaucrat decided we need to eliminate salt from our diet. Then he recants and declares he only said it for the publicity.
 
I’m not saying I’m anti-organic, anti-vegetable, anti-locavore; even though I just might be anti-vegan. All I am saying is let’s not get militant.

Is there a way to scale down this rhetoric or am I just being a naive rube? Do we have to vanquish someone who doesn’t hold the same opinion as us, or can we respect our differences?  Can’t we all just get along?  OK. I get it. I’m a naive rube.  Welcome me back.

Embracing Bittersweet Fall

Hard to believe but our time in Italy is growing short and little by little we are closing down and ticking things off the list. Jeff has winterized the orto and that feels so final. Sure we have a few leeks and bitter greens left, and the parsley is still happy and vibrant, but for the most part it’s rest time for our vegetable garden.  Even our roof top and balcony gardens have gotten their winter trim.

We picked olives this week, which is another sure sign that it’s time to get ready to head back to New York.  Olive picking is a marvelous excuse to be outside on a gorgeous fall day, to climb a tree, to spend time with friends.  Now if we could solve our olive pressing problems, life would be perfect.  Finding a mill that will press only 100 kilos of olives is turning into a challenge.

Last night we headed to Citta di Castello for their Tartufo Bianco festival which is always a treat.  Huge tents filled with truffle vendors, cheese, porcini, salumis...the smells are intoxicating.  We got side tracked at the immensely crowded Syrah wine bar, then a fabulous dinner at Le Logge, so looks like we need to go back to the festival today if we are going to buy any truffles. Oh, the things we must do.

And speaking of smells, Montone has taken on that smoky, wood fire smell that I love. It  makes me crave roasting meats, chestnuts and big red wines. The past few mornings we’ve seen the heavy morning fog that is typical of this time of year making for spectacular scenery.
Bittersweet signs of fall, no doubt about it.