Memorie di Angelina

Onions are everywhere in Italian cooking. They form part of the flavor base for just about every savory dish you can think of but, besides that, they make for a perfect contorno because they go with just about anything. The most common onion side dish is no doubt cipolline in agrodolce, baby onions braised in a […]

This dish brings back some of my fondest childhood food memories. Calzone di cipolla, or onion pie, is one of the signature dishes of the cuisine of Puglia. My grandfather Lorenzo hailed from a small town outside of Bari, the capital of Puglia, called Grumo Appula. His sister, whom we called Zia Angelina (not to […]

Chicory (cicoria in Italian) is one of my very favorite greens. It brings back memories of Angelina for whom cicoria and escarole were almost daily staples. Maybe that’s why she lived well into her 90s… A great weeknight dinner option, the recipe for this soup is very fast, very simple and very healthy. (If you […]

Risotto is one of my ‘go to’ dishes when I don’t feel like cooking anything elaborate. That may sound odd: risotto has a reputation for being a lot of work and easy to get wrong. And yes, when done badly, risotto can be a rather goopy mess. But it is not really very hard to […]

Where would we be without onions, I ask you? The onion and other members of the allium family provide the flavor base for practically every savory dish in the Italian repertoire. Countless dishes begin with the preparation of a soffritto which, almost always, includes onion. In fact, although it might come as a surprise, I […]

Pasta e fagioli, or pasta and beans, which goes by the amusing nickname ‘pasta fazool‘ in Italian-American slang, is one of the most internationally famous dishes in the entire Italian repertoire.  It is, however, a victim of its own success, and is too often made badly, very badly, which is why I would never order […]

A sformato, which literally means ‘unmolded’ is something like a soufflé without the puff: the main ingredient is mixed with a very stiff béchamel sauce and eggs, then baked in a mold until set. But since the eggs are left whole rather than separated and the whites whipped, a sformato only rises ever so slightly […]