It began with 120 kg of tomatoes. Six huge boxes of small, somewhat oval tomatoes of a Sicilian variety called siccagno, from the word secco, dry. They’re grown in tiny bushes, low to the ground, without any water at all. When you cut them open they’re just flesh, no juice, and deep, deep red. They taste almost savoury, as if they’ve been sprinkled with salt. Intensely tomato-y.

It’s late August and I’ve arrived (with my special little helper) at Anna Tasca Lanza cooking school , a mecca for food lovers and farm to table cooking (the likes of Alice Waters and Grant Achatz have come here, searching for inspiration) in rural, central Sicily. It hasn’t rained since May and the empty, scorched golden hills that we’ve been watching grow since leaving Palermo two hours ago are bone dry. Case Vecchie, the school’s home, led by Fabrizia Lanza in her mother Anna’s footsteps, is like an oasis among the hills — orchards, vegetable gardens, vineyards, hens, a deep, refreshing pool and the deep blue windows and doors lining the stone courtyard are a heavenly sight.

We’ve come to make astrattu or estratto, tomato paste, for the school’s inaugural Tomato Week, a highlight of their program and one of the first gatherings they’ve had since the pandemic began. I always knew I was going to love this but I wasn’t prepared for how deeply these four days would penetrate my whole being. That might sounds over the top but somehow the very act of chopping, stirring, mixing, checking, eating and talking with a group of eight like-minded women was just the balm I needed with all the negative things going on in the world. Tomato paste made the ancient way, using the sun and wind and time, needs care, patience and community. It was a grounding and entirely inspiring experience.

Fabrizia put us to work right away, we spent more than 2 hours chopping tomatoes, then put them to boil with onion, garlic and bay leaf until the pulp gave away completely. An electric passaverdura helped us turn the pulp into juice, spitting out the seeds and skins much like a hand-cranked passaverdura does. The 120 kg of fresh tomato becomes about 70 litres of this pulpy juice. To this, 900 grams of salt is added. Then, out in the hot sun, we poured the juice onto eight large wooden tables set in the protected stone courtyard. They dripped for a day, being carefully checked every 30 minutes or so, the solids settling on the wood, the water dripping off as it should, until we could move the extract onto just four tables. The sun beat down relentlessly on the backs of our necks while we stirred and checked the paste or sliced tomatoes and figs to sun dry on a large rack.

At night, we brought the tables inside, and in the warm morning sun, they came back out again. Soon, we could scrape the extract onto two tables, with more checking, and stirring to allow the crust that had formed on top move to the bottom and the softer, wetter tomato paste to move to the top and finally, it was just one table. We moved from spoons to dough scrapers, and the tomato paste grew denser, darker, deeper red — the smell was unbelievable — tasting so intense, almost candied.

At the end of the third day, we were able to place that last remaining table of tomato paste into a large basin — reduced to about six kilograms now — and then it goes in the shade, inside, and for the first time, covered, to settle until it was solid enough to roll into balls with oiled hands and be placed in glass jars for that taste of Sicilian sunshine throughout the year.

This extract is so good you could eat it by the spoonful, or spread onto crostini of Fabrizia’s homemade bread, sprinkled with some dried oregano and a bit of olive oil. But otherwise you would add it to soup, sauces or stews.

We also made salsa pronta, or bottled tomato sauce, ready to use or “pronta” for a taste of summer all year round. “They come from the same mother,” explains Fabrizia of the tomato paste and the salsa pronta, “But one comes with a dowry of a lot salt — precious salt — and the other with a dowry of basil, garlic and olive oil.”

We made many more delicious things while we were waiting for the sun and wind to do their thing.

We picked figs from the dry, crunchy, sunburnt orchard and we made jam, the creamiest fig sorbet and I contributed a little bit of Tuscan flavour with a schiacciata all’uva made with both grapes and sliced figs. One day Fabrizia made us her gelo di mellone, an absolutely delicious watermelon jelly that was such a treat — I have never tasted a watermelon quite like the ones grown at Case Vecchie. We also made cavatelli with the Case Vecchie durum wheat, and eaten with homegrown almonds and sage, blended into a pesto. Roast pork with mint and garlic. Casatelle — ricotta stuffed into a deceptively thin pastry of ancient grain flour, olive oil and white wine, deep fried and dusted in cinnamon and sugar. Oh and the most wonderful involtini di carne, basically a way to make a tiny bit of meat stretch far, made delicious with breadcrumbs, corinto currants which we had dried in the courtyard and patiently picked off their stems, pistachio and more. When it was too hot to cook, or eat, or even sit in the kitchen, we retreated to the glorious swimming pool with ice cold drinks until the afternoon sun faded a little.

The evening aperitivo sitting in the courtyard was so delightful that we decided that our favourite way to do dinner was in the same place, buffet style, taking plates on our laps and eating in the cooled courtyard with a bottle of wine and plenty of (good, relevant, inspiring) conversation. I might miss those evenings even more than the delicious food.

It was more than a cooking class, more than I had hoped for. It was an inspiration, it was a balm. It was meditative and the connections that were made around that kitchen and that protected/protective courtyard is something I will treasure. I can’t wait to come back next year to host my own workshop there — it will be the week of 5-11 September — and it will be along the same line as Fabrizia’s philosophy, using the bounty of the summer, slow cooking, using our hands and making the most of what we have. We will hopefully visit a local ceramicist and the local cheesemaker for that delicious ricotta. If you’re interested in knowing more about it or booking, send an email to info@annatascalanza.com.

The post Tomato paste making at Anna Tasca Lanza, Sicily first appeared on Emiko Davies.

I was dropping in on Marco’s aunt and uncle, Franca and Riccardo a few years ago. We let ourselves in through the gate, attempting not to let Asia, the giant Maremma sheepdog, escape, and slipping into the house where, behind several piles of books, Riccardo was printing out a short story to share with me. It’s about cake; he thought I would like it.

It was a cake often made by Nonna Maria, a farmer’s daughter from the countryside near Pisa, and a baker. The cake pervades Riccardo’s memory like a ghost. He remembers the smell, the taste, the month of the year – she made it in November, a month of cold, short, rainy days, during a festive season when the fair would come to town. He remembers it as “una bomba” – of calories, that is. A very dense, short cake, heavy with eggs and lard (olive oil and butter were luxuries). It was eaten it around the fire, one piece devoured after another.

Riccardo had spent years searching for this recipe, based entirely on the memory of eating it when he was young. At first we thought it might be like a sort of Florentine schiacciata alla fiorentina, a fluffy, yeasted cake typical of Florence, made exclusively during the Carnival period in February (already that made raised my doubts), heady with the aromas of orange zest and vanilla and enriched with lard. I made it for him to try, but it was too fluffy, too perfumed, too dainty with its veil of powdered sugar and cocoa powder, to be the one.  

“It’s more rustic,” Riccardo said.  

“And more dense, much more dense,” Franca piped up.  

They got married when they were both 17 years old. They have been together for over sixty years and have three great-grandchildren. Even Franca remembers this cake. In fact, although it’s Riccardo’s memory, Franca is a great cook, and she knows cakes, so I listen to her recollection of it too and in particular to a detail that Riccardo doesn’t mention.  

“There were ciccioli in it,” she assures me, speaking of savoury, crunchy, porky bits scattered throughout the cake.  

Ciccioli are small, dry pieces of fatty pork, cooked slowly until dry and all the fat has melted out of them – this part is then drained for making lard. They are at times spiced or salted, but at their simplest, left plain and unseasoned. To the cake, they lend crunch. Similar to pork scratchings, they can be eaten as is as a rather addictive snack, but it’s more traditionally found sprinkled through polenta, bread or, in this case, cake.

I didn’t have to look very far for inspiration – Pellegrino Artusi has a recipe in his nineteenth century cookbook for focaccia coi siccioli (ciccioli). And although he calls it a focaccia, it’s not a bread but actually a sweet, very dense, flat cake. It may sound strange, but the sweet-savoury result is much like wonderful effect of having pancakes with maple syrup and crispy bacon, though much more subtle. It’s a country cake has that has a comforting, satisfying quality worthy of cherishing as a memory for a lifetime.

In memory of Riccardo Cardellicchio (3 May 1939-14 August 2021), a brilliant journalist, author of stories, poems and plays, and at one time the cultural assessor of Fucecchio. I couldn’t have written Tortellini at Midnight without him. Partly, it was for the initial research, like for this recipe, and other details which he remembered better than my mother in law did, being her older brother by 7 years. But then his health deteriorated quickly and he could no longer communicate with me, and he has spent the past couple of years lucid but trapped in a body that would not allow him to talk or move. Later, it was one of his books, Il Pozzo di Muscioro, where he recounts some of the stories of his Nonna Anna (here, her famous polpette), my children’s great-great-grandmother, who ran away with the postman, that helped me finish my cookbook. Grazie Riccardo.

Torta con i ciccioli di Nonna Maria
(Nonna Maria’s lard cake) 

200 grams sugar 
150 grams softened butter 
60 grams of softened lard 
2 whole eggs 
2 egg yolks 
500 grams flour 
60 ml vin santo (or white wine, rum or Marsala) 
zest of 1 lemon or orange 
150 grams of ciccioli (unseasoned, deep fried pork fat pieces), finely chopped 
powdered sugar, for serving 

Cream together the sugar, butter and lard. Add the eggs and yolks one at a time until well incorporated. Mix in the flour and, once smooth, the wine, followed by the zest and the ciccioli pieces. Stir until just combined.  Spread out the mixture onto a rectangular tin (such as a brownie pan) lined with baking paper. Bake at 180ºC for approximately 45 minutes or until deep golden brown on top and springy in the middle. Cut into squares and serve dusted in powdered sugar. 

This cake photograph is by Lauren Bamford, styled by Deb Kaloper for my cookbook, Tortellini at Midnight, where this extract is also from. The black and white photographs are of young Riccardo with his parents Lina and Mario in Turin, where they lived until moving to Tuscany during the Second World War.

The post Riccardo’s Lost Recipe – Torta con i ciccioli first appeared on Emiko Davies.

Ever since losing my ice cream maker (I lent it to a friend who put it in the dishwasher — never do that!), homemade semifreddi and granita have taken over as my go-to summer desserts when it is truly unthinkable to turn on the oven. The beauty of making semifreddo, which usually has a base of pure whipped cream, whipped egg whites (an Italian meringue) or both is that you can flavour it with whatever you like — I’ve used it with some abundant seasonal fruit that we had too much of, but you could also add (or replace with) liqueurs, coffee, chocolate in any form, nuts, or even nougat.

Here you can find my gianduia semifreddo with chocolate and hazelnuts for Food52, and here there is a version I wrote about for Marcella Hazan’s stracciatella semifreddo (like a chocolate chip) for Corriere della Sera and there is also this simple semifreddo with honey and berries for Good Food Australia. I also have an easy chocolate semifreddo in my dessert cookbook, Torta della Nonna.

Italian semifreddo is often compared to French parfait. But true Italian semifreddo is made by folding whipped cream into Italian meringue (which is where the egg whites are whipped with boiling hot sugar syrup, which cooks them and stabilises them). The whipping is vital as it creates air, making a creamy semifreddo that you don’t need to churn. It’s almost like a frozen mousse.

Some semifreddi are made with even simpler methods, like whipping melted chocolate and cream until fluffy and then freezing it and this really appealed to me because, well to be perfectly honest, in the heat we are having here I just felt like doing as little possible!

So this is a bit of an experiment because unlike the semifreddi I usually make with meringue, this one is just barely sweetened whipped cream, a little yogurt for acidity and cherries.

I always quote Marcella when talking about semifreddi because when she said in an interview in 1987 with the New York Times, “Everyone can invent one,” she was perfectly right.

My best tips for making semifreddo: Use very cold cream — some even like to put the bowl and the beaters for whipping the cream in the fridge to chill too. And if you are using the meringue, use room temperature egg whites for the best whipping. Equally important is to be careful to not over-whip – both the cream and (if using) meringue for semifreddo should be whipped to soft and fluffy peaks, but not stiff, firm peaks otherwise the resulting semifreddo can have a crumbly texture rather than a creamy one.

On the right container to freeze it in: A loaf pan or something rectangular and long is ideal. Rectangular is traditional only because it makes it easy to cut into slices to serve. But for a different look, you could use a round mould and cut into slices like cake – pudding moulds and bundt pans make pretty semifreddi. You can even make individual semifreddi in small teacups or ramekins. I used my daughter’s lunch box as it already has a handy lid!

Cherry semifreddo

This makes enough for 8 slices, and you could halve this if you wanted but the question would be finding the right sized container to freeze it in so they are nice thick slices. Remember that the good thing about semifreddo is it keeps very well in the freezer.

400 grams of cherries
375 ml (1 1/2 cups) chilled cream
4 tablespoons of fine sugar
60 ml or so (1/4 cup) of thick natural yogurt

Pit the cherries (if you don’t have a cherry pitter, just cut them in half, and remove the pips after they are cooked and cooled, it’s a bit messy but easy) and place them in a saucepan with half of the sugar and a splash of water. Heat gently until they begin releasing juice and simmering, and stir occasionally, adding water as needed so that the fruit cooks in its own juices. It should take about 15 minutes. Let cool completely.

Whip the cream in a chilled bowl. When it starts to thicken, add the rest of the sugar until incorporated. Stop whipping when the cream begins to hold peaks. Stir in the yogurt.

Pour half of the cherries in to the bottom of the pan and then cover with the cream mixture. Let it freeze 4-5 hours or overnight. Turn the semifreddo over onto a serving plate and cut into thick slices. Spoon over the rest of the cherries. Semifreddo is really at its best when you let it sit for about 10 minutes or so (well in this heat 5 was enough) for the semifreddo to soften — it should be “half” frozen, as its name suggests, which is a lovely spot between frozen and melting when it is still chilled but very creamy.

I discovered that this happens to be absolutely delightful when served over the top of a brownie or flourless chocolate cake like torta caprese!

The post An idea for a cherry semifreddo first appeared on Emiko Davies.

We spent a week in our favourite holiday place, the very special Giglio island, a tiny island in Southern Tuscany that can only be reached by ferry from Porto Santo Stefano. It’s the kind of place where time slows down and there is a simplicity to the rhythm of the days when you’re on an island like this so we really slow down when we are here (especially in a spot like Pardini’s Hermitage, where we stayed one year).

One of the things I love most about being in a place that isn’t home is tasting all the typical things or local produce that you don’t get anywhere else. Here on Giglio, that means things like fist sized jammy figs unlike any that I’ve tasted before, tiny, sweet yellow plums, apricots that taste like sunshine and tonnina, which is a unique salted tuna preparation. Once you desalt it, you combine it with some aromatics like bay leaf and chilli peppers and put it under oil – it is so delicious on sandwiches or in salad, much like how you’d use tinned tuna but turbo charged with flavour and with an almost stringy texture. For sweet tooths, there is also panficato, a figgy, chocolately dense bun of goodness, said to be related to the Sienese panforte.

The other thing I can’t resist here is the fresh seafood. The variety of fish and shellfish from the Tuscan archipelago is so wonderful and to get it so fresh from the passing fish trucks from the Porto Santo Stefano Fishing Co-op that park next to the beach at Campese (or up in the main piazza outside the walls of Castello or by the port) is such a treat. You’ll hear them coming with their megaphone announcing their arrival to beachgoers! There’s also a larger van on Fridays at the little weekly market in Campese.

One particular day, Marco went to see what was on offer. I had my eye on the baby calamari but the man in front of us took them all with one fell swoop. Marco ended up with a small scorpion fish, a bag full of mussels still with their beards and barnacles slinging to them, a bag of proper vongole veraci (you can tell them from other varieties that are often passed as vongole veraci as they have two siphons not one), and two big handfuls of beautiful pink prawns, all caught between here and Monte Argentario. A fish soup was in order.

This is more a broth with chunky fish pieces, rather than a thicker soup. Vital are thick pieces of bread toasted, then rubbed with a garlic clove, to dunk in the broth. Have extras. Also important is to have whole fish – it doesn’t have to be scorpion fish, any white fish will do (just don’t use oily fish like bonito, mackerel or sardines, they are my favourite fish in general but for soup they can be too bitter), and in fact in Italy they often have a basket of “pesce da zuppa” on offer, which are small fish that are really too small for any other preparations other than frying them whole or throwing them directly into a pot for soup. The whole fish adds so much more flavour to the dish than just fillet, add do the prawn shells. Don’t waste those either!

If you have any leftovers – which we did as this makes a really generous amount for four – you can pass the fish through a passatutto or a mouli, and reduce the broth a little or add a touch of tomato passata, then cook some short pasta in it for a satisfying, brothy pasta. If you need to pump it up a bit to spread it out, add a small tin of cooked cannellini beans or chickpeas.

Brodetto di pesce di Marco
Marco’s Giglio island fish soup

Note: Marco likes scorpion fish (scorfano), chopped into large pieces, which the fishmonger can do for you if you like. You could also use a handful of small whole fish, or opt for other white fish like tub gurnard (gallinella). The key is that they are whole, for more flavour, and white fish rather than oily fish. To clean the mussels, make sure to pull out their beards and give them a scrub if they are as fresh as Giglio island ones! Store bought are probably already cleaned and ready to go. For the clams, see this post on a very detailed description of how to purge clams properly.

For 4 people

400 g of whole fresh prawns
2 cloves of garlic, peeled and squashed with the side of a knife
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
10 cherry tomatoes, halved
Handful of chopped fresh parsley or basil (save the stalks)
500 g whole white fish such as scorpion fish or tub gurnard
2 glasses of white wine
1 small dried or fresh chilli
500 g mixed (cleaned) mussels and (purged) vongole clams
Juice of half a lemon
Toasted bread rubbed with a garlic clove for serving

Remove the heads and shells of the prawns and set the flesh aside. Place the heads and shells in a frying pan with the garlic and cook over medium heat until the shells are toasted and the garlic is lightly browned.

Add the tomatoes and the stalks of the herbs, and season with a good pinch of salt and some freshly cracked pepper and cook for 5 minutes, then add the white wine. Keep simmering and when reduced a little, add enough water to cover, add the chilli and let the broth cook for 20-30 minutes.

At this point you have two options. Option 1: pass the broth through a passatutto (mouli) for a smooth, slightly thicker (and less fiddly to eat) soup, or option 2: simply strain and remove only the shells and the head of the prawns, putting back the tomato and garlic in the pan (we chose the latter here).

Whichever you choose, now bring the broth back to a simmer, add the whole fish pieces and cook for 2 minutes, then the clam and mussels, cook until they open, which should only take a couple of minutes at most, and at the last minute add the prawns. Adjust for seasoning with salt, pepper if needed, and the lemon juice. Sprinkle over the fresh herbs.

Serve the soup with plenty of toasted bread rubbed with a clove of garlic. An absolutely stunning and delicious dish, which we washed down with a precious amber glass of ansonaca from Francesco Carfagna’s wild, Altura vineyard on the southern side of the island.

P.S. If you like fish soup, you might like to check out this unusual Tuscan soup, zuppa corsa.

I’m so pleased to announce this family-friendly gathering — which is open to anyone who is curious, wants to make a connection, enjoys slow travel, good food, good wine and good company — together with our friends Martin and Taryn of Quartier Collective.

We will spend 5 nights together, from 11-16 October 2021, in the blissful Villa Pienza, which has a 360 degree view of the Valdorcia countryside. Activities are planned each day, but there is also plenty of time to relax and enjoy the villa, which is a beautifully restored Tuscan farmhouse with a heated saltwater pool, yoga studio, hammocks, cosy communal living rooms and billiard room. We will show you our favourite artisans and organic produce in the area and go truffle hunting, wine tasting, visit hot springs, pet farm animals, taste the best pecorino cheese, as well as visiting some of the most charming medieval towns in the area. Most evenings we will be relaxing at the villa, making and enjoying dinner together.

Our days will look a little like this:

Day 1: Afternoon arrival and welcome drinks. Long table dinner at the villa.

Day 2: After breakfast, we set out for a truffle hunt in the woods on the property of a wonderful organic farm and one of the best Pecorino di Pienza cheese producers in the area. This unique landscape known as the Crete Senesi is known for both white truffles and black truffles. With our truffle hunter and his dog hopefully we will find some of the prized white ones at this time of the year, then we’ll sit down for lunch where we can also taste the cheeses and a truffle meal.

After lunch, time to relax at the villa and anyone who would like to help make dinner is welcome to join in making fresh pici pasta with Emiko, the most well-known pasta dish of the Valdorcia, which can be served all’aglione (a garlic and tomato sauce) or cacio e pepe (with pecorino cheese and pepper). Marco will be opening some wines and can take the grown ups through an informal tasting of wines from the area. Dinner at the villa of antipasti, pasta, dessert and wine.

Day 3: After a late breakfast and morning spent at the villa (maybe time for some yoga in the studio or a swim in the heated pool), we will visit an organic producer of ancient grains and their mill, where they make pasta everyday. We will also stop here for a light lunch too, for a taste of local specialties.

After lunch we will visit Bagno Vignoni, a charming medieval hamlet famous for its curative hot springs since the times of Catherine of Siena. These hot springs are the hottest in Tuscany and have volcanic origins from about 1000 meters below the surface and anyone can visit them in the pools of the village’s two hotels or by walking down the hillside to the ancient Parco del Mulino (park of the mills), where there is a slightly cooler natural pool. We will have free time here to explore this beautiful village. You can relax in one of the cafes and stroll around, or go for a swim at one of the town’s thermal pools (an entry fee of around 22 euro for half day) or come for a mini trek down the hillside to the natural one, a short but steep 5 minute walk. We will have dinner in a wonderful trattoria here.

Day 4: Today after breakfast we can go exploring some of the Val d’Orcia and its towns and other beautiful gems like the Vitaleta Chapel and the town of San Quirico d’Orcia, which has a beautiful garden called Horti Leone which was constructed in the Renaissance (they say it was designed by Michelangelo) as a public resting stop for those on the pilgrim route.

Lunch and siesta back at the villa, then in the afternoon we will stop in at Montepulciano, a historic hilltop town enclosed in a 14th century wall, there’s a wonderful historic cafe here for some refreshments, then we will visit a flower farm where we can pick flowers, make a small posy or wreath and have aperitivo in the beautiful panoramic garden before heading back to the villa for pizza night.

Day 5: A slow breakfast before a visit to a winery and organic farm that produces beer, wine and honey (and they also have a collection of cute farm animals and a picturesque view of Pienza). We will have lunch here at their food truck with a natural wine tasting too, before heading finally to Pienza, the “ideal” Renaissance city: great views, great gelato, cheese shops, beautiful piazza and a good spot for aperitivo with a view. After an initial walk to the best gelateria in town get your bearings, we will have free time here to explore the wonderful shops and little streets. For the kids, there will be a one hour workshop in a little studio and shop of all things made with recycled materials. We can meet on the wall for aperitivo before heading back to the villa for our last dinner together.

Day 6: Our last breakfast together and goodbyes.

To participate, the cost per adult is 3500 euro (children 2000 euro). This price includes everything (board, food, drinks, activities, and your charming hosts) except what you choose to do during your free time. To confirm your place we ask a 40% deposit. Note that we have limited space of only 6 rooms, with a possible wait list for a second week.

Covid-19: We will do everything to operate in a covid-safe environment, so guests (children 12 and under are exempt) will need to show either a covid-19 negative test or proof of recovery from covid-19, or vaccination, which you will likely have to do anyway on your travels here. Your own travel insurance (not included) is a must.

If you would like to register for this workshop, please send an email to martin@quartiercollective.com for the FAQs and to submit your registration.

I had the pleasure of a truly relaxing and rewarding getaway earlier this month in the Dolomites, an area of Italy I have only scratched the surface of so far, but that is so worth digging deeper into! I was invited to stay at Adler Dolomiti in the heart of the charming centro storico of Ortisei (more on this soon), and at their sister property, Adler Lodge Ritten, in the beautiful, unspoilt Alpine highlands of Ritten (also known as Renon), sitting northeast of Bolzano in the South Tyrol.

At 1,100+ meters above sea level and with the Dolomites as a stunning backdrop, it feels like being in an entirely different world, so it is almost hard to believe that this is just a 3 hour train ride from Florence to Bolzano — and then an incredible 12-minute floating ride in the clouds on a cable car (the Funivia) to a little forest train that brings you right to the lodge in Ritten.

This was an absolutely beautiful stay, I can wholeheartedly say one of the most rejuvenating, relaxing and refreshing stays — the unbeatable mountain views, the heated infinity pool, Finnish saunas with ice cold pools in the forest (and even a private one in the room), yoga amongst the trees, cosy pine cabins with a view and Slow Food-inspired, Farm to Table fine cuisine. But I think another part of the reason this is so relaxing is the format of the stay, which is all inclusive full board, meaning all the food and drink and scheduled activities are all included. The mini bar, the breakfast and lunch buffets, the afternoon tea offering of cakes, and of course dinner. You can help yourself to wine and soft drinks (I loved the local Kohl juices, they are based just down the road and, based on the juice of different varieties of mountain apples in many different flavours, are something special) in the lobby’s lounge area, or ask for a cocktail or a tisane of mountain herbs on the deck. It’s all included. You don’t need to think about it.

For me, dinner was the highlight. I would come back and stay here just to be able to taste head chef Hannes Pignater’s menu again. And actually it is the only way you can taste his food because the restaurant is not open to the public — only for guests. Being a private restaurant, it’s not up for certifications like Slow Food or awards from the Michelin guide, but it is in every way a restaurant that upholds both Slow Food ideals and Michelin quality and skill.

There are two menus offered at dinner, an à la carte menu that changes daily and the Farm to Table menu, which Hannes, who is from Alto Adige, tells me is “his identity.” I saved it for the last night because I like to do that, save the best for last, but honestly the à la carte menu was a delight as well. We tried raw, marinated turnip and a beautiful tomato broth with trout, and venison with coffee and braised eschalot. One of the things that struck me was the taste of his canederli, the traditional bread dumplings of Alto Adige, which were served on a bed of finely sliced braised cabbage and a delicious jus. When cut open, inside were crispy, delicate tasty pieces of cubed potato and Grammlen, pork scratchings, a traditional frugal specialty from Austria and a recipe learned by Hannes’ Austrian mother in law, he tells me. To me it tasted of my Japanese grandmother’s okonomiyaki, which is like a pancake made with cabbage, pork belly and the crispy bits leftover from frying tempura with a dark, sweet sauce over the top and this comparison is something I will never forget.

When I sat down the next day to chat with Hannes before trying the Farm to Table menu, amongst many things we talked about the mix of cultures in this corner of Italy (long part of the Austrian empire, Alto Adige became part of Italy in 1919, in fact 95% of the population speak German as their first language, just 4.5% are mother tongue Italian) with both influencing what he eats at home and cooks for his farm to table menu. He seeks out the most interesting local producers to inspire his menus, from the goats cheese to organic beef (served as a tartare) to the ancient grains for pasta (farro dicocco nero which is made into tagliolini in Hannes’ kitchen and served with local smoked cheese and juniper jus, is being produced in extremely small quantities, recounts Hannes, by a German farmer who grew up here as a child and wanting to escape his city life, decided to farm something that was once all over Ritten and couldn’t be found anymore).

Hannes has built an important relationship with local producers and farmers, many of whom are young and often work part time jobs to help support their businesses. He hopes to be able to guarantee them enough work to keep them going, so they can just focus on the farming, and would rather nurture this relationship with the producers and wait to be able to use their local products than find other quicker or easier alternatives. He pointed out to me that, just like a wine list has the name of the producer, the year and such, that he wanted to do the same on his menu, to amplify the farmer, the face and the person behind the ingredients, which is part of the story to tell — so he does indeed list the producer an the place underneath the Farm to Table dishes.

When I asked if he finds there is something that the clientele asks for that he has to accommodate for — I suppose I was curious if they prefer more “pan-Italian” dishes or if they want the local fare, Hannes rightly tells me that he has long stopped asking what the clients wants and instead offers what he wants to show them, what products he wants them to try. And after hearing how passionately he speaks about the produce and the area, I only want to eat what Hannes tells me I should try.

My favourite dish next to the tagliolini was a last minute change to the Farm to Table menu that night — a wonderful broth infused with locally grown saffron (another young, new producer) and smoked trout from the Venosta Valley. It was absolutely delicious, yet delicate and elegant that felt like a warm, enveloping embrace — a little bit like how I felt about this entire stay.

This was a Press Trip organised by TN Hotel Media Consulting but the views expressed are, as always here, purely my own opinion.

I’m counting down the days until we get back to our favourite annual Tuscan holiday spot, Giglio island, and in the meantime I’m feeling a little bit nostalgic about the cookbook where this recipe for Insalata Gigliese (a deliciously refreshing salad of tomatoes and celery) comes from, Acquacotta. I recently found out that it is getting harder to find copies of Acquacotta because it sadly isn’t going back into another reprint, which is such a shame because to be perfectly honest it is my favourite.

It came out 5 years ago in March 2016 and is a celebration of a little part of Tuscany that we called home for 6 months in 2015 when my husband Marco was head sommelier of the divine Pellicano Hotel. We lived in the little fishing port of Porto Ercole in Monte Argentario: a gem. The whole area of Southern Tuscany, a small part of the Maremma, from Giglio Island to Capalbio to moody Pitigliano, which looks as if it’s carved right out of tufa, to the hot springs of Saturnia, is an incredibly beautiful, rugged and still undiscovered part of Tuscany.

The landscape is one of the things that soothes my soul as it reminds me of a mixture of Italian coast and the southeastern Australian coast, where I grew up — the best of both worlds. So that gets me every time, but then there is the food. It’s the kind of food I really love: wild food from the mountains, incomparable seafood, delicious cheese, grains and legumes from the farms and rustic, ancient sweet treats. And something strangely that reminds me of Japanese food, not in the flavours (which are thoroughly mediterranean) but in the ingredients themselves and how they are used. I think as well it is just that mix of mountain and sea coming together, which is the ideal combination in Japanese cuisine too — with a similar landscape to Monte Argentario of mountains meeting the sea. So it is a combination of recipes and stories about a place that is really close to my heart.

When you see these recipes, I think they’ll surprise you, they aren’t what most people know of as “Tuscan food” (which is generally speaking quite meat and carbohydrate heavy!) and yet they are so traditional and so intertwined with the landscape around them. Of the 80 recipes, more than half are vegetarian (and of those, more than half are vegan) and over a third are gluten free (lots of chestnuts, rice and polenta here) and that’s not counting the many pasta recipes that could simply be substituted with gluten free pasta. Every dish tells a very unique story.

This salad’s story is about Giglio Island. The main protagonists are tomatoes and celery and it is so fresh and so good, I love it especially with grilled fish. We fell in love with Giglio when we visited for the first time while living in Porto Ercole to see some winemaker friends Francesco Carfagna and his family, who make the most delicious macerated ansonica. You can only reach Giglio by boat from Monte Argentario, but you have to drive over the bigger port, Porto Santo Stefano. Because of this it’s a lesser-trodden part of the coast (as the Maremma is in general). Even in the middle of summer it’s nowhere near as crowded as the rest of the Italian coast and that is a big part of why I love it so much. You can catch a glimpse of it in this 24 hour visit recap and also in this magical hideaway on the island too.

Insalata Gigliese (Tomato and celery salad) from Acquacotta

One bite of this salad and I imagine I’m looking over that absolutely crystal sea and those huge granite rocks, a glass of amber coloured ansonica in hand. What I love about this salad is that the celery leaves are treated almost like a herb – so pick a nice stalk of celery that’s not too large and old (which will be tough), something young and tender with healthy leaves. It’s a good one to prepare in advance to give the flavours a chance to mingle.

Serves 4 as a side dish.

• 2 spring onions, finely sliced
• 4 young celery stalks, leaves and all, finely sliced
• 4 ripe tomatoes, diced
• 2-3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 1 1/2 tablespoons of red wine vinegar
• 1 handful of flat leaf parsley, finely chopped

Put the sliced spring onions (try red onion if you don’t have spring onion) in a bowl of cold water for 10 minutes. Drain, then toss together with the celery and tomatoes. Dress with olive oil and vinegar and season with salt and pepper about 30 minutes before you want to serve it. This gives the ingredients a bit of time to get to know each other. Finally, toss through the parsley and serve.

{This photo above of the salad is by Lauren Bamford, styled by Deb Kaloper for Acquacotta}

As some of you know, we recently bought and renovated our first home — right out of lockdown in 2020 — in the place my husband Marco was born, San Miniato. It’s a hill top village between Florence and Pisa, and equidistant to Siena, San Gimignano, Livorno (the sea! The fish market!), Lucca and Pistoia. It’s really in the heart of everything. From the large windows of our home, a 100 square metre apartment that was built in 1800, we have sunset views over the valley and even the Apuane mountains, where I can tell with just a glance at what the weather is like or what season it is — so far I’ve tracked the blossoming of the walnut tree, the elderflower and False Acacia. I’ve noted the rambling blackberries and loquats that are way out of our reach. A garden is missing but somehow, seeing this horizon every day, and filling my senses with this nature and greenery, is a huge comfort.

We renovated the apartment on a budget, enough to make it liveable and “us,” while looking towards whatever thing we could do to make it more energy efficient and sustainable, and still adhering to the rules that surround renovating historic properties — which meant, we kept the original floors with their decorative cement tiles known as cementine in Italian, and we kept the charmingly old fashioned bathroom as it was, but we are replacing all the old, drafty, badly painted single-pane windows (taking advantage of a new government bonus called bonus infissi that will cover 50% of these expenses). The most exciting parts of the renovation however was building the kitchen and I’m sure that’s what you have come here for too!

Many of my readers followed the whole process over on Instagram as it was unfolding and I got many questions (and great advice!) about our choices in the kitchen that I promised I’d respond to. We finally moved in to our home in February and now, a few months in (with not only daily usage but I’ve just finished shooting my new cookbook all on my own here), I thought I would let you know how it is all going. I was recently visiting an architect friend in Venice and his first question that he wanted to know is:

What is one thing that I like best about the new kitchen?

It is a good question, because there are many things I like but I couldn’t help but blurt out right away: “It is so easy to clean!” Honestly, let’s be practical. New kitchens are lovely and choosing them are fun but it’s so hard to know until you put it into good use whether you really did make all the right choices. So this for me, right now, is my favourite thing about the kitchen. It cleans like a dream. It feels effortless!

What material are your beautiful worktops made from and how are you finding them?

This in some form is probably the most asked question I get! I am in love with marble terrazzo, so it was hard to resist when choosing what kind of counter top. Terrazzo is a traditional eighteenth century northern Italian (in Italian actually it is called graniglia or  pavimento alla veneziana, referring to the classic Venetian pavements) technique of reutilising off cuts of quartz, stone or marble and mixed together and cast with a binder (this one is bound with resin). Ours is marble and made in Verona by Santa Margherita and this colour combination is called Vendome.

I am finding it very practical as you don’t need to be as careful of stains as you do with marble or wood tops as we used to have (I am so tired of nagging Marco about wine stains!). Cleaning is so easy. However, like a whole marble slab, you do need to be careful about acidic ingredients (wine! Also coffee, lemon, juice, vinegar etc) and you do need to make sure to use a pH neutral cleaner for this reason too. But for the most part a quick clean up ensures that even a small spill doesn’t affect the finish of the terrazzo — if you missed a spill, what happens is you’ll see a duller spot at a certain angle — there are special creams and polishes you can use to touch these up and maintain the shine of your marble and terrazzo.

Very interested in your appliances. How’s the hob and dishwasher, size and function. Any regrets?

I have a dishwasher for the first time in my life and for the amount of cooking I do, this is so freeing! I am a little bit in love with the dishwasher. It’s a horizontal 90cm long design, from Smeg, so it is full size but it doesn’t go all the way down to the ground so you don’t have to bend down so much (I feel old as I write this but let’s be practical!). It is also designed to actually wash your dishes — which it does beautifully — so you do not need to rinse anything before putting them in. I keep testing it. I put things in there like a bowl I made a sticky dough in or a blender I made a smoothie in, a pan that I shouldn’t have tried to cook eggs in and I even leave them overnight to crust up. Comes out perfect. Watching my parents and mother in law load their dishwashers where they wash everything before putting it in, I always thought was so much work and so counterproductive. This is not a sponsored post, I’m sure this goes for most new dishwashers these days, but the point of this dishwasher is (and this is written multiple times in the instructions manual) that pre-washing is simply a waste of water and energy and therefore is not sustainable. So there’s the end of that argument! Don’t pre-wash your dishes.

I’m sure a very big part of my kitchen love is the induction stove top. It is a wide 90cm hob, equivalent to 6 hobs but these also work in “zones” so there are three zones where you can technically fit as many pots and pans as you can. I love the size — there is more space to spread out, I am often cooking side by side with Marco, or cooking multiple things for a recipe test and family meals, so I am absolutely loving the size. No regrets!

Do you have an induction or gas cooktop?

Why we chose induction — I get asked about this a lot. Marco and I have previously only ever both had gas stovetops, and years ago I thought I wouldn’t be converted, perhaps because I like the idea of cooking over a flame, perhaps something about the induction top reminded me too much of an electric stovetop that is my least favourite form of cooking. However, in designing our new kitchen we decided on induction purely for energy-efficiency and sustainability (although Marco had also convinced me that it would be perfect for beautiful food because this is what they use in the Michelin star kitchen where he works). We wanted to move away from relying on gas as a non-renewable energy source. We still have gas in this old apartment for heating and heating hot water — this is something I hope to change one day, maybe as new options come in (we cannot put solar panels on the roof because of rules surrounding preserving the historical centre of Italian villages – ie for aesthetics). But at least we are less reliant on gas for the kitchen, which I admit we use a LOT.

We did have to make sure that we could use our exisiting pots and pans on the induction stove top — you just place a magnet on the bottom and see if it sticks. Sadly, I can’t use the few copper pots I own (though they still work nicely in the oven so I kept them) and some small pans I gave away that we can’t use here anymore. I was thrilled that my cast iron pan still works wonderfully. We invested in a couple of good, new pots and pans though and we use these all the time.

I can say after using induction for three months now that I love it, I’ve cooked an entire new cookbook with it, and I have no regrets about our choice. It is easy to use, easy to control, water comes to a boil so quickly — I’m still being caught by surprise by it. Food cooks beautifully, even things that need to sear quickly or be cooked on very high heat. The only time that I’ve had a problem is a pot of liquid like milk that boils over and spills onto the cooktop sends the system bonkers and it turns off. But the same would happen on a gas stovetop too and you have to wait until it dries before lighting it again. Oh and did I mention it is so easy to clean — a wipe and you are done.

Where do you store your plates and pans? Are you planning on putting in upper cabinets?

I was a tiny bit worried before we moved in that we wouldn’t have enough space for our things as we decided to forego any upper cabinets on the wall in favour of a lighter, brighter space — there is also a questionable pipe that goes behind this wall diagonally like a tree branch that we need to avoid if we put holes anywhere (you can see it in the before and after photos below!). So we went for a long rod (it’s actually 2 of the Fintorp rods from Ikea) for hanging larger utensils and accessories that we use often, and another two for pans on the wall. It means they’re on display all the time, quite like open shelves, but everything is so conveniently at our fingertips. I’m also really happy with the deep, wide drawers that we have for cutlery (especially the hidden knife drawer, it is now my favourite place for knives rather than a knife rack) and the bottom drawer for pots.

We have a separate cabinet for crockery, glasses and baking trays/cake pans that is working well for us. We also turned a funny little room off to the side of the kitchen into an open pantry with shelves (see the after photos below. It is a small room with a tiny window that is shared with the washing machine — my first time ever since moving to Italy not having a washing machine in the kitchen). Marco’s great-grandfather Angiolino’s old marble table, upcycled from a marble slab from the alimentari Angiolino owned before the Second World War and rescued from my mother in law’s attic sits in the middle of the whole kitchen.

Where did you get your pans/equipment/light switches/appliances/kitchen cabinets etc from?

For those interested in where we sourced some of the things you see here, I have a list of sources below, also for some details in the rest of the house that I’ve been asked about.

As much as possible I wanted to support local companies and Very Simple Kitchen were a big part of making my dream sustainable kitchen come true — someone asked me what the role of a kitchen designer does, and I have to say that what Federica and Riccardo did for me was invaluable! Their signature stainless steel kitchen modules are inspired by vintage industrial work benches, in other words, built to last and be practical but they can powder coat them in any colour you can imagine (we chose them in a deep teal green that they call ‘Comodoro’, it’s a chameleon, it changes hue depending on the light and sometimes looks dark blue). They made really good suggestions about the best, most practical layout — we wanted to maximise the counter space of the 3 metre long space we had, and have a huge sink and the 90cm induction; it was also their idea to hide the dishwasher to look like one of the drawers. I love what they did. Also using their contacts we also got a good discount on the appliances and terrazzo top. (Full disclosure, I only paid for half of the kitchen in return for visibility about their work, but I had already approached them over a year before we worked on this together to see their kitchens and I would highly recommend them now that I’ve been using it).

We chose Smeg for all our appliances, choosing the most energy efficient models we could afford in our budget (they’re high quality, Italian and rate well in terms of sustainability, I found this Ethical Consumer guide from the UK really useful, you can search their product guides to dishwashers, fridges, ovens, etc and find a list of which companies rate the most sustainable).

Can you share your budget?

We went over our restoration budget (is it ever possible not to?), especially once we removed the kitchen and I realised how awful the old white tiles were, but below you’ll see some of the numbers for the kitchen.

Our biggest expenses after the actual kitchen were the electrician and the lights/switches/cables, as we had to entirely redo the extremely outdated electrical system in the apartment. This turned out to be tricky because we couldn’t put the wires inside the walls anywhere (being load bearing walls) or under the floors (being heritage) so they had to be external and we went for a vintage style braided silk wire coverings (copper pipes in the bathroom). It was time consuming too. We ended up having to cover some larger wires for the heavy appliances just above the kitchen with drywall (and conveniently some lights went in here too). The builders were another a big expense but they were amazing, they retiled the kitchen, the toilet and fixed up many general little issues all over the house (for example removing the horrible pvc covers that covered the pipes and tubes in every room that the previous owners had installed; we simply left them exposed and painted them white) as well as painting the entire house and more. The plumber had to move the original sink taps towards the window and close off access to gas in the kitchen. I haven’t included those costs in the kitchen breakdown but I would estimate their combined work in this portion of the house to be about 3,000 euro.

In general, some other expenses to consider when buying property in Italy is the real estate agent’s commission (2%) and the cost of the notary and the surveyor (geometra) or architect who will see through the project, sign off on paperwork, research any past issues or interventions with the house and be present at all the major work. It all adds up!

Kitchen by Very Simple Kitchen (Bologna), including transport and mounting: 9,000 euro

Smeg appliances including Dishwasher (STO905-1), Induction Stovetop (SIM693WLD), Oven (SF6390XE), Fridge/freezer (FC183PXNE), Range Hood (KATE900EX), total: 3,800 euro

Kitchen tiles/backsplash are Atlas in Ivory by Cifre Ceramica (Spain): 28 euro per square metre and we bought some extra just in case so in the end I think we ended up with about 4 square metres of tiles, another 112 euro.

Before and After scenes:

Ready for a house tour?! Below you’ll find some of my favourite before and after (and a few during) of the process. The main projects were obviously the kitchen and the toilet. We left the bathroom as it was except for changing the taps, shower and sink — it made such a difference. The radiators were in pretty awful condition in all the rooms. I simply painted them and they looked brand new — you can buy special paint that is heat resistant for radiators. I recommend the spray paint version so you won’t see any streaks.

Before: The living room

After: The living room

Before: The kitchen!

After!

Before: The kitchen cabinets

After: The kitchen

Before: We moved the taps closer to the window to maximise counter space

Halfway through! We took out the gas, moved the water pipes and redid the tiles.

After: (and here is where the dishwasher is hidden)

After: my cookbooks, pans and the pantry

Before: The bathroom

After: The bathroom (we changed the taps and shower, sink, mirror and lights and the builders tidied up the tiles behind the sink)

After: In love with the new shower!

Before: The ghastly toilet

After: the toilet

Details in the bathroom

After: Details in the toilet

After: The girls’ room (still a work in progress!)

After: We had some of the doors restored rather than get new ones and I’m so glad we did this

Sources:

Ceramic light switches by Fontini (Garby series, Spain) and Fanton (“Country” series, Italy) which in Italy you can buy online here

Pans and olive wood boards and utensils and copper utensil holder by Ruffoni (Piemonte)

Washable paper bag containers in pantry and bathroom by Uashmama (Tuscany)

Kids bunk beds — which I get asked a lot about — are the Kura bed from Ikea!

Cotton curtains for bunk beds were repurposed from a long window curtain by Numero 74

Bathroom mirror and shelf from Zara Home

Taps and shower head by Bugnatese in “Classic” series

Hexagonal terracotta tiles in toilet by Cotto Impruneta (Tuscany)

Linen curtain in bathroom made from vintage linen from La Grosse Toile (France)

Subway tiles in toilet by Artens (a good solution for small budgets! 12 euro per square metre).

Artwork around the house from my children, flea markets, Marta Abbott, La Tipografa Toscana, me, Arts Project Australia.

If you love cooking and all of Italy’s regional food traditions then probably you have already heard of Anna Tasca Lanza cooking school in Sicily. It is run by Fabrizia Lanza, whose mother Anna founded the school in the 1980s. Every year Fabrizia hosts a number of students from all over the world at Case Vecchie, Fabrizia’s beautiful nineteenth century property in central Sicily with organic vegetable gardens, fruit and olive orchards, wheat fields and 500 hectares of vineyard (the Tasca d’Almerita winery). Since 2016 she has run Cook the Farm, a two-month long, immersive, educational winter programme of food experts that goes beyond just the kitchen, with lectures, tastings as well as hands on cooking too. And in the summer she runs shorter workshops with co-hosts from around the world with various themes.

I was thrilled when Fabrizia contacted me last year and we began planning a workshop — with all fingers crossed — for May 24-29th, 2021 and here we are, still keen but we are still playing things by ear, waiting to find out if the world is ready, and if anyone is able to come to it. It may be pushed to June 7th-12th. My workshop at Case Vecchie will be based on pasta and seasonal sweets, accommodation will be in the beautiful, rustic rooms of Case Vecchie, with views of the vineyard and garden, furnished with pieces from the original estate. You can enquire directly through this form, if interested and hopefully we can rustle up a wonderful week together in Sicily.

I love this description of Case Vecchie that Fabrizia has on her website:

Perched on a working vineyard and surrounded by cultivated land, the 19th-century farmhouse Case Vecchie is near to nowhere. Its remote location makes for stunning panoramas and a certain stillness, allowing guests to embrace each changing moment. Surrounding an open courtyard are the guest rooms and kitchen. Walking trails cut through vines that parade a rainbow of colors with the changing seasons. In warmer months, a peaceful pool invites you to cool off and chill out. When rain rages, cozy up with a good book from our extensive food-focused and place-based library.

To connect, we did a live cook along on Instagram last week, where you can see us chatting and making Fabrizia’s verdure primaverili, a proper celebration of spring and the garden, quite like a Roman vignarola. And so here I share it with you too. I adore this dish so much, as Fabrizia says, it’s delicious cold or warm, it’s lovely as part of a bigger meal like a side dish, you could even toss it through pasta, but I do love Fabrizia’s addition of boiled eggs with it, which just makes it the perfect light meal with some nice bread and a glass of wine!

Fabrizia’s Verdure Primaverili (Spring vegetable stew)

2 kg (about 10 large) artichokes
1 lemon, juiced
1 large onion, diced
60 ml (1/4 cup) extra virgin olive oil
1 bunch of asparagus (10 asparagus if thin, 6 of the large ones), cut in segments about 3 cm long
100 gr of peas
3 hard boiled eggs, peeled and halved
Handful of parsley, finely chopped

First you need to prepare the artichokes by trimming the stalk and removing and discarding the tough outer leaves (yes, you will have to remove quite a lot of the leaves, take a look at the prepped on in the photo above!). When you reach the tender, soft, pale yellow leaves inside, cut the top half of the artichoke off completely, then slice the artichoke in half to reveal the centre, remove the choke with a teaspoon and cut into thin slices. Keep the artichokes in a bowl of cold water and lemon juice until ready to use.

Cook the onion with a pinch of salt in the olive oil in a large sauté pan until just golden, about 5 minutes. 

Add the artichokes then cover and cook for 10 minutes. If needed add some water through the cooking. Add the asparagus and the peas, adjust salt and pepper. Let the vegetables simmer until they are homogeneously cooked then transfer to a large bowl or platter and cool.

Pile the vegetables in a small pyramid and surround it with hard boiled eggs. Sprinkle with chopped parsley and serve cold or at room temperature. Buon appetito!

Notes: this dish even better if made a day before and served at room temperature.

We’ve had a strange April, most of it spent in ‘red zone’ lockdown (this weekend is the first time since mid-March that some slight restrictions are lifted — two steps closer closer to freedom!) with temperatures dipping to freezing point, even though a month ago it seemed as if summer had arrived a few months early. The cold front was devastating for winemakers in northern Italy, some even set up burning pyres to warm the crops and keep away the frost (as an aside, this was a story I read in journalist Jamie Mackay’s newsletter The Week in Italy, which is excellent if you want to keep up with a range of things going on in Italy).

But I personally don’t mind a few extra weeks of cooler weather — I am glad of it actually, as it means I can make more things like this sausage ragu, to which, as a last minute thought, I added mushrooms and pretended it was autumn. Marco also likes to add a touch of milk at the end which kind of rounds everything off and gives the sauce an appealingly creamy-but-not-too-creamy silkiness.

We layered it in a sort of lasagne with pane carasau, a rustic, paper-thin, delicate flat bread from Sardinia, and — an impulse buy.  They’re also known as carta musica, “music paper” as it is said that the dough needs to be so thin you can read a sheet of music through it. Once this paper-thin sheet is baked, it is opened, separating into two sheets again, and these are baked further to reach ultimate crispness. It is an ancient bread and was once a staple for shepherds who were away from home for months and could appreciate this long-lasting bread.

It comes in impossibly huge packets of half-meter wide incredibly crisp breads wrapped in paper and one of the things that I love doing with it is layering it in a lasagne in place of pasta into what some Italians might call a “pasticcio.”

Like a pasticcio or a lasagne, you could layer pane carasau with really anything you like — you only need a sauce, some cheese, maybe some bechamel. A simple tomato and mozzarella version is wonderful too, or you could make a spring vegetable version with a sauce of green vegetables like artichokes or asparagus and herbs.

The recipe

For the sugo recipe, see this flavourful sugo bugiardo (an oldie but a real goodie of a recipe from the province of Siena) with crumbled up Tuscan pork and fennel sausages, rigatino or pancetta, a soffritto of onion, carrot and celery, red wine and tomato. I added about 150 grams of chiodini and button mushrooms that I had cooked separately (as an after thought) with garlic and parsley, and Marco added his splash of milk right at the end too. I suppose this was sort of a lazy way for adding creaminess without having to make a bechamel sauce (though I admit, I love bechamel and it would go really well in this too). Four small balls of buffalo mozzarella were torn up and added between the layers of sugo and pane carasau too and a handful of Parmesan went over the top and it went into the oven (190C for about 25 minutes) until well-browned with those crispy bits at the edges that everyone fights over. It’s a really full flavoured dish, I’d suggest a crisp and crunchy salad to pair with it and a nice glass of red.

Note: Some people like to moisten the pane carasau before layering, with water usually, but I find this really unnecessary as the sauce and cheese has more than enough moisture in it.

Introducing my new cookbook, Torta della Nonna ~

Making sweets was my first foray into cooking independently in the kitchen, and as a teenager I could often be found baking my way through my mother’s cookbooks, in particular an American pie cookbook – I have always had a thing for pastry. You will see a bias towards it in this collection too, from southern Italian custard and jam bocconotti to ricotta-filled crostata and Florence’s little rice pudding pastries, budini di riso. Oh and Torta della Nonna, a shortcrust pastry case filled with pastry cream and topped with pine nuts.

I also have a thing for historic Italian cookbooks, as they have been instrumental in helping me appreciate the unchanging nature of regional Italian cuisine, as well as being a constant source of inspiration for recipes. My Tuscan mother in law, Angela, relied on her mother for recipes, who, in turn, like so many Italian housewives of her generation, relied on her Artusi.

A thick copy of Pellegrino Artusi’s 1891 cookbook, Science in the Kitchen and the Art of Eating Well, with its 790 recipes, was often given to new Italian brides to guide them in the kitchen. Angela’s copy (inherited from her mother, Lina) is so well-worn that the spine is broken and the book automatically opens to Artusi’s three recipes for pasta frolla (Italy’s soft shortcrust pastry) and there is a little mark next to recipe B – Lina’s and my preferred of the three, too, and one of the essentials in my kitchen today.

In fact, many of the recipes in this book have their beginnings in that very pasta frolla. Many are the kind of recipes that Carol Field refers to in her excellent The Italian Baker (1985), sweets that “have perfumed mountain homes in Val d’Aosta, simple farmhouses near Bologna, villas in the Tuscan countryside, and apartments in Rome. Emanating from a simple way of life, they almost invariably start with pasta frolla.”

A few decades after Artusi’s publication, in 1929, a Roman magazine editor, Ada Boni, published Il Talismano della Felicità (The Talisman of Happiness, an enormous collection of more than 1000 classic recipes) and, along with Artusi, it became the Joy of Cooking for many Italian households too. Her book is still an important reference book, the recipes still very much valid today, like Artusi’s, but easier to follow for a modern reader in a modern kitchen than Artusi’s charming, nineteenth century banter-filled recipes. From granita to stuffed peaches and the wonderful thrifty chocolate cake (a dense, satisfying cake made with only pantry items and milk, no eggs or butter), Boni’s no-nonsense recipes are still among some of my favourites when I want to produce something that channels my inner nonna.

The recipes in Torta della Nonna, which have been plucked out of my three cookbooks, Florentine, Acquacotta and Tortellini at Midnight, along with a handful of new inclusions (such as latte alla portoghese, chocolate semifreddo, homemade savoiardi and more), are a collection of beloved Italian classics, many of which you could likely find on nonna’s table for Sunday lunch, in a homely trattoria or one of Florence’s best pastry shops, broken down into 8 chapters.

You can read a full review of the book over at Shipshape Eatworthy.

The recipe I want to share with you from this book is probably one of my very favourite cakes, but is definitely an underrated recipe — you would probably skim past it, possibly never even try it because there is also no photo to accompany Nonna Vera’s Almond Cake. But there are a few reasons why I love it so much.

One, because it is a cake recipe that was given to my mother in law by her mother in law, Vera, who is now in her mid-nineties and still lives alone in her own home — it is for our family, literally the “torta della nonna.” Two, it is the simplest cake to make: a one bowl cake, you put everything in together and just combine it with a fork. You don’t even need any rising agents in this. It has the taste of a perfectly simple, satisfying cake: buttery, a slight hint of lemon, a delicious crunch of toasted almonds. Whenever I have made this for events, it is the first thing that disappears. You can eat it at any moment of the day and it’s just perfect, especially, in my opinion, with an epresso or a cup of tea. I hope you’ll try it. It’s a solid, foolproof recipe, easy to remember and so easy to whip up – all you need is a bowl and a fork. Practical, just like Nonna Vera.

Torta di Mandorle di Nonna Vera
Nonna Vera’s Almond Cake

Serves 6–8

150 g (1 cup) plain (all-purpose) flour
150 g (3/4 cup) sugar
150 g (1/3 cup) butter, melted
1 whole egg
3 egg yolks
finely grated zest of 1 lemon
100 g (3½ oz) blanched whole almonds

Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F) and grease and line a 20 cm (8 in) round cake tin.

Combine the flour and sugar in a bowl. Add the melted butter and mix in along with the egg and yolks, and then the lemon zest, stirring with a fork until just combined. Pour the cake batter into the tin and top with the whole almonds, pushing them in slightly.

Bake for 30 minutes, or until golden brown and springy on top. If you like you can dust with icing sugar to serve; in the summertime my mother in law, Angela, likes to top the cake with strawberries macerated in a bit of sugar.

Torta della Nonna is published by Hardie Grant Books and is available worldwide now!

It’s not every day that you walk into a butcher shop and come out with a few kilos of bitter oranges aka Seville oranges or arance amare in Italian. But it’s also, I think, not every day that you find a butcher shop that has this sort of garden out the back with a sweeping view over the valley and terraces of mandarins, lemons and Seville orange trees. San Miniato seems to be full of these terraces of citrus trees and one of the homes we saw when house hunting had a garden full of trees so laden and ripe with fruit that the boughs were almost dragging on the ground and the girls were running through them, playing hide and seek behind the dark green leaves. I had dreams of buying that house and making pots and pots of marmalade, but unfortunately the house itself had its own issues (rooms with no windows and an ongoing dispute with the neighbours over a faulty ceiling with cracked beams) but I still dream of that garden.

Cue my friend and favourite butcher, Andrea Falaschi, whose trees are packed like over-decorated Christmas trees. I have dropped hints before but this particular visit, Andrea’s mamma Lina (who you might remember with her stuffed chicken recipe), ushered me out the back with a large bowl to collect some. I told her I’d try out a test batch of marmalade. “But come back and get the rest,” she urged me, “They’ll only drop and go rotten otherwise!” As I started picking them, I couldn’t help but think of all the abandoned trees I’d seen around town where this does happen. It reminded me of a little project my friend Alice in Rome runs which she calls the Neighbourhood Orange Project — they collect bitter oranges from the decorative trees that line Roman roadsides and she has been teaching refugees to make marmalade, which they sell, with success.

Bitter oranges, or Seville oranges, are a hybrid citrus, a cross between mandarin and pomelo. They come into season in deep winter and have a thick peel and an extremely bitter pulp that tickles the back of your throat. Although inedible raw, bitter oranges make a delicious and fragrant marmalade and as they have a higher than usual pectin content, it seems a no-brainer to just make jam out of them. But you can also make good use of the peel in liqueurs (think of homemade bitters, vermouth or even cordials), candied fruits, spoon sweets (swoon!) or even pickles. People told me about making preserved orange peel much like preserved lemons, and marinades for meat (cochinita pibil!) and fish (ceviche!) with the juice. So if you have access to one of these trees — which seem to be easier to find abandoned in a garden or on a roadside than in the markets, at least here in Italy — it could be a little playground for culinary experiments.

I asked around for some great marmalade recipes and had some wonderful tips come in that I thought I’d share. Many suggested Delia Smith’s traditional Seville Orange marmalade recipe which I noticed is quite sweet (2 kg of sugar for 1 kg of fruit; more on this below) and involves juicing all the fruit, then chopping the peels and tying the pips and membranes in a little muslin bag to pop into the saucepan (this helps to draw out the pectin). After 2 hours of simmering, the sugar goes in and it is cooked until set. Nigel Slater’s marmalade with ginger, which is similar but requires the addition of 4 lemons and 100 grams of fresh, shredded ginger for 1 kg of Seville oranges. There is also Stephanie Alexander’s recipe in The Cook’s Companion, where the fruit is separated from the peel, the peel is shredded and this is (minus pips and bitter membranes) all cooked together with water and a pinch of salt and left overnight. The next day, you add sugar to match the weight of the cooked fruit and boil for 30 minutes and a bright, just-set marmalade is made. I love Stephanie’s no-fuss approach.

Pam Corbin, also known as Pam the Jam, author of a number of jam books including the River Cottage Preserves book, shares wonderful jamming tips on her instagram feed, such as make sure to fill the jam to the brim of your jars and using herb scissors to save time cuttings the peels. I loved the idea of freezing Seville oranges (for when you have a glut but not enough energy to make it all into jam!).  She also wrote to me, “Marmalade making can be split over several days. It’s always good to slice and then allow the sliced peels to soak to soften and begin pectin release. Also a day for the softened peel to steep in the sugar syrup turns the peels beautifully translucent and tender.” Great ideas!

While I was looking into all these recipes, my old neighbour from Settignano, Helen, an Australian who has been living in Florence longer than I’ve been on this earth, sent me pictures of her marmalade making process – so wonderfully organised and precise! She orders her oranges from Sicily when she can’t find them at the Sant’Ambrogio market and makes enough to last a year, her beautiful jars all perfectly lined up in her cupboard to go with her homemade sourdough that she bakes once a week.

But the recipe and post I fell in love with was Luisa Weiss, aka the Wednesday Chef, who recently wrote a post on her blog about her “holiest of kitchen rituals,” marmalade-making. It made me want to race into the kitchen right away and cook these oranges but when Luisa writes, “Not only does nothing commercially made come close to the brightness and flavor of homemade Seville orange marmalade, but there is a certain Zen flow to the process of making the marmalade that I have come to cherish. Even my family respects the marmalade zone, giving me a wide berth while I’m elbow deep in granulated sugar and hair-thin shreds of orange peel, the kitchen windows fogged up with orange-scented air,” it made me just cleared my schedule and rolled up my sleeves. Perhaps I was also looking for some Zen flow and a wide berth from the family but it was just the inspiration I needed!

One thing Luisa does that I love is that she boils the oranges whole first. When I read this, it suddenly clicked to me that this is what I do when I make lemon marmalade. I admit, it’s been a while since I’ve had a lemon tree but in the days when I did, this recipe is how I loved to preserve them. And guess what, it’s practically the same as Luisa’s! It is, unsurprisingly, inspired by a bitter orange marmalade recipe from Emma Gardner’s Poires et Chocolate blog, who in turn was inspired by Jane Grigson’s recipe in English Food.

Back to the whole oranges. I love this trick. It resolves many marmalade making tips in one. First, it just makes the whole process easier, in particular the shredding and separating part. Second, it produces a beautifully clear, jewel-like jelly. Luisa’s method is handy if you don’t have a muslin cloth for the tying of the pith and seeds, which can seem a bit fiddly. Also, the cooking whole and (if you leave it overnight in the pot, to continue the next day – I do like breaking it up into 2 days if you can’t get all the time at once) the soaking releases the prized pectin that helps to set the jam.

The world may not need another marmalade recipe when there are already so many good ones, so I won’t add more other than, I’m back to using my lemon marmalade recipe for the bitter oranges too. But like Luisa, I added the juice of a few lemons, and I used less sugar so I could enjoy that natural bitterness (for 1 kg of fruit, try 1.5 kg of sugar instead of 2). I also warmed the sugar in the oven as Luisa suggests — heating the sugar makes it dissolve faster and, I’ve learned, the quicker a jam is made, the fresher, and brighter it tastes.

Finally, if you need a little citrus inspiration, while you’re waiting for the whole oranges to simmer sit down and read this post on citron inspired by Helena Attlee’s The Land Where Lemons Grow, one of my favourite reads ever.

The Valdorcia is one of my very favourite areas to visit in Tuscany, it embodies so much about what I love about this region — the green and golden rolling hills, magnificent stone hamlets, rustic and genuine country food and the delights of the natural landscape, in particular the pampering hot springs.

In Bagno Vignoni, one of the most charming towns of the area, natural thermal springs flow that have been attracting travellers since Roman times who appreciated the water’s curing and revitalising properties. Not surprising then that Saint Catherine of Siena and Lorenzo the Magnificent liked to visit too.  In Piazza delle Sorgenti is an enormous, stunning, fifteenth century pool filled with the steaming hot spring water — particularly beautiful to see in the cooler months when the steam is rising up from the water into the cool air. These thermal waters are the hottest in Tuscany (about 50C) so this is another reason why this is a spot I love to visit in the winter because there is nothing like being outdoors in the water in the winter but feeling like you are wrapped up in a warm cocoon!

Recently, I was invited to experience Bagno Vignoni’s thermal waters at the Adler Resort, a short walk from the historic town. The whole theme of this resort is comfort and relaxation — once you walk in, you feel immediately taken care of. The girls spied the Kids Club and just wanted to stay there for the rest of the stay! Our 8 year old joined in on movie night after dinner in their mini cinema, walks to Bagno Vignoni, lunch, crafts and free play (which the little one loved too). There’s also an outdoor playground and an area to play bocce (boules), so it is full of things to keep kids busy.

Our room was a large family suite with a second bedroom attached, a comfortable lounge area and a terrace that overlooked the valley and hills with those iconic cypress trees lining the long driveways to hill top farmhouses. I’m told this is the quiet side of the hotel — indeed, it is incredibly peaceful and private. The opposite wing of the hotel has a view over the hot spring pools, which is popular for those who like to be amongst it all.

The first thing we did when we arrived in our room was get into our swimmers — of course! In the room was a whole set of fluffy white dressing gowns for the whole family for going to the pools in and we couldn’t wait to get in — and the out — of them! The pools of thermal hot springs begin with a serene indoor pool that has an automatic door that leads into the main outdoor pool which looks out over the valley, and it is here around which our mornings and evenings revolved. There are sections that have water jets like a jacuzzi and there is a central waterfall that is heavenly to stand under for a great shoulder and neck massage! Coming first thing in the morning at 8am before anyone else was there one was one of the best things we did, and I highly recommend it! We could have easily spent all day here, if it weren’t for hungry tummies rumbling.

The Food and Wine

Considering that breakfast and dinner are included in the stay, the restaurant is an important feature of the resort and they pride themselves on their housemade offerings, from the jam to the bread to the pasta and excellent pastries and desserts. Working with many local producers, the chef Gaetano Vaccaro, likes to highlight the ingredients of the Valdorcia, for example local saffron, honey, salumi, cheese, seasonal fruits and the stone ground, organic ancient grain flour from the nearby Mulino Valdorcia for their pasta and bread (which is so popular that guests want to take it home; you can by ordering it 24 hours ahead of time! During dinner you receive a beautiful bread basket full of different types of baked goodies so you can taste test ahead of time). Seeing as the bread is so good, it is unsurprising that they also do a superlative pappa al pomodoro, a bread and tomato soup, easily one of the best I have tasted. Handrolled pici with local Chianina beef ragu was a highlight — and just what I wanted to eat being in the Valdorcia — and tiny, pillowy gnocchi with creamy vongole sauce was a nice change.

Much appreciated was the children’s menu but there is no doubt that their favourite part of dinner was the buffet of desserts, in particular the gelato. Handy tip: if you see something you like, you better taste it then and there as every night the menu and offerings change! The chestnut cake with rosemary gelato and custard was my favourite. After dinner, you can wander to the bar where you’ll find a view overlooking the lit-up thermal pools and people playing cards in front of the fireplace or live music.

Breakfast, like dessert, is a generous spread, buffet style (in singular portions carefully displayed in glass Weck jars), while you can ask the chef for eggs, any which way, cooked on the spot. There’s also fresh bread, fruit, delicious muesli, any kind of yogurt (sheeps milk? soy milk?) and cereal, fresh juices (we loved the carrot, orange and ginger combination), crepes made on the spot, housemade jam, fresh ricotta and smoked salmon or sword fish, and more. Another thing I liked was the generous timing for breakfast, which is served until 11am, allowing for a leisurely morning swim before an equally leisurely, slow breakfast.

For those who are interested in wine, you can visit the resort’s own winery, Tenuta Sanoner, which is a few minutes drive away on a dramatic spot with a 180 degree panoramic view (above). Here you can do a full tasting of their biodynamic and organic wines and also taste their olive oil along with a platter of salumi and cheese. For the Valdorcia, where you can often stumble across riper, more concentrated wines, the Tenuta Sanoner wines (which are called Aetos) achieve something more elegant. Try the Aetos Orcia Organic Sangiovese Riserva 2017, and also interesting is the project on metodo classico sparkling wine from 100% biodynamic and organic Sangiovese grapes (Aetos Classic Method Extra Brut). The fact that they put a lot of effort into sustainability and being environmentally friendly gives them more points from me!

The Spa and Gym

There is a well-equipped gym with a great view and a soothing stream of water running through it. They have a schedule of classes running throughout the day that you can join in on or you can be free to use the equipment as you like. I joined in on a yoga flow class on our last morning and doing a salute to the actual sun as it rose over the valley was so rewarding!

The spa includes the thermal springs and five different saunas (four of which need to be booked as only one room at a time can go in), but there are also beauty treatments and massages available throughout the day. While I was there, unwinding in the warmth of the outdoor pool, I knew I couldn’t pass up arranging a massage, after all I am at a spa — it is an extra expense but it is totally worthwhile! The serene rooms face another thermal pool (but one that you can’t swim in) where you can also find the saunas. It is private and a curtain gets drawn for more subdued light and a quiet atmosphere. I chose the “Kerala” massage, the ultimate relaxing massage with warm sesame oil, which lasts 75 minutes. Marco always likes something stronger — as he says, he likes to feel pain! — so he chose a Lomi Lomi massage, which is done with elbow and forearms, also 75 minutes, and came out a new person! The kids during this time? They were in the Kids Club!

The Kids

Outside there is a bocce pit and a beautiful playground with swings, a slide and a cubby, all facing the wonderful view of the valley. The children also loved the thermal pools in general and would have spent all their time in there if it weren’t for the discovery of the Kids Club. The Kids Club is usually for 4 years and above, but Luna (2 1/2) joined in on the free play a couple of times. They have a fun schedule with activities that range from crafts to making popcorn or cotton candy to a walk to Bagno Vignoni and playing in the playground. The kids can eat all their meals with the Kids Club if they like and after dinner there is a movie in their mini cinema! It is open until 10pm so it means parents can enjoy a more relaxed dinner while the kids watch their favourite movie in the cinema. Mariù (8 years) loved it so much she only wanted to be here the entire time!

An important detail: The resort is a “covid-free” area; all guest (except children) are required to either bring a negative result test taken within 48 hours with them (otherwise you can do it on the spot on arrival), so this allows for maximum relaxation as it is something you don’t have to worry about! Masks are worn throughout the hotel but in the water and spa areas you do not wear them.

Some tips for visiting the resort and hot springs: The resort supplies you with a lovely fluffy dressing gown (children included) and flip flops for wearing to the hot spring pools or wherever you like around the hotel (even at breakfast if you fancy!), but if you do have children with you, do bring their own flip flops or sandals as they do not supply those. There are showers by the pool, both outdoors and indoors, but some say for the best effect of the water’s curing properties you do not need to shower after coming out of the water! It is very warm and comfortable in the hotel, even on a cold winter’s day, and I found we needed to dress only lightly and comfortably. We even forgot to put on our coats and jackets when we checked out and left — I think we were still in a haze of delight!

“It looks like a fleshy purple flower, as fresh as if it had been specially created to bring spring to the dinner table in winter,” wrote Ada Boni in her Regional Italian Cuisine cookbook, while Marcella Hazan calls it the “most magnificent vegetable.” I have to agree. Radicchio might just be my favourite vegetable. It’s beautiful to look at, it’s incredibly versatile — you can grill it, roast it, braise it, have it raw or even in a cake — and that is before I even go into how delicious it is with its slightly bitter, juicy leaves. I find myself seeking it out every week and the market, and whenever I see the impossible curls of radicchio tardivo, or the rose-like speckled pink tender leaves of radicchio variegato Castelfranco, I cannot help but impulse buy — and cook!

Radicchio varieties

First, a bit about the different varieties because in Italy, radicchio is also the name given to chicory in general, not just the reddish-purple salad you may know, so sometimes it is also called radicchio rosso (red radicchio). The main varieties are named after their cities of origin.

The most well-known are radicchio di Chioggia — a round salad head, slightly less bitter than its relatives, from the town of Chioggia, south of Venice — and radicchio di Treviso, an elongated variety from Treviso, just north of Venice, which actually comes in two forms. The first, simply called Treviso or precoce, is an early-harvested version with long flat leaves, similar in shape to a Belgian endive (witlof), and the second is the tardivo, a highly prized, late-harvest version with beautiful, gently curled, crunchy leaves that have large white veins that resemble fingers or tentacles. It’s impressive.

To earn prestigious IGP status, both Treviso precoce and Treviso tardivo must be grown only in a select number of municipalities in the provinces of Treviso, Padova or Venice on land rich in water in central Veneto. Tardivo is a work of art, literally, and considered the king of the radicchio family. It doesn’t just grow like this but takes weeks of manual work. The seeds are planted in fields in the height of summer, then once the first frosts of autumn come along (there should be two frosts for IGP standards), the leaves are ‘burned’ and growth is stopped. This is usually at the start of late November and this is where the transformation begins — the radicchio is taken, roots and all, and transferred to large pools of running water at a constant temperature in complete darkness for 10-25 days. The water revives the plant and it begins to grow again. Without sunlight and without photosynthesis turning the leaves green, the characteristic brilliant red and white leaves grow. The plant is then trimmed and cleaned manually — a process called toelettatura — removing about 70% of the dead and wilted outer leaves and trimming the root to retain just the heart of the plant. It is then thoroughly washed and packed ready for the market. It’s in season in the coldest months of winter, until the end of February.

Meanwhile the regular Treviso (or precoce) is harvested earlier in the season — from September. It’s characteristic elongated form is created in the fields, an elastic band wrapped around the tops of each broad salad head like “soldatini“, soldiers, which keeps the hearts of the salad blanketed in darkness for 15-20 days so that, like the Tardivo, the lack of photosynthesis keeps the new leaves from turning green. When they are harvested, they are cleaned in the field of their outer green leaves to reveal their red hearts.

Some favourite radicchio recipes

I love radicchio in basically any form. I most often eat it as a salad vegetable, it’s delicious dressed in something sweet-acidic to balance its slight bitterness. This is one very rare occasion where I like balsamic vinegar in salad, particularly a sweeter, aged one. It’s also very nice with a mustardy dressing or with something strong and salty — hello anchovies (recently I have been testing it in a salad with salted herring). And it goes so well with cheese — gorgonzola is my go to, it ticks the salty/strong/spicy boxes all at once. Tardivo is the preferred, prized radicchio to cook with, but outside of Italy it might be easier to find the round Chioggia or the early Treviso precoce, which are also slightly less bitter. 

Radicchio, mascarpone and walnut cream is a condiment that is just as excellent as a dip with crunchy vegetables, a few nicely aged cheeses and crostini, as it is on sandwiches (below on a bagel with ham and more radicchio!) or even as a pasta sauce! It’s also a very pretty colour to brighten up the winter table.

Grilled radicchio, although I don’t have a recipe to send you to, this is an easy non-recipe. I like the elongated radicchio precoce for this one. Slice it in half lengthways and cook it on a dry grill pan or barbecue until wilted and tender. Serve it on a plate dressed in some extra virgin olive oil, balsamic or red wine vinegar, salt and pepper. (You could, if you wished to, wrap them in some lardo or pancetta before grilling).

Risotto al radicchio, a simple winter risotto that marries two iconic ingredients of the Veneto – rice and radicchio. Plus a good slug of red wine. There are a couple of ways sweetness is brought into this classic Venetian risotto. One is through the use of onion, and the other is the addition of pancetta, with its salty-sweet tendency. I love the red wine in this, you could use white too but I love that it matches the beautiful color of raw radicchio – which the vegetable inevitably loses as it cooks. To help with the balance of flavors, you could go for a red wine on the sweeter side too, perhaps a Lambrusco Amabile or, for a local choice, Barbera.

Torta di Radicchio That’s right. This is an intriguing, delicious, dessert made with radicchio. It is a Tessa Kiros recipe for a traditional, if unconventional, cake from Chioggia. Tessa tops it with an easy, thick glaze of melted white chocolate—even for those who aren’t fans of white chocolate, it’s an addition that works beautifully with this otherwise quite plain, but moist radicchio cake. But you could also dust with powdered sugar or do a simple lemon glaze here too.

This recipe comes from Tessa Kiros’ Linenwater and Limoncello cookbook, which I adore. I have only made one quite different modification, which is to add lemon juice to the water where the radicchio leaves are blanched. This acidic bath keeps the radicchio a bright pink (which you can see in flecks in the finished cake) —otherwise, the leaves can turn greenish blue, especially if you happen to live in a place with hard water (I do), or use unprocessed sugar, which can be slightly basic rather than neutral. Radicchio, like red cabbage and other fruit and vegetables that contain anthocyanin, can change colour from red to blue in acidic and basic environments.

Do you have a favourite way with radicchio?

My favourite butcher shop, Sergio Falaschi, which is one of the reasons why we bought a house in San Miniato (joking — sort of!) has one of the prettiest and enticing counters, it could compete with any pastry shop window. It is run by my friend Andrea, Sergio’s son, and they are the fourth and third generation to run this shop, with great care for the products, and in turn the heirloom breed animals and local farmers they work with (see my last post all about their prosciutto di Cinta Senese). I’ve always loved walking through the butcher section in the Florentine markets to marvel at what they have on display, offering not only all the classics, from the most rustic to the most sought after cuts, but also an array of inventive, creative and delicious prepared meats ready to simply take home to cook.

At Falaschi, they have things like cotolette (flattened out crumbed chicken thighs with the bone still attached), collo ripieno (stuffed chicken necks), roast pork wrapped and tied with lardo and rosemary, fegatelli in the winter season (pork liver wrapped in caul fat and stored in lard, my husband’s favourite dish) and  spiedini. I love their boiled beef polpette, ready to take home to fry until golden brown (delicious with salsa verde) and their filetto in crosta is genius (below), it’s a delicious pork loin rolled in finely chopped rosemary, garlic, thyme and fennel seed. It’s pushed into the crust of an emptied out baguette and the whole thing is wrapped in pancetta. They’re sold like this, ready for roasting for about 20 minutes in a hot oven.

They also sell some cooked dishes too, including ready made ragus, insalata russa (Russian or Olivier salad) and pollo in galantina, which is a classic Italian family dish, popular in Tuscany and Emilia Romagna, one often made for important celebrations like Christmas, when there is broth being made and there are plenty of people around the table to feed. It was once considered a noble dish, prepared for festive occasions and perhaps for the care and length of time needed to prepare it, it has always been the sort of dish that appears once a year for that special occasion.

I recently spent some time in the kitchen at the back of the butcher shop — which, before the pandemic, did a roaring trade as a restaurant — with Lina, Andrea’s mamma and she showed me how she makes her glorious pollo in galatina for the shop, to share here on my blog.

Lina’s Pollo in Galantina or Stuffed Chicken
Pollo in Galantina di Lina da Sergio Falaschi Macelleria, San Miniato

Lina uses a deboned, butterflied chicken (in Italy a whole chicken, in particular free range, local ones like the ones they have at Falaschi’s butcher shop, weigh about 1 kg whole). And she uses a large sewing needle and kitchen string to sew it all up! It is ideal to start this dish 24 hours before you want to serve it so that the chicken can chill and set in the fridge. It will be easier to slice after this.

Serves 5

For the chicken stuffing:

1 small white onion, finely chopped
1 garlic clove, finely chopped
small handful of fresh parsley, chopped
600 grams minced veal and pork (Lina prefers mostly veal, with a small quantity of pork)
1 egg, beaten
40 grams grated Parmesan
pinch of grated nutmeg
salt and pepper
1 piece of boiled beef tongue in brine (lingua salmistrata), diced (or if you don’t have it perhaps try diced mortadella)
150 grams of prosciutto, diced
a handful of blanched peas
a handful of pistachios, toasted lightly (optional)
1 deboned chicken, approximately 800 grams in weight
2 hard boiled eggs, peeled

For the broth:

1 onion
1 carrot
1 stick of celery
1 bay leaf
Enough water to cover

To serve:

Salsa verde (see recipe here)
Salsa tonnata/tuna mayonnaise (see recipe here)
Boiled potatoes or Insalata russa (Russian or Olivier salad)
Giardiniera (Italian Pickles, see my recipe here)

Method:

Combine the onion, garlic, parsley in a large bowl with the minced veal and pork. Add the beaten egg and mix through, along with a good pinch of salt, a good grinding of pepper, Parmesan and nutmeg. Mix until well combined then add the diced tongue, prosciutto, peas, and pistachios if using, until well distributed.

Now take the deboned, butterflied chicken and place it skin side down on a board. Place about half the stuffing on the chicken and then arrange the two boiled eggs inside then cover with the rest of the stuffing mixture. Sew the chicken back up with kitchen string, closing it entirely and securely. You can (and should) also tie the chicken as you would a good roast pork.

Heat the oven to 160C. In a large dutch oven place the vegetables for the broth and the bay leaf, along with the tied chicken and add water to cover. Cover and let it cook gently for 1-1 1/2 hours. You can also boil it on a stove top but be careful to cook it gently and slowly so that it doesn’t break open. Remove from the heat and allow it to cool entirely in the broth. Once cool, you can slice it no more than 1cm thick (hint, the more chilled it is, the easier it is to slice thinly, which is why you should do this the day before you would like to serve it and keep it in the fridge). You can eat this cold or warm. To serve it warm, reheat the slices with some of the broth.

Serve the pollo in galantina with salsa verde and salsa tonnato (tuna mayonnaise), piping hot boiled potatoes, pickles or Olivier salad.

Notes: Some like to prepare a broth beforehand, using the bones of the chicken, so if you’ve deboned your own chicken that would be a very good idea to not waste the bones! Also at the end of the cooking, you should definitely keep the broth to make a minestrone or some other warming, comforting dish. It’ll be delicious.

Thank you to the Falaschi family for their generosity and time!

I have long been taking advice from my friend and favourite butcher, Andrea Falaschi (above), a fourth generation butcher who goes by @guidofalaschi, the name of his great grandfather who first opened the family butcher shop in 1925 in San Miniato. We share the same passion for ethically and sustainably raised free-range animals, Tuscan traditions and quality over quantity when it comes to eating meat.

Andrea works with his father, Sergio, in the butcher shop and laboratory where they make their famous, artian salumi, prosciutto and sausages, and his mother Lina, who makes fresh preparations for clients to cook at home like stuffed chicken (pollo in galantina), filetto in crosta (pork fillet to be roasted inside bread crust) and spiedini. Before the pandemic, Lina also headed a wonderful restaurant at the back of the butcher shop, which happens to have one of the best views in town!

They work directly with local farmers – just as Andrea’s great grandfather Guido did – who have the same values, and that same care goes into everything they do. They make, amongst many things, San Miniato’s only Slow Food presidium, mallegato, a spiced winter blood sausage, my favourite truffle sausages and precious prosciutto di Cinta Senese, made from an ancient Tuscan pig breed that is only raised free range and has a natural diet of foraged acorns, tubers and roots. One day I’ll go into more detail on the mallegato and other specialties but today I wanted to share their process of making prosciutto, which they do for their own butcher shop and also for other well known farmers and producers around Tuscany.

I was recently invited to visit the Falaschi laboratory, which is in the countryside just 5km from the butcher shop in the historical centre of San Miniato (and a few minutes walk from our new home!). I brought my 8 year old, who loves prosciutto and helped me document the experience! Everything is done by hand, from the filling of finocchiona and salumi in their natural casings, to all the tying, with all natural products according to ancient traditions. We watched the Cinta Senese prosciutto being made – prized for its juicy and tasty meat and its thick, delicious layer of fat. You can always tell it’s a certified Cinta breed (it is a DOP product, aka protected designation of origin) because the hooves are left on the prosciutto to differentiate them from regular prosciutto.

First the prosciutto legs are rolled with a rolling pin to remove any excess blood at the socket. Then they are painted with a mix of garlic, sugar and water. Over goes a heavy sprinkle of ground pepper, then coarse salt all the way down to the hoof (above). They stay like this for 3 days then are hung to cure in an air-temperature controlled room. They take 60 days all together from start to finish! That’s it, time and a few essential curing ingredients, no preservatives or additives.

Cinta senese is a truly ancient pork breed native to Tuscany’s province of Siena (as its name suggests) — it is thought that they were raised even in Roman times. There is a well known fresco by Ambrogio Lorenzetti on the Palazzo del Comune di Siena, painted in 1338, that depicts a farmer with a Cinta Senese pig — easily identified by the thick white band or cinta (belt) across its otherwise black body, which is still how it looks today. A century ago it was the breed of pig that most Tuscan farmers would have kept, however, after the second world War their numbers fell drastically — partly due to the fact that after the war, the prolific Danish and English breeds were introduced. Sadly, this happened all across Italy and during the 20th century many native pigs died out — in 1927 there were 21 heirloom breeds native to Italy and today there are only six, including the Cinta Senese. Luckily from the 1970-1980s, some passionate farmers helped bring them back from the brink of extinction.

In the year 2000 the Consorzio di Cinta Senese, a voluntary group that determine the rules and regulations in which this heirloom pig should be raised, was created and by 2012 it was awarded DOP status. Certified Cinta Senese are born, raised and butchered in Tuscany. They are pure bred, live free range with an enormous amount of space (usually in woods or partially wooded areas, no more than 10 animals per hectare or 2.5 acres) and forage for their food. During the months where there is less around, their diet can be integrated with a small percentage of cereals, legumes, seeds, fresh fruit and vegetables, 60% of which must be Tuscan — more or less replicating the Tuscan traditions of centuries past.

Christmas may be upon us but since 2020 is a very different kind of year and we will be just us, I feel we can do something kind of different for Christmas too. Homemade pizza is something we have always loved making but to make it special I thought I might put truffle on it so we came up with this rather unusual combination — but oh it works so well!

We recently moved from Florence to my husband’s hometown, San Miniato, which is half an hour from both Florence and Pisa. It’s a charming hill top town that I’ve written about often, even before moving here, and one of the main attractions, other than the views and affordability, is the fact that this is the heartland of Tuscan truffles.

I’ve been testing out some different truffle products that are on offer in San Miniato (spoiler alert, we are hoping to very shortly share with you a special, curated box of delicious things, including truffle products!) and one of the things that got me curious was an artichoke and truffle paste. The first thing I thought was — what a Tuscan combination! Artichokes and truffles are two classic Tuscan ingredients available in the winter. The second thing I thought was, how have I never thought about this combination before?! We smothered it onto a pizza base in place of tomato sauce, added some anchovies (because I love anchovies, especially on pizza, and did you know anchovies and truffles go hand in hand as well?), and fresh mozzarella right at the end. It was spectacular!

I also wanted to share this recipe for an unusual pizza dough (to add to our other pizza dough recipes, including this Roman style pizza dough, and this Florentine ‘bar style’ pizza dough from my cookbook Florentine), which we changed from our usual favourite because we were working with an interesting flour that has very little gluten. It’s grown organically and stone ground here in San Miniato with a ‘tipo 2’ wheat called ‘Gentil Rosso’, an ancient Tuscan grain which a century ago was grown widely all over Italy but has now almost disappeared because of the fact that it has very little gluten in it and it was replaced by more productive modern grains.

An aside on ancient grain flour and its strength

This ancient grain flour’s strength, measured by W index, is only 42 (a soft ‘tipo 00’ flour could have a W index of around 90-180, regular all purpose flour around 250, while strong flour like Manitoba flour has a W index of 400). So there are a few things to consider when using a very ‘weak’ flour. The stronger the flour, the more resistant it is to leavening and needs to rise longer, so technically this weak flour doesn’t need a long rise (but we did, a couple times, and we liked the results). The stronger the flour, the more water the flour can absorb too — Manitoba can absorb 90% of its weight in water, while a tipo 00 can take more like 50%. We pushed this too, and the result is a sticky, wet dough that you will mould with yur hands rather than roll out.

In general the weaker flours are more ideal for making biscuits and cakes, while stronger flours for things like sourdough bread (and the ones in between for pizza). But we went ahead and tried this very weak ancient ground flour out for pizza anyway! My husband Marco (the passionate baker in the house), aimed for a 65% hydration at the suggestion of Emanuele Bianucci, the producer of this Gentil Rosso flour. Marco used his sourdough starter (boosted by a pinch of dried yeast) but you could use directly yeast too.

We loved it because it made an absolutely delicious, perfumed, soft style pizza crust that, as Italians like to point out, is more easily digested. We also made schiacciata from this dough, scented with rosemary and olive oil, and it was impossible to stop eating it!

Truffle, artichoke and anchovy ancient grain sourdough pizza

If using regular flour or you don’t have sourdough starter, you may like our Roman style pizza dough recipe, but if you are attempting a pizza dough with a weak, ancient grain, low gluten flour, give this dough recipe a go! It is best made the morning before you want to cook the pizza. I used an artichoke paste but if you can’t get the paste, use quartered marinated artichokes and chop or blend them yourself into a paste.

For 2 x 30cm diameter pizzas

For the sourdough pizza:

100 grams sourdough starter
290 ml water
pinch of active dried yeast/instant yeast
420 grams ‘tipo 2’ ancient grain flour (we used ‘Gentil Rosso’ W42)
60 ml extra virgin olive oil, plus more for topping
10 gr salt

For the pizza topping:

350 gr buffalo mozzarella (or burrata) at room temperature
180 gr artichoke paste (or marinated artichokes in quarters, see note)
8-10 anchovy fillets (the best quality you can afford)
1 small truffle, thinly sliced

To make the dough by hand, combine the starter with the water and a pinch of dried yeast in a large bowl and whisk together. Add half of the flour and whisk into a batter. Add the olive oil and salt and combine. Add the rest of the flour little by little until well incorporated – switch to a spatula, wooden spoon or hands to mix at this point. Let the dough rest for 30 minutes, then mix the dough, from bottom to top, almost like folding it, a few times, every 30 minutes for a total of 4 times/2 hours. Cover and leave to rise in the fridge 8 hours (or overnight).

When ready to bake, preheat oven to 230C (450F).

Divide the wet dough into 2 portions and plop them onto well-oiled pizza trays and spread out evenly with (oiled) hands. Place spoonfuls of the artichoke paste here and there all over the pizza bases and then, with the back of the spoon, roughly spread the paste around the base to cover lightly. Add anchovy fillets (I like to keep them whole and use them as ‘markers’ where the pizza will be sliced but you can chop and scatter if you prefer) and a good drizzle of olive oil.

Bake in hot oven (remember to swap the pizzas around so that they get even time on the lowest shelf; if baking one at a time, keep it on the lowest shelf) for 18-20 minutes of until the crusts are golden brown and the toppings are sizzling furiously. At the last moment, throw over the mozzarella and leave 1 more minute, just enough for it to go lovely and soft but not melt. Remove from the oven, scatter over the truffle slices and serve immediately with another good drizzle of olive oil.

This is a slightly untraditional variation on the most traditional recipe I know for panforte — a sweet, dense, spicy medieval cake from Siena. The recipe comes from the bible of Tuscan cooking, Paolo Petroni’s Il Grande Libro della Vera Cucina Toscana and every time I make panforte (since I first posted about it back in 2011) I make some kind of variation on his recipe. To be honest, I usually don’t deviate from it much unless there’s something I can’t find — even in Tuscany, that candied melon he calls for can be hard to procure! Often I might simply play around with proportions of spices, more black pepper, a little less cinnamon. Or, if I have it, I go with the spice mix Tuscan’s call, droghe, drugs, which are bought by the weight in little neighbourhood alimentari, wrapped in paper.

But this time I wanted to try something quite different, and I used chestnut flour, which you can find in Tuscany from about October to March in place of regular flour. It makes such a delicious seasonal version, and although it’s not a traditional part of panforte’s long history, the flavour of chestnuts is so Tuscan that it feels like it’s meant to be in here.

Panforte generally has only a few variations. There’s panpepato, which is a very spicy version, with it’s top covered in a layer of black pepper (pepato means peppered) in place of the icing sugar — it tastes positively medieval and is just the thing to warm you on a wintery day with an espresso. On the other side of the scale, there is a very delicate version known as Panforte Margherita. Invented in 1879 in honour of Queen Margherita of Savoy’s visit to Siena, it’s made using candied citron instead of the melon and vanilla instead of the characteristically heady spices. The citron makes it ‘blonder’ than the classic, dark panforte.

Down the bottom of Tuscany in Monte Argentario and Giglio Island is what I would call the long lost cousin of panforte, panficato – made similarly but with dried figs in place of the candied fruit. I have that recipe in Acquacotta and it is something like a figgy brownie, with only flour holding the fruit, chocolate and spices together, shaped into a rustic loaf.

The main ingredient in panforte is candied fruit— so it should be something you are already particularly fond of and, if you can, I strongly recommend using a good one, either homemade or artisan-made rather than industrial, pre-chopped bits. It’s not a cheap option but it makes a world of difference and I would go as far as to say it’s probably not worth making if you can’t get the good stuff.

Not having candied melon in lockdown, I use candied citron like the panforte Margherita (or try dried figs like the panficato of the coast). Use whatever nuts you like best — almonds are traditional but since this is an untraditional panforte, I think hazelnuts or walnuts would go particularly well with the chestnut flavours.

This makes such a lovely treat for Christmas. Like many fruit dense Christmas cakes (the little ones in the photo below are Belinda Jeffrey’s Christmas cake), panforte lasts weeks and weeks and you only need tiny portions at a time because it is so sweet and dense. It makes a nice gift too, if you make one big one like this, cut into slices and wrap in greaseproof paper before wrapping in pretty paper (you can also make this in small tins, just note that the panforte should be about 2cm tall). Oh and did I mention, it’s gluten free and vegan too?

Chestnut Panforte

I recommend having all the ingredients ready before you add the syrup as once this gets added it can harden to a point where it becomes difficult to handle (especially if your kitchen is quite cold). If this happens, you simply need to warm the mixture gently and then it becomes easier to pat into the cake tin. If you can, use whole spices and grind them just before using in a mortar and pestle or a spice grinder for maximum flavour. You may be timid about using pepper, but I can’t stress how important the flavour of the black pepper is in here, go for one whole teaspoon of it!

Serves 12

350 grams candied citron
50 grams candied orange peel
200 grams whole peeled almonds, walnuts or hazelnuts
4 teaspoons ground spices (coriander seeds, nutmeg, cloves, cinnamon, black pepper)
150 grams chestnut flour, sifted
300 grams white sugar
Icing sugar for dusting

Grease and line a 24-26 cm cake tin with baking paper and heat the oven to 160C (320F)

Chop the candied fruit into very small diced pieces and place in a large bowl. Add the nuts, the spices and the sifted chestnut flour (it tends to be lumpy, don’t skip the sifting) and set aside.

Place the sugar in 100 ml of water in a saucepan over low heat. Let it dissolve and thicken very slightly into a syrup, about 5 minutes of simmering should do it, do not let it colour into a caramel (it should reach 120C, if you have a sugar thermometer).

Pour the syrup off the heat and mix with the candied fruit mixture until just combined. Tip the mixture immediately into the cake tin and flatten/smooth out with a nonstick spatula (or dust the top with some extra cinnamon and then use your hands to pat it out). Bake for 40 minutes or until golden brown and the top is firm to the touch. Allow to cool completely in the tin. Before serving, cover generously with icing sugar.

It keeps very well stored in a cool, dark place.

The supermarket was offering the prettiest fish plucked out if the waters of the Tuscan arcipelago last night — so fresh they smell of the sea and are still in rigor mortis — for a steal, 6 euro a kilo. Look at how bright eyed and beautiful they are! These small fish — a mixture of different types of sea bream known as fragolino (the pink one, known as pandora in English) and mormora (striped sea bass, with the yellow stripe on his cheeks), along with gallinella (gurnard), scorfano (scorpion fish) are labelled as pesce da zuppa, fish for soup, or sometimes paranza, for frying whole, because of their pint size. Often there are some triglie (red mullet) in the mix too.

Tuscany alone has 400 km of coastline and 7 islands and there are many good Tuscan fish soups (let alone the ones found all over the country!), the most famous being Cacciucco from Livorno, a huge, minimum 2 person type dish made with thirteen different types of seafood. But there’s another, very memorable one for me that I had many years ago a little south of Livorno. We were in the port city of Piombino (the mainland stop if you’re on the way to Elba Island) on a very cold blustery autumn day, at Garibaldi Innamorato — an appealing choice I had selected out of that year’s Slow Food restaurant guide. What got me was that they only use the freshest fish of the day so the menu is never the same, it’s always unexpected, except for one mainstay, the Zuppa Corsa or Corsican soup.

Before you wonder why you’d have Corsican soup in Tuscany, look up Piombino on a map and you will see about 100 km to the east, on the other side of Elba island, is the finger-point of Cap Corse, Corsica. It’s closer than Florence. You can see it on a clear day easily from here. Well, we had to have their famous Zuppa Corsa, where the thick, smooth, rust-hued fish soup is ceremoniously spooned out of a tureen over a plate of toasted crostini previously topped with grated cheese and a dollop of pink rouille sauce (it’s a bit like an aioli but spiced with chilli and often paprika, however at Garibaldi Innamorato, they make theirs — interestingly — with housemade mayonnaise and harissa). It sounds odd in the regular context of Tuscan fare — fish with cheese is just not a thing in this part of Italy, creamy mayonnaise isn’t particularly either. But oh it works!

If you are already familiar with French bouillabaisse, then it’s not too dissimilar from the famous soup of Marseilles. Yet it is also different. In bouillabaisse, similar fish is used (traditionally also eel and shell fish) but the soup base is decidedly more Provençal, which in Julia Child’s description means, garlic, onions, tomatoes, olive oil, fennel, saffron, thyme, bay, and usually a bit of dried orange peel. You may even find potatoes or sea urchin, and it is served with rouille sauce on toasted bread at the bottom of the plate. The boiled fish is eaten after the soup course. The Corsican soup base is more rustic and very similar to smooth, brothy Tuscan fish soups like minestra di pesce which you might eat with pasta in it, and this zuppa Certosina from a Tuscan monastery. Oh and then there’s the Swiss cheese. A must – you could probably use another type of cheese but make sure it is mild and melty.

Just thinking about this warming, delicious dish, at once creamy, cheesy and yet tasting of the freshest Tuscan seafood, made me dream of heading back to Piombino as soon as lockdown is over. In the meantime it also had me looking up the rouille sauce recipe right away, while Marco was already cleaning the fish.

I followed a recipe for the rouille from the Silver Spoon, the main tweak being that Marco insisted on a hint of tabasco going in there! The soup part of the recipe was all Marco. It doesn’t usually have the calamari in there but we couldn’t resist as those were on display too and very fresh. Rather than the entire soup being blended smooth, he left the fish in pieces but this is a matter of taste. One thing I will say is that if you have a mouli/passaverdura/passatutto, it is an old fashioned contraption but a great help in making fish soup with whole fish this way as it gets rid of the bones and unwanted bits while filtering through the wanted bits. If you don’t have one, you can blend with an immersion blender, but do be careful of small bones.

Zuppa Corsa inspired by Garibaldi Innamorato

Serves 4-6 (four as a main dish, 6 as an first course)

1 kg small fish for soup (sea bream, scorpion fish, gurnard, red mullet), gutted and scaled
4 small calamari, whole if very small, or cut into large pieces and cleaned (optional)
2 garlic cloves
1 small red onion, thinly sliced
Handful of chopped fresh parsley stalks
1 whole fresh chilli, chopped
4 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon of tomato paste
500 ml wine (red or white) or fish stock
500 ml tomato passata
4 large slices of sourdough or country style bread, cut into crostini sized pieces.
50 grams of Swiss cheese, grated

Rouille sauce
1 egg yolk
2 slices of soft white bread soaked in a bit of fish stock or milk
1 garlic clove
Fresh or dried chilli (or cayenne pepper)
Pinch of salt
80ml extra virgin olive oil

Any very small fish can go in whole, but you may like to skin and fillet the larger ones (keep the heads).

In a saucepan, place garlic, onion, parsley stalks and chilli, pour over 3 tablespoons of the olive oil and bring to a low heat, letting everything sizzle and soften gently for about 5-7 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add the tomato paste, turn heat up to medium and stir it across the pan, you want to toast it a bit to bring out the flavour but not let it burn, 1 minute or so. Add fish heads and whole fish, and brown them on the outside a few minutes. Then add the wine, a good pinch of salt and bring to a simmer. Let cook 10 minutes, uncovered and it should reduce slightly. Add the passata along with 500 ml of water and let simmer 30 minutes gently. Taste and adjust salt to your liking.

Pass it through a mouli or sieve. It’s meant to be smooth but we actually kept larger pieces of fish in there. If you would like to do it that way, keep the fish pieces you filleted earlier for the next step. If you would like the smooth version, add the fish fillets to the soup and continue simmering 2-3 minutes, then pass through the mouli.

If using the calamari, in a separate pan, heat a little oil and over medium-high heat roast the calamari for 1 minute then add to the soup and continue cooking 10 minutes. Add the fish pieces the last 2 minutes of cooking. Keep the soup warm, this should be served nice and hot.

While the soup is simmering, you can toast the bread for crostini and set them in a dish to place on the table, maybe wrapped inside a linen napkin to keep warm.

For the sauce, use a pestle and mortar or an immersion blender to blend all the ingredients except the oil until creamy, about 1 minute. Add the oil a little at a time, whisking or blending it in for a smooth, creamy sauce. Taste for salt or heat. (Marco likes a drop of Tabasco in this but I prefer without!)

Spoon the rouille sauce into a small bowl and set it on the table, along with the grated Swiss cheese. Place the soup in a tureen with a lid and ladle. To serve, place crostini in the bottom of the bowls, top each with rouille sauce and a sprinkle of cheese. Spoon the hot soup over the top and let it sit for a minute or so then enjoy.

My first baby, Florentine: The True Cuisine of Florence, which I started writing in 2014, was published in 2016. And this month it has been launched in Australia and the UK (the US will have to wait a few more months until 9 February 2021) with a brand new look! It has a slightly smaller format to the original, still hardback only, and a moodier, darker, beautiful marbled cover.

The recipes and photographs are the same as the original, where I was mindful to include the most Florentine dishes you can find, but in this edition I have also written a brand new guide to eating and drinking in Florence! This is my most comprehensive list — all my favourites, in short form (such as a quick list, where all you need is a glance, and even a 24 hours in Florence suggestion), and in long form (descriptive reviews of my favourite Florentine restaurants), with plenty of photographs and even suggestions for shopping for gourmands — alongside my address book for Florence.

To celebrate the release of my new edition, my publishers Hardie Grant Books are giving away 5 copies of the new Florentine anywhere worldwide! To enter and see those details, just tell me about what you love about Florence on my latest Instagram post. Winners will be drawn on Sunday 15 November 2020 and contacted on Instagram.

I’m so proud of this book, it was the dream cookbook I always wanted to write (if you want to read more about the making of Florentine, head to this article in Good Food Australia), and I’m so grateful that my publishers wanted to give it a new life and re-release it with this new look. Thank you, as always, to Jane Willson, my publisher at Hardie Grant Books, book designer Allison Colpoys, who together with Kasia Gadecki created the marbled covers of the original and new edition, and recipe photographer Lauren Bamford, stylist Deb Kaloper, home economist Caroline Griffiths. Thank you also to my family and thank YOU, my readers, for all your support over the years!