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The Florentine
Well known for being tricky, rife with double meanings and open to various interpretations, the Italian language never ceases to surprise and delight me. What do Michelangelo’s 20 seated nudes, ...
Probably the most important thing I have learned in Italy is to spend more time shopping and less time cooking. My mother-in-law, Tina, taught me this. Choosing fabulous ingredients means you don’t have to do a lot to make it taste good. The recipe I offer
As fall comes to Florence, the city begins to smell like roasted chestnuts. Stands appear on street corners, and locals love to buy a small bag for their passeggiata, the afternoon walk downtown. Although the prickly outer casing makes chestnuts hard to harvest, the hills around Florence are filled with
When you dine out in trattorias there are always a few desserts on the menu for special occasions: zuccotto, zuppa inglese and millefoglie. The oldest of these is zuccotto, which has many connections to the Renaissance. This liqueur-soaked dessert is made of sponge cake and, in its classic semifreddo
The longest day has past, the heat is here to stay, and so is the summer fruit. The star of summer fruit in Tuscany is by far the watermelon. Citrullus vulgaris: luscious rich red in colour, juicy and glossy, sweet and syrupy, sticky on the fingers and face if you
Every week I buy some pigs’ heads to cure the cheeks to make guanciale, and I have been sad at discarding so many good bits of the head. Then I started thinking: most of my Italian friends get a pig every year, and the day becomes a family affair,
In Italy, traditional Easter desserts are usually egg-rich baked goods. Naples’ Easter sweet is pastiera, a ricotta and wheatberry cake scented with orange blossom and candied citron. In Sicily, it is cassata, a sponge cake layered with ricotta, chocolate and candied fruit. Tuscany’s simpler palate is
In the past, people's diets followed the seasons: eating fresh when nature offered an abundance of harvest and preserving as much as possible for use in the colder months, when plant activity slowed to a minimum. Autumn was a time for harvest and for making conserves to last for
When it comes to food and drink, the world has a lot to thank Tuscany for. Tuscan cuisine dates back to the time of the Etruscans, the ancient civilization once living in areas of Tuscany, Umbria and Lazio a number of centuries before the Romans arrived. Etruscan frescoes show
The great-grandfather of Italian cuisine, Pellegrino Artusi (see theflr.net/artusi), has a recipe in his 1891 cookbook, Science in the Kitchen and the Art of Eating Well, for a dessert that he calls Dolce Firenze, a previously unnamed dish that he savoured in Florence. While it is no
Natale con i tuoi, Pasqua con chi vuoi (Christmas with your family, Easter with whoever you like) is how the great Italian saying goes, but when you are like me and have spent more than half your life in places other than home, the word ‘family’ gains a
Last winter was my first time having cioccolata calda in Italy, and I just fell in love with it. Italian hot chocolate is nothing like the American version. It is very thick, rich and not terribly sweet. In fact, it is usually served with a pack of sugar on the
Buongiorno all’autunno! We have arrived at the season of fall cooking, leaving juicy summer tomatoes and fresh citrus fruit behind. Now the heartier gourds, vegetables and apples are becoming part of our daily diet. Whether in soups, purees or pastas, the pumpkin—or zucca—is
The humble potato is often referred to as a tartufo bianco, a white truffle, both because of its looks and for its vital role in keeping people alive during World War II. But the potato-filled pillows of pasta that are tortelli di patate mugellani are close to divine. &
As nights turn cold, there is no meal more comforting to come home to than a warm and satisfying Tuscan soup. Along with the famous ribollita, Tuscany’s soups include the delicious and hearty zuppa Ricasoli, which features beans and sausage. Named after Baron Bettino Ricasoli, zuppa Ricasoli
I love this time of the year: the autumnal colours intensify as the evenings begin their shorter fall into dusk. The shades become stronger just before nightfall, and we see more of that amazingly intense hue of the sky, il cielo azzurro, that powerful blue the heavens offer around sunset,
In Tuscany, the end of summer and beginning of autumn is synonymous with mushrooms. And when mushrooms are mentioned, they are porcini of course. Fresh porcini. Many a keen forager will plan to andare a funghi to collect their own fresh porcini, which go into pasta and risottos. But another
The first lesson to learn about Italian cooking is that there really is no ‘Italian cuisine,’ but 20 diverse regional cuisines, each with their own character, style, flavours and traditions. What you find in one region you may never see anywhere else on the peninsula. There are, however,
Colonnata, a very small town high up in the white marble mountains of Carrara, near the Tuscan coast, is known for its lardo, the cured back fat of the pig, a high-energy food developed out of necessity: to keep workers sustained during their several-day shifts working in the
There’s no doubt that Italians have a sweet tooth, particularly when it comes to starting the day. Take a glance at the offerings behind the glass counter at your local bar or pastry shop: cornetti (sweet and fluffy rather than buttery and flaky croissants), berry or apricot jam
As spring turns into summer, walking along the Arno—fresh in the morning, with beautiful sunsets in the evening—gets me thinking of the sea, for it is not far away, and the late spring breeze wafts its aroma inland. I love eating seafood at this time of
One of my favourite things to do at this time of the year is to go to the Sant’Ambrogio market to see what the beginning of spring mushroom season has to offer. My first experience of mushrooming in Italy occurred when I lived in the mountain town of
My memories of Easter as a little girl growing up in New Zealand involve camping, trout fishing and Easter egg hunts. To me, Easter meant a short break from school and an active home life, usually a long weekend road trip with family, and hot cross buns, chocolate and marshmallow
When I moved from New Zealand to Italy in 2001, I missed many things from home. Not only was the spoken language different, but the difference was deeper than vocabulary: the sentence structure of Italian was so unlike that of English; Italian has both formal and informal address, expressed in
