Tasting Italy: A Culinary Journey

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From the Publisher A Culinary Journey Hunter's Style Chicken Why this recipe works: In Italy, anything cooked alla cacciatora is cooked 'the hunter’s way.' Hunters in central regions like Le Marche would braise their fresh-killed game simply, until super tender and enveloped in a savory sauce. Given the dish’s throw-together nature, there isn’t one recipe. What is always standard: The meat (typically rabbit or poultry) is first sautéed and then cooked slowly with a selection of vegetables, which are often foraged. A Marriage Made in [Culinary] Heaven What better source for Italy’s heavenly cuisine, culture, and landscape than National Geographic (culture and travel experts) and America’s Test Kitchen (of food and cooking fame)? Here they team up to bring you 100 authentic regional recipes, 300 gorgeous photos, and the origins and stories behind the taste. Rich excerpts feature the origins of celebrated cheeses, the nuances of different wine growing regions, the best farmer's markets in Venice, and more. Geography and Products of Northern Italy Here geography dictates cuisine: mountains yielding superlative cheeses and meats, foothills hosting nut and fruit trees and wine grapes, and forests famous for mushrooms. The huge Po Valley remains a prolific producer of DOP grain and vegetable crops, freshwater fish and seafood along the littorals. Tangy Bleu d’Aoste Geographically, Valle d’Aosta is the foyer of central Europe. It’s where cultures meet and eat, where travelers have historically filled up on meals such as potato gnocchi or milk dumplings draped in a creamy robe of melted cheese, or ibex bresaola, sliced thin and eaten with black bread, butter, and a drizzle of the region’s superb honey. Tangy Bleu d’Aoste is one of many exceptional cheeses produced in the valley. Nutella, A Worldwide Addiction The hazelnut cocoa spread Nutella is the peanut butter of Italy, produced by the multibillion-dollar Ferrero Group, maker of Ferrero Rocher chocolates. Just after World War II, Italy experienced a period of hunger and deprivation. Chocolate was a rare treat, but there were hazelnuts growing in the Langhe. A century earlier the chocolatiers of Turin had developed an expensive concoction of chocolate and hazelnuts; Pietro Ferrero, Ferrero Group’s founder, reimagined this confection with a lot more hazelnut, making it more affordable, and founded a company to sell it. In the 1960s the paste was reinvented again as a soft cream, renamed Nutella, and the product took off. Today one jar of Nutella is sold every 2.5 seconds. The Frasca Table With their language and traditions forged in isolated mountain valleys periodically overrun by marauding invaders, it is no wonder the Friulians are tough customers. But one way they welcome visitors is by sharing wine and traditional foods at the frasca table. Frasca means “branch,” from the tradition of hanging a laurel branch at an intersection of roads pointing the way to a vineyard with new wine to sell. Frasche are working vineyards and farms, mainly in the hill country, with a special license to sell wine and food. The good news is the food they serve must be produced on the premises: cheesy frico made with their own cheese, featherlight gnocchi, fatty sausages (from their own pigs) cooked in vinegar and onions, grilled wedges of polenta, and pitchers of fizzy new wine. Sweet Somethings Traditional sweets are often related to religious holidays (rice fritters for St. Joseph’s Day), ritual occasions (rings of leavened, fruit-studded doughnuts that hark to courting rituals), or the harvest (cookies flavored with grape must). Others reflect the local landscape and history. Among these is ciaramicola, Perugia’s red-tinted cake. Some say it is a Valentine’s Day tradition, strong here since St. Valentine, one of Umbria’s 20,000 saints, was born in Terni. Others say the color represents the red griffin, the city’s emblem. Another to try is torciglione, a rich almond-flour cake shaped like Trasimeno’s prized eel. Find it at Pasticceria Sandri, in Perugia.

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