Pizza and pasta are two elements of a cuisine that has made Italy famous worldwide, but how much do we really know about the complexity of this proud nation's traditional cooking? A couple of years ago I travelled from the north to the south of the country as part of a TV show called Grandma's Boy to learn more about Italy's rich food heritage. Who better to teach me than an army of Italian nonnas? Despite the fluffy television premise, the trip took me to some of Italy's finest food regions and, most importantly, I was welcomed into the homes of grandmothers who have seen the secrets of Italian cookery passed down the generations.
I started in Rome, heading north to explore the small towns of Capena, Casteldilago, Rieti, Graffignano, Montefalco, Trevi and Todi. I followed in the footsteps of St Francis in the Rieti valley to La Foresta monastery, to pick tomatoes with the monks for pizzacoti alla Rietina, a humble dish with a rich tomato sauce wrapped around dumplings of bread dough poached until tender. I picked olives and foraged for wild herbs in Graffignano for Arrosto morto do coniglio, a surprisingly simple whole braised rabbit casserole stuffed with lip-puckering young olives.
However, it was the small town of Sant' Angelo in Colle, Tuscany, that stole my heart. Heavily populated by women of a slightly older generation, the tiny village overlooked spectacular rolling vineyards. The local grandmothers set up tables on the piazza, where we filmed them making "donzelle", pizza dough, pricked with fennel seeds and deep-fried until crisp. As the sun went down, I was pulled into a communal kitchen used to cater for special occasions, and put to work.
The ladies chuckled at my attempts to roll pici, a pencil-thick, hand-rolled version of spaghetti, which was served for our sunset street party. Great food savoured with a local biodynamic wine, which flowed late into the night, along with fantastic company, made for a truly special experience.
The running joke among our crew was that each town we visited claimed to have the best olive oil. We all smirked at each other as each local guide would extol the virtues of the local produce, but it’s exactly this pride the locals have in something as simple as olive oil, right down to the preservation of traditional recipes, that sets their cuisine apart. It’s precisely why Italian food continues to inspire the world.
Today I’m sharing some recipes I picked up along the way, including a comforting stuffed gnocchi dish, a refreshing salad and a creamy dessert with a kick.
