Tuscany Archives - Page 3 of 11 - attheitaliantable.com

May 27, 2017 by Gina Stipo Leave a Comment

Summer grilling the Tuscan Way

Memorial Day means filling the pool, cleaning off lawn furniture for al fresco dining and getting the barbeque or grill ready for a season of cooking outdoors. Welcome summer!

Grilling outdoors is generally a warmer seasonal activity. But in Tuscany, we grill inside as well. Show a Tuscan a fire and he’s at the ready with some meat to throw on a grill over the live coals – inside or out!

There is no comparison to the flavor that a wood or charcoal fire gives to anything you put on it. The recent article by Sam Sifton in the food section of the NYTimes attests to that. Gas may be more convenient, but nothing matches the flavor of grilling over live coals. I’m of the opinion that the reason we feel the need to use so many rubs and marinades in our gas grilling is to either to add some flavor that gas doesn’t provide or to mask the bad flavor that gas so often imparts to food.

At my restaurant in Louisville, we only grill outdoors over live coals. Using a Weber grill, and a special grilling chimney to start the natural hardwood charcoal, I can have a fire ready in 20 minutes. Sea salt, meat and live coals is all you need. My guests frequently ask “What did you put on this meat? It’s so delicious!” Sea salt and a real fire. That’s it!

In Tuscany, any indoor fireplace means an opportunity to grill dinner. In the dead of winter, in the smallest fireplace with a fire started with a small amount of wood and allowed to burn down to a bed of coals, the portable grill with little legs come out and dinner is grilled right in the living room! Nothing is more surprising but nothing beats it!

Next up I’ll give you a few tips on grilling meat over live coals.

Buon Appetito and Happy Memorial Day!

May 26, 2017 by Gina Stipo Leave a Comment

Myriad cow stomachs in Italy

Part of my ongoing blogs about “strange and unusual things Italians eat”, this months entry is cow stomach, trippa in Italian. Eaten in other parts of the world as well, cow stomach is not the strangest thing to eat you’ll find in Italy. But especially in Florence, where they love them some cow stomach, you will find an amazingly wide variety!

As you may know, cows have four stomachs to digest their food, and each stomach has a different purpose and a different look and texture. I took these photos in the historic market of the Mercato Centrale in the San Lorenzo area of Florence. The dark brown wavy one is lampredotto, and is the fourth stomach of the animal. Supposedly more delicious than the others, lampredotto is especially popular in Florence.

The most commonly eaten stomach is tripe or trippa; you’ll find that all over Italy and most especially in the central regions. If you’d like to try some while you’re in Tuscany, there is a great lunch counter, da Nerbone, in Florence’s mercato centrale, that serves lampredotto and trippa sandwiches. It is very old and very famous and filled with everyday Italians eating lunch, as well as a significant amount of tourists. If you want to opt out of the cow’s stomach option, go for the boiled beef sandwich. It’s excellent and is served with au jus and salsa verde!

Buon appetito!

April 11, 2017 by Gina Stipo Leave a Comment

Fresh pecorino cheese & new fava beans are heralds of Spring

In Italy, many things are done in old-fashioned ways – growing vegetables, caring for animals, cooking traditional dishes – that inevitably tie the people to the seasons. Spring is a time of renewal and many spring dishes reflect the season. Egg-rich dishes and desserts are a result of an abundance of eggs the chickens lay as the days get warmer and longer. Lamb shows up on menus more often, often with fried spring artichokes. In Tuscany, one of my favorite spring pairings is fresh pecorino, or sheep’s milk cheese, and fresh fava beans – cacio e bacelli in Tuscan dialect – that is the perfect example of how the simplicity of a seasonal dish belies the complexity of nature.

Most of us are far removed from the farm and little nuances of life tied to the land frequently escape and astound us when we learn of them. In the second year I lived in Italy, it came as a revelation to me that in order for a sheep, or any animal, to give milk, it has to have a baby every year. Tuscany is a big producer of pecorino, or sheep’s milk cheese, and I learned the facts of natural cheese making when my friend, Silvana, closed her dairy in the late autumn. She explained to me, as if I was a small child, that in late summer a ram is put in with the sheep to impregnate them; once the ram’s job is done, he’s put back out to pasture until the next year. (When a Tuscan is up to his ears in work he’ll say “I’m busier than a billy goat in September!”) The pregnant sheep are then slowly weaned off of milking, ending altogether in late October or early November, and the dairy is closed for the winter.

In the late winter, the sheep give birth to little white lambs and it’s another harbinger of spring when you see them frolicking in the fields. As you can’t keep every lamb born, many of them are butchered, and the mammas go to milking again.

In a natural setting, where the farmer allows his animals to live as nature intended, fresh cheese – aged less than 30 days – is available only so long as fresh milk can be obtained. The industrial food complex has developed to give us fresh cheese all year round, the natural process is controlled with hormones and a sheep never even sees a billy goat.

When they begin milking the sheep in the spring, the first cheeses made are fresh pecorino – soft, buttery yellow and aged less than a month. Its arrival is welcome after a long winter of eating only aged cheeses. It coincides with the season of new fava beans. Sold still in their furry pods, they were planted in the fall and have ripened with the spring warmth. Cacio e bacelli, the classic pairing that is a perfect example of Tuscans honoring the seasonings.

At the Italian Table we’ve been thrilled to get our hands on both imported fresh pecorino and cases of fresh fava beans and have been making little baked custards with the cheese and serving them with blanched fava beans and fresh thyme from our herb garden!

Happy Spring, a blessed Easter and Buon Appetito!

January 17, 2017 by Gina Stipo Leave a Comment

Come join us for the Palio of Siena!

It’s on everyone’s bucket list – the most amazing and exciting sporting event in the world, a bareback, no-holds-barred historic horse race around the main Piazza of the medieval city of Siena, and this is your opportunity to experience it! Join us for our Days of the Palio tour and you will be immersed in this important cultural event when we take ten lucky people to Siena for the July 2^nd Palio this summer.

The oldest continually-run horse race in the world, it is run only twice a year, in July and August. More than just a single event, this special cultural festival spans four days of trial races, dinners, parades and traditions. The days of the Palio begin when the horses are chosen and assigned to the participating contrade (neighborhoods), and culminate with the winning contrada demanding the coveted silk banner that signals victory, to be lauded and paraded all over the city that evening.

In order to truly appreciate and experience the The Palio, you must be immersed in the culture beforehand to gain an understanding of what makes it so special: which contradas are enemies or allies, what horses have won before and which are new to the track, which jockeys have won and who is known for selling out the contrada that mounts them. Gina lived in Siena for over thirteen years and as a member of the Selva contrada, her in-depth knowledge of the Palio, the Sienese and life in the contrada will ensure that your immersion into Siena and their time-honored traditions during the days of the Palio will be complete!

Our Days of the Palio tour includes:

* 5 nights private accommodation at a beautiful villa close to Siena

* Premium balcony seats above the Piazza del Campo to view the historic medieval parade, the charge of the mounted military police and most especially for the July 2^nd Palio

* Insider’s guided tour of several contradas, their chapels and museums to view the ancient and recently won silk banner

* Special contrada dinner the night before the race in the Selva contrada (La Cena Generale) with its festive atmosphere of singing, drinking and speeches by the jockey, the captain and the head of the contrada

* Attendance at the event when they choose the horses and assign them to each contrada (La Tratta), which is second only to the Palio in terms of anxiety and excitement

* Guided walking tour of Siena with emphasis on Palio history

* Visit to Montalcino with a winery tour and lunch

* All meals and transportation to all scheduled events

* All inclusive pricing: $4500/per person, double occupancy

Early bird $4300/ per person with registration by 1/28/2017

We are only taking 10 people and we must have everyone signed up and committed for this tour by February 15^th in order to purchase the best balcony seats in the Piazza.

Whether you’re a fan of horses and racing or just want to experience an amazing cultural event, the Days of the Palio are sure to charm and enthrall you. Come experience this glorious tradition with Gina and Mary!

And Viva La Selva!!