Simple, True and Delicious
Roman food through the ages and the importance of good ingredients and slowing down
I’m keeping to this food & garden theme and I love every minute of the writing and research. If you’re interested supporting me as I explore what we eat, plants, nature and the culture behind it all, here’s the link:
I dove into a collection of books on Roman food this past week that took me on a trip from the countryside to the city. From recreating ancient texts with dishes balanced by spices from all over the world to more modern dishes utilizing a few simple amazing ingredients, Roman food has subtle complexity from nature but really is simple — and always has a story.
From a number of sources, I found mention of of Roman food as “e vero”. Simple, honest, delicious. Michaela Pavoncello said that Roman food is “povero e sublime” - poor and sublime.
Don’t Rush!
Except when whipping up the pasta water with cheese for a cacio e pepe pasta dish, in general Italians don’t rush. Somewhat recently on a sunny afternoon, I walked around the corner to my favorite coffee shop to get out of the apartment and be around some people. My barista, who is a transplant from the midwest, was so happy I ordered a macchiato to stay. She went into an almost astrological-reading-level analysis of people that will take a macchiato to go and how people need to chill and take 5 minutes to sit and drink a tiny little coffee.
Only a day later, I started on the “Eating Rome” book I got from the library—where Elizabeth Minchilli talked in detail about a number of Italian culture points. One of her sections delved into coffee culture and I was taken aback by this quote:
“In Italy I learned the words “coffee” and “to go” don’t even exist on a conceptual level” - Elizabeth Minchilli
Did my midwestern barista have an inkling that her peeve was so close to the Italian way of thinking? In the same spirit of taking writing to go, or rushing, I ask that you slow down and see if you can read this with bit of enjoyment and relaxation. See if you can take your reading as a moment to absorb and contemplate instead of a mad dash to go back to your inbox or check social media.
The Four Pastas
I was initially captivated by the idea of focusing on Rome this month by an episode of Stanley Tucci’s “Searching for Italy” featuring simple pastas of Rome. What’s not to love about carbonara followed by Stanley hugging everyone in the kitchen out of pure love for the pasta and astonishment at how good it tastes?
4 different dishes, super simple, amazingly delicious. Basically universally acknowledged as the reigning pastas of Rome and the surrounding regions. There are many sources for the best way to cook them, so I’ll just name them. Cacio e pepe, amatriciana, carbonara and gricia. All of them have pasta and pecorino romano. Additions of tomato, or egg, or pepper, or guanciale (kind of like bacon) determine what dish you’re going to get, but each is distinctive and made its own way in spite of being so closely related to the others.
The Farmland
Roman food is what it is because of the roads that lead into the city. At its peak ancient Rome had a million inhabitants, and they all needed to eat. So the influneces on what people ate inside the city came from the surrounding areas. The livestock influenced a culture that ate every part of the animal, and to this day in spite of the modern tastes many people still eat traditional dishes with tripe, pajata and other parts of an animal not easily found in an American supermarket.
Hard work goes into working on a farm, and everything from eggs to lemons to cheese are shipped into the city and lovingly transformed into dishes that are familiar and comforting but nuanced enough with the changes of the season to give a sense of adventure and emotion to even the most common and simple cooking.
The Artichokes. The Asparagus. The Attention to Freshness.
So. Much. Talk about artichokes! I typically eat my artichokes pickled, in a jar and mixed into a salad or I’ll fork out the flowers one by one as a snack that nobody else I know wants to emulate. I find artichokes in all forms addictive and give me a satisfaction similar to the shivers I get when I have shellfish in the middle of winter or blueberries right off the bush in the middle of July. There must be some kind of vitamins that are uniquely in those artichokes!
Raw or cooked, artichokes are greatly anticipated in the spring in Italy, and there are many varieties. Piles of them can be found in farmers’ markets or stacked high in front of certain stores.
Asparagus is similarly revered as a staple vegetable. While we’re familiar with the more chubby and substantial stalks, in Italy people with a trained eye hunt for wild asparagus, which grows in clumps and often near certain telltale companion plants and are a giveaway to people that have grown up in the area all of their life.
There are many other facets to the vegetables and how to best cook and serve them, but overall there is a focus on getting the freshest ingredients and then adding just a couple of other ingredients to what is grown to truly bring out the true simple flavor from something grown in the sun and rain for an entire season.
Sweetness: Breakfast & Dessert
We are all familiar with tiramisu, and typically every time I’ve tasted it I feel it’s absolute perfection of a dessert. The creaminess mixes with bitter coffee and cocoa; the cookies are just the right amount of crumbly mouthfeel and layered for structure. But now that I know most Italians have cookies for breakfast, or other kinds of crumbly pastries filled with whipped cream when they wake up from their slumber. Well, maybe just like my tradition of eating a slice of pie for breakfast can combine with a possible slice of tiramisu with my coffee.
Ancient Roman Food
I love pine nuts — the flavor, the texture, everything. So while looking at the recipes in Cooking Apicus, I was naturally drawn to some of the dishes that used pine nuts. I’ve made all kinds of pestos and nut butters before and never thought to make a creamy sauce out of pine nuts. One sauce calls to soak pine nuts in wine overnight and then blend with honey, vinegar and fish sauce. But even better than that (and more modern perhaps) is a recipe to toast pine nuts and then grind and blend those toasted nuts with herbs and saffron. Spread that on some bread!
The banquets of Roman times were usually long in duration and eaten while lounging. I can’t imagine reclining on a couch for hours while feeding myself in a semicircle with friends. But I can appreciate the use of flavors like cumin, honey, lovage and rosemary to flavor vegetables brought in the same day from the hills surrounding the city.
Like good cooking, good writing takes time.
It’s all about the ingredients, and in this case I’m going to compare the ingredients in a recipe to the sources I used for this article.
Katie and Giancarlo Caldesi. Recipes from Rome. Hardie Grant Books.
Elizabeth Minchilli. Eating Rome. St. Martin’s Press.
Sally Grainger. Cooking Apicus: Roman Recipes for Today. Prospect Books.
Jarrett Wrisley and Paolo Vitaletti. The Roads to Rome, Clarkson Potter/Publishers.
Katie Parla and Kristina Gill. Tasting Rome, Clarkson Potter/Publishers.
Public domain image of asparagus from http://hdl.handle.net/10934/RM0001.COLLECT.140390
Lovely post! I always find myself rushing around throughout the day and yes, taking my coffees to go. I need to remember to not be in such a hurry when there really is no need.
Slowing down to savor this post was good advice. Thanks, Lorraine!