It was nearly lunch time when I went up to the village shop this morning. Opening the door, a wave of good smells washed over me. Since Renato was serving another customer, I peeked into the room at the back of the shop where I found Eugenia preparing ragù alla matriciana. As she lifted the lid from the pot, releasing even more intense aromas, she asked whether I knew the recipe and rattled it off for me anyway. The pasta was already boiling in the huge pan on another burner. Turning back into the shop, I bought my half loaf of bread and a stick of celery, all that I needed this morning, but before I could leave, out came Eugenia bearing a plastic bowl full of pasta alla matriciana. She wrapped it in a sheet of white paper and presented it to me for my first course at lunch. An authentic home-cooked ready meal!
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All winter I’ve been banned from taking clients to visit one of my favourite cheesemakers because they were rebuilding the dairy. When you arrived at the old dairy you entered a shabby sitting room with an old table in the centre, along one wall a lumpy sofa, usually occupied by one of the farm cats, and along another an old chestnut-wood sideboard. It was dingy, but welcoming. The walls were decorated with black-and-white photographs of the family, showing grandfather and his sons posed outside the barn, and a poster listing the cheeses they used to produce. Since granddad died, they’d narrowed the range to fresh pecorino and ricotta made from the milk of their 400 handsome black Massese sheep. The cheesemaking took place behind in a space no larger than a corridor. Four large gas burners sat on the floor on the right and a narrow stainless steel draining-shelf with an upturned rim was fixed to the white tiled wall on the left. Giuliana and her daughter-in-law Maria Rosa took turns making the pecorino in a large aluminium pot, warming the milk on a burner, cutting the curd with a wooden stick and bending almost double to gather up the chopped-up curd into a lump after it had sunk to the bottom of the pot. Although there was barely enough room to turn around, each pecorino-sized lump was put into a plastic mould on the stainless steel shelf behind to allow the whey to drain and run into a plastic bucket on the floor at the far end of the shelf. Then they’d make ricotta by reheating the whey in battered copper cauldrons on the same burners on the ground. It was back-breaking work, and I spent the winter imagining the new large, more convenient dairy with the burners at a more comfortable height and more space to move about in. Today I went to see it. The front wall of the sitting room had been knocked down and replaced by a shop window. From the yard, I could see inside a chill counter filled with cheeses, and shelves affixed to the side walls stacked with honey, grappa and some kitsch stuffed animals. The photos had gone. A window had been inserted into the back wall of this new shop through which I glimpsed the enlarged dairy full of gleaming elephantine stainless-steel vats. Maria Rosa was standing at one on some portable steps, since the vat is too tall for her to operate from the ground. She beckoned me in and, as I entered, I realised she was peering intently at a thermometer immersed in the milk that filled the vat. I commented that I’d never seen her or Giuliana use a thermometer before. She explained that with this new container that heated the milk by circulating hot water in its double walls, she had lost her sense of the temperature. While we waited for the milk to coagulate, she listed the benefits of the new system. Before they only had the capacity to make half their milk into cheese; they sold the other half which brought in less income than cheese. Besides that, now they have a larger temperature-controlled storeroom, and instead of selling all the pecorino fresh, they’ve started maturing some of it, which also adds value. Since they’re making more cheeses, they can branch out and reach new markets by flavouring the pecorino with walnuts, tomato, pepper, herbs and hay. I asked her whether she liked, for instance, the pecorino aged in hay. ‘No’, she admitted frankly. ‘It’s too dry’. But then added quickly, ‘Lots of people like it because they eat it with honey and jam’. During this conversation, Maria Rosa tested the curd four times to check whether it was ready to be cut. Previously the women had a sixth sense about when it was ready and only once had to test it a second time. When she finally decided it was ready, she pressed a button and a vertical frame strung with wires started to rotate inside the vat and cut the coagulated curd into small pieces. When she judged they were small enough, she hauled the free end of a large-diameter plastic hosepipe over to a two-metre square stainless steel box-table on legs and casters, which took up most of the centre of the room. She now pressed a red button on the vat and the cut curd and whey was pumped from the vat through the hosepipe into moulds in a frame in the box-table. She needed my help to redirect the awkward, heavy hosepipe to different areas. When all the curd was in the box, it had to be redistributed among the moulds which required wheeling the table away from the wall. Again it was too heavy for her to do on her own, as was the frame holding the moulds, which had to be lifted out after the moulds were full. Usually her daughter was around to help. I remembered when even old Giuliana could lift all the human-sized equipment by herself. Now Maria Rosa looked awkward as she worked, compared to the ease and grace she had displayed when working in the old cramped dairy. I observed that the new system seemed to distance her from the cheese so her senses were no longer in control, and she agreed. But she insisted that the flavour of the cheese is the same. When she gave me a taste, I didn’t tell her that it had a bitter taste that hadn’t been there before. And best of all, she assured me, Giuliana is glad not to have to make cheese any more. When I had arrived, Giuliana was taking down the laundry. I’d greeted her and asked how things were going. She’d replied, ‘In somma’, which usually means ‘Could be better’. So did the soups live up to all the hype? As usual, some did and some didn’t. It was obvious that each cook had put loving attention into the making of thezuppa. They had been made with care and all contained the correct basic ingredients. It was the ‘element of surprise’ that I sometimes found too surprising: the domineering aroma and flavour of nepitella (Calamintha nepeta) in sample 2 (it was a blind tasting) and the overpowering sensation of stringy celery in sample 4. Cavolo nero is delicious but had taken over the whole bowl in one sample, and another screamed carrots. The individual flavours should be in balance and harmony; the subtle flavour of cinnamon in one was just right. I like a few whole beans in my zuppa, but only a couple of cooks seemed to agree with me. In the first round I attended, we tasted five soups, and the winner came next to bottom in my ranking. My friend Kathleen Dunne and I were the only foreigners, while the rest of the jury were Italian and mostly in their 20s and 30s, many of them employees at Effecorta, a newish grocery in Marlia that shortens the supply line by buying directly from local farmers. But at the second round, my favourite of the six was also the winner in the eyes of the locals. The dinner was held in the church hall at Aquilea, and here I was the only foreigner. More of the crowd were older than at the previous judging, and it was a woman in her late 50s who had made the winning soup. Maybe one’s palate changes? Or perhaps the young are more daring and out for obvious excitement, whereas us oldies desire the warm comfort of the known? (Photos of the Marlia round are at: Disfida della Zuppa) During a necessarily brief Twitter conversation with Alex Roe of @newsfromitaly and Blog from Italy about the Slow Food Compitese e Orti Lucchesi soup tournament, he asks me what one wins. I know every contestant gets an apron and a certificate, but what does the winner get? I look at the announcements, the menus, the Elegy to Zuppa and the rules of the competition. Nowhere is a prize mentioned. I email Marco Del Pistoia, the leader of Slow Food Compitese. No reply. I telephone. Hesitation. ‘Ma’, I can imagine the shrug of his shoulders, ‘we haven’t decided yet. Maybe a hand-painted ceramic soup tureen filled with local produce.’ So whatever the official prize turns out to be, the contestants are really competing for the love of soup. If you haven’t had enough soup yet, try my soup story at Sapori e Saperi Newsletter vol. 2 no. 4 where you’ll find out the basics for making a zuppa yourself. According to my Italian dictionary ‘zuppa’ means: pasta, rice or vegetables cooked in broth (of meat, fish, legumes or vegetables), served with small pieces of bread, toasted or fried in oil or butter. More a stew than a soup. And this is only the beginning according to the ‘Elegy on Zuppa alla Frantoiana’, which we found at each of our places at the Disfida della Zuppa (Zuppa Tournament) at Ristorante Diavoletti in Camigliano on Friday night. Since it covers both sides of an A5 page in tiny type, I’ll try to convey its essence. ‘The Zuppa alla Frantoiana is a dish that, for the Lucchesia [area around Lucca] and in particular the plain of Lucca, represents a synthesis of territory, characteristic local produce, memories, culture and social gatherings.’ That’s a lot to pack into a bowl of vegetables. Yet every one of those elements was present at the Zuppa Tournament. A group of about 60 people — old, young, families, singles — from a radius of maybe 10 km had gathered to eat and judge a dish, made from ingredients also from a radius of about 10 km by a friend or parent or child. In judging each cook’s entry, this volunteer jury was comparing it with Zuppa alla Frantoiana as made by their mothers and grandmothers and friends and local restaurants, and inevitably recalled the many occasions on which they had eaten it. Even I, only five years in the Lucchesia, was remembering the first time I ate it at the Sagra della Zuppa (Zuppa Festival) at Aquilea, its annual appearance at my own village’s Ferragosto dinner and its apotheosis as created by Emma at Da Pinzo in Ponte a Moriano, not to mention my own efforts which often provide a satisfying winter supper. The Elegy lists the essential ingredients:
There are so many beans to choose from. You can choose some grown near you. (Photos: http://germoplasma.arsia.toscana.it/) ‘The Zuppa is a “dynamic” dish in that it has a high level of “diversity” depending not only on the hand of the cook, but also the family tradition, the village and the season in which the zuppa is made, determining which wild plants are available.’ Besides it’s traditional value, it has other notable qualities:
The Elegy ends with a plea. 'Increasingly we find banal versions of this traditional dish on the menus of bars that serve food reheated in the microwave and on the shelves of supermarkets packaged in simulated plastic terracotta for the microwave. We mustn’t forget the proverb: "There is no future without memory". Let’s keep the original identity of the Zuppa at the heart of present-day and future creativity.' Correction to my previous post: There are six rounds, not five, to determine the finalists. The play-off will be on 27 February at the Frantoio Sociale del Compitese, Pieve di Compito. To be absolutely clear, the remaining rounds take place at 20:00 as follows: 22 January at Effecorta, Marlia; 23 January at Aquilea (sold out), 30 January at Sala ex Collegio Cavanis, Porcari; 5 February at Ristorante La Pecora Nera, Lucca; 6 February at Sala Parrocchiale, Santa Maria del Giudice. Each round is a full dinner, not just soup. Only €20 per person (€17 if you’re a member of Slow Food). Go to Disfida della Zuppa 2010 Lucchesia e Compitese for booking information. Don’t miss the chance to help choose the champion soup maker! As soon as Marco del Pistoia, leader of Slow Food Compitese e Orti Lucchesi, told me they were organising a soup tournament, I asked him to put me on the mailing list and ever more excited emails keep arriving about the pilgrims already being on the road. The contestants are volunteers each believing his or her soup recipe to be the best in the region, or more probably in the world; the juries are self-selected gourmets and gluttons from the public. There will be five rounds to determine the finalists who will compete on 6 February for the ‘World Championship’ at the Sagra della Zuppa (Soup Festival) at Santa Maria del Giudice, not far from Lucca. The soup will be variations on zuppa alla frantoiana, a thick vegetable soup based on a brodo di fagioli (bean broth) and drizzled with new-season olive oil. Some people maintain the tradition of including wild greens; those suitable for soup are only in season from January to March. It takes at least a day to prepare, or two days if you count the 12 hours needed for soaking the beans and the time spent scouring the fields and hedgerows for the wild herbs. It would be a great course for Sapori e Saperi Adventurers. I’ve signed up for the jury on Friday and Saturday evenings and am already wondering, what is the equivalent of a tiebreaker in a soup tournament — who can throw their soup pot through the kitchen window first? If they’re not all deep dark family secrets, I’ll come back with some recipes. In case you’re near Lucca and are in the mood for some good warming soup, the full programme is at: Disfida della Zuppa 2010 (it takes forever to load, Slow Web?). If you need a translation, send me an email at info@sapori-e-saperi.com The mulino is a building from the past that is becoming part of the future of the Garfagnana. Chestnut flour used to be so important in the local diet that there were seven water mills in the tiny valley below our village and many hundreds more throughout the Garfagnana. Today there is barely a trace of them left. However, with diagnoses of coeliac disease and wheat allergies on the increase, chestnut flour, completely free of gluten, is enjoying a comeback, and that from the Garfagnana has attained the exalted status of DOP (Protected Designation of Origin) from the EU. This may not seem very momentous, but it has raised the prestige and price of a homely commodity, making it more attractive and worthwhile to produce. To meet increased demand, the early 17th-century mill at Fabbriche di Vallico, was recently restored to its former glory, and several others have also been refurbished. In all the water mills I’ve seen in this area north of Lucca, the grindstones are driven by horizontal water wheels, mounted in beautiful arched stone chambers directly below the grindstone, one wheel per millstone. At the outer ends of the wheel spokes are shallow metal cups, which used to be made of chestnut wood. Water shoots out of a narrow channel at the back of the chamber, striking the cups and turning the wheel which in turn drives the huge circular grindstone. The lower stone is fixed, while the upper stone spins and can be raised or lowered to change how fine or coarse the flour will be. The type of stone from which the grindstone is made and how it’s dressed also determines the texture of the flour. Having harvested, dried and cleaned our chestnuts, we drive along the beautiful Turrite River valley to Fabbriche, where Domenico reverses the car up to the door of the mill. We enter onto the welcoming warm upper floor of the mill. The miller keeps two wood-fired stoves burning to maintain a low humidity and prevent the chestnuts from re-hydrating and squashing into a paste when they’re ground. By now Marco has arrived too, and he and Domenico carry in the sacks on their shoulders and pile them onto a large set of scales with weights that the miller slides along the balance arms. Each sack weighs about 40 kg (88 lb). The miller used to charge in kind for his services by taking a small percentage of the flour to sell directly from the mill. This barter system is now illegal; it didn't allow the government to levy taxes on the miller's income. Since the mill grinds only chestnuts to avoid gluten contamination from wheat and other cereals, it’s only open from the end of November when the chestnuts are ready for milling until all of this year’s crop is ground. Now that I’m writing this, I wonder whether he’ll finish by Christmas, but I know that if you go in spring or summer, it’s shut up tight. Even though four grindstones work from morning to night every day except Sunday, there’s a big backlog of chestnuts waiting to be ground. I feel proud of our white hemp sacks with their blue embroidered initials which are much handsomer than everyone else’s utilitarian plastic sacks. I can’t wait to go downstairs where the flour is being ground, but before descending the steep, narrow wooden steps, the miller shows me the chestnut-wood boxes, one per grindstone, which are actually chutes into which he pours the chestnuts, and through which they descend into the hoppers that feed the chestnuts unbelievably slowly, only one or two at a time, into the hole in the centre of the upper grindstone. Downstairs each pair of grindstones is housed in its own wooden (chestnut, of course) cupboard, with doors to keep the flour from flying out and getting into the miller's lungs. The miller goes to the stones at the far end which he had been setting up with a new batch of chestnuts when we arrived. He pulls a lever to start the flow of water, which we can’t see from here, starts the hopper vibrating, turns a sort of steering wheel to adjust the height of the upper stone and reaches over to feel the fineness of the flour as it sprays out from between the two stones. It’s not right. He turns the wheel a little more and feels the flour again. After a couple more tests, he’s satisfied that it’s exactly right and closes the doors to the cupboard. I notice a sign on the wall next to the cupboard on which ‘biologico’ (organic) is written. I shout over the roar of the four whirling stones: ‘Why is only this one organic? Aren’t all chestnuts organic?’ Both Domenico and the miller rub their thumbs and forefingers together in the Italian sign for money. The miller explains: ‘This one is for producers who have paid for the organic certification so that they can sell their flour at a higher price, but yes, I’m right that all chestnuts are organic. No one sprays or fertilises chestnut trees.’ He leads us to a plastic sack of flour from the certified chestnuts and tells us to take a pinch and taste it. Not bad. Then he takes us to a sack of flour ground from uncertified chestnuts from Coreglia. We sample it. The sweet chestnut-y flavour explodes in my mouth. The implication is that people who go through the bureaucracy and cost of getting organic certification are more interested in money than in the flavour of the flour. They won’t have lavished enough care on the drying, cleaning and sorting processes as we at Casabasciana did. I think to myself that there are probably some who care passionately about the flavour and some who don’t in both camps. You have to taste the flour before buying and when you find one you like, stick to that producer.
The jury is still out on our own flour. When I left for England a week later, it wasn’t yet back from the mill. As soon as I return next week, I’m going straight to Ebe’s to try it. By now the chestnuts of Casabasciana had had two months of care lavished upon them. What with collecting them, drying them, shelling them and sorting and cleaning them, they should have been feeling properly mollycoddled. Now was the big moment, the first dry sunny day for a week, when they were to be taken to the mulino, the water mill, to be ground into flour. There were 12 sacks of chestnuts ready for the first trip, so we have to go in two cars. Marco goes ahead to stop for petrol on the way, and I accompany Domenico in his Suzuki 4×4. The journey is as interesting as the destination. He describes something of his life when he was a boy growing up at Castelluccio in the ‘50s and talks about the evolution of the landscape and movements of people in those days. When he was 10, he went to school every morning in Casabasciana, a 45-minute walk along a woodland path, and returned home again at lunch time. Children didn’t play in those days. In the afternoon he went out on the mountain with the sheep. They had 15, as did most families, and his mother Olga made pecorino cheese and ricotta from their milk. What with chickens, rabbits and a pig, chestnuts, wheat and vegetables, plus a couple of horses for transporting goods, they were virtually self-sufficient. I ask whether they felt life was hard. He replies, ‘We didn’t know anything else. We were happier than people are now. Now everyone needs a car, a television, all those things that require money. It was simpler then.’
The sweet chestnut has three layers of protection, which makes for much hard work for those who want to turn the fruit into flour. There’s the green spiny outer covering. When the chestnut is ripe at the end of September or early October, it drops from the tree and this outer case splits open revealing the middle shell, the shiny dark brown one we see on fresh chestnuts in shops and, at this time of year, roasting on street corners of some cities. Inside the leathery dark brown shell is the final protective layer, a thin reddish brown skin. Inside this hides the cream-coloured nut. It’s the remnants of the shell and this pesky inner skin that is occupying all our time now. When we collected the chestnuts, the prickly outer case was left on the woodland floor where it rots very slowly — beware sitting on the ground in a chestnut wood! After being dried for at least 40 days and nights in a metato (a special chestnut-drying hut), most, but not all, of the dark brown shell and inner skin was removed in a machine resembling a giant cheese grater. Chestnut flour is naturally sweet, and the goal is to produce the sweetest flour possible. You shouldn’t have to add sugar to a chestnut cake, but the shell and skin are bitter, as are chestnuts that accidentally got burnt in the drying process. All the chestnuts and pieces of chestnuts have to be sorted and cleaned by hand to remove them. We gather in the old school that now functions as a community hall. In the centre of the room is a large shallow wooden box with a screen bottom resting on trestles. Members of Franca and Peppe’s family are bent over around the sieve, pushing the chestnuts from one end of the sieve to the other. Each person quickly removes some of the bad pieces, scrapes off remnants of inner skin with a serrated kitchen knife and pushes them on to the next person who does the same until they reach the other end, where Franca and Olga remove the last of the offending bits and shove the good ones out the end into a plastic bucket, which Franca empties periodically into antique hemp sacks embroidered with family initials. I love the way they happily mix old and new — the utilitarian plastic buckets next to the beautiful hemp sacks, also perfect for their purpose. This is the most boring work imaginable. The others are talking, but I don’t understand when they race along in the local accent. Everyone’s back aches. We stand, we sit. I stand on one leg and then the other, try a tai chi stance. Glance at my watch. Still two hours till lunch. Then someone asks me a question. I ask them to repeat it and understand the second time round. I reply and we have a short conversation. When we stop talking, I realise my back doesn’t ache. I listen more intently and join in. I begin to realise, that’s the remedy. And now it’s lunch time.
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