Pasqua at Benefizio

Pasqua is Italian for Easter. Last year I went to Francesca Bonagurelli’s agriturismo Al Benefizio to join her family and friends for their typical Easter lunch.

The dining room was decorated

Family and friends were there

Queen of the day Francesca at the right edge of the photo nearest the kitchen, her daughter, her nephew, her cousin from Milan, her brother-in-law, her sister, her mother and her dear friend Marta.

The table was laid

Chocolate eggs flaunting their Easter gowns

In ever more extravagant wrapping

Except for these happy nudists at the other end of the table

An antipasto consisting of the usual crostini and some olives didn’t prepare me for the surprises to come. The primo was something I’d never had before: gnocchi alla romana. Instead of the little potato cylinders, these circular cakes were made of semolino polenta to which egg yolks and parmigiano was added. And instead of boiling them, they were sprinkled with butter and more parmigiano and browned in the oven. Delicious!

Francesca's gnocchi are heart-shaped

The secondo, roast beef, was accompanied by enough vegetables to please any of my clients, who are always asking, ‘Where are the vegetables?’

Perfectly roasted beef

Stuffed artichokes

Roast mixed vegetables

Roast potatoes

Here again there was a surprise: a vegetable looking like the hair of a punk angel who had dyed it bright green. It was Salsola soda, a saltwort that grows around Mediterranean coasts and is harvested between March and May. In Italian it’s called agretti or barba dei frati(monk’s beard—a punk monk?). Wikipedia tells me that it was important historically as a source of soda ash, one of the alkalis needed for soap and glass making. The clarity of cristalloglass from Murano depended upon soda ash. As a food it’s supposed to have a detoxifying effect.

Agretti

Wow!

​Just when we thought we would burst, the table was cleared, the cakes arrived and the spumante was uncorked.

Alberto and Isabella open the bubbly

Naturally there was a colomba di Pasqua (Easter dove), a traditional Easter cake similar to panettone served at Christmas.

An Easter dove topped with sugar and almonds

Recently arrived from Naples was another novelty: the pastiera napoletana wrapped in its Easter finery.

The pastiera was from the renowned Gran Bar Riviera

One legend reveals its origin. One night some fishermen’s wives left baskets of ricotta, candied fruit, wheat, eggs and orange flowers on the beach as an offering to the sea, so it would protect their husbands and bring them back safe and sound. The next morning, when they descended to the beach to greet their returning husbands, they discovered that the waves had mixed the ingredients, and in the baskets was a cake.

Pastiera without its Easter veil

It comes with a packet of confectioner's sugar

Now it's ready to be served

I'm inviting the sea waves to make me a cake this year