Mid-Century Culinary Lore
This Italian style red bean salad with canned tuna feels so familiar to my Western palette acclimatized to grocery store prepared salads that I almost didn’t bother to include it on this review. Which would have been a mistake. No, this cold bean salad doesn’t reinvent the wheel. That’s probably because dating to the early …
Pork chops stuffed with mozzarella and prosciutto and then breaded and fried. Pretty straightforward as guilty pleasures go and pretty tasty as well. A little nutmeg goes a long way in giving this dish a bit of personality. All in all, another winning dish from Ada Boni’s The Talisman Italian Cook Book. Ingredients 4 pork …
I kind of stumbled across this recipe in Ada Boni’s The Talisman Italian Cook Book and was attracted to its sheer audaciousness only to later learn that that audaciousness is precisely the point of the dish.
Another specialty from the northwest corner of Italy, this time from the city of Genoa, buridda is a seafood stew that can be found throughout the Ligurian region of Italy. What attracted me to this particular recipe was the combination of white wine and pine nuts that just screamed success. And it was. It’s rare …
It is perhaps unsurprising that the pasta section of Ada Boni’s The Talisman Italian Cook Book has become prominent feature of this retrospective. Pasta is, after all, the culinary contribution that Italy is famed for, second only to pizza. This is a rather obscure recipe with little to no online presence which would lead me …
Spaghetti and meatballs. Arguably the quintessential Italian-American restaurant fare. Pretty hard to make this dish stick out from the pack, but Ada Boni does just that with an alluring spice mix of clove, cinnamon, and nutmeg.
Spaghettini alla Vongole, or thin noodle spaghetti with clams is a popular dish throughout Italy, often served in a simple olive oil or butter sauce with garlic. This dish opts for a light tomato based sauce but to great effect.
Beefsteak Cacciatora, or Hunter Style, is a robust, hearty and yet refined culinary feast sure to please.
With it’s exquisite blend of ingredients, this home-made stuffed pasta is just left of centre to intrigue any dinner guest.
A household favourite at Gourmet Relics it was actually my girlfriend, herself of Sicilian descent, who first introduced me to arancini, the deep fried stuffed rice balls native of southern Italy. Hence, needless to say, when I came across this recipe in Ada Boni’s The Talisman Italian Cook Book it was only a matter of …
