Italian Recipes

Panzanella

Aug 27, 2004

Today's lunch was panzanella, another good thing to eat while tomatoes are in season. I more or less follow the recipe from The New Basics Cookbook, except that I didn't have any of the herbs. Basically, you make home-made croutons by frying chunks of dry, old bread.  

...which is a great way to use up dry, old bread, BTW. We always end up with a lot, partly because we overbuy and undereat, and Italian fresh bread goes stale very quickly, sometimes within the day. Whatever I can't use up making croutons, or bread cake (recipe another day), or crumbs, goes to the horses - horses love dry bread. 

Where was I? Bread: chop into 1-inch cubes (roughly), sauté in butter and olive oil with minced garlic, fresh herbs if you have them. Pepper. Remove from pan into a large bowl, toss with fresh-ground cheese. The recipe says parmigiano, my grater currently contains odds and ends of sharp aged cheeses, I don't even know what all.  

Then chop ripe tomatoes, thinly slice red onions, toss with oil, red vinegar, salt, and pepper. When ready to eat, add the croutons.

Scripelle

Aug 29, 2004

Saturday night we had scrippelle, a traditional treat from Abruzzo. You can think of them as crepes made without milk, or very, very thin omelettes. These had been home-made for us by family friends, Enrico brought them back carefully wrapped in layers of plastic with a wet dishtowel, storing them in fridges when he stopped along the way. They freeze very well, but we decided to eat them right away.  

The simplest way to prepare scrippelle is to roll them up with lots of freshly-grated parmigiano inside, place three in a shallow bowl, and pour fresh, hot chicken broth over them. Sprinkle with some more parmigiano if you like, and dig in.

Torta di Pane (Bread Cake)

Sep 7, 2004

This is a good way to use old, dry bread. The recipe is more or less one that I scribbled down from a magazine in a waiting room.  

• Cut/break 1/2 kilo of dry bread into smallish dice  
• Soak it overnight (in the fridge) in about 1 liter of milk; I also add a few tablespoons of amaretto or other liqueur  
• Mix two eggs with 50 gm melted butter, 200 gm sugar, and 50 gm cocoa powder (unsweetened is fine)  
• Add a grating of lemon peel, raisins, pine nuts or other nuts. I also tend to toss in any other dried fruit I have around, e.g. figs.  
• Mix in the soaked bread; I use an electric mixer, which also helps pulverize the bread into smaller pieces, but the batter will not be smooth in any case  
• Bake at 175 C / 350 F for about an hour   It's okay if it comes out a bit puddingy. It tastes best when warm, and reheats well in the microwave.