Frutta secca: nuts used in Italian cuisine

Italy is a small country. Sixty million inhabitants occupy 301,338 square kilometers (think California minus 40,000 square miles). But thanks to its natural resources and historical influences, the local cuisine boasts a staggering wealth of diversity many larger countries can only envy. One constant in the Italian bounty is the use of nuts.

While Americans tend to enjoy nuts as snacks or with drinks, Italians tend to use them as ingredients.

Almonds, hazelnuts, walnuts, pistachios, chestnuts and pine nuts are all typical Italian crops. Though cashews, peanuts, Brazilian nuts, macadamia nuts and pecans are not grown locally, half-a-century of market globalization has given them passport into the Italian diet.

Known as frutta secca—botanically speaking correct since a nut is indeed a dry fruit with a seed encased in a hard, woody shell—nuts appear in all manner of regional dishes.

For nut lovers, here's an alphabetized shortlist of locally grown Italian nuts with notes on how they're used.

Continue Reading In Praise of Nuts as appeared on The American in Italia Magazine

Chestnut soup

Autumn has officially become my favorite season.

Porcini mushrooms, antioxidant and smelly brassica, aromatic truffles, plus pumpkin and chestnuts all start making their appearance on market stalls all over in Italy. Cheeses made with summer pasture milk are reaching their 3-month maturation period, which means flavor pangs and rich texture in each bite. Grapes and olives are being harvested, fireplaces are crackling and the air is crisp enough to bury our chins in favorite wolly scarves again.

With crunchy fallen leaves underfoot and a precise seasonal shopping list in mind, I negotiate the trek to my neighborhood market, mentally going over what fall recipes I can finally start making again.
The first thing to catch my eye at Luisa's stall is a crate spilling with plump shiny chestnuts that seem to be popping out of thier thorny urchins.

Chestnuts are a very versatile food that can be eaten in a variety of ways: fire roasted, boiled, oven baked and dried to make flour, plus candied for marron glacé, or made into a creamy spread, or crafted into mont blanc cake.

Thoughts of castagnaccio, necci pancakes, poultry stuffing and other delightful chestnut-based treats danced around in my head. Then I remembered about soup.

500 g (1 lb) fresh chestnuts
2 slices crusty homestyle bread, cubed for croutons
2 celery ribs
1 whole leek
1 carrot
1 white onion
Extra virgin olive oil
Sea salt and black pepper

Score the skins of the chestnuts with a paring knife – this prevents them from exploding during cooking. Place them in a large pot covered with cold water. Any that float to the surface should be discarded.

Cook the chestnuts for approximately 20 minutes from when the water starts to boil. Drain and once cooled off enough to handle, peel them making sure to remove the inner husk too. 

Prepare a light vegetable broth with approximately 1,5 liters (about 6 cups) of water and chopped leek, onion, carrot and celery, boiling for about 20 minutes. I don't add salt at this point but you may be accustomed to seasoning broth earlier than I do.

Add the peeled chestnuts to the broth and cook over medium heat for another 20 minutes. Drain the chestnuts and whir them in a food processor or blender. Should the cream be too thick you can filter the broth and add some of it to dilute the chestnut cream. 

Adjust seasoning.

Place the cubed bread in a single layer on an oven pan drizzled with a thread of olive oil and a sprinkle of your favorite fresh herbs. Grill in the oven for a few minutes, until barely golden. 

Serve the hot chestnut soup with a few croutons, a thread raw olive oil and a few more turns of the pepper mill.

Buon appetito!
 

Last photo courtesy of lacucinaitaliana.it

Mont Blanc dessert recipe

One fantastic summer of several years ago, I shot most of the action scenes of a film at 11,000 ft elevation at Helbronner Point on the Mont Blanc massif, short of breath and ecstatic. To see the indescribable beauty of the silent montagna, you can take a virtual tour here. 

The giant snow capped glacier is reproduced in this amazing and likewise substantial dessert, also known by its francophone name 'Mont Blanc.'
600 g (3 cups) chestnuts, whole
50 g (1/4 cup) sugar
2 tbsp butter
1 egg yolk
50 g (1/4 cup) confectioners’ sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
10 small meringues, crumbled
250 ml (1 cup) fresh cream
Milk

With a sharp paring knife (or the appropriate implement) scoring the chestnuts with a lengthwise incision on the skin, then boil in water for 10 minutes. Strain and peel once cool. Be sure to remove the thin inner husk as well.

Put the peeled chestnuts in a saucepan and cover them with milk, add vanilla and sugar, and cook over moderate heat for about 45 minutes.

Strain (saving the cooking milk) and mash with a food mill into a large mixing bowl, adding some cooking milk in order to obtain a soft yet thick purée. Let the blend cool while you work the butter and the egg yolk into a paste with the tines of a fork. Once they are cooler, add the eggy paste to the mashed chestnuts and relax for a moment while you put the stovetop moka on the fire for a nice cup of espresso.

Place the crumbled meringues on a round serving platter and pile on the chestnut mix, forming a mountain. Some like to use a potato ricer to make long spaghetti with the chestnut paste mix to build their mountain. I'm more a trowel-kind of girl, I spread my nutty plaster like stucco with a spatula.

Whip the cream and confectioners' sugar with a hand mixer and evenly distribute on the pinnacle, designing snow patches, glaciers and crevasses to your own geologic whimsy, and refrigerate.

When ready to serve chilled, adorn the summit with a cocktail toothpick flag. After all you did conquer one of the hardest Italian desserts to make!

Image courtesy of Akiko Ida & Pierre Javelle Minimiam