Eating Italy: A Chef's Culinary Adventure (45 page)

Heat the oil in a deep fryer or deep pot to 350°F (175°C). Drop in the chiacchiere a few at a time and fry until golden brown, 3 to 4 minutes, flipping once and adjusting the heat to maintain a 350°F (175°C) oil temperature at all times. Immediately transfer to paper towels to drain. Dust with confectioners’ sugar and serve with the budino.

I GOT THE CALL IN EARLY 2006. MY HANDS WERE DEEP IN BREAD DOUGH AT THE BEDFORD VILLAGE INN. IT WAS MARC VETRI AND JEFF BENJAMIN CALLING FROM THE CA’ MARCANDA VINEYARDS OF GAJA WINERY IN TUSCANY. THEY HAD AN IDEA AND A LOCATION FOR A PHILADELPHIA RESTAURANT: A TRADITIONAL ITALIAN
OSTERIA
WITH A WOOD-BURNING STOVE, SERVING RUSTIC YET REFINED FOOD IN A CASUAL, UPSCALE ATMOSPHERE. THEY OFFERED ME A PARTNERSHIP IN THE RESTAURANT. I STARED AT THE KITCHEN WALL FOR HALF A MILLISECOND AND SAID YES! EVERY CHEF DREAMS OF OWNING HIS OR HER OWN RESTAURANT.

The real eye-opener came over the next six months. I spent every spare moment before and after work helping to design the restaurant space, draft blueprints for the kitchen, frame out and lay concrete for the building itself with the construction crew, develop the menu, test the dishes, and interview and hire everyone from line cooks to dishwashers. We spent months staining the concrete floors red, filling the restaurant with antique country tables, seeking out a vintage Faema espresso machine, and finding a decent price on three antique Berkel meat slicers for slicing our house-cured prosciutto paper-thin right in front of our guests.

For six months, I dreamed in menus. The dishes for this restaurant had to capture the bold flavors and rustic simplicity of all the food I cooked in Italy. The wood-burning grill and oven took center stage in our collective visions, and we put more than half a dozen wood-fired pizzas on the menu, including the Lombarda, topped with house-made cotechino sausage, Bitto and mozzarella cheeses, and a baked egg. Roasted vegetable antipasto, spit-roasted suckling pig, bistecca alla Fiorentina, and rustic copper-pot polenta all underscored the importance of a live wood fire in Italian cooking. I also included some traditional dishes from Bergamo, such as ciareghi, and a few I learned from my mother-in-law, Pina, such as Nonna’s rabbit and candele with wild boar Bolognese. Pastas and desserts are among my specialties, so I featured plenty on the menu, including robiola and fava francobolli, chicken liver rigatoni, bonet, chocolate flan with pistachio gelato, polenta budino with gianduia mousse and candied hazelnuts, and torrone semifreddo with candied chestnuts and chocolate sauce.

From working in Italy in such Michelin-star restaurants as Frosio and Loro to running the kitchen at Locanda del Biancospino, I can honestly say that building, opening, and running Osteria in Philadelphia has been, by far, the greatest learning experience of my career. More than any other, this restaurant has taught me that being a chef isn’t always about cooking. An executive chef spends roughly 30 percent of his or her time preparing food—and it’s the easiest 30 percent. The rest of the time is consumed with organizing schedules, writing checklists, taking inventory, placing orders, doing payroll, acting as mentor and psychiatrist to the staff, and dealing with countless little crises that arise on any given day. If all a chef had to do was cook, the job would be easy!

But I love every minute of it. I love Italian food and cooking so much that Osteria eventually wasn’t enough. I soon wanted to give people a more immersive experience by taking them directly to Italy. In 2010, Claudia and I led our first culinary tour of northern Italy, anchored in Desenzano, a popular vacation city on the largest lake in Italy, Lake Garda. We hosted ten guests at Agriturismo Armea, a beautiful inn near the southern shores of Lake Garda with an outdoor pool and a stone-walled dining room. From Desenzano, you get a stunning lakeside view of the Italian Alps. Shops and cafés buzz with tourists by day and restaurants and clubs come alive at night. Formed by glaciers, Lake Garda enjoys a climate that’s unusually mild this far north but perfect for growing both olives and citrus. The deep waters teem with fresh fish like lake salmon, trout, perch, eel, and fresh sardines. It’s a cook’s dream region. On Mondays, the nearby town of Peschiera hosts an incredible open-air market where you can stock up on local foods, and there’s a great butcher shop in Rivoltella that specializes in horse, a meat that’s more popular in Italy than in any other country in the European Union.

On that first tour, Claudia and I showed Americans the food and wine of Italy in a way that only a native Italian could reveal it. As expected, guests dined in Michelin-star restaurants, such as La Brughiera in Villa d’Almè, Loro in Trescore Balneario, and Frosio in Almè. And they enjoyed wine tastings at famous Franciacorta wineries, such as Bellavista and Ca’ del Bosco. But Claudia and I also escorted them to our favorite gelateria, Gelateria Peccati de Gola in Albino, so they could taste the incredible licorice gelato. We gave them personal tours of Venice, Verona, and the historic Città Alta in Bergamo. And we enjoyed an intimate, home-cooked lunch under Pina’s pergola in Cene, overlooking the foothills of the Alps, digging into her classic stuffed zucchini blossoms and polenta with wild boar ragù and her amazing crespelle. Best of all, we taught three cooking classes so guests could continue to enjoy the taste of Italy after returning home to the States. We showed them preparations that could be easily adapted, such as stuffed focaccia, mixed-meat grill, and fresh stone-fruit tart.

The culinary tour has become an annual event, and we recently expanded the experience by traveling south. In 2012, we chartered a private forty-two-foot (13-m) yacht in Sicily and cruised among the volcanic Aeolian Islands. We toured the entire eastern coast of Sicily, stopping in Taormina, Catania, Ragusa, Siracusa, Noto, Modica, and Giardini Naxos. Guests stayed at the Donna Franca villa in Trappitello and we held cooking classes that made use of all the incredible local products, such as fresh swordfish, tuna, sea urchin, tomatoes, lemons, mozzarella, and ricotta. Of all the restaurants we visited on that trip, Locanda Don Serafino was by far the best. It’s built from stone right in the side of a hill in Ragusa, and when you enter the huge stone archways, you feel as if you’re dining in a beautifully restored cave of kings.

Both Osteria and my culinary tours make me feel incredibly lucky. Through the restaurant, the cooking classes, and the food trips, I get to share the best of Italy with anyone who wants to enjoy it. Bringing guests into our restaurant and back to Italy offers a unique opportunity for me to say thanks and to honor the cuisine and culture that has given me so much.

FOCACCIA STUFFED
with
TALEGGIO
and
PANCETTA

On our first trip to Liguria, Claudia and I stopped in Bergeggi, a tiny beach town near Genoa. Claudia stuck her head out the window, took one whiff, and said, “Stop the car.” She didn’t know where the focaccia was, but she could smell it. We found a line of people, pulled over, and got in line. The store sold twenty different kinds of stuffed focaccia—Speck and blue cheese, tomatoes and arugula, Nutella. . . you name it. You order whatever you like in hundred-gram increments, and they slice off your order and warm it in a wood oven. We got Speck and
crescenza
, cipolline and Gorgonzola, artichoke and Parmigiano, and Nutella. That was our lunch. Here’s my northern Italian twist with pancetta and Taleggio. Try it warm out of the oven or at room temperature alongside a soup or pasta dish.

MAKES TWELVE TO SIXTEEN 3-INCH (7.5-CM) SQUARES

1½ packed tablespoons (28.5 g) fresh yeast, or 2¼ teaspoons (9 g) active dry yeast

3¾ cups (514 g) bread flour

1½ teaspoons (9 g) salt

1 tablespoon (15 ml) extra-virgin olive oil, plus more for drizzling

8 ounces (227 g) Taleggio cheese, shredded (2 cups)

4 ounces (113 g) pancetta, julienned

1 teaspoon (6 g) flake sea salt

1 teaspoon (2 g) freshly ground black pepper

If using fresh yeast, put the yeast, flour, and 1⅓ cups (330 ml) of cold water in the bowl of a stand mixer. If using active dry yeast, put 1⅓ cups (330 ml) warm tap water (about 110°F/43°C) in the bowl of a stand mixer, mix in the yeast, and let stand for 5 minutes until foamy; then add the flour. Using the dough hook, mix on low speed for 2 to 3 minutes. Switch to medium speed, add the salt, and stream in the olive oil. Mix until the dough is smooth and silky, about 10 minutes. Transfer the dough to an oiled bowl and let rise in a warm spot until doubled in bulk, about 1 hour.

Oil a half-sheet pan (an 11 x 14-inch/28 x 35-cm rimmed baking sheet), and then punch down the dough and turn it out onto the oiled pan. Fold the dough over itself in thirds, and let rise in a warm spot for 30 minutes. Punch down the dough, fold it over itself in thirds again, and let rise in a warm spot for another 30 minutes.

Cut the dough in half and press half of the dough into the baking sheet so it is about ¼ inch (6 mm) thick. Roll up the pressed out dough and set aside. Re-oil the pan and press the other half of the dough into the pan so it is about ¼ inch (6 mm) thick. Scatter the cheese and pancetta over the dough in the pan, leaving a ¼-inch (6-mm) border around the edge. Unroll the other half of the dough over the cheese and pancetta and pinch the edges to seal. Dimple the surface all over with your fingertips and let rise in a warm spot for 30 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 500°F (260°C). Turn on convection if possible. Drizzle the top of the focaccia with olive oil and sprinkle on the flaked salt and freshly ground black pepper. Bake until golden brown, 20 to 25 minutes. Let cool in the pan on a wire rack and cut into 3-inch (7.5-cm) squares. Serve warm or at room temperature.