100 Blog Posts and Getting Better with Age?

The real Parmigiano Reggiano.

This is another milestone day for this blog. 100 posts. Since arriving in Italy my traffic has increased from and average of 40-50 hits a day to about 100. I know have 52 subscribers who receive a message and link immediately when I click “publish”. Since I know most of my subscribers by their email addresses I also know who is not a subscriber. So if you enjoy the blog regularly or occasionally please subscribe.

I am writing about many things. Not just recipes and foody standard claptrap that fills so many cooking blogs but also the places I visit, the people I meet, the experiences offered us here at Alma, the amazing Chefs who are teaching us cooking and plating techniques for specific regional Italian dishes but also the philosophy underlying their cuisine such as the use of simple, fresh, seasonal and local ingredients. Some of these concepts are almost unheard of in most of the USA and where they have been heard of and even discussed in cooking schools they are rarely utilized in the operation of cooking schools or restaurants because it is difficult.

Parmigiano Reggiano aged 20 years in a celler build in 1310 AD.

I have no doubt that what we are learning here at Alma, first in our practical cooking classes guided by Chef Bruno Ruffini, who I respect greatly because of his skills as a Chef but also because of his natural ability at teaching, and then there is what we have the opportunity to learn during the guest Chef demonstrations from real master Chefs and thirdly during   the excursions to many places that we could never otherwise visit as tourist or even as students at other first class cooking schools.

Italy takes food seriously and not just growing it, preparing it and eating but also teaching it. I know I may offend some folks in NYC by saying this but at the ICA, if we were serious, we were being taught to be entry level line cooks for NYC style, “feed them fast and feed them often” restaurants. At Alma, for those of us who are serious and committed, we have the opportunity to learn the techniques, skills and philosophy of food and cooking necessary to be a first class Italian Chef when we return to the USA. It is a totally different environment and of course I wouldn’t be here but for having the opportunity offered by the ICA so I am very pleased with everything including my experience in NYC at the ICA.

Those of who are getting older chronologically without feeling older cling fast to the belief that things get better with age. Of course that concept is not true for everything but it is for some, like the Parmigiano Reggiano Cheese shown above. The top photo show a May 2009 vintage cheese and the second photo shows a 20 year old cheese.

Another Italian produce that fills our cupboards and the isles of American supermarkets is what we know as Balsamic Vinegar.  I am not going to complete my dissertation of this subject until tomorrow but let me say that what we find in our cupboard and on the supermarket shelves, even if you paid $15.00, $20.00 or $30.00 a bottle is not real Balsamic Vinegar as it is known and strictly regulated by laws  in Italy. What we mostly consume is a cheap imitation that while it tastes fine on a green salad is really swill compared to the real thing. And last Saturday I samples the real thing and bought some so I now know the real thing.

The easiest way to spot an impostor is but the shape and size of the bottle. If it doesn’t look like the photo below it isn’t traditional Balsamic Vinegar no matter what the bottle says or how fancy the packaging.

Aceto Balsamico Tradizionale di Reggio Emilia.

It is fair to say that I did not just buy the real thing, I invested in the real thing and after tasting the real thing, multiple times I know I will not have any regrets. The real thing is never poured on lettuce of any kind, actually it  is never poured at all rather is is served a few drops at a time. Typically it  is served as a sort of simple sauce to go with aged cheese like those in the photos above, on raw or slightly cooked fish or shellfish or even as a topping for Gelato.

The bottle on the left is 100 ml of red label which goes for 45 Euro for 100 ml. The bottle on the right is silver label sells for 65 Euro for 100 ml and the gold label in the middle can be picked up for a mere 105 Euro for 100 ml. The package deal is a bit less but I wish you could taste it before you judge me a fool.The gold has been aged for 25 years or longer. The silver 15 years or longer and the red 12 years or longer.

More on getting better with age next time so stay tuned.

Lastly today our class of 18 with 7 knuckleheads absent cooked lunch for the whole school, about 250 strong. Here is a photo of the food we served. I worked on the Sea Bass and actually single handedly scaled and cleaned 60-70 fish in about three hours. I filleted about 10 and them cooked and plated the fish. My hands still hurt from the scaling and cleaning. Those fins are sharp and when you have a time limit when hungry people show up well you do what you have to do and we did great.

From left top, Zuppa Inglese an Italian Pastry Cream Sponge Cake, Orecchiette pasta with broccoli, Chicken Romagna, Sea Bass in an parsley herb sauce and boiled new potatoes. Missing is lasagna bolognese.

Read Full Post »

What do you get when you place 8 tons of Pecorino in a deep hole on August 1 and leave it there until November 1?

Pecorino Cheese hole.

The correct answer is it depends. It depends on the location of the hole. Not any hole will do. The hole must be in a special place, dug in a special way in the right type of geological conditions. And a new hole won’t do, rather it must me a hole with history and personality and perhaps a little magic.

So if you just happen to find such a hole does the result depend on anything else?  Of course. Just like any cheese made in  traditional ways the quality of the cheese depends on the quality of the food that the sheep ate and the quality of the water that the sheep drank and of course on the quality of the air that filled the lungs of the sheep and entered its blood. After that it depends on the skill of the farmer who bred and raised the sheep and choose the location where the sheep would graze and then the skill of the people who collected the milk, the skill of the cheese maker, and of course on the weather. The temperature, the humidity, the sunny days verses the cloudy days, the amount of rain and let us not forget about the direction that the wind is blowing. Is it blowing the salt air from the sea to the East into the lungs of the sheep or is the wind coming from the West or South, across the land, over the fields of wheat,  across the olive groves and vineyards before entering the lungs of the sheep? Anything else? Well there is the quality of the barley, wheat and other grasses you use to  line the hole and the care with which the cheese is lowered into the hole, among many other things.

The next question most people will consider but typically not ask because they feel the answer is too obvious but of course the answer is not obvious and that is, why do you believe that the Pecorino you age in this manner, the same as your ancestors of 500 years ago; how did the people back then, 500 years ago, come up with the perfect method of aging Pecorino without the benefit of technology, of computers, of modern atmospheric controls and the wisdom of the past 50-60 years when these modern methods have been invented? Well, the answer is that they, the ancestors of this man had the benefit of 500 or perhaps even 1000 years of his ancestors learning by trial and error.

Rabbit braised in a wood oven.

Then how do you know that the cheese aged in this way is really the perfect cheese? Yes, you know this answer. This time the answer is obvious. You know the cheese is better because of the taste. The aroma, the smoothness, the acidity, the flavor, the sensations you feel when the cheese touches your lips, then your tongue and then in your whole mouth as you savor the flavors and perfumes of perfection and of course there is the chill that runs up you spine when you know you have accomplished perfection. Close your eyes and you can taste the salt from the sea and the grain from the fields. You can taste the grass and herbs which the sheep ate and the water which the sheep drank. You can taste the grapes and orchards over which the wind blew before the sheep breathed in deeply.

Who has a job such as this. Who can possibly judge these things. Who has a hole such as this and the experience and judgment passed down from father to son for hundreds and hundreds of years? Who could possibly know such things so foreign to the contemporary makers and eaters of cheese, who often judge a cheese by nothing more than the calorie, salt and fat count found on the plastic in which the cheese is wrapped.

The Cheese Master.

Well, to learn the answer, and yes there is an answer and I know it as certain as I know the sun will rise again in the morning, but  you will need to wait a moment while I fill my wine glass before writing further. Just as a cheese aged to perfection cannot be rushed neither can a blog about things such as this be written in haste.

So what is the perfect wine for writing a blog about Pecorino from the Romagna side of  Emilia Romagna? How about a Sangiovese di Romagna made from the grapes over which the wind blew before entering the lungs of the sheep which produced the milk for the Pecorino which goes in the hole! Yum. I will be right back.

Okay, I am back. This is the website.  fossadellabbondanza.com

This is the man who taught us about cheese in Italy.

Read Full Post »