Ossobuco alla Fiorentina

Ossobuco is a classic of Milanese cuisine that made its way to Florence simply because of its deliciousness. Nobody really knows how and when that happened (people travel, duh!), and the recipe by the way does not even appear to be that old. This great dish, that was probably created in a random Osteria in or around Milan, does not appear in the Anonymous “La Vera Cucina Lombarda” cookbook published in 1890 and Pellegrino Artusi waited until his 14th edition of “Scienza in Cucina e l’Arte di Mangiar Bene” in 1920 to mention it. Continue Reading…

Babbo, What does “Virgin” mean?

I am kind of bummed.

I wake up every morning eager to write a new blog post, there is so much going on in our family life at the moment, and I so would love to be able to share it all, Extra Virgin style. Problem is that I always run out of time, as work and household duties always take priority over whatever else we have going on in our lives. We are happy over here, happy and overwhelmed! We just started writing brand new episodes for the second season of Extra Virgin (on Cooking Channel this coming fall) and this much I can tell you: it’s going to be quite a ride! I have been testing new and old recipes for the past few months, I finally mastered traditional Tuscan Bread, I started making fresh pasta and I have been baking and perfecting a bunch of fantastic cakes that I cannot wait to share with you. Continue Reading…

Farm Fresh Vegetables, delivered!

I don’t’ know you, but I freak out when my doorbell rings after 6 pm! A chill conquers my spine and my brain inevitably starts processing all the plausible excuses I can arm myself with in order to get rid of any solicitor I might end up facing at my front gate. Who is it going to be this time? Girls Scouts? Bible Aficionados? The occasional gardner or painter? Shall I use the “Sorry I am Jewish excuse” or should I use my kids… “Sorry my daughters are in the bath tub, have a good evening”, or the more truthful “I am cooking dinner, sorry cannot chat or I am going to burn my meal”. All my excuses usually work pretty well, and at the end I do not even feel that bad, as I am sure that a polite rejection is the least that can happen to solicitors by trade.

However, a few weeks ago, as I was truly engaged in a cook-a-ton, I just called on the wife to take on the 6.15 bell ring at our door: “Deeeeeb, can you get it? I just can’t deal!”. After a few minutes of chatting at our front gate, Debi came back into the kitchen and slipped in my hands a couple of pages of paperwork… with my name on it! WTF! I thought the whole point was to get rid of whoever had showed up, not sign some papers with my name! Wife, what did you have my buy?

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The Lexicon of Sustainability

When Debi and I were about to start shooting Extra Virgin this past summer, our dear friend and executive producer Janelle gifted us with a book; “I took a bike ride to a county fair, and when I saw this I thought of you guys” she said as she dropped it in my hands.

My mom taught me not to judge a book by its cover. I personally like to fall for a publication just because of its cover, I like being lured into a book just because the cover brought me to action… In this case, a big black and white picture of farmer-ly rugged hands carrying a half dozed fresh eggs simply swept my mind away to my youngest age, when those hands could have been my grandma’s and those eggs the ones from our chickens. “SLOW, life in a Tuscan town” by Douglas Gayeton kidnapped me from the moment I laid my eyes on it; I poured a glass of wine and sat down in the kitchen for a good hour, while the girlfriends were catching up, and explored my homeland through somebody else’s experience. Douglas has lived in Tuscany for a few years and was able to capture in this book many essential features of the “natives of my country”; with incredible simplicity he conveys a powerful description of what he saw through the lenses of his camera by creating composite collages and pencil-writing the soul and the mechanics of each piece he creates. Continue Reading…

THE RECIPE HUNTER – A Casting Call

I spent the past few years using food as a vehicle to reach people’ souls. I am not a chef, I am just a delivery guy.

The food I cook is not the result of years spent working on the-line, nor I attended culinary school, and I still am not even remotely interested in opening a restaurant of my own. To me sharing the recipes I know and cook every day for my family is a way of telling you who I am and where I come from, in the most humble way… the way my grandmother taught me. I always have taken a lot of pride in my food heritage, and I consider myself extremely lucky for being the one in my family that now is in the position of passing our culinary history and traditions to the next generation. Indeed my daughters can tell you what I am talking about, as I recruited them at the kitchen counter as early as they both can remember. Evelina is now 8 and has an incredible palate, she is very critical and willing to try everything I bring to the dinner table, but she has no interest in cooking. Giulia is turning 5 this week, and she already handles with pride a 7″ chef’s knife (If she can play video games she can chop onions as well); she cooks everything with me, but she is willing to eat very few things, even when she prepares them: “I cooked it for you Babbo, I don’t like it!”.

I am an immigrant and I thrive to keep my family traditions alive in a foreign land, like many of you out there. Unless you are a Native American your blood and your gene-pool comes from a different place on this planet… so do your recipes!!! Continue Reading…

Caprese di Farro

Farro salad is a stable of any given Italian Summer; its freshness and lightness are perfect for a pic-nic or an evening appetizer, especially and if you happen to have a vegetable garden where to pick fresh Tomatoes and Basil.

There is much confusion or disagreement about what exactly farro is. Emmer, spelt, and einkorn are called farro in Italy, sometimes, but not always, distinguished as farro medio, farro grande, and farro piccolo, respectively. Regional differences in what is grown locally and eaten as farro, as well as similarities between the three grains, may explain the confusion. Barley and farro may be used interchangeably because of their similar characteristics. Spelt is much more commonly grown in Germany and Switzerland and, though called dinkel there, is eaten and used in much the same way, and might therefore be considered farro. Common wheat may also be prepared and eaten much like farro, in which form it is often referred to as wheatberries. Continue Reading…

Farro Salad, special episode from the SoBe WFF in Miami

When I started posting videos on Youtube a few years ago I never thought it could have brought me this far… I just got back from a very intense three-days-food-marathon in Miami, where Debi and I attended the South Beach Wine and Food Festival for the very first time; it was the Oscars of Food, and everybody was there! It was a non stop kermess of flavors and laughs, attendance was at its best, and the perfect weather created the optimal conditions for the festival to unfold; Parties on the Beach, Burger Bashes, Cooking Demos and so much more.

I Was Scared!

As a professional musician I never feared the stage or the spotlight, and with Debi on my side I usually feel pretty confident about myself, no matter what. This time though it felt different; I had to talk, I had to explain, I had to entertain and involve my audience in a way I’ve never done before… using food instead of my drums. Also my bosses were there, you know I kind of like my new job, and really would like to keep it for the years to come; the pressure was on. Continue Reading…

Under The Tuscan Gun, The E-Zine has launched!

Under The Tuscan Gun has been online for a few years now, and it has grown into something really special, for us as we graduated from video blogging to prime time television, but also to the thousands of readers and visitors that every day come to visit us on our pages. Demand for new content has increased, now that we have consolidated a fan base, and I had to think of a way to satisfy the demand without having to spend my nights glued to my laptop trying to create new posts, and expand the range of topics I always wanted to discuss. Don’t get me wrong, I love writing and sharing my Extra Virgin “philosophy”, but I also have a family and when the sun goes down, you know, my time is with the girls!

Hence, I decided to reach out to a bunch of writers and bloggers I have been following and corresponding for years, and I asked them if they were interested in joining me on Under The Tuscan Gun and try to create a wider platform where more topics rather than my personal life and my food experiences could be discussed. I am humbled by the outpour of their generosity, and with this post I am very glad to announce that as of this week I will be joined by a first batch of about 15 new contributors that will be posting along with Debi and I on a weekly basis. I am sure some of them are no news to you, as they are actually very popular bloggers with great popularity and incredible “chops” like Nicole Emmert Hamaker from Pinch My Salt, Rachel Rappaport from Coconut and Lime, Barnaby Dorfman from Foodista and Douglas Gayeton from The Lexicon. Continue Reading…

EXTRA VIRGIN, the countdown has started!

The moment has finally arrived, Extra Virgin will premiere on the Cooking Channel on January 19th 2011 at 10 p.m. EST.This is an incredibly exciting moment for me Debi and the Girls, as a project that we started out about 4 years ago on these very web pages is finally getting promoted to bigger audiences.

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Introducing, THE FOOD TRUCK SHOW

It has been a few months now, and it seems so far away already.
Right before Debi and I started shooting Extra Virgin, while Network negotiations were ongoing, I needed something to get myself distracted with: something fun, something to get me out of the house, possibly related to food.
Then one day I brought my kids to the beach, it was a nice Saturday morning in Venice Beach… that fantastic early bird hour that is exclusively family owned: some dudes are riding waves, but for the rest everybody is still sleeping. We parked the car and went playing for a few hours on the sand… As the day started heating up and the crowd started flowing in our direction we decided that it was time to retreat; “Maybe a nice brunch in the garden at home, girls?” I tossed the ball in their court with ease. “But Babbo, we are hungry NOW!”. I shivered, as walking through the parking lot I could clearly see masses in line at any given food joint available on the line of my horizon… Continue Reading…