La credenza, the kitchen dresser. Iconic corner of the Italian kitchen, indispensable home to assorted crockery, glasses for every occasion, jars of hazelnuts, various preserves, unknown keys, screwdrivers and other bits. Most of what lives in this one came from second hand mercatini around the provincia di Viterbo, apart from the green Woods Ware from my Aunt Lizzie's attic. I have a couple of posts on my blog about hunting for old stuff - treasure hunting in the Tuscia & a Rome list of mercatini - scroll down from the link in my profile. #mercatinidellusato #huntingandgathering #trashandtreasure #upcycling #rusticaretro
Bread. When I was a child, and this was long before the tribe of great Melbourne bakers arrived, my mum started making bread. Too soft were the 1970’s offerings, she lamented, as she started mixing and proofing and looking for the warmest spot in our perennially cold house, and travelling all over the city for flour. Mum never graduated to sourdough, but her beautiful salad filled rolls were the envy of my school mates, and slices of her still warm loaves were pure after-school bliss. But when you can buy good bread, making it seems beside the point, except during the summer, when there is little more than Umbro-Toscano unsalted bread - wonderful for some things, dismal for others - at the shops. These are the weeks I am grateful for my jar of ‘lievito madre’ that has lived in my fridge for a year and a half. And that the little loaf on the left was baked in one of mum’s old tins. #bakingstories #sourdoughforbeginners #stilllearning #panevero #realbread #weeklybread
Last week @carla_tomasi brought a basket of just picked zucchini to the studio for her #gardentotable class. We kneaded and rolled a batch of simple flour and water #lombrichellii from Alto-Lazio to toss into a ‘sautéed till it melts’ zucchini sauce. Thank you @shebets for sharing this gorgeous photo, and to Carla for always picking her zucchini small and tender. The full recipe in how to make lombrichelli is on my blog rusticaretro.com, and the sauce, which also goes super well with various dried shapes like cassarecce or mezzo maniche is as simple as:
Take 1-2 small zucchini per person. Grate on the large setting of a box grater. Gently heat a good couple of tablespoons of extra virgin oil oil in a light high sided pan with a clove of whole squashed garlic and a small broken dried chilli (only half if cooking for 2). Add the grated zucchini, pinch of salt and sauté for a few minutes, mixing well so that the zucchini takes on a bright glossy sheen. Add some cooking water as the pasta cooks and allow the zucchini to break down into a soft velvety sauce. Handful of pecorino at end just before the cooked pasta gets tossed in if you like. Always add extra pasta water (starchy from the cooking process) to keep the sauce liquid. #cooktheseason #zucchinipasta #lombrichelliconzucchine #altolazio #gardentotable
