Early Morning Light from Our Calitri Balcony
I Do It My Way
Lying in bed in the dawning hours of a new Calitri day, awakened to the castanet song of a morning bird, I sometimes play a game of chance. My roulette wheel was the ceiling fan. Ceiling fans are not common to the average Italian home because
When the once feeble light eventually grows to dissolve the darkness, making further procrastination on my part impractical, it’s time to rise and shine, my goal being to enjoy another fabulous day in Italy. First things first, I begin by making coffee and serving it to the principessa (princess), Maria Elena, who, over our years in Italy, has grown accustomed to my barista
Our Rooftop Terrace
services. When the weather cooperates, which in sunny Italy is most of the time, we take our morning brew on our rooftop terrace. As she dawdles up there, checking her email while waiting, I’m downstairs in the kitchen fiddling with our art deco style Moka coffee maker on our gas stovetop. Everyone should try it, and for those who do take the leap, here’s a hint - for best results, something between espresso and Turkish coffee, use coarse ground coffee and fill the base with hot water. Oh, and be sure to keep the heat low. It’s a much slower process then if I used a plug-and-forget drip or percolator coffeemaker, and yes, ours makes only a little over one cup at a time, and a rather small cup at that, but there is no hurry for we’re in another dimension of time, Italian time.
When the Moka pot cools some, I twist its octagonal pieces apart, reload it, and make my cup of morning java. The Moka pot got its name from the city of Mocha on the coast of Yemen, which for centuries was considered a center of coffee excellence. Its inventor, Alfonso Balletto, was an Italian engineer. In 1933, he came up with the coffeemaker after he noticed how local women in the province of Piedmont did their laundry. They washed their clothes in tubs that had a pipe centered in the middle. The pipe drew the boiling soapy water up from the bottom of the tub and showered it over the laundry. Harnessing this same principle to draw boiling water up a pipe to allow it to spill over ground coffee, Bialetti revolutionized coffee making in Italy and transformed an essential part of the national fabric. A new day had dawned, for instead of relying on time-honored coffeehouses for their source of coffee, his idea resulted in a coffeemaker that allowed Italians to brew coffee at home. To this day the Moka pot is made of aluminum. Why aluminum? Well, it seems that Alfonso, during a ten-year stint in France, had learned the art of aluminum craftsmanship as an apprentice. That helped a lot, but the final push came with an embargo on stainless steel imports introduced by Il Duce himself in favor of what was then being promoted as Italy’s “national metal”, aluminum. For Alfonso, it was a no-brainer.
A few hours later, if it’s a Wednesday or sometimes a Friday, I put my empty cup aside and get going to the fish market (pescheria) downtown. If I delay too long, there’s a chance of finding the fish selection significantly diminished, and God forbid, the fishmonger may even have closed. Word is, never buy fish on a Monday because they likely had stopped wiggling days earlier, late on Friday or Saturday for instance, well after the supply truck last came to town. Calitri lies about halfway across the Italian peninsula, smack dab between Naples and Bari. With this geography, the view from our home does not include a sea view although there are times a photo leads some to think we are along the coast because low lying clouds can give the impression of water. I can only wish we were by the sea and from our terrace I could flip a line out and haul something in dripping fresh. That’s not to be, not unless I win a lottery sufficient to move to the Amalfitana or Portofino. Maybe that’s why, subliminally, I practice betting on my imagined ceiling fan roulette wheel, prepping for the eventual big-time win. I can only hope. Like much of landlocked Italy, we rely on deliveries for our fish supply. Beyond my concern about the day, if I dawdled too long, I could find it closed. I wouldn’t even bother to try after 1pm. The door, like the doors of other businesses throughout town, save for bars and cafes, would be locked until later in the afternoon. Trial and error have taught me, it’s mid-week for fish, never on a Monday, and don’t be late.
Adriana is the saleswoman in our fish shop of choice, Pescheria del Gargano. This pescheria is named after the peninsula that juts into the Adriatic Sea a few hours drive east of us. There are others in town. All are conveniently scattered about, much like the small grocery stores sprinkled here and there, handy to various neighborhoods. While there are others closer to us, we went with the prevailing advice of friends on where to buy fish. In any case, it’s a nice walk to her door from where we live in the Borgo, … down Corso Matteotti, past the post office, then along the storefronts of Corso Garibaldi and Italia, which combined, I picture as Main Street Calitri. Anxious to come along with me was my friend Captain Jack, an aficionado of the fish eating type, who with his wife Dotty, was staying with us for a few days. Once through the dangling beaded tentacles that drape the entrance, we were greeted by smiling Adriana positioned behind a display case heaped with all kinds of sea creatures. They rest on mounds of crushed ice beside small placards, like headstones, announcing their names and prices. It all seems in code of course, Italian to be exact. From their
color, the tuna (tonno) and salmon (salmone) are easy to spot as are the mackerel with their torpedo shapes and vertical stripes. Others aren’t so easy, nor are their names which take some getting used to, like sea bass (spigola), sea bream (orate), and the cod (merluzzo). Just beyond her station, behind a wall with an opening the size of a picture window, I’ll find Antonio. Back there, where he can see what’s going on and framed as if he were a picture on the wall, he deftly performs the messy job of cleaning customer fish orders. Coming and going as we do, I’m not yet such a regular shopper that I need him to butterfly some huge fish or filet a sea bass for me. I usually get an already filleted slab of cod or hake. Thanks to a cooking lesson from our friend Titti, I’ve had a chance to cook calamari and stuff squid but I’m not there yet to try it on my own. Someday, however, I’ll surprise Adriana and ask for some, maybe even a sea bass.
Theirs is a busy operation. I’ve never had the luxury of being their sole customer even for only a few minutes. However many waiting customers there may be, it’s amazing how everyone knows their turn in addition to yours. Some walk-ins are taken care of immediately for they have called ahead with their orders or have standing orders waiting for them. There are no numbers to take to confirm your turn in the unorganized queue. If it gets too much to recall, someone will certainly remind you with a wry smile, nod, or anxious movement.
What would it be this week? I usually buy filets of pangasi, a form of catfish, or the more expensive perch, persico. On that particular visit, looking over the icebound table laden with fish awaiting my turn, I spotted the bins sitting to one side filled with clams of various sizes. That was the ticket, why not Pasta a la Vongole, a delicious Venetian clam pasta dish that started life as peasant food but has since grown into an Italian classic? With house guests, I knew this dish would be a big hit. When my turn came around, I motioned to the vongole, actually Manila clams, and Adriana gathered two hefty scoops of the small, American quarter-sized clams into a plastic bag and added a few sprigs of parsley, important to their preparation. At 10 Euros a kilo (approximately $5/lb), they’re a super bargain especially when they are so hard to find back in the US. The last time I checked the Internet, they were no less than $15 per pound plus $10 to ship from California! My concern, if I could first get beyond my shock over their cost, would be whether they’d still be alive when they arrived. I was soon walking home toting my pouch of tiny clams with an extra impetus in my gate. I was anxious to get into the kitchen and get started.
The Italian big meal of the day is dinner, or to avoid confusion, what I call lunch. With little to do with the town shut down for the afternoon, cooking dinner followed by a few hours rest is the norm. First things first, we needed to clean the vongole (clams). We began by first discarding any broken clams, then soaking those that pass muster in a cornmeal bath, which in addition to helping to coax out any sand and grit, adds to their sweetness. Any that float should be rejected. After a good soaking, we don’t strain the clams but instead remove them by hand and rinse them so as not to allow any contaminants to be reintroduced. It is important to do what follows rather quickly so as to prevent the finished dish from cooling and be served cold. To avoid this, it’s a good idea to prep everything in advance. One other thing, I don’t worry about grams and measured volumes. Instead,
for this dish, I rely on what it looks or sounds like. It’s easy enough. The amount of garlic, dribbles of olive oil, glugs of wine, or pinches of pepperoncino are dictated by taste and experience.
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| Our Calitri Kitchen |
For a start, as the clams are cleaned, a pot of water for the pasta can be brought to a boil. To the boiling water add salt followed by the pasta. “Danger Will Robinson” …. don’t overdo it with the salt. Hold back some because the clams add to the saltiness all by themselves. When it comes to adding the pasta, I’m a contrarian. As opposed to normal convention, I snap the pasta (we prefer Linguini) in half before dropping it into the water. Maybe my pots just aren’t tall enough, but I don’t enjoy seeing approximately a third of the shafts sticking up in the air leaning on the side of the pot. It’s easy to also rationalize that by using less water (the snapped pasta fits well with the idea of using less water) and less bottled gas to get it boiling, and absent any plans to own any cows, I’m doing my part for posterity. Watching as normal length pasta plays “down periscope” as it softens to eventually slip into the pot, leads me to believe it also cooks more evenly my way. Additionally, snapping the pasta in half pre-empts any need to cut the pasta later while on my plate. Both may be enormous sins to a pasta purist. Not claiming to be a purist, I may have sinned. I could petition for forgiveness, “bless me, father, for I have sinned”, but it just doesn’t bother me.
As the pasta softens, I chop some garlic, uncork the white wine, and scissor the flat-leaf parsley. One of the secrets to the flavor of this dish lies in the parsley. Many folks use only the leaves and discard the stringy stalks in favor of the leaves when the stalks are most important. In addition to the leaves then, be sure to use them as well. Well before the pasta is al dente, I start preparing a broth by
melting some butter in a large pan with sidewalls high enough to allow for tossing and stirring when the pasta and clams are later combined. First off, when the pan is heated, add the garlic, parsley stalks, a pinch or more of powdery pepperoncino hots to taste, and not to be forgotten, a few generous slugs of extra virgin olive oil. At this point, only to assure the quality of the wine, I take a swig of it myself. If it’s acceptable, I pour some in. When I’m just not convinced, I’ll take another draft in case I may have been mistaken. Eventually assured of its quality, I add the wine. After stirring everything together, it’s time to pour in the clams. I stir the growing mélange a bit more and cover the pan for the steam to coax the clams open and add a briny zest to the broth. It takes about 3 to 5 minutes for the clams to open. In the meantime, I drain the pasta, and when I’ve peeked to see that the clams have indeed opened, I’ll add the pasta to the clam mixture along with a little of the pasta water. At this point, I’m on the lookout for any clams that may not have opened. If I find any, they are discarded. Almost done, I toss and stir everything for a minute or two more to allow the pasta to absorb the juices from the clams. At this point, it’s a race upstairs to the terrazza with the pan to immediately serve and enjoy this wonderful seafood concoction, being sure not to forget to bring along the wine.
Topside, we were joined by our house guests, Jack and Dotty, the perfect couple to be with to enjoy an afternoon seafood meal. While I’d stirred, poured, and tossed, they had joined in to help set the table. The terrace was a destination not new to us with the beauty of distant valleys and the rugged spine of mountains as our backdrop. As I poured the wine, earlier certified to be just right, the sun had already leached to the west enough to cast shade over the table. No tricks of the eye here. It was easy to see that the day had merged in a sublime moment like a fine wine matched with a superb meal. Although Italy is known for its art, I prefer the kind on my plate. Memories are made at table, where the company and the meal come together like the crescendo of an orchestra’s cymbals. While memories last, a meal regrettably survives only minutes. Over the years I’ve come to realize this and conditioned myself to take photos of these culinary works of art. Soon consumed and no more but a satisfying memory, a sambuca digestivo garnished with three coffee beans for prosperity, health, and happiness, was served all around. As the last of its thick licorice drained from the liqueur glasses, all that remained was time enough for a lethargic hour or so of rest and recovery. There, now well sated, lying beneath the hypnotic influence of those slow turning ceiling fan-blades, I’d eagerly double down on the bet that I’d be asleep in minutes and this time I’m sure I’d win.
From That Rogue Tourist
Paolo
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