FOOD ON THE FOOD

In Memoriam

"Nonni"

Dora Barbaresi Donroe

November 28, 1918 - November 29, 2010

 

We were lucky to have her for as long as we did!

 

Cookbook Friday: Tortiere

                   

This is my grandmother, Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe, at my wedding in 2000.  She hates this picture because she thinks it makes her look old.  But, I love it because this is mostly how I’ve always known her.  She forgets that I wasn’t around when she was young, stick thin, and flawlessly beautiful.  As much as I love the old pictures, I barely recognize her. 

I knew her in the later stages, still fiercely independent with a wicked sense of humor, but capable of more love than I thought humanly possible.  She has a favorite skin cream, which she uses liberally, that kept those wrinkles at bay for as long as nature would allow.  But, I wouldn’t trade in a single one of those wrinkles because there’s a story behind each one.  (Although, now that I’m getting of an age, maybe I should find out what brand it is.)  (So, then, I guess it is actually possible to miss your own point.)

Growing up, Nonni got me hooked on crossword puzzles, Alfred Hitchcock, and seven-layer cookies.  We’d spend hours wordlessly working on nine-million-piece jigsaw puzzles.  She had a weakness for scratch tickets.  I had a weakness for chocolate.  We worked out an arrangement.  If you were sleeping over and she heard you cough, she’d crank the heat up to 85° until you woke up thinking you were dying in the Sahara.  Then, when you finally cooled off and fell back asleep, she’d be up banging pots and pans at 5 a.m.

If you piss her off, you hear about it.  If you make her happy, you hear about that, too.  She isn’t perfect.  And you wouldn’t want her to be.  This is starting to sound like a eulogy.  Fear not, she’s alive and well.  But, why wait for a funeral? 

Here, have some chicken.

Tortiere

Unrelated, as far as I know, to the French-Canadian meat pie by the same name, this Italian peasant dish is equally hearty.  Serve with plenty of Italian bread to mop up the juices.

¼ cup olive oil
1 onion, sliced thinly
1 medium package boneless chicken breasts, cut into thirds
2-3 potatoes, cut into medium cubes
3 cups Nonni’s homemade tomato sauce
1 15-oz. can peas (you can substitute frozen peas, but they won’t taste murky enough)
Salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 300°F.  Pour oil onto the bottom of a 9x11-inch baking dish.  Add onions, then arrange chicken breasts on top and potatoes around them.  Sprinkle salt and pepper, and add just enough tomato sauce to cover the chicken.  Bake uncovered until chicken is cooked through and potatoes are tender, maybe 2 hours (depends on how big your chicken and potato pieces are).  Then, take the can of peas, water and all, and throw them in the pan as soon as it comes out.  Let sit a few minutes to warm the peas. 

Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe
New Haven, Connecticut
1918 -

And that's the end of the Italian Cookbook Friday, folks.  (If you missed the beginning, it starts here.)

Cookbook Friday: Pecan Tassies

I found this 1940's picture of my great aunt Dava [Barbaresi] Catone, so I thought I’d post it even though it’s out of chronological order.  Dava is holding my Aunt Margaret, who was the daughter of her sister Dora [Barbaresi] and Freddie Donroe, before her baptism (I’m guessing it was before the blessed event since the baby seems peaceful and blissfully dry about the head). 

Dava was Margaret’s godmother, but what makes this picture astoundingly prophetic is that Margaret’s godfather, standing next to Dava, was her father’s brother, Albert Donroe.  Soon after, he became Margaret’s stepfather when his brother was killed in World War II.  Confused, yet?  The backstory is here, in case you missed it.  If that doesn’t help, maybe a cookie will.

Back to Dava.  Pecan tassies were among the fabulous cookies that she produced by the bushel for various family gatherings.  Others included: chocolate spice cookies, coconut meltaways, and chocolate chip cream cheese cookies.  More to come. 

These particular cookies are like bite-sized pecan pies, though I’d recommend spreading out the enjoyment over more than one bite or they’ll be gone WAY to fast.  That’s just me.  Baked as they are in miniature muffin tins, using paper liners will spare you some cursing later on when you try to pry them out.  Especially if you’re making them for something like a baptism (pssst…priests don’t like the cursing). 

These are one of my favorite Dava cookies.

Pecan Tassies

Crust
2 sticks oleo (or butter)
2 3-oz. packages of cream cheese (or shave 2 oz. off of an 8-oz. package)
2 cups flour

Filling
3 eggs
1 lb. brown sugar
3 Tbsp. melted oleo (or butter)
½ tsp. vanilla
1¾ cup chopped pecans
Dash salt

Preheat oven to 350°F.

For crust, cream together oleo and cream cheese in a large bowl.  Add flour gradually and mix with a fork.  Chill 2 hours (much longer and it will get annoyingly stiff).  Place a piece of dough the size of a walnut in muffin tins.  Does anyone know how big a walnut is anymore?  Think cherry tomato.  Press dough ball so that it forms a cup against the bottom and sides of the muffin liner.  The deeper the depression, the more filling can fit inside.  I’m just saying.

For the filling, beat eggs in another large bowl.  Add brown sugar, oleo, vanilla, and salt.  Sprinkle a few chopped nuts on the bottom of each dough cup, spoon filling almost to the top, and sprinkle with more nuts.  Bake at 350°F for 15 minutes, 325°F for 10 minutes.  Cool.  Remove from pan.

Makes four dozen.

Dava [Barbaresi] Catone
New Haven, Connecticut - Hamden, Connecticut
1921 - 1998

Next Recipe: Bambury Tarts

     (Previous Recipe: Chocolate Chip Cream Cheese Cookies)

Cookbook Friday-ish: Wands

Last week, the Preschooler informed me that on Fridays, all of our food must be fried.  The apple dumpling, it seems, didn’t fall far from the frying pan.  So, this past Friday (the day before the Eat Local Challenge), we made wands.

Wands are what Nonni, Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe, always calls these little strips of fried dough dusted in confectioner’s sugar.  But, the word doesn’t look Italian in the least, and for the life of me, I can’t find anything to support it or my great grandmother’s pronunciation, “ee-wands.”  So, who knows.  The Marchigianos are crazy.  I’m not sure you can believe anything they say.

You’ll need a pasta machine for these.  Part of the fun is to develop your own signature shape.  My great grandmother, Lydia [Belbusti] Barbaresi, used to make large circles by tracing a knife around a saucer, but her daughters started making them all sorts of crazy ways.  Nonni’s version had a style all its own: a few twists, if you will.  The recipe below is for her method.

These were always a personal favorite of mine.  Nonni knew this.  While everyone else was busy fighting over the cappellettis, and passatellis, and crescia, Nonni would pull out a HUGE Tupperware container of these things just for me.  I’ve never seen Tupperware that big before or since.  Now that I know how long it takes to make them, I realize that a grandmother’s love knows no bounds.

 

Wands

I’ve taken the liberty of cutting the recipe in half so you don’t find yourself in front of the frying pan for six hours.  If you have an army to feed, or are just Italian, feel free to double it back again.

2½ cups flour
1 Tbsp. granulated sugar
½ tsp. baking powder
3 eggs
¼ cup canola oil, plus more for frying
Confectioner’s sugar for dusting

In a large bowl, mix together the flour, sugar, and baking powder.  Make a well in the center, and add eggs and oil.  With a fork, gently beat the eggs and oil together.  Then, gradually mix in the dry ingredients, a little at a time, until too thick to stir.  Knead dough slightly until it holds together.  Cut into 8 pieces and cover until ready to use.

Set up pasta machine with rollers at their widest setting.  Using a rolling pin, roll out one piece of dough until thin enough to fit through the pasta machine.  Run it through, and then decrease the space between the rollers by one notch.  If pasta gets stuck, just back it up by cranking the lever in reverse, flatten it again with the rolling pin, and try again.  Continue decreasing the space between the rollers and running the dough through until you get to the thinnest setting (the thinner the dough, the more delicately crispy they become). 

Cut into rectangles about 1-inch wide and 3 inches long.  Cut a 2-inch slit the long way, so each rectangle looks like a pair of pants.  Twist each leg, then seal at the ankles.  Set on floured pan and cover with plastic wrap.  Repeat for remaining pieces of dough.

In a medium frying pan, add enough oil to reach at least a depth of ½ inch.  Heat until very hot.  Test the oil by dropping in a wand; it should only take about 20 seconds to fry it (turning once halfway through).  Remove before it starts to brown.  Repeat for the others, frying several at a time.  Let drain on paper towels.  When cool, dust generously with confectioner’s sugar.  Serve immediately or store in an airtight container for several days.

Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe
Hamden, Connecticut
1918 –

Next Recipe: Chocolate Spice Cookies

     (Previously: Remembrance)

Cookbook Friday: Icebox Cake

                        

Here, Freddie Donroe (my dad) is showing off for his father, Albert Donroe, and grandmother, Margarita Donarumo, sometime in the early 1950s.  Did I mention my dad’s apparently-very-long bratty phase?  It was known to bring out the best in people.  For example…

Freddie and family were at his Aunt Ann’s house.  A music-lover from an early age, Freddie was rifling through her collection of 78 records.  He was undoubtedly warned to be careful with them since the older shellac records were quite fragile compared to the newer vinyl ones. 

As the story goes, Freddie wanted to bring some of them home.  Ann said no.  Freddie launched into a huge tantrum.  It went on forever.  Finally, Ann lost her temper, grabbed a record, and hit him over the head with it.  She wisely chose one of the durable vinyls.  Still, it shattered. 

Ann was more surprised than Freddie.  “It said it was unbreakable,” she remarked. 

“Yes,” replied Freddie’s Uncle Gerry.  “Under normal circumstances.”

***

All right, food snobs, brace yourselves.  Jell-O pudding is about to make an appearance.  There are only a couple of distinctly non-Italian desserts that Nonni makes, and icebox cake is one of them.  Why?  Because kids love it, and the author of this blog was no exception.

Icebox Cake

To lazy to make Italian cream pie?  Have I got a recipe for you.

2 packages chocolate instant pudding
2 packages vanilla instant pudding
5½ cups milk (or whatever the instructions on the box call for)
1 box graham crackers
4 bananas

In a large bowl, mix together 2¾ cups milk and the contents of two packages of chocolate pudding according to the instructions on the package (e.g., add mix to milk and whisk for two minutes). 

In a 9”x13” pan, arrange graham crackers on the bottom, breaking into smaller pieces to fit, if necessary.  Pour half of the chocolate pudding on top and spread evenly.  Slice two bananas and arrange in a single layer on top of that.  Add the remaining chocolate pudding.  Set another layer of graham crackers on top. 

Wash out the bowl and mix together the remaining 2¾ cups milk with the two packs of vanilla pudding.  Spread half of it over the graham crackers.  Slice two more bananas and arrange in a single layer.  Add the rest of the vanilla pudding.  In a blender or food processor, pulse 5 graham crackers until pulverized.  Sprinkle crumbs over top of cake.  Cover and chill in the refrigerator (i.e., icebox) for 24 hours before serving.

Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe
Hamden, Connecticut
1918 -

Next: Remembrance

     (Previously: Baseball Cards)

Cookbook Friday: Baseball Cards

       

Here’s a photo of my dad, Freddie Donroe, being consoled by his mom, Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe.  I don’t know what he was upset about, but I’m sure it was very, very important.  And speaking of tears, here’s a story written by my dad about collecting baseballs cards in the 1950’s and 60’s:

As a young baseball fan, my prized possession was not my bike, my Yankee-Doodle rocket launcher, or even my dog.  It was my baseball card collection. 

From 1957 through 1963, I was an avid collector of those cardboard stock photos of our diamond heroes: Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra, Whitey Ford.  There was no greater joy than to go to the corner store after school with my friends and buy a pack of baseball cards.  And if one happened to have a whole quarter to spend, one could buy five packs of cards.  That meant 25 cards and five slabs of the most delicious stale, dried-out gum on the planet.

I became a master at “pitching cards,” that simple game of hurling cards against the wall, with the card nearer to the wall the winner.  If you won, you took your opponent’s card.  I managed to win every one of my cousin Joe Donroe’s Yankee cards one year that way.  Today, as an older and wiser man, I regret the mercenary way I treated my cousin.  But, at the time, he knew what he was getting into.

In 1958, I managed for the first and only time to collect the entire Topps series of cards.  Every single player card, team card, specialty card, and even index cards.  I kept the entire set in an old Thom McCann shoebox in my closet.  I kept them for over a decade.  Safe from thieves, weather, and other mishap, they were not safe from the one predator I could not foresee: a spring-cleaning mom. 

How could she (or any of us) have known the way the sports memorabilia market would explode in the 1980’s and 90’s?  So much for my daughter’s college tuition!

Freddie Donroe
Hamden, Connecticut
1948 -

Blogger’s note: Coincidentally, Joe Donroe’s son ended up attending the same university as me.  He has since become a doctor, while I am, well…a blogger.  Looks like Dad's cousin Joe got the last laugh, after all.

Next Recipe: Icebox Cake

     (Previously: Stuffed Mushrooms)

Cookbook Friday: Stuffed Mushrooms

Let’s talk about mushrooms!

I have a love/hate relationship with mushrooms.  I love to eat them, but sometimes they make me vomit.  Same with wine (why, God, why?) and, in an unexpected twist this week, sometimes summer squash.  But, like I said, I LOVE mushrooms and will choose to eat them based on how convenient it might be at that moment to vomit spontaneously.

What’s that you say?  It’s never convenient to vomit?  Well, you would be right, sir, but have you ever tasted mushrooms?  They’re delicious.  This is the dilemma of my life.

On the other hand, my dad, Freddie Donroe, has a hate/hate relationship with mushrooms.  Unlike all of the other things my dad claims to hate when he really just doesn’t realize he likes them, my dad really does hate mushrooms.  Here’s why.

When my dad was much, much younger, his father, Albert Donroe (my Poppi), used to take him to forage for mushrooms.  I assume, since Poppi’s family was from Naples, that this was in his blood, or, at the very least, he had some tutelage.  Poppi had a special place they always went, some woods near a quarry in Hamden, Connecticut (maybe East Rock, maybe Sleeping Giant).  There, according to my dad, Poppi would go over every rotting stump he could find and gather mushrooms of every shape and size.  To hear my dad tell the story, Poppi never turned one down, food poisoning be damned. 

After about 45 minutes, and what I can only imagine was my dad’s constant whining, they returned home so Poppi could cook them.  And this is where things got really ugly.  Sometimes, he cooked them in a sauce for spaghetti, but usually they were just sautéed.  The smell was so bad, my dad remembers, he’d completely lose his appetite.  I believe “hellacious” was the word he used to describe it.  Nobody else in the house would touch the stuff, so Poppi just cooked them for himself.  Meanwhile, my dad would make himself scarce for as long as the smell lingered.  To this day, he can’t stomach them.

Now, the question I have is, was Poppi really that bad of a cook?  Perhaps, not a very discriminating hunter/gatherer?  Or were they, in fact, delicious, but my dad just hates mushrooms?  Anyone else ever taste them?  Because I’m willing to bet I would have been smacking my lips, even as they were wheeling me to the ER.  (Poppi, by the way, is a whopping 93.)

The following recipe is Nonni’s Marchigiano recipe for stuffed mushrooms.  They have never made me vomit. 

 

Stuffed Mushrooms

The secret to these is long, slow cooking in a cool oven.  Don’t rush them.

10 oz. package button mushrooms
3 Tbsp. olive oil
1 Tbsp. garlic, minced
¼ cup fresh bread crumbs
½ cup grated Parmesan cheese
Salt and pepper

Preheat oven to 300°F.  To the bottom of an 8”x8” pan, add 1 Tbsp. of the oil. 

Using a damp towel, wipe dirt off of mushrooms.  Gently, pull out the stems and chop them finely.  In a medium bowl, combine chopped stems with garlic, bread crumbs, cheese, salt, and pepper.  Working over the bowl, mound stuffing into hollowed out mushrooms.  Set in oiled pan.  Drizzle with remaining 2 Tbsp. of oil.  Bake uncovered for 1 hour or longer (Nonni cooks the hell out of them and that’s how I like them). 

Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe
Hamden, Connecticut
1918 -

 

Next: Baseball Cards

     (Previously: Squirrel Surprise)

Cookbook Friday: Chicken Potacchio

               

This is a photo of Lydia [Belbusti] Barbaresi (on the right) with her sister Rose [Belbusti] Bernabucci in New Haven, CT in the 1940s.  Lydia was my great grandmother and Nonni’s mother.  The sisters were heading back to Italy for a wedding, and it was, I believe, the first time they had been back since emigrating in 1910.  This is the only picture I have of Lydia smiling.  She always looked very serious, like here and here (of course, if I had that many kids, I wouldn't be smiling, either).

Today, I’m sharing her recipe for Chicken Potacchio, pronounced “po-TAH-key” in their Marchigiano dialect.  You have no idea what I had to go through to get this recipe.  First of all, I didn’t even know it existed.  I had already interrogated Nonni multiple times to make sure I had all of the family recipes written down, when this chicken dish suddenly appeared on the table.  I had never seen it before in my life.

Once I tasted it, I knew I had to include it in the cookbook.  It was mop-up-all-the-juices scrumptious.  Lydia had taught Nonni how to make it, of course, and Nonni made it for her kids growing up, but not so much after that.  In fact, she had forgotten about it entirely. 

Nonni gave me the run-down, but my first attempt to duplicate it was lackluster, with the chicken cooking way before the potatoes were done.  Turns out, there weren’t even supposed to be potatoes in the recipe (you may recall this conversation). 

So, I nixed the potatoes, made it again, and it still wasn’t up to snuff.  More phone calls.  We played this game of culinary Marco Polo for quite some time.  With each conversation, a new ingredient or technique was discovered.  Peeled garlic cloves turned into unpeeled garlic cloves.  Uncovered pots suddenly had covers.  Preheated ovens were abandoned for the stovetop.

But, the recipe still wasn’t right.

I was about to give up, drive down to New Haven myself, and videotape the whole production, but I decided to make a last-ditch attempt from afar.  When I called, Nonni’s sister-in-law Regina was there.  Regina had also learned how to make the dish from Lydia.  When Regina heard what Nonni was telling me, she interjected her own instructions, which (surprise, surprise) were completely different.  Suddenly, there’s salt pork instead of oil and red wine vinegar instead of white. 

Nonni, who’s pushing ninety, laughingly shouts: “She’s always been jealous of me...My shape...Now, she’s trying to take away my chicken.”

Ultimately, there was consensus on the technique.  Even some of the ingredients!  I tried the recipe again, and guess what?  It was perfect.  Finally.

I haven’t asked much of you, dear readers, but somebody, somewhere, please make this.  It may be the most over-researched recipe in the whole world, but so very well worth it.

 

Chicken Potacchio

This is Lydia’s original version.  Nonni makes it a bit differently with a few tablespoons of oil instead of the salt pork, and the same amount of white vinegar instead of the red wine vinegar.  Serve this with Italian bread to soak up the sauce.  For the garlic, squeeze it out of its skin and eat it whole or spread it on bread.

2 oz. salt pork, cut into a small dice
2 lb. boneless chicken breasts, cut into two or three pieces
1 head garlic, separated into cloves with skin still on (DON’T YOU DARE PEEL THEM)
½ cup red wine vinegar
½ cup water
1 Tbsp. dried rosemary leaves
Salt and pepper

In a large skillet (with lid) over medium-high heat, fry salt pork (uncovered) until it starts to turn golden and there’s a thin layer of fat rendered at the bottom of the pan.  Season the chicken pieces and add them to the pan with the salt pork along with the unpeeled garlic cloves.  Don’t cover the pan (I’ll tell you when, okay, just hold your horses).  Brown the chicken on both sides, taking care not to let the garlic burn.  You can do this in two batches, if necessary.

With the chicken in the pan nice and brown, add the vinegar and water, and sprinkle the rosemary on top.  Cover the pan (yes, now) and reduce the heat to a gentle simmer.  Cook until chicken is done and sauce has reduced and thickened, 20-30 minutes.  Season with salt and pepper. 

Lydia [Belbusti] Barbaresi
New Haven, Connecticut (by way of Castelvecchio, Le Marche, Italy)
1883 - 1974

Chicken Potacchio, Swiss chard sautéed with pine nuts and raisins, and one very marked-up manuscript.

Next: Making Pasta

     (Previously: Italian Bread)

Cookbook Friday: Italian Bread

This is my dad, Freddie Donroe, in grammar school in the mid-1950s.  He has this story to share about bringing home the Italian bread:

Hot, freshly baked Italian bread.  Now that’s Italian!  For me, no meal is complete without one or more loaves of Italian bread fresh from the oven.

My infatuation with the long loaf with the crispy, light brown crust began at a young age.  In 1956, my family moved out of New Haven and into one of its growing suburbs, Hamden.  It was part of a larger migration of ethnic, mostly European groups out of the city.  Many Italians were part of this migration and an awful lot of family names in our new community ended with a vowel.  For this reason, a number of shops and stores sprung up that catered to Italian tastes and habits.  Bakeries were among them, and it was there that as a youngster I first delighted in both the taste and aroma of bread straight from the brick oven.

Over the years, I made my way to a number of these establishments to pick up a loaf or two for my mom.  Most of them were storefront type businesses located on Dixwell Avenue, the main street in the town.  But the bakery I remember most was located on Church Street, a small side street where my grammar school sat.  This neighborhood was made up of mostly two- and three-family homes with garages in the back.  One enterprising family had converted part of the garage into a bakery.  It held only one small counter, a tiny prep station, and a large brick oven.  As a result, every part of the preparation was done right out in plain view.

It was a treat to watch your own loaves being prepared from scratch, from the kneading of the dough to placing it in the oven with the large, wooden paddle.  The wait was excruciating, as the aroma of baking bread swallowed me up.  Finally, the loaves were removed from the oven, slipped into long paper sleeves, and placed, piping hot, into my eager 8-year old hands.  Then came the hardest part: how to walk all the way home with two deliciously hot loaves of Italian bread under my arm without snatching a hunk for a quick snack!  To be honest, I couldn’t always resist the temptation.  But my mom was pretty understanding.  I always suspected that she ordered two loaves specifically so that one might make it home unscathed.

Eventually, the little backyard bakery went the way of all such ventures.  Either the enterprise failed or was so successful that it moved to larger quarters in a more commercial environment.  I hope it was the latter.  Whatever the reason, I was forced to start frequenting more conventional establishments.  And although the fantastic aroma still accompanied the loaves I brought home, the overall experience was never quite the same again.

Freddie Donroe
Hamden, Connecticut
1948 –

And that’s the reason why we don’t have a family recipe for Italian bread.  So sorry to disappoint!

Next Recipe: Chicken Potacchio

     (Previous Recipe: Stuffed Artichokes)

Cookbook Friday: Stuffed Artichokes

This photo was taken in 1954 at the Horace Day School in New Haven, Connecticut.  Freddie Donroe, my dad, is on the far left in the second row from the bottom.

Cute as he was, he was known far and wide as a brat.  Not only did he steal anything with silver paper, but also, according to his aunts and uncles, he always had to have his way.  One day, the whole family was planning a trip to the Bronx Zoo.  No one wanted to bring Freddie.  His Uncle Gerry summed it up best: “He’ll end up wanting a giraffe, and I’m not cutting a hole in the roof of my car for his pet giraffe.”  (He did eventually get to the zoo, and no giraffes went missing.)

In honor of my dad, here’s one of his favorite recipes.  Happy Father’s Day!

 

Stuffed Artichokes

The heart is usually considered the best part of the artichoke, but this tasty stuffing will make you appreciate the leaves, too.

6 large artichokes
3 or 4 cloves of garlic, chopped
¾ cup breadcrumbs
¾ cup Parmesan cheese
¾ cup olive oil

Cut off stems of artichokes so they will sit flat.  Cut off top third of artichokes to remove the sharp thistles.  Remove and discard the tough leaves from the bottom two layers.  Using kitchen scissors, cut off any remaining sharp tips from the leaves.  Holding the bottom of the artichoke, bang it upside-down to open the leaves for easier stuffing.

Fill bottom of pan with 1½ inches of water.  Place artichokes in pan.  Divide garlic equally between the six artichokes and rub into the crevices between the leaves.  Sprinkle 2 Tbsp. breadcrumbs and 2 Tbsp. Parmesan cheese over each artichoke, then drizzle each with 2 Tbsp. olive oil.  Cover pan with foil and bake at 300°F for 2 hours. 

To eat, pull off leaves one at a time and holding the tough, upper part of the leaf, use your teeth to scrape the stuffing and tender artichoke meat into your mouth.  Continue, making a pile of leaves on your plate, until you reach the heart.  With a spoon, gently scrape away the fuzzy choke.  The heart is what’s left.  Enjoy.

Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe
New Haven, Connecticut
1918 –

 

Next: Italian Bread

     (Previous Recipe: Italian Cream Pie)

Cookbook Friday: Italian Cream Pie

This is a picture of my Great-Aunt Dava on her wedding day to her second husband, Joe Catone, in New Haven, Connecticut in the early 1950s.  Dava’s first husband died young in World War II, as did her sister Dora's (my grandmother's) first husband.

Dava always had a sweet tooth, which may explain why she was such a great baker.  Nonni tells the story of when they were young (Dava was 7, Dora was 9) and they found themselves at a bakery with their mother, Lydia.  Dava wanted a pie.  But, the family couldn’t afford such luxuries, so Lydia said no. 

Still, Dava continued to loiter close to the pies that were on display out in the open.  Angela, the shop-owner, got suspicious.  She warned Dava that if she so much as touched one, her mother would have to pay for it.  Dava promptly stuck her finger right into that pie.  Lydia was furious, but she paid up.  The apple pie, Nonni remembers, was delicious!

This recipe for Dava's Italian cream pie is also delicious. 

Italian Cream Pie

The basic recipe is for a vanilla cream pie, but Dava also sometimes made a half vanilla/half chocolate cream pie by melting a couple of chocolate squares into half of the Italian cream.  Then, she would pour the chocolate and vanilla creams into the crust at the same time (easier with help) so that they bump up against each other, but don’t mix.  You can also pour the cream in two layers.

1 recipe Italian pie crust
1 quart milk
1 cup flour
1 cup sugar
3 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
1 tsp. lemon extract
1 Tbsp. Galliano*
1 oz. chocolate (optional)

Heat milk until hot, but not boiling.  In another pot that’s more wide than tall, bring an inch or two of water to a boil.  Lower heat to a simmer.  In a large bowl (one that will be able to sit comfortably on top of the pot), mix flour, sugar, and eggs.  Stir in vanilla and lemon extracts.  Whisk in heated milk, then set bowl on top of pot.  Alternatively, you can use an actual double boiler, if you have one.  Cook, whisking constantly to remove lumps, until thickened.  Remove from heat and mix in Galliano.  Let cool.  (If you want to make a pie with both vanilla and chocolate cream, divide cream in half into two bowls.  Melt 1 oz. of chocolate in the double boiler, and stir into the cream in one of the bowls.  Let cool.)

Preheat oven to 350°F.  Roll out one pie crust on a well-floured counter until ¼-inch thick and at least 12 inches in diameter.  Dough will be soft and sticky, so flour rolling pin well.  To transfer dough to a 10-inch, deep-dish pie plate.  I use a bench scraper to loosen the dough from the counter and push it up and over my rolling pin.  Once half the dough is draped over the pin, I center it over the pie plate and gently unfurl it. 

Pour the Italian cream into the pie shell.  If using two flavors, either gently layer them without mixing, or pour into two different sides at the same time to create the half-and-half pie.  Roll out the second pie crust the same way as the first and place on top of the cream.  Press edges together and tuck under itself along the rim of the pie plate and crimp.  Brush crust with milk or beaten egg, if desired.

Bake about 50 minutes, until crust is puffed and golden-brown.  If crust starts to brown too much too early, just cover top with foil.  Let cool.  Chill before serving.

Dava [Barbaresi] Catone
Hamden, Connecticut
1921 - 1998

* Galliano has an anise flavor that some people don’t like, but I happen to love.  In the Italian cream, you can barely notice the licorice-like flavor and instead get more of an herbal tinge.  It really does add something, so I’d recommend trying it once (even though the smallest bottle of Galliano costs $15).  I’ll have to come up with some interesting cocktails to polish off the rest of the bottle.  Or make more pie.

Dava’s Italian cream pie on the dining room set that Great-Uncle Joe gave us.

Next Recipe: Stuffed Artichokes

     (Previously: The Cherry Tree)

Cookbook Friday: The Cherry Tree

One of my favorite features of this family cookbook I’m writing (besides the recipes, themselves) is the collection of stories from family members.  Usually, they’re short anecdotes that I relay in the context of a specific recipe.  But, sometimes the stories have special significance, so they deserve their own space and to be told in the voice of the original storyteller.  This is one of them, written by my dad, just in time for cherry season:

I grew up in New Haven, Connecticut during the early 1950’s.  My family rented the lower floor of a triple-decker in a lower middle-class, ethnic neighborhood in “the Hill.” Originally called Sodom’s Hill, it was initially the Irish section of town before the Irish moved on and the neighborhoods were turned over to the newer Italian and German immigrants.  My childhood address, 163 Spring Street, was very much a part of the Italian community, which was centered on Columbus Avenue about four blocks away, with its beautiful parish church, Sacred Heart.

Our landlords were a wonderfully ethnic Italian family known as the Mell’s.  The house itself was a wonder to me, with its high ceilings and wood floors.  The stove in the large kitchen was huge and had a very large vent pipe (according to my parents, that was the way Santa Claus got into the house since we had no fireplace).  My sister and I shared a bedroom with a walk-in closet, long before we thought it was anything special.  The cellar was old and unfinished, and one of the highlights of the day was evening time when my Dad took me down to put coal in the old coal-burning furnace.  TV was an old black and white nine-inch RCA set and the memories of my donning a red towel around my neck and flying around the living room during and after “The Adventures of Superman” are still vivid.

Outside, a very long driveway ran to the left of the house.  It continued on past the main yard and Mrs. Mell’s vegetable garden before widening out to a gravel-surfaced area leading to a three-car garage, a chicken coop, and a rabbit hutch.  I, of course, assumed that the Mell’s chickens and rabbits were pets, and I loved to help feed them.  Near the garden was an ornate birdbath that I would fill to overflowing whenever someone would be nuts enough to give me the hose.

Past the garden, two white stone blocks bordered the driveway.  They appeared to be crude benches, but Mr. Mell told me the terrible, secret truth: they were the tombs of Mr. and Mrs. Mussolini!  Back then, I didn’t know who the heck the Mussolinis were or why they were buried in the Mell’s yard, but I knew they must be important, for just to the left of one of the “tombs” was a very large and very old cherry tree.  It was the only cherry tree in the entire neighborhood, to the best of my knowledge.  It seemed so out of place as it towered over the more typical elms and chestnuts. 

For most of the year, the tree was like any other on the property.  Since I was too young for climbing, trees were just obstacles to be avoided while motoring around on a tricycle or pedal toy car.  Then, in the spring of 1951, something enchanted happened.  Roger Mell, the landlord’s eldest son, climbed the tree and began raining bright red cherries down on to the ground.  At first, my sister and I didn’t quite know what to make of it all.  But Roger invited us to help ourselves and we did.  We gorged on the juicy, fresh cherries, laughing out loud and running around, grabbing them off the freshly cut lawn as Roger threw some here, some there, so we all got a share.  My sister and I competed for who got the most.  She was bigger, but I was quicker, and we both got all we could eat.

The tree became my treasure.  I became so protective of it that I once rashly challenged some high school kids who were picking cherries from the branches that had grown over the fence into the next yard.  Thank goodness it was 1953 or those kids would have found a way to stuff me into Mussolini’s tomb!

To this day, I have never tasted cherries as good or as fresh as that.  I spent the whole year waiting, often pelting poor Roger with the hopeful question, “Is it time, yet?”  I was afraid he wouldn’t remember, but he did.  The cherry festival went on every spring for a few more years and was as anxiously anticipated as Christmas or my birthday.

My last memory of the cherry tree is circa 1955, when our family was evicted so the Mell’s newly married daughter could move into the apartment.  Still, it’s hard to be mad at them: they gave me something worth remembering for a lifetime!

Freddie Donroe
New Haven, Connecticut
1948 –

Next Recipe: Italian Cream Pie

     (Previous Recipe: Pignoli Cookies)

Cookbook Friday: Pignoli Cookies

This picture was taken around 1950 with some of my grandmother’s siblings.  From left to right: sister Jean [Barbaresi] Borrelli, sister Edith [Barbaresi] Piccolo, niece Terese Bontempo, sister-in-law Regina [Lipowski] Barbaresi, and brother Gerry Barbaresi.  Notice the milk bottle and what appears to be an untouched piece of pie in the center of the table.  What’s up with that?

While I was growing up, Edith lived with my grandmother, Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe, for some number of years.  In her sixties at the time, Edith always struck me as a tornado of fury.  It seemed best just to stay out of her way.  But, I remember coming out of the woodwork for these pignoli (pine nut) cookies.  They were totally worth it.

Edith shaped these into crescents, not an easy task with such a sticky dough.  I never have any luck with this, and today was no different.  I gave up halfway through and just dropped them in circles with the rationale that, who the hell cares?  When I pulled them out of the oven, I saw that all of the crescents had transformed themselves into circles anyway, so it was like I didn’t even try.  I’m not sure, but I think I heard her laughing.

Gluten-free peeps, this is the cookie for you.  (Unless you’re allergic to nuts, too.)  (In which case, man, that sucks.)

Pignoli Cookies

This moist and chewy Italian cookie is one of my all-time favorites.

1 lb. almond paste, crumbled finely
1 ½ cups sugar
3 egg whites
1 lb. pine nuts

Preheat oven to 350°F.  Line two cookie sheets with aluminum foil or parchment paper.

Crumble the almond paste into tiny pieces.  You can do this painstakingly by hand, or you can whiz it in the food processor in a flash.  Your choice.  With an electric mixer, beat the crumbled almond paste, sugar, and egg whites together until mixture fluffs up, about 2 minutes.  Spoon ½ teaspoon dough, dip spoon upside down into pine nuts, and push dough onto baking sheet, nut side up.  I find a regular teaspoon (as opposed to a measuring teaspoon) is easier to work with. 

Bake until just golden, 12 to 15 minutes.  Pull the foil off the pans to allow these cookies to cool while baking the rest.  Be sure to reline the pans.  Although the baked cookies may appear to be stuck to the foil, once they have cooled sufficiently, they can be gently peeled right off.  Makes 50 cookies.

Edith [Barbaresi] Piccolo
West Haven, Connecticut
1917-1994

Next: The Cherry Tree

     (Previous Recipe: Meatballs)

Cookbook Friday: Meatballs

With Freddie Donroe a casualty of the war in 1944, my grandmother, Dora Barbaresi, was left a widow with their infant daughter.  So, how is it that I carry the name Donroe two generations later?  Let me explain.

After a long period of grieving, Freddie’s brother, Albert Donroe, stepped in to ask Dora to marry him.  Albert was actually the Best Man at Dora and Freddie’s wedding (he's standing to the right of Freddie in the picture of the wedding party).  In my mind, I’ve concocted all manner of noble reasons for this proposal.  To provide for Dora the way his brother would have wanted.  To bring up his brother’s child as his own.  To help keep Freddie’s memory alive.  It may have been all of those things, but, let’s face it, she was also cute. 

In an attempt to pick up the pieces of her life, Dora wed Albert and, in doing so, retained Donroe as her married name.  So, Freddie wasn't my grandfather — Albert was.  That marriage turned out to be, um, less blissful.  But the union did produce two sons. 

               

This is my dad, who was born in 1948.  He was named Freddie in memory of the late Freddie who would have, in effect, been his uncle.  Indeed, as adults, there is a striking resemblance between the two.  His brother, Eddie, was born six years later. 

As family lore has it, when my dad was born, the doctor declared him to be not only the most beautiful baby in the nursery, but also the most beautiful baby the doctor had ever seen over the course of his career, and maybe even in the history of the world.

Albert was very proud of his newborn son and was swaggering around by the nursery window when another proud papa and his entourage arrived on the scene.  That father was singing the praises of his newborn son, but he was pointing at baby Freddie.  Albert turned around and said to him, in no uncertain terms, “Who the hell do you think you are?  That’s my son.  That scrawny one over there is yours.”

And maybe now my dad will stop complaining about how I never write about him on my blog, anymore.  Here’s a manly recipe to boot.

 

Meatballs

Nonni serves these with her lasagna and manicotti.  They are the best.  There’s no convincing me otherwise.

½ lb. ground beef
½ lb. ground pork
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 Tbsp. Italian parsley, finely chopped
1 handful fresh breadcrumbs
1 handful Parmesan cheese
1 egg
Salt and pepper
Canola oil

Using your hands, mix together all of the ingredients in a large bowl.  Roll into round balls.  Heat oil in a large frying pan, and cook, turning meatballs often to maintain their shape, until browned and cooked through. 

Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe
Hamden, Connecticut
1918 –

 

Next Recipe: Pignoli Cookies

     (Previously: World War II)

Cookbook Friday: Italian Pie Crust

This is the wedding photo of my grandmother Dora’s younger sister, Dava Barbaresi, taken sometime in the early 1940’s.  Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe was her maid-of-honor.  Dava’s husband, Eddie Apuzzo, and Dora’s husband, Freddie Donroe, were best friends.  On the far right is my great grandfather, George Barbaresi.  On the far left, I’m not sure, but it looks like maybe a brother of Eddie’s.  The young men, as well as Freddie, were getting ready to ship out with the military, headed for Europe during World War II.

Dava was the baker in the family.  She used this pie crust for her famous rice and Italian cream pies.  The crust, I was told by Dava’s daughter, Roseann, is temperamental, and no one in the family has been able to master it.  After my first attempt, it was clear that I hadn’t mastered it, either.  Unless Dava’s technique happened to involve causing the dough to fall apart into a million pieces and then pressing them into the pie dish in a perturbed fashion.  Could that have been it? 

So, I’ve taken some liberties to make the recipe easier to work with.  My apologies in advance for inserting a food processor into an otherwise vintage recipe.  Also, under normal circumstances, you want to handle your pie dough as little as possible so the gluten doesn’t develop and cause the crust to toughen up.  But, in this case, I found that gently kneading the dough really helps the eggs to incorporate and allows just enough gluten to develop to hold everything together.  It also improved the texture, making the finished crust flakier.

Anyway, it meets my specs as far as crusts go, but I’ll need someone else in the family to try this and see if the crust tastes the way you remember it.  The rice pie filling is coming up next week and, by god, if you do decide to try it, make sure your wills are in order.

Italian Sweet Crust

This spiced crust is like a cross between your typical pie crust and a soft sugar cookie.  Dava used it for her rice pie and Italian cream pie.

3 cups flour
¾ cup sugar
3 tsp. baking powder
¼ tsp. salt
¼ tsp. nutmeg
¼ tsp. cinnamon
¾ cup shortening, cut into medium hunks
2 eggs
2 tsp. vanilla

By hand: In a large bowl, mix flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, and spices.  Cut in shortening.

In a food processor: Mix together flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, and spices.  Add shortening and, using the on/off turns, pulse 10-12 times until the shortening pieces are the size of peas.  Dump mixture into a bowl.

Make a well in the ingredients, and add eggs and vanilla.  Fluff until eggs are incorporated.  Knead gently until dough is smooth. If you’re worried you overdid it, just wrap in plastic wrap and set in the refrigerator for a half hour to relax the gluten.  Dough will be soft.  Cut into three parts.  Roll as a pie crust. 

Makes enough dough for two 10-inch rice pies plus lattice, or one 10-inch Italian cream pie with a top crust (plus an extra crust you can freeze).

Dava [Barbaresi] Catone
Hamden, Connecticut
1921-1998

Next Recipe: Sweet Rice Pie

     (Previous Recipe: Cappellettis)

Cookbook Friday: Cappellettis

This is my grandmother, Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe, beaming with what must be her first child, Margaret Ann, in 1942.  The U.S. had been at war with Japan and Germany since the bombing of Pearl Harbor the year before.

Cappellettis are among the top three all-time favorite family recipes, along with crescia and passatellis.  Pronounced “cop-LETS” in the dialect Nonni spoke, these are meat-filled tortellini shaped like little hats (that’s what the name means in Italian) and served in chicken soup.

Nonni still makes these filled pastas by the thousands, despite the rheumatoid arthritis that has permanently bent her fingers.  She freezes them in big bags and sends them home with me (if I play my cards right) or my dad (if I don’t) along with containers of homemade soup.  Her youngest son, Eddie, now in his fifties, has a standing order for shipments of cappellettis and crescia to be sent to him from Connecticut to Washington State several times a year.  Although the prognosis for pork traveling through the U.S. postal system is grim at best, he still lives to tell a happy tale.

 

Cappellettis

I recently revised this recipe (12/10) to make half the filling and double the pasta so you end up with about the right amount of each.  That recipe can be found here.

For the filling:
3 Tbsp. oil
2 lb. ground lean pork
½ cup breadcrumbs
1 cup grated Parmesan cheese (or more)
2 eggs
Pinch of nutmeg
Salt and black pepper to taste

For the dough:
2 cups flour
1 egg (sometimes 2)

Heat the oil in a large pot over medium heat.  Brown pork until cooked through.  Remove pan from heat and mix in breadcrumbs, cheese, eggs, nutmeg, salt, and pepper.  Mixture should be thick enough to hold together.  If too wet, add more breadcrumbs and/or cheese.  Let cool while making dough.

In a large bowl, add flour and make a well in the middle.  Crack egg in the center and stir with a fork, gradually scraping in the flour from the perimeter to incorporate.  When it gets too thick to stir, turn out onto flour board and knead, adding more flour if necessary. Roll into a cylinder and cut into 2-inch pieces.  Put in a lightly oiled bowl and cover to keep from drying out.

Set up pasta machine with rollers open to the widest setting.  Run one piece of pasta through the machine.  Decrease the number by one and run the pasta through again.  Continue decreasing the space between rollers until the pasta is so thin, you can almost see your fingers through it.

Working quickly, place rolled-out pasta on lightly floured surface and cut into 1½-inch squares using a sharp knife.  Place one teaspoon of filling in the center of a square and fold into a triangle, corner to corner, pressing on the edges to seal.  Bring the two pointy corners toward each other, overlapping slightly, and press to join.  They should sit flat like the little hats they are.  Lay them in a single layer on a rimmed cookie sheet and cover while filling the rest of the pasta squares.  Repeat until all the pasta is used, freezing the pans of completed cappellettis as soon as they are filled.  Once the pasta has frozen, you can transfer them to plastic freezer bags.  Any remaining filling can be stored in the freezer for future use.

To serve, bring homemade chicken soup to a boil.  Add frozen cappellettis (don’t defrost them), stirring occasionally.  Let soup come back up to a boil, then turn down heat to a gentle simmer.  Cook until al dente (fully cooked but still firm) about 7 minutes. 

Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe
New Haven, Connecticut
1918 –

Nonni's freshly made cappellettis.  Photo by Trish Barker.

Next Recipe: Italian Pie Crust

     (Previous Recipe: Sausages and Peppers)

Cookbook Friday: Sausage and Peppers

So, back to my grandmother.  We left off with Dora Barbaresi marrying Freddie Donroe in 1940.  This picture was taken two years later on the Fourth of July of 1942.  Nonni, visibly pregnant, is sitting with her niece, Terese [Bontempo] Cirasuolo, and nephew, Gerry Piccolo, who are enjoying some tasty raisins.  Speaking of picnic food, which I hope to be enjoying in the near future, here’s an Italian standard that’s easy, portable, and lip-smacking good.

 

Sausage and Peppers

The secret is in the sausage.  Get the most authentic Italian sausages you can find.  I love the ones from DePasquale’s in Nonantum, MA, which you can buy from their tiny little shop on Watertown St. or at Russo’s.  I throw a couple of spicy ones in with the sweet to keep things interesting.

2 Tbsp. olive oil
2 onions, sliced thinly
3 green bell peppers, thickly sliced
1 red bell pepper, thickly sliced
2 lbs. sweet Italian sausages, links separated, pricked
6 Italian sub rolls

Preheat oven to 350°F.  In a large baking dish, add oil, onions, peppers, and whole sausages.  Cover with foil and bake until sausages are cooked through and peppers are soft, between 1 and 1½ hours, depending on the thickness of the peppers.  Serve in sub rolls.

Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe
New Haven, Connecticut
1918 -

 

Next Recipe: Cappellettis

     (Previous Recipe: Crescia)

Cookbook Friday: Crescia

This is Gerry Barbaresi, brother of Dora Barbaresi (my Nonni).  He was the youngest of the seven, and arrived on the scene in 1927 (the original family portrait was taken two years before he was born).  I have no idea when this particular shot was taken, but I’m going to say 1940 just to keep my fragile chronology intact. 

Gerry was the only son and the only one of his siblings to be able to go to college.  There, he met his future wife, Regina Lipowski.  Growing up in a household full of Italian women, Gerry was also the only one who married a non-Italian (he was no fool).  After graduation, he started working as a teacher and eventually worked his way up to Superintendent of Schools in New Haven and, later, New Fairfield, CT.

Gerry was well known for his sharp wit.  He loved crescia, the traditional Easter bread from the Marches region of Italy where his parents were born.  Nonni often made crescia for him, and she remembers Gerry giving his wife a hard time when it came to sharing his beloved loaves.  He used to say to Regina, “My sister made this for me.  You let your sister make you crescia.”  Regina didn’t have any sisters.  She was an only child.  Of Polish immigrants.  “Go ask your sister to do it,” he would say.  “My sister will do it for me, your sister will do it for you.”

Gerry passed away in 1998.  Regina still lives in the New Haven area where she, Nonni, my dad, my boys, the Easter Bunny, and I hope to all get together this weekend.  I’ll be bringing crescia.  I promise to share.

 

Crescia

Nonni’s recipe for this Parmesan pepper bread makes five loaves.  If this seems like a ridiculous amount of bread, then I’ve failed to express how much the people in my family love it.  You can cut the recipe in half, or store the extra loaves in the freezer wrapped in foil inside an airtight freezer bag.

7 cups flour
6 cups grated Parmesan cheese
½ lb. fresh yeast*
1 Tbsp. black pepper
13 eggs
1 stick butter, melted
¾ cup oil

Preheat oven to 300°F.    Grease 5 medium loaf pans.

In the largest bowl you can find (or a stockpot), mix together flour, cheese, and black pepper.  With your fingers, crumble yeast as finely as you can and mix.  In a large bowl, beat eggs with butter and oil.  Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and add the wet ingredients.  Stir together until well mixed, but do not knead.  Cover and let rise for 1 hour at room temperature.  Divide dough into pans and bake for 45 minutes to an hour.

*A note about yeast: I know a half-pound of yeast seems like a mistake, but it’s not.  I must have asked Nonni more than a dozen times to check this figure before I tested the recipe.  Usually, by the 14th conversation, I’ve gotten the straight story.  Sure enough, the recipe works as written.  The best and most cost-effective thing to do is get fresh yeast from your local bakery, which is what Nonni does and what I, in turn, did.  It comes in 1 pound bricks, which you can ask them to cut in half, and they might charge you anywhere from $1 to $4.  If you’re smart, you’ll ask for a few cannoli on the side.  Everyone wins.

Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe
New Haven, Connecticut
1918 –

Next Recipe: Sausages and Peppers

     (Previous Recipe: Clam Sauce)

Cookbook Friday: Clam Sauce

The last of my grandmother’s wedding photos, this is her sister-in-law, Rose [Donroe] Valentino, in 1940.  Rose learned how to cook from her Neapolitan mother, Margarite Donroe.  She refers to this recipe as white clam sauce, to differentiate it from the tomato-based red version.  Rose still lives in the New Haven area and is very spry at age 95.

 

White Clam Sauce

An old standard Christmas Eve recipe, Rose would use fresh cherrystone clams and serve them in their shells for a more festive presentation.  This everyday version uses canned clams from the pantry.

3 Tbsp. extra virgin olive oil
4 medium garlic cloves, minced
Pinch of red pepper flakes
2 small bottles of clam juice (8 fl. oz. each)
3 Tbsp. fresh parsley, minced
2 cans minced clams, drained (6 ½ oz. each)
Salt to taste
1 lb. angel hair pasta

Set a large pot of salted water to boil.  Meanwhile, heat oil and sauté garlic until light brown (careful, as garlic burns fast).  Add red pepper flakes, clam juice, and parsley.  Cook for 15 minutes.  Just before serving, add canned clams and let simmer together for 1 minute. 

Cook angel hair pasta as directed.  Before draining, save ¼ cup of the pasta water.  Put pasta in bowl, add part of the clam sauce along with the reserved pasta water.  Serve topped with additional clam sauce.  Serves 8.

Rose [Donroe] Valentino
North Haven, Connecticut
1911 –

 

Next Recipe: Crescia

     (Previous Recipe: Fried Artichokes)

Cookbook Friday: Fried Artichokes

               

This is my grandmother, Dora Barbaresi, posing on her wedding day with her mother-in-law, Margarite Donarumo.  I like the contrast between the New World and Old World in this picture, and the way Nonni has scooped up her veil so casually. 

Dora remembers how different the Italian cooking was between her northern Italian family and that of her Neapolitan husband.  She especially remembers the fried artichokes.  Margarite used baby artichokes.  Old, dried out ones were fine because you would only keep the hearts and throw away everything else (whereas, stuffed artichokes demand very fresh, large artichokes since eating the edible parts of the leaves is half the fun).  Though the recipe for fried artichoke hearts wasn’t written down, Dora watched Margarite make them many times.  This is how she remembers it.

 

Fried Artichoke Hearts

Prepare to eat all of these right away.  Restraint is utterly foolish.

8 baby artichokes, 4 regular artichokes, or a bag of frozen (or canned) artichoke         hearts (not marinated)
1 lemon
1 egg
½ cup flour
Salt, to taste
Vegetable oil for frying

Frozen or canned artichoke hearts are ready to use as is (you know, after defrosting or de-canning/draining them), so skip to the last paragraph.

To clean and trim fresh artichokes, snap off the dark, tough outer leaves at the base and trim the stem.  Cut artichoke in half and scrape out the fuzzy choke with a spoon, leaving just the heart and the tender inner leaves.  (Sam of Becks & Posh has a lovely pictorial guide that shows how to get to the heart of an artichoke).  Cut in half again so the baby artichoke heart is now in quarters (cut larger artichoke hearts into eighths).  Place the wedges into a bowl of water with the juice of one lemon. 

In a deep pot, pour oil to a depth of 2 inches.  Heat oil to 375°F.  Beat egg in a small bowl.  Mix flour and salt in another bowl.  Drain, rinse, and pat dry artichokes.  Dredge them in beaten egg and then flour.  Fry the artichokes, several at a time, and remove when golden brown.  Let drain on paper towels and season with salt.  Serve immediately.  And, now they're gone.

Margarite [Avallone] Donarumo
Naples, Italy - New Haven, Connecticut
1877 - 1956

 

Next Recipe: Clam Sauce

     (Previous Recipe: Zeppole)

Cookbook Friday: Zeppole

Another photo from my grandmother’s wedding in 1940.  From left to right, we have Eddie Apuzzo (friend of the groom), George Barbaresi (father of the bride), Dava Barbaresi (sister of the bride), Dora Barbaresi, Freddie Donroe, Albert Donroe (brother of the groom), and Lou Donroe (brother of the groom). 

Nonni’s maid of honor was her younger sister, Dava.  Eddie Apuzzo was Freddie’s best friend.  Dava and Eddie had taken a liking to each other and got married, themselves, not too long afterwards. 

The following recipe is Dava's.  Zeppole, much like the fried dough we know, is very popular with kids, and is best eaten when just cool enough to handle.  Adults might want to test out five or six before letting the kids dig in, you know, just to be sure it's safe.

Zeppole

Dava often made these around the holidays.  It makes about 2 dozen, but you can easily halve the recipe using 1 teaspoon of yeast.

1 pkg. dry yeast
1½ cups warm water
4 cups flour
¼ tsp. cinnamon
¼ tsp. salt
2 eggs
Canola oil, for deep-frying
Honey, for drizzling

Mix dry yeast with warm water in a small bowl.  In a large bowl, add flour, cinnamon, and salt.  Make a well in the flour with a wooden spoon, and add the eggs, water, and yeast.  Mix dry ingredients into well, little by little, until it reaches bread dough consistency (if the dough still sticks to the bowl, add more flour).  Cover and let rise until double in bulk.

In a deep pot, pour oil to a depth of 2 inches and heat to 375°F.  Fry dough by the tablespoonful in hot oil (dip spoon in flour, if necessary, to keep dough from sticking).  Drain on paper towels.  Place zeppole in large bowl and pour honey over them.

Dava [Barbaresi] Catone
Hamden, Connecticut
1921-1998

Zeppole drizzled with local honey.

Next recipe: Fried Artichokes

     (Previous Recipe: Eggplant Parmesan)
 

Cookbook Friday: Eggplant Parmesan

Dora Barbaresi (my grandmother) and Freddie Donroe on their wedding day in September 1940. 

Freddie was the son of Francis Donarumo and Margherita Avallone who were both immigrants from Naples in southern Italy.  Freddie was the youngest (and, as Nonni is quick to point out, the tallest) of their nine children.  Once they were of age, Freddie and his brothers and sisters all anglicized their last name to Donroe, and that’s the name that Nonni took.  To my knowledge, this is the origin of all the Donroes in this country, for better or for worse.

 

Eggplant Parmesan

This is one of my favorites.  The eggplant is divine, but I also love finding morsels of Italian sausage, or Nonni’s meatballs, tucked within the layers.

1 large eggplant (or 2 smaller ones)
¼ cup canola oil, or more
3 eggs
2 cups flour (or bread crumbs)
1 recipe homemade tomato sauce, sausage included
½ cup Parmesan cheese, or more
Salt to taste

Cut eggplant into ¼-inch thick slices.  Heat oil in large frying pan.  Dip eggplant slices in egg and then flour.  Fry until golden brown on each side, adding more oil as necessary, and set on paper towels to drain.  Season with salt.

Preheat oven to 300°F.  In a 9x12-inch pan, put a thin layer of tomato sauce.  Add layers of fried eggplant, tomato sauce (with sausage cut into pieces), and Parmesan cheese, ending with cheese on top.  Bake for about half an hour, or until warmed through.

Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe
New Haven, Connecticut
1918 -

Stack of crispy, fried eggplant, pre-sauce.

Next Recipe: Zeppole

     (Previous Recipe: Tomato Sauce)

Cookbook Friday: Tomato Sauce

Dora Barbaresi (my grandmother) with sweetheart, Freddie Donarumo, in 1940 in front of her house in New Haven, CT.

Dora met Freddie at a party hosted by the Junior League club.  She was 18 years old and was there with her boyfriend at the time.  Freddie, 20, was there with his girlfriend.  Dora took one look at Freddie and decided right then that he was the one.  He must have noticed her, too, because the very next week, Freddie invited Dora on a hayride.  After that, they were inseparable.

No one in the family has ever heard anyone say a bad word about Freddie.  He worked as a manager at the local A&P, and was known as an all-around great guy.  After dating for five years, Freddie proposed.  “Will you marry me?" he asked Dora.  "Because if you don’t, I’m going into the seminary.”  He was only being slightly dramatic; he actually was considering the priesthood.  But, Dora accepted and, reflecting back, she says, “Of course, I was going to marry him.  I wasn’t going to waste him on the church.”

Nonni’s Tomato Sauce

But, where’s the oregano?  Where’s the basil?  She doesn’t use it, and I’ve never missed it.  This sauce is great with her eggplant parmesan, lasagna, manicotti, and tortiere.  It also freezes well.

2 Tbsp. olive oil
3 garlic cloves, chopped
1 pork chop or 2 sausage links
1 large (28 oz.) can tomato puree
½ can water
Salt and pepper

Heat olive oil in large frying pan.  Add meat and cook until nicely browned.  Remove meat and set aside.  Add garlic and cook until fragrant (about 10 seconds).  Add tomato puree, water, cooked meat, and simmer for about an hour (she says, taste and you’ll know.).  Add salt and pepper.

Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe
New Haven, Connecticut
1918 -

Next Recipe: Eggplant Parmesan

     (Previous Recipe: Passatellis)

Cookbook Friday: Passatellis

A park in New Haven circa 1941.  From left, Dora Barbaresi (my grandmother), pregnant sister Jean [Barbaresi] Borrelli, mother Lydia Barbaresi, and sister Edith [Barbaresi] Piccolo.  Lydia died when I was a baby, but I do remember my Auntie Jean and Aunt Edith (both great-aunts to me).  I thought Jean was very nice, but Edith scared the hell out of me!

What, you’ve never heard of passatellis?  Neither has anyone else.  Nonni pronounces it “passa-TAYS.”  It’s a tubular pasta made from breadcrumbs and Parmesan cheese that is served in chicken soup.  This is another old recipe from the 1800's, passed down from the Polverari/Belbusti families of Castelvecchio in the Marches region.  It evolved as an ingenious way of using up stale bread. 

Growing up in the 1980's, I got used to the inevitable blank stares I'd receive when describing the Italian food that Nonni cooked for us.  Sauceless pasta?  In soup?  It was as if I were Laotian trying to pass myself off as Italian.  But, what of lasagna, manicotti, and ziti, they would inquire at recess?  Well, Nonni made those, too, I clarified, but the pasta we hold most dear comes in soup.  Then, they would beat me up.

Only a small handful of people in our family know how to make passatellis.  Nonni freezes and bags them in big batches, but only the lucky ones get to bring them home!

Passatellis

I’m not sure how they shape them in Italy, but Nonni uses a meat grinder to extrude the noodles.  You could also use the meat grinding attachment on your stand mixer.

4 cups plain breadcrumbs
3 cups Parmesan cheese
Pinch of nutmeg
Pinch of lemon zest
8 large eggs

In a large bowl or pot, mix breadcrumbs with cheese, nutmeg, and zest.  Add eggs and mix thoroughly until cohesive dough forms.  Make into small balls (about 2 inches in diameter) and set aside in a covered bowl. 

One by one, put balls through a meat grinder to form thick strands.  Cut strings to about 4- to 6-inch lengths and lay them out on the table to dry for several hours before cooking.  To freeze, let them dry overnight before storing. 

Serve in Nonni’s chicken soup.  To cook, bring soup to a boil and add fresh or frozen strands (no need to defrost).  Cook until done, about 3 minutes.

Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe
New Haven, Connecticut
1918 -

Nonni’s homemade passatellis.  Photo by Trish Barker.

Next Recipe: Tomato Sauce

     (Previous Recipe: Chicken Soup)

Cookbook Friday: Chicken Soup

Or when your cable Internet goes down, Saturday (thanks, RCN).

Dora Barbaresi (my grandmother), on the right, around 1941, with her father, George, and older sister, Eva Blasi.

It’s hard to believe that Nonni (Dora) is younger in this picture than I am now, but I guess the camera doesn’t lie.  Is this the same woman who, in my recent memory, would feign a heart attack when the cops pulled her over for speeding?  Sure is.

She’d be in her early twenties here.  She spoke English and Italian fluently, although her parents got by speaking hardly any English.  New Haven was very Italian back then and her father was a member of the Marchigiano Club.  No ladies were allowed, and you peed into a trough right there at the bar.  Ah, the good old days.

Like the rest of her sisters, Dora couldn’t finish high school because she needed to help support the family.  All of the girls were smart, but their mother insisted that they go to work as soon as the law said they could.  Rumor has it that on more than one occasion, Dora fought to keep what she had worked so hard to earn in the dress shop. 

Several of her sisters, like Eva, were already married and starting families.  World War II was heating up, and Dora’s boyfriend, Freddie (whom she would later marry), was considering enlisting in the Army. 

Around this time, Dora’s sister, Anne, a platinum blonde, was sitting in the audience of the Miss New Haven beauty pageant when the judges pulled her onstage with the other contestants.  Their father, usually a mild-mannered man, was horrified.  “You’re beautiful,” he would say to his girls, “but you’re not supposed to brag.  You’re supposed to be quiet.  Act like a lady.”  But they made Anne go up, and she won.

 

Chicken Soup

This simple soup goes hand in hand with two of the family’s favorite pasta recipes coming up.  Nonni isn’t big on amounts, as she just uses what she has around the house, but this recipe will get you where you want to be.  She cuts her whole chicken in half because her pot isn’t big enough to accommodate a whole one.  She freezes the other for later use.

1 whole chicken (3-4 lb.), cut in half
2 cloves, pressed into chicken (not garlic cloves, actual spice cloves)
2 small onions, peeled and halved
2 ribs celery, cut into large pieces
2 carrots, cut into large pieces
Small can (14.5 oz.) of stewed tomatoes
Salt and pepper

Add all ingredients to a large pot and cover with water by two inches.  Bring to a boil, then cover, lower heat, and simmer for 1 hour.  Strain soup and set aside.  Reserve carrots and chicken (remove the cloves).  Cut carrots into chunks and pull off shreds of chicken meat with a fork to add to soup.  Season with salt and pepper.  Serve with cappellettis or passatellis, or freeze. 

Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe
New Haven, Connecticut
1918 -

Next Recipe: Passatellis

     (Previous Recipe: Friselles)

Cookbook Friday: Friselles

The Barbaresi family in 1925.  Clockwise from left: Dora, George, Jean, Eva, Anne, Lydia, Edith, Septimina, and Dava Barbaresi.  According to Dora (my grandmother), she is pouting because she didn’t get to sit in a chair like her younger sisters.  Septimina died of pneumonia within months of this photograph.  Gerry, the only surviving son, was born two years later.

In Italy, there is a saying: “Better a corpse in the house than a Marchigiano at the door.” 

They couldn’t be more right.  Marchigianos are my people.  Northern Italians who hail from the often-overlooked Marches region of Italy, just across the tracks (in this case, mountains), from Tuscany.  I say northern Italian, but really it’s about five paces north of the Italian equator, if there were such a thing, but somehow this makes a big difference to my grandmother.

Anyway, the reputation Marchigianos had, as I understand it, was due to the fact that they comprised the vast majority of tax collectors at one time in the Old Country.  If the taxes weren’t paid, then there would be hell to pay instead.  And I can believe it. 

But my relatives weren’t tax collectors; they were farmers in the little town of Castelvecchio.  And they cooked in the true peasant style.  Suffice it to say that there wouldn’t be a corpse in the house if there were a Marchigiano in the kitchen.

George Barbaresi and Lydia Belbusti, in the photo above, were both born in the Marches and immigrated to the U.S. independently of each other by way of New Haven, Connecticut.  In some pre-Internet, trans-Atlantic feat of communication that only Italians could pull off, they were set up on a blind date/arranged marriage in this country by their families back in Italy, or so it goes.  When they met for the first time, George reportedly offered Lydia the following proposal: “Will you have my babies?” 

It appears that she agreed.  They were married in 1910, and raised seven children (two others died very young).  They lived in a rented flat in New Haven during the Depression.  The daughters went to school until about age 14, when they were old enough to work in the dress factories to help support the family.  Their everyday dresses were made from flour sacks.  Only the youngest child, a son, was able to go to college.

Most of the recipes I have came from the little girl on the left, Dora (my grandmother, who I’ve always called Nonni), who learned the dishes from her mother, who learned them from her mother.  I’m not sure of the extent to which these recipes have diverged over time from the original Marches recipes, but they have not changed much over the lifetimes of my relatives who grew up on them. 

They would never let that happen!

Friselles

These peppery little biscuits are an acquired taste to many.  But once you’re bit, they’re addictive.  We keep bags in the freezer (courtesy of Nonni) and wash them down with non-Italian beer.

3½ cups flour
3 Tbsp. baking powder
½ tsp. salt
1½ Tbsp. black pepper, coarsely ground
1 cup water
¾ cup oil

Preheat oven to 300 F.  Grease a large sheet pan.

In a large bowl, mix flour, baking powder, salt, and pepper.  Make a well and add water and oil.  Mix well (the dough will be soft and oily).  Form dough into several thin logs (about the diameter of a nickel) by rolling against the countertop.  Slice into pieces about 1/4-inch thick and set on pan.  Press thumb into the center of each coin to form a large indentation.  Bake for 25-30 minutes, flipping once halfway through before bottoms start to color.  Cool. 

Dora [Barbaresi] Donroe
New Haven, Connecticut
1918 -

Next Recipe: Chicken Soup