The opening of the Cacioteca Regionale di Sicilia – the Sicilian Regional Cheese Consortium – is being celebrated during Cheese Art 2012, which includes two days of Tasting Workshops with traditional cheeses from around the world.

The Consortium works towards elevating the production of historic traditional cheeses to the status of “works of art.”  The idea is that great cheeses should be considered among Italy’s important cultural assets, holding a place beside the many works of art for which the country is famous.

During Cheese Art 2012, cheese tastings will be available with various cheese boards paired with locally sourced cured meats (priced at 14-20 euro) or you can join in the Tasting Workshops on January 28 & 29, when traditional cheeses from around the world will be paired with Sicilian wines from Cerasuolo di Vittoria and Planeta, or beers from the Baladin microbrewery of Piedmont.  Cheesemaking demonstrations will take place during the course of the event – we know this is great fun, as we include it on our Eastern Sicily walking tour.

Here are the cheese tasting menus  in Italian, or check out the listing at the end for the 2012 Cheese Art Tasting Workshops and where they are.

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Saturday January 28:

13.30 – 15.00 “Drowned in Beer”

• Robiola di Roccaverano, aged goat cheese in cherry leaves (Piedmont)
• Frumage Baladin (Piedmont)
• Piacentinu Ennese DOP, sheeps milk with saffron (Sicily)
• Perdido Cheese (Usa
• Vezzena di malga (Trentino Alto Adige)
• Castelmagno d’alpeggio (Piedmont)
• Roquefort (France)

Paired with artisanal beers from Baladin
Cost  €24,00

19.30 -21.00 “European Breeds”

• Camembert (France)
• Queso de la Tetilla (Spain
• Provola dei Nebrodi (Sicily)
• Aged Pecorino di Farindola (Abruzzo)
• Salers (France)
• Goat Cheddar Quickes (England)
• Erborinato sheep cheese, alpi cozie (Piedmont)

Paired with Planeta wines

Sunday January 29:
11.30 – 13.30 “Brunch Cheeselandia”
 Brunch prepared by Accursio Craparo (chef of 1-star Michelin restaurant La Gazza Ladra  in Modica) and Corrado Assenza, the pastry chef of Caffè Sicilia in Noto, and will end with this cheese board:
 

• Mozzarella di bufala (Sicily)
• Organic Robiola from “happy goats”(Veneto)
• Ragusano DOP, aged and semi-aged (Sicily
• Beaufort (Francia)
• Red Cheddar (England)
• Stilton (England)
  Paired with wines from Planeta, and the Consortium of  Cerasuolo di Vittoria  as well as artisan beers from microbrewery Baladin
  Cost  €35,00

19.30 – 21.00 “European Pastures”

• St. Nectaire (France)
• Manchego (Spain)
• Raschera DOP d’Alpeggio (Piedmont)
• Tuma persa (Sicily)
• Monte Veronese d’allevo DOP di malga (Veneto)
• Blue deTermignon (France)
• Blu capriziola, goat cheese (Lombardy)
  Paired with Sicilian wines from the Consortium Cerasuolo di Vittoria
  Cost €24,00

Details:
To reserve in advance, fill in the online form  or phone:
Tel. +39.0932.660.427

Located at km 5 on the SP 25, the main road from Ragusa to Marina di Ragusa.
E-mail: info@corfilac.it

The many facets of Italian regional cooking are to be celebrated January 17, during the 2012 International Day of Italian Cuisines (IDIC).  This year’s official dish is ossobuco, and cooks from all over the world are invited to make this dish and send in their photos.  You can sign-up to participate, or just make it because you feel like it.

Ossobuco, which means “hollow bone”, is a traditional dish from Milan, and is made with veal shanks that are slowly braised in a rich broth.  At the end of cooking, the traditional ossobuco recipe calls for the veal shanks to be topped with a finely minced gremolata of lemon rind, parsley and garlic. 

The marrow of the bone is considered a delicacy and is meant to be scooped out and eaten, in delicious ignorance of its cholesterol content.  The milanesi actually have a long handled spoon just for this purpose, which has the amusing name of esattore - tax collector.  

 Ossobuco is a rich dish that is often served with the equally rich risotto alla milanese, but I like it with simple polenta or mashed potatoes to soak up every bit of flavorful sauce. 

The veal shanks themselves should be tender and juicy, or as poet Billy Collins described “soft as the leg of an angel / who has lived a purely airborne existence”. 

I’m not sure what Billy was drinking when he wrote that, but you can try to reach these lofty heights with the ossobuco recipe at the end of this post.  A good bottle of Barbaresco should do the rest.

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Ossobuco Recipe

This is an adaptation of the official 2012 dish of the IDIC

Prep Time: 10 minutes

Cook Time: 2 hours, 15 minutes

Total Time: 2 hours, 25 minutes

Yield: 4-6

Ingredients

• 4-6 hind veal shanks, 2” (5 cm) thick, 5” (10 cm) wide
• 4 oz. (100 g) celery finely diced
• 4 oz. (100 g) carrot finely diced
• 4 oz. (100 g) onion finely chopped
• 4 oz. (100 g) butter
• 4 TB olive oil
• ½ lb (200 g) peeled plum tomatoes, chopped
• 1 qt (1 liter) veal broth
• 10 oz (300 ml) white wine
• For the Gremolata:
• 3 strips organic lemon rind, chopped fine
• 1 TB flat-leaf parsley, chopped fine
• 1 clove garlic, peeled and minced

Cooking Directions

1. Heat the oil and butter in an ovenproof pan that is just large enough to tightly hold the veal shanks in one layer.
2. Pat the veal shanks dry with a paper towel, and sear them in the butter and oil over medium heat, turning to brown evenly.
3. Reduce the heat on low, remove the veal shanks and set aside.
4. Over a low flame, sauté the carrots, celery and onion in the same pan, scraping the bottom with a large spoon to mix in any brown bits, being careful this "soffritto" doesn’t burn.
5. When the "soffritto" vegetables are soft, add the wine and turn up the heat.
6. Stir occasionally until wine is almost evaporated, then add the tomato and broth and stir to blend.
7. Heat to a boil.
8. Place the browned veal shanks in one layer in the pan, and spoon some of the vegetables over the top-the shanks should be covered with the broth.
9. Cover the pan and place over a very low flame for about 90 minutes (or place in preheated oven at 350° F (180° C) .
10. Remove the cover and cook for another 30 minutes.
11. Finely mince the lemon rind, parsley and garlic together – this is the "gremolata" which will used just before serving.
12. When the veal is done, place the shanks on a warm platter and skim excess fat from pan, and bring to a simmer, adding a bit more broth if it is too dry.
13. Add salt and pepper to taste.
14. Spoon the sauce over the veal, sprinkle with the gremolata mixture and serve with polenta or mashed potatoes.
15. Drink a good bottle of Barbaresco and float away-

If you hear food vendors at a Sicilian market shouting bastardoni - big bastards – don’t be offended.  They’re just hawking their wares, which are autumn prickly pears from cactus plants. 

The wild and wonderful food markets in Sicily are a blast to shop in and we always look forward to buying a case of bastardoni.  These are the fattest, most succulent fruit of the cactus plant, harvested in the fall in eastern Sicily.

The smaller variety of prickly pears, sometimes known as agostani for the fact that they ripen in August, are generically known as fichi d’India - Indian figs. They do not come from India nor have any relation to figs, which goes to show you that you can name things any way you want, but what’s important is eating them. 

The bastardoni are the most highly prized prickly pears because they are bigger and juicier, and are a result of cutting off the first cactus flowers in late spring, a procedure known as the scozzolatura.  This results in a second flowering of the cactus plant.  The fruits then ripen in the fall during the rainier season, which produces juicy plump fruits.  

Cactus plants were often grown as a sort of fence between neighbors in Sicily, and the prickly pear fruits were a handy thirst-quenching  treat when working in the fields.

According to a Sicilian legend, the practice of the scozzolatura began because of a feud over property lines between neighboring farmers.  In a fit of anger, one farmer cut off the flowers of his neighbor’s cactus, in an attempt to destroy his neighbor’s prickly pear crop. Instead, the cactus bore fruit later in the season, and the prickly pears were much larger and juicier than normal.  Soon the practice of the scozzolatura became widespread, and this “bastardized” version of prickly pears was born.   In some areas of eastern Sicily, there are now cactus plantations that are irrigated, which produce the beautiful bastardoni found in Sicilian markets through December.  

If you want to try eating bastardoni, the first step is to peel it, or better yet, get someone to do the peeling for you.  The peel is studded with fine prickly spines that like to imbed themselves in delicate flesh, and can be an uncomfortable nuisance for days.  Many Sicilian restaurants serve seasonal fruit including prickly pears, so you can let the waiter peel and you just taste.   

Cutting back the peel, you’ll be surprised by the color of the prickly pear fruit, which can be deep yellow, pure white, or a stunning crimson.  The fruit has a slight floral  fragrance reminiscent of citrus, and a very mild flavor, like a pear with an identity crisis.  The juicy pulp is punctuated by an enormous number of seeds that Sicilians simply swallow. It is not a fruit to everyone’s taste, but big bastards seldom are.

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I like a man who is serious about sweets.  Giuseppe Trapani, a 4th generation torrone maker in Sicily, fits the bill.

When he welcomed me into the Torronificio Trapani, he’d already been at work since 4.00 am preparing the first batch of his secret family recipe for torrone.  Since torrone is a traditional sweet in Italy at Christmas time, Giuseppe’s Christmas season begins the first of October, when his torronificio goes into high gear, making 2 batches of torrone a day.  That’s about 70 kilos (155 lbs) of torrone, which seemed like an enormous amount to me, but Giuseppe told me that it had already been reserved for customers.

In the spotless kitchen of the Torronificio Trapani, the air is suffused with the fragrance of honey.   Several people sat at a marble table busily wrapping tiny chocolate-covered torroncini, big pans of toasted almonds were being pulled out of the oven, and a machine held a huge mixing bowl where a combination of honey and egg whites was being heated and stirred, becoming a thick white cream.  I’d stepped into torrone heaven.

I’d already done extensive tasting of almond nougat from some very good artisan torrone makers (forget the commercial ones, which are like eating a sickeningly sweet sponge mixed with sawdust and ersatz flavorings) but when I first tasted Torrone Trapani, it was clearly the best, and I was here to get to the sweet heart of the matter.

Giuseppe explains what makes his torrone so good: high quality ingredients and no skimping on the almonds.  (Of course, there is also the secret to his recipe, which he isn’t revealing.) While some large-scale commercial producers of torrone use as little as 10% of almonds in their product,  Torronificio Trapani uses close to 70%.  The almonds are locally grown, not the cheap imported ones, or the California almonds that Giuseppe pronounced to be “woody and tasteless”.  His  almonds come from the highly prized almond varieties grown near Noto, and they are slowly toasted to a rich golden brown. The honey he uses is also local, and is fragrant of orange blossoms, which contributes to the torrone’s unique taste.

Giuseppe was constantly on the move – in fact he never stood still long enough for me to snap his picture – checking the consistency of the batch in the mixer, making sure the almonds are toasted to perfection then added at just the right temperature, and that each chocolate-covered torroncino is cooled properly before wrapping.  I am beginning to see that the real “secret” in the recipe is Giuseppe’s know-how and constant vigilance, as he strives to make every batch of torrone consistently perfect.

Giuseppe’s Aunt Maria is helping out. She has been making torrone for 30 years, though she admits that she no longer likes to eat it.  Don’t worry, I think, I’ll eat your share.  She remembers when all this work was done by hand – heating the honey and egg white mixture over a coal fire in a big copper pot, and stirring the mixture for several hours.  “Difficilissimo,” she says, sounding tired at the mere thought. Then the pots were scrubbed with ashes and lemon juice, and polished until gleaming with a white cotton cloth.  She shakes her head in wonderment. 

In 1986, Giuseppe asked an engineer to design a machine that would mimic his hand movements as he mixed the honey and egg white mixture, and this helped him increase his production with a larger batch that couldn’t be mixed by hand. Then in 1996, he decided to investigate the use of the machine that he now has on the premises, to see if he could replicate his torrone with a device that both mixed and heated. He traveled to Milan to try out the machine, mixing his batches of torrone and adjusting the temperature and paddle of the machine until he was satisfied that he could make the same excellent caliber of torrone. Only then did he buy the machine, which allowed him to double his production.

There is still a lot of hand work involved in Giuseppe’s torrone business.  When Giuseppe pronounces the torrone in the mixer ready, the staff snaps to attention and works like a well-trained relay team.  One fellow piles the warm nougat mixture on a wooden board on a scale. When the needle hits exactly 7 kilos, he passes the board to a table, where 2 people pat the nougat down into an even layer, then pass it to Giuseppe. He inverts the mixture into a shallow rectangular mold that was previously lined with edible wafer paper, then vigorously works a rolling pin over the torrone mixture until it uniformly fills the mold.  He places the mold on a rack and another person covers it with wafer paper, and lets it rest.  This procedure is repeated nine times.

The cooled nougat is then cut – first with a machine that scores the torrone, then finished by hand with a pizza cutter – which releases an intense aroma of toasted almonds.  Mixed with the sweet fragrance of honey, the air becomes almost edible.

Torronificio Trapani’s classic torrone bianco is available with almonds, a combination of almonds and pistachios, with hazelnuts, or as individual almond torroncini, covered in dark or white chocolate.  I stocked up on a variety before stepping out into the disappointingly sugar-free air. 

Before I got to my car, I’d already unwrapped a torroncino.  The dark chocolate coating was paper thin, just barely beginning to melt against my anxious fingers. And inside, oh my.  It was packed with crunchy almonds, toasted to perfection, with just the right amount of creamy filling holding it all together in a sweet embrace.  Torrone heaven.

Torrone Trapani can be found in several pastry shops in the area – Pasticceria Di Pasquale in Ragusa and the wonderful Rosy Bar in the Sacro Cuore district of Modica – as well as the larger DiMeglio supermarkets. 

Or go straight to the source:
Torronificio Trapani -Via del Mercato 66

Giarratana (RG) 

Tel 0932 975014

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Two new fixed price lunch menus are now available at Ragusa’s Il Duomo, the first restaurant in Sicily to be awarded two Michelin stars.  Discerning diners can taste the creations of chef Ciccio Sultano by choosing from a 45 euro menu and a 59 euro menu, both of which offer 3-courses featuring an antipasto, main course and dessert, along with several “mini-courses” that allow the diner to get an excellent sampling of  the restaurant’s cuisine. 

The 59-euro menu is truly all-inclusive, as wines are paired with the meal – all you have to do is sit down and eat…and drink.  There are no other charges, a welcome treat in these economic times.

As with all of Sultano’s cooking, the fixed-price menus adhere to using locally-sourced ingredients, a trait I have always liked about Il Duomo.  Certainly there are advantages to being located in Sicily, where there is an enormous variety of fruits and vegetables, artisan cheeses and superb olive oil, as well as exquisitely fresh fish and traditionally farmed meats, whereas a Michelin restaurant in the Dolomites does not have such a food bounty close at hand. 

Once you’ve gotten hooked on Il Duomo’s fixed price lunches, you might take the plunge and splurge at dinner, with the 150 euro fixed price “Sequilla” menu with wine (that I thoroughly  enjoyed with a group of travelers last spring) or celebrate the holidays with a new 12-course festa menu at 170 euro with wines included.   Once again, there are no other charges.   Except for the taxi, when you can’t manage to stagger back to your hotel on foot.

Il Duomo is located in the center of Ragusa Ibla, right near – you guessed it – the Duomo!  It is closed at lunch on Monday, and all day Sunday. You can make reservations through their website.

View our Trip that Dines at Il Duomo

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In Cucina Povera, Pamela Sheldon Johns has written a cookbook with authentic recipes based on Tuscan peasant cooking, but more than that she invites the reader to reflect upon the hard times of Tuscan peasants, and the meaning of making do with very little.  She tells the stories of people she has met over the ten years that she has lived in Tuscany, particularly those who grew up in the aftermath of World War II.  Don’t expect glitz here, just down-to earth stories laced with food memories that are heartbreakingly simple.  A fig stuffed with a walnut and heated in a wood-fired oven still evokes fond memories of a nurturing mother from a man who is now a grandfather, while the photographs of elderly women cooking with gnarled hands give the reader a true sense of Tuscany’s past, long before it became a tourist hotspot. 

The recipes and stories connected with them change from the high, cold mountains of the Apuane where chestnuts were a mainstay, to the coastal plain of la Maremma and focus on the seasonal and wild foods available to poor Tuscans during extremely difficult times. From this poverty comes not only the ingenious use of a few basic ingredients to make a meal, but also making it flavorful enough to warrant a cookbook, which attests to the culinary skills of these home cooks.  

There is a small map on page 39 highlighting the places that Pamela Sheldon Johns writes about, which helps the reader understand the stories in the context of place and type of terrain.  It made me think back to my own 17 years in Tuscany, and how so many of the dishes that John’s has collected had nourished my soul. 

The classic recipe for ribollita is shown first as a vegetable soup, the leftovers then reheated (“ribollita” literally means re-boiled) with bread, illustrating how nothing was wasted.  Other classic recipes includes panzanella, a bread salad that is dressed with a few tomatoes and onions, to making crusty Tuscan bread the slow way, with a starter and long fermentation, to a simple springtime dish of eggs and peas. 

I tried my hand at making Cucina Povera’s version of ricotta cake.  In following the recipe, I used the zest of just one lemon instead of two, which was the only thing I changed besides my black sweater, which I covered in powdered sugar while taking my first enthusiastic bite.  The cake was as good and genuine as Pamela Sheldon Johns’ book.  See the recipe below.

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During summer in Sicily a traditional beverage is latte di mandorla – almond milk – and visitors wilting in the heat will often be offered a chilled glass of this refreshing drink. Once upon a time, almond milk was commonly made at home in Sicily, but nowadays, most people drink the commercially available stuff bought in the supermarket. Instead of being refreshing, I find it to be cloying sweet. So, I set out to make my own.

I had scored a kilo of beautiful pizzuta almonds from the San Basilio farm during the almond harvest, and so I began quizzing the natives about the best way to make almond milk. Asking for culinary advice is always a dangerous proposition in Sicily, as it inevitably leads to an overload of information, often conflicting. Just when I may have settled on a method, another person will look at me in surprise and explain an incredibly simple way of doing the same thing, that they claim is buonissimo. So, first I needed to sift through all the almond milk info.

Everyone did agree that the almonds had to be shelled, which I had taken for granted. Next, should they be blanched in order to remove the brown skins? The “yes” crowd said the skins would make the almond milk bitter, the “no” crowd claimed the skins added flavor and color. I wondered if the no crowd could simply be lazy? Everyone also agreed that the almonds needed to be finely chopped, though methods differed. A food processor was okay with some (see lazy crowd above), others said the heat generated by the blades would affect the taste, and that the almonds must be finely chopped with a mezzaluna. My friend Giovanni said they should be slowly pounded to a paste with a mortar and pestle, gradually adding water. He claims he learned this when he had to make emulsions while studying to be a pharmacist at the University of Catania. Meanwhile, my trusty neighbor Beatrice said she just tied the unpeeled almonds in a cloth sack and beat the whole thing with a wooden mallet. As the path to almond milk became ever baffling, this at least seemed like a great way to release my frustration.

Everyone soaked the ground almonds in water, except for Beatrice-of–the-Mallet, who just dipped the sack in water periodically, until the water became “milky.” The soakers put the almond mass into a fine cloth and squeezed out the almond milk. Some added sugar, others honey. One left it plain, but admitted to being on a diet. Time to move on I told myself, before I just decide to make almond biscotti.

First, I had to shell the almonds, and these being pizzuta almonds with amazingly thick hard shells, a regular nutcracker was useless. It was time to use ‘The Rock’, a 5 lb. stone that I use for crushing olives, and occasionally, my fingers. At first, I had a tendency to hit too hard and crush the almond to smithereens along with the shell, but soon I got skilled at giving one sharp whack that splits the shell, yet leaves the almond intact. By the time I’m done, I’ve got a sore arm and one bulging bicep.

Next, because I don’t fancy the idea of brown bitter milk, I decided to remove the skins. I poured boiling water over the almonds, and let them sit for 30 minutes, while I rested my arm. Then by squeezing each almond between thumb and index finger, the skins slipped off quite easily. There are always a few recalcitrant ones that hold tight to their skins – I used the zero tolerance approach to these and just ate them.

By the time I am done with this, I am intimately familiar with each and every almond and am beginning to understand why everyone buys almond milk at the supermarket. (You could skip this whole process if you simply buy blanched almonds, but depending upon their age, they may be fairly tasteless, and you won’t become close personal friends with your almonds.)

Now, it was finally time to chop or grind the almonds. I tried the mortar and pestle method, and it took just 30 seconds to flunk out of pharmacy school, as with each move of the pestle, the slippery almonds flew out of the mortar and went skidding across the kitchen floor. By now I was hot and tired, and longed for a glass of cold almond milk to perk me up. Time to skip tradition and revert to modern times with a food processor (you could probably use a blender, but I don’t own one.) I ground the almonds in batches, pulsing and adding a bit of water until the mixture was fairly fine, then dumped the mixture into a bowl. I added some mineral water, and let it soak while I rested in front of the fan.

Finally, I poured the contents of the bowl into a cloth-lined strainer, over another clean bowl. Then with my last bit of strength, I squeezed the cloth of ground almond paste to extract all the liquids. Wow! Out poured almond milk! I refrigerated the almond milk and had a nap. Once it was cold, I slightly sweetened it with sugar – this seemed to enhance the almond flavor – and added a little more mineral water. Sitting in the shade, it made a refreshing silky drink with a surprisingly tangy almond finish. In the end, worth all the effort.  

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Recipe type: Beverage
Author: Anita Iaconangelo
Prep time: 1 Hour
Cook time: No cooking
Total time: 2 hours, including chilling
Serves: 8 three-ounce servings

Nutrition:
Serving size: 3 oz

Ingredients:
4 oz almonds

Cooking Directions:

1. Pour boiling water over the almonds to cover, let sit for 15-30 minutes, then squeeze each almond individually so that it slips out of its brown skin. (You can also just buy blanched almonds and skip the shelling and skinning.)
2. Place almonds in food processor and pulse in order to finely grind, adding a bit of water to make a thick chunky paste.
3. Transfer the almond paste to a bowl, add about 2 cups (16 oz.) of mineral water, and let soak for 30 minutes.
4. Dampen a square piece of fine linen or cotton cloth and place it in a sieve over another clean bowl.
5. Pour the contents of the almond paste bowl into the cloth lined sieve.
6. Let the liquid (which should be milky looking) drain into the clean bowl.
7. Gather the corners of the cloth together, twist them tightly and squeeze the almond paste so that the liquid also goes into the clean bowl – do this until you have squeezed out all liquid humanly possible from the almond paste, and are perspiring heavily.
8. Next, fill a measuring cup with about ½ cup of water, and place the bag of almond paste in it, dip it and up and down, then push it down into the water several times to extract more milky liquid, then add the liquid to the bowl of almond milk and squeeze the bag again – do this 3 times or until the water is no longer very milky, and you are feeling weak.
9. Assuming you have enough strength left, place a funnel in a bottle or pitcher and pour the contents of the almond milk into the funnel.
10. Taste the almond milk!
11. It will be quite bland without any sugar, but should have a nice almondy finish.
12. Sweeten to taste if you like, with either honey or sugar.
13. If it seems okay as is, refrigerate; if too strong, add a bit more water.
14. Shake or stir before pouring into glass, and serve well chilled.
15. Makes about 8 servings of 3 oz each.

When the almond trees are in blossom in Sicily, it is a glorious sight.  Beginning in late January and through the early days of March, the cool green hills are bedecked in lacey blossoms in shades of pure white to delicate pink.  The air is sweetly perfumed and bees are buzzing.  It’s already spring.

On the other hand, the almond harvest takes place in the heat of summer, so forget cool and green, and think Dante’s Inferno. The August sun is fierce, the earth baked dry.  Still, I wanted to experience the almond harvest, and Francesco Padova of the Mastri San Basilio farm, willingly obliged. 

I am not sure why people who are not farmers often have a romantic idea of agriculture, and are prone to exclaiming “Oh, wouldn’t it be fun to take part in the grape harvest!  Or “ How wonderful to go olive picking!”  Their enthusiasm quickly wanes once they are covered with mud, miserably damp, and have stiff fingers aching from the cold.  Not once have I heard anyone thrill to the idea of almond picking, and now I know why.

I follow Francesco’s car to where his great-grandfather first farmed in the late 1800’s, near Ispica in southeastern Sicily.  The hills are chalky and grey, looking nearly white in the harsh sunshine.  Once we’ve parked along a quiet road, I open the door of my air-conditioned car to a blast of oven-hot air, and wonder what I’ve gotten myself into. 

Francesco leads the way on foot up a steep rough track, through groves of almond trees that have already lost many of their leaves.  Underfoot the finely tilled earth is soft but dry as a bone, and my shoes are soon covered in grey dust.  Above my head, the  outer husks of the almonds – which were once as plump as little peaches – have shriveled and split, and the precious almonds are protruding.  It feels strangely sad and forlorn yet bountiful at the same time. 

At the top of the hill, I am drenched in sweat, and glad to find a carob tree that provides some shade.  Francesco leads me to an overlook that looks out onto an intensely cultivated landscape, where the bare fields are resting in the August heat. 

I’d normally be thankful for a breeze but here on the hilltop a hot wind is blowing – the scirocco from Africa – and it feels as though I’m standing in front of a full-length  hairdryer.  We retreat to the shade.

Francesco speaks in measured tones, calmly explaining the ins and outs of almonds as beads of sweat trickle down my back.  We are in a grove of fascionello almond trees, which along with the prized pizzuta cultivar, are able to thrive in this arid climate.  The fruits survive the intense Sicilian heat by growing an extremely thick, hard shell that protects the intensely flavored almond seed inside.  In fact, the shell amounts to 80% of the whole almond’s weight. 

Francesco warns that it is impossible to open these almonds with a nutcracker – the farm has a special machine for this, and sells most of its almonds already shelled.

By comparison, California grown almonds have only a 40% shell weight, but their almonds contain less oil and as a result, less flavor.  It’s a trade-off that Francesco seems happy to make.  

At last we hear a motor and the almond harvester arrives.  It has a tractor-like section in the rear with a yellow contraption up front that resembles a huge upside-down umbrella.   

Within the folds of the umbrella, are two thick metal arms covered with rubber, which reach out and grasp the trunk of a tree.  The umbrella unfolds to form a big cup-like sack, and suddenly a loud motor kicks on.  The ground beneath my feet trembles, the tree shakes furiously, leaves fly up in the air, and almonds land neatly in the sack.   It only lasts a few seconds, like a mini-earthquake. 

Francesco explains that with this method – manned by 2 or 3 people – they can harvest as much as what 40 men could do by hand, or about 600 trees in a day.  When there are 15,000 trees to harvest, it makes sense. 

A few of the smaller trees with slender trunks still get the hand-picked treatment, which consists of whacking the branches with a wooden pole, then collecting the almonds that fall to the ground. The fellow that does this has skin darkened from the sun, and is amazingly energetic, filling a bucket in a short time, then jogging off to dump them in the machine’s sack.  Finding 40 men like this would be no easy task.

Later the harvested almonds are separated from the leaves and left to dry in the sun for a few days, until they “sound right.” When ready to be harvested, the almond will rattle in the shell.  If you listen to it carefully, the rattle will be soft, like a tiny thud.  Once it has dried in the sun, the rattle will become like a sharp tapping noise.  This is a signal that the almond is truly ready.  It can be stored without fear of getting moldy. 

Since I’m obviously a glutton for punishment, Francesco gives me a kilo of whole almonds so that I can attempt to open them.  Being around all these almonds has given me a hankering to make traditional Sicilian almond milk.   

 “Let me know how it goes”  he says.  Later, when I am struggling to open the the almonds by bashing them with a rock, I wonder how he managed to say that with a straight face.

It’s now close to noon, and is getting hotter by the second.  As the top of my head feels like it’s about to burst into flames, I say goodbye to Francesco. 

My car is parked in the sun, and is like a blast furnace inside.  I’ve learned a lot about the almond harvest, but also that being hot in Sicily is a relative thing.  I drive home with the windows down, enjoying the African wind.

Details:  Mastri San Basilio pizzuta almonds can be purchased in Ragusa Ibla at Gelati Divini or by mail order in the USA at Zingerman’s.

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In a previous post, I wrote about how to preserve capers in salt. Now here is a recipe for pasta with capers and olives, and other nice things.

This is a quick and easy pasta recipe that uses items commonly found in an Italian pantry. You can vary it by adding tuna, which makes it a meal in itself.

This is an example of a dish you can put together at the last minute, in the fine Italian tradition of making something delicious with just a few ingredients. The key is to use quality ingredients, and don’t skimp on the olive oil.

Just to prove our point, we dropped in on Lidia near lunchtime, and she rustled up this dish of pasta that sent us off on an afternoon nap.

Recipe type: Entree
Author: Anita Iaconangelo
Prep time: 5 mins
Cook time: 10 mins
Total time: 15 mins
Serves: 4-6 People

Ingredients:
1 clove of garlic cut into thin slivers
A small peroncino
4TB extra virgin olive oil
6-8 green olives pitted and sliced
1 heaping tsp of capers, packed in salt & rinsed
1 8oz. can Italian peeled plum tomatoes, crushed (or use fresh tomatoes)
1 TB flat-leaf parsley, roughly chopped
1 lb spaghettini or spaghetti (I use DeCecco)
Fresh basil leaves
Canned tuna (packed in oil)

Cooking Directions:

1. Lightly sauté the garlic in the oil, and, for a piccante kick, add the peperoncino.
2. Add the olives and rinsed capers and cook over medium heat for 2 minutes.
3. (Optional variation: Add the well-drained tuna, breaking it into pieces with a fork.)
4. Add the peeled tomatoes and mash with a fork.
5. Cook the sauce for 10 minutes over medium heat.
6. Sprinkle in the parsley.
7. Cook the spaghetti until it is al dente, then toss with the sauce until it is thoroughly coated. Add a few torn basil leaves to each serving.

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It’s hot. Not just any hot, but Sicilian hot. Which is why we are out at 8.00 am, before the heat forces us to stay locked indoors until sunset. It’s time to pick capers.

Caper plants thrive in stone walls and rocky crevices, and disdain rich earth – in fact the few that I have managed to grow in a pot are decidely puny, while a cliff of limestone sends the capers into a fit of ecstatic growth.

And then there are the flowers. Exquisitely delicate, they last no more than 24 hours, leaving behind a stem with a tiny seed pod that will grow into a caper fruit, called cucunci in Sicily.

But I’ve gotten ahead of myself. The capers are the buds of the flowers before they open. In Sicily, they are traditionally preserved in salt, which is easy to do at home.

Start by picking as many as you want, choosing the tight healthy buds – leave the large ones that are ready to open into flower so at least someone else may admire it in the next 24 hours.

We like to combine a lovely walk with caper picking in the canyon of Misericordia near Ragusa, where sprawling caper plants drape the limestone cliffs, and we are far from any kind of pollution. A 15-minute downhill walk brings us to a narrow trail that hugs the cliffside, and capers grow in profusion As birds sing we rustle through the caper leaves, the scent of wild mint in the air. The tiny buds break off easily in our hands, and we quickly filling a small bag.

Before trekking back to the car, we stop to cool our feet in a clear stream, and Emanuele flicks tadpoles with his toes. The sun is hot on our backs as we continue our walk which has clearly become a trudge, and we realize that we should have started at dawn. At least we had the good sense to park in the shade. A short drive with the A/C blasting and we are back in the kitchen with our caper stash.

Once they have been cured in salt, capers can be used in many recipes, such as this pasta dish. Here is how to preserve capers in salt so they end up looking like this:

Recipe type: Breakfast
Author: Anita Iaconangelo
Prep time: 5 mins 
Cook time: 1 week
Total time: 1 week
Serves: As desired

Ingredients:
Capers
Sea salt

Instructions:

1. Go through the capers carefully, picking off any extra-long stems and stray ants (particularly important if you are vegetarian).
2. Rinse them in a colander, and pat dry on a dish towel.
3. Place the capers in a jar, layering them with fine sea salt.
4. (If you have a lot of capers, it’s better to use 2 small jars than one large one.)
5. Cover the jar with its lid and shake it to make sure the salt is well distributed.
6. Remove the lid and cover the jar with a single layer of a paper napkin or tight netting, and close with an elastic band.
7. Leave it in a place where it will get some airflow, but not in direct sunlight – a breezy countertop is good.
8. Every day, drain off any liquid that forms, and add another spoonful of salt.
9. After about a week, or when the capers stop giving off liquid, transfer to a clean jar/storage container and cover with a lid.
10. The capers can be kept on a shelf for up to one year.

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