About Silvia Expertise I am a native of Italy. I was born and raised in northern Italy. I love cooking. People say I am very good at it. My English might be not perfect but I would like to try and help you if you are interested in true "authentic" Italian cooking..
Experience I few details when I mean "authentic" Italian cooking: Alfredo sauce, Chicken Primavera, Scapariello? I don't exactly know these...who is this Alfredo guy? Italian cuisine from Italy is quite different than that of Italian/American.
Cappucino's are for breakfast with a croissant. Not for dessert.
I don't know how to build brick ovens to cook my pizza.
I don't know how to grow capers in my backyard.
And, I don't have buffalo's to make homemade mozzarella!
I surely don't know how to press olives to get homemade olive oil!
Italians are not all farmers and peasants! I don't have time to milk the cows after working 8 hours in the office!
I'm not a chef in a fancy restaurant. Please ask me about my homestyle recipes such as that for lasagne, tiramisu, and other things that a real Italian would eat. I'll try to answer as best as I can. Thanks! Buon appetito :-)
Italian Cuisine - Husband is an Italian Chef, I want to cook for him.
Expert: Silvia - 11/19/2005
Question Help! My husband is a first generation Italian. His parents came here from Italy right before he was born. He is now a chef, and makes the best Italian dishes. I want to surprise him and make an authentic Italian meal all by myself. Can you please help me make a menu and then give me step by step instructions on how to prepare them all? I really need your help.
Answer Hello Kimberley,
I am very sorry to answer you so late... I received an email from All Experts saying they needed my help because I had a couple of pending questions BUT... I never received the original e-mail asking me the questions.
This has already happened to me 3/4 times lately... (?)
However, to your question...
I will give you a hint of a typical complete Italian meal and I do hope that your husband will enjoy it.
You usually start with an APERITIVO (cocktail).
Aperitivo is served about 1 hour before the dinner and it is supposed to
wet you.
Usually you serve parmesan cheese cubes and olives with light drinks as
Martini or Campari, or also analcoholic fruit drinks.
The dinner starts with an ANTIPASTO (appetizer).
The typical Italian antipasto consists of bread-sticks, sliced cold meats
(all fresh stuff) like: boiled ham, San Daniele (raw ham), bacon (fresh,
not fried), salami, mortadella and so on... and preserves of chopped
veggies under oil or winegar.
Then it comes the main dish: PASTA
Here's a recipe for a tasty and authentic PASTA AL RAGU' (ragų is a
meat-tomato-sauce)
An important thing, first of all, is finding a good Italian brand of a
thick tomato sauce... like Pomė, Barilla or Cirio. The first thing is
always buying good ingredients. You can also use fresh tomatoes. In this case the procedure is the same, you just need to cook the sauce longer.
Put some pork ground meat together with some ground bacon in a pot
with some olive oil and butter and let the meat become lightly brown.
Then add to it some chopped onion, celery and carrot (the quantity depends
on how much sauce you are making). Let them fry and when they are browned
a bit add half a glass of red italian wine as Barolo or also white wine as
Soave (I don't know the wines you have there, here I could use some
cheaper wines than Barolo or Soave to cook because almost all wine is good
but once I was in CA and I bought a bottle of "Cooking Wine" and I had to
throw it away because it was salted water!). When the wine evaporated
(the fire must be low) add the sauce, 2 or 3 cloves, 1 laurel leaf and a
bit of grated nutmeg. Let it cook for half an hour (more or less) mixing
and adding bouillion cube instead of salt to make the sauce tastier. Add
the cube a little at a time and keep on taste the sauce after it melt
completely so that you know when you can stop adding it. When ready serve
the sauce on some penne or maccheroni (Barilla is the best italian brand
for pasta) with also some fresh grated parmesan cheese on top
(buy some good stuff).
Cook pasta in boiling salted water and be careful not to overcook it!
Taste everything often so that you can't make mistakes.
After pasta there's the second dish: MEAT and/or FISH
I will give you a recipe for meat here.
FILETTO DI MANZO AL MARSALA (Beef Filet with Marsala).
Take 2 1/4 pounds filet, tie it, and set it to brown in butter, with a
finely-sliced small onion, a couple of fine slices of prosciutto, salt,
and pepper. Once the meat has browned and the onion slices begin to
separate into rings, dust the pot with a little flour, let the color
darken, and then sprinkle it with broth or water (about a half cup to
begin with). Simmer the meat until almost done, then strain and degrease
the sauce if necessary. Return the meat and the sauce to the fire with
three fingers of a glass of Marsala, and gently simmer for a little
longer; serve the meat with its sauce, which should be quite reduced.
This will serve 7 or 8.
You can serve a salad as a side to meat or roast potatoes.
Italian salads are plain. There are no sauces in them. It's just a mix of
veggies dressed with olive oil, salt and, if you like, also some winegar.
After the meat you usually take a break and serve some fresh Italian
cheeses as gorgonzola, fontina, caciotta, crescenza, taleggio...
Then you have fresh fruit or fruit salads dressed with lemon juice and
sugar or white wine if you like.
After fruit you have a dessert.
One of the most typical one is TIRAMISU'.
Here's the recipe:
3 eggs (separate whites from yolks)
300 gr of powdered sugar
500 gr of mascarpone cheese
pinch of salt
40 imported Savoiardi cookies
some warm and sugared coffee
powdered chocolate, for sprinkling
In a bowl, whip the 3 egg whites with a pinch of salt.
In another bowl beat the mascarpone with the sugar and the yolks. When
this mix is smooth, add the 3 egg whites and mix gently. Quickly drop the
cookies in the coffee (one by one). Then make a layer of cookies and a
layer of cream. You should make at least two layers of cookis ending with
the cream on top and sprinkle liberally with powdered chocolate. Cover
tightly with foil and refrigerate at least 6 hours. This is important, as
it blends the flavors and make the dessert firm. A perfect tiramisu should
slice easily, but be a little soft.
After dessert we have Expresso coffee. Italian coffee is strong and served
in small cups. You need a bar-machine to make Expresso or, for plain but
always strong Italian coffee, you can use a moka.
Lavazza is one of the best Italian brands for coffee.
The very last thing we have is a liquor to digest all the food we ate. The
most common ones are "Montenegro" "Limoncello" "Cynar" "Grappa" but
any Italian liquor you will find that can help digestion is fine.
With meals we usually drink sparkling water (as San Pellegrino for
example) and wines as Barbera, Barolo, Chianti... too many names...
