"Quanti per cena?" Loridonna asked me every evening upon entering the kitchen. Because I knew very little Italian I would smile my understanding and then dutifully walk around to figure out how many people were going to be at dinner that night.
It was the summer of 1993 and I was working at Spannocchia, a medieval castle outside the small town of Rosia, which is about a half-hour south of Sienna, Italy. I was there as a "gift" from a grandmother to mother, an extra set of hands ( a kind of a nanny/babysitter ) to help take care of her two older children. When the kids were in school, I cut lawn, painted, harvested spinach and cherries. Here, I learned a thing or two about Italian cooking, and perhaps one of the most important things there is to know about cooking anything at all.
Loridonna, and her co-cook Carme, appeared to me then to be in their late forties. They were shorter than I, by a few inches, stout; not fat. Their features were rounded and their muscles firm; they both had incredibly strong forearms. Twice I watched in awe as Carme would hacked up an entire lamb—bone and all—into 2x3 inch cubes of meat, little blocks that would all be roasted in garlic, olive oil and fresh rosemary. Swift and able and strong, I marveled at their culinary prowess. This, I remember thinking, is how I could be in a kitchen.
There wasn't a ton of variety in the foods we had: pasta, roasted meat ( chicken or lamb ) , spinach ( every day for nearly six weeks ) that was in the form of a salad or frittata, crostini ( a dry-ish shortbread with jam on top ) . As is the tradition, the pasta preceded the meat and vegetable and the portions were much smaller than the Olive Garden-sized piles of noodles we see here in the states. But the taste—it was unbelievable. The ingredients, of course, were almost always fresh, and the preparation flawless. But wasn't just muscle that enabled Loridonna and Carme to create such culinary delights.
Every night, after dinner, the twentysomethings would sit around on verandas, drink wine, shoot the breeze. Often, we'd talk about the meal we'd just eaten, how it didn't matter that we ate nearly the same things daily ( though we did appreciate that there was variety in the pasta course ) because it all tasted so good. Why, we all wondered together, was it all so marvelous? One night, we got an answer, an answer that I have taken to heart. A young architecture student, leaning back against the railing, wine glass in hand, declared: "Their food is so good because they cook with love."
I had never heard this expression before. But, yes. He was right. That was it. They were cooking with love. And, not because they specifically loved everyone they were feeding. They had their own families and were really just employees at the castle. They weren't specifically loving those who ate the food. What they were doing was loving through their cooking, loving the food itself, the preparation.
It isn't always possible to invoke this level of intention. Sometimes you just have to get food on the table, get people fed. But, I do whatever I can to carve out the space in a week, to make sure I can give the food and the recipes and the cooking time and attention. Honor it and revere it. Love the process of the preparing as much as the people for whom I am cooking. The food always tastes better this way. And, no matter who eats it, they can tell. They can taste the fact that I have loved with the food and through the food and by the food.
The recipes from Spannoccia are the first in my collection. Here, I provide you with a very easy to prepare bean and pasta soup—what American's call "Pasta Fazool." You'll see below the "recipe" that is taken from my journal. There are no measurements and amounts. I have had to translate this for you the best I can figure; I learned with Loridonna and Carme how to make these foods my feel, but texture. As fall approaches, I suggest you give this a whirl. And, as you make it, think about the simplicity of the ingredients, the magical way they transform into the soup, the people for whom you're making the dish. Love through it and serve it. I promise the guests will enjoy it for sure.
Pasta Fazool
1 ½ cups dried Northern White beans
1 large or 2 small onions diced
½ bulb of garlic cloves minced
1 cup loosely packed flat leaf parsley
2-3 tbs of olive oil
½ tsp of fresh ground black pepper
½ tsp sea salt
2 14 ½ oz cans of diced tomatoes
2 48 oz boxes of vegetable stock ( Trader Joe's is a great place for this )
½ cup-1 cup water
½ to ¾ cup of tiny pasta shapes
Fresh grated Parmesan
1. Soften the white beans by placing them into a larger pot and cover with water. Bring to a boil without a lid and watch regularly. As water evaporates and gets absorbed, add more and return to a boil. This takes about an hour. You can turn the beans off once they are able to be eaten, but they do not need to be completely soft.
2. In a soup pot ( six to eight quarts ) , place the onion, garlic and oil. Cook for four to five minutes, constantly stirring, until the onion is somewhat translucent.
3. Add the parsley and fresh ground black pepper and sea salt.
4. Add beans, tomatoes, vegetable stock. Bring to a boil and simmer for an hour or so. If all of the beans are totally soft, you're done. If not, boil until soft.
5. In a blender or with a Cuisinart, puree the soup.
6. Add about a ½- ¾ a cup of water and a ½ to ¾ a cup of the small shaped pasta. It's really hard for me to give you measurements on this part. But I will warn you: err on the side of less pasta or you'll no longer have soup. You want to do this step just before you serve the soup. If you aren't going to eat it all now, pull off soup without the pasta and freeze that first. Then, when you thaw it, add the water and pasta then. You don't want to end up with pink macaroni glop.
7. Garnish with freshly grated Parmesan.
