All posts by Marlena Spieler

Nov 04 2014
0

A Pasta Party in Gragnano!

By | Uncategorized | No Comments

Gareth Jones, Giusseppe di Martino, and me!

They are so cute, aren’t they: food writer (legendary) Gareth Jones and pasta-maker (legendary) Giuseppe Di Martino! And there I am, happily sandwiched inbetween these cute guys, aprons tied on, all of us cooking pasta!

We were at La Citta del Gusto Napoli, a Neapolitan culinary centre for teaching and partying. Giuseppe was our host, the guy throwing the party.  Gareth is esteemed British food writer extraordinaire, who can be found these days, more often than not, in Italy, sniffing out stories of deliciousness.

Giuseppe is the third generation of the illustrious Di Martino family, one of the oldest and most famous pasta-making families in Gragnano. He is president of the consortium Gragnano Citta della Pasta and owns Pastifico Di Martino and Pastificio dei Campi as well as Pastificio Antonio Amato in Salerno. He travels the world spreading the goodness of fabulous pasta, and has been a strong motivator in Pasta di Gragnano recieving the prestigious P.G.I mark of excellence and terroir.

No one knows more about pasta than Giuseppe. I say this enthusiastically having eaten pasta with him on so many occasions, over the past decade. These days,  is the President of the Gragnano Pasta Makers Consortium;  pasta di Gragnano has become a DOP product of internationally known excellence in large part to sheer ebulliunce and devotion to the subject.  He travels the world as a goodwill ambassador for his family pasta. Just seeing his smile is enough to make you think: is this (happiness) what pasta can do for me?

Our teacher in this pasta-making extravaganza, besides Giuseppe,  was Michelin star Chef Raffaele Vitale, of the Michellin-starred Ristorante Casadelnonno, and his crew. Vitale works in Salerno to promote the cuisine of Campania region.

Our theme for the pasta-licious evening was tomatoes,  because 1. we were in Napoli! and in Napoli, when you talk pasta, its ALWAYS about tomatoes. 2. it was the annual tomato harvest and canning. Canning tomatoes is a long held tradition in Campania. When the tomatoes are ripe, of course, fresh tomatoes are everywhere; but when they are not perfectly ripe and in season, no one turns their noses up about canned. That tin, those tomatoes: fabuloso! Of course, they are not just ordinary tomatoes: being rich and sweet and flavourful, preserved with a canning technique  that gives care and attention to every detail: the canned/tinned tomatoes of Campania truly are so delicious you can just open a tin, dig in with your fork, and feel goooooood!

Gragnano–where the pasta is made, not far from where our cooking party was being held– is a tiny town slightly inland from the Sorrento Coast whose history of pasta-making is so ancient that the name itself: Gragnano, means grains.  Pasta-making in Gragnano  dates back at least 2,000 years, so when people start talking about Marco Polo bringing it back from China, Giuseppe just chuckles. “It was a local invention”, dating back to 3 B.C.E, when the local grain harvest needed to be preserved. As hard wheat grew well in the area, unlike the softer wheat (much like the noodles of China) that grew north of Rome. This grain was piled high after harvest for the winter but became infested with insects. It was discovered that by milling the wheat the insects were killed; then the powdery substance was mixed with a little water and spread out to dry. Lagane, the forerunner of lasagne, was the first shape, next came Macari, which we know as macaroni.

Epicious wrote about pasta and gave recipes: not recipes for gourmets and parties, but rather, for feeding the Roman Army, how to build the strength of the Roman soldiers. Gragnano became famous for the excellence of its pasta: the soil that grew the best durun (high protein, high gluten) wheat, and the breezes that blew through the little town drying the sheets of pasta hanging in the piazza.

The menu for our cooking show, class, and party was: 1. bucatini pizzaiola style of cherry tomatoes and a lovely slice of veal which gave the tomatoes the umami of, say, a Japanese sauce with a chunk of seaweed or bonito 2. mezzi canneroni lisci with peels tomatoes and basil, and the dish of celebration 3. ziti with Neapolitan ragu! Because we didn’t have time for the long simmering of a Neapolitan ragu, someone brought in a large potfull, saying that his own nonna, or grandmother, had made it for us! The excitement of everyone in the room, upon seeing and smelling, that gorgeous ragu, was….palpable! what a happy frisson went through the room as Chef Vitale went about cooking the pasta, and serving it up, “just so” and with such loving attention.

Nov 03 2014
0

Vietri Sul Mare: a Little Town Built by Ceramics

By | Uncategorized | No Comments

The little village-town of Vietri sul Mare clings to the cliffs on the Campania coast, just up the hill from the port city of Salerno.

Vietri is a town built of ceramics: everywhere you go, there are ceramic walls, mosaics, tiles, shops, community park-lets, all strewn with and made out of ceramics. Vietri sul Mare ceramics might well be the ceramics you think of when you think of the joyous, brightly coloured, whimsically designed ceramics of the south. Plates and bowls to eat from, mugs and cups to drink from, jugs and pitchers to plant in and pour from, tiles to brighten your wall, your house, your pool, your benches…..oh and if there aren’t enough ceramics everywhere–lets put it this way: it isn’t easy to get more than a store or two through the town without a shop, gallery or simply a tiled sign or exhibition–there is also a huge museum devoted to all things ceramic.

Nov 02 2014
0

DaDong: Amazing Duck, and Much More

By | Uncategorized | No Comments

DaDong, the restaurant named after its chef-owner,  is where I would recommend you go when you ask–as you inevitably will when you visit Beijing–”Where should I go for Peking duck?”

You’ll ask because, of course–its one of the must-do things in the capital. Your list: Great Wall? check. Forbidden City? check. Hutong Visit? check. Tiennamen Square? check. Peking Duck? oh yes.

Peking Duck has long been a speciality of Peking/Beijing, and it is an amazing dish: the bird, specially raised for its fate on Beijing tables, prepared and cooked to a state of crisp laquered skin that sometimes is so sweet it is nearly honeyed in taste, it is hard if not impossible to find elsewhere in the word.

Succulent, tender flesh and crisp laquered-brown skin is carved into smallish morsels, arranged on a plate that arrives along with thin pancakes, sweet-savoury dipping sauce, and a handful of fresh accompaniments: cucumber, cilantro/coriander leaves, green/spring onion: you take a little duck flesh–dab of sauce, plop in the fresh stuff, and roll it up. It is divine: a smallish morsel so uniquely well-balanced as to sweet-savoury-umami tastes and lovely textures: crisp, fresh, long cooked, I mean: that little delicacy you hold in your hand is one of China’s most opulent, perfect, specialities.

Confession of greedy feelings: in general the plates of duck always seem too small but that is because the duck is so luscious my inner glutton starts carousing for more ahead of time: but to be honest: Beijing duck is so rich one really can only eat a small amount.

At a Peking Duck dinner, the service of duck is but one of an array of courses, albeit a high point of the meal, the course that you expect and are so excited to see, situated in a menu which balances all other tastes and textures–which Chinese food does so brilliantly.

Many restaurants in Beijing are known as roast duck restaurants, slinging out duck after duck. But DaDong is not one of those centuries-old Peking duck palaces: it is famous purely for its amazing duck (and imaginative, delicious food in general). Here, the classic,  demanding duck is transformed to an even higher level of delicious, finesse, until it becomes a thing of beauty. The ducks are rubbed, air-dried, roasted while hanging in an oven of open flames from which  they emerge: succulent fleshed, with a skin that is so crisp and crackling, the luscious fatty layer under the skin turned into an exquisite mouthful, light, crunchy, without even a trace of greasiness. It is a genius of a roasted bird, and there is a cadre of staff working hard and skillfully to produce this amazing roasted duck. I was told that they are experimenting with new ways of cutting the duck, that is how devoted to his craft is Chef DaDong.

I’m not saying that the other traditional roast ducks you find in Beijing aren’t brilliant: a handful of years back my favourite duck was served by an acolyte of Chef Doh, whose face was at the time appearing on a postal stamp along with a selection of other chefs. I must get the name and address for you, because not only was the duck wonderful, but everything on the menu was as well: fresh, traditional, delectable. And the staff was so kind to us, poor foreigners, pointing and trying hard to figure out what to eat. (in addition to the duck, i loved the cucumber salad, and the cloud ears fungus among other things).

But we were on the other side of Beijing this trip, and were invited to DaDong by Edouard Cointreau, member of a prestigious food and drink family, descendant of Rabelais, and founder of World Gourmand Awards and Paris Bookfair, among other events. He is also President of China Food Television. I’m sure there are roles he plays in the food world that I don’t even know about, so forgive me if I don’t mention them. Edouard lives in Beijing much of the year, and wherever he is, Europe, China, wherever, lives the life of wonderful food. So if he recommends or even better, invites, I go.  “I eat there about once a week” he shared as we wandered through the kitchen, lucky enough to be given a peek at what goes into the food at DaDong.

The duck at DaDong is revolutionary, so to speak, in raising and cooking methods, as well as attention paid to the best way of slicing and serving the duck. Also, its presentation is updated and freshened: the little handkerchief-like pancakes that you expect are served, yes, but also puffy little sesame-seeded cakes. The cucumber, cilantro/coriander, green/spring onion has also fruits/vegetables in season: sweet red pepper, juicy melon, chopped garlic, red turnip. I like also that the DaDong duck skin is not as candy-sweet as sometimes the skin can be. At DaDong, the skin glistens crisp and brown-hued, tasting slightly sweet and uber-umami. It is lusciousness.

All in all, DaDong’s duck is transcedental: the oh-so-traditional dish elevated to a new level by sheer good cooking and vision.

In addition to duck, Dadong creates and serves some of the most inventive, modern food: its not really fusion, yet it fuses: past and future, east and west, traditional and modern: its a modern view of food in China right now, at its very best. For instance, one of its signature dishes is what appears at first to be a plate of cherries. You are instructed to pick two next to each other. At first glance they are both glazed, plump, enticing, but otherwise appear the same. Bite into one: it is a glazed cherry. its lovely.  Bite into the second: it is a glazed…..tiny ball of foie gras (France’s Rougie Foie Gras is producing foie gras in China). Its a surprise and it is delicious, and makes you smile as the delicious liver melts between your lips.(The restaurant is a combination of tradition and modern, balanced and lyrical, with great horse sculptures as you walk in along a sort of boardwalk, over a modern stream full of fish which were being caught for someones dinner as I crossed….I am told it is located in what was formerly an imperial granary. Oh, and in addition to the duck: they are so proud of their sea cucumber–dried, braised, served in a fragrant pot–that it appears on their neon-lit sign, right next to DaDong and Duck…..)

1-2Nanxincong, Shangye Daxia, 22A
Dongsishitiao, Dongcheng District

tel: 5169 0329

Nov 02 2014
0

Hutong Eats: Noshing our Way Through “Old Beijing”

By | Uncategorized | No Comments

If you are in Beijing for even a few days, one of the most fun, and most evocative things you can do is get a glimpse of “Old Beijing”–that is, what China used to look like before the huge tearing down and rebuilding frenzy of recent years. You’ll find this last morsel of traditional Chinese life in the narrow winding alleyways known as Hutongs.

A number of Beijing’s hutongs have been protected from the wrecking ball and preserved into special districts: enter and you enter a different era, a different world: low buildings in traditional Chinese style; humble dwellings and larger grander ones, beautiful tiny temples and dilapidated buildings; all  speckled with shops, both boutique and practical, stalls selling vegetables and fruit, restaurants, cafes, sweets-vendors on the streets, and traffic consisting mostly of bicycles and mopeds with the occasional small motor vehicle pushing its way through the crowded streets to make–or try to make–a delivery.Hutongs are an adventure in traditional foods: but, like many adventures, its good to have a guide. Not only do you want the most up-to-date knowledge on who has the best dumplings, what to order in the steamy noodle shop, but unless you speak Mandarin, you won’t even know what is on the menu. Getting around China can be daunting. My friend, Israeli cookbook publisher and author, Ofer Vardi, (LunchBox Press), who was with me in China, mentioned the tour, I said: “Count me in”. The tours (http://www.hiasgourmet.com/hutong-eats.htm ) are Thursdays and Saturdays and last about 3 hours. You can form your own group or see if they have a group already going that you can join. Prices depend upon how many people are on the tour; the more people, the cheaper!

As it happens, I had another, more private, reason to wander through the old Hutongs: an address scrawled on a piece of paper, found in an old box. It was my brothers address when he lived in Beijing. When he died in Bejing. I had shown the address to a number of people who all said: ahh, it is in a Hutong. I wanted to see where he was happy, his last home on earth.

Ofer assembled a group–we were about 6–and met up with our walking/noshing guide, Victoria, near Lake Houhai, in the Dongcheng district, about a ten minutes taxi drive from The Forbidden City.

we met up at this beautiful lake, a world apart from Bejing's hustle and bustle yet 10 minute drive from Forbidden City

At this point I need to say how adorable and helpful, energetic and bubbly Victoria is, as well being as a font of knowledge about Chinese foods and cuisines.

the adorable Victoria offering me some stinky tofu!

Before we started walking and noshing, I showed her my scrap of paper with the address and asked if she had any idea where it was. She didn’t, but the friend she had brought along said: I think its over in a different hutong area, perhaps we can get there on our walk.We’ll look.

Ducking off the major crowded fume-filled road we entered  the tranquility of the lake and the meandering alleys that make up the hutongs; we entered Old China. Houses were small and people sat outside, watching the world; I saw a man shopping for vegetables, carrying a little bird in a cage.  It all seemed so social, and yeah: I was the only one who thought it unusual. “We like to take our birds for walks” said Victoria.

Whenever Victoria found something she thought we really shouldn’t miss, she stopped and bought a plate for us to sample. The kung pao chicken baos were pretty lovely, but the stinky tofu she passed around on a stryofoam container for us to try…..I had tried in in Taipei and a year later was still trying to get over the experience. Perhaps like the durian fruit, stinky tofu and I might not be meant to be. But you know, you gotta try it all: you never know when you’ll taste something that will enrich your life so hugely you won’t even be able to imagine your life without it.

The Hutongs are rich with streetfood, small stalls, little restaurants….You can buy bao at a walk-up window or a huge bowl of steamy spicy soup and array of noodles and savoury pastries at a very humble canteen filled with enthusiastic eaters of all ages; you can sit in a calm and style modern restaurant and eat traditional dishes like pineapple stuffed with glutinous rice or special chicken and seafood soup, or walk around with an ice cream-like tofu pudding known as “Imperial Beijing Custard”.

Did I ever find my brothers old address, the house he lived in at the unexpected end of his life? No, I never did. Hutongs are not easy to find your way around in, and in the end neither Victoria or her friend were able to locate it. I thought if that happened I would be sad, dissappointed, but a funny thing had happened: by spending the day wandering through this world that my brother had once lived in, seen the shops and alleyways and restaurants and tea houses that he might well have walked in, stopped in, sipped, in….you know, I was able to feel the sense of peace I had expected would only come with seeing his actual home. Surprisingly, it didn’t matter in the end. I saw his everyday surroundings, and it was as if being with him again. I know he would have been happy there.