Italian Food Lovers

Though the famous popular Acquacotta soup has a very mysterious and unusual name, it is a well-known soup dish that originates from the Maremma area of Tuscany. The Italian name of this soup literally means “cooked water”.

Legend has it that the inventors of this dish, the herdsmen and coal men of Maremma, were accustomed to frequent journeys, and thus normally traveled with stale bread, dried meat, oil, garlic, onion, and a few herbs, in order to prepare acquacotta.

A more poetic version of its origin can be traced in the short movie “La Zuppa di Pietra“ (Stone Soup) by Christian Carmosino, winner of the First Prize at the latest Academia Barilla Short Films Festival.

In the short film director Carmosino tells a story staged in the 19th century in a village in rural Italy, where the metaphore of a stone soup stands for the pleasure of getting around the table for a rich meal all together by sharing ingredients, big smiles, and a big heart.

You can discover more about award winning director Christian Ambrosino by browsing his online channels on YouTube and MySpace, from where we got the embed code (with Christian’s authorization) to republish the beautiful “La Zuppa di Pietra“ short film here below in full. Enjoy it!

Contrary to its origins as a peasant dish, made simply of water and a few flavors, acquacotta is a very hardy soup. There is an assortment of recipes for acquacotta amongst the different areas of Tuscany, yet acquacotta is distinguishable from other Tuscan soups due to its use of eggs and stale bread at the end of (and not during) its preparation.

We found several book tracing the origins and tradition of acquacotta at the Academia Barilla’s Gastronomic Library in Parma, such as “Cucina e vini della Toscana” by Flavio Collutta (1974 Mursia Editore), “Il grande libro della cucina Toscana” by Paolo Petroni (1991 Ponte alle Grazie), and Sara Vignozzi and Gabriele Ganci’s cookbook “Tuscany – Flavour of Italy” (McRae Books, 1999), from which we picked the traditional recipe here below (image taken from the same book).

ACQUACOTTA
(serves 4)

Preparation time: 30 minutes
Cooking time: about 1 hour
Recipe grading: fairly easy

INGREDIENTS

- 5 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
- 2 onions, thinly sliced
- 2 cups (10 oz - 300 g) fresh or frozen peas
- 1 and 1/4 cups (l7 oz - 200 g) freshly hulled broad beans
- 1 medium carrot, sliced
- 1 stalk celery, thinly sliced
- 1 crumbled dried chili pepper
- salt to taste
- 12 oz - 300 g trimmed young Swiss chard or spinach leaves, washed and shredded
- 10 oz - 300 g firm, ripe tomatoes, skinned and chopped
- 6 and 1/2 cups (2 and 1/2 pints - 1.5 liters) boiling water
- 4 large fresh eggs
- freshly ground black pepper
- 1/2 cup (2 oz - 60 g) freshly grated Parmigiano Reggiano or Pecorino cheese
- 4 slices firm-textured white bread, 2 days old
- 1 clove garlic

Suggested wine: any dry white wine

PREPARATION

Pour the oil into a large, heavy-bottomed saucepan. Add the onions, peas, fava beans, carrot, celery, chili pepper, and a dash of salt.

Sauté for about 10 minutes until tender and lightly browned. Add the chard or spinach and the tomatoes and simmer for 15 minutes.

Pour in the boiling water and leave to simmer gently for 40 minutes, adding more salt if necessary.

Using a fork or balloon whisk, beat the eggs with salt, pepper, and the grated Parmigiano or pecorino cheese.

Toast the bread and when golden brown, rub both sides of each slice with the garlic. Place a slice in each soup bowl or in individual straight-sided earthenware dishes, and pour a quarter of the beaten egg mixture over each serving.

Give the soup a final stir and then ladle into the bowls. Drizzle with extra virgin olive oil and add a pinch of pepper.

Serve immediately and enjoy acquacotta sharing it with others, as in Christian Carmosino’s award winning short movie!

CHEF TIPS

Our Chefs at the Academia Barilla Culinary School suggest to use Academia Barilla’s products such as Toscano IGP extra virgin olive oil, Peeled Cherry Tomatoes, and Academia Barilla’s traditional Parmigiano Reggiano or the Sardinian Pecorino Sardo Gran Cru, which you can all easily find at our gourmet online store. also, try Mantecarlo Bianco as dry white wine for better recipe results.

Buon appetito from Academia Barilla and Italian Food Lovers!

Over the last couple of weeks Academia Barilla partnered and sponsored a couple of gourmet events in New York and in Tuscany, and will participate to a third event in Los Angeles, California, scheduled for the month of July.

The fil rouge that connects the three events is Italian wine, at its more elevated expression.

The first event has been the presentation of a book by author Sergio Esposito at the Italian Cultural Institute in NY. The event, held on May 5 in collaboration with Italian Wine Merchant, of which Sergio Esposito is Owner and funder, was centered on the recent release of the book “Passion on the Vine - a memoir of food, wine and family in the heart of Italy”, and had a few gourmet tasting moments on the side, to which Academia Barilla’s Italian Food Specialist Rosario Procino participated with a gourmet food tasting moment in favor of the event participants.

Last week Academia Barilla took part of an high-profile charity gala event at Corte del Vino, an event held at Fattoria Le Corti in San Casciano Val di Pesa (in the countryside outside Florence) to fund research on children’s tumors (through the Milan-based Association 7° piano and the Meyer Children Hospital of Florence) through a charity gala lunch and auction of very precious items.

Among the items on auction donated by top Italian collectors were precious Italian wine bottles with more than 20 years, a 6-liters bottle from 2005 serigraphed in gold (auction base: 5,500 Euros), the famous 3-liters bottle of Sagrantino 1997, awarded as one of the 12 best bottle of the historical last decade of the 20th century, or the famous 9-liters bottle of Apparita 2004 (both auction base: 1,500 euro), the 5-liters Zonin Acciaiolo, with the label engraved in gold by a Venetian glass master, or the Contini Bonaccossi Vin Santo di Capezzana 2000, awarded as best dessert wine in the world by the International Wine Challenge, in a 3-bottle box created specifically for this charity auction.

Beside the top section of the wine auction, other prizes has been part of the Corte del Vino charity auction. Four Seasons Firenze donated a spa treatment weekend at their location among the Franciacorta Vineyards in Chianti, and another signed by Henri Chenot in a resort previous residence of Prince Corsini in Maremma, southern Tuscany.

Academia Barilla supported the charity event by donating for the auction two days of dedicated cooking classes at the Academia Barilla Culinary School in Parma, Italy. Other top auction items as jewelry pieces and fashion exclusive clothings were donated for the auction by private donors.

From Chianti hills to Hollywood hills with the LA Wine Festival, scheduled in Los Angeles, California for the next month of July. The LA Wine Festival, today at its third edition, takes place at the Raleigh Studios right in the heart of Hollywood, and is organized by wine expert and celebrity Joel M. Fisher, PhD.

Professor Fisher, among other top wine expertises and qualifications, is wine columnist for the Culinary Connection of the Chefs de Cuisine Association of California, professor at Cordon Bleu in Pasadena, wine instructor for the Culinary Arts Department of the Art Institute of California, sommelier for the Escoffier Association of Southern California, and wine host for CRN’s What’s Cooking Show.

We will be blogging more about the LA Wine Festival, as Academia Barilla’s Italian Culinary Expert Francesco Zimone already scheduled his presence at the Los Angeles event; so save the date if you live in southern California: July 12 and 13 at the Raleigh Studios in Hollywood, LA. See you there!

Remember to drink wine responsibly and, most of all, to make sure to pair good wines with good gourmet food - we will surely talk soon about the wine and food pairing subject.