Italian Food Lovers

Welcome to a new blog post in the Ingredient of the Month series! After introducing watermelon as a mid-summer dessert, today we introduce a strict relative of the watermelon as the ingredient of the month of August: the melon.

Chef Matteo Carboni of the Academia Barilla Culinary School gives us today a Chef tip: how to choose a ripe melon at the market. In Italy melon is a quite versatile ingredient, says Matteo; it used as an antipasto, for example with Prosciutto di Parma, and also as a dessert.

As Chef Matteo says in the video below, the first thing to check in a melon is its flavor that must have a strong and full, ripe smell.

Another important thing to verify before buying a ripe melon is the color of the side stripes. The melon is ripe, says Chef Carboni at the end of this video, when the green stripes have turned yellow.

Thank you very much Chef Carboni for this short but interesting video. Tomorrow we will publish part two of the video; Chef Carboni will delight us with a gourmet recipe of the month using melon as the ingredient. Stay tuned!

There is no better symbol for summer than a watermelon, at least in Italy where its sweet and juicy pulp refreshes million of Italians (plus all the tourists) every summer - in July and August you can even buy watermelon by the slice in many public squares and beaches across Italy!

The Italian name for watermelon is anguria, but in Central Italy it is also called cocomero while in the South people calls it melone. No matter the name, everybody loves the juicy watermelon in summertime!

This is why we picked up a very summer-ish recipe for this Ferragosto (the Italian public mid-summer holiday on August 15) which is fresh, easy to prepare, and mostly made out of watermelon.

We browsed the Academia Barilla Gastronomic Library and found a cookbook by Italian celebrity Chef Gianfranco Vissani, “Il Vissani - 400 recipes in 100 menus proposed by Gianfranco Vissani” (2002, RAI Radiotelevisione Italiana Editions).

Our Ferragosto recipe of choice here at Italian Food Lovers definitely is Watermelon Chill with Sugar Grate, a recipe proposed by Chef Vissani and based on the very popular Sicilian summer dessert Gelo di Mellone. Ready? Let’s go to the kitchen!

WATERMELON CHILL WITH SUGAR GRATE

A recipe by Chef Gianfranco Vissani
(serves 4)

Preparation: 20 minutes
Cooking time: 45 minutes

INGREDIENTS

- 21 oz Watermelon
- 5.3 oz Icing sugar
- 2.8 oz Dark chocolate grains
- 3.5 oz Sugar
- 1 fl oz Water

PREPARATION

Using a food processor, blend the watermelon into a fine pulp. Then, slowly mix in the icing sugar.

Distribute the watermelon mix into cups, decorate with the dark chocolate grains and let it store in the fridge until it has reached the right consistence (approximately one hour).

When the watermelon mix is ready, decorate with an abundant amount of icing sugar on top.

To prepare the sugar grinds cook the sugar with water until it reaches a temperature of 200°F. Continue cooking until it has caramelized.

Place the pot into a container filled with cool water in order to stop the cooking process. Then spread the caramel onto parchment paper.

Using a fork, shape some crossed stripes obtaining a grind made of sugar. Put the sugar grind on top of the watermelon chill and serve.

Happy and fresh Ferragosto to all Italian food lovers from our blog team and from the Academia Barilla Gastronomic Library!