(photo: Bagnara, located in the Province of Calabria) We’ll be taking a break from writing about the Italian life over the next few weeks.  Please enjoy our current content, search the site, and utilize our A-Z index! Enjoy the remainder of the summer! Vince

(photo: the “wheat harvest”; taken in Calabria and including Latella and Scordo family members) The above photo is a favorite from my mother’s collection and was taken on the Latella family wheat field in southwestern Calabria (just outside of Bagnara) during the late summer harvest, most likely in the late 1950’s / early 1960’s.  The photo includes my Grandfather (Vincenzo Scordo), […]

Did you know that as of about 10 years ago Italy was the 4th largest exporter of strawberries?  Areas like Campania, Basilicata, Veneto, Piedmont, Emilia Romagna, and Lazio all grow strawberries but the most famous area is just outside of Roma in Lago di Nemi. Lago di Nemi is a crater lake located in the Alban hills and folks say that […]

(photo: fried potatoes with flat romano beans, garlic, and tomato paste) You may think that there’s not much of a connection between McDonald’s and rural Italian cuisine but the two modes of eating, however far apart, are connected by the fried potato.  While McDonald’s fried potatoes (or french fries) are comprised of: potatoes, vegetable oil (canola oil, hydrogenated soybean oil, natural beef […]

(photo: basil, parsley, and Japanese eggplant from our Italian garden in New Jersey) Back in August of last year we posted some photos of our Italian American garden and we thought we’d share an updated series of photos from our current garden.  We recently harvested Japanese eggplant, flat green beans, basil, parsley, arugula, and chili peppers.     With the basil […]

(photo: we sampled the Villa Cappelli orange conserve with Greek yogurt and local blueberries) The Greeks, like the Italians, treat ingredients with great respect and they do very little in the way of manipulation when preparing dishes.  Take, for example, the way Greeks consume yogurt with a simple fruit conserve or compote.  Often the yogurt is served in a bowl with some […]

  (photo: beautiful bread is a work of art and our reader Dr. K is a maestro!  photo courtesy of Dr. K.) I have to admit that I get very jealous of folks who bake with great success as I’ve been slow to experiment with baking bread, for example.   And it’s also why I’m incredibly thankful for skilled Scordo readers like […]

Growing Figs We recently put up a quick  survey on our Facebook fan page and asked readers if they own a fig tree and we had well over 30 readers respond positively!  The survey not only put a smile on my face but also re-assured me I wasn’t the only child who grew up with live Mediterranean fruit in their […]

Cook More at Home, Duh Mark Bittman, the reductionist food critic and cookbook author, published an interesting op-ed in the New York Times recently (“Make Food Choices Simple: Cook”) where he argues, in a simplistic fashion, that you (viz., American consumer of food) should cook more so that you’re not overwhelmed with choices when it comes to what to put […]

Let’s face it, without the many ethnic groups now a permanent part of the US fabric we’d all be living in a pretty bland and sterile environment.   Specifically, immigrants are at the heart of American life and they are what make our country so special.  If not, for example, the culinary traditions of recent immigrants to the United States we’d […]