Category: kitchen

Italian Olives: Taggiasca and Castelvetrano

Italian Olives: Taggiasca and Castelvetrano

(photo:  The lovely Taggiasca olive from Liguria in northwestern Italy)  We often talk about the importance of the Italian pantry and how critical it is to have certain staple ingredients in your kitchen at all times.  Keeping a well stocked pantry means you’ll never starve, order out, and be relegated to a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for dinner.  Among the universal items we keep […]

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Cento Italian Pantry Giveaway

Cento Italian Pantry Giveaway

(photo: some of the items in the Cento Italian Pantry Giveaway, including pasta, olive oil, hot peppers, etc.) !Cento Italian Pantry Giveaway Has Ended! Last summer I espoused the virtues of the Italian pantry and the concept of being prepared to cook and eat well every day of the year regardless of access to “fresh ingredients.”  Specifically, I suggested lovers […]

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Kitchen Essential: The Food Mill or Passatutto

Kitchen Essential: The Food Mill or Passatutto

(photo: various food mills; ours is the top left above) How many of you own a food mill?  Uh-oh, I only see a few hands and I’m getting some quizzical looks!   OK, let’s jump out of the role play and get down to why I think everyone should own a food mill; after all, like a chef’s knife and a cutting board, the […]

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La Cucina Povera or The Kitchen of the Poor

La Cucina Povera or The Kitchen of the Poor

What is Cucina Povera? A friend recently asked me to explain the concept of cucina povera and here’s the working definition I came up with: A style of cooking best represented, in the past, by the lower class (read: peasants) of a given society.  Peasant cooking aims to utilize whatever is found in the kitchen, household, farm, etc. to prepare meals. […]

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Guide to Making Espresso At Home

Guide to Making Espresso At Home

What is Good Espresso and Can You Make it at Home? Over the last few weeks or so I’ve been giving some serious thought to purchasing a semi automatic espresso machine.  My rationale for buying a home machine (including a burr grinder) includes two premises: 1. it’s very hard to find quality espresso at cafes (even in major cities like […]

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Recipe: How to Make Homemade Chèvre (or Goat Milk Cheese)

Recipe: How to Make Homemade Chèvre (or Goat Milk Cheese)

Our good friend Dr. K has passed along his homemade chèvre (goat milk) cheese recipe and I’m excited to be able to share it with our loyal Scordo.com readers.   Goat cheese is made in Calabria, of course, and it’s some of the best produced cheese on the planet.  In Aspromonte, close to our family’s village in Pellegrina, you’ll find Caprino […]

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Why It’s Impossible to Cook Italian Food in America and the Frankies Spuntino Kitchen Companion and Cooking Manual

Why It’s Impossible to Cook Italian Food in America and the Frankies Spuntino Kitchen Companion and Cooking Manual

(photo: street scene in Bagnara Calabra, courtesy of myworldshots.com ) I’m going to make a statement that may upset serious cooks, but here goes: It’s almost impossible to cook foods from other places in the world outside of their place of origin.  I’m not stating an absolute truth because you can get pretty damn close to replicating a pizza from […]

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Branzino with Feta, Parsley, and Red Onion Couscous and Sautéed Spinach with Garlic

Branzino with Feta, Parsley, and Red Onion Couscous and Sautéed Spinach with Garlic

When it comes to consuming food, a golden rule we aim to follow is centered on eating “whole foods”; namely, minimally processed from scratch food items.  For example, buying whole bean coffee (and roasting it yourself if possible) and grinding it before each use is better than buying a mega container of preground, and unforgiving, Folgers or Maxwell House and, […]

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A Kitchen Scale for Everyone: Pasta Portion Control and GiveAway!

A Kitchen Scale for Everyone: Pasta Portion Control and GiveAway!

(The unit comes in many colors and is perfectly sized.  The two simple buttons are large and easy to use.  The LCD screen is huge and there’s no guessing the amount when scrambling in your kitchen preparing a dinner party)  Update: Congrats to Ami for winning the contest.  The giveaway is now closed. For years, I’ve used a Salter metal […]

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