Cooking for Italians

Holy Goat. It’s one thing teaching pasta classes in Berkeley, or going on and on at length about Italian cooking to cognoscenti, even cognoscenti of Italian extraction.

It’s quite another thing to cook for Italians.

I had to cook for a whole roomful of Italian Italians a couple of weeks ago. I’ve only just started breathing again. What did I cook, you ask? A regional specialty from their home territory?

Are you nuts? I punted. I cooked Sicilian food.

Sicilian people eat a lot of eggplant, plus fried food is univerally adored, so I made something everyone can agree on: Eggplant Parmigiana.

Wait- that means from Parma, right? Like, northern Italy? Yes, that’s true, but eggplant parmigiana is kind of like the tuna noodle casserole of Italy. They make it everywhere, and everyone is convinced that they make the best and most authentic rendition. I made it Sicilian style, a la Joe Fish. Basically, it was fried eggplant and zucchini together, with a fresh tomato sauce and fontina cheese. No, fontina isn’t remotely Sicilian, but it was fantastic.

This was all as a second course after Pasta con Patate, and an antipasto of spanish olives stuffed with lemon, a personal favorite.

Ok… now I’m hungry again.

So, yes, it was stressful, and even though most of the room would have happily eaten anything politely, my buddy Anna wouldn’t have been shy about letting me know my shortcomings.

She loved it.

Michele, Massimo e Anna