Pellegrino Artusi barely needs an introduction for those who follow the blog since I often post about recipes I've copied from Science in the Kitchen and the Art of Eating Well (1891) - and most of them without any change, except for the occasional Mediterranean twist (olive oil vs. butter). Today's story is dedicated to his roschetti, thin cookies that are partly made of almonds.
Translated into English, roschetti means 'nuts' - as in 'ginger nuts' that we have seen in nineteenth century books and have been popular for ages in Scandinavia and the Baltic countries. Pellegrino's version, however, does not use any ginger or spices at all. It does contain fat, which is 80% butter and 20% lard, weighing exactly half as much as the flour. If there is one ingredient that you absolutely cannot make Pellegrino Artusi dessert without it's almonds, closely followed by powdered sugar. Both are present in roschetti that are made of 2 parts flour, 1 part butter & lard, 1 part almonds, 1 part sugar and few eggs. The dough is lightly kneaded, set aside for a few hours, rolled out quite thin, shaped with a flower-patterned cutter, and baked in a "Dutch oven". (A Dutch oven, in Artusi's time, meant that you baked something with a lid.) The finished cookie is crispy but not hard, with a sort of nutty flavor - because the almonds must be lightly toasted before they are chopped into pieces" no bigger than half a grain of rice".
 |
| Excursion in Italian Countryside - Károly Markó, 1862 |
For me, Italian cuisine must always use olive oil so I generally replace part or all of the fat in Pellegrino's recipes with that. In this case, I used olive oil instead of lard and even baked a version in which butter is less than half of the mixed fats. Artusi was born into a rich family, an industrialist himself, and privileged enough to have good food in abundance. Living in the north or Italy, he would enjoy animal-based meals without remorse, believing his everyday regime to the healthiest in the world. That was not because he ignored the danger of eating too much fat, it was because he lived with 'moderation and economy' (an idea shared by Jane Austen in Persuasion, 1817). Not so familiar with the use of olive oil, however, Pellegrino and his kitchen staff depended on cows and pigs for making a good dessert. Of course, lard was used much less than butter, and more of that in savory dishes. Still, the renowned author lived to be a hundred minus nine years because - he liked sunlight and fresh air, moderate exercise (which, for the privileged classes was brisk walking or horse-riding), and reasonable amounts of well-prepared food.
Just about when Science in the Kitchen and the Art of Eating Well became a hit, English, French & American cookbooks featured recipes for extravagant dishes, both savory and sweet. Haute cuisine or just food that was enjoyed by the middle classes in the Early Modern and Modern periods was sophisticated enough on both sides of the Atlantic but in the late nineteenth century every housewife was prompted to over-indulgence and luxury. None of that in Pellegrino, whose recipes use as much sugar and fat as needed for results that would appeal to our palates without leading to gluttony.
Comments