Minestra Maritata is from Calabria. Maritata in the Calabrese/Calabrian dialect means married. It is an odd name for a soup and as Danielle Alvarez says in the introduction of her recipe, it has nothing to do with marriage. I was very happy to see a version of Danielle Alvarez’ s recipe for Minestra Maritata in The Age (March 30/2024 ). Not many people have written about this recipe and what Alvarez has written adds yet another layer to this mysterious traditional recipe. Alverez has added meatballs (polpette) and this seems appropriate and the version I ate in Adelaide a number of years ago w ..read more

I would not blame you if you thought that Torta Pasqualina could be a cake called Pasqualina or made by a woman called Pasqualina. But a torta in Italian isn’t just the word for a torte or cake that’s associated with a dessert, it can also be used to describe a tart or a pie. A torta is very often baked with a pastry shell and can be filled with sweet ingredients, but however, it is more likely to be filled with savory ingredients and mainly with vegetables. Sometimes to differentiate a savoury pastry/ torta from the sweet it is called a salty torta – torta salata. The torta may have an enclos ..read more

This is Sweet Marjoram plant growing in a self-watering planter box on my balcony. I particularly like to use this herb to make PESTO DI NOCI (Walnut Pesto). This is my Oregano plant in the same planter box and although it is difficult to see the differences in the photo (below), the Oregano is much darker, and the leaves are larger and firmer. The Sweet Marjoram leaves are softer, smaller and a lighter green. Both herbs are so similar, it is understandable that the two are often mistaken for each other. Sweet Marjoram is difficult to find in plant nurseries and nurseries often label and sel ..read more

For the last two weeks, I have been in Adelaide. This usually happens at this time in all years. They say Italians always talk about food, but it seems that all of our Adelaide friends (irrespective of culture) discuss food and where to eat, and there was one place that almost everyone seem to recommend. We of course told others we saw, especially unexpected friends and acquaintances from Melbourne we encountered while in Adelaide, who then recounted that they indeed found this stall at the Adelaide Central Market and what a wonderful place it was to eat and buy fish from. Finally, we got to g ..read more

There are many who read my posts, apart from Victoria, there are others from other Australian states, Italy and Europe, and many from the US. But I am not writing recipes this time. I live in an apartment overlooking the Queen Victoria Market. This time, I want to tell you about the birds that come to my balcony to drink, and how Melbourne City Council are going to fell the trees where these birds nest. The reason is to make way for a development consisting of three block towers in the southern end of the open air car park in the Queen Victoria Market. I have considered myself to be very luck ..read more

We cannot expect recipes to remain exactly the same, but there are some culinary traditions when it comes to Italian food. These may influence our thinking. Just like food has evolved in Australia (and elsewhere) cooks are influenced by new ingredients, the wide exposure to the cooking of others (media, travel, migration/immigration, eating away from home) and perhaps the wider acceptance of not sticking to the rules, except perhaps as do the nonne (plural of nonna) and in my case, it was also the zie (plural of zia=aunt). One simple example of how traditional recipes have evolved is to consid ..read more

When I first came to Australia with my parents (1956), eggplants (aubergines/ melanzane in Italian) were non-existent commercially in Adelaide and probably in the rest of Australia.  I remember friends moving to Canberra in the 80’s and they had to order eggplants from the Sydney markets. Like so many vegetables that were unfamiliar in Australia, it took a few seed smugglers some time before eggplants were grown in home gardens, and even more years before they were found in produce markets and green grocers’ shops. Now of course, there are many types of seeds that have been imported legal ..read more

Pasta Con Le Sarde (sardines) can only be a Sicilian dish. Sardines are plentiful, so is the wild fennel (it is seasonal), and most Sicilians eat pasta in some form, every day. The flavours and ingredients of pine nuts, saffron and currants are said to have been introduced by the Arabs. Breadcrumbs toasted in a fry pan with a little bit of olive oil are popular in Sicily as a topping or dressing – called muddica/ mollica/pan grattato, it is sprinkled on pasta instead of grated cheese, and some vegetable dishes like Parmigiana di Melanzane (eggplants), Caponata, fried peppers (Peperonata ..read more

The greatest component in my diet has always been vegetables, but now and again there is a definite main dish, and duck is what I cooked one night last week for dinner. Most of my cooking is about “using up” something and I chose duck because I had some left over cumquats in the fridge. Last year when it was cumquat season I preserved some in vodka, and some in brandy. When I remember that I have them I sometimes present them at the end of a meal when I have guests. There were a few cumquats in vodka left over from a dinner with friends recently. Duck breast does not have to be a dish for im ..read more

It is far too late to write about Christmas recipes, although Christmas melds with New Year Festivities, especially in Australia. I have to admit that usually my month of December is just so busy that I don’t have time to investigate new recipes. I tend to rely on old favourites that I can cook with my eyes closed. Some of these old favourites are:  Pasta con le sarde; baccalà cooked in various ways;  a risotto or pasta with squid and black ink with green peas; mussels; tuna steaks also cooked in different ways: insalata Russa; grilled seasonal vegetables like zucchini, peppers and e ..read more