At the Table, An Introduction to the Italian Way of Eating + Herb & Sea Salt Focaccia Bread

According to the great Marcella Hazan, widely regarded to be the foremost authority (who writes in English) on traditional Italian cooking, all authentic Italian cooking is family style. Feeding the family, the practice of home cooking, the connection found at the table, is the root and priority of all Italian cooking. Because of this there is no real haute cuisine in Italian cooking. It’s not about being fancy or highbrow, it’s about feeding and sustaining people. However, Italy is divided up into many regions, culinarily speaking, and each region achieves this goal in a completely different way. Though two culinary regions may be no more then 50 miles from each other the choices made on how to cook and present food can vary dramatically. 

One thing all the regions have in common however is a completely different style of structuring a meal compared to somewhere like America. In Italy there is no “main course,” a meal instead consists of a succession of smaller portioned courses (though there are exceptions to this rule).  A traditional meal might consist of:

1. An appetizer, antipasto. This course is not always part of the home cooked meal, but may be served for special occasions or at restaurants.  This may include all different types of meats, vegetables, seafoods, etc. Sometimes an antipasto dish may be served as a first course. 
2. A first course, primo, which could include a soup, pasta dish, risotto, gnocchi, etc. The primo course usually is the heavier dish and generally more carbohydrate focused. 
3. A second course, secondo, could be something like a pan roasted chicken, sautéed veal chops, or a stuffed fish. The secondo course is focused on protein. Meats, poultry, and fish are all very common for this course. 
4. One or two vegetable courses, contorno, often accompany the secondo course. Small amounts of meats and cheeses often occur in these dishes as enhancements to the vegetables flavors.
5. A salad, L’insalata, is served after the meat and vegetable side dishes.  This course is important as it gives relief from richer foods before desert. An Italian salad can be much more varied then the basic salad Americans usually think of. For example a caprese is composed primarily of tomatoes and contains no lettuce.
6. Desert, Dolce, is rarely a baked or heavy confection, at home. Most often fruit, or marinated fruits are served for deserts. Baked goods are generally reserved for special occasions. 

And one other important piece of an Italian meal that should not be forgotten: Bread, pane. Bread is a regular and consistant part of the Italian table. (No low carb nonsense here!) It may be nibbled on it’s own at the start of the meal, and is certainly served in any dish where it is appropriate. Bread is generally not eaten with pasta, but may be used to soak up extra sauces after a bowl is finished. It is very common to see this done with a meat course as well. Bread is traditionally not removed from the table until the salad course is complete (aka. Bread stays on the table throughout the entire meal minus desert). 

I should also mention that every meal isn’t always multi coursed in Italy. Certainly there is flexibility and some dishes are served as a single course. Some times only two course are served. And even a simple meal like a pizza and a salad is appreciated as well. However this multi course, family style of eating is very common. This practice conveys a totally different attitude towards food then is often found in America. While not universally true, Americans are often on the run, including during meal times. I would argue that many of us find it hard to prioritize sitting down and eating together. No criticism is intended towards anyone who has trouble with this. I personally struggle with this balance myself. But I do feel our culture generally values busyness. There are always so many tasks to get done that just seem so vitally important, and everyone thinks this way. It makes it hard to prioritize differently. 

The Italian meal structure, which requires time, shows a high priority is set for nourishing oneself well. And taking time to be social with family or friends over food seems to indicate that constant busyness is not such a priority in Italy. I personally love this attitude and want to promote it in my own life. One of the things I grew up with was a family dinner together almost every night. Not a multi course dinner, but home cooked, and time together, type dinner. My Mom worked and I know she busted her tail to pull this off! She came home after a long day and cooked. She moved meal times around sports practices, drama rehearsals, my Dad’d work schedule and all sorts of other activities. Seriously amazing I think.

I stay home with young children and still find it hard to pull off. But I really do want to encourage this habit in my own life. While multi course meals on a regular basis are not realistically going to happen in my world, I do think I can prioritize sitting down to eat and making more time for my entire family to eat together. 

Another thing I love about the Italian table? The bread. I’m tired of this low-carb business. Carbs are good for your brain people!! Carbs are not evil. Yay carbs! I know we don’t have to over do it, but one of the finest pleasures of the table is a good piece of bread.

Since bread is such an important part of the Italian table I figured I would start these Italian themed posts with a recipe for focaccia, a well known, and completely amazing bread. Focaccia is an olive oil based bread and can be made plain or is often cooked with toppings. Think herbs, sea salt, onion, tomato… sound kind of similar to pizza in a way right? In fact in many cities in the Italian Rivera, focaccia is called pizza genovese. Focaccia may also be known as crescentina (in Florence and Rome) or schiacciata (Bologna and Venice).

Focaccia was originally a hearth bread. Baked on a stone slab and covered with ashes. Fortunately for us modern hearth-less bread lovers focaccia turns out quite well in a conventional oven, with or without a stone. (If you happen to have a pizza stone you can certainly follow this recipe and shape your dough into a round shape and bake it on the pizza stone.  Preheat your oven and stone for about 30 minutes. A little closer to authentic I think!)

The recipe I’m going to share with you is adapted from Marcella Hazan’s Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking and partially from Chef Anne Burrell (I <3 her by the way). I think between guidance from both sources I have a recipe that is semi-authentic, but adapted to work in a more standard kitchen. While this recipe takes a little time to make (mostly rising time) it’s actually quite easy. It’s a pretty kid friendly project as well. My four year old had a great time kneading the dough for me. So give this a try and save this recipe for your repertoire, it’s a keeper and will pair so well with many of my upcoming dishes like (sneak peak) the Pasta e Fagioli pictured below. Enjoy!

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P.S. Because I’m doing a lot more research for these posts, and to give credit where it’s due, I will be citing my sources. (Though not in correct APA format… I’ve been done with college for a while now and am so totally over that one) i. If your interested my sources are very interesting reading look for the References section at the end of each post. 

References 

•  Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking, Marcella Hazan (I just have to annotate here, this cookbook is so so awesome. There is SOOO much information in this thing. At some point I will post a full cookbook review for you but until then I’ll just say I recommend it highly!)