Cooking with My Sisters Part 7

FILLING.

1 large sweet onion, finely chopped cup olive oil 2 cans anchovies packed in oil Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste In a large skillet, cook the onion with the olive oil. Mix with the anchovies, being careful not to mush up the anchovies. Season with salt and pepper.

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.

Rub olive oil on a cookie sheet. Take one piece of the dough and stretch it out into a rectangle, about inch thick. Spread one third of the anchovy mixture over the dough and roll, pinching one end over the other to form a loaf. Repeat with the other two pieces.

Bake for about 25 minutes, or until lightly brown.

To wind up the fish trio, we have Grandmom Trigiani's Cod Brodetto, a recipe I shared first in Lucia, Lucia. This soup is substantial, and it's terrific on pasta, which is how Grandmom served it. You can use regular cod fillets, but we recommend baccala, which is salt-cured cod.

Grandmom Trigiani's Cod Brodetto SERVES 6.

2 pounds salted cod fillets (baccala), cut into chunks 1 lemon cup olive oil 1 large sweet onion, sliced 3 garlic cloves, minced 6 fresh tomatoes, chopped 1 cup balsamic vinegar 2 quarts water 3 cups white wine 3 tablespoons chopped Italian parsley Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste Place the cod on a large platter. Sprinkle it with the juice of the lemon and set aside.

In a large pot, heat the olive oil and lightly saute the onion, garlic, tomatoes, and balsamic vinegar. Add the water and wine. Stir well. Add the seafood and parsley. Season with salt and pepper. Cook on the stovetop over medium heat for 40 minutes, or until the seafood cooks through. To serve, line soup bowls with thin slices of toasted Italian bread. Ladle the stew over the bread and serve.

We were not big fans of fish as kids, except maybe for fish sticks, because we got those on Friday nights if Dad wasn't home. Anyway, if Grandmom served the Cod Brodetto with a side of Dandelion Salad, and you didn't like the latter, you were sunk.

Dandelion Salad Round up your grandchildren. Send them out into an open field to pull the green leaves from beneath the yellow flowers. Best to yank them before the tops turn to puffs. Tell the grandchildren to load them into a sack and run them to you in the kitchen.

Dandelion greens 8 tablespoons wine vinegar 2 tablespoons olive oil 1 teaspoon sugar Pinch of salt Separate the leaves by hand, wash, and throw into a bowl.

Whisk together the wine vinegar, olive oil, sugar, and salt. Toss over the leaves and serve.

Fortunately, if you didn't like dandelion greens, you were safe ninety percent of the year. Grandmom Trigiani never bought the greens, she just sent us out to forage, and there's a limited time they're available.

Cave people had nothing on us. Grandmom constantly had us on the side of the road grabbing stuff. If you were in the back of her car, and she saw a patch of something edible, you could bet that you'd be sent out to gather the berries, or whatever they were. (Grandmom made the best jam from wild raspberries.) Flowers were not exempt, either, unless, of course, they were in someone's yard.

During the summers in Pennsylvania, if you saw Trigiani grandchildren running along the side of the road, you knew Viola had them out collecting something. It was reminiscent of that scene in The Sound of Music in which the captain is driving home with the baroness (hiss) and sees all his children hanging from the big trees lining the road. The only difference between us and the von Trapps is that they were having fun.

It was rare that we didn't like Grandmom's cookies, but her Fig and Date Cookies (Fichi e Datteri Affettati) were a taste we didn't acquire until adulthood. Probably because they are best with coffee. (I think of them as the Italian version of a breakfast bar, only better.) They can last for months if you store them in tins and put a layer of wax paper on top before sealing.

Fig and Date Cookies MAKES 3 DOZEN.

PASTRY.

3 cups all-purpose flour cup sugar teaspoon salt cups (l sticks) unsalted b.u.t.ter, softened 3 eggs Pinch of grated lemon zest FILLING.

1 pound dried figs 1 cup dates cup boiling water cup walnuts 3 ounces melted milk chocolate 1 tablespoon grated orange zest 2 tablespoons orange juice 4 tablespoons sugar 1 teaspoon cinnamon On a work surface, mix the flour, sugar, and salt. Make a well in the center and add the b.u.t.ter, eggs, and lemon zest. Knead until sticky and refrigerate overnight.

Chop the figs and dates. Soak in the boiling water for 10 minutes. Remove the fruit from the water and grind it together with the walnuts. Add the rest of the filling ingredients and mix together. Cover and let stand for a few hours.

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

Roll out the dough into several rectangles. Line the center of each with filling. Wrap the sides of the dough over the top, pressing together gently. Turn upside-down and cut into pieces.

Bake until slightly brown, about 15 minutes. Let them cool off before packing.

If we turned our noses up at something on the table, there would be one of two common responses from our parents: "You people don't know what's good" (Dad) or "I want you to learn to eat everything" (Mom). Plus, there was the waste factor. This was an equal-opportunity obsession on both sides of our family. A person eats everything in front of him or her because it would be wrong to throw anything away, and not just because there are so many people without food in the world (although that was always part of the message, as it was in so many American homes). We learned that eating what was prepared for us was a sign of respect for the person who cooked it and the breadwinner who made it possible. To waste food was to waste goodwill. I can remember Grandmom Trigiani having special funnels for emptying the last drop of anything from a bottle or can, whether it was olive oil or ketchup. Everything was used. And reused. Viola never even threw away a jelly jar.

For Grandma Lucy, not wasting also meant sacrifice. When Grandpa Carlo died, times were tough. Mom remembers a knock at the door the Christmas after he died, and it was a man from one of Chisholm's civic clubs with a basket of fruit. He wanted to give it to Grandma Lucy, but she thanked him and refused. She said, "This is so kind of you, but I want you to give it to someone who needs it." While her kids never really wanted for anything, Mom said that basket would have come in handy. But Grandma Lucy couldn't even consider accepting something that she felt someone else needed more than she and her family did.

That was a defining lesson for Mom, her brother, and her sister. No surprise that the centerpiece of the story is food. In our family's corner of the world, food inspires and fuels, fascinates and sustains, tempts and teaches. It is a reason to come together, to remember, to learn, to create, to celebrate, to give. With luck, our festa will go on for a long, long time. And we'll leave the family treasure in even better shape than we found it.

Afterword.

What I Learned on the Journey Through Our Kitchen Checka reminded me that Dad always used to say you should leave the world better than you found it. I had forgotten that I first heard this from him. They're extraordinarily powerful little words, leave the world better than you found it, and they can strengthen the resolve to do the right thing in the face of whatever challenges or irritates or even hurts. No family is perfect. And each one of the Trigianis would compete to be the first one to remind you of this fact, with an I-can-top-that story as proof. Siblings perfect the barb. Parents make mistakes. Grandparents pick favorites. Cousins poke fun. But in our expansive family, the positive messages are the most powerful, and these messages play out in an entertaining variety of ways. It's the reward I wouldn't trade for the perfect world of peace, quiet, and reason that once was my fantasy. Our family has helped me realize that just as there's affection in every cookie and a story in every strand of spaghetti, there is a laugh looking to be found in every conflict. Maybe it's because we're half Bergamaschi-as in the thespians who gave the world Punch, Judy, and the commedia dell'arte. Or perhaps it comes from being one quarter Veneziani-as in the adventurers who would just as soon throw you over the side of a gondola as they would serenade you. Or it could be from the part that is Pugliese-as in the mystics who invented superst.i.tion while they were directing traffic at the crossroads of every Mediterranean civilization. I like to think, though, that we find life's fun in the same way families all over the place do: by spending time together doing something we love. In our case, the connecting happens around the kitchen table. I hope that in this complicated world, every family can find a treasure to share pa.s.sionately and graciously, and to laugh over, for the dear ones here now and those who surely will follow.

Mary Yolanda Trigiani.

San Francisco.

ABOUT THE AUTHORS.

ADRIANA TRIGIANI is an award-winning playwright, television writer, and doc.u.mentary filmmaker. The author of the bestselling novels Big Stone Gap, Big Cherry Holler, Milk Gla.s.s Moon, Lucia, Lucia, and The Queen of the Big Time, Trigiani has written the screenplay for the movie Big Stone Gap, which she will also direct. She lives in New York City with her husband and daughter.

MARY YOLANDA TRIGIANI is a business consultant in corporate marketing and executive communications. In addition to speechwriting for business leaders, she writes and speaks on a wide range of management topics. Now that she's completed this project, Trigiani is qualified to address family relations as well. She lives in San Francisco.

ALSO BY ADRIANA TRIGIANI.

Big Stone Gap.

Big Cherry Holler.

Milk Gla.s.s Moon.

Lucia, Lucia.

The Queen of the Big Time.