Comfort food, northern Italian style
Chef Nathan Fong’s trip to Italy reaps many delicious rewards
Chef and columnist Nathan Fong returns from a trip to Italy with plenty of culinary tricks up his sleeve.
Although the low- carb diet may have become the trend for summer beach bodies, the cooler weather brings out heartier fare, which usually means comfort foods.
Along with comforting slow, rich stews, braises and roasts, there’s always room for plates of steaming hot pasta, smothered with a hamper of simmered tomatoes heady with garlic and herbs, or with slowly braised meat liberally doused with dry reds to emerald- hued olive oils, freshly pressed and green from the local frantoios. Or the velvety creaminess of a warm bowl of risotto, the infamous rice dish, slowly stirred to carbohydrate heaven, with all my favourite fats, butter, creams and cheeses. This, I think, is the comfort food of northern Italy.
Early last June while avoiding the region’s earthquakes, I was invited to the headquarters and main factory of the world’s largest pasta company, Barilla, located in the medieval northern Italian city of Parma, home of one of the country’s most famed cheeses, Parmesan, in the culinary- obsessed region of Emilia- Romagna. This is also the province of their valued slowcured prosciutto ham, and their salamis and mortadella sausages.
Not only did we see some of the most incredible high- tech machines that produce their high- quality pasta, contorting, pulling and extruding it into a cornucopia of shapes, lengths and sizes, we were given cooking lessons at the company’s Academia Barilla. Here we learned how to prepare some of Italy’s traditional sauces that complete their matched pasta.
Then it was off Modena, the home of the renowned aceto balsamico, the original birthplace of balsamic vinegar, that wonderfully deep rust- brown sour- sweet tincture that’s gracing many caprese salads — the pairing of the harvest season’s plump, rich tomatoes with creamy, fatty- flavoured buffalo mozzarella and accentuated with fragrant basil and a drizzle of freshly pressed olive oil.
It’s the original balsamico, long aged in family heirloom wood barrels and slowly mixed over generations into a syrupy elixir, not the mass produced, caramel- coloured and artificially flavoured vinegars we’re so accustomed to seeing these days.
After adding an extra belt notch, it was off to the culture- and historyrich city of Bologna, home of the slowsimmered tomato, meat and red wine ragus, otherwise commonly known as Sauce Bolognese. It’s this ubiquitous sauce we so often see smothered on over- cooked pasta and usually poorly made, resembling usually nothing of the original.
And then to Milan, the fashion capital, also passionate about food and known for their breaded cutlets ( cotoletta Milanese). These are pounded into a delicate, thin layer, breaded and seared over high heat and melted butter so they’re crisp, light and puffy. It’s usually accompanied by the city’s celebrated risotto dish, slow- cooked in liberal amounts of butter and aromatic chicken broth, infused with heady saffron and finished with copious amounts of their beloved Parmesan.
A couple of weeks ago, I ended my season’s quest in northern Italy with a short visit to Venice. Here, I was immersed into the flamboyant beauty of their stunning architecture, from the brilliant San Marco Basilica Cathedral and its glamorous piazza, to Renaissance buildings that now house some of the world’s most renowned hotels, such as the family owned The Bauers, housed in a glorious 16th- century palazzo paired with a superb Art Deco addition.
It’s here that seafood and simplicity reigns. From the Philippe Starckdesigned interiors of the Palazzina G hotel and restaurant comes one of the most basic pasta recipes I’ve ever eaten. It’s a stunning artisanal pasta lightly graced with wonderful anchovies and salted butter, a superb pumpkin risotto enriched with the region’s famed taleggio cheese, perfect for autumn. Also memorable was The Bauers Hotel’s sublime risotto, made with fresh carrot juice and enhanced with candied citrus.
Autumn is a glorious season for comfort foods, and here are some of my favourites from one of the world’s most culinary- renowned regions, northern Italy.
Buon Appetito!