Herbs & Spices

We should call these “Lyn’s Leeks” because Lyn, who tested many of the recipes in this book, had to make them several times before getting the recipe right. In each instance the leeks she made were delicious, but she pushed on until she achieved the caramel color and glazed look of those we serve in the restaurant.

I love the way the funky flavor of artichokes complements the mild flavor of buricotta cheese in these crostini. The currant and pine nut relish on top of the buricotta adds a touch of sweetness and acidity, and a little mint pesto livens up the whole story. The result: one of the most popular offerings at the Mozzarella Bar, and one I always recommend to vegetarians.

I love a fish in meat’s clothing, and that’s what this is: a mild-flavored fish cooked in a rich veal jus. I got the idea for it at a restaurant called Ribollita, in Chiusi, the nearest large town to my house in Italy. There, they wrap a pork filet in lardo and then smother it with green peppercorn sauce. Eventually the lardo found its way onto fish instead of pork. We use veal stock that we have left over from making the Veal Breast Stracotto (page 235), but if you haven’t made that dish recently, you can substitute any quality veal or beef stock.

For me, a “tell” for a restaurant I probably don’t want to eat in is seeing a Caprese salad on the menu when tomatoes are out of season. I knew I wanted to serve a Caprese at the Pizzeria, both because everyone loves it and because it is an icon of a casual, inexpensive Italian restaurant. Since we opened in November, when tomatoes were no longer in season, I took it as a challenge to figure out how to present these flavors in a way that was every bit as good as a Caprese made with sweet, vine-ripened summer tomatoes, even when such tomatoes were nowhere to be found. This adaptation, which I first named Winter Caprese, consists of fresh burrata cheese, basil pesto, and cherry tomatoes on the vine that have been slow-roasted to concentrate their sweetness and flavor. I changed its name to Mozza Caprese when winter ended, tomatoes came into season, and it had become so popular that I could not take it off the menu. I suggest you serve it with Fett’Unta (page 65) to sop up the wonderful, juicy flavors left on your plate. The recipe for slow-roasted tomatoes makes enough for six or more of these salads, and the pesto recipe will give you more than enough pesto for that many. So, to expand the number of servings you make, just increase the amount of burrata you buy.

One of the things I like about Italian food in general is that it is not a wimpy cuisine; the flavors are bold and decisive, as you will see in this preparation of bacalà, or salt cod. I first tried this classic preparation at Ristorante Da Delfina, at the same lunch where I also discovered Ribollita “Da Delfina” (page 115). I loved how hearty the dish was and how pronounced the flavors were. In keeping with the Florentine tradition of eating bacalà on Fridays, we serve this as the Friday piatto special in the Pizzeria, and in keeping with our tradition of cooking Pizzeria dishes in the pizza oven, this, too, is cooked in that oven. We start with fresh cod and salt-cure it in the style of old days, where the fish was cured as a way of preserving it. Ideally you will start with a center cut of cod, which will yield more even-size pieces, which will salinate evenly. The cod takes three days to cure, so plan accordingly.

It’s impossible to walk into any bakery in Italy without seeing a lattice-covered jam-filled tart called a crostata, so when I penciled out a short list of the desserts I would want to make at Mozza, it was only natural that crostata was on that list. For the longest time, I just couldn’t decide how I wanted to serve it. An unadorned crostata seemed fine for a bakery, but it looked too naked on the plate to serve alone at the Pizzeria. At the same time, I was struggling with how to incorporate another Italian favorite, panna cotta, into our repertoire. Somehow, in the course of all of my experimenting, I got the idea to substitute the creaminess of gelato, the most obvious accompaniment to a fruit tart, with the creaminess of panna cotta, and I put the crostata and panna cotta together. It worked, solving both problems at the same time. We drizzle the panna cotta with saba, Sardinian grape must. What we created was a dessert built of all Italian elements that, though you would never see them together in Italy, somehow work. I’m proud of that. The recipe makes twelve crostate, four more than you will serve with the panna cotta. I based the yield on the number of crostate the dough would make—and I figured you could find someone to eat the extras. You will need twelve 1/2-cup miniature brioche molds to make the panna cotta, though you could use 2-ounce ramekins—your panna cotta will taste just as good, it just won’t look as pretty. The crostata dough is the same as the Pasta Frolla (page 276) with toasted sesame seeds added. Dahlia and I got the idea when she was working on a sesame-seed biscotti. We didn’t like the biscotti enough to include them in our repertoire, but we really liked the subtle flavor and crunch that the seeds added to the dough.

The first time I ate at the Atelier of Joël Robuchon in Paris, I saw a whole fish delivered to another customer that I could tell had been boned and deep-fried. The skeleton had been removed but the head and tail, which flipped up so nicely on the plate, had been left intact. I watched in awe as the diner carved into the fish and ate it head to tail, without any of the usual fuss required to eat around the bones of a whole fish. I was so impressed that I told Matt I wanted to put something like that on the Osteria menu. He chose to grill the fish rather than fry it, but it’s the same idea. We chose to use orata, also called dorade or sea bream, a classic Mediterranean variety, because you see whole branzino on every Italian menu from California to Campagna, and we wanted to introduce our customers to something different. We wrap the fish in a fig leaf in the fall and a radicchio leaf the rest of the year before grilling it in order to contain the herbs stuffed inside the fish. Boning the fish is the most difficult part of making this dish—and I won’t lie to you: it is tricky. I promise that with patience, a good sharp knife (preferably a fish knife or a 6-inch boning knife) and fish tweezers, you will be able to do it.

Americans think of vanilla as “plain” ice cream, the connotation often being that it is boring. But vanilla, if it’s done well, is neither plain nor boring. Although they are expensive, it’s worth the extra money to buy large, plump vanilla beans, which will impart significantly more flavor than lesser-quality beans. My favorite are Tahitian.

When we started working on this book, I had a battle with Matt and Carolynn about whether to ask for the various pestos that we use to be made using a mortar and pestle or in a food processor. I always make pesto using a mortar and pestle, and I feel strongly that pesto tastes better this way. That said, as Matt was so kind to remind me, when I make pesto, it’s usually because I’m in Italy in the summer, where it gets light at five, dark at ten, and I have all the time in the world. At the restaurant we make pesto in such volume that we have to do it by machine; it would not be practical for us to make it by hand. “This is a restaurant cookbook,” Matt said, “and how we do it at the restaurant is in a food processor.” I’m sorry to say that Carolynn took Matt’s side. “Save that for the Lazy Days in Panicale cookbook,” she said. Although here they gave you instructions for how to make it in a blender, I’m hoping you’ll prove me right by taking the extra time and using elbow grease to make yours with a mortar and pestle from time to time.

Matt got the inspiration for this dish from the Whole Hog Dinner that the restaurant Oliveto, in Oakland, hosts every year for chefs, food professionals, and friends from all over the world. One year they served pasta with cured pork, pickled peppers, and tomato sauce, which was so good that when we got back to Los Angeles, Matt decided to make his own version. Fiorentini means “Florentine,” but here refers to a twisted short pasta shape made by Setar, an artisanal pasta producer in Napoli. If you can’t find it, use another dried, artisanally produced pasta in its place, such as maccheroni alla chitarra, a big tube-shaped pasta from Napoli. The tubes collapse when they cook so they’re like empty ravioli.

Just when I think we have perfected a dish, I come across a version that someone has done better, and that’s what happened here. I always thought we did a great job with the chicken liver pâté we served at the Pizzeria, and it is one of the most raved-about items we serve. The combination of pancetta, lemon, and capers is delicious, and we hand-chop it, which gives it great texture, so I was totally happy with these crostini until I went to the Spotted Pig in New York City and had theirs. April Bloomfield, the chef, served her chicken livers on bread that was doused with—not drizzled and not brushed, but drowned in—olive oil, which made the chicken liver taste that much better. When I came back from that trip, we started doing the same thing, drowning the toast for our chicken liver pâté in the best finishing-quality olive oil we have. After I copied April’s bread, I think our version of chicken liver crostini went back to number one—or at least we’re tied for first place.

Pizzelle, which some say are the original cookie, are thin waffle cookies from the Abruzzo region of Italy. They’re made of a simple batter of flour, eggs, sugar, and butter, and are cooked in a pizzelle iron (available at cooking supply stores and online sources) that is either electric, like a waffle iron, or handheld over the stove, which is what we use. Note that this recipe makes enough batter for 16 pizzelle. They should be served the day they’re made, but the batter lasts for a week in the refrigerator so you can reserve the extra batter to cook fresh pizzelle whenever you want them. We serve pizzelle with the Caramel Coppetta with Marshmallow Sauce and Salted Spanish Peanuts (page 296) and also sticking out of each serving of gelato or sorbetto. Thin wafer cookies are often served in a coppetta of gelato in Italy, and it just makes the presentation more festive.

Traditionally, lamb shanks such as those in this recipe would be braised and served in all their glory, and subsequently, making lamb ragù would be a way to turn a relatively small amount of leftover meat into tomorrow night’s pasta dinner. We braise the lamb just so that we can pull it apart and turn it into ragù. It’s a decadent thing to do, and results in a luxurious and delicious pasta. Enjoy.

In the Italian tradition of stuzzichini, I don’t like to put out so many appetizers that my guests will ruin their appetites, but two things that I must serve whenever I entertain are roasted olives and toasted almonds tossed with olive oil and sea salt. These olives, which are tossed with citrus zest and garlic confit, are as beautiful as they are delicious. If we get an unusual olive variety, we might throw that in, but normally the combination we use is Lucques, Castelvetrano, Taggiasche, and Picholine. You can use whatever combination of olives you want or have access to, as long as they’re not the canned pitted things I grew up with. Also, keep in mind that it’s ideal to have a variety of colors and sizes. You can prepare the olives up to a month in advance. Keep them in the refrigerator and roast them just before serving. If you are preparing them in advance, however, omit the garlic confit and garlic oil, as they will cause the olives to spoil more quickly. Prepare the olives with only the regular olive oil, and add the garlic and garlic oil up to several days before you are ready to roast them.

This cocktail is named after the brand of amaro, or bitters, that we use to make it. You could use another bitters if you can’t find Meletti.

Dahlia developed these cookies—shortbread topped with rosemary, pine nuts, and nougatine—to serve alongside the Butterscotch Budino (page 272) at the Pizzeria, to contrast with the smooth texture of the pudding. We now make two versions: the small cookies to serve alongside the budino in the Pizzeria and a larger version to sell individually for Mozza2Go. You will need a 1 1/4-inch or a 2 1/2-inch cookie cutter to make these.

These are chewy caramels with the rich, mellow flavor of pure vanilla.

It’s easy to grow lemon verbena in a pot inside or in the garden. The leaves themselves are bitter and unpleasant to eat, but when infused into cream, the sweet lemony flavor is a perfect pairing with white chocolate.

The pungent flavor of crystallized ginger blends perfectly with the richness of white chocolate. These truffles have a slightly granular texture, which adds to the pleasure of eating them.

Mint adds a burst of fresh flavor to dark chocolate. These are the perfect truffles to serve after dinner, or anytime for that matter.