Fulvio Ferri & Mary Jane Cryan

A Rough Guide to Seasonal Eating

One of the reasons that fruit and vegetables taste so good in Italy is that they are eaten during their specific season. No one would try to plan a winter menu around fresh artichokes or cherries nor should you be looking for porcini mushrooms before mid-October. Here is a rough guide to fruits and vegetables according to the season when you can find them in farmers’ gardens and buy them at the local (central Italy, Lazio) markets. Seasons may vary according to where you are on the Italian peninsula.

Hot house strawberries and grapes are available out of season and can be purchased in supermarket chains…but the taste and prices show that they are not in season.

Photo by G. De Camillis

Thanks to gardener, chef and cookbook author Fulvio Ferri for his valuable advice.

Fulvio’s Spring Recipes

Frittata con asparagi selvatici e luppoli

In spring you can gather wild asparagus in the woods and along the sides of country roads while luppoli (hops) are to be found among the canes and along small brooks.

Quantity for four . Ingredients : 50 wild asparagus, 50 luppoli, 4 eggs, l clove garlic , 4 spoonfuls extra virgin olive oil, salt to taste. -After having washed the greens and taken away the tough part, immerge them in boiling water for a few minutes.

-brown the garlic in oil in a non stick pan, then take it out.

-Shake excess water from the asparagus and luppoli and mix them for a few minutes in the pan. Add the well beaten eggs and continue with the frittata . Be sure to cover the pan to cook the eggy surface. Add salt to taste when its almost finished. Enjoy with light rosè wine.

Pizza Napoletana con Fiori di Zucchina

Tasty and easy to make. A good way to use up the season’s many zucchini flowers. Ingredients for four: 500 gr. pizza pasta (pasta di pane)from the baker or at the supermarket.

4 cleaned alici (anchovies), 50 large zucchini flowers, extra virgin olive oil, salt, pepper to taste

-Delicately clean the zucchini flowers, open them and set them on a large plate , drizzle with a bit of olive oil, salt, pepper. Set them on the plate so that they get the flavours on both sides while sitting in the fridge for about an hour.

-Spread the pizza pasta on an oven pan that has been oiled, work the pasta with your fingers until it covers the entire pan.

-Spread the zucchini flowers on the pasta covering with several layers until the flowers have all been used.

-Add the anchovies broken into small bits and spread evenly

-Cover all with the cut up mozzarella in thin slices so that the flowers are totally protected.

-Pass in the pre heated oven (160-180 °) and cook until the mozzarella is lightly browned.

-Serve immediately cut in 4 parts with a cold white wine.

Carciofi All’Agnesina

Artichokes Agnesina style

I learned this dish from my grandmother Agnesina who had a restaurant in Vetralla. Since we had a large family she knew how to save money on the ingredients; in fact, the carciofi are neither “alla giudia” nor “alla romana” but a little bit of both.

Ingredients for 4 : 4 cimaroli (the best and biggest, from the top of the plant) artichokes, 4 alici cleaned & deboned, 2 cloves of garlic, fresh mentuccia (mint), lots of extra virgin olive oil, dry white wine.

-How to clean the artichokes: Take off the external leaves until the white part is visible at the base, cut the top 1/3 of the artichoke and cut the stem until the base of the artichoke so that it can stay “seated” in the pan.

Immerse them immediately in water with vinegar or lemon juice to keep them from turning black. Clean the stem with a knife and cut in pieces measuring 7/8 cm. & add them to the water .

Cooking: Enlarge the “mouth” of the artichoke and put in half cloves of garlic, the fresh mint and a small anchovy. Pour oil over the artichokes and set them in a terracotta pan. The pan’s surface should be covered with oil. Place them close to each other with the stem pieces.

Add water and wine in equal parts but not submerging the artichokes.

Cover the pan and cook over a low fire until the liquid begins to boil lightly. Move them once in a while to be sure that they do not stick to the pan as they cook . They are ready when a fork easily enters the base of the artichoke.

Enjoy with white delicate wine.

January

In Sardegna the myrtle berries are ripe for picking and to be turned into mirto liquore.

February & March

Wild asparagus and hops (luppoli) start pushing their way through the underbrush. It takes a trained eye to see them along country roads. First salads such as puntarelle, crisp spinach, romaine lettuce.

April

Salads, artichokes (carciofi) the best are the braccioli from the fields of Tarquinia & Cerveteri , peas (piselli)

Cherries, fennel (finocchio), rocket ( rucola or rughetta) for a bitter taste in salads . Zucchini are at the top of their beauty and goodness and the flowers can used in a variety of ways: on pizza, stuffed and fried. Black truffles (scorzone), tiny wild strawberries (fragolini di bosco) , asparagi, pears.

Pears Truffles

June

Peaches, green beans (fagiolini), apricots (albicocche), patate novelle Blackberries can be found along many country roads.

July

Eggplant (melanzane), plums and prunes, tomatoes, melons.

August

Blackberries (more), green apples used for cider, watermelon (anguria)

September

Figs, grapes - “Settembre l’uva è fatta e il fico pende”

October

Mushroom hunting begins, porcini can be found in Vetralla’s woods, chestnuts.

November

Truffles, mushrooms, olive harvest, the pumpkins (zucca) that have been growing all summer are now ripe for harvest and will be used in a thousand ways throughout the winter.

Olive harvest in Vetralla

December

Sicily’s oranges and Sorrento lemons are at perfection.

Special Home food Cooking under Etruscan sun at Fontana del Papa