Food For Thought

May it please our readers; today we have before us a man who in his everyday professional life is an attorney. He is educated, he is successful and he works hard. Now you might not believe that a man of his stature would be willing to return home to cook in his kitchen. It is easier to believe he would be too tired to go through the effort that is evidenced in his blog. How could such a man be the creator of such delicious meals and the majority of them make our readers want to lick their computer screens? I’ll tell you how. He is not simply an attorney he is the maestro of his creations. Gentle Readers, I give you … Frank Fariello!

Please tell our readers the reason you chose Memorie di Angelina for the name of your blog. What does it mean to you?

The name means “Memories of Angelina”. Angelina was my paternal grandmother, who, more than anyone else, sparked my passion for good food.

Actually, the name includes a double entendre, as the word memorie can also mean ‘memoirs’ in Italian. I like the idea that through this blog I can be Angelina’s voice, writing her culinary memoirs.

The first time I visited your blog I was a little overwhelmed by the emotions your dishes made me feel. It was a lovely experience. How do you decide which recipes to share with your readers?

Well, first of all, thank you for the kind words! For the most part, I simply blog about the food we are eating at home, much of it the Campanian country cooking of Angelina. But I do have a list of recipes that I eventually want to make sure to blog about, both old favorites that Angelina used to make as well as some of my favorite dishes from Italian regional cooking. Having lived in Rome for many years, I have a special affinity for Roman cooking. And, although I only visited, I also particularly love Tuscan cooking. But having also lived in Paris and Vienna, I like to make the occasional foray into French and (occasionally) Austrian cuisine.

I want to compliment you on the way you compel your visitors to continue scrolling over your blog pages. The settings in the photographs are very well staged. I say staged because the food seems to know it is going to impress us. (laughs) Tell us how you do this.

Thank you again! It’s great that the blog has that effect on you and, hopefully, other readers, too. But I cannot say how I do this, since it is entirely unintentional. One thing I do like to do is to refer back to other recipes and techniques, to try to show how there are common themes in Italian cooking—just as in any cuisine—that underlie the enormous variety.

As for the photography, I am a total amateur, but trying to learn as much as I can about it. It’s my new favorite hobby.

Do you have a family? If so, are you the head cook or do you have helpers?

Yes, indeed, I have two helpers that clean up after I’m done making a mess in the kitchen! (Well, one is a Lab who licks the plates, but never mind…) Wouldn’t be able to cook as much as I do without them!

I cannot believe you have only had your blog up for five months. It’s fabulous to see how much work went into it. What made you decide to become a blogger? Is blogging something you will be doing a year from now?

It’s something I rather fell into, almost by accident. It all started when I joined Facebook earlier this year. Like a lot of people, that allowed me to get back in touch with old friends from school. One of my friends, who works in the film industry, started writing notes on his favorite movies. Well, I thought it might be fun to share notes on something I knew about—food—so back in March 2009 I began sharing recipes with my Facebook friends. My first note was about gnocchi ai funghi—potato gnocchi with mushroom cream sauce. Other friends were interested in posting recipes, too, so we came up with the idea of starting a Facebook group which we called the “Gnocchi ai funghi Recipe Exchange Club”, where my friends and I began to post our recipes.  (The name, by the way, was just meant as a working title until we came up with a better one, but Facebook doesn’t allow you to change the name of fan pages!) The club still exists and has developed quite a following—over 4000 members from around the world and still growing.

As I continued writing on food, I began to feel rather constrained by the limitations of Facebook notes, so I decided to launch a food blog. It was only natural that I should dedicate it to my paternal grandmother, since she really sparked my interest in good food. Many of the early posts were copies of the notes I had done on my Facebook page, with a focus on the dishes that my grandmother used to make. Then I branched out a bit with posts on other dishes, but always in the spirit of the kind of soulful ‘comfort’ food that I learned from Angelina.

I plan to keep blogging indefinitely. It taps into two things I love to do—cook and write—and obliges me to expand my horizons in both areas. The blog requires me to try out new dishes all the time and expand my culinary horizons. I have consciously chosen a different way of approaching the recipes, which I call ‘food stories’. I try to describe how to make a dish as if I were demonstrating the recipe one on one, in real time. I under-emphasize the usual building blocks of exact measurements and times, and try instead to focus on the actual experience of cooking, with commentary as well on the history of the dish, variations, technique, choosing the right ingredients (and possible substitutions). I give measurements when necessary, but put more emphasis on developing a ‘good eye’ and basic ratios. These are the things that actually matter in good cooking. Recipes are guidelines, and exact measurements and times mislead people into thinking that cooking is an exact science, which it is not. It requires direct engagement with the food in the moment and developing good intuition about how to react to what is actually happening in the pan. This is what I am trying to communicate through my food stories. But since I am not following the tried-and-true formula for writing recipes, I am constantly tweaking and (hopefully) improving my approach, so by blogging I am constantly challenging myself.

Blogging has also given me a chance to learn new skills. The most important of these is photography. Like most people, I’ve been taking photos most of my life, but without giving much thought to the matter. Pointing and shooting, as they say. But I very soon cottoned on to the fact that however delicious the dish or engaging the writing, blogging is also—even primarily—a visual medium. So I have tried to learn as much about photography as I can. It is an ongoing learning process, and I still have much more to learn.

So, in short, you never stop learning and growing when you blog, and I love to learn, so I plan to blog for the foreseeable future. And the feedback from readers has been so wonderfully positive,  it is hard to stop anyway—I am a glutton for flattery!

Personally I believe you are a food genius. Your Linguini al Limone, so simple, yet it almost made me cry it was so beautiful. I can go to your blog and find something unique and special every time.  For example: Moules au curry, Tagliatelle al tonno e panna, Pasta e piselli, Gnocchi ai fungho, and I could go on and on. What inspires you to use these ingredients in the creations of your meals? Explain that part of your personality that is released, when you walk into your kitchen.

Thank you again. As I said, I am a glutton for flattery! Seriously, though, this is a difficult question to answer. As I said, I basically just cook what I eat every day, using the ingredients that I like. I should say that most of the dishes you will find at Memorie di Angelina are based on traditional recipes, my personal ‘take’ on the classics. Frankly, my own view is that invention is something you should only undertake when you already have a deep understanding of the basic techniques and ‘rules’ that underlie a particular cuisine or set of cuisines. Even after almost 40 years of cooking, I feel that, in some sense, I am still learning the basics. After all, the great cuisines of the world—and for me that means Italian, French and Chinese—have been developing for centuries, so you can spend a lifetime just learning and perfecting the traditional recipes. I think it is a huge mistake to go off and be ‘creative’ before you have a good grounding in the classics, and that leads to much bad cooking and worse eating. So I don’t really feel ready to invent. But I do add my own personal touch through perfecting techniques for getting the best results from traditional recipes and coming up with interesting variations based on classic themes.

That is not to say that I don’t think cooking is a creative activity. Just the opposite. I still find the whole process of turning raw ingredients into a finished dish wonderfully creative, almost miraculous. For someone like myself who spends most of his day dealing with intellectual and analytical challenges, cooking gives me a chance to exercise the left side of my brain. That’s why I find it both engaging and relaxing.

Have you ever considered writing a cookbook and dedicating it to your Grandmother’s memory? It seems like a wonderful idea. Most of us have fond memories of a beloved family member, too. A book would appeal to the masses.

I get that question pretty often—and sure, the thought has crossed my mind. It would be a lot of fun, and I would love to leave that kind of testament to nonna Angelina. But for the moment I am focused mostly on making the blog as enjoyable and successful as I can. I have a few writer friends and I know getting published is easier said than done. And the cookbooks field is incredibly crowded. But who knows, maybe some day…

By the way, speaking of publishing, I have been asked to write a column for a new online magazine on Italian food that will be launched in the near future. Will keep you and readers posted.

Which seven ingredients must be in your kitchen most of the time? Which are your favorites?

That’s a hard one, but if you go to the Memorie di Angelina website, in the right hand column you’ll find my list of the “Essential Italian Pantry” items such as olive oil, pasta, canned tomatoes and beans, and various herbs and seasonings. There are a lot more than seven there, however, lol! Leaving aside essential pantry items and talking about main ingredients, those change with the seasons. But perhaps this time of year—late Fall into early Winter—is when my favorite ingredients appear in the markets: greens like endive, escarole and the various chicories, lentils and legumes of all kinds, stew meats, charcuterie, nuts in their shells, fennel, pears and wonderful aged cheeses…

Do you have a particular pan, skillet, pot, dish or utensil that you cannot be without?

My needs are pretty basic, but I particularly like to cook with enameled cast iron pots, like the ones from Le Creuset or Staub. I have a fairly large collection, but the ones I use most often are the soup pot and the braiser. These are great for stews, soups, pasta sauces and just about anything you need to cook over gentle heat. Of course, I cannot do without my non-stick skillets, a few basic stainless steel saucepans (my favorite is from Fissler, a great German brand that is popular in Italy but hard to find here in the US) for boiling, blanching and simmering just about anything, a stock pot for making broth and, of course, a pasta pot. And I love my pressure cookers. They make short work of everything from beans to broth to stews to polenta to risotto. I don’t understand why they seem to have gone out of fashion. Every chef should have at least one.

Back in Italy, one of my favorite pots in the cool weather months was a special polenta pot, with an attachable electric paddle that would stir the polenta automatically so that the cook (i.e., me) didn’t have to. Impossible to find in the States and, because of the difference in current, I could not bring back the one I had over there. Such a shame. Polenta tastes best when it is simmered and stirred for an hour or more, but I just don’t have the patience or the stamina to stand there stirring for that long…

For the professional men reading this, what tips would you care to share about cooking?

Hmmm… the most important thing, I suppose, is that cooking does not have to be a long, drawn-out affair. There are so many dishes that can be made in 30 minutes or less, there is no need to eat out, or order in, every night. And cooking (preferably with a glass of red wine at hand) is a wonderful way to relax and get your mind off the office!

How did you hear about Half Hour Meals?

If I remember correctly, I was contacted by email and invited to join.

When and why did you decide to join?

Soon after I was contacted, in August 2009. I joined essentially out of curiosity, and as a way to get exposure for my blog. As a busy professional, I was attracted by the concept of quick but homemade dishes.

What do you enjoy about Half Hour Meals site?

I like the format—unlike some other food sites, it’s easy to navigate and visually ‘clean’. There are some great blogs on the site, and many of the bloggers are also ‘foodie friends’ of mine. And then there are the recipes—just the type of thing I like, quick and easy, but very satisfying. I especially enjoy seeking out recipes from cuisines that I don’t often cook from. And although I haven’t yet participated in the discussion board, there are some great topics being discussed there.

If asked, what would you tell others about Half Hour Meals?

Try it, you’ll like it!

Every time I think of Italy, I shall think of you working away in your fragrant kitchen. It is time to close but it would be remiss of me not to tell you how very much I have enjoyed learning about you. Your food is wonderful and your blog is a great place to visit and tell other people about. Keep on doing what you do best and I encourage everyone to stroll through the pages of Memorie di Angelina. You are in for a treat. I rest my case.