The Cabinet of Curiosities | Of Italian Food and Migration
Food and the world that surrounds it is often the result of many cross-cultural contaminations, as food traditions evolve when people migrate
Welcome to our fresh new Cabinet of Curiosities! What changes since last year, you might be asking yourself. Don’t worry, we will keep on being the source for your monthly food digest and discovery of all things curious about the world of Italian food culture. We’re just going to do it bigger and better.
From this month on, alongside the monthly newsletter, you’ll find short Morsels of stories and insights on Instagram. Both the social Morsels and the newsletter will follow a monthly theme that has the purpose of focusing our narration and uncovering even more in-depth stories. The theme will only be revealed at the end of each month, in the newsletter, but by paying close attention to the Morsels you might figure it out beforehand.
We begin 2024 with a theme that many of us are familiar with yet often don’t go beyond the surface in discovering: Italian food and migration. Food and the world that surrounds it is often the result of many cross-cultural contaminations, and just as every custom, food traditions evolve when people migrate. Italians throughout history have migrated in mass to many parts of the world, resulting in the creation of a new tapestry of recipes that hold the flavours of home with the addition of ingredients found in the new land.
Lost in Translation: Italian Culinary Evolutions in America
by Marianna Pitonzo: pasta girl, professional eater and Italian food opinionist.
As a child, Italian food in America confused me. I grew up in Italy, but being half-American, I would visit family in Upstate New York every summer and loved to indulge in all the American foods that didn’t exist back home, but even then, I would’ve picked a dish of pasta al sugo over mac & cheese any day.
At my core, I was a true Italian. My American family also proudly boasted their Italian heritage, descending from immigrants of the early 20th century. And yet, something didn’t add up. Many of the dishes served at family gatherings were presented as Italian - yet there was always something slightly off. The names would be in Italian, yes, but they would have different meanings from the words. Ingredients I recognized, but the flavours? The preparations were familiar, but the presentation was strange. I was baffled and frankly, annoyed. If we all came from the same place, how could everything be so different?
In my young mind, it was all wrong. Eventually, I would come to learn that just like every custom, food traditions evolve when people migrate. Over time they take on a new identity, but still maintain some pieces of their past. Italian-American cuisine has become something of its own entirely, a valuable and unique tapestry of dishes that tell the stories of immigrants from all over our beautiful peninsula. Recently, I decided to get to the bottom of the food mysteries that used to bug me the most, and here are my findings.
Pepperoni pizza
Without surveys or statistics, I can confidently say that pepperoni is one of the most popular pizza toppings in America. Oily, cheesy and a little spicy, this pizza is a meat-lover favorite. You might be wondering why I was so puzzled by this classic food. In Italian, peperoni (one p) is the plural of peperone, bell pepper. So the first time I looked at the pizza, I could not figure out why it was loaded with circles of hot salame and not strips of vegetables. As it turns out the explanation is quite simple. The Italian word for hot peppers is peperonicini, so in the early 1900s, Italian immigrants began naming spicy sausage “pepperoni” because of the pepper powder that made it spicy.
Biscotti
Biscotti (plural of biscotto) is the generic term for biscuits in Italian. In Tuscany there is a biscuit called cantuccio which is a hard, long cookie with almonds. In the US however, cantuccini are referred to as “biscotti.” You can imagine how mind-boggling that was to me growing up. I could not grasp why these biscuits, with their own specific name in Italy, were just called “biscuits”? But most of all, why was the plural form used for both single and multiple cantucci. Digging deeper into the history of the Tuscan biscuit, you find a variation of them that originates from the city of Prato, called biscotti di Prato. The main difference between the two is that cantucci are baked twice, while biscotti di Prato are only baked once, making them softer. My best guess for why Americans call them biscotti? I assume it’s easier to say than cantucci, yet I still can’t say why a single cookie can’t be called “biscotto,” or for that matter, why a single sandwich can’t be called “panino.” But that’s for another time.
Marinara sauce
My final conundrum involved marinara sauce. Both in Italy and in America, it is a red sauce. In Italy we only associate it with a pizza, topped with tomato sauce and no cheese, whereas pasta with red sauce is just called pasta al pomodoro. So when my American grandma would make marinara sauce and serve it with pasta and meatballs, I did mental gymnastics as I ate. I was confused about the sauce and simultaneously about the meatballs being in the same dish as the pasta. The literal translation of the word marinara is “marine”, so these Italian dishes probably originated along the coast and involved fish. Pizza marinara dates back to the 18th century and was first created by sailors who couldn’t afford expensive ingredients, so anchovies were added to tomato puree and oregano. It’s unclear why Americans use marinara sauce for pasta and not pizza. The mystery remains unsolved for now!
From Italy with love, the journey of Spaghetti and Meatballs
By Caterina di Luzio: Passionate about literature and osterias, takes aperitivo very seriously.
Spaghetti and meatballs is perhaps the most iconic Italian-American dish: when a large number of Italians emigrated to the United States in the early 20th century, pasta with tomato sauce was the most common meal. Over time, with increased well-being, Italians in America began to introduce more meat into their diet - adding ground beef to spaghetti al pomodoro, a meat cheaper than other cuts. This dish, which evokes Little Italy and Disney fantasies, does not, at first glance, seem to have much to do with Italian traditions.
However, if you take a closer look at traditional recipes from central and southern Italy, you find several examples of recipes resembling this somewhat messy, mouth-watering dish. In Abruzzo, around the province of Teramo, spaghetti are replaced by pasta alla chitarra - a long, squared fresh pasta made by rolling out the dough on a steel wire frame, a “guitar”. Pasta alla chitarra is served with a simple tomato sauce and pallottine, little fried beef or lamb meatballs.
Meatballs - whose origin dates back to the days of ancient Rome - accompany pasta not only in Abruzzo: from the Apulian maccheroni all’azzese to the Calabrian pasta mbrusciata, a rich baked pasta, passing through Campania. In Naples, meatballs are the condiment of lasagne and the filling for Sartù, an 18th century rice “cake” stuffed with ragù, eggs and peas, born out of an attempt to make the Bourbon court like rice, healthy but unpalatable to queen Maria Carolina of Austria.
So, to the Italian-Americans from these regions, the combination of pasta and meatballs must have been quite familiar. Although, it goes without saying, American spaghetti and meatballs has since taken a road of their own.
Fugazzeta & Fernet
by Sophie Echeverry: curious and hungry Colombian polyglot passionate about tasting & cooking world foods.
In the 19th century, Italian migration to Argentina began. As the largest migratory movement ever to Argentina, with around two million immigrants, the italo-descendants became established as the greatest European community in Argentina. More than half the country's population have some level of Italian ancestry. Unsurprisingly, modern Argentine society has been strongly influenced by Italian culture. A particularly strong influence is seen in the Argentine street-food scene, where it appears in local pizzerias or from actual Italian products, like Fernet, one of Argentina’s cultural symbols.
La fugazza is a traditional type of Argentine pizza that originated in Buenos Aires. In the late 1800s the Banchero family migrated from Recco, Italy, to settle in the La Boca neighbourhood. Here, they decided to open a bakery. Known for its Italian bread, you could find the fügassa Genovese - a fluffy focaccia topped with generous amounts of olive oil, sliced onions, and occasionally olives. It is due to its Spanish pronunciation, that the fügassa Genovese became la fugazza.
With time, the Bancheros started making their own version of the Italian-inspired breads. They cut the fluffy fugazza in half and added more moisture with cheese, creating a returning customer base obsessed with the fugazza con queso. It was then, in 1932, that they opened their own pizzeria, and the fugazzeta was born.
The novelty and innovation of this simple street food turned into a symbol of Buenos Aires. As variations improved with time, the dish began resembling the classic Neapolitan pizza, yet it remained stuffed with low-moisture mozzarella and garnished with classic fügassa toppings - onions, olives, and olive oil.
Fernet, on the other hand, is an amaro introduced by Italian immigrants in the 1800’s which became a cultural sensation in Argentina. When it first arrived in Argentina, Fernet was sold in pharmacies for medicinal purposes. Nowadays, 75% of Fernet produced globally is consumed in Argentina, triple the quantity consumed in Italy. You might ask yourself, how? Well, in Italy, Fernet is commonly enjoyed after a meal as a digestive. In Argentina, Fernet is the perfect cocktail. The recipe is simple: Ice, Fernet Branca, Coca-Cola, lemon wedges and you’re set!
I think the common misunderstanding with the spaghetti meatballs being only an American dish is the fact that in the US you found in it in the restaurants, whereas this doesn't happen in Italy. I guess that's because they're considered two separate dishes that need to be paid separately. But in Italian houses I believe it was common from moms putting the two things together to optimize time and cooking the red sauce with meatballs as sort of a ragù... At least my mom used to do it, a thing which I always hated 😄 Because, yes, personally I believe those two things don't go well together.