Gray Rose - River Cafe: Italian kitchen

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Epub ISBN: 9781446460436
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Photography: Neville Kidd. Text and recipe assistants: Lucy Boyd and Alex Colman.

First published in 1998 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 Text copyright Rose Gray and Ruth Rogers 1998 All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owners. Ruth Rogers and Rose Gray have asserted their right to be identified as authors of this work. First published in 1998 by Ebury Press, Random House, 20 Vauxhall Bridge Road, London SW1V 2SA. Random House Australia (Pty) Limited, 20 Alfred Street, Milsons Point, Sydney, New South Wales 2061, Australia. Random House New Zealand Limited, 18 Poland Road, Glenfield, Auckland 10, New Zealand. Random House South Africa (Pty) Limited, PO Box 337, Bergvlei, South Africa. Random House Group Limited Reg. No. 954009. A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. ISBN 0 09 186798 3 Printed and bound in China by Midas Printing International Ltd.

The food we cook in The Italian Kitchen, like the food we cook in the River Cafe, is inspired by the seasons late spring and early summer in series one and autumn and early winter in series two.

We want you to be as excited as we are by the variety of vegetables and other produce which are particular to these seasons and learn as we did to use basil in the summer when the flavour is pungent, make polenta in the autumn when the maize has just been milled, and cook fennel in the winter before the bulbs start to shoot and into tough stalks.

All the recipes we cook in the programmes can be cooked at home. We demonstrate the techniques we use in the restaurant, and work with alternative equipment griddle pans instead of the char-grill and domestic ovens at high heat instead of the wood oven. In every programme there are simple recipes with few ingredients that can be prepared quickly such as Spaghetti al Limone as well as demanding ones such as Bollito Misto but all the recipes represent what is, to us, the essence of Italian food.

The photographs in this book are of the people who make the Parmesan, find the truffles, produce the wine and press the olives. Their care and precision, their passion and knowledge inspire us. We want, through this book, and the television series, to inspire you to cook these recipes, to get pleasure from using such special ingredients and to feel more confident and knowledgeable about cooking Italian food, the food we love most.

The Italian soups we cook have been chosen not only because they are the ones we like most but because they convey our approach to cooking so well. They are robust and thick and are often served as an alternative to risotto or pasta.

We have picked soups that reflect both the different regions and seasons. Broth soups from North Italy, like Risi Bisi Verde, a soupy risotto made only in the early summer with peas, spinach, rice and Parmesan; bread soups like Summer Ribollita, thickened with fresh cannellini beans and seasoned with summer herbs; and the famous very, very simple Pappa al Pomodoro which has only four ingredients and is so regional that you would hardly find it outside Tuscany. From Puglia in the south of Italy we chose to make our favourite fish soup Spicy Mussel Soup the key ingredients being tomatoes and fiery chilli.

In the autumn series we show you how to make Pumpkin, Chestnut and Farro Soup. These ingredients are all harvested, and are at their best, from October to December. In Tuscany, in the first week of November, the pressing of the new seasons olive oil starts. This oil has a very special, intensely peppery flavour and gives us the perfect reason to make Cannellini Bean and Parsley Soup.

We hope that making these soups with their distinctive characteristics will inspire you to adopt our approach to ingredients, choosing them with real care and preparing them in a precise and exciting way.

The word ribollita means re-boiled, and traditionally was applied to leftover minestrone which was reheated on the second day and served with added bread. The classic ribollita is made with dried beans and cavolo nero, a winter vegetable. Our summer ribollita uses fresh cannellini beans, Swiss chard and summer herbs.

The soffritto forms the base of the soup. Onions, celery, chard stalks and herbs are cooked together gently for the soffritto which is particularly important to the taste as there is no stock to enrich the flavour. The best extra virgin olive oil is an essential ingredient.

This simple, thick soup is found only in Tuscany, where there are almost as many local versions as there are local cooks. Every small trattoria will have Pappa al Pomodoro on the menu, especially in late summer when tomatoes and basil are at their best. Our version relies on really ripe and flavourful tomatoes (although good-quality tinned can be substituted), the pungency of fresh basil, summer garlic and extra virgin olive oil. The bread used must have strength, and should ideally be a sourdough bread such as ciabatta or Pugliese, both of which are made with olive oil.

Made only in October and November (when chestnuts and pumpkins are in season) this is a typical River Cafe soup. The flavour comes from the chestnuts which are very sweet, and the pumpkin which is roasted to concentrate the taste. The first two ingredients are soft and floury, so the farro, which is soaked and cooked separately, is added to give texture.

The best chickens to use when making stocks are free-range boilers. This stock should taste of chicken rather than vegetables and herbs; simply use carrots, onions and celery, keeping both the chicken and the vegetables whole. It is cooked for less time than the more traditional methods in order to achieve a lighter stock.

Use turbot bones and halibut and monkfish trimmings to make this fish stock. Put them with herbs and vegetables which complement fish for example, bay, fennel and fennel seeds, chillies and parsley stalks. White wine or dry vermouth adds perfume and depth to the stock. Cook the ingredients gently for only 20 minutes.

Zuppa di poveri (soup of the poor) was one of the first soups we cooked in the River Cafe when we made it with purple sprouting broccoli. This version uses wild asparagus or thin sprue. The basis of the soup is a good chicken stock very much part of the Italian kitchen with toasted bread and grated Parmesan which melts into the broth.