Here is a simple, Italian country bean soup with escarole. The beans are cooked, the escarole is wilted, and garlic, celery, and parsley are sauteed and added. Halved cherry tomatoes add color and a burst of summer flavor, and their acid brings out more flavor from the escarole and the beans. A good quality olive [...]

Minestrone is the classic Italian vegetable soup, and an excellent way to enjoy the bounty of summer. In Italy, the soup is often finished with pesto, which adds its beautiful, bright green color, as well as a great deal of flavor. The salty Pecorino or Parmesan cheese in the pesto also seasons the soup – [...]

I cooked a lot of Italian dishes this week from some of the cookbooks I bought recently, and as I was already doing the string beans from Mario Batali’s Babbo Cookbook, I decided to also do the string beans from one of Biba Caggiano’s books, and compare the flavors. The two recipes are very similar; [...]

Here is a simple recipe for string beans that gives them a deep, distinct Italian flavor. The dish starts with a soffrito of red onion, garlic, chile flakes, and anchovy paste, which blend together to form a complex, balanced flavor base; zesty, pungent, spicy, and salty. The beans are added and sauteed for 15 minutes, [...]

I made this penne pasta dish the other night from leftover ingredients from other pasta sauces I had made. I had some asparagus and fava beans in the fridge which I of course didn’t want to go to waste, a piece of prosciutto and some Parmigiano and Pecorino cheeses, and canned San Marzano tomatoes, which [...]

Here is a bright, fresh pasta based on a spring combination: tender baby artichokes and freshly-shucked fava beans. It’s green, grassy, and slightly bitter, and anchovy cream adds salty and rich notes to the dish. A little drizzle of high-quality, fruity olive oil tossed in at the end really gives this pasta a lift.