Lidia’s Got Your Back with Commonsense Italian Cooking

Years of fame from authoring best selling cookbooks, hosting TV cooking shows, opening restaurants and gourmet food stores, including the many Eataly stores including the one in Chicago that opened eight years ago, and creating her own line of pastas, sauces and readymade foods hasn’t even slightly dimmed Lidia Matticchio Bastianich’s enthusiasm for spreading the word about the glories of Italian cuisine. Indeed, if she had her way, we’d all be experts in Italian cooking.

“Italian food is very simple,” Bastianich tells me as we chat about her cookbooks including one of my favorites, Lidia’s Commonsense Italian Cooking: 150 Delicious and Simple Recipes Anyone Can Master (Knopf $35), which she co-authored with her daughter Tanya Bastianich Manuali. “It’s all about good ingredients and not fretting about the recipes.”

Passing on the traditions learned from helping her mother and grandmother cook, Bastianich revels in the email and comments she gets from fans crediting her with teaching them how to cook Italian.

“People think I don’t know how to make an artichoke or risotto or pasta,” she says, “and when they learn, they are so excited. At one of my book signings, a woman told me that when her kids get home from school and they ask what’s for dinner, if she says I’m cooking Lidia, they’re happy.”

In her book, Bastianich expounds on using our judgment when it comes to cooking.

“We all have commonsense in life, in the kitchen we all have it too, this book brings it out,” she says. “It’s straightforward. Recipes are not law. It’s okay to change a recipe according to what we have in the house. I want people to be comfortable with food.”

Intense food memories of her grandmother’s Italian kitchen mix with those of coming to America at age 11 at a time when the Italian ingredients we take for granted now—fresh ricotta, pasta and mozzarella, a wide selection of Italian charcuterie, the Arborio rice necessary for making risotto and high end canned tomatoes—were difficult if not impossible to find. Bastianich describes herself as feeling “yanked from a cocoon.” And indeed life was much different. From milking goats and helping harvest the seasonal garden bounty, she instead wanted to be American which meant eating like an American.

“I was intrigued by Jell-O and TV dinners because that’s what being Americans was— heat up a TV dinner and sit in front of the TV to eat,” she recalls. “Sometimes my mom would give me a fried zucchini sandwich for school. I was so embarrassed. In high school and college you did what your peers do.  My mother was very upset.”

Fortunately, not only for her mother but for American home cooks, Bastianich, realizing she had a heritage that was rich, reconnected to her roots and became an advocate for real food versus what she calls American “utility” food.

“My father never would have eaten a TV dinner,” she says. “Food has given me so much. If I can share that it’s a great gift.”

Sidebar: Mega Italian

Partnering with her son Joe as well as several others, Bastianich opened the 50,000-square-foot Eataly in Manhattan over a decade ago, the group then brought the concept of all thing’s Italian cuisine-wise to other cities including Chicago. The two-story 60,000-square-foot store features a plethora of restaurants, cooking classes a gelateria for gelato lovers and enough retail food vendors to send even the most blasé foodie into overdrive. On October 22 & 23, Eataly is presenting their Tuscan Wine & Cheese event, a focus on artisanal cheeses, regional wines, and seasonal bites on October 22 & 23, Eataly Restaurant Fest until October 31, and How to Eataly offering tips for living and eating better as well as getting the most out of fall until November 1. As for other events, there are cooking classes, market tours, and more all the time.

Eataly is located at 43 E. Ohio St., Chicago, IL; 212-229-2560 http://www.eataly.com/eataly-chicago

The following recipes are from Lidia’s Commonsense Italian Cooking.

Chicken Breast with Orange and Gaeta Olives
Pollo con Olive ed Aranci

  • 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
  • 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
  • 1 1/2 pounds thin sliced chicken cutlets
  • 1 teaspoon kosher salt
  • all-purpose flour for dredging
  • 1 large red onion, sliced
  • 1 cup pitted Gaeta or Kalamata olives, halved
  • Juice and zest of 1 orange
  • 1/2 cup white wine
  • 1 teaspoon fennel powder
  • 2 tablespoons chopped fresh Italian parsley

In a large skillet over medium heat, add the olive oil and butter. Season the chicken with 1/2 teaspoon of salt and lightly dredge it in flour. Lightly brown the chicken in the skillet (you want the chicken to end up with a blonde-colored crust and slowly build the color, and flavor, up) on both sides, about 2 minutes per side. Cook the chicken in batches, if necessary, depending on the size of your skillet. Remove to a plate as it is colored.

Once the chicken is colored, add the onion and cook until softened, about 3 to 4 minutes. Add the olives, orange juice and zest, white wine and fennel powder. Add chicken back to the skillet and simmer until the chicken is just cooked through and the sauce coats the chicken, about 3 to 4 minutes. Season with remaining salt, sprinkle with the parsley, and serve.

Food Network Ina Garten Panettone Bread Pudding

Lidia’s Pear Bread Pudding

  • 2 tablespoons softened unsalted butter
  • 6 large eggs
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • Zest of 1 lemon, grated
  • 1 cup milk
  • 1 cup heavy cream, plus more to whip for garnish
  • 4 cups day- old 1/2-inch country- bread cubes, crusts removed
  • 2 Bosc pears, peeled, cored, and cut into 1/2-inch chunks
  • 1/3 cup blanched sliced almonds

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Coat the baking dish with softened butter. Whisk the eggs in a large bowl. Add all but 2 tablespoons of the sugar, the vanilla, and lemon zest, and whisk to lighten the mixture. Whisk in the milk and heavy cream. Add the bread and pears, and pour the mixture into the prepared baking dish. Sprinkle with the remaining 2 tablespoons of sugar and the almond slices.

Bake until the pudding is set and puffy and the top is golden, about 40 to 45 minutes. Let cool on a rack for 15 minutes; serve warm or at room temperature, garnished with whipped cream.

Serving Size

Makes 6 to 8 servings

Apple Cake

Serves 4

  • 2.2 pounds golden delicious apples
  • 2 eggs
  • 3.5 ounces flour
  • 3.5 ounces sugar
  • 3.5 ounces Amaretti
  • 3.5 ounces butter
  • 1 tablespoon milk
  • 1/2 pack yeast for baking

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Butter and flour an -8– or -9–inch springform pan.

In an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream the butter and white sugar until pale and light, about 1 minute. Add the eggs, one at a time, and beat until light and fluffy, another minute or two. Beat in the vanilla.

Sift together the flour, baking powder, and salt. Pour the dry ingredients into the mixer with the lemon zest, and mix until just combined. In a medium bowl, toss together the apples, brown sugar, and walnuts. Scrape the batter into the prepared pan, smooth the top, and then sprinkle with the apple mixture.

Bake until a toothpick comes out clean from the center of the cake, about 35 to 40 minutes. Let cool on a rack, then unmold, and cut into wedges to serve.

Lidia’s newest cookbook, A Pot, A Pan, and A Bowl: Simple Recipes for Perfect Meals was just released, here’s a recipe from the book. Find more recipes on her Facebook page.

Follow Lidia at @lidiabastianich

Eataly: All About Pasta: A Complete Guide with Recipes

The largest marketplace of all things doing with Italian edibles in the U.S., the 63,000-square-foot Eataly in Chicago is a mecca for food lovers, a vast space crowded with a variety of venues including unique specialty restaurants, stalls selling meat, cheese, breads, sweets and fish (though really stall is too plebian a term—these are sparkling and enticing places where you can get lost for seemingly hours looking at all the delectable offerings), rows of olive oils and wines and even a Nutella Bar (be still my beating heart). One of more than 40 worldwide concepts, Eataly Chicago, owned by Joe Bastianich and Mario Batali,  not only offers a plethora of ingredients, classes and events but also an expanse of cookbooks including the second in their Eataly series, All About Pasta: A Complete Guide with Recipes (Rizzoli 2018; $25).EatalyPasta_p027 btm

With the guiding philosophy of “the more you know, the more you enjoy,” this book immerses readers into a world of pasta from the easily recognizable—spaghetti and linguine—to the rarely found and more esoteric—maltagliati (translation: badly cut), mallopredus (pasta dough with saffron) and tajarin—thin egg pasta strands also known as taglierini. Of course, you’re never going to learn all the different types of pasta  because even the experts don’t know since no one has successfully completed a survey of all the pasta shapes in the world. There are simply too many different shapes and multiple names for each.EatalyPasta_p123

But there are ways of differentiating one from another and how to use them in creating delicious meals which the book shares. Take long and short pastas. As a basic rule, long dried semolina pasta pairs with oil-based sauces, smooth tomato sauces and seafood. Tube-shaped semolina pasta, known as la pasta tubolare, with its hollow centers, is perfect for capturing the ingredients used in the sauce.EatalyPasta_p049

Le pastine or small pasta is most often cooked in either broth or chunky soups.  Other pasta types include le perle del Mediterraneo–semolina pastas made by rubbing hard wheat flour with water until small balls form, cereali antichi is made with heirloom or ancient grains, while croxetti ot corzetti is the name for two different types of pasta that are pressed or stamped rather than rolled out.

We told you was complicated and it gets even more so as the book explores the different types of flours used for making pasta, the different sauces and il tocco finale—the finishing touch which can be such flavorful ingredients as cheese, basil, spicy chili oil or just a handful of minced flat leaf parsley to add a bright herbaceous flavored to almost any dish.EatalyPasta_p071 btm copy

The wonders of this book, with its immense amount of information as well as recipes, is that you can go deep or you can just choose the information you want. Either way, you’ll end up knowing a lot more about pasta—”a world fashioned out of flour and water.”

The following recipes are courtesy of Eataly.

Vesuvio al Ragu di Salsiccia e Scarola

Vesuvio Pasta with Sausage Ragu and Escarole

Serves 12

12 ounces sweet sausage

1 tablespoon red wine

One cup tomato puree

½ cup chicken or beef stock

3 cup shredded escarole

Find sea salt to taste

Coarse sea salt for pasta cooking water

1 pound Vesuvius pasta or other short pasta preferably with a complex shape

3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

Grated Romano, pecorino or parmesan cheese for serving

Remove the cost sausage casings and crumble the meat into a bowl. Sprinkle the wine over the meat and massage the wine into the meat by hand until it is soft and elastic, about two minutes about two minutes.

Place the meat in the cold skillet with high sides. Placed the skillet over low heat and slowly cook the meat until it’s no longer raw looking., about two minutes. Do not brown the meat.

At the tomato puree and stir to combine. Increase the heat until the tomato puree is simmering gently.

Pour in the stock, stir once, and decrease the heat until the ragu is at a very gentle simmer, with a bubble just occasionally breaking the surface. Simmer uncovered without stirring for two hours. The meat should poach in the liquid and turn very soft.

When the sauce is cooked, carefully spoon off and discard any liquid remaining on the top. Stir in the escarole and cook until just wilted, about two minutes. Season to taste with sea salt. Remove from heat.

Bring a large pot of water to boil for the pasta. When the water is boiling salted add the pasta. Cook until the pasta is al dente. Smear a small amount of the sauce on the bottom of the warm pasta serving bowl. Then transfer it immediately to the serving bowl. Top with remaining sauce and toss vigorously to combine. Drizzle on the olive oil and toss again. Serve immediately with grated cheese on the side.

Spaghettoni al Tonno (Pasta with Tuna)

Yield: 4 servings

1 pound spaghettoni (or bucatini)

1 (7-ounce) jar Italian tuna preserved in olive oil, drained

2 tablespoons salted capers, rinsed & drained

2 tablespoons plus 1 teaspoon extra virgin olive oil

¼ cup breadcrumbs

1 yellow onion, minced

1 clove garlic, sliced

1 Calabrese chili pepper in olive oil, drained & minced

Zest of 1 lemon, grated

Coarse sea salt, to taste

Place 2 tablespoons of the olive oil in a large pan over medium-low heat. Add the onion, garlic, and chili pepper and cook, stirring frequently, until the onion and the garlic are golden. Flake the tuna into the pan, and cook until heated through, about 2 minutes. Stir in the capers and the lemon zest, and remove from the heat.

Toss the breadcrumbs with the remaining olive oil, and toast in a toaster oven or cast-iron skillet over medium heat until crisp.

Meanwhile, bring a large pot of water to a boil. Add the sea salt and spaghettoni. Cook, stirring frequently with a long-handled fork, until the spaghettoni is al dente.  Drain, reserving about 1 cup of the cooking water.

Transfer the pasta to the pan with the tuna. Toss vigorously over medium heat until combined, about 2 minutes. If the pasta looks dry, add a small amount of the cooking water, and toss until it looks moist.

Garnish with the toasted breadcrumbs, and serve immediately. For another taste of Calabria, repeat tomorrow.

Eataly Chicago

Eataly: All About Pasta