'Nduja!

From streets to stars

Last year some friends and I went to Calabria to visit a class mate of us. It was his birthday.
While we were at his birthday party, one of our friend was hungry and on the table there were a lot of typical dishes. He took a plate on the table, he thought that it was a big piece of cake, but he didn’t know how wrong he was! After the first piece of that "strange cake", he changed color and he began to sweat. At first we laughed about that joke, but then we started worrying because we knew that it wasn't a cake at all but a very very spicy sausage. He asked for help and we passed him a glass of milk because it is one of the most effective methods against spicy. Water or other similar drink do not help much against the spicy. Since that day every time our friend eats spicy he holds a glass of milk in his hand.. just in case!

The name of the food our friend confused with a cake is 'nduja or simply duja. The name originates from the Latin word "inducere" that means to introduce. 'nduja consists of meat and spices. The anduja is typically associated  to the entire Calabria: it is usually made of fatty pork meat with the addition of Calabrian hot pepper, stuffed into the blind gut and  finally smoked. The 'nduja is consumed on a slice of toasted bread or it can taste even better if used fried to cook a sauce.

Glossary

Nduja: meat, and extra spicy spreadable Calabrian.
Spicy: having an agreeably pungent taste
Spreadable: it’s like a cream that you can spread, for example, on a piece of bread
Classmate: when someone is with you in your school classroom
Sweat: when you feel hot water evaporates off the surface of your skin
Laugh: when someone find something funny he laughs
Joke: it’s like a prank, a little game with friends
Sausage: highly seasoned minced meat stuffed in casings
Spices: any of a variety of pungent aromatic vegetable substances used for flavoring food
Fatty: containing or composed of fat
Blind gut: initial part of the intestine
Slice: a thin flat piece cut off of some foods
Sauce: flavorful relish served as an accompaniment to food

Naples street food: between tradition and modernity

Newsroom: GH9

Naples has two different types of street food: the best traditional ones and the modern ones that allow us to enjoy the new face of Naples.

Walking around the streets and alleys of Naples can be a completely different experience when accompanied by good street food. The Street Food is often criticized by many, but especially loved by people and tourists who cannot leave the city without trying some traditional Neapolitan products.

Naples is not only a place of tradition and culture, but in recent years new cultures from all around the world have set there bringing with them new forms of street food. Not only classic flavours, but also the American and Asian ones.

We want to propose you some recipes and descriptions of Traditional and Modern street food.

Zeppole and Panzerotti

Why not walking around the city while eating some Zeppole or Panzerotti freshly baked?

The Acuzano family, from 1938, manages the historic “Friggitoria Vomero”: here you can find Zeppole that are fresh pasta with a pinch of salt, fried in hot oil. The Panzerotti are potatoes croquettes stuffed with parsley, parmigiano or pecorino, salt and pepper, fried in hot oil as well.

Frittatine di pasta

Frittatine di pasta are that type of dish that once you have tried it, you cannot stop eating!
This is a traditional recipe, that you can try in every pizzeria while you are waiting for your pizza.
It is a croquette stuffed with bucatini, besciamella, cubes of ham and green peas. The mix is fried in hot oil.
On the web you can find a lot of recipes to make them by yourself, but the ones prepared by the shop “Imperatore” have an incredible flavour!

Taralli napoletani

This is a product that nowadays represents a tipical excellence.

Taralli are made with flour, sugna (lard), one cube of brewer’s yeast, almond, salt and pepper (the right amount), all baked for 25 minutes. The best Taralli are made by the Infante family, that owns “Casa Infante”. They are the exellence from the 1940. 

Sfogliatelle

And, finally, here we are to the typical Neapolitan dessert: la Sfogliatella. This historic delight conquests every palate, Neapolitan or not.
The mixture is made by flour, strutto (lard), water, a pinch of salt, honey, stuffed with semolina, fresh ricotta, powdered sugar, eggs, water, sweets, vanilla extract, cinnamon, a pich of salt.
The historic “Pintauro” is the most famous bakery, that takes out the best Sfogliatelle of the planet!

Nowdays there also modern and tasty street food like Kebab, Pita, Hamburger and Hotdogs ...but that cannot be compared with the traditional Neapolitan dishes!

And remember... In Naples when the meal is ready you will always hear someone saying “Jamm à magnià!”

Glossary

Allow: To let someone do something;
Alley: Narrow street with walls or buildings on both sides;
Manges: Skillfully handle something;
Delights: When you like someone or something;
Recipe: Directions for making a dish or dessert;
Brewer’s yeast: Used as leaven in baking and brewing;
Flavour: the taste experience when a savoury condiment is taken into the mouth.

The Queen of the recipes

Newsroom: Truceklan!

Hello we are the Truceklan group!
We chose this topic because one of our class mate is very good at preparing this dish, and sometimes he makes us taste it (we are very lucky!)
This is his mother's recipe. We asked her if she could give it to us: at the beginning she did not want but later she decided to share it.

Ingredients:
- 1.5 kg of eggplant
- 3 eggs
- 150 grams of flour
- 500 g of tomatoes
- 1/2 onion
- A few leaves of basil
- 1/2 cup of oil
- 300 grams of smoked cheese
- 150 grams of grated Parmesan cheese
- salt
- oil (extra virgin olive oil)

How to prepare Parmigiana
To prepare the sauce soften the onion in oil, add the chopped tomatoes, just before finishing the cooking, add the basil and season with salt.
Slice the eggplants lengthwise, with a 2.1 cm thick, dip in flour, beaten eggs with a little salt and fry in oil.
In a baking dish greased with oil throw a ladle of tomato sauce, forming a layer of eggplant, a handful of grated Parmesan cheese, a ladle of sauce, mozzarella slices, another layer of eggplant and so on. Finish with the tomato.
Bake at 180 degrees for forty minutes.
A variant provides that eggplants are grilled instead of fried. In another, the eggplants are peeled and rolled in whole wheat flour, beaten egg and again in flour, making the dish look like baked pasta, because the eggplants treated in this way become almost unrecognizable.

Glossary
Recipe: a recipe is directions for making a dish or dessert
Eggplant: egg-shaped vegetable having a shiny skin, typically dark purple
Flour: Flour is a fine, powdery ingredient that's used to bake bread and cake and it is made by grinding wheat or other grains.
Egg: an egg is the shell-covered, roundish object that's laid by birds and reptiles, which usually has an embryo inside.
Potato: The potato is a tuber. You can find it baked, mashed, or fried,.
Mozzarella: Mozzarella is a soft, mild cheese that's commonly used to make pizza. If you love that stretchy white melted cheese on your slice of pepperoni, you're a fan of mozzarella.
Ham: Ham is a type of pork, or meat that comes from a pig.
Cheese: Cheese is a dairy product that's made from milk. Many delicious foods with cheese are made even more delicious .
Oil: You can dress your salad with olive oil and use motor oil in your car's engine
To cut: The verb cut means the act of slicing with a knife
To mix: To mix is to combine or blend different things together.
Season: one of the natural periods into which the year is divided by the equinoxes and solstices or atmospheric conditions.
Ladle: it  is a large spoon with a deep bowl for scooping and serving soup and other liquids. If you make clam chowder, it might be messy to serve it without using a ladle.
Baking tray: a cooking tool consisting of a flat rectangular metal sheet used for baking cookies or biscuits.
Immerse: to put something in a liquid.
Oven: An oven is a device for baking food using heat.
Pan: A pan is a container used for cooking.