By Bonnie S. Benwick
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, July 25, 2007
To Italophiles, the duke of Urbino-style hat that food writer Faith Heller Willinger wears seems fitting. She is confident culinary nobility, this American expat who has spent more than three decades discovering and promoting the food and wine of her adopted country. And to those who sigh at the mere mention of Firenze, her Florence, where she teaches cooking classes, an audience with the new grandmother constitutes immersion therapy.
The greatest, the best, the most authentic: The details unfold unhurriedly, with the total recall of a bilingual sports geek.
She's currently stateside, on tour to support her fourth book, "Adventures of an Italian Food Lover: With Recipes From 254 of My Very Best Friends" (Clarkson Potter, 2007, $32.50). She's particularly thrilled that her sister painted the watercolor illustrations that run through it.
At a recent book signing at the Dupont Circle FreshFarm Market, Willinger, 61, held court unfazed by the crush of the crowd and the heat in her trademark Moschino sunglasses and scarf, bovine earrings (in honor of butcher Dario Cecchini), loose red T-shirt and khakis. She joked in Italian with Washington chef Cesare Lanfranconi of Ristorante Tosca as he sweated through a cooking demo of ricotta-stuffed zucchini flowers.
Later that day, she answered questions while she savored a casual summer feast at the home of longtime friends Charles Yonkers and Ann Harvey Yonkers, the market's co-director: glasses of cool pinot grigio, seafood salad, grilled bread, a tomato-basil-onion mixture dressed with vinegar and Willinger's hand-carried olive oil (Castello di Ama, her favorite), fresh mozzarella, crab cakes, steamed corn on the cob and slices of melon that she called "melon with prosciutto." Excerpts from the conversation follow.
The prosciutto's missing.
I did a recipe in "Red, White and Greens" for Pasta Poma Sarde al Mare: Pasta With Sardines at Sea. It's a concept that I love. It means they're in the sea -- and not in the dish, which is vegetarian. That's so Italian.
That whole concept guided my life from then on. It sounds like you're actually having something wonderful when you're missing an ingredient.
And you've put olive oil on your corn instead of butter.
I get that from my Tuscan husband, who refuses to admit that butter exists.
It's easy to eat this well in August. What are you eating in Italy, say, in February?
Beans, leeks and potatoes, and onions. Members of the brassica family: kale, cauliflower, cabbage. And tomatoes that have been put up. The great thing about the sauce you made in August is that you've stored it in a glass jar. A tomato from a can doesn't taste like a tomato anymore.
You can write a recipe and still not know its secrets. Did any Italian chefs hold out on you?
Gennaro Esposito, a fabulous chef in southern Italy, told me how to make a sauce. It was just two or three little dots on a plate . . . yellow, sweet and sour, lemony and delicious. Served with raw seafood. Just the most delicious thing I'd ever eaten.
So I asked him for the recipe, and he explained the whole thing to me. It was very complicated and it involved six days of procedure. So I figured first I'd do it his way and then figure out something simpler.
Well, I made it his way and it didn't work -- at all. I went back and stood there and watched him do the whole thing. And, yes, there were many, many steps that were left out.
You're sure that was on purpose?
Yes! The thing I considered so interesting from his recipe is that Italians brine their citrus rind. That's what's done when they candy any citrus. I looked at all candied peel recipes everywhere and nobody mentioned that stage.
Did any of them balk at your divulging their recipes in this book?
No. There's only one person who refused to tell me what I wanted to know, and, as it turns out, he was someone who wouldn't have made the cut for the book, anyway; he was in a region I didn't include.
You've studied with Italian cooking masters great and unknown. When did you feel like you'd earned their respect?
About 15 years ago, I attended Marcella and Victor Hazan's cooking school in Venice. She has done amazing things for Italian food, and Victor's been a huge inspiration for me in writing recipes. I cooked for them at home, and when Marcella eyed a pesto I'd made with cavolo nero -- dark Tuscan kale -- she busted my chops until she stuck her finger in the bowl and tasted it. Then she said, "Maybe you should think about teaching." I passed the Marcella Hazan test.
So you've been saving string on this book for a long time. Did you test as you went along? The recipes read very clean.
I want my recipes to work. For me, a cookbook is a real message. If I don't have something I really want to say, what's the point? I think this book is different from anything else out there because I've been collecting friends and recipes for 35 years.
My friends have introduced me to their friends, and I've introduced them to my friends.
You've made some of your friends famous.
Dario Cecchini, the legendary butcher, is somebody who has become a legend because I wanted everyone to meet him. And they did, and, deservedly, he has become quite famous.
" Mario, Meet Dario" -- that was the name of one of your classes.
I introduced Mario [Batali] to Dario, and that was the beginning of something fabulous.
Then Armandino, Mario's dad, wanted to learn to make salumi. He'd always dreamed of it. Mario asked me to help him. I said I'd work with him under two conditions: He had to learn to speak some Italian, and he needed knife skills. He went to Peter Kump's cooking school, took some language classes, and then he came over to me.
We spent a month traveling around with a norcino, the guy who goes to somebody's house and breaks a pig apart and makes all the stuff.
And that's how Armandino learned to make salumi.
Speaking of catchphrases, you're referred to as La Faith. Where'd that come from?
Dario. I need that "La" before my name. We both think it's funny.
You're after the best ingredients, all the time. But there has to be bad food in Italy.
First, there's long-life milk (UHT). It's become huge in Italy because it lasts a long time. We have ultra-pasteurized, too. It lasts for a week and a half instead of three days. There's bechamel in a box. We have a cake mix in a box. All you do is snip off the top and pour it in the pan.
Another thing is called quattro salti in padella, which means "four leaps in the pan" -- frozen food that you defrost in a skillet with some butter or some olive oil. It could be pasta, even! But the truly disgusting thing is that bars and places that serve lunch use it. I don't know anyone who eats that.
I heard someone at the market ask you if real pasta is dying in Italy.
Nothing is dying in Italy. There will always be someone who wants to do things the traditional way.
Massimo Bottura is somebody who was visited early in his chef career by Alain Ducasse. He spent time studying with him. He went to Ferran Adria to learn, as well, but has always stayed within his regional flavors.
At one point, Bottura did a balsamico gelatin, like this really thin sheet, draped over some rabbit. It was a traditional flavor used in a new way. You have to admire that.
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