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Mary Taylor Simeti on "The Heart of Sicily"
Author Mary Taylor Simeti, an expert on the culinary history of Sicily, discovered the traditions of Sicilian cuisine alive and flourishing on the centuries-old agricultural estate and vineyard of the Tasca family. In her Foreword to The Heart of Sicily, Simeti places this classic cookbook by Anna Tasca Lanza in its historical and cultural context:
The Tasca family tradition of fine food first came to my notice quite by chance, in an Italian magazine article about the return to fashion of fancy weddings. For the marriage of the count’s granddaughter, the article said, the wedding breakfast at Villa Tasca included medallions of chicken served in baskets woven of pasta and decorated with fresh flowers dipped in wax, the re-creation of a centuries-old recipe their chef had discovered in the family archives.
I was researching the history of Sicilian food at the time and longed to know more, but I was far too shy to present myself out of the blue, my natural timidity intensified by the rather daunting picture of the Sicilian aristocracy and its chefs that was emerging from my reading. I had been using the loving descriptions of food in Giuseppe di Lampedusa’s novel The Leopard to show how the elaborate dishes developed in the baronial kitchens – dishes with roots that went back through the Renaissance as far as the classical era – had been joined in the 19th century by newcomers from the north. In the famous ballroom scene, for example, “huge blond babas, Mont blancs snowy with whipped cream” take their place on the refreshment table beside traditional Sicilian sweets such as the “triumph of gluttony” and the “virgins’ cakes.”
The fashion for French cooking had invaded the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies on the heels of Napoleon’s army, and a French-trained chef became a status symbol in Sicily’s aristocratic houses. Endowed with great prestige and influence, the monzu (a local corruption of monsieur) added consommé and foie gras to the Sicilian menu and guilded the local culinary lilies with vast quantities of cream and butter.
In the early decades of the 20th century, Sicily emerged as a favorite winter resort for European royalty, and the Palermo monzu chefs cooked for kings and Kaisers. One of the most distinguished of these, Giovanni Messina, reigned in the Tasca kitchens for more than half a century, and it was his pupil and heir, Mario Lo Menzo, to whom the magazine article referred. No wonder I was intimidated. References to the employers tended to be equally discouraging. The men the monzu chefs served were passionate about the prestige and quality of their table, but they disdained the practicalities of financing it. Enlightened exceptions notwithstanding, the Sicilian aristocrats were much more preoccupied with spending the income from their vast agricultural holdings than they were with improving them….
When I finally did interview him, chef Mario proved to be extremely amiable, as generous with his laughter as he is with his recipes, and as I came to know Anna Tasca Lanza, I learned that she is justifiably angered by journalists who describe her father, the Count of Almerita, as the “last of the Leopards.” While he does share Prince Fabrizio’s appreciation of fine cooking, Giuseppe Tasca is no resigned witness to aristocratic decline. Rather, he is a successful farmer and a daring entrepreneur who has transformed the small winery on the family estate of Regaleali into an international concern. His is one of the few private houses still to perpetuate the great Sicilian baronial cuisine, yet he and his family are deeply attached to the rural world of Regaleali, its products, and its traditions.
It is the link with Regaleali that gives a special character both to the history of the Tascas and to their cooking. This vast tract of gently rolling hills in the center of Sicily’s wheat-growing interior was purchased in 1830 by the Mastrogiovanni Tasca brothers, rich grain merchants from eastern Sicily. Although their heirs married into the aristocracy, through the generations they have remained dedicated agriculturalists, first turning Regaleali into a model farm by introducing new techniques and prize-winning straings of wheat and cattle and then, in recent years, replacing outdated crops with the vineyards that furnish the Regaleali winery.
The food that Anna Lanza presents in The Heart of Sicily is colored by this double thread of Sicilian history, the aristocratic and the agrarian. It is, as anyone who has had the privilege of eating at Regaleali can testify, exceptionally fine food, prepared for the most part from ingredients produced on the estate: lamb and poultry from the Tasca flocks, ricotta and pecorino from the day’s milking, vegetables from the garden, and fruit from the orchards. There are the elaborate showpieces Mario creates for special occasions, and the simple and strongly flavored vegetable dishes that visitors to the island rarely have occasion to taste, since Sicilians consider them too humble to offer to guests.
On Easter Sunday, the Tascas expect to ear their lamb in a rich, cream-based fricassee that only a monzu would have invented. But as children, Anna relates, they used to squabble among themselves over who got to eat the Stigghiole, delicious but decidedly plebeian twists of grilled baby lamb intestines, more commonly sold in the streets and marketplaces of Palermo. The elemental and earthy tastes of country cooking – sun-dried tomato extract, home-baked bread, Spaghetti aglio, olio e peperoncino – alternate with the sophisticated nuances of a more cosmopolitan cuisine such as Pasta alla moda dei monzu – in which the only typically Sicilian ingredient is pasta – or Prince of Wales cheese brioche.
The recipes follow the dictates of the seasons and their festivals and of the caprices and tastes of strong-minded family members. At Regaleali, as in any kitchen that still has close ties to the land, one prepares what the season provides; feast-day menus were decided upon decades ago. The personal preferences of the count have become Mario’s prejudices. Anna and her sisters (all expert cooks) defend their own inclinations, and the countess manages to reconcile everybody before they reach the dinner table. What results is a distinctive and very personal version of Sicilian cooking.
In The Heart of Sicily, it is Anna’s voice that provides the most distinctive flavor of all. Together with her recipes, she shares with us her world, in a delightful blend of personal and regional history. She takes us by word and by photograph through a year at Regaleali, showing us how the changing seasons alter both the landscape and the food it produces, describing in a beguiling fashion the rituals with which the Tascas observe their family anniversaries, the feast days of their faith, and the crucial moments of sowing and harvesting. Each page is imbued with her tolerant, amused, but passionate love for Regaleali’s past and her profound commitment to preserving and projecting the best of Regaleali into the future. The book is a celebration of family, of the deep and constant affection and respect, and the occasional friction, which bind it, a celebration of the responsibilities and rewards of belonging to a tradition, of having strong roots.
In the preface to my own book on Sicilian cooking, I said that the inspiration to write the book had come from my discovery that Sicily’s “density of history and tradition is fascinating and deeply satisfying when it informs and gives substance to the actions and rituals of daily life.” It is hard to imagine a better illustration of what I was trying to say than the story of Regaleali and its cooking.
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