Lidia's Kitchen

LIDIA

Buon giorno. I'm Lidia Bastianich, and teaching you about Italian food has always been my passion. I want to taste it. Assaggiare. It has always been about cooking together... Hello....but it is also about reminiscing, reflecting, and reconnecting through food.

WOMAN

Mmm! Delicious!

LIDIA

For me, food is about family and comfort. Whatever you're making, always remember... Tutti a tavola a mangiare.

ANNOUNCER

Funding provided by... At Cento Fine Foods, we're dedicated to preserving the culinary heritage of authentic Italian foods by offering over 100 specialty Italian products for the American kitchen. Cento -- Trust your family with our family. Authentic and original. Amarena Fabbri -- A taste of Italy for brunch with family and friends. Amarena Fabbri -- the original wild cherries in syrup. Grana Padano -- authentic, Italian, rich in tradition yet contemporary. Locatelli Pecorino Romano cheese from Italy. Handcrafted from 100% sheep's milk. Rovagnati Gran Biscotto, a true Italian ham. Crudo o cotto? Gran Biscotto. And by...

LIDIA

Flour -- We all have a new appreciation for it. And as I cook and bake at home, ever more I think of how much work it takes to make flour -- the harvesting, the milling, going to the fields when the workers were working, and going to the mill with grandma to mill some flour. Wheat harvest and pasta. Learn how to turn your leftover bread into croutons with this classic salad refreshed with baby kale. A fresh pasta may take a bit more time and effort, but this one is worth it. It features a creamy chickpea sauce, and each bite is extra satisfying. Grain is the basis of bread, pasta, everything that's anything for the Italian table. Mietitura, the harvest of the grain, usually comes towards the end of June. It's a project. There's a system. Grandpa would call people to help -- neighbors -- and then he would do the same for them. So, they kind of divided their time, who's gonna do the mietitura when, because, in a day or two, the big machine, the thresher, would come and separate the kernels, the heads from the stems, from the hay. And that was a big process. The left straws were put in piles, whereas the grain was taken away and ultimately brought to the cantina. When we were finished with the whole field, the straw was ultimately used for the animals. There was a whole aroma in the air -- a beautiful smell and great memories. Caesar salads has become so popular. Everybody loves it. But I'll give you a little different version. We'll make Caesar salad with kale, with baby kale. It's easy, it's delicious, and, you know, maybe more contemporary of the times, if you will. For a good Caesar salad, you need croutons, and I have here a piece of old focaccia. Cut it in pieces like that, toast it in the oven until it is nice and crunchy, and you let it cool. And then we go to make the sauce, the dressing for the Caesar salad. Garlic in the dressing for the Caesar salad. What really kind of emulsifiers the Caesar salad is the cooked yolk of two eggs, actually, for this. Dijon mustard gives it a nice little zest. Lemon juice. White wine vinegar. And what gives the flavor to all of this is actually the anchovies. Let me put them in right now. And you don't have to cut them. And...

Food processor whirring

LIDIA

Okay, so that's mixed. Now a little bit of oil just to give it kind of that creaminess.

Food processor whirring

LIDIA

I think that should be enough, but let's taste. You know, I always tell you, go in and taste and see if it is what you like, if anything is missing. So, it's nice and dense. Let me taste. It's perfect. So let's dress the salad. These are the baby kale leaves. And they're just wonderful. They're great. You wash them, of course, and you let them drain well. So I think that's enough of that. Just to make you more comfortable and familiar with the Caesar salad, let's put some romaine greens, as well, just like that. Okay. Let's add the croutons. Okay. The dressing is salted just right. But we have an awful lot of salad here, so we do need a little bit of salt. And let's just toss it like that so everything is mixed. So, pour it right from here. And I'm confident that it will need all of this dressing, but, otherwise, you know, put it in a little pouring cup, and you can always add. You know, once you have the dressing added, you can't take it back, but you can always add. So always hold back some of the dressing. And you want all of the leaves to be really coated with the dressing, just like that. Now you say, "Okay, where's the cheese?" But, you see, you put the cheese once you have coated all of the leaves. So now, when you add the cheese, it'll stick to the leaves. If you were to put the cheese before and then the dressing, the dressing would make clumps of cheese within the salad. This way, it'll stick to the leaves. Then you'll get that kind of freshness of cheese on each leaf. Okay. And some fresh pepper. And the salad is done. Mmm. Okay. Maybe just a little bit more grated cheese. And voil. Let me taste it for you. Mmm. Mmm. It's delicious, and the combination of the romaine and the kale, with the Caesar dressing -- really good. It's so great to be in touch with your grandchildren. They're growing up, they're going off to college, off to work, and, you know, the media is the way to do it. Love FaceTime with them. Miles is calling me, so... Hi, Miles. How you doing?

MILES

I'm good, Nonni. How are you?

LIDIA

All right. School, everything is fine?

MILES

Everything's great.

LIDIA

So, are you having fun, a junior in college? You're in a home now. You know, you're off-campus, right?

MILES

Yep.

LIDIA

All right. Are you cooking these days?

MILES

We are cooking full-fledge -- every single day, lunch and dinner.

LIDIA

So, are you the chef?

MILES

We take turns doing certain stuff. I'm mainly the pasta cook since I make the best pasta in the house, so... And usually, other people will switch off doing the other main entres, like the steak or the burgers. It really depends.

LIDIA

Oh, good. I'm so proud of you. So what pasta did you make lately? Tell me.

MILES

It was a fusilli with maybe some kale, some scallions, some baby spinach, and we chopped it all up and sauted it together. We were trying to be healthy.

LIDIA

I had one like that in the magazine. You must have seen it in my magazine.

MILES

Oh, yeah. Yeah, 100%. It's still in my kitchen, actually.

LIDIA

Ah, still in your kitchen. Well, keep it close by. And then, at the end, you put some ricotta, and that binds the whole thing. Do your friends like the ricotta?

MILES

I mean, I'm sure I can't cook it as good as you, but they do love it.

LIDIA

Do you put anything else in it?

MILES

I mean, sometimes I'll throw a little bit of potatoes in there, and I'll, like, add some extra protein.

LIDIA

You can do bacon. Little pieces of bacon in the beginning.

You guys like that. MILES

Yeah. Potatoes and bacon. That's a good idea, Grandma.

LIDIA

Yeah. And chicken breast. You can do chicken breast. Sliver it in in the beginning with onions and all that. So this pasta sounds very good. I remember in my magazine it's nice and creamy. And you know what about this pasta? It lasts. You can reheat it, and you can leave it in the pan, and even half an hour later, it's still good.

MILES

That's the best part about it -- having leftovers in general. It always gets me through lunch in the morning. Sometimes I eat pasta for breakfast. It depends. Whatever's in the fridge. If I'm hungry, I'm gonna eat it.

LIDIA

You're gonna eat it. So, tell me, do you have any more questions of me?

MILES

Maybe how to make a good Bolognese sauce, like a homemade Bolognese. That would be pretty dope.

LIDIA

Bolognese sauce. That's a good one. I'm gonna send you my recipe, and then we'll talk again, and I'll lead you through it. And it's gonna be -- You're gonna be, boy, the winner of the whole campus.

MILES

It'll be epic.

LIDIA

Miles, it was so great to talk to you to sort of catch up with you and see you still love to fiddle around in the kitchen. You keep on doing that, okay? And Grandma's here for any questions that you have.

Let me know. Ciao. MILES

See you soon. Love you.

Bye. LIDIA

I love you. Isn't that great? I am still a confidant or an adviser to my grandchildren. When they need me, when they're in the kitchen, and for some emotional elements, they call Grandma. And I love being there for them. When the kernels of wheat were brought home from the harvest, Grandma would spill them out of the burlap bags all over the floor of the cantina, and she would let them dry a little bit. Us kids, you know, it was a good feeling to run your fingers through this -- lots of grains of wheat, if you will. You would sort of fall in them and push each other into it. We had fun, and she would portion her grains so that it would last for the whole year. So she saw how much she had. And sometimes she had plenty, and sometimes she didn't have enough. It wasn't a good yield. And she knew that someplace down the line, if she wasn't careful enough, she would have to buy some flour or wheat. Lagane pasta with chickpeas. Different region of the South. Have a different name for this very simple dish. It's all about ceci -- chickpeas -- and pasta. So let's make the base. The ceci, the chickpeas, they were dried chickpeas, and I soaked them overnight. That's how you reconstitute dry legumes of most, whether you have beans or ceci, and then you just drain it. So some olive oil, crushed garlic. And I'm crushing the garlic because I want to get a lot of flavor out of it, but then I want to be able to pick it out. Let's put the pancetta in there, just like that. Okay, let's put the ceci in there. The rosemary, the whole branch right in there. Bay leaves -- two, nice and fresh. And peperoncino. Now, peperoncino -- This is, you know, Southern Italian cooking, and they use a lot of peperoncino. Here I have some hot water, and we'll just... We'll bring this to a boil, lower it to a simmer, and it'll take about 45 minutes to an hour for the cecis to really soften up. In the meantime, we'll make the pasta. And the pasta is very simple. These are the ingredients. I'll put a little salt in the eggs and whisk them. Then I'll whisk the eggs right in the water. Add a little bit of oil. Okay. And here is the flour. To make pasta, it's just a question of flour and the liquids that you add. A rich pasta, of course, has eggs. The more eggs you put in, the richer the pasta. But even my grandmother, you know, we used a lot of half and half. One egg would be enough for two people for pasta. The rest, water would kind of compensate. And the pasta maybe is not as rich, but it's more porous, and it really absorbs. And I kind of love that kind of, if you will, poor man's pasta. It's lighter. Let's put this in. So I'm looking at it. Usually when you get the dough collected to one side, the pasta is done. A little bit of flour on the board. And if the pasta is a little sticky, you knead in a little bit more flour. And this looks like it's very workable. Wrap it in plastic wrap. Let the ceci cook, the pasta rest, and then we'll finish the lagane. Me dice quanto. Passa cosi?

CONCETTA

Passa.

LIDIA

I'm getting instructions. Poca la volta. Little bit at a time. So, I have Concetta to my right and Maria to my left. And it's not unusual that the women make their lunch together. They make their pasta together. So we're gonna make orecchiette and cavatelli. So, orecchiette and cavatelli are very much the pasta of Puglia. You know, where I come from, we use a different flour. We use the white flour. This is 100% semolina flour. As you can see, it's very yellow. Different than white flour. It's like little fine sand. The semolina is used all over Southern Italy because it's delicious. It's the microclimate here that really renders it extra delicious. Allora, Concetta, col orecchiette, che salsa fate?

Tutla verdura. LIDIA

Vegetables. A lot of vegetables with the orecchiette.

CONCETTA

Con pomodori fresco, basilico.

LIDIA

Fresh tomatoes, basil. On Sunday, the meat rag.

Speaking Italian

Speaking Italian

LIDIA

She said that the cavatelli are typical with legumes, ceci...

Speaks Italian

LIDIA

lentils, beans, and seafood. How wonderful is this? In this setting, the birds are chirping, and I have two wonderful, traditional professors, if you will, in pasta making. I am ever so grateful, but it also is nostalgic, because I recall as a child making pasta with Grandma. And for you, it's a great tradition to bring to your home.

Conversing in Italian

LIDIA

Okay, so the ceci has cooked. It's tender. The pasta has rested. What's beautiful about this recipe of pasta is that you have it for two times. All you need is for that amount of ceci half of this pasta. So the other half, take it, wrap it up nice and tight, and freeze it. And in a week or so, make another plate of lagane e ceci. Let's cut this in half. So that's good. A little bit of flour. Okay. And I'll roll it first through the largest opening. And on the side, of course, you adjust it, and let's get... Okay. Okay. So I'm gonna cut it in half. Wide and kind of shorter. Let's get to... The next to the last one -- You don't want it too thin. Okay. Okay. So let's see. Like this. And like this. And the lagane are like this. Almost like a pappardelle. One. Okay. Okay, we'll clean up, and then we'll finish the lagane and ceci. During the harvest, the men, of course, worked and all that. I was the runner. I wasn't in the field harvesting, but I was the runner between Grandma's house and the fields. You know, the men work hard. It was hot. They needed drink. So I would run back and forth, bring water, bring some wine. And then, of course, it came lunchtime, and there was no call up and delivery. Grandma was cooking. And usually it was a big bowl of pasta with either chicken or rabbit. whatever she had in-house. A little prosciutto to begin with, a little antipasto, cheese, and, of course, the bread that she baked, and some wine. And she would take this big bowl of pasta in a tablecloth, just like a purser's bag. She would tie that, put a cover on the bowl of pasta, and then put the bread on top and whatever, and tie it like a beggar's purse. And we would go in the fields and bring them lunch. And we waited until they were all finished to have the lunch, relax a little bit. They went back to work. We gathered all the dishes and went home and washed. Chickpeas are just finishing to cook. The pasta is boiling nicely. Just about cooked. Let me just put a little bit of oil in the sauce, just like that, and let me fish out the pasta. Put it right into the sauce. Now, a little bit more just for the pasta, just like that. Okay, this looks good. Let me get it closer to -- Mmm. This looks just delicious. So we'll add some of the Pecorino cheese, which is a pronounced cheese very much used in Southern Italy, Sicily, Calabria, Apulia. Absolutely. I'll use some of the grated cheese. And just some parsley for that last-minute freshness. Okeydokey. I think we are ready here. Mmm, mmm, mmm. And a little bit for Lidia, for the chef. So this is kind of a flowing pasta. You can eat it with a spoon, you can eat it with a fork. Mm-mmm. I am going to taste it. Mmm. Just the aroma. Delizioso. The pasta has just a nice bite, the mellowness of the ceci. And the Pecorino really gives it a little zest. So, tutti a tavola a mangiare. Venite! Lagane and ceci is a traditional Southern Italian dish. And we're all way up north, but we had similar dishes making fresh pasta. Our pasta had some eggs in it, and lagane is sort of wide pasta, like pappardelle maybe. And the ceci are made almost like -- They're cooked, but they're made almost into a dense soup. You can put a little bacon in there. You can put a little rosemary in there or whatever. And then you cook the pasta, the fresh pasta, in this soup, and it stands, and it's delicious. Fresh pasta absorbs the flavors of whatever it is cooking or dressed with. And there's such a softness, there's such a deliciousness. I feel like it caresses me, the flavor, the texture. It's just -- Does it -- Is it worthwhile making fresh pasta? Absolutely. In my book.

Speaking Italian

LIDIA

Si.

Both singing in Italian

LIDIA

Okay. That was a good one. Caesar salad with baby kale and focaccia croutons. Lagane pasta with chickpeas.

ANNOUNCER

The food from this series is all about reflecting and reconnecting. The recipes can be found in Lydia's latest cookbooks. "Felidia: Recipes for My Flagship Restaurant," a collection of restaurant-inspired dishes for the home cook, available for $35. "Lidia's Mastering the Art of Italian Cuisine" is available for $40, and "Lidia's Celebrate Like an Italian" is available for $35. To purchase any of these cookbooks or order additional products, call 800-PLAY-PBS or visit shop.pbs.org/lidia. To learn more about Lidia, access to videos, and to get recipes, tips, techniques and much more, visit us online at lidiasitaly.com. Follow Lidia on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram at Lidia Bastianich.

LIDIA

I'll drink to that.

ERMINIA

Me too.

LIDIA

Ethan. What are you looking for? Something to eat? You're next.

Speaking indistinctly

LIDIA

The camera's in front of her. She comes alive.

OLIVIA

Whoo-hoo! That was so good.

LIDIA

Tell those guys to get out of there. I don't want to cover it. Come on, bee. Okay. And then, let's make them together. Okay?

It's a deal. JULIA

Yeah.

LIDIA

Ready?

MAN

You feel that energy.

LIDIA

Come and join us. So I'm going to have...

ANNOUNCER

Funding provided by... At Cento Fine Foods, we're dedicated to preserving the culinary heritage of authentic Italian foods by offering over 100 specialty Italian products for the American kitchen. Cento -- trust your family with our family. Grana Padano -- authentic, Italian, rich in tradition, yet contemporary. And by... Olitalia -- from chef to chef. Closed captioning provided by San Benedetto. "Lidia's Kitchen" studio provided by Clarke, New England's official Sub-Zero and Wolf showroom and test kitchen.