Marcella Hazan’s Musings

A proud mother of my son

May 12, 2012
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It was tremendously moving to see my son cooking on national television a dish of my mother’s that has been part of my food memories forever.

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Marcella Hazan’s Halibut Recipe

May 10, 2012

It’s already good, just be careful not overcook it.

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Fresh Peas and drawing out the flavor

May 3, 2012
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The most sublime dish that uses fresh peas is vignarola, the Roman vegetable braise that also includes artichokes and fava beans.

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American Politics and Food: Sandra Lee

April 23, 2012

Sandra Lee believes that people who place too much importance on fresh ingredients are snobs.

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Culinary Vandalism as Creativity or…. then you do something more.

March 7, 2012
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The craft of cooking is not only practicable at home, it was born in the home.

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Cheese on Pasta with Fish

February 29, 2012
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Recently, one of Marcella’s facebook friends asked. Marcella, can you answer the age-old question as to why Italians do not put cheese on pasta with fish? (or on any fish for that matter!) Marcella answered:

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Fava Beans at their Best

October 10, 2011

there were some blanched, peeled favas left over and they went into a quick sauce for homemade tagliatelle, sautéed in butter with a hunk of prosciutto ground very fine and whipping cream.

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Fresh Isn’t Always Necessarily Better: Canned Tuna vs. Fresh

September 29, 2011
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Fresh tuna, a bland, almost neutral-tasting meat can’t compare with the irresistible flavor of good Mediterranean tuna packed in olive oil.

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Cooking Still Matters

June 27, 2011
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No comparable collection of recipes has ever before been brought so fully to life, so respectfully executed, so minutely illustrated, and so usefully commented by such a collection of genuine cooks

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Goodbye Espresso Machine

May 5, 2011

Many may be surprised to learn that it’s not the least like dust dissolved in hot water. It can be delicious, if you learn how to use the Moka. It’s not pushbutton coffee, it requires judgment to do well.

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Marcella responds to Modernist Cuisine and Marcus Aurelius

April 7, 2011

Why does Cooking need to be defended? Isn’t it only about food? It isn’t only about food the way love isn’t only about sex.

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Cooking with Olive Oil

March 10, 2011
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The smoke point for good quality EVOO is around 200o C, which is more than hot enough for frying. The interesting thing is that the cheap oil you are recommending has a lower smoke point than EVOO. …Do you know what really matters in the end? It’s how the food you cook tastes. There is no more powerful agent for good flavor than genuine EVOO.

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Marcella Answers a Question about Risotto

March 4, 2011
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A recent letter to Marcella and her answer: Here is the recipe for squash risotto. Dear Marcella I thought of you watching Top Chef these last couple of weeks. One chef used cream in his risotto, to make it creamy, and clearly that would make any student of yours upset. Then Tom Colicchio said that [...]

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In Praise of Tenderness

February 24, 2011
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Why are we bringing home rock-hard fruit, stuffing it sometimes in a brown bag where we are told it will ripen? It’s the sun not a paper bag that ripens fruit, that makes it produce succulent, sugary flesh. Have we all forgotten the difference?

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CRUISING THE BACARI, VENICE’S WINE BARS

January 13, 2011
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The wines bacari dispense by the glass are of the kind Italy excels in making: very young, light-bodied, exuberantly grapey, inexpensive and deliciously gulpable. Many are produced in the Veneto itself, including the most popular white, the fresh, soft, and gently sparkling Prosecco, and the most popular red, Merlot, produced in a simple, tenderly fruity style.

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Marcella and Victor Hazan on NPR

January 2, 2011
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Recently Linda Wertheimer interviewed Victor and Marcella Hazan at their home on Longboat Key for NPR’s Morning Edition series the Long View.

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The Intersection of Culinary Cultures

December 3, 2010
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And so, although our backgrounds were religiously and in many other ways diverse, there were moments at table where they coincided.

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Deconstructing the language of Food: Colman Andrew’s biography of Ferran Adria

November 11, 2010
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Cooking well is like the telling use of language: Expression must be vigorous, clear, concise. There can be no unnecessary ingredient or unnecessary step. A dish may be complex, but every component, every procedure, must count. …Do not arbitrarily shuffle the vocabulary of one cuisine with that of another to make your cooking (original). There is no more use for use for such a hybrid than there was for Esperanto.

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What makes us Human?

November 5, 2010
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Language and cooking – home cooking that is – are vehicles for consciousness, the thing that makes us human

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The Rialto Market in Venice Italy

October 28, 2010
Rialto Market in Venice Italy

The world has many magnificent markets, of which I have seen a good number, but it has none like Rialto. Its stalls are lined up behind an embankment along a curve of the Grand Canal, displaying their contents in the open air.

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Gallura Restaurant in Olbia Sardinia

October 3, 2010
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How to describe the flavor of Rita’s food? Intense, yet subtle; penetrating, yet gentle; surprising, yet comforting; fragrant, aromatic, surging from deeper sources of savor than anyone else seems to have tapped.

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Ode to the Peach

September 26, 2010
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There is nothing edible from the earth, the sea, or the sky that tastes so wonderful to me as a fully ripe, soft, sweet, and yes, messy fruit

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THE FLAVOR OF SARDINIA

September 17, 2010

We had our first taste of Sardinia some years ago at the Rialto food market in Venice, and it had the quality of revelation. Daniela, whose vegetable stall is our favorite, offered each of us a small, round, deep red tomato, about 1½ inches in diameter, its top dimpled and marked by splotches of vivid malachite green. “These are from Sardinia” she said. “Pop one into your mouth as though it were a cherry.”

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Boiled Meats

August 22, 2010

Victor and I had a most succulent dinner today, but anyone who would ask what I cooked would be dismayed by the answer: boiled beef. Why does the word boiled turns people off? If they are really boiling something they prefer to call it steamed, although usually they are doing exactly the same thing. In [...]

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How to learn to cook Italian

August 22, 2010

I would start with an introductory course on the spot. My son gives some in the wine country above Verona, see his website. I would then rent a small place in two or three cities and towns, for a few days each. Choose places with great markets such as Venice and Rome, get to know [...]

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One of the top cookbook authors of all time

August 22, 2010
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Marcella Hazan on being named one of the top cookbook authors of all time. August 16, 2010 Thank you my dear Friends for your kind messages and your loyalty. It was enormously flattering to find my venerable cookbook – 37 years old this past spring – landing on the Guardian’s list as it did on [...]

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