Food Mystery!

One of our readers has written in with a wonderful food mystery on his hands — there’s a certain almond bread he remembers from back in the 1970s, and he is hoping to find the recipe to share with his family.

Now, I’ve run this question past a couple of food-savvy friends, and checked my own cookbook library, but the bread isn’t ringing a bell…

Can you help?

Here’s the story.

Gary from California writes:

(I’m paraphrasing a bit here, to combine a couple of emails)

Hi:

Every time I see someone with Italian Recipes I look in VAIN for a recipe my Godmother used to make. Nobody in the family bothered to get it from her and write it down.

I am now the only one left of the Grandchildren, and am teaching my boys and their familys to cook different Italian dishes, breads etc.

I believe it was called “Ocenti“… a small sweet bread with an almond flavor and topped with sugar … may have been a regional recipe.

She was from Lamporo, located in Vercelli, Piemonte, Italy.

It didn’t taste like a yeast bread but more like a roll, it was about 4 inches long shaped liked a log, cut at an angle on the ends. She would make 2 indents on the top using the sides of her hands so it had 3 humps on the top, sweet, light almond taste with sugar on the top.

If you have anything close to this recipe… I would be forever thankful as I have been looking for the recipe since 1971 when she died.

I am now 70 yrs old and would like to give this recipe to my family.

Hope this information helps, and looking forward to hearing from you with some GOOD NEWS!

Thank you again for taking up your valuable time in trying to help me.

Gary

Now, I’ve run this question past a couple of chef friends, and the bread isn’t ringing a bell in any of their memories. We did wonder if maybe “Ocenti” might be a half-remembered variation on “Osso d’ Santi” — sort of in there somewhere between the “Osso dei Morti” cookies/biscotti that are traditionally baked for All Souls’ Day, and the “Pan de Santi” bread for Easter — but that’s pure conjecture, with no basis in fact. Another theory — could “Ocenti” have been “Occitani” (as in Occitan Valleys) originally? No way to know… and I’m just throwing it out there, in case someone can confirm (or rule out) any of these wild theories.

My friend, the bread-loving Guilherme Zühlke O’Connor, who lived for some time in Italy, says that “by the description it could be a variety of breads or pastries, almonds (and bread for that matter) are very popular over there.” Without more to go on, it was hard to say…

So then I got hopelessly lost (and very hungry!) browsing the beautifully photographed bread recipes at Il mondo di Milla and Academia Barilla / Italian Food Academy.

And I’ve flipped through my cookbooks on Italian cuisine without finding any bread that looks like it might fit the bill…

Nothing.

So, over to you!

Can you help Gary to find that old family recipe? Does the long-lost Italian almond bread sound like a recipe you know and love?

If you have any idea of what it might be, please leave a comment — Gary and his family would be grateful, and I’d love to know as well!

If you want the word on authentic Italian cooking, where better to find it than in Italy? Today’s guest post is contributed by that modern-day Renaissance Man best known as Guilherme Zo’C — and I think you’ll enjoy his joyful approach to cooking! ~ Jen

How to cook original Italian style

Many of the delicacies gourmets use and abuse these days, were created to overcome food difficulties of the past.

Sun dried tomatoes, just as most other dried food, were invented mostly to overcome food shortage on winter. In southern Italy, people dried the tomatoes in the sun and, to make them last even more, they conserved them into olive oil, a mix that could easily last for a long winter.

These days, anyone can have dried tomatoes just because is delicious, and just because of this, about a month ago I decided to make my own conserve of Sun Dried Tomatoes.

Because I had never done one, I found it appropriate to google a bit before I start. I found many pages with similar, although different, procedures. After a bit of reading I put my thoughts in order and my hands into it.

You can dry the tomatoes yourself by cutting them into halves, cover them with a mix of sugar and salt and let them dry in the sun for a couple of days, but I decided to buy them already dried because it was the conserve I was actually interested in.

For the conserve, pick a clean and preferably sterilized glass pot and pour some Extra Virgin Olive Oil nto it. Put a layer of sun-dried tomatoes, then cover them with olive oil, then another layer of tomatoes and so on.

Be sure the olive oil covers entirely the tomatoes. Cover and let them rest for 2 weeks before using it. If the oil properly covers the tomatoes and you keep the jar from dust, they can last for the whole winter as in the old days before the refrigerator and canned food.

So far, so good, but what is so interesting in this conserve, why didn’t I just buy the conserve, once I have bought the tomatoes already?

Well, the fun part is that you can chose your favorite oil other things to go into the jar with the tomatoes and oil. Among the recipes I read, I found suggestions to add garlic, basil, oregano, peppers… but I also found a warning:

Sorry, I must disagree!

A good part of original Italian cuisine was developed by housewives, little local restaurant cooks and even the poor and the people in general trying to survive to winters, wars and misery. What makes it so good is the intimate cultural relationship they have with food, that naturally becomes a cooking instinct.

I think the only way to really cook Italian style, is to develop an instinct and invent your own dishes on a daily basis, even if your first attempts are so bad that Italians themselves would laugh at it.

Guilherme is a Web Designer and works freelance in northern Italy.

He is happily married to Anna, and in his free time he enjoys cinema, traveling, cooking and eating.