Typical  Falconaresi Recipes:

Le Ricette di Zia Dina

Starters: Home Made Pasta – Falconarese Baked Pasta
Main Courses: Stuffed Aubergines – Stuffed Peppers -  Stufed Entrails
Sweets: Biscuits all’Ammoniaca – Fried Sweets - Taralli – Dough (deep-fried)
Bread: Bread baked in a wood burning oven

STARTERS:

Home Made Pasta: (Back To Top).

Home made pasta, similar to tagliatelle of various formats, depending on accompanying vegetables (In particular served with white beans) or just served with a tomato sauce.

Ingredients for 4 people:
1. 4 eggs. 
2. Flour. 
3. A pinch of salt. 
4. A little chilly pepper (for those who like it hot!).

Preparations:
Mix the ingredients into a bowl, stretch the dough with a rolling pin till the dough is 3mm thick. Let the extended shape rest for about 10 minutes. Roll the shape into itself and loose, about 75mm Dia (3”) and then cut into thin strips about 5mm wide (¼” ). Sprinkle some flour and leave for about 30 minutes. Cook the normal way of cooking pasta. BUON APPETITO.

Pasta Baked in the oven alla Falconarese: (Back To Top)

The particulars of this dish are the "Local Provola Cheese" and lamb cooked in a tomato sauce.

Ingredients for 4 people:
1. 500 g. of pennette pasta or similar (not too long). 
2. 200 g. of provola cheese (from the local delicatessen). 
3. 200 g. lamb cubed about 25mm square (1”). 
4. 300 g. passata (tomato sauce). 
5. 2  clefts of garlic. 
6. 1 onion. 
7. A pinch of rosemary. 
8. Extra virgin olive oil, about 200 cl. 
9. A little flour.  

Preparations:
In a frying pan add the Lamb and cook until brown, at the same time in a sauce pan start the passata, transfer the lamb with a little of the oil. Boil a pan with water, add the pasta and cook (al dente). Cut the provola cheese into cubes, mix the pasta with a little sauce. Grease the baking dish with a little butter, sprinkle a little flour, and proceed with adding (in the baking dish) one layer of pasta, one layer of provola, one of sauce with the lamb. Bake in the oven mark 250c for about 30 minutes.

MAIN COURSES:

Stuffed Aubergines: (Back To Top)

Ingredients  for 4 people:
1. 2 large aubergines. 
2. 100 g. of grated bread.
3. A pinch of salt. 
4. A little oregano. 
5. 2 eggs. 
6. 50 g. grated pecorino cheese. 
7. 100 g. provola cheese cut into cubes. 
8. 200 cl. extra virgin olive oil. 

Preparations:
Wash the aubergines, cut in half and remove the inside, leaving the rest in the form of a boat shape. Par boil the boat shape aubergines, drain and leave to cool. In A mixing bowl, add the eggs, grated bread, pecorino cheese, provola cheese cut into cubes, a pinch of salt, a small amount of oregano and the inner part of the aubergines. Mix all the ingredients and fill the now cooled boat shaped aubergines and fry over a low flame till cooked, place on a serving dish and enjoy.

Stuffed Peppers: (Back To Top)

Ingredients  for 4 people:
1. 4 peppers.
2. 2 eggs. 
3. 50 g. anchovies.
4. 150 g. grated bread. 
5. A small amount of basil. 
6. One garlic. 
7. 200 cl. extra virgin olive oil. 

Preparations:
Wash the peppers and cut the top end, putting it aside for later use. Clean the inside by removing all seeds. Mix the eggs, anchovies, bread crumbs and the basil. Fill the pepper with the mixture and infill the top with the cut piece of the pepper, put into a frying pan with olive oil and garlic, cook for 10 minutes over a low flame, turning every few minutes.

Stuffed Entrails: (Back To Top)

Ingredients:
1. Innards of baby lamb. 
2. Heart, liver, lungs and gut. 
3. A clove of garlic. 
4. 1 onion. 
5. 2 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil. 
6. 200 g. of peeled and diced potatoes). 
7. 4 to 5 basil leaves. 
8. Parsley. 
9. 200 g. passate tomato sauce. 
10. Salt (to taste).

Preparations:
Wash well all the offal heats liver lungs. Cut the entrails into long strips and roll with it the offal cut into manageable pieces, to attain all the different tastes, and fasten the rolled up entrails with cocktail sticks. Boil for about 30 minutes; drain all the water from the pot leaving only two ladles of the liquid in which the entrails have been boiled. Add fresh water and finish cooking. Meanwhile prepare the Passata sauce, with the basil, parsley, garlic and the olive oil. Boil the potatoes over a low flame, when the potatoes are about cooked mix one ladle of sauce and one ladle of stuffed entrails. In a serving dish, on one side place the potatoes and on the other the stuffed entrails and serve.

SWEETS:

Biscuits all'Ammoniaca: (Back To Top)

Ingredients:
1. A sachet of ammonia (ammonium hydroxide from your local deli). 
2. 100 g. of sugar. 
3. 1 kg. flour type "OO". 
4. 2 rinds of grated (whole) lemons. 
5. 3 eggs. 
6. 100 g. olive oil. 
7. Butter. 
8. 100 g. flour.

Preparations:
Mix the ingredients; stretch the dough with a rolling pin and with the aid of a drinking glass cut the dough into round shapes, or any shape you wish. Grease the baking dish with butter and sprinkle some flour. Place the cut shapes into the baking dish, making sure not to place them near each other. Bake in the oven 180c for 30 minutes controlling the progress (Traditionally these biscuits used to be baked in Falconara, after the villages baked the bread, which used to take place every 15 days).

Fried Sweets: (Back To Top)

Ingredients:
1. 1 ladle of olive oil. 
2. 100 g. of  yeast.
3. 1 Ladle of sugar. 
4. 1 Ladle of milk. 
5. 3 Eggs. 
6. Flour (all that is necessary to obtain a rather soft mixture).
7. 1 lt of vegetable oil.

Preparations:
Mix and work the dough together with the ingredients. Lay in a warm place for 4 hours and let the dough rise. Take pieces of the risen dough and form into shapes that are similar to gnocchi. (The shape for these sweets was obtained by rolling up a pinch of dough against the textured bottom of a basket,  called Crivu, creating striped grooves in the dough, but if the Crivu is not available, you can use a fork) Once shaped let the sweets rise for a further 2 hours. In a frying pan add the oil and bring to temperature of around 150° (to check the oil temperature put a cocktail stick into the hot oil, if the oil starts to sizzle, then the oil is ready) fry the gnocchi in small amounts at a time, until the colour changes into darkish honey. Remove from the frying pan and drain on a paper towel. They can be served hot or cold. The villagers add  honey from figs and slices of lemon skin or castor sugar.

Taralli (shape similar to (Hard) doughnuts): (Back To Top)

Ingredients: 
1. 200 g. ready made yeast.  
2. A glass of milk. 
3. 100 g. sugar. 
4. 30 g. aniseeads. 
5. 2 eggs. 
6. Flour (all that is necessary to obtain a rather soft mixture).

Preparations:
Mix the ingredients well place in a warm area and leave the dough to rise for about 4 hours. Take amounts of the dough enough to enable you to make one rounded doughnut shaped Tarallo and leave to rise for another two hours. Bring to boil a pot of water, insert the Taralli one at a time into the boiling water, once the taralli dough has surfaced, remove and lay on the table. Put into the oven for about 20 minutes. (Similar to the biscuits recipe above).

Cuddaççe (very much similar to doughnuts): (Back To Top)

Ingredients:
1. 2 lt vegetable oil. 
2. 200 g. of yeast (prepared the day before). 
3. 100 g. potatoes par boiled and mashed.
4. 50 g. salt. 
5. 1 kg. flour type "OO".

Preparations:
Mix the ingredients until the dough sticks to the work surface, and leave the dough covered in a warm area to rise for about 3 hours. Make dough doughnut shaped and leave to rise for 1 hour. In a frying pan pour the oil and once the oil gets hot, start to fry the doughnuts till a golden colour, then turn them to cook the other side. Once ready drain on a paper towel. Traditionally they are served with salamis and a good wine (Cirò, Verbicaro or Donnici, typical Calabresi wines ). Utilising the same dough you can add anchovies or provola cheese and fry.

BREAD:

Bread baked in a wood burning oven: (Back To Top)

It has been a habit with the Falconaresi families to bake bread every 15 days. During Bank or Religious holidays. The ritual of baking bread began the day before, with the preparation of the yeast “Brum being the Albanian word.”

Ingredients for the preparation of the "BRUM": (12 kilos of bread)
1. 1 kg. Corn flour. 
2. 500 g. Flour type "O". 
3. 1 small cube of yeast (25 g.). 
4. 50 g. of salt. 
5. Tepid water (enough to obtain a soft mixture). 

Ingredients for the preparation of the "BRUM": (1 kilo of bread approximately)
1. 100 gr. Corn flour.
2. 50 gr. Flour type “O”.
3. 2.5 gr. Yeast.
4. 5 gr. Salt.
5. Tepid water (enough to obtain a soft mixture).

Preparations:
Mix in a terracotta (large) tray all the ingredients cover with a dish cloth (place in a warm cupboard) and leave to rise for 24 hours.

Ingredients for baking the bread: (12 kilos of bread)
1. 10 kg. Flour type "o". 
2. 200 g. of salt. 
3. The prepared yeast. 
4. Tepid water (enough to obtain a soft mixture). 

Ingredients for the preparation of the "BRUM": (12 kilos of bread)
1. 1 kg. Flour type “O”.
2. 20 gr. Salt.
3. The prepared yeast.
4. Tepid water (enough to obtain a soft mixture).

Preparations:
Mix all the ingredients in a large recipient (Madia being the Albanian word for this), kneed the mixture for one hour, until the dough reaches a smooth, soft consistency. Leave the mixture to rise for about 3 hours. Meantime light the wood in the oven. From the now ready dough mixture, make a (kravzia) rounded shape dough, weighing approximately 1 Kg. when the oven is hot enough, put the bread in to bake. For the feasts the women would also prepare what in Albanian is called (bukë) meaning bread and they would also prepare (kuddacci) Bread with a hole in the middle. Other particular shapes of bread would be "kuddacci" for men and the (pupesa) for women. Another type of bread would be the (kaddrikia) which would only be baked during the matrimonial feasts.