Nonna's Kitchen 11 - Spinach Soup and Frittata

If you’ve been reading faithfully for the past few months, you might think that I had an idyllic childhood filled with culinary delights, and never a bad meal. The reality was, of course, somewhat different. Take Wednesday nights, for example. When I was a kid, Wednesday was Liver and Onions night. My paternal grandparents had a small farm in Missoula and raised a cow or two each year, so calves’ liver was fresh and…plentiful. Liver – Fegato – is a Venetian delicacy, most often sautéed with onions, white wine and sage and served with polenta. Not our liver – we had liver, quickly fried with onions, but not enough to disguise the taste. My brother and I would load ours up with ketchup and force it down, practically holding our noses. Clearly, liver is not one of my more fond childhood memories.

The funny thing is that we ate liver for literally YEARS because my parents each thought that the other loved it! My mother prepared it faithfully each week because she assumed that it was one of my father’s favorite foods, and he ate it each week because he thought it was one of her favorites. Much later, when I was in high school and the farm was no longer, calves’ liver became somewhat rare at the supermarket. One Wednesday my mother prepared something else and apologized to my father because we weren’t having liver. His reply was that she must be disappointed, and in true comedic fashion it finally came out that NOBODY particularly cared for liver, but nobody said anything about it! Except maybe my brother and I… (My parents recently celebrated their 44th anniversary, so they obviously learned to communicate at some point!)

Because Sunday dinner at Nonna’s was a pretty big deal when I was younger, undesirable foods seldom made an appearance, but Nonna cooked a few clunkers too, at least for my palate. One of them was tripe; for the uninitiated, tripe is the lining of a cow’s stomach. You might be familiar with it as the basis for Menudo – the Mexican soup, not the singing group. Tripe basically resembles a small volleyball net in color and texture (and probably flavor), and it’s considered a great delicacy in Italy. It’s most often stewed with tomatoes, and the one thing about it is that it’s pretty stinky; when I stopped in the store to say hello to my grandparents as a teenager, the smell would permeate the place and I knew immediately that I needed to fabricate an excuse to turn down the requisite dinner invitation.

The other thing of Nonna’s that I was never crazy about was runny eggs. On Fridays, if a good fish wasn’t available, the main course would often be a Frittata – sort of. Frittata is a classic Italian egg dish that incorporates vegetables, meats and sometimes cheese in what is essentially a baked omelet. It’s started in a pan, finished under the broiler or in the oven and wedges of it are often eaten cold or at room temperature. Sadly, Nonna’s frittata was nothing like this. She started with spinach, onions or mushrooms, sautéed in a pan, and a few minutes before dinner she added several beaten eggs and cooked them over very low heat, stirring frequently, until they were just barely set. I think Nonno must have liked his eggs this way, but not me; I’m perfectly happy with a runny yolk to dip my toast into at breakfast, but these eggs were basically raw. I always took as small a portion as possible and filled up on whatever else was on the table.

I actually make frittata pretty often, because it’s a great way to use up leftovers, and it’s quick and easy. For the fillings, you can use nearly anything, so feel free to experiment. Bell peppers – roasted or fresh – are great, as is spinach, or tomatoes and fresh basil, or maybe caramelized onions and a little gorgonzola. My mother’s choice? Leftover spaghetti, fried until slightly crispy, and then finished with eggs and parmesan.

The Spinach Soup would be a good accompaniment to frittata for a weeknight dinner, because it cooks in just as long as it takes to cook pasta. When I was growing up, we usually had it with Cassaoun, the spinach “ravioli” that I described in the article about vegetable sides. The pasta in the soup was the scraps leftover from making the cassaoun. This recipe uses store bought pasta, which is just fine.

The Recipe:
Spinach Soup
serves 4 as a first course

total prep and cooking time – about 30 minutes

Ingredients:
1 medium onion, diced
1 clove garlic, minced or put through a garlic press
1 14 oz. can diced tomatoes
1 tsp. sugar (optional)
Salt and pepper to taste
1 small package frozen chopped spinach, thawed and squeezed dry, or
1 bag fresh spinach, roughly chopped
8 oz. egg pasta – country style noodles, broken into small pieces

Put a large pot of water on to boil for the pasta. In a large, deep sauté pan or Dutch oven, heat the olive oil over medium heat and sauté the onion and garlic until translucent – 5 minutes or so – being careful not to let them brown. Add the tomatoes and their juice, the sugar (if your tomatoes are particularly acidic – depends on the brand) season to taste with salt and pepper and reduce heat to low. When the water comes to a boil, cook the pasta – it will take as much as 20 minutes. About five minutes before the pasta is cooked, add the spinach to the tomatoes. When the pasta is finished, don’t drain it! Scoop it out of the cooking water with a slotted spoon or a spider and add it to the tomatoes, stirring to incorporate. Then start adding ladles of cooking water to the pan, stirring until you have a consistency that you like – you could use as few as 3 cups, or as many as 8, depending on how thin you want the soup to be. The starch released from the pasta makes this soup much more rich and silky that you might think. Correct the seasoning and serve with grated Parmesan cheese

The Recipe:
Frittata
Serves 4 as a main course, 6-8 as an appetizer

Total prep and cooking time – 20 minutes

The recipe that follows is for a basic vegetable frittata – feel free to experiment with ingredients as described previously, with one caveat. If you’re using a meat such as pancetta or bacon, be sure that it’s fully cooked before adding the eggs. Beyond that, the only limit is your imagination! If you don’t have an ovenproof frying pan, you can cover the plastic handle of any frying pan with two layers of aluminum foil – this is fine for occasional use. I cook my frittata until it’s thoroughly dry and set, but you can leave the center a little moist if you prefer.

Ingredients:
2 T. olive oil
1 small onion, finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, finely slivered
1-2 small zucchini, sliced into 1/8” rounds
1 red pepper, cut into ¼” dice
1 tsp. dried oregano
Salt and pepper to taste
8 eggs
½ cup grated cheese – Parmesan, Romano or Asiago

Heat the olive oil in a 12” ovenproof frying pan – preferably nonstick – over medium heat, and add all of the vegetables at once. Cook to desired doneness – anywhere from nearly raw to thoroughly browned – your choice. Add the oregano, season with salt and pepper. In a large bowl, whisk the eggs with about half of the cheese and a healthy grind of pepper – beat them until frothy. Pour the eggs over the vegetables and stir a couple of times to distribute the ingredients, then cook for about five minutes or until the bottom and edges are slightly brown and set – lift the edges with a spatula to check. Sprinkle the remaining cheese over the top and finish in the oven under the broiler – set the rack about 8” from the top of the oven – until set and nicely browned. Serve in wedges. Can be eaten hot, room temperature or cold!