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Postcard - Alla Madonna Del Piatto, Cooking Class with a View

ColleenK

10+ Posts
On this trip to Italy, with my husband and three other couples, I thought it would be fun to include some tours/activities during our week in Umbria to provide us with a more in-depth look at the culture and traditions in "the green heart of Italy". Since food and wine are interests we all share, a winery tour and a cooking class seemed like a fun way to gain some insight into the local culture.

When I asked my female friends if they were interested in taking a cooking class during our week in Umbria and then have our husbands join us for the lunch we made, I got an enthusiastic and positive response. That it was a discounted class as a prize I won in the 2004 Slow Travel Anniversary Contest made it that much sweeter.

The incredibly accommodating Letizia, who with her husband runs Alla Madonna Del Piatto agriturismo just outside of Assisi, agreed that our husbands could join us for lunch for the very reasonable fee of 25 euro each. Not to be sexist, but there just wasn't enough room in the kitchen for that many cooks if our husbands joined us for the lesson. We agreed on a date, that just happened to be my birthday, and made arrangements to meet at the Assisi train station. Letizia brought another couple with her who were staying at her agriturismo and would be taking the class with us. Small world, they lived in neighboring New Hampshire and were lots of fun.

Our day began at 10am at Terra Umbra Antica, a gourmet food shop where Letizia would instruct us on the fine art of choosing top quality olive oil, pasta, truffles, cheeses, and meats. We would also taste many of these products so that we could choose what we wanted for appetizers for our meal later in the day. Our husbands were a part of this market tour and enjoyed themselves immensely. I am not sure which they enjoyed more however, tasting the delicious samples or interacting with the lovely proprietor Barbara.

As soon as we walked into this shop, there were admiring murmurs from our group on the artistically displayed gourmet products. The rooms are painted in warm and welcoming rust and orange hues and her products include exquisite chocolates, high quality olive oils and vinegars, dried seasonings to make your own delicious sauces at home, jars of wonderful sauces, truffles and truffle oil, a nice selection of wines and beautiful pasta. Her selections of cheese, meats and fresh bread were varied and delicious. This is a woman who cares very much about offering high quality goods and it shows in every aspect of her shop.

We started off with Letizia describing the various types of olive oil and why the DOP label insures a high quality product. To receive this Denominazione di Origine Protetta (or DOP label) the oil must meet strict guidelines on how and where the olives are produced and which types of olives are used. We tasted several extra virgin oils with the fresh bread Barbara sells and liked the spicy oil from Trevi best. Olive oil is best used within in a year of its pressing (it does not improve with age) and should be stored in a glass container, in a cool place out of the sunlight.

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Letizia and the group in the gourmet shop.

Next we tasted several pates and discussed the Umbrian delicacy, truffles. The black truffle ripens from November to March. The white truffle matures from October until December and is even rarer and therefore more valued. There is also a more ordinary scorzone, black summer truffle. We enjoyed the different tastes but of course did not try any of the very expensive white truffle. The tasting of the wonderful looking cheeses and Italian meats came next. My favorite cheese was the plain mild caciotta cheese but the caciotta with truffles was good too. The Pecorino Stagionato and Fossa cheeses were a nice accompaniment to the fabulous prosciutto, pancetta, salame, capocollo, and salsiccia samples. The group had a hard time deciding which delicacies we should bring for appetizers, so we had Barbara wrap up a selection of all of them.

Letizia told us that when shopping for pasta, the best tasting brands are made with bronze pasta machines and the packaging should say trafile in bronzo. She also said that pasta with a "rough" surface held sauces better and were therefore tastier. Finally we had a tasting of various desert wines including vin santo, grappa, limoncello, and some interesting rose flavored amarettos. Mind you, it was only 11am so we were careful to take small sips! We left Barbara's lovely shop with quite a few packages. If I had more room in my suitcase, I would have loved to have brought home more delicacies.

Ten minutes later we were climbing the dirt road up to Alla Madonna Del Piatto. We drank in the spectacular views from Letizia's terrace. You can see the town of Assisi in the distance. The surrounding countryside brings new meaning to Umbria being billed as "the green heart of Italy". Picture postcard perfect!

Our husbands departed to scout out Assisi and it was time for us to get to work. We donned aprons and began preparing our desert first as it would need some time to chill. The panna cotta was really quite simple to make although it called for the leaves of unflavored gelatin, a product I don't think I have seen in the States (regular gelatin can be substituted). The gelatin was placed in 1 1/3 cups of whole milk until it softened (about 15 minutes). Steve (the only male in the group - poor thing) whisked 1 1/3 cups of whipping cream with 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract and 1/4 cup + 1 tbsp of caster sugar. We then added the gelatin mixture, stirring until dissolved. Next was dividing the mixture into dessert bowls, using about 3/4 cup for each. They were allowed to cool uncovered then covered and refrigerated until set (approximately three hours). We used the freezer for some of this cooling in the interest of time.

Making the pasta for our main course of Ravioli with Swiss chard and mozzarella filling was next. Although Letizia is a traditional Umbrian cook, she does not shun modern conveniences and used a food processor to blend the flour and egg mixture to form balls for rolling the pasta dough. This saved us about an hour and we needed the time as we had a lot of ravioli to make for our group of 10. Rolling the pasta dough into the correct size and thickness was not an easy task, especially for this rather clumsy cook! The dough needs to be folded and fed through the pasta machine as many as eight or nine times, changing the settings until the narrowest setting is reached and the dough is at the correct consistency and shape. We each had at least two turns at the pasta machine. Happily, my friend Beth was the most skillful at this task, so she kept at it while others of us prepared the filling, and began filling and cutting the ravioli into the correct size and shape. The filling consisted of washed Swiss chard leaves, cubed fresh mozzarella, 1 pinch of nutmeg, 1 egg and grated Parmesan cheese.

Filling the ravioli was my favorite part of the cooking lesson. We put teaspoons of the filling about 6 cm apart on the long, thin strip of pasta dough and then folded it over the filling to make a "parcel". After lightly pressing the dough together to seal it, we used a pasta cutter on 3 sides to further seal and cut each piece of ravioli. Voila, a masterpiece!

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The finished ravioli.

Of course during this process, there is much laughter and sipping of wine as Letizia cajoled us into creating a great meal. Not only is Letizia a great and patient teacher, she has a terrific sense of humor. We had an absolute ball in her very well equipped kitchen. We were having so much fun in fact, that when our husbands returned we were not close to being finished, so some of them joined in the ravioli making and more laughter and picture taking ensued. My friend Mark really got into making the ravioli and had to make sure that each scoopful of the filling was a work of art. So much so that Letizia asked if he were Japanese, as those are usually her most disciplined and artistic students. When we finally made enough food for our group, Letizia sent us out to her spectacular terrace with wine as she and a helper, the charming Carmen from Holland (who coincidently also works at the nearby Brigolante,a SlowTrav favorite), finished preparing our feast.

Our late lunch is served at a long table in the cozy dining room. And it is indeed a feast! The excellent local Sagrantino wine is flowing, our antipasti of the cheese and meats we had selected is delicious and the fresh, spicy Umbrian oil to dip our bread in is wonderful. Our ravioli with a simple butter and sage sauce and Parmesan cheese is melt in your mouth delicious if I do say so myself. Laughter and good conversation fills the air. Our panna cotta is served with Letizia's homemade cherry compote from her garden. Mine is served with a birthday candle. It is one of the most fun birthday celebrations I have ever had.

We leave with printouts of our recipes and memories that will last a lifetime. Because our wonderful day with Letizia lasted much longer than we anticipated, we arrived in Assisi at the perfect time of 4pm when all the crowds have left for the day. So we got to enjoy this stunning town with its breathtaking sunsets in relative peace. But that's another travel postcard!
 

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