College menus: an inspiration for today’s dinners
A little more than a month before the Christmas festivities, today’s column offers some inspiration for preparing a festive menu, drawing directly from sources in our historical archive.
Today, with our column, we find ourselves in Arezzo, where the Collegio di Strada of the Society of Jesus, active from 1882 to 1925, had its seat.
Among the documents concerning the boarding school and the activities that took place there, there is also a house diary recording the menus served to the boarders between 1902 and 1911.
An interesting source for researchers dedicated to the history of food, for those who study gastronomy, but also – why not – useful for those who were struggling with menu planning for the forthcoming festivities and were looking for original ideas for combinations and dishes.
The book market is teeming with recipe books, but our archive is no less.
Traditional combinations such as ‘sole with peas’ or ‘boiled fish with mayonnaise sauce’ or ‘tuna with beans’ are alternated with interesting and unusual combinations such as ‘omelette with rice inside’.
We also recommend for your menus – boiled meet with ‘strascinati’ broccoli and boiled with ‘strascinati’ celery – fried ‘ova’ in bianco with fried milk dumplings – steaks genovese style with dry pasta – offal with ‘strascinati cabbage’ but also offal broken up with rice – pastina with ‘mashed beans – roast eel with beans – fried fish and brains – Fegatelli with rice supplì – fried ‘ova’ with ‘gobbi strascinati’ [cardoons]
[cardi]
Coppa with macaroni – Chicken giblets pudding – Pork steak with polenta – Soup with giardiniera – Boiled beef with apples in syrup – Ciccioli with pasta sciutta – Stew with risotto
Steak with marsala – Portuguese-style cream – Chestnut polenta – Meatballs with risotto – Stew with plums and apples – Boiled with roots – Boiled with stewed fennel – Pickles with ‘ova toste’ (hard-boiled eggs) – Roulades with cheese croutons – Hare with croutons – Ova affogate’ with beans
There is no shortage of great classics of the Italian table such as – breaded steaks with stewed potatoes – sausage with risotto – stewed salt cod with cauliflower – tortellini from Bologna – rice in broth – sausage with polenta
These dishes are easy to make and can be served on Christmas tables, unlike the somewhat low-calorie menu that was proposed in the Collegio Romano and to which we devoted an in-depth article in July 2019.
Maria Macchi
