More Reasons To Get Off The Gluten-Free Bandwagon

No Medically Or Scientifically Sound Reason To Avoid Gluten

I've never been a dietary faddist. When the cholesterol bandwagon rolled through town, I kept right on eating eggs. When everybody started touting the health benefits of margarine over butter, I continued to slather on the real dairy product. When carbohydrates were being crucified, I baked bread and made pasta. When it seemed that every package in the supermarket sported a “fat-free” or “low-fat” or “reduced fat” label, I ignored them all in favor of real “full fat” food. And in every instance, I've been proven right. Modern food science has been issuing apologies for past mistakes at a furious rate lately, exonerating eggs and butter and carbs and fat and lots of other previously demonized and denigrated substances. Is it too much to hope that maybe it's finally gluten's turn?

Actually, science doesn't really have a lot for which to apologize in the current gluten fad. Few if any reputable scientific studies have ever pointed fingers at gluten as a culprit in any dietary or digestive disorder other than the legitimate case of celiac disease. No, we owe those honors to fad-mongering celebrity types. I honestly don't know what's wrong with our culture that we willingly accept the opinionated pronouncements of airheaded, vacuous, blinkered and benighted music, movie, and/or television “stars” over the studied and documented facts presented by doctors, scientists, and other experts. Line up a hundred people with lots of letters after their names on one side of a room and put somebody like Oprah on the other side, and guess who the great majority of sheeple will choose to believe. It's unbelievable. But there it is.

Aiding and abetting these ridiculous celebrity shenanigans are the enablers in the media who keep ginning up the publicity because it's great feature fodder for slow news days. And then factor in the opportunistic advertising agencies who all know a good marketable gimmick when they see one. I'll tell you right now, ingesting gluten does not make me sick. What makes me sick is seeing the words “gluten free” screaming at me from every package in every aisle of every supermarket in America. I get especially ill when I see it tacked on to products that, by their very nature, are physically, chemically, scientifically incapable of actually ever containing gluten in the first place. I saw something the other day that almost made me pass out: I picked up a bottle of “gluten-free” water! Things are labeled that way just to be part of the fad.

You know what a “fad” is? Here's what the dictionary says: “an intense and widely shared enthusiasm for something, especially one that is short-lived and without basis in the object's qualities; a craze.” Yep. That about sums it up.

It is said that when Clark Gable took off his shirt onscreen and revealed that he was not wearing an undershirt, undershirt sales plummeted. Why? Blame it on the cult of celebrity. Everybody wants to be like somebody famous. So somebody famous says, “I stopped eating gluten and I lost a hundred pounds overnight. I feel so much better, my sex life is fantastic, and darn if I'm not taller, too!” Blammo! Celebrity cultists in their millions start vilifying a perfectly good, perfectly innocent naturally occurring protein. There's no science behind it. Just uninformed idiots with a platform and a gullible audience. The perverse logic, such as it is, seems to be, “well, they're on TV so they must be smarter than I am.” And if you're an easily led person prone to the influence of the siren song of celebrity, if Dr. Oz tells you that you can keep your hair by rubbing horse manure on your head, you're gonna go out and find a stable.

H.L. Mencken is (mis)quoted as saying, “No one ever went broke underestimating the intelligence of the American public.” And I swear they must have that engraved on a plaque somewhere in every ad agency in the United States. If tomorrow some celebrity goofball were to stand up in front of a camera and aver that pig snouts were the answer to all your health and wellness issues, I promise you it would be about two weeks before every product in every store would feature a picture of a pig and the words “made with real pig snouts” on the package. If you believe for one skinny second that ConAgra and Kraft and Pepsico and the like are concerned about your health and well being when they slap “gluten-free” on everything from apples to zwieback, you are seriously deluded. Big Food and its marketing machinery can play a food fad like a flute and they just sit back and watch the bucks inflate their coffers as the idiots dance to their tune.

I'm not going to go into a lengthy discussion of gluten here. Simply put, gluten is a general name for certain proteins found in wheat, rye, and barley, proteins that help foods maintain their shape and structure by acting as a sort of natural glue. There is nothing intrinsically or inherently “unhealthy,” “bad”, or “evil” about gluten. And unless you have a specific disorder called celiac disease, a condition wherein the ingestion of gluten leads to damage in the small intestine, there is no medically or scientifically sound reason to avoid the substance.

“Well, I don't have celiac, but I'm gluten intolerant.” No, you're probably not. Because research indicates there ain't no such thing. A study conducted by the Department of Gastroenterology, Eastern Health Clinical School, Monash University, Box Hill, Victoria, Australia concluded: “In a placebo-controlled, cross-over rechallenge study, we found no evidence of specific or dose-dependent effects of gluten in patients with NCGS [non-celiac gluten sensitivity] placed diets low in FODMAPs [fermentable, oligo-, di-, monosaccharides, and polyols].” In non-scientific terms, it's all in your head.

One of the authors of the study, Professor Peter Gibson, says the real reason many people who have eliminated gluten from their diets claim to feel better or sexier or healthier or whatever is simply because they've changed their diets. People hear about “going gluten-free” from some talking head or another and they go out and start buying fresh vegetables. They stop eating processed crap and they just start cooking and eating a lot better in general. So while it may seem on the surface that cutting out the gluten is what helped them lose the weight, or cleared up their complexion, or made them taller, or whatever the ridiculous claim might be, in reality, as Gibson says, “Blaming the gluten is easy, but you could point to about a hundred things they're doing better.”

Imagine a man standing in a pouring rain getting soaking wet. Another man comes along and hands him an umbrella and a packet of magic powder. The second man tells the first that he will stay dry if he raises the umbrella and stands under it while throwing the magic powder into the air. The first man does as he is instructed, and upon finding himself staying dry as promised, he proceeds to go out and tell everyone he knows about the wondrous magic powder. Far-fetched? No more so than the miraculous claims of the “gluten-free” crowd. When it comes to dietary health and wellness, there are no magic powders. That's a hard-sell in this day and age, because nobody likes to think that all the alleged benefits they reap from listening to some celebrity spokesperson about the glories of going gluten-free might just be psychological.

Here's some more food for thought: the “gluten-free” craze may actually be damaging to your health. It's a basic premise of food science that everything is a trade off. When you make something “low fat” or “sugar free,” you take something out of a food that you have to replace with something else. Often that something is an artificially, chemically produced additive that is far worse for you than the original natural substance ever was. Or it could be something like salt. Take a gander at the label of your favorite “fat-free” snack. Yeah, they took out the fat, alright, but they doubled down on the sodium to make up the flavor difference. Same thing happens with “gluten-free” products. They've got to replace the gluten with something else for texture or taste. According to research conducted by places like Columbia University Medical Center, many gluten-free products contain higher amounts of fat and sugar and lack fiber, protein, and a lot of nutrients such as folate, iron, and B vitamins. That leaves us with a whole line of products on grocery store shelves that have less fiber, protein, and vitamins and more sugar and sodium in their gluten-free formulations than they have in their supposedly less healthy ones.

This is especially problematic for kids. Okay, moms. Maybe it's alright for you to risk your health based on the wisdom of some “personality” who couldn't even qualify for the low “star” standards of “Dancing With The Stars”. But does that mean you have the right to inflict your gullibility on your growing and developing children? Why don't you try getting your health advice from the Journal of the American Medical Association rather than from People Magazine? Or maybe you could check out the Journal of Pediatrics, where it was recently published that “increased fat and calorie intake have been identified in individuals after a GFD [gluten-free diet]. Obesity, overweight, and new-onset insulin resistance and metabolic syndrome have been identified after initiation of a GFD.”

Here's the science, not the gossip: for people who don't have a medical condition like celiac disease, there are no proven health benefits to a “gluten-free” diet. Period. Furthermore, without proper nutritional guidance, cutting out foods with gluten can lead to nutritional deficiencies and increased fat and calorie intake, especially among children.

I'm not going to reach everybody with this message. I'm a realist and I understand that many of the rabid gluten-free dieters out there will say something along the lines of, “Stuff it, bozo. I know what I feel so you can just take your opinion and sit on it.” To them I say, “more power to you.” To everybody else I would plead stop the craziness and stop listening to the crazies. Get off the bandwagon and into the kitchen. Get rid of the packaged chemistry sets that masquerade as processed foods and start cooking with fresh, natural ingredients. Practice balance and moderation in your diet and before you know it you'll lose weight, feel better, be sexier, have clearer skin, keep your hair, make more money, and maybe even be taller. Who knows? It won't be a matter of being gluten-free or fat-free or carb-free or anything else that requires being brain-free. It's just common sense, a commodity unfortunately uncommon among the senseless followers of celebrity fads.

The Best Way To Cook Bacon

Start With A Quality Product

Can there be any doubt about the allure of bacon? Or the oft repeated fact that bacon makes everything better?

Bacon happens to be the first food I learned to cook. Back when I was about seven years old, I used to beg for bacon at breakfast, lunch, and supper. Finally, my long-suffering mother broke down and taught me how to cook it myself so that she wouldn't have to deal with my constant demands for what the USDA defines as “the cured belly of a swine carcass.” Such an inelegant description of ambrosia!

Since I intend here to instruct on the cooking of bacon rather than to expound on its character, I won't go into the different types of bacon (back bacon, jowl bacon, cottage bacon, middle bacon, streaky bacon), or the different curing processes (dry cured, wet cured, sugar cured, applewood smoked, hickory smoked, unsmoked). Let's just assume we're dealing with ordinary strips, slices, or rashers of good old grocery store bacon.

Well, let me stop myself there for a minute: the best way to cook bacon is to start with a quality product. Generally speaking, that means looking beyond the meat counter at the grocery store. That's not to say you can't find good bacon at the supermarket. In the U.S., Oscar Mayer is probably the top of the line national brand, but Hormel makes some good stuff and there are lots and lots of other fine quality national and regional brands to choose from. Local and store brands are an "iffy" proposition. Publix has an excellent private label bacon, but I have not found many other store brands that compare favorably to the more expensive name brands. And none of the local, regional, or national brands compare with the exceptional product being produced by artisans like Tennessee's Allen Benton. Benton's Bacon, procured only online or at the Benton's SmokyMountain Country Hams smokehouse in Madisonville, Tennessee, will change your life. There's a reason Michelin starred chefs from coast to coast swear by the stuff. Iowa's Vande Rose Farms also produces a superior bacon as do the folks at Neuske's in Wisconsin. Unfortunately, these products – when and where you can find them – are gonna cost you more than the common brands. You can't buy quality bacon for a dollar a pound.

Case in point: I have a relative who is absolutely, positively convinced that store brands and economy brands are every bit as good as name brands. I can't convince him that saving pennies on the cheapest stuff he can buy sometimes winds up costing more in the long run. So when I went shopping with him, I bought a pound of Hormel Black Label bacon and he bought his usual cut rate store brand. I cooked up batches of both and laid them out side by side on a plate. My bacon had minimal shrinkage. Each piece cooked up to a length of between five and six inches. It retained a nice even strip of lean meat throughout. It cooked evenly and had a wonderful, rich, smoky flavor. His bacon shrank down to uneven little pieces of curled up fat barely three inches in length with practically no lean meat on them. And it was absolutely flavorless. But, by golly, it was sixty-five cents cheaper than my Hormel! You get what you pay for.

Okay, back to the kitchen. You've chosen your bacon, now choose your cooking medium. I learned to cook bacon on a steel flat top grill plate, and I've used everything from electric griddles to toaster ovens to broilers to non-stick cookware. And, of course, there is always the microwave. But for my money, nothing works better than frying up your bacon on the stovetop. And for that, nothing beats cast iron. A well-seasoned cast iron skillet or griddle and bacon are just made for each other.

Begin by taking your bacon out of the refrigerator ten or fifteen minutes before you intend to use it. The slices will separate a little easier. If you must use fresh from the fridge cold bacon, a rubber spatula or the dull side of a butter knife slid along the length of the slices with a slight rocking motion should help separate them neatly.

Start with a cold pan. This will help reduce the amount of splattering. Splattering occurs in part because of the quick salt-brining wet-cure method used by most of today's meat processors. The liquid soaks into the meat, and when water hits hot oil – well, you know what happens. Starting cold and cooking low and slow will keep the snapping, crackling, and popping to a minimum.

Low and slow is always the way to go. Never exceed medium-low to medium heat. Bacon can go from barely cooked to barely edible in about two seconds if you're not careful. Watch it carefully and turn it frequently. Now, some people use tongs or a fork to turn bacon. I use a standard kitchen turner. Some people call it a pancake turner, others just call it a spatula. Whatever you call it, here's why I use it instead of a fork or tongs; not only can I turn the bacon over cleanly and easily, I can also press it down. Pressing the bacon while cooking it keeps the slices from curling up and produces nice flat, evenly cooked slices. They sell bacon presses to do the job, some of them cutely shaped like pigs, but I just press down with my turner to get the same effect.

From the “did you know” department; did you know that older bacon cooks – and burns – quicker than fresh bacon? So watch the stuff from the package you opened last week. And, obviously, thick sliced bacon cooks more slowly than thin.

Don't overcrowd your pan. Cooking in small batches might take longer, but it will yield better quality results. Some people cut the slices in half. Meh. Leave 'em long. They're gonna shrink anyway. If you're going to make several batches, drain off the excess grease in the pan after each batch. Or after every other batch at most. Otherwise, you're basically shallow-frying the bacon in its own grease and it won't come out as nice and crispy that way.

As with most cooking techniques, practice makes perfect. Only you know how soft or crisp you like your bacon. It's a real challenge when I make breakfast for a particular couple of friends. He likes his bacon really soft, barely cooked. She likes it crisped, but not overdone, which is the way I prefer it, too. My wife, however, likes hers cooked really crisp, almost to the point of burning. I usually manage to please everyone. It's all a matter of watching and timing.

Finally, remove the bacon from the pan and lay it out on a double layer of paper towels. Allow the towels to absorb the grease and blot it off the top of the slices, as well. If the cooked bacon is going to have to sit for awhile while you cook eggs, make toast, or whatever, you might try setting your oven on "warm" and sticking the bacon in there on a plate to keep it nice and warm for serving.

Another increasingly popular method involves the oven for actually cooking the bacon rather than just keeping it warm. I've done it this way and I am not a real fan of the method. It's commonly done in high-volume restaurant kitchens and it is cleaner and more convenient if you're cooking a lot of bacon. But there's something about the texture. I can always tell pan fried bacon from oven baked.

If you really must cook your bacon in the oven, set your rack in the middle portion of the oven and preheat the oven to 400°. Lay your bacon out on a rimmed baking pan lined with parchment paper or aluminum foil. Better yet, a slotted broiler pan, if you have one. If not, a wire rack placed in the baking pan works, too. Using the rack or the slotted pan allows the grease to drip away as the bacon cooks rather than having the bacon poach in its grease. The bacon will be crisper when cooked on the rack and softer directly on the pan. Your preference. Once the oven once reaches temperature, place the pan on the center rack and cook the bacon for 15 to 20 minutes. Keep an eye on it. If too much fat starts to accumulate, take the pan out and drain it off. When it's done, remove the bacon and drain it on paper towels.

The advantages to this method are many: you can cook a lot of bacon at once – a whole pound, if you want; the bacon will cook absolutely flat with no curling; you don't have to turn it or tend it; there's more space on the stovetop for other things; and cleanup is a breeze. All that said, it's still my second favorite method. Call me stubborn and old-fashioned.

My least favorite way to cook bacon is the microwave. Yeah, it cooks in a jiffy, but the results are.....unpalatable at best. The only time I cook bacon in the microwave is if I'm going to crumble it for “bacon bits” in a salad or on a baked potato. The microwave excels at making bacon dry and crunchy.

If you really, really must use the microwave, you can either employ one of those nifty, grooved microwave bacon cookers you see on TV or you can just use a microwave safe plate. Either way, lay the bacon out so its not touching. Otherwise it will fuse into a large, crispy mass and be very difficult to separate. Cover the bacon with a paper towel, unless you're really into cleaning the microwave. Just lay the towel over the bacon gently. Don't press it down or you'll have loads of fun trying to remove the little bits of paper towel that will invariably cook into your bacon. Rule of thumb; one minute cooking time per slice. But, as all the microwave instructions disclaim, microwave temperatures do vary according to the power of the oven, so watch it carefully. If it looks like it needs a little more cook time, do so in 30 second intervals. You'd be surprised how much difference there is between 30 and 45 seconds. I've had bacon go from soggy to rigor mortis in that little interval. Watch it. No need to drain, but get the cooked bacon off the paper towels as quickly as possible. The bacon is likely still cooking for a few seconds after you take it out of the microwave and it will cook itself right onto your paper towels if you don't remove it quickly. And be careful; that plate and those greasy paper towels are going to be hot.

There you have it: fry your bacon for best results, bake it if you're cooking a lot and want easy cleanup, and microwave it only when you're desperate.

James Beard said it: “There are few sights that appeal to me more than the streaks of lean and fat in a good side of bacon, or the lovely round of pinkish meat framed in delicate white fat that is Canadian bacon. Nothing is quite as intoxicating as the smell of bacon frying in the morning, save perhaps the smell of coffee brewing.” But that's another subject entirely.

Celebrate Being Italian -- Even If You're Not

It Works For The Irish!

As established by Presidential Proclamation, October is National Italian- American Heritage Month, a time set aside to recognize the many achievements and contributions of Americans of Italian descent as well as of Italians in America.

I sort of straddle the line. I'm not an “Italian in America” because my ancestors left Emilia-Romagna a long time ago. And I don't have a dog in the hunt when it comes to an “Italian- American Heritage” because said Emiliani ancestors originally landed in Canada. But I'm still an “American of Italian descent,” I still have an Italian birthright, and October is a great time to celebrate it.

I think anybody can be Italian in October if they want to be. Looking at the impact Italians have had on this side of the pond, everybody should be at least a little Italian this time of year. Hey! It works for the Irish every March 17.

Undoubtedly, the Italian with the greatest impact on America was the man commonly (if incorrectly) credited with discovering America, Christopher Columbus. Although he sailed under a Spanish flag, Columbus was born in the Republic of Genoa in present-day Italy. In his native dialect his name was Christoffa Corombo. In Italian, the name translates to Christoforo Colombo, which, in turn, anglicizes to Christopher Columbus.

Of course, there's a lot of retrospective revisionist PC-ness going on these days, and in many circles Columbus has been stripped of his title and vilified as a bringer of disease, doom, and destruction. Modern scholarship tells us that the Vikings got to North America centuries before Columbus and that the Chinese, the Russians, the Arabs, and even the Polynesians deserve part of the credit for discovering America. Be that as it may, Columbus was still the guy who made the most of the whole thing. Regardless of whether or not he was the “discoverer,” he was the man in the right place at the right time with the right political connections and the right publicity machine. So he's the one who gets his own holiday in October and who has streets, cities, counties, provinces, and even a country (Colombia) named after him. Sorry, Leif Ericson.

Many Italian-Americans observe Columbus Day as a celebration of their heritage. The Italian population of New York City organized the first such celebration on October 12, 1866. A few years later, in 1892, President Benjamin Harrison issued a proclamation recognizing the 400th anniversary of the “discovery” of America. Colorado became the first state to officially observe Columbus Day in 1905. And in 1937, President Franklin Roosevelt declared October 12 to be a federal holiday, designated as Columbus Day. (The Uniform Monday Holiday Act, signed into law by President Richard Nixon in 1968, moved the date to its current second Monday in October.) The day is often designated in many communities as Italian-American Day or Italian-American Heritage Day.

Another Italian, this one from Florence, had a big impact on America: he gave America its name. Amerigo Vespucci was a navigator, a cartographer, and an explorer in his own right. He was actually well acquainted with Columbus and was familiar with his voyages of discovery. At the behest of Manuel I, King of Portugal, Vespucci traveled as an observer on several voyages to the newly “discovered” continents conducted between 1499 and 1502. As a result of the publication of his observations, the American continents were named for him by a German cartographer, Martin Waldseemüller, who first used the name “America” on the 1507 map “Universalis Cosmographia” in honor of the Florentine explorer.

The British got a toehold on the new continent thanks to the exploratory efforts of an Italian named Giovanni Caboto. Except when the Brits wrote the history books, they chose to call him “John Cabot.” Like Columbus, he was Genoese, and unlike Columbus, he actually explored the mainland of North America during his voyages in 1497 and 1498. And then there was that other Italian guy, Giovanni da Verrazzano, the first European explorer to map the Atlantic coast and to sail into New York Bay. You might be familiar with his bridge, the one that spans New York Harbor today – even though they spell it incorrectly.

The first Italian to take up permanent residence in America, thus becoming the first “Italian-American,” was a Venetian fellow named Pietro Cesare Alberti. At the age of 27, Pietro decided to leave failing fortunes in Venice behind and to seek a new life in the New World. Sailing aboard the Dutch ship De Coninck David (King David), he arrived in the Dutch colony of New Amsterdam on June 2, 1635. Taking up initial residence in a house on Broad Street and later farming a hundred acres in Brooklyn, Pietro and his wife Judith were killed in an Indian raid in 1655. If you wander through New York City's Battery Park and find the bronze statue of Giovanni da Verrazzano there, look around for a small stone that commemorates Pietro Alberti's arrival and declares June 2 to be "Alberti Day".

So while Columbus and Vespucci, Caboto , Verrazzano, and Alberti may have been the first Italians in the neighborhood, they were far from the last. A few immigrants trickled in, mainly from the northern regions, in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Then the floodgates opened and nearly 4 million Italians, mostly from the poverty-stricken southern regions of Sicily, Calabria, Campania, and Abruzzo, entered the United States between 1899 and 1924. A million more came after the close of World War II in 1945. As a result, “Little Italys” sprang up in cities all over the country. In New York City, “Little Italys” were located along Arthur Avenue in the Bronx as well as in lower Manhattan and on Manhattan's Upper East Side, known as “Italian Harlem. “Little Italys” can be found on Boston's North End and Chicago's Taylor Street on the Near West Side. The Hill section of St. Louis is one of the most popular “Little Italy” neighborhoods in the country. And it was at Il Giardino d'Italia, or “The Garden of Italy,” located at the corner of East 9th Street and Woodland Avenue in Cleveland's “Little Italy,” that an Italian immigrant named Ettore Boiardi – known as “Chef Boyardee” – introduced America to his brand of Italian food.

Today, more than 15.7 million people in the United States identify themselves as Italian-Americans. They make up nearly six percent of the U.S. population and represent the country's fourth largest European ethnic group.

Much is heard these days about the treatment of Japanese-Americans during World War II. Often forgotten in modern times, however, is the plight of Italian-Americans during the war years when nearly 600,000 Italian-American citizens were branded as “enemy aliens.” They were required to register with authorities and carry cards identifying them as such. They were prohibited from traveling more than five miles from their homes without permission. They were not permitted to own firearms, radios, cameras, or even flashlights – considered to be “signaling devices.” And on the West Coast, they were subjected to an 8 PM to 6 AM curfew. The FBI arrested around 1,500 Italian-Americans between December 1941 and June 1942. Most were quickly released, but about 250 spent up to two years in internment camps.

In odd contrast, an estimated 1.2 million Italian-Americans served in the U.S. military during WWII. The only enlisted Marine in U.S. history to win the nation's two highest military honors -- the Navy Cross and the U.S. Congressional Medal of Honor – was Italian-American John Basilone, a U.S. Marine sergeant, who died at the Battle of Iwo Jima.

These wartime conditions left indelible marks in the Italian-American community. Signs and flyers were posted directing “enemy aliens” to “Speak American.” As a result, many Italian-Americans stopped speaking their mother language. Others Americanized their names or otherwise attempted to distance themselves from their heritage. Only recently have some of these antiquated cultural prejudices begun to fade, allowing people of Italian descent to take pride in their ancestry.

Overcoming generations of hardship and cultural prejudice, Italian-Americans have made substantial contributions to all aspects of American life, including food, entertainment, popular culture, law, politics, education, science, and sports. The following is a brief and by no means comprehensive list of Italians and Italian-Americans who have made significant contributions to American society:

In the world of finance, Amadeo Pietro Giannini founded the Bank of Italy in San Francisco in 1904. Giannini is credited with instituting the practice of branch banking in the United States. His Bank of Italy ultimately transformed into today's Bank of America, which he chaired until his retirement in 1945.

Although not an Italian-American immigrant, few can dispute the impact Guglielmo Marconi, “the Father of Radio,” had on America and on the world.

Italian-born scientist Enrico Fermi discovered radioactive elements that led to the nuclear age.

Italian-American inventors made many contributions to ordinary life. Did you have a “Radio Flyer” wagon when you were a kid? Antonio Pasin, son of a Venetian cabinetmaker, made it possible. Alessandro Dandini invented the three-way lightbulb. Bernard Cousino was the inventor of the eight-track tape player and of the automobile tape deck. Think of the Jacuzzi family, developers of the jet water pump, as you soak in your hot tub. Thank Vince Marotta for your morning coffee. He invented “Mr. Coffee.” And when overnight guests arrive, be grateful to Bernard Castro for inventing the sofa bed.

When it comes to social work, Mother Frances Xavier Cabrini, founder of the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, spent her life in Italy and later in America working to build schools, orphanages, and hospitals. As the first American citizen to be canonized as a saint (Saint Francesa Saveria Cabrini), she is the patroness of immigrants.

Lido “Lee” Iacocca looms large as an American business icon. Another guy who did well in business was Anthony Rossi, founder of Tropicana and pioneer in the pasteurization of orange juice.

In politics, Fiorella H. La Guardia and Rudolph W. Giuliani stand out as Mayors of New York City, while Mario Cuomo served as Governor of New York. Alfred E. “Al” Smith also served four terms as New York's governor and was defeated by Herbert Hoover in the 1928 Presidential election. Smith might have been New York City born and raised, but he was still the first Italian-American Presidential candidate. His father, Alfred Emanuele Ferraro, changed the family name to “Smith,” the English equivalent to “ferraro” or “blacksmith”. Sons of Sicilian and Italian immigrants, respectively, Antonin Scalia and Samuel Alito were both appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Where would we be without Italian food and wine? Besides the aforementioned “Chef Boyardee,” Mario Batali, Michael Chiarello, Rachael Ray, Giada De Laurentiis, Lidia Bastianich, Guy Fieri, Tom Colicchio, and Rocco DiSpirito are just a few of the celebrity chefs who enrich our lives and our tables. And we can thank Ernest and Julio Gallo and Robert Mondavi for many of the wines that accompany our meals. And let's not forget Domenico Ghirardelli and his fine chocolates for dessert.

Still in a food mode, Jim Delligatti was the franchise operator responsible for the creation of McDonald's “Big Mac.” Amedeo Obici and Mario Peruzzi founded the “Planters Peanut” company. Vincent R. Ciccone started out as a janitor for the “Charms Candy Company", but he retired as President and CEO after patenting the “Blow Pop.” And it was Italo Marcioni who patented the ice cream cone.

Italians have been foremost in the arts since the Renaissance. In America, Constantino Brumidi has been called “The Michelangelo of the U.S. Capitol.”

The world of opera was graced by tenors Enrico Caruso and Alfred Arnold Cocozza, better known as Mario Lanza. Combining opera and food, we have coloratura soprano Luisa Tetrazzini – also the namesake of “Turkey Tetrazzini”.

Award-winning composer Henry Mancini and world renowned conductor Arturo Toscanini dominated their fields.

In popular American music we find: James Francis (Jimmy) Durante, Francis Albert (Frank) Sinatra, Dino Paul Crocetti (Dean Martin), Vito Rocco Farinola (Vic Damone), Anthony Dominick Benedetto (Tony Bennett), Gennaro Luigi Vitaliano (Jerry Vale), Alfred Cini (Al Martino), Concetta Rosa Maria Franconero (Connie Francis), Walden Robert Cassotto (Bobby Darin), Francis Thomas Avallone (Frankie Avalon), James William Ercolani (James Darren), Francis Stephen Castelluccio (Frankie Valli), Salvatore Phillip (Sonny) Bono, Dion Francis DiMucci (Dion), Fabiano Anthony Forte (Fabian), Madonna Louise Ciccone (Madonna), and Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta (Lady Gaga).

On the big and small screens: Rodolfo Guglielmi (Rudolph Valentino), Dominic Felix Amici (Don Ameche), Louis Francis (Lou) Costello, Ermes Effron Borgnino (Ernest Borgnine), Alfonso Roberto D'Abruzzo (Robert Alda, also father of Alan Alda), Armand Joseph Catalano (Guy Williams), Harry Guardino, Vincenzo Scognamiglio (Vincent Gardenia), Anthony George Papaleo (Anthony/Tony Franciosa), Vincent Edward Zoino III  (Vince Edwards), Joseph Campanella, Catherine Gloria Balotta (Kaye Ballard), Paul Sorvino (also father of Mira Sorvino), Salvatore Mineo, Jr. (Sal Mineo), Dominick (Dom) DeLuise, Sylvester Gardenzio Stallone, Joe Pesci, Alfredo (Al) Pacino, Susan Lucci, Danny DeVito, John Travolta, Ray Romano, Tony Danza, Stanley Tucci, Marisa Tomei, James Gandolfini, Nicolas Kim Coppola (Nicholas Cage), Scott Baio, and Alyssa Milano, just to name a few.

Italians are big on family, perhaps explaining these artistic duos: Robert De Niro – the father – has paintings on display in the Metropolitan Museum, while Robert De Niro – the son – displays a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Carmine Coppola was a renowned flautist and composer. His son, Francis Ford Coppola, gained fame as an award-winning film director.

Vincent Minnelli was a well-known film director. Daughter Liza Minnelli may be even better known as a singer/actress/entertainer.

Garry and Penny Marshall were brother and sister actors and directors. The family name “Masciarelli” was Americanized before they were born.

Elsewhere in “showbiz,” Frank Capra was an Academy Award-winning director. Animator/cartoonist Joseph Barbera formed half of the team of Hanna-Barbera and gave us “Yogi Bear” and so many other beloved characters.

Speaking of cartoons, Walter Lanza (Walter Lantz) was the creator of “Woody Woodpecker,” and Adriana Caselotti provided the voice of Disney's original “Snow White.”

Speaking of Disney, Annette Funicello and Albert R. "Cubby" Broccoli were original Mickey Mouse “Mouseketeers.” Both went on to film careers, she as an actress and he as producer of the “James Bond” series. (And, yes, his ancestors developed the vegetable that bears their name.)

The world of sports would be a very different place without these baseball legends: Joseph Paul “Joe” DiMaggio, Ernie Lombardi, Tommy Lasorda, Lorenzo Pietro “Yogi” Berra, Phil Rizzuto, Roy Campanella, Joe Garagiola, Tony LaRussa, and Joe Torre. Mention, too, of A. Bartlett Giamatti, the youngest President of Yale University and later Commissioner of Baseball.

On the gridiron: Vince Lombardi and Joe Paterno called the plays, while Joe Montana, Dan Marino, and Brian Piccolo executed them.

In the squared circle, Rocky Marciano, Rocky Graziano, and Jake LaMotta were all boxing champions. And while wrestler and TV personality Hulk Hogan was tops in his profession, his mama called him Terry Gene Bollea.

Finally, if you were ever a 98-pound weakling always getting sand kicked in your face by bullies at the beach, you probably dreamed of being just like body builder Angelo Siciliano. Except you called him “Charles Atlas.”

It's October, so be Italian – even if you aren't – and take pride in the effect Italian-Americans have had on American culture. From their arrival as poor immigrants, often feared, derided and relegated to urban ghettos to their rise to the pinnacle of food, entertainment, law, politics, education, science, and sports, Italians haven’t just contributed to that culture, they have in many ways defined it.  

Essentials of Italian Entertaining

Save Your Money On Quantity And Concentrate On Quality

You're planning a big dinner party. And because you are a person of unquestionable taste and sophistication, you want it to be an Italian dinner party, right? Bravissimo! As the saying goes, “chi mangia bene mangia italiano.” (Those who eat well eat Italian.) So you take a cue from hundreds of church socials and civic “Italian Night” suppers and you go out and buy bagged salad, creamy Italian dressing in a bottle, frozen garlic bread, and the fixings for spaghetti and meatballs. You even score some Neapolitan ice cream for dessert. Find some plastic tablecloths in a red and white checked pattern at the dollar store, stuff some candles into Chianti bottles, throw around a few plastic grapes and you've created the ideal menu and décor for the perfect authentic Italian experience, right? Only if you are trying to achieve the atmosphere of a cliched old movie set somewhere in New York City fifty or sixty years ago. Real Italian entertaining is much different.

For example, unlike American meals or the common American “salad and spaghetti” concept of an Italian meal, traditional Italian entertaining and dining involves long meals with lots of courses. Italians don't think so much in terms of “courses” as they do of plates. Italians say “primi e secondi piatti” (first and second plates), etc. An American meal consists of an “appetizer course” followed by a “main course” or “entree course” which includes a “side dish,” and concludes with a “dessert course.” Even a simple Italian meal is more complex. And a formal meal can have as many as eight “courses” as Americans would consider them. We recently prepared a simple four-plate meal for my sister and her husband. As we explained the order of service and started bringing out the plates, my non-Italian brother-in-law commented, “Looks like we're gonna be here for awhile.” To which I replied, “Yep.”

We plated this meal because it was just the four of us. For larger groups, the food is often served family-style and platters are passed around rather than having individual plated portions. And get that hokey “abbondanza” idea perpetrated by American advertising companies trying to sell spaghetti sauce right out of your head. Because there are many so courses, Italian portions tend to be much, much smaller than Americans are used to. The whole “abbondanza” schtick glorifying wretched excess comes straight out of Madison Avenue, perhaps by way of Arthur Avenue, but would never be found on any street in Italy. Italians just don't eat that way. Save your money on quantity and concentrate instead on quality. Now that's Italian.

Here are the basic steps to a dinner party-worthy full eight-course Italian meal. If you don't have the money, the time, or the endurance, you can skip some of the courses, but you'll also be skimping a bit on the authentic experience.

Start out with the Aperitivo course. This is simply a pre-dinner drink. You may have heard of an apéritif? Same thing. The term comes from the Latin “aperire,” meaning “to open.” And that’s the point of the exercise: an aperitivo is meant to stimulate, or “open,” your appetite. Because an aperitivo is meant to stimulate the appetite, the drink should be very dry (low in sugar), since sugar actually limits the appetite. It should also be low in alcohol, because......well, you don't want people getting rip-roaring drunk before dinner. Traditional aperitivi include Vermouth, Prosecco or Italian liqueurs like Campari and Aperol. Recently, spritzes and other cocktails have also become popular aperitivi.

Move on to the Antipasto course. “Antipasto” literally means “before the meal.” In general English terms, it means “appetizer.” There is no such thing as “an” antipasto. There are countless varieties of antipasti across Italy, limited only by the imagination. Some of the more traditional offerings include olives, cured meats, cheeses, bruschette, crostini, preserves, and grilled or fried vegetables or seafood. Usually a variety, hot, cold or mixed, are served together. Portions are small: antipasti are intended to whet the appetite, not overwhelm it.

The next plate or course is the Primo Piatto, which literally means “first plate.” Obviously, if you've already had an appetizer, the primo piatto is technically not the “first” plate, but work with me here, okay? That's just the way they do it. Primi piatti are starches like pasta, risotto or polenta. Unlike at the American table where these starches are served snuggled up next to a hunk of steak or chicken or a pork chop, Italian primi are self-contained, stand alone dishes. That's one big reason why Italians don't serve the monstrously huge piles of pasta commonly seen in American Italian restaurants: the pasta is intended as a course, not as the entire meal. No Italian in his right mind would think of trying to consume enough pasta to feed a small village and then move on to the next two or three or four courses. In general, a primo piatto serving is about the size of a man's closed fist rather than the size of his head. In Italy, it’s not uncommon to see two primi served with a big meal. Something like, say, a spaghetti carbonara and a gnocchi alla sorrentina; two distinctly different dishes allowing for a little variety.

The Secondo Piatto is next in line. These are your protein dishes. Meat, poultry, seafood, and sometimes an egg dish like a frittata are served as secondi, a word which means – I bet you can guess – “second.” Although most secondi are meat-based, there are a few vegetarian options. Melanzane alla parmigiana (eggplant Parmesan) comes to mind. Again, this is a separate plate all its own. The food served as a secondo does not share space on a plate with starches or vegetables. The starches come first and the vegetables come next.

The vegetable course is the Contorno. Contorno means “outline,” “boundary” or “edge.” Served on a separate plate, it occupies space on the edge or the boundary or the outline of the secondo piatto. Contorni may be served at the same time, but never on the same plate. A contorno may be as simple as a few stalks of asparagus or it can be a complex creation containing many elements. Or maybe something like a stuffed tomato. Insalate (salads) kind of sneak themselves onto the contorno's playing field. In general, salads are just not an Italian thing and they are never served before a meal or as a meal. Sometimes insalate can be served as contorni, but usually they are presented near the end of the meal as a separate course to cleanse the palate.

Some Italians serve a Formaggi course as part of a full meal. It's basically a cheese platter, the purpose of which is to provide a transition from savory to sweet flavors. Typically the platter includes a variety of fresh cheeses and aged ones that can be paired up with fresh fruits, dried fruits, jellies, honey or nuts. Not all Italians utilize this course, but among those who do, there are many who use it to close out the meal in place of the sweet or “dolci” course that follows.

Dolci means “sweets.” But the Italian idea of sweets and the American idea oftentimes don't match up. Americans tend to lean toward heavily sweet desserts like cakes and pies and ice cream concoctions. An Italian “dessert” may consist of a plate of fresh fruit. That's not to say that Italians don't have “desserts.” They do and there are hundreds of varieties of them, ranging from simple “biscotti e torte” (cookies and cakes), to regional specialties like cannoli siciliani and panforte di siena, to festive seasonal offerings like panettone and colomba di Pasqua. But most often, Italians reserve these options for big meals or celebrations and rely on combinations of local, seasonal fruit for less auspicious day-to-day occasions.

In Italy, coffee is a course. The final service to almost any Italian meal is Caffè e Digestivo. Especially the “caffè” part. Of course, when Italians say caffè, they mean only one thing: espresso. Rich and flavorful, espresso caps off any meal. And it is always served at the end of the meal. Unlike in America, coffee is never served with lunch or dinner; it is always served after. And cappuccinos and macchiatos are strictly breakfast drinks. You'll never find them served after 10 or 11 a.m. As far as digestivi go, they are beverages served on the opposite end of the digestive spectrum from the aperitivi. Intended to stimulate digestion, digestivi run the range from dark, herbal, medicinal drinks to lighter but still bitter beverages. Amaro is a common example. In fact, the digestivo course is often called the Amaro course. Grappa is also quite popular, as are Sambuca, Limoncello and other liqueurs. Digestivi flavors are pretty bold and complex, leading the course to also be called “ammazzacaffè,” which translates to “coffee killer” because they finish off the taste of coffee.

Speaking of beverages, we've already established that coffee is not an appropriate accompaniment to an Italian meal. Neither is Coke, Pepsi or any other flavored soda. Iced tea is practically unheard of. Wine is the beverage of choice, but Italians also drink a lot of water. Strangely, although most of Italy has perfectly potable tap water, Italians tend to eschew water straight from the sink (acqua del rubinetto) in favor of bottled water. When you ask for water, you'll be offered the choice between “acqua gassata o naturale”; fizzy water or still. Sometimes the choices will be between “fizzante e minerale,” which is pretty much the same choice expressed in different terms. Italians drink a lot of sparkling water, the most popular of which is probably San Pellegrino. Among non-carbonated or “still” mineral spring waters, Aqua Panna is a leading brand. Serve either or, preferably, both, since drinking straight carbonated water is an acquired taste many Americans are slow to acquire.

As far as “authentic” décor for your party, forget the kitsch. Red checkered tablecloths, candles stuck in fiaschi (that's what those Chianti bottles with the baskets are called), and plastic grapes are relics of a bygone time that may or may not have ever existed outside the mind of advertising executives. Nice meals in Italy are served on nice tablecloths and nice plates with nice flatware and glassware just like anywhere else. And nice fresh floral arrangements are also....nice. Put on some nice Italian dinner music (there's tons of it on iTunes), some light opera by Mario Lanza or Luciano Pavarotti, or maybe mix in some more recognizable tunes by Italian-American artists like Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Tony Bennett and others, and you'll have the perfect setting for your perfect Italian meal.

Okay. Obviously, what I've outlined here are the preparations for the whole megillah. The big party meal. This is not something you're gonna throw together for supper on a Tuesday night. Truth be told, the evening meal is not all that in Italian culture. Lunch, or pranzo, is the big meal of the day, a leisurely one that takes place as part of the afternoon riposo. Dinner is most often a light meal, eaten late by American standards and consisting of soup, salad, cold meats, or leftovers from lunch. But since we Americans make such a big deal of dinner, you could probably do with half the courses. You could still make a very impressive – and delicious – dinner showing with a little antipasto, a primo, a secondo and contorno, and a nice dolci.

Just remember, whether you go all out or scale back, Italian dining and entertaining are all about the food and the fellowship. No TV in the background, no cellphones at the table, and no wolfing down your food and running off to do something else. I have two signs posted in my dining room that sum up the Italian philosophy. One says, “vivere, ridere, amore, mangiare,” meaning “live, laugh, love, eat.” The other reads, “a tavola non s'invecchia,” which loosely translates to “at the table, one does not grow old.”

Buon appetito!

Hairy Cooks, Public Health and Public Perception

Cooks Are A Helluva Lot Hairier These Days

Hair, hair, hair, hair, hair, hair, hair
Flow it, show it
Long as God can grow it
My hair
– “Hair,” Galt MacDermot, James Rado, Gerome Ragni –

A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away, “proper” cooks and chefs, the ones who worked in “nice” restaurants, were always expected to wear white jackets, clean, crisp aprons, tall white hats (called “toques”), and, with the exception, perhaps, of a skinny little mustache, to always be clean-shaven. Cooks of a “lesser” sort, like the ones found in greasy spoon diners, usually wore grubby t-shirts, dirty aprons, paper hats and a perpetual five o'clock shadow. My, how things have changed!

The ratio of chef jackets (white or otherwise) to t-shirts (grubby or otherwise) in today's restaurant industry remains about the same. It's largely a matter of the establishment's style and the cook's personal taste. Aprons are still part of the uniform, too. Traditional toques, however, are all but gone, relegated to the annals of history and the halls of culinary schools. The tall, white, pleated toque has been replaced by a variety of headgear ranging from beanies to ballcaps to bandanas. And sometimes to nothing at all. And therein lies the issue because cooks are a helluva lot hairier these days than they've ever been in the past.

Turn on Top Chef, Hell's Kitchen, or Chopped and you'll see what I mean. Long hair, frizzy hair, curly hair, spiky hair and beards that rival ZZ Top or those Duck Dynasty guys. All of it gloriously unbridled and unrestrained. Even clean-shaven men with average length hair go uncovered in the kitchen. And despite the fact that these are supposed to be “reality” shows, that's not really reality. Every time I watch one of those programs where some guy cooks with a mop on his head and a beard hanging down to his knees, I say the same thing: “I'll bet he doesn't get away with that in a real kitchen.”

Public health codes in every state contain some variation on the verbiage “food employees shall wear hair restraints such as hats, hair coverings or nets, beard restraints, and clothing that covers body hair, that are designed and worn to effectively keep their hair from contacting exposed food.” And I know this section of code is enforced because a quick scan of restaurant inspections in my area turned up the violation “all food employees must wear effective hair restraints when working around food” numerous times. I once fired a guy who refused to keep his head covered in my kitchen. I wasn't about to let the twerp cost me a point off my inspection grade just because he didn't like hats. My cooks could always tell when I was getting ready to cook something myself because I kept a cap under the counter and I put it on whenever I headed into the kitchen.

So what's so bad about hair, anyway? Technically, nothing. The FDA doesn't even place a limit on strands of hair per plate. (It does, however, allow up to two maggots per can of tomatoes.) People who study such things say hair is made of a densely packed protein called keratin, which is chemically inactive and won't cause any problems if digested. It's possible that staph bacteria, which can upset the stomach and bring on a case of diarrhea, could hitch a ride on a strand of hair, but it's highly unlikely that the tiny amount of staph that can hide on a hair or two is going to be enough to lead to gastrointestinal problems. Add that to the fact that the FDA has never received a report of anyone getting ill from ingesting hair found in food, and you have to ask yourself “what's the big deal?”

Well.....it's gross, right? Like major league, instinctively, viscerally, makes you choke to think about it gross. I don't know of anybody who doesn't react with revulsion to finding a hair in their food. It's science versus psychology. The eggheads can tell me all day long that eating a hair in my scrambled eggs isn't going to hurt me, and the intellectual me agrees. But the me whose gag reflex developed at my clean-freak mother's knee just says, “Oh, HELL no!” Most people refuse to eat the rest of a dish once a hair is discovered. Some stalwarts just pick out the offending strand and keep on going, but the average person's appetite is effectively quashed. I knew somebody who tossed an entire batch of cookies (literally, not colloquially) because a hair turned up in one cookie. Overkill? Probably. But people just feel that strongly about it.

And for some reason, a lot of people think of facial hair as being “dirtier” than head hair. That's generally not true. Chemically, it's the same stuff. And as far as cleanliness goes, guys who wear beards are usually pretty fastidious about them. They wash them and oil them and comb them and baby them. It's a fashion statement, after all, and who wants to make a dirty fashion statement? Besides, if a guy's beard is going to be smelly and nasty........well, it's right there under his nose, you know? But again, it's psychological. I don't care how clean and oiled and combed some dude's beard is, I don't want him dragging it through my soup. Or leaving parts of it therein.

Most health codes state that a beard must be restrained in a net of some sort if it “hangs off the face.” I have a beard. It's a close-cut goatee that I've had for most of the last thirty years. My son has a similar affectation. Neither of us restrain our chin curtains in the kitchen because, in my case anyway, the hair on my chin is shorter than my eyebrows are getting to be. Talk about restraining facial hair! Remember Larry Hagman and Andy Rooney? There are a lot of old guys out there who should be sporting eyebrow nets. Anyway, my beard doesn't “hang” so it remains unfettered. Unfortunately, these days a lot of cooks who look like they're auditioning to be one of the “Smith Brothers” – especially the brother on the right – are running around kitchens with their beards flying free.

Part of the problem is that nobody wants to look stupid. And, I'm sorry, but beard nets look stupid. Period. My supply catalogs are full of catchy, sporty, cool and attractive ways to cover your noggin. But there ain't nothin' cool or sporty about a beard net. They're ugly, silly, unwieldy, and uncomfortable and nobody in their right mind wants to wear one. So by and large they don't. Regardless of comfort or appearance, though, customers are frequently turned off by heavily bearded cooks. Here are a few comments I gleaned while researching the topic:

I want my chefs either clean-shaven or with beards clipped close. Anything else IS unhygienic. That beard hair I consume with my soup may not cause illness, but that shouldn't be the threshold for determining policy.

Gross gross gross thinking that one of those beard hairs ends up on the food.

Unsanitary pigs.

A long beard that is not symmetrical or otherwise trimmed says to me "I am too lazy to take care of myself and I really don't care what anyone thinks" which is not the message I want to hear about who has been handling my food before I eat it.

Just shave, already. I don't care how much you groom beforehand, restaurant kitchens are hot, sweaty places and the image of a big old beard hanging down is just gross.

Who knows what's living in those beards! Seriously chef(s) cut them back a little cause it's unsanitary!

Unsanitary pigs? I don't know if I'd go that far. But when some of these tattooed wooly-boogers set out to make a “statement,” they need to realize that in many people's minds, that's the statement they're making.

I guess when it comes down to it, it's as much about public perception as it is about public health. Restaurants don't get “fined” in monetary terms for health code violations, they just get points deducted from their grade score. That score gets posted and, believe me, people notice. They also notice slovenly looking cooks and servers. There were a couple of young cooks working in a place I took over that did a pretty good job with the food, but they were perceived by customers as being slobs because they were unkempt, unshaven, didn't keep their heads covered, and wore the crotch of their pants down around their knees. There were a lot of complaints and when I came in and brought a professional dress code to the kitchen, they didn't make the cut. Good enough cooks, nice enough guys, but people didn't want them cooking their food, and at the end of the day, customers vote with their wallets and with their feet.

I've got nothing against hair. At my age, I'm glad to have it. And I'm okay with beards. I've had my facial fuzz for a long time and I intend to keep it. But in a professional setting where appearance makes a difference, I keep my hair covered and my beard short and trimmed. Nobody has ever found a hair in anything I've cooked and they never will. None of my kitchens have ever been dunned by an inspector for hair restraint violations, and they never will. If you're an up and coming cook who wants to establish a “personal style,” just do it with your food and keep your hair out of it. So to speak. If your “personal style” is such that you can't conform to code and to the expectations of your customers, maybe you should be “styling” in a profession where it doesn't matter.

To paraphrase the title song from the hit Broadway musical “Hair”:

“Give me a face with hair, long beautiful hair,

Shining, gleaming, streaming, flaxen, waxen.”

Just keep it out of my kitchen.

About Pasta All'Amatriciana

A Simple But Delicious Dish

I'm sure by now you are aware of the tragedy in Amatrice. Amatrice is an ancient town located in the northern part of the central Italian region of Lazio. People have lived in the area since prehistoric times, and the remains of Roman buildings and tombs have also been found in and around Amatrice. And now it is all but gone, victim of a devastating earthquake that leveled almost three-quarters of the town and killed nearly three hundred people. Prior to the August 24, 2016 quake, Amatrice was a picturesque mountain village rich in artistic and historic heritage. Part of that heritage related to food, as the town was at the center of the region's food and agricultural area. Most notably famous is a simple but delicious pasta sauce called sugo all'amatriciana, a traditional sauce based on guanciale, pecorino cheese, and tomato. Justifiably, the Italian government has named it a traditional agro-alimentary product of the region. All'amatriciana is a sauce traditionally served with long pasta such as bucatini, spaghetti, or vermicelli.

After the earthquake, there was a movement among Italian and Italian-style restaurants to put pasta all'amatriciana on the menu and donate a portion of the proceeds from sales to the relief effort in Amatrice. I passed this idea on to an Italian friend of mine who operates several ristoranti. He thought it to be a noble gesture, but doubted the Italian government's ability to properly handle the money. He suggested instead that I share a recipe for pasta all'amatriciana that readers could prepare and enjoy on their own.

The last time I made pasta all'amatriciana was for a small dinner party. I was to be working in a tiny rural town where a Piggly Wiggly would be the only grocery outlet available to me. Having anticipated that, I set out to assemble the necessary ingredients beforehand. Bucatini proved difficult to find. It's not something that even higher-end grocers regularly stock. Bucatini is like a thick, hollow spaghetti. I finally located some in a specialty shop. Had I not been able to find bucatini, regular spaghetti would have sufficed, but I was going for tradition. Guanciale, however, eluded me. Guanciale is a cured pork jowl or cheek bacon, and it's really hard to find. I wound up substituting pancetta. Failing that, I would have opted for a good quality thick-cut American bacon, but the smokiness of the meat would have altered the flavor profile of the dish. Beyond those two speedbumps, the road to a delicious all'amatriciana is fairly straightforward and smooth.

Here's what you'll need:

2 or 3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
12 ounces of thinly sliced (1/4-inch thick) guanciale, cut into 1/4-inch x 1-inch strips
1 medium onion, finely chopped
2 or 3 cloves garlic, sliced
½ to 1 teaspoon (to taste) red pepper flakes
2 cups tomato sauce, jarred or homemade

salt
1 pound bucatini pasta
½ cup freshly grated Pecorino Romano cheese

As mentioned, you can substitute pancetta, or good quality thick-cut bacon for the guanciale. And almost any long pasta will work in place of the bucatini. Spaghetti is good. Some people prefer using crushed Italian tomatoes instead of a pureed sauce. The choice is yours.

Here's what you do:

Heat the oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add the guanciale (or whatever substitute) and cook for about 8 minutes, or until lightly browned and crisp. Transfer to a paper towel-lined plate and set aside. Drain all but about 2 tablespoons of the fat from the pan and add the onions. Sauté the onions over medium heat until soft and translucent, stirring occasionally, about 5 minutes. Stir in the garlic and cook for about a minute. Add the red pepper flakes and allow them to infuse for about 30 seconds before stirring in the tomato sauce. Add back the cooked guanciale. Bring the sauce to a boil then reduce the heat and simmer uncovered for about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Taste and correct for salt and red pepper.

Meanwhile, cook the pasta in a large pot of generously salted water. Drain the pasta when it is barely al dente, add it to the pan with the sauce and stir to incorporate. Simmer an additional minute or two, then remove the pan from the heat and add the cheese. Toss thoroughly before serving.

Serves 4

Make and enjoy the dish for yourself, then contact the Italian Red Cross (Croce Rossa Italiana) to offer assistance. The organization is collecting funds, which you can contribute online via PayPal, via wire transfer, or by going to their website at http://www.cri.it.  

A Dozen (Or So) Reasons Why You Don't Want To Run A Restaurant

How Hard Can It Be?

So you're sitting around in your underwear watching some foodie porn movie like “Chef” or “No Reservations” or “Burnt” or “Big Night.” And you start to think, “Wow, it must be great to run a restaurant. You're surrounded by all that food and you get to hang out with your friends and feed them and party with them and get waited on by sycophantic servers while you dictate the finer points of preparing your food to eager young cooks who hang on your every word. All you've got to do is open the doors and wait for the customers to stream in while everybody else does the actual work. Hell, I could do that. How hard can it be?”

Or maybe you're a really, really good cook. And everybody you know tells you you should open a restaurant. Why not? Where's the downside to getting paid to cook the same food you already make for your family and friends? They love your meatloaf so why wouldn't everybody love your meatloaf? All you've got to do is hire a few people, open the doors and wait for the money to start rolling in. How hard can it be?

Let me offer you some free advice: the next time somebody suggests you open a restaurant, or, God forbid, actually hands you the keys to one, just look 'em straight in the eye and kick 'em right in the shins.

Restaurants run in my family. My grandparents operated them, various aunts and uncles operated them. One of my sons is in the restaurant business. I've done it, too. So that makes four generations of idiots in one family. Must be a record.

I have a great old black and white photograph of my grandparents standing outside one of their establishments. The picture was taken back in the 1940s or early '50s and both are just beaming with the pride of ownership, Grandpa cutting quite the jaunty figure in his white jacket and peaked cap and Grandma looking appropriately matronly in her apron. They look so happy and satisfied. I gotta wonder if maybe the picture wasn't snapped on opening day before reality set in.

I'm a caterer and/or personal chef and happy to be such. Restaurants ain't my bag. Been there, done that. No, I like serving my tightly select menu to my tightly select clientele, and whenever somebody asks me why I don't open a restaurant, I tell them, “because I like to cook.” That's why I totally astonished myself when I volunteered – did you catch that?, volunteered – to help a friend with his struggling eatery. Yes, sir, I just went out and bought me the economy size bottle of “Stupidol” and swallowed the whole damn thing.

'Course, I knew I couldn't do it alone, so I dragged my long-suffering wife and business partner into the fracas and we set up a “consulting team.” That means we called in my son and several other friends in the business, described the situation, and asked them for advice. The advice ran from, “gee, Dad, are you sure about this?” to “sei pazzo.” (From my Italian friend who runs four restaurants. Means “you're crazy.”) Most just said, “oh hell, shut it down.” But not me. No, I was committed. As it turns out, I should have been.

So, drawing in part from my recent experience, here, in no particular order, are a dozen (or so) reasons why you don't want to run a restaurant.

It's a guaranteed success. So you think you've got a concept that can't miss? A study conducted by Ohio State University found that 60% of restaurants fail within their first 3 years of operation, and 80% fail before the 5th year. Okay, so your idea of building a restaurant around rabbit leg confit might be unique, but I promise you after the "new" wears off in six months or so, your trip to the final restaurant resting place will likely begin.

You will never cook again. Before Harry Potter whacked us with some version of an “obscuro” spell, my wife and I were prolific cooks. We have a professional quality kitchen in our home and we were in it nearly every night turning out fantastic food for ourselves and our friends and neighbors. We visited farmers markets and higher-end grocers on a regular basis and waxed rhapsodic about the importance of quality ingredients. All that went “poof” the minute we turned the key in the restaurant door. During our adventure, we cooked exactly four meals at home over an eight week period. The rest of the time, we consumed restaurant foodstuffs purchased at the lowest possible cost from the cheapest possible vendor. Or we ate at the McDonald's across the street.

Your idea of the “glamorous” aspect of the business will change dramatically. Notice how they never sweat in onscreen kitchens? It ain't so. My wife and I each dropped nearly twenty pounds. And that was with the AC blowing full blast. AC that, by the way, didn't quite make it to the dish bay, where it was even hotter than the kitchen. My first job in a professional kitchen was busboy. Forty-five years later, I'm still doing it. How's that for glamor? Cleaning public toilets is always fun, too and if you want to see where the restaurant's real glitz and glamor are located, I've got two words for you: grease trap. “Floor drains” and “hood vents” are right up there, too.

What's an “eight-hour day?” When the Fair Labor Standards Act was passed in 1937, I think the restaurant management folks were out to lunch. “Eight-hour day?” Riiiiiiight! You open at six or seven in the morning and you close at nine or ten at night. And when you're the boss, you're there for pretty much every one of those sixteen or so hours.

Social life? Fuggedaboutit! Friends........let's see.......I used to know what those were. Oh, yeah! They're the ones on TV who you see being wined and dined by the convivial restaurateur. Let me tell you, the closest my best friend got to my restaurant was the night he stopped by with a bread delivery because I was too tied up with other fun and glamorous restaurant stuff to get to the bread store before it closed. And would it surprise you to know that restaurant workers have exceptionally high divorce rates? As high as 38.4%? Fortunately, my wife and I both took the crazy pills together. But even so, the experience tossed a few pebbles onto our otherwise pristine path. We snapped at each other more in eight weeks than we had in eighteen years.

Weekends, holidays, vacations? All things reserved for your customers, not you. You’re part of the hospitality industry now, which means your job is to make other people happy. You don't get to be happy anymore.

Think of the money! You might as well think of it because you sure as hell ain't gonna make any of it. After you pay the landlord, the electric company, the gas company, the insurance company, the accountant, the laundry service, the pest control people, the waste management people, the food vendors, the employees, and any advertising costs you might have, then you get to think about replenishment. Take-out containers cost money. So do cups and glasses and dishes and flatware and napkins and janitorial supplies and........the list goes on and on. Unfortunately, your cash flow usually does not. And if you think you own your business, try not paying your taxes. There used to be a great little pizza joint just down the road. Great food, great service, not so great bookkeeping. The tax man backed a big truck up to the door one day and hauled away everything but the memories.

Make sure you use the right screws. City and county building inspectors, fire marshals, and health inspectors will drive you straight up a wall. You've got to have your thermometers hung near the front of your reach-in, not the back. Check those dates! There's a cracked tile behind the toilet in the men's room. Sorry, that'll cost you a point. The can opener must be cleaned and sanitized at least once every four hours when in use. All equipment with the exception of microwaves, toasters, and mixers must be NSF-approved or if not NSF-approved, must be used for its intended use and meet Chapter 4 of the food code. Etc., etc. I got written up because there was a piece of duct tape wrapped around a faucet on the handwash sink. “It must be covering a pinhole,” says the inspector. “Repair or replace the faucet.” After the guy left, I peeled off the tape to see what it was covering. Nothing. Some doofus just wrapped it around there for no good and apparent reason. Still got us a write up. The lights in your kitchen have to be “X” candlepower. The sanitizer in your sink has to be no less than 50 and no more than 200 ppm. Is your business license up to date? Is your operating permit properly displayed? Have you paid your city, county, state, and federal taxes? The list of “i”s to be dotted and “t”s to be crossed is endless.

Beware of Yelpers. The absolute bane of the modern restaurant industry is the DIY restaurant critic. This is the palate-numbed idiot who once drove past a Michelin starred restaurant on his way to the IHOP and now thinks he is the next Craig Claiborne or Ruth Reichl. He doesn’t know a damn thing about food, but he knows what he likes and if you don't spread the peanut butter thickly enough on his PB&J, he'll rip you a new one on Yelp! I got a scathing “one-star” review because the “critic” said the owner of the place was a terrible driver who almost ran her off the road. In the first place, what the hell does that have to do with the restaurant? In the second place, how did she know it was the “owner” at the wheel? Lots of our customers have bumper stickers and window decals with our logo on them. Point of fact, on the day the “review” was written, the owner was out of town.

And then there are all the wonderful people you'll meet. The restaurant business is a people business. It's people serving people. And it would be so much more pleasant if it weren't. Most of your customers will be pretty nice folks. You're providing them with a service, after all, and they generally appreciate it. As long as you don't burn the food or drop the plates in their laps, they're likely to be fairly easygoing. You'll even develop a following; “regulars” who will really become part of the character of the place. It's the other characters you can live without. Like the asshat who comes in pissed off, complains about everything, leaves pissed off and stiffs your waitstaff. Or the parents who turn their little darlings loose to crawl under tables and swivel around on barstools and make a general dangerous and annoying nuisance of themselves for you, your staff, and your other customers. And then they stiff your waitstaff. Picky eaters are okay. I'm a bit of one myself. But I have yet to consume three-quarters of a meal and then complain that the food was “inedible” and demand a comp. Happens all the time. And then they stiff your waitstaff. Get used to the fact that your prices are too high, your portions are too small, the room is too hot, the room is too cold, the music is too loud, the lights are too bright, the lights are too dim, the fries are too salty, the fries aren't salty enough. “Can I substitute this for that?” You get the picture. And then they stiff your waitstaff.

Speaking of staff......You know, I think I figured out why Grandma and Grandpa looked so happy and content in that old photo. They had the damn place to themselves! He cooked, she waited tables. Period. It was a true “mom and pop” operation. Oh, that I could have had such luck! My wife and I operate like a well-oiled machine in our catering/personal chef business. We plan and execute nearly everything ourselves and only occasionally have to rely on temporary help for big jobs. Not so in the “real restaurant” world where you have to have cooks and servers and dishwashers and bussers. And every last, single, solitary, solo son of a so-and-so has some kind of drama that they bring to the workplace. I had a part time cook whose life was like a country song with a new verse every day. One day it was his kids, then it was his ex-wife, then it was his car, then it was his landlord, then it was his food stamps, and finally, it was his dog. No, I'm not kidding. He no-showed on me on a Saturday night because his dog got in a fight with a neighbor's dog and the neighbor was threatening to call animal control. 

Then there was the cook with the famous name culinary school education. I was over the moon about snagging him until I realized a couple of weeks in that while they might have taught him to read a thermometer at that blue ribbon school, they apparently neglected to teach him to read a clock. Late every day. The kicker came the day he called me and said he was in a cab and on the way. He lived five minutes from the restaurant. Thirty minutes later, no cook. Forty-five minutes, no cook. An hour and a half later he calls me and says he's in a cab and on the way. “From where,” I bellowed, “Florida?” He started to stammer an excuse. “You live five minutes away,” I said. “Either you're coming in from out of town, or you lied to me.” “Awww, I was just trying to buy myself a little extra time,” he whined. “Guess what, dude? You bought all the time you need.” And the phone went “click.” 

There's an old saying in the restaurant business; “Never hire a cook with an ego bigger than yours.” That's difficult in my case, but somehow I managed. Didn't matter that I had been cooking since before this dork was born, he knew everything and he had no problem letting me know it. There was pushback regarding every policy, procedure, and decision. On top of that, he had what they euphemistically call “anger management issues.” What that means is that if a customer had the temerity to send something back, he would do a live version of that famous and funny scene from “No Reservations” with himself cast in the Catherine Zeta-Jones role. (Go watch the movie. The scene involves an entitled customer, a pissed-off chef, a raw steak and a big serving fork.) It also meant that he was constantly threatening to kick the ass, punch the face, slit the throat, or cut off the head of other staff members. He was a great cook. He just wasn't worth the price. 

Waitresses work hard. Well, some do. And then there are the ones that hardly work. Far more of the latter out there than the former. Of course, they make crappy money. Base pay is insulting for a grown adult and tips in a struggling little hole-in-the wall place are spotty at best. Still, I wish I had a dime for every waitress who told me how much she loved the place and how much she wanted to stay and be a part of our success and be part of the team going forward into the future and yada, yada, yada just before she walked out the door with no notice whatsoever and took a better paying job somewhere else. Especially galling was the one who was being groomed for management and had been trained and certified at company expense and who left for Walgreens a week after she got her ServSafe certificate. And then there was the little gem who had zero personality. Zippo. Niente. The fiberglass clown at the place across the street had more personality. At least it smiled. This girl was a poster child for the walking dead. She stood behind the counter waiting for customers. Side work? Fuggedaboutit! She just stood around waiting. Guess that's why she was called a waitress. When a customer came in, there was no “Welcome” or greeting of any kind. She would shuffle to the table and stand silently waiting until the customer spoke up and ordered. Then she would shuffle to the kitchen and silently stick the ticket up on the rail before silently shuffling back to her post behind the counter. What do you expect for $2.13 an hour?

You get what you pay for. As I stated in the previous paragraph, “what do you expect for $2.13 an hour?” If you're really going to succeed in the restaurant business – or any business, for that matter – you've got to employ passionate people. You have to hire and keep people on your payroll who share your commitment and dedication. You've got to find people who aren't afraid of work, people who will take pride in their job performance, people who will go, if not the extra mile, at least an extra yard or two to help you achieve your goals and realize your vision. And you know what? That ain't gonna happen at minimum wage. And that's assuming you're paying the federal minimum of $7.25 per hour. Most cooks make between $8 and $9 per hour. Waitstaff really gets screwed because the federal minimum wage for tipped workers has remained at a slave labor rate of $2.13 an hour since 1991. Oh, the government statisticians will tell you that servers make an average exceeding $10 per hour. Maybe so if they're hustling in high-end or high volume places. But you take a waitress in a little dive of a small town diner and you're looking at a whole lot less. I saw a lot of days when my servers made twenty or thirty bucks in tips on a seven-hour shift. Factor in the base pay of $14.91 and they're rolling in dough to the tune of about $45 a day, or about $6.42 an hour. That doesn't buy a lot of passion. What it buys is people who stand around with their hands out every two weeks while they watch the want-ads for a better job.

Smoking will kill you. They should require a special warning label on cigarette packs sold to restaurant workers. Something along the lines of “cigarette smoking can cost you your f***ing job if your boss catches you outside one more time.” I don't smoke. Never have, never will. Unfortunately, the restaurant industry seems to be one of the last bastions of the filthy habit. I did an actual happy dance when I hired a non-smoking staffer because I knew with reasonable certainty that I wouldn't have to go hunting him on the patio or out back by the curb sink every time I needed him. You can tell people all day about the “two breaks” policy, but that doesn't hack it when you're dealing with somebody so nicotine addicted they can't go ten minutes without getting the shakes. Had one guy leave a ten-pound pile of raw chicken on his board so he could go out and smoke. I was prepping something else and when I turned around and saw the flies congregating around his station, I threw some plastic wrap over the chicken and went out hunting the dumbass. “Prep first, smoke later.” So he came in and prepped the chicken and promptly went back out to smoke. Half hour later, I see a waitress flipping burgers. “Where's the cook?,” I ask. “Oh, he's outside smoking.” And I find him out enjoying the smoky evening air with a couple of customers. I stick my head out the door and give him the sign, and he waves me a “just a minute.” Fifteen minutes later, I go back out and tell Ol' Smoky I'm not paying him to smoke while my waitress cooks. Next thing I know, he's stalking off across the parking lot having thrown down his apron and muttered something about me riding his ass. One cook had already called in. (Remember the dog story?) So there I am cookless at 8:00 on a Saturday night. And naturally, five minutes later, in walks a deuce and a couple of four tops. I man the fry station, my wife hits the stove, the waitress bellies up to the flattop and the char-grill and I spend the rest of service vowing to never hire another smoker.

Nothing lasts forever. And you'd better know how to fix it. My first line of defense for nearly everything was the breaker panel. The water heater's out? Try the breaker panel. The ice machine is down? Try the breaker panel. The credit card machine's dead? Try the breaker panel. When some gorilla with a wrench overtightened the faucet on the dish sink and stripped it out, guess who toddled off to the plumbing supply store to get a new one? A plumber just wasn't in the budget. There's a gap under the back door you could drive a truck – or a mouse – through. So out came the carpentry tools and I replaced the broken sweep. And then I fixed the lock on the rest room while I was at it. Some idiot “fixed” the French fry cutter with a big wood screw. I went to the hardware store and bought the bolt it needed to really fix it. When the sign on the roof quit working, I had to figure out why. Worse than normal wear, though, is the callous disregard people have for stuff that's not theirs. That's why immersion blenders, waffle irons, and other small appliances have to be replaced every other week. That's why pristine new pots and pans look – and perform – like shit after a week or two. Check your trash for things like flatware and ramekins. Chance are your careless employees won't. But, hey, you've got lots of money for stuff like that, right?

Ultimately, we had to close down my friend's place. He was just in too deep in too many areas. I don't think even a visit from Robert Irvine and a $10,000 Food Network makeover would have helped. Our intervention slowed the bleeding and was turning things around, but it was way too little and way too late, so, unfortunately, the restaurant became part of the 60%.

You still wanna run a restaurant? Fine. Examine your options, examine your motives, examine your finances and then go have your head examined. And whatever you do, don't call me. Never again. Not for any money. I value my personal integrity, my financial security, my social relationships, and above all, my sanity. So good luck. I'll see you at the restaurant equipment auction in a couple of years.