vEight-eight years ago, a text titled Signature lunches. The recipes of the great literature. The innovative idea of combine the classics of fiction with the recipes of the dishes mentioned by the writers was of Oretta Bongarzoni (1939-1995), cultural editor and chronicler of Country Evening. That book, which was successful at the time, is now being revived by Mimimum Faxwith the colorful illustrations by Agnese Pagliarini. To give as a gift or to treat yourself, to find literary inspiration on the occasion of the New Year’s Eve dinner or the Epiphany lunch. If you buy it by December 31st by ordering it on the minimum Faxthe publishing house will donate 20 percent of the proceeds to the Foundation AIRC for Cancer Research in favor of research on pediatric cancers (the cost of the book is 20 euros).
60 illustrated recipes for 30 writers
Oretta Bongarzoni had a degree in Philosophy, wrote books and reports. He loved to cook (especially the meats) and evidently it was also an avid reader. Signature lunches and a journey through sixty recipes and thirty writers and books selected by her where you come across a dish.
Today in the era of chefs and the many television programs dedicated to food, any writer could be tempted to insert a recipe in the narrative and to describe its protagonist while cooking. THE literary classicsInstead, they limit themselves to mentioning a dish, leaving it up to the reader’s imagination to imagine it. Bongarzoni evokes the passages of the book in which he is mentioned and gives us the recipe, elaborated by her.
Babette’s lunch
An example taken from Signature lunches? The timeless Babette’s lunch by Karen Blixen, from which a film was also made in 1987, directed by Gabriel Axel, Danish like the famous writer. Oretta Bongarzoni reminds us Babette’s story, the French maid of Martina and Filippa, two elderly spinsters, daughters of a Protestant pastor. An unexpected inheritance makes Babette suddenly rich. The woman decides to prepare a sumptuous dinner, inviting the whole village. Spare no expense. She starts planning the evening two months in advance and procures the ingredients in France. At the end, his cuisine is so rich and unusual as to overwhelm those present. One of the guests, a general, tastes a plate of Babette which takes him back in time and memories, to the delicious Quail en sarcophage taste in a Parisian restaurant. Bongarzoni reconstructs the recipe, for anyone wishing to identify with the general.
The taste of bread
Signature lunches it is a slalom between first and second courses of meat and fish, appetizers and desserts. Including jams and bread. Bongarzoni presents well four bread recipes (with cumin, with walnuts, with olives and anchovies, and with raisins) inspired by A life by Guy de Maupassant. In the novel, the whole Breton country is invited to the wedding between Giovanna and Giuliano, both nobles. The reception is very rustic and on the table, in addition to cider and wine, there are cheeses, butter, sausages. And of course bread.
Around the world
From Gabriel García Márquez to Tolstoyfrom Virginia Woolf to James Joyce and to writers of our house like Tomasi di Lampedusa and Ippolito Nievo. The journey among authors that Oretta Bongarzoni proposes is also associated with exotic flavours. Russian appetizers, Hawaiian fish soup, farofa, sweet tortillas and Brazilian corn chowderwith a foray into India with i Indian banana donuts summoned by Edward M. Forster. Don’t be surprised if you don’t find sushi and other Japanese dishes. The rising sun food trend that has infected the world does not belong to the classics of literature. On the other hand, up until the 1980s, Japanese restaurants in a city like Milan could be counted on the fingers of one hand.
Spinach salami. Illustration by Agnese Pagliarini
Food is happiness
As Davide Orecchio, writer and son of Oretta, recalls in the afterword, Bongarzoni did not live long enough to enjoy the success of his book, which was a real novelty at the time. After her, there will be other publications that will enjoy ad bring together great authorsfor instance Agatha Christieto cooking recipes. While she was preparing the book, Oretta was already ill. This colorful volume – combining great literature and the pleasure of food – fully enters the category of texts which, dealing with cooking, “I am morally above suspicion” because their purpose is “to increase the happiness of mankind”. Word of Joseph Conradquoted by Oretta Bongarzoni.
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