Easter is a big deal in Italy, big enough that everyone goes around wishing each other “Good Easter” for days beforehand, homage we in the U.S. generally pay only to Christmas and New Year’s. In addition to Easter’s religious significance, it’s a long weekend; the Monday after Easter is called Pasquetta, little Easter, and it’s a state holiday that most people take off.
Unlike other major Italian feste, this one apparently isn’t particularly family oriented. There’s a saying, “Natale con i tuoi, Pasqua con chi vuoi”—Christmas with your own (relatives), Easter with who you want. A lot of people nevertheless do the big Easter lunch with family, often in a restaurant, but for many the rest of the weekend is for hanging out with friends.
On Saturday morning our street was full of people in a holiday mood, with “Buona Pasqua” sounding on all sides. That evening, Easter eve, the bar across the street turned its loudspeakers up full blast and played a barrage of hits from the eighties and nineties (including, strangely, a couple of Christmas songs), while a large crowd sang along and even did some dancing in the street. The music stopped a little before 10 p.m., so I’m not complaining. They started up again last night, presumably after everyone had consumed their Easter dinner, for a few similarly cacophonous hours. Today, Pasquetta, the bar is closed to give everyone, including the neighbors, a well-deserved rest.
True to the saying, Pam and Romano did not have a holiday meal planned with Romano’s extended family, the way they do at Christmas and various birthdays, so they invited us over to celebrate with them. This gave Pam the excuse she’d been looking for to make a a Ligurian recipe she’d had her eye on for a while, a torta pasqualina. It also gave our hosts a chance to share out an array of Southern Italian food gifts that Romano has received from former students, including wine, an array of different homemade vegetables sott’olio (preserved in olive oil), and some wonderful pancetta and coppa.
We asked what we could bring, but as Pam rattled off the menu it became obvious that the most helpful thing we could do was to come hungry and take home leftovers. Accordingly we showed up with empty stomachs and several pieces of Tupperware.
Behold the Pasqua table. That’s the pancetta and coppa on the left, sliced on Romano’s family’s big slicer, which after his mother’s death now resides at his sister’s house. Alongside is a hunk of Parmesan and a bottle of prosecco, while on the right are a botle of Lambrusco and the vegetables sott’olio plus some olives, with Pam and her beautiful torta in the middle. I acted too soon, so I missed the big dish of eggplant she brought out of the oven immediately after this photo was taken.
The torta is made with an olive-oil pastry that’s rolled out into multiple layers, a bit like filo. Traditionally you were supposed to make 33 paper-thin layers of pastry, one for each year of Christ’s life, but Pam settled for six, which I figure was plenty if you count in dog years. Inside is a layer of cooked and seasoned chard beneath a ricotta filling. Both layers include beaten egg and plenty of grated Parmeson. Before putting on the pastry lid a few more raw eggs are nestled into the ricotta filling. The whole thing is baked, then allowed to cool to room temperature before serving
This online recipe isn’t exactly the one Pam used, but the pictures will show you how much work goes into this dish, even if you don’t understand the Italian.
We all felt the trouble Pam had gone to was worth it, even Pam. It looked beautiful and tasted delicious, and so did the succulently cheesy eggplant Parmesan she served alongside. Those things in the upper left of the photo are Sicilian cheese pastries that we barely got around to. We never got into the bottle of Lambrusco, either. Luckily Pam and Romano’s son dropped by and enthusiastically helped us work our way through a lot of what was on the table.
At last it was time for dessert: a big chunk of a colomba. a yeast-risen cake, another gift to Romano sent from my grandather’s home region of Molise. This version of the seasonal treat was flavored with white chocolate and sour cherries. We enjoyed it with a bowl of strawberries and an atavistic pleasure, whipped cream from a can.
Their son took off soon afterwards, loaded down with leftovers, but we lingered around the table for a while, mostly because we didn’t have the energy to get up. Finally, though, the prospect of a midday nap got us out of our seats, and we trundled back up the street with a big piece of torta, some sott’olio onions, peppers, and eggplant, and a miniature Sicilian cheesecake.
Anything to help our friends.
Love this Easter meal with your Fidenza family, especially the food details and the lovely photo of Romano and Pam.