THE RECENTLY RELEASED documentary “Marcella” got people talking about the revered Italian cookbook author again, and she should be talked about. If you love food and you’re not yet a Marcella Hazan acolyte, you need to know about her volumes of simple, fantastic recipes, written in her uncompromisingly bossy style, that brought the joy of authentic Italian cooking to the United States back in the red-sauce days.
I mentioned the documentary to a dear friend. “My god!” she said. “I learned to cook from one of Marcella’s books!” What?! I knew my friend had limits to her adventurousness in eating, but also that she knew her way around a kitchen. How did I not know this origin story?! Turns out that before we knew each other, my friend had only ever undertaken the simplest food preparation; she and her husband had existed, apparently happily, in a world of takeout and such. Then he got cancer. She wanted to feed him during long months of treatment, and she asked someone she knew who loved to cook what to do. The answer: Marcella.
Documentary
Read more about the documentary “Marcella” and view a trailer at marcellafilm.com.
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My friend got a copy of Marcella’s scriptural “Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking,” and with the crystal-clear instructions therein, she began in short order to produce Italian dishes that beat this-and-that takeout hands down.
I’d also guess that, at a very hard time, my friend felt an enveloping reassurance in Marcella’s prose style — “It is difficult to imagine serving carbonara on anything but spaghetti,” she dictates, and you believe. The essays on ingredients, equipment and more remove doubt with full authority, making for vastly soothing reading that leads, incredibly easily, to marvelously delicious success. Where nearly all else in life is uncertain, in Marcella we trust.
My friend’s husband loved how she cooked Marcella’s food so much that during his cancer treatment — a full success — he actually gained weight.
Julia Child called Marcella “my mentor in all things Italian,” and Marcella was a sort of reverse Julia herself. As you might know, Julia, an American, moved to Paris in 1948 not knowing a lick of French; nonetheless, she attended culinary school there, and then brought all things foundational in that country’s cookery back here with her cookbooks and TV shows. Marcella was Italian; when she moved to the United States in 1955, she had dual doctorates in biology and the natural sciences, and she didn’t cook at all. Finding American food of that era appalling, she taught herself how to reproduce the repertoire of her homeland — partly from a classic Italian cookbook by Ada Boni, partly from sense-memory.
Marcella started holding cooking classes in her apartment, then went on to author a half-dozen volumes of recipes that schooled the entire United States on the regional cuisines of Italy. She never attained full fluency in English, which likely is to blame for a lesser degree of fame; her husband translated her recipes for her (and captured amounts of ingredients as Marcella added them by instinct).
“Marcella” the documentary covers all this and more (including how she famously smoked cigarettes nearly all the time and often indulged her penchant for Jack Daniel’s). Her death at age 89 in 2013 occasioned an outpouring of love and deep respect. Now the film, properly, celebrates her legacy, with Jacques Pépin and other culinary stars paying tribute on-screen.
The best way to celebrate Marcella, of course, is to cook one of her recipes. The number of times that the favorites have been made for someone ailing, for a special date, for a dinner party, for a wake — is difficult to imagine. Her super-simple and absurdly delicious tomato sauce from “Essentials” has acquired as much cult status as a recipe can get — the secret is a lot of butter. (The secret’s secret is that in its original form, in “The Classic Italian Cook Book,” Marcella’s amount of butter was even greater — a quarter cup, or 8 tablespoons, rather than the revised-for-lower-fat 5.)
Here, I have had the temerity to adapt one of my favorite recipes from “Marcella’s Italian Kitchen.” I know Marcella would not approve (particularly of adding a bit more garlic), but it happened accidentally as I made it many times, and I just really love the addition of the peas. Mea culpa, Marcella!
B.J.C.’s Pasta with Sausages, Cream, Tomato and Peas Alla Marcella
Adapted from “Marcella’s Italian Kitchen” by Marcella Hazan
Serves 4-6
For the pasta in the original, Marcella calls for ruote di carro, or cartwheels; I like large conchiglie, which are easier to find, and also the sausage-rounds and peas nest inside the shells nicely. There’s a little more garlic here and more tomato for a saucier effect (which, admittedly, is taking American-style liberties). I deglaze for fun/extra flavor and throw in peas for color, texture and pings of sweetness. In season, you can sub 2 pounds of very ripe tomatoes for the canned. — Bethany Jean Clement
½ pound breakfast or other mild pork sausage
1½ teaspoons chopped garlic
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
Splash of dry vermouth or whatever wine you’re drinking
1 28-ounce can whole peeled tomatoes with their juice, roughly chopped (Bianco DiNapoli, Cento and San Merican are good brands; easy to chop with kitchen shears plunged into the can)
1 cup peas, fresh or frozen (for frozen, look for petite, which tend to be sweeter)
½ cup heavy cream
Kosher salt and fresh-ground pepper
1 pound dried pasta — medium shells or another shape that holds sauce well (De Cecco is a good, widely available brand)
2 tablespoons chopped Italian parsley
Freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano
1. Cut the sausages into disks about ¼-inch thick.
2. Add the garlic and olive oil to a large heavy-bottomed pot, and turn heat to medium. When the garlic is pale gold, add the sausages and cook, turning from time to time, until nicely browned on all sides, about 10-15 minutes.
3. Add a splash of vermouth or wine (about three tablespoons), stirring and scraping the bottom of the pan to deglaze and letting it evaporate nearly entirely. Add the tomatoes, stir and reduce heat to simmer for 20 minutes; stir occasionally, chopping up any remaining large pieces of tomato with your spoon.
4. Turn heat up to medium, add the peas, stir and cook for about 3 minutes. Add cream and stir for 1-2 minutes. Turn off the heat, taste and add salt as needed, plus several grinds of pepper.
5. Cook pasta to your desired level of al dente — Marcella’s dictate is “barely tender but firm to the bite.” Drain and add the pasta to the potful of sauce; toss to combine and sprinkle with the parsley. Serve with plenty of grated Parm and enjoy!