Focaccia Mama returns to Monday Night Foodball

Focaccia Mama does not believe in small portions.

This she picked up from her Momma Francesca, who came from the Sicilian town of Caccamo, perched on the cliffs above Palermo. She, in turn, absorbed it from Nonna Nicasia, the grandmother of Gabriella Mazzarisi. This was demonstrated each November, when Mazzarisi, the aforementioned Matriarch of Italian Flatbreads, requested her birthday favorite, pasta al forno: baked rigatoni in red sauce with fresh mozzarella, parmigiana, and peas.

Such wanton abbondanza will be demonstrated one month early, this September 22, when the Focaccia Mama returns to Monday Night Foodball.

Focaccia Mama feeding pasta al forno to Momma Francesca Credit: Silvia Mazzarisi

She’s headlining her second Foodball with that very same birthday pasta al forno, and yes, you can share it—but no shame. “If you are hungry,” she says, “you are welcome to have your own.”

I’d be worried if you didn’t. You look too thin.

So don’t disappoint her. Before you throw up your “sono pieno come un uovo”* agita hands, save room for the bouncy beef and pork meatballs Mama and Momma used to make together; or the sweet and sour (gluten-free) squash agrodolce with burrata and smoked sage; or the bombolini two-ways—cinnamon-dusted donuts piped with Nutella or lemon curd, served with raspberry coulis.

And of course, she’s baking a trio of focaccia: rosemary–garlic, shallot–giard, and tomato–basil, for your glutenous indulgence.

Mazzarisi’s been leaning into private and multicourse dinners lately (book her now!), so this is a rare opportunity to catch her doing, as it were, bar food en Italiano.

It’s buono come il pane**, beginning Monday, September 22, from 6 PM until sellout at 2905 N. Elston in Avondale.

Nel frattempo, di seguito è riportato il programma completo del Foodball:

*“I’m as full as an egg.”

**“as good as bread”

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Mike Sula (he/him) is a senior writer, food reporter, and restaurant critic at the Chicago Reader. He’s been a staffer since 1995.

His story about outlaw charcuterie appeared in Best Food Writing 2010. His story “Chicken of the Trees,” about eating city squirrels, won the James Beard Foundation’s 2013 M.F.K. Fisher Distinguished Writing Award. “The Whole Hog Project,” and “What happens when all-star chefs get in bed with Big Food?” were nominated for JBF Awards.

He’s the author of the anthology An Invasion of Gastronomic Proportions: My Adventures with Chicago Animals, Human and Otherwise, and the editor of the cookbook Reader Recipes: Chicago Cooks and Drinks at Home.

His work has appeared in the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Sun-Times, NPR’s The Salt, Dill, Harper’s, Plate Magazine, Rolling Stone, and Eater. He’s the former editor in chief of Kitchen Toke.

He lives in Chicago and is the curator of Monday Night Foodball, a weekly chef pop-up hosting Chicago’s most exciting underground and up-and-coming chefs.

Sula speaks English and can be reached on X.

More by Mike Sula