TRADITIONAL DISH IN ATRANI, ITALY FOR               
FEAST OF ST. MARY MAGDALENA – July 22nd  
STUFFED GREEN SQUASH

1 large green squash                        tomato sauce
1 lb. ground meat                           salt and pepper
stale bread (crumbs)                        3 eggs
1/2 lb. mozzarella cheese,                  Romano cheese, grated
    diced                                   oil
4 slices Genoa salami, diced

      Peel skin of squash; carefully scoop seeds inside of squash,
which has been cut in six inch lengths.  Mix all ingredients,
except tomato sauce, and stuff cavity of squash.   
      In oil, fry the stuffed pieces of squash slowly on low heat,
turning so that they will brown on all sides.  When browned,
place in baking dish, side by side.  Cover with tomato sauce;
sprinkle with grated cheese.
      Bake in 350° oven for 15 minutes.  

                                                          

 

Photo above is of Amalfi, Italy, which is literally around the corner of Atrani. It takes me only ten to fifteen minutes to walk there.  With this short-cut the walk to Atrani from Amalfi is no longer than 10 minutes. You just follow the road out of Amalfi (turn left from the main Piazza) up the incline past the tourist office and around the corner by the Hotel Luna and just before the road tunnel you walk through the Zaccaria restaurant on your right (it is a recognized footpath) once down the steps of Zaccaria you follow the small road down to the beach area of Atrani and through the arch is the main piazza of Atrani. You have the option of riding a horse and carriage to get there and it seems to me that they are always ready and throughout eternity waiting for you.

TRADITIONAL DISH IN AMALFI, ITALY FOR   
FEAST OF ST. ANDREW – June 27th
BONITO VINAIGRETTE

      Cut Bonito in serving pieces.  Dip lightly in flour and fry
in oil.  Set aside to cool.
      Make marinade by combining:

2/3 c. vinegar                       season with salt, pepper and
1/3 c. oil                             if desired, red crushed pepper

      Place Bonito in deep serving dish and add marinade.  Garnish 
with mint leaves.
                                                    

PS Here in Amalfi, Italy in the basement of Saint Andrew’s Cathedral, lay the remains of Saint Andrew the Apostle, in a tomb that is mounted with a large statue by Michelangelo. There is something very interesting that happens every year on the same day of his feast and at the exact same time. A salty liquid, that is perspiration like, comes from his bones. The smartest scientists in the world can’t explain it. This qualifies to be non-other than a miracle.

This fluid phenomenon that is called “Manna” is dripped into a copious quantity of cotton; after which pieces are then put into envelopes and distributed to the congregation that is present before Saint Andrew’s tomb at the time. I was a witness and thus have one that I scanned and have pictured below. I was fortunate to be there when once, every so many years the skull of Saint Andrew is placed on top of the crypt. Everyone present can get a good view, only because the tomb is located in a small room that is very chapel like. I have to admit that I have been in that room alone several times and must say that I had to keep looking over my shoulders, sort of speak, if you know what I mean. Have you ever been down a basement alone and had to run up the stairs in fear that someone or something would grab you at the ankles? Well that’s exactly the way I felt. All kidding aside, when at the tomb I knelt, prayed and felt closer to God.

 

In the video above is seen in the procession, the skull of Saint Andrew the Apostle, which is brought out every so many years for the public to view.

I found that no matter where I went in Italy, that there were Christian relics that performed miracles of all kinds, all of which I witnessed myself. The most famous one is that of the Holy Shroud of Turin.

                                                                                                                 - Cosmo Carrozza

SAINT ANDREW

- Matthew 4:19
 

TRADITIANAL DISH IN SCAFATI, ITALY FOR
FEAST OF SANTA MARIA DELLE VERGINE – July 24^th
BABY LAMB ROAST

Rub cavity with a mixture of garlic, salt, pepper and oil
and minced parsley.
Bake slowly in 300° oven for 1 hour, or until tender.
                                                                         

PS Scafati, Italy is my Godfather’s hometown. I have many memories of him and his Italian Restaurant in New Haven, CT’s "Little Italy". It was really an outstanding place, attracting many rich and famous people, including movie stars and Broadway stars that came into New Haven, CT to open up new musical shows like, South Pacific, The Sound of Music and Oklahoma at the Shubert Theater, The Oakdale theater in Wallingford, etc. We lived upstairs from the restaurant on the second floor, along with my godfather and his family in the same apartment building that he owned. All of the cooks, my father was one of them, also lived in the same building, being that just about everyone in this predominately Italian neighborhood could really cook.

The Italians believe that children should be seen and not heard, well I was no exception to that rule.  Of course us kids could care less about what adults had to say, much less the old timers with their outdated ways.  Who wanted to hear, who did this and who did that of the grown up world? Who cares? That was our attitude! All though these days, I find that kids are more inquisitive as to what the elders have to say, except for when they're supposed to pay attention, like in school or church, of course. My family and their friends would sit around the table telling stories, jokes and singing in Italian. There were always plenty of musicians around, who played the accordion, who played the guitar, who played the mandolin, and so we always had plenty of live music accompaniment around our kitchen table.  Now children and even though they are children, begin to take notice when there is any strange adult behavior going on, especially if they hear the laughing and telling about it. 

Now I began to take notice that my godfather's father was acting very peculiar, leaving his wife behind, to do the bulk of the restaurant work and she would say nothing.  What? Hello!  She would get up at four in the morning to go down stairs into the restaurant and start the cooking. She was an extremely hard working woman to say the least and if it had not been for her, the restaurant would probably not even exist.  As for her husband, it was a different story entirely for him! He would leave for Italy and then all of a sudden, out of the clear blue sky, come back again. Now I gather that he would do clown antics like bluff an accident, grubby beard, bandages, a cane and of course, the famous limping act, that he could have won an Academy award for.  The act that was good enough to fool a doctor, in order for him to collect a huge amount of insurance money, of which he would take with him back to Italy.  But on this one occasion, as I recall, when he arrived in Rome, he was tipped off that the FBI was waiting for him, so he took the very next plane back. I guess that sort of explained to us kids, why he was going back and forth.  We said nothing about it at that time, because they were all still living. Plus, children are by nature, very trusting of adults and feel that they can take care of them selves. When you are born and raised in Little Italy, you quickly learn what to say and what not to say, what to write and what not to write, it all becomes second nature to you.

I can remember as a young boy, just learning how to play the trumpet, that Louis "Satchmo" Armstrong, the famous trumpet player, came into my godfather’s restaurant with this blond and put in a special order for Chicken Cacciatora that my father made. I learned also, that while Satchmo was just right downstairs from me, that he went into the kitchen and shook my father’s hand, thanking him for the excellent meal my father made special for him. How I wished I could have met this great trumpet player that I admired, along with every other trumpet player, musician and music lover that there ever was and will be.

Peeking into the restaurant every two minutes, I can also remember how us kids would wait for the last customers to leave the restaurant so we could all pile up into my godfather’s big car and go out to the biggest amusement park in Connecticut, "Savin Rock" in West Haven. We would get disappointed sometimes, because the last customers would seem to never want to leave and if that was the case and they left too late, it would be too bad for us kids, because that meant we could not go to Savin Rock. How down hearted we all felt!

 

Did we ever eat in my godfather's restaurant? Never! Not if our life depended on it! There is no substitute for homemade and even as kids we had the God given common sense to know that. The meatballs for example, were mostly bread that they should have called, matzo balls or sawdust balls. There was so much bread in them, that I can imagine that they tasted more like pancakes in tomato sauce. With the chicken alone, I didn't know how his customers didn't die on him. In the backyard, he would have crates of chicken outside in the summer heat that smelled so raunchy , you could shrivel up bathroom tiles with them.  His trick was to spice them so much that you couldn't tell. They usually ended up as some sort of, " Chicken Hunter-style: Pollo alla Cacciatora".  A customer would come into the restaurant and ask, "Ay cum-ba, what-a the special-a the day?"  He would say, "Pollo alla Cacciatora"  magnifico!  Unbelievably, after eating it, the customer would say, "Cumba, that's-a the best-a Pollo alla Cacciatora I eve-a eat-a! Era realmente speciale!"  as he would shake my godfather's hand. 

The other thing I'd like to add is, don't ever send your food back to the kitchen if it's not done right, like send your steak back because it's not well done enough or not rare enough.  Big mistake!  Very big mistake! I can't even begin to tell you what they do to it, not to make you sick to your stomach.  You'll never want to eat in a restaurant again. Yuck!

The thing that drives employees and the employers of a food establishment simply nuts, is the incredibly stupid trivial complaints, like the two paragraphs in the mail, telephone or in person, about how the slice of a pickle was missing with their sandwich or meal. At that point, anyone one with a normal disposition, would get this sudden rush of blood to the brain, accompanied with the urge to literally strangle the customer, publicly. While that may not be realistic, you can always fantasize, like throwing the customer into a washing machine and leaving he or she in there for a few days, for example.  That sounds good!

I did find however, that the restaurant food in Italy is comparable to homemade, if not, even better.  There they are fooling no one.  The Italian people know the food and what the dish is supposed to be, so there is no misrepresentation. 

What became of my godfather's restaurant?  Well from the very beginning it was a case of money making money. It was started as a small establishment by his mother and it moved to a bigger place and yet an even larger place and finally a facility which was able to handle very large parties, such as wedding receptions.  As it came to be, my godfather retired to Florida with a bundle. One of his sons in the mean time, gambled the entire business in Las Vegas, Navada.  Did his son get his head mounted on a wall somewhere? Could be! I haven't seen him in a while, so I sort of have visions of that.

But seriously speaking, this son was no fool by any means what so ever. I know I grew up with him! I believe that he had so much money, that he was able to afford to gamble the restaurant, simply because it was just too much work; just like so many other children that inherited the business of their grandparents and parents. I can understand that, especially to the very high level that it had gotten to be. It was a lot of work just when it was small, let alone the way it had evolved to be, with weddings and all. With upper level and lower level functions. I'll grant you this, he could have sold it, but I don’t think he even wanted to be bothered with that. What fool do you know of that would gamble everything that he or she, what ever the case may be, has to live on? Personally, I know of no one.  I only know of some people that would give the shirt off their back to help the poor!

This sons philosophy is, what good is it to have money and yet slave all the time?  You never get to enjoy it.  To me, it is  like going to a restaurant, ordering a big expensive meal, have it sitting in front of you and you never eat it.  As you leave, you pay for it and go home to bed. Is that nuts or what? Money...what are they saving it all up for?  Have you ever seen a moving van in a funeral procession?  I haven't!  Maybe they think they have to pay admission to get into heaven or pay Saint Peter under the table.  Saint Peter, come over here to the side a minute, I got to tell you something, Shhhhhhhh...now look, here is five million dollars so you can let me in through them pearly gates...Shhhhhhhhh.  After they are all departed, most likely their kids will be at each others throat over it....I should have got this and I should have got that.  I could hear it all already. Maybe the departed had it all planned that way, as a weapon of rebellion because of family feuds. Maybe the battle cry of the departed is, "Knock each other out over it! Yes!!! Pow! Pow! Bang!"  No, this one of my godfather's sons was not about to make himself a slave to money, like his grandmother and father did over hot restaurant stoves. He is going to enjoy the money while he is still able to and forget about work. Work is no fun! 

I often tell people when they complain about their job, "Show me where they pay you to have fun and I'll be right there!"  Guess what?  No one ever told me where.  There is no such place.  No one is going to pay anyone to have fun, so in that specific regard, I don't complain about my work.  When I weigh the pros and cons of my full time day job, I find that while I am not making that much money, I am not breaking my back at it either. I really have an almost no work job. Thank you Jesus!  On the other hand, my part time job at night, leaves something to be desired both ways.

To this very day, my Godfather's cousin owns two excellent Italian restaurants on Wooster Street in New Haven, CT's Little Italy, both owned by Tony & Lucille's.

                                                                                                 - Cosmo Carrozza
 

Photo above is of Minori, Italy one of Atrani's
neigboring towns along the Amalfi, Coast.
So many emigrants came to New Haven, CT from this town.

       TRADITIANAL DISH IN MINORI, ITALY FOR
         FEAST OF ST. TROFIMENA – July 13nd
         FUSILLE (Homemade Curly Macaroni) STRANGUGLIA

         2 c. flour                                           12 eggs
         3 to 4 c. water                                  1 tsp. Salt

        Beat eggs and add other ingredients. Knead well amount of flour added to keep dough from being sticky. Roll dough to thickness of a pencil. Cut in 3 inch pieces.
      With open end size 4 knitting needle, roll on piece of dough, starting at one end and roll quickly – the result, a small macaroni curl. Dry for about an hour, and cook in boiling salted water till tender.
      Serve with your favorite sauce.

                                                                                                  
PS The coastline just south of Naples, known as the AMALFI COAST, is undoubtedly one of the most beautiful in the world. It has an inherent natural beauty characterized by very steep, rocky hillsides falling sheer into the sea, and the local villages, untouched by modern architecture, which used to be dedicated to fishing, have retained all their centuries-old charm. Sightseers, if they really want to absent themselves from this beautiful area, can visit Naples, Pompeii and Vesuvius. Ravello, just above Amalfi, has two enchanted villa gardens with views of the coastline. Capri and Ischia are islands nearby, both of extraordinary natural beauty.

I have been all over Italy, but the most beautiful area that I have ever been to, is the Amalfi Coast. As soon as you leave Naples and enter the Amalfi Drive, there is a feeling of tranquility and beauty that I have found nowhere else. The warmth and hospitality of the people is a relief in itself.

Here, if you need to find a relative or friend, for example in Atrani, just ask the very first person you meet in that town and they can tell you exactly where he or she is, just like I did as soon as I got off the bus from Rome.  Everyone seems to know everyone, just like members of your own family.  Amazing!  Am I on another planet?   Where are the Indians that I would ask for directions in New Jersey? One of them Indians can manage to get you lost in your own bathtub and they all sound like they know New Jersey and New York, inside out too!  How ironic!

                                                                                         - Cosmo Carrozza
_______________________________________________________________________
FEAST OF ST. LUCY
CORNMEAL BREAD

4 c. boiling salted water                                     2 c. cornmeal
1/2 c. raisins

      Cook cornmeal as directions. Cool. While still warm, shape into small loaves. Bake in greased pan in 450° oven for 1/2 hour.
_______________________________________________________________________
FEAST OF ST. JOSEPH - March 19th
ST. JOSEPH'S ZEPPOLE

1 cup water                                                      
1/2 cup butter                                                   
1 Tbsp sugar                                                    
1/2 tsp salt                                                      
1 cup flour
4 eggs
1 tsp lemon peel
1 tsp orange peel

   Combine water, butter, sugar and salt in saucepan. Bring to a boil and add flour. Stir vigorously until mixture leaves sides of pan. Add eggs, one at a time. Beat vigorously after each egg is added. Add grated rinds; mix until mixture is smooth.
   Drop by tablespoon 2 inches apart on greased baking sheet.
   Bake 15 minutes at 450° and 25 minutes at 350°. When cool, split and fill with Italian Cream.

   Italian Cream:

2/3 c.sugar                                    2 c. milk
3 egg yolks                                   1 tsp. vanilla
1/2 c. flour

Cook in double boiler all above ingredients until thick; cool.

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to TO SPECIALTIES OF "THE DAY" AMONG ITALIANS CONTINUED
 

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