You could translate ‘style’ in recipe writing, as ‘mutually-agreed-upon national fiction’. They are the lies each country agrees upon, such as measuring in volume (‘by the cup’, and not remotely accurate) or ‘quanto basta’ (‘as much as it takes’, (sic)’, here in Italy.
As a school we have had students from 54 different countries. I say this not to brag but to talk about something deeper, more universally human. Our goals and desires at the table are the same, so why should’t the path that leads there be too?
Most of this need to write recipes differently came out of a sort of teacher’s pragmatism: how do you tell in real time a Russian, a Canadian, an Italian, an Irish, an American and a Dane how thick to cut the potatoes, or how much water to add to the pot? Get it wrong and the activity becomes instantly alienating: metric, imperial, gas marks, volume, weight, consistency and on and on. ‘I don’t know how much a centimetre is, I just want to know how thick to cut the potatoes’, and, ‘yes, but which cup?’, were routine.
Any calibration in process probably happened more rapidly though, as this all happens everyday, in my own home, and at the castle (as opposed to the average cookery writer, the connection between writer and reader, happening months and years and great distances away). My feedback loop were instant facial expressions, of delight or confusion.
International methods of conceiving of heat fell away quickly with ‘as hot as the oven goes’. And it always works. Sizes became ‘postage stamps’, and ‘thumbnails’, and ‘as wide as your little finger’. ‘Handfuls’ were embraced.
And language righted itself over time: ‘hob’ and ‘burner’ are national differences but ‘fire’, and ‘flame’, aren’t. When forced to choose sides, say with ‘brinjal’, ‘aubergine’ and ‘eggplant’, we simply remain in Italian, as most know ‘melanzane’, anyway.
The check on this process over the years has been the facial expressions and our students’ satisfaction at the table; Fuzzy direction only made me look bad.
That is not to say that I’m in favour of freedom in the kitchen, at least for the food that I like to eat. Puglia has been the number one domestic travel destination in Italy for the last 15 years for a reason. The food is essential, pure, pristine. This recipes were finished when there was nothing left to take away. Can you add sausage? Sure. Would it be good? That’s up to you. But try it first as it is: these are some of mankind’s most successful inventions, as valid now as when they were first invented (and how often do you use a pulley nowadays?)
It would be wrong to see the following pages as ‘the esperanto’ of recipes, the international standardisation just to save bandwidth. Or as the modern fixation, as personal branding. The goal is arrive at something deeper, more human, more in touch with the spirit of this gorgeous part of the world.
And to encourage your return, to wade into Puglia’s warm and generous river once more.
