It would be sufficient honor for one nation to provide the world with
the best olive oil and the _real_ staff of life. But Italy lays claim
to another gastronomic distinction.
It is generally conceded that the Americans and also the English,
French, Germans, Russians and Scandinavians, eat more than is
necessary, especially meat. In a previous chapter attention was called
to the fact that, in the cooking of the future, meat is destined, for
diverse reasons, to be used largely, if not chiefly, as a condiment to
be added to equally nutritious but cheaper foods. The Italians, more
than any other nation, have shown how this can be done without any real
deprivation.
When our greatest man of letters, Mr. Howells, was consul in Venice and
gathering the material for his delightful book on life in that city,
he was impressed particularly by the surprisingly small scale on which
provisions for the daily meals were bought and the general absence of
gluttonous excesses: "As to the poorer classes, one observes without
great surprise how slenderly they fare, and how with a great habit
of talking of meat and drink, the verb _mangiare_ remains in fact for
the most part inactive with them. But it is only just to say that this
virtue of abstinence seems to be not wholly the result of necessity,
for it prevails with other classes which could well afford the opposite
vice. Meat and drink do not form the substance of conviviality with
Venetians, as with the Germans and the English, and in degree with
ourselves; and I have often noticed on the Mondays at the Gardens, and
other social festivals of the people, how the crowd amused itself with
anything--music, dancing, walking, talking--anything but the great
northern pastime of gluttony."
After describing the meals and referring to the great market at the
Rialto and the way provisions are distributed throughout the city,
he says: "A great Bostonian, whom I remember to have heard speculate
on the superiority of a state of civilization in which you could buy
two cents' worth of beef, to that in which so small a quantity was
unpurchasable, would find the system perfected here, where you can buy
half a cent's worth."
Half a cent's worth of meat will not go very far, even in Italy, but
for a few cents' worth you can get enough to impart the Flavor of veal,
lamb, or chicken to a pot of farinaceous food or a dish of vegetables,
and that is all a true epicure needs to be happy.
Throughout Italy, especially in the South, meat is used sparingly.
Large joints are seldom cooked, because of the effect of the warm
climate in spoiling animal food rapidly. But there is another food
which does not thus deteriorate and which is therefore used largely as
a substitute for meat, and that is cheese.
To speak of cheese as a substitute for meat seems odd to those
who--like most Americans--have been brought up to look on cheese with
French eyes, as a dessert. The Italians also have cheeses--notably
Gorgonzola, a variety of Roquefort--which are eaten at the end of a
meal; but more characteristically Italian is the use of cheese as an
ingredient of various cooked dishes, which take the place of meat.
While the statement made by one writer that the Italians put cheese
into everything they eat is an exaggeration, it is true that many of
their dishes are thus enriched; and it is this enriching of foods
with cheese, to make up for the absence or scarcity of meat, that
constitutes one of the great lessons Italy is teaching the world.
Gastronomically, this lesson is as valuable as what France has
taught the world regarding the dessert usefulness of ripened cheese
as an appetizer; and from an economic point of view it is much more
important, because meat is becoming dearer every year, whereas cheese
is not only cheaper but _more nutritious_ than meat.
More nutritious--yes, twice as nutritious. In Farmers' Bulletin 487,
entitled _Cheese and its Economical Uses_, two of our Government's
nutrition experts published a table (p. 13) based on a series of
experiments which show that "cheese has nearly twice as much protein,
weight for weight, as beef of average composition as purchased,
and that its fuel value is more than twice as great. It contains
over twenty-five per cent. more protein than the same weight of
porterhouse steak as purchased, and nearly twice as much fat."
Thus does science justify the culinary practices of Italy, and explain
how it happens that the sturdy sons of that land, instead of being,
as many foolishly suppose, idlers, habitually indulging in _dolce
far niente_, can and do accomplish the hardest manual labor, notably
railway building--abroad as well as at home--on a diet which contains
little or no meat.
Among the first things that strike one on visiting Italy the first time
is the universal custom of putting grated cheese in the soup.
Being hot, the soup dissolves the cheese at once; and this is a point
of great importance. There is an impression the world over that
cheese is indigestible, and this is correct so far as raw cheese is
concerned, unless it is taken in small quantities at dessert and
carefully munched with a hard cracker or a crusty roll of bread.
Cooked cheese, however, is easily digested--provided the cook knows
her business and does not follow the British custom, graphically
described by the eminent chemist, W. Mattieu Williams, of making, for
instance, "macaroni-cheese," which is "commonly prepared in England by
depositing macaroni in a pie-dish, and then covering it with a stratum
of grated cheese, and placing this in an oven or before a fire until
the cheese is desiccated, browned, and converted into a horny, caseous
form of carbon that would induce chronic dyspepsia in the stomach of a
wild-boar if he fed upon it for a week."
How it should be prepared, it is not the mission of this volume to
indicate. The best cook books reveal the method and so does the
Farmers' Bulletin (No. 487) just referred to. This bulletin should
be, indeed, bound and placed in the kitchen of every American and
English home, as it goes into the subject in much more detail than any
of the cook books. There are in it pages on Kinds of Cheese Used in
American Homes, The Care of Cheese in the Home, The Flavor of Cheese,
Nutritive Value and Cost of Cheese and Some Other Food Materials,
Home-made Cheeses, Cheese Dishes and Their Preparation, Cheese Soups
and Vegetables Cooked with Cheese, Cheese Salads and Sandwiches, Cheese
Pastry, etc.
Especially important are the pages devoted to a description of "Cheese
dishes which may be used in the same way as meat." Under this head
we find, among many other things, and with the recipes in full,
references to cheese sauces, corn and cheese soufflé, macaroni and
cheese, baked rice and cheese, cheese rolls, nut and cheese roast,
Boston roast, baked eggs with cheese, cheese omelet, fried bread with
cheese, cheese with mush, cheese croquettes, oatmeal with cheese, etc.
Doubtless the best cooking cheese is Parmesan; but when the genuine
article cannot be obtained in bulk (never buy it grated, in a bottle)
it is better to use Swiss or even American cheese (cheddar). The Dutch
Edam is also excellent for the kitchen, as good as when eaten raw. Of
the Italian uncooked cheeses for the table, the best are Gorgonzola
and, particularly, Caciocavallo. This is not, as its name suggests,
made of mare's milk. It looks like a rag doll, is similar to Edam
in consistency and has a very pleasant and unique Flavor owing to
its being slightly smoked. Beware of American imitations, cured with
"liquid smoke."
In times of meat scarcity and high prices it is well to remember
that hard-working men can (as experiments have shown) fully sustain
their strength for months on the cheapest of all products of the
dairy--cottage cheese made of skim milk, to which, just before eating
it, some cream is added for fat and flavor. Strange to say, in all
the literature on this matter I have never seen any reference to the
transformations to which cottage cheese can be subjected. By standing a
few days, it gets a ripening flavor that appeals to epicures, and if
it is then boiled it assumes a consistency like that of Port Salut,
making another pleasant variant.
A helpful little volume for those who wish to know how the Italians use
cheese in cooking and how they make a number of other national dishes
is Antonia Isola's "Simple Italian Cookery." Here are receipts showing
how _risotto_, and other rice dishes, _ravioli_, polenta, _gnocchi_
of farina or potato, are made (all of them delicious and desirable in
American and English homes, particularly the gnocchi), and how eggs,
fishes, vegetables, and meats can be cooked in tempting Italian ways.
The chestnut, as a matter of course, is a frequent ingredient in the
dressings and the pastry.