Posts Tagged With: Da Roberto Tuscany

“We are far from Da Roberto” is a phrase I’ve used more than once already.  The first time was in Rome’s Le Mani in Pasta where we got treated like second class citizens. The last time was in my house where Mrs Ziggy flat out refused to disclose where she got the couscous. I suspect now that it wasnt organic couscous.

Da Roberto, in the remote Tuscan village of Montisi, represents everything I love about eating in Italy.  Fantastic setting, great food, local ingredients, and a man whose passion for food is contagious.  I said “Man” instead of “Chef” for a reason.  “I’m not a chef, I’m not a cook, I’m simply here to present the finest local ingredients in the simplest form”.  And what ingredients they were.  Every grain, every bean, every tomato, cow or pig that you will consume at Roberto’s house, its origin will be explained to you in full detail.  Roberto’s freezer is turned off and his has no microwave.  You get fresh or you get nothing.  The only salt in the house is for the pasta water in the kitchen and out on your table. The fact that our American salt demanding palates only reached for the salt once throughout the meal apeaks volumes.

Pici, the Tuscan specialty we couldn’t get enough of, was well represented here, in a healthier more organic way.  Pici with Chianina ragu – most excellent.  Pici with pork sausage, pecorino and sweet onions was even more satisfying.  The fact that we had Pici for lunch that day and the previous day did not affect our enjoyment.

Our short streak of overcooked, dry secondis was stopped here with a lovely, tender roast of chianina.  And “The last sausage of the season from a {vendor name} 15 kilometers away”.  Sorry Roberto’s guests who came in the following days and months. You missed a darn good sausage.

You will be hard pressed finding a better Slow Food ambassador.  “Slow Food”, the fight against fast food and globalization in Italy means fighting a bug that is in its infancy, or hasn’t fully developed yet. While in the USA, its like fighting a late stage cancer.  In Lucca, they recently banned any non-Italian restaurants from opening within the ancient walls, leaving 4 kebab houses as the only ethnic options in the historic center.  While I, ethnic food lover Ziggy, cant even begin to imagine life without ethnic food, I understand what Lucca, and other Tuscan towns like Siena (who banned fast food in its beautiful historic center) are trying to do.  They are trying to prevent the floodgates from opening.  Can you really blame them?  Its a sensitive subject in Italy that deserves its own post.  But as much as I like living in ethnic food capital of the world, New York City, I’m not sure I would mind trading all that for a few Robertos and its farms in my area. Well, at least for a short while.   Gotta have that non-organic couscous eventually.