Most days, I think you guys would agree, I am not a Wendy Whiner.
Today is not one of those days.
Look, I love to cook, and I love ingredients, and I’m creative to the core (for better or worse. For worse, see here and here and ooooh just recently here). So please know I am all for personal expression, for putting something into the world that has your own stamp on it.
But…what is the unholy obsession today with calling dishes by the wrong name? I see it especially in restaurants that call themselves Italian, the cruelest knife in my side. New Jersey has the third largest Italian population in the country and it’s the densest state in the country. So in essence, we’re talking about a whole lot of Italians who really ought to know better.
But this virus is not just in Italian restaurants, nor it is endemic in New Jersey. It’s everywhere.
Stand by for the dirty laundry.
1) Tortellini in Brodo
This translates to ‘tortellini in broth.’ It’s a very simple dish. You can tell by the name. I ate this as a kid when I had a sore throat. A wanna-be-upscale place nearby serves a dish by this name. It has tortellini, broth, lemon juice, eggs, cheese, and Italian parsley. And it’s actually pretty good. But it is not tortellini in brodo. It’s stracciatella, Italy’s version of egg drop soup.
Chefs. Just because you float tortellini in soup doesn’t mean you can pick any name out of the Italy handbook and slap it on. And most importantly? People who eat it and aren’t aware that it’s not what you say it is are going to be misled. You’re the ones wearing the aprons. You’re supposed to be authorities on this stuff. Hello.
Wait, here’s another one. This same place also serves what they call pasta carbonara, and thinks the odd chunk of ham in a cream sauce does them proud. To clarify, there is no cream in carbonara. This sauce is made when you add (along with pancetta and other ingredients) raw eggs to hot pasta, which cooks the eggs on contact and provides a lovely velvety texture. You cannot get this out of a jar, kids.
If you call yourselves a ‘ristorante‘ and brag on the menu that the experience of eating here is going to be authentic, then p.s., you don’t get to lie to us.
Bolognese is my favorite sauce. Marcella Hazan, who even while dead could cook me under the table, calls for butter, oil, onion, celery, carrots, beef, pork, veal, pepper, milk, nutmeg, white wine, and tomato sauce. Recently I saw a recipe named the above. The creator said she loved traditional Bolognese sauce, but likes to vary it up with turkey.
But she didn’t stop with turkey. She spiraled off the map, using red wine instead of white, adding garlic salt and mushrooms…then she remembered the Alamo and threw in steak seasoning and Worcestershire sauce.
Do I applaud her innovative spirit? Without question. Would I eat this? Sure. But it is Bolognese sauce? Not even CLOSE.
Dear lady. Give your recipe a new name. Name it after your sainted Portuguese Water Dog for all I care. Just don’t call it Bolognese.
Her recipe is sitting on my desk next to me as I type this, and re-chafes me every time I look at it. It’s WordPress’s problem now. Recycling.
Okay.
3) Caesar Salad
I’m not sure anyone makes classic Caesar salad anymore, which kills me because it’s a knockout. The dressing is made with raw eggs, anchovies, fresh lemon juice, fresh garlic, olive oil, Parmigiano-Reggiano, Dijon mustard, salt, and black pepper. This is tossed with Romaine lettuce and topped with rustic toasted croutons. It is not, as most restaurants would have us believe, thick, gloppy, and sponsored by Hidden Valley.
4) Chocolate Mousse Cake
This was an edit I was assigned. After scanning the ingredients I called my higher-up.
eve's apple 