One in an occasional series of conversations with those who try to “live Italian” wherever they are.

"La Principessa" in Perugia

Linda Dini Jenkins is a freelance travel writer and photographer and the author of Up at the Villa: Travels with my Husband (more later on how to win a free copy!). She also blogs regularly about travel and travel writing at Travel the Write Way and teaches creative writing and journaling. She enjoys taking small groups of friends, to explore what Italy has to offer beyond the Florence-Venice-Rome triumvirate, and she can pack her suitcase in 15 minutes.

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Q: Living “Italian”. . . Is it a great way to live or the greatest way to live?
A: Well, I think it’s the greatest way to live. When you take into account the slower pace of life (outside the big cities!), the immersion in history and art, the fantastic cuisine, the love of design and music, the respect for taking time out to enjoy the simple things . . . whether it’s Italian or Mediterranean or European, it’s how I want to live.

Q: Why?
A: Are you kidding? Start with the food, the design sensibilities, the language, the arts, the vino, the pausa, the passeggiata . . . need I go on?

Q: When did you discover your Inner Italian? What is your Inner Italian named?
A: I always knew about my Inner Italian but, like other children of first-generation Italian-Americans who desperately wanted to assimilate, “being Italian” was something that just happened and was never really encouraged. In fact, I’d heard stories growing up of how hard it was for my father to be Italian in a New York suburb in the 1930s and ‘40s; even being Italian in my first job in New York in the 1970s was something of a liability. And I was always a little ashamed after that of being part Italian (my mother’s side of the family was English/Irish/German) until I met my husband and he took me to Italy in 2000. Since then, I have been a proud and vocal Italian-American. If my Inner Italian has a name and it needs to be something other than Linda, I suppose it’s Principessa . . .

Q: What does “living Italian” mean to you?
A: My grandparents came over from Italy in the late 1890s and they were anything but rich. So for me, living Italian has to do with cooking and eating together, always having crusty bread and wrinkled olives and green olive oil on the flowered oilcloth-covered table. It means not being afraid to be emotional—even if that involves fists and things flying when you’re angry. It means loving music and feeling the arts very deeply. It means trying to have a sense of style—of la bella figura—even if the clothes or table settings come from Target. And it means being a storyteller and a traveler and something of an adventurer.

Legge piu qui

As I meandered through the recipes of The Glorious Pasta of Italy by Domenica Marchetti, with France Ruffenach’s sensual photographs, my appetite revved from 0 to 60 in no time.

What to savor first?

Mafalde with Roasted Tomatoes, Robiola, and Crushed Fennel Seeds?

Maccheroni alla Chitarra with Ragù all’Abruzzese and Palottine?

The Candy-Wrapped Tortelli with Rainbow Chard and Ricotta (whimsically named because the pasta is twisted to resemble hard candy wrappers)?

Bigoli with Spicy Sardine Sauce?

Or… BLT Bucatini?

Turns out—none of the above.

The answer presented itself definitively on page 127: Spaghetti al Farouk. It wasn’t only the spaghetti, cream, seafood, and saffron that got to me. It was the charming anecdote that seasoned the dish. The story behind the pasta reminded me of the scene in Fellini’s Amacord where the Middle Eastern potentate arrives at the Grand Hotel with his harem.

Domenica describes is like this. . .

“This is a unique dish, and one that is near and dear to my heart. When I was a girl, my family owned a beach house on Abruzzo’s Adriatic coast. I have many wonderful memories of whiling away summer days on the beach with friends and enjoying late-night marathon meals that featured freshly caught local seafood. One of our favorite restaurants was right on the beach. My memory says it was on the outskirts of the port city of Pescara, but my mother swears it was in nearby Francavilla. Since she is originally from the region, I will defer to her on that detail. Neither of us remembers the name of the restaurant, but we do remember that it was a casual place with a reputation for impeccable fish and seafood. One of its signature dishes was Spaghetti al Farouk, a fanciful curried pasta dish that brimmed with fresh mussels, shrimp/prawns, and pannocchie (something like crayfish or tiny lobsters.) The dish was named for the deposed Egyptian king who fled to Italy in 1952, and the sauce was spicy, silky, and a deep gold. My mother re-created the recipe in her own kitchen in the 1970s, and I still have a typed copy that she gave me. I’ve tinkered with the sauce over the years, lightening it a bit and trying different quantities of the various spices. In all honesty, I can’t tell you whether it is anything like the original—it’s been some thirty years—but I can tell you that it is a sauce like no other.

Spaghetti al Farouk

Makes 4 to 6 servings

2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

1 tablespoon unsalted butter

1 large yellow onion, chopped

Large pinch of saffron threads, pounded to a powder (see cook’s note)

1 tablespoon curry powder (preferably spicy)

1/2 teaspoon ground ginger

1/4 teaspoon minced fresh thyme

1 fresh bay leaf

1/2 teaspoon kosher or fine sea salt

Freshly ground black pepper

Juice of 1/2 lemon

3/4 cup/180 ml dry white wine

1 cup/240 ml heavy/double cream

1 pound/455 g dried spaghetti

12 mussels, well scrubbed and debearded if necessary (see cook’s note)

16 large shrimp/prawns, peeled and deveined

6 ounces/170 g frozen shelled cooked langoustine tails (see cook’s note)

Bring a large pot of water to a rolling boil and salt generously.

In a frying pan large enough to hold all of the seafood, warm the olive oil and butter over medium heat. When the butter is melted and begins to sizzle, add the onion and stir to coat with the oil and butter. Sauté, stirring frequently, for about 7 minutes, or until the onion is softened but not browned. Stir in the saffron, curry powder, ginger, thyme, bay leaf, salt, and a generous grind of pepper, taking care to incorporate all of the herbs and spices. Stir in the lemon juice, raise the heat to medium-high, and pour in the wine. Let the sauce simmer briskly for about 3 minutes, or until slightly thickened. Reduce the heat to medium and stir in the cream. Bring the sauce back to a very gentle simmer. If the pasta water is not yet boiling, reduce the heat under the sauce to low and wait until the pasta water boils.

Add the pasta to the boiling water, stir to separate the noodles, and cook according to the manufacturer’s instructions until al dente. Once the pasta is in the water, proceed with finishing the sauce.

Add the mussels, shrimp/prawns, and langoustine tails to the simmering sauce, cover, and cook for 5 to 8 minutes, or until the mussels open, the shrimp/prawns are just cooked through, and the langoustine tails are heated through. Discard any mussels that failed to open.

Drain the pasta into a colander set in the sink, reserving about 1 cup/240ml of the cooking water. If the frying pan is large enough to contain both the pasta and the sauce, add the pasta to the frying pan and gently toss the pasta and sauce to combine thoroughly, adding a splash or two of the cooking water if necessary to loosen the sauce. If the frying pan is not large enough, return the pasta to the pot, add about two-thirds of the sauce, toss to combine thoroughly, and then top with the remaining sauce when serving. Transfer the dressed pasta to a warmed serving bowl or shallow individual bowls. If you are preparing individual servings, be sure to divide the seafood evenly among them. Serve immediately.

Cook’s note: Saffron

Beautiful red-gold saffron threads (zafferano) are the dried stigmas of the purple-striped flowers of the Crocus sativus plant. Saffron from Abruzzo’s Navelli plain is among the best in the world. The spice is sold in two forms, powder and threads. The powder dissolves more easily, but it is also more easily tampered with. To be sure you are getting pure saffron, buy the threads and gently pound them to a powder before using. I use a mortar and pestle for pounding, but you can also press down on the threads with a heavy object, such as the flat side of a meat pounder or mallet.

Cook’s note: Shellfish

Much of the shellfish available these days is farm raised and therefore contains less dirt and grit than shellfish harvested from the wild. To clean mussels, scrub their shells with a stiff brush under cold running water. Discard any that do not close tightly when handled. If the mussels have beards, the fibrous tufts they use to hold on to pilings and rocks, you need to remove them. Using a towel or just bare fingers, grasp the beard gently but firmly and yank it toward the shell’s hinge. This will remove the fibers without tearing the mussel meat.

Frozen langoustine tails lack the flavor of fresh ones, but they are much more readily available and they have a nice, meaty texture that captures the sauce and absorbs its flavor.

Text copyright ©2011 by Domenica Marchetti

Photographs copyright ©2011 by France Ruffenach

Linguine al limone is a silken melange that complements grilled summer seafood.

She had me at “limone.” That’s because lemon is perhaps the best flavor on the planet.

When Sara posted a comment longing for a recipe for chitarra al limone she ate in Sulmona, she set me on a delectable sleuthing mission.

Sara wrote:

Sulmona’s where I had maybe the best pasta dish of my life…but I can’t remember the name of the restaurant. The dish was chitarra al limone, unlike any I’ve had before or since. I’ve tried several recipes, but nothing comes close. When I asked the owner for her secret, she said “limone!” I said, I know…and what else? She smiled and said, “solo limone, signora.”

She’s going to her grave with the secret. I thought it might be that they used that panna that comes in little tiny cartons and doesn’t need refrigeration, but I tried it and that wasn’t it. The secret’s still in Sulmona…

When I asked Sara for more description, she offered this:

It was very very light and I don’t remember that it was creamy, buttery or eggy. It was as if essence of lemon and very little else coated each strand… I’ve tried just olive oil and lemon with a touch of cream but that just wasn’t the same.

Armed with these clues, I speculated that the dish had to contain cheese, probably Parmigiano-Reggiano, to counter the tartness of the lemon and help create the luxurious mouth feel that she described.  I’m thinking that Sara’s signora wasn’t being coy when she said “solo limone.” To her, cheese is probably just a “given” not worth mentioning.

I consulted the usual reference suspects: Ada Boni’s Italian Regional Cooking, Le Ricette Regionali Italiane (Solares), Artusi’s The Art of Eating Well, The Ultimate Italian Cookbook by Carla Capalbo and Marcella’s Italian Kitchen. None offers a recipe for chitarra al limone. Giuliano Bugialli’s Bugialli on Pasta has a Spaghetti al Limone recipe “from all over Italy” containing quite a bit of butter and cream, more of a lemon- flavored cream sauce than the intense lemon sauce desired by Sara. Michele Scicolone has a Linguine with Lemon recipe in 1,000 Italian Recipes but it’s made with butter. For an Abruzzese dish, I felt that olive oil would be more traditional.

Read more about Linguine al Limone

The great Roman poet Ovid was born in 43 B.C. in the outskirts of Sulmona and the town proudly claims him as its native son. A bronze statue of him commands the Piazza XX Septembre.

Ovid likely wrote his poems about love and life on wax tablets or rolls of papyrus.

These days, it’s microprocessors and LCD screens that facilitate communication in Sulmona and beyond. Through this miraculous technology, we “visited” the Albergo Stella on venere.com, just one of many accommodations middlemen. Turns out we paid $97.82 for a small but spotless room with bath, free parking, and continental breakfast in the morning.

Roberto Bono, co-owner of Albergo Stella in Sulmona.

Albergo Stella is owned by the Bono brothers, Roberto and Giuseppe. Roberto operates the hotel and the Caffé Bono. Giuseppe, the wine guy, maintains the impressive enoteca adjacent to the Caffé. These enthusiastic entrepreneurs even have plans to open another Caffé on the other side of town despite the current economic downturn which has increased unemployment in town.

Roberto noticed that we booked our room online and volunteered that, next time, we should make the reservation directly. “I’ll give you a great room rate and save the 15 percent commission I pay the booking service.”

He also asked if we were set with lodging reservations for the rest of our trip. We explained that we were going to wing it and re-create the good old days when we first met and fell in love in Florence and traveled all over Europe by the seat of our pants.

“Just in case,” he said, “remember www.booking.com. It has a great selection of European hotels and B & B establishments.”

We thanked Roberto but secretly thought to ourselves, “We don’t need that. Now that we’re back in Italy, our old radar will kick in.” Less than 48 hours later, we were humbled into logging onto booking.com. The night after we left the Stella, we had to settle for a Best Western in the seaside resort of Barletta. Arriving as sun set, and dealing with traffic from hell, our dreams of winging it took flight for the night.

Lining the main streets of Sulmona are shop after shop selling confetti, the confectionary for which the town is famous. It sounds simple: start with almonds, pistachios or hazelnuts and coat them with multiple layers of molten sugar cane syrup.

This dessert artistry has been evolving since Roman times when almonds were coated with honey. The results are magnificent. They are edible mosaics, work so detailed, artistic and well-executed that they fool your eye. Of course these are real flowers . . . no, they are confetti.

Confetti Pelino, which dates form 1783, operates a museum of the craft at their factory at Via Stazione Introdacqua 53-55.