A restored estate, a bird sanctuary, a whole lot of history

Fritz Maytag, the founder of Anchor Steam Brewery, once told me, “It’s not all that hard to find a great product. And it’s not that hard to find a really wonderful story. But when you can find a great product that has a great story behind it, you’re onto something special!” The Italian rice from Cascina Oschiena is just that—both the rice and the story behind it are exceptional. Oschiena’s work exemplifies beautifully all of what I wrote in “A Taste of Zingerman’s Food Philosophy,” and thanks to the always amazing work by our friends and importer Rogers Collection, their rice has finally arrived in Ann Arbor!

Cascina Oschiena is one of the oldest farms in their area in the province of Vercelli in the Piedmont, up in the northwest corner of the country. All the way back in the 13th century, Cascina Oschiena was being farmed by the friars at the Abbey of St. Stephen of Vercelli. As was true in those days, estates of this sort were essentially self-contained communities. As the crew at Oschiena writes:

All the inhabitants contributed to life on the farmstead, each with their own activity: the paddy weeders, diggers, carters, riders, saddlers, blacksmiths, carpenters and joiners. … The traditional hand broadcast sowing method was accompanied by the transplant technique in the 1930s, and this continued until the end of the 1950s.

Rice growing at that time was almost exclusively done by hand. If you want to see what it was like, check out the amazing 1949 black and white film Riso Amaro, which is centered around the work of the folks who worked so hard in the fields. For the most part, they were women, known in Italian as mondine. Today, Cascina Oschiena is again run by a woman. It is the passion project of Alice Cerutti, whom I had the honor of spending a day with back in 2019, when I visited Cascina Oschiena. Of her work, Alice shares,

I am a farmer with a degree in Business Studies from the University of Turin. … We are deeply involved in safeguarding the environment, and are committed to biodiversity and conserving the historical landscape. Over the years, we have made renovations to maintain the essence and character of the original structures, honoring a centuries-old history of our farmhouse.

In the spirit of what I wrote above about stories and birds, part of the drive for the project was to create a safe resting place for some very special winged creatures. Alice shares the backstory:

The fields surrounding our farmhouse constitute the last recorded Italian nesting site of the Black-tailed Godwit. This … brought us to create the Cascina Oschiena Nature Reserve by converting 60 acres (one fourth of the farmland) from rice cultivation to Natural Reserve and the Black-tailed Godwit became the symbol of our Farm and its Products.

Of course, the main culinary question is “What is the quality of the rice?” The answer is, it’s excellent! There’s a wonderful freshness to the flavor, a vitality and aliveness that I love. It is, in the context of what I wrote last week, the essence of the amazing ecosystem from which it emerges.

We have four risi from Oschiena on hand at the Deli to get going with:

Arborio – The classic for making risotto. Rice arrived in Italy as an immigrant, coming from the Spanish-ruled Sicily, where rice had earlier arrived from India. Arborio (and Carnaroli) are actually descended from rice varieties that came from the Philippines in 1839. Nearly 200 years later, Arborio and Carnaroli would clearly be called some of the most Italian agricultural products available.

Carnaroli – With a bit more “tooth” and a little more flavor, this is my personal pick for risotto.

Selenia – A special short-grain variety that works well for making Sicilian arancini and other similar dishes that call for a stickier rice. Though it’s rarely seen in the U.S., we have this rice on hand, and I’m especially excited!

Ebano – A rare black rice with a great toasty, earthy flavor. Super tasty and visually appealing for summer rice salads, main course rice dishes that aren’t risotto, and more.

All four rices are remarkable, as wonderful as the story of Alice Cerutti, her family, friends, and team at Cascina Oschiena have created over the last eight years. Swing by, take some home, and start cooking soon!

Buy a box (or two)

Extraordinary organic oil from California

Over the last few months, trying to figure out how to lead through such trying times, I’ve been reassuring myself regularly that working through hard times like these (which I wrote about in the pamphlet of the same name) builds character, increases resilience, and enhances long-term health. In a sense, I suppose, that is what was proven true for us throughout the Covid pandemic. Although it was incredibly challenging, I can see now that there are indeed some good things that came out of it. ZingTrain added online classes. BAKE! did the same as well. Roadhouse Park was created in response; in fact, it just opened for the spring season a few days ago. (Swing by on a nice afternoon, appreciate the fresh air at the picnic tables, and enjoy some oysters—they’re only $2 each if you come for Happy Hour, Monday through Friday from 2–6 pm. Order up beer, wine, cocktails, and the whole compelling Roadhouse menu anytime this spring and summer.)

Another one of the good things that emerged out of the Covid pandemic was my connection with the Independent Restaurant Coalition (IRC). The non-profit brought together quality- and community-focused independently owned and run restaurants from all over the country. The group advocated for restaurants with great effectiveness in very thoughtful, collaborative ways throughout those Covid years, and is still actively engaged in doing terrific advocacy work today. Maybe most meaningful of all, out of that group of caring people, I probably also made 14 or 15 new friends! On every level, it was, and is, an inspiration!

One of the many great friends I’ve made through that work is Camilla Marcus, one of the IRC’s co-founders. At the time, she was running a recently opened restaurant in Manhattan. Unfortunately, like many small businesses I know, the restaurant did not make it through the pressures of the pandemic. To her enormous credit, Camilla came out of Covid by creating a whole new company, which she called west~bourne, in its place. Fast Company called Camilla one of the “Most Creative People in Business.” I just call her kind, caring, compassionate, and a great cook and businessperson to boot! All the products on the west~bourne website are worth taking a look at. My total top pick, though, is the exceptional extra virgin avocado oil.

The folks at west~bourne have set a whole new standard for me of what avocado oil can be—it really does redefine the class! Each bottle is filled with a beautiful green-gold, cold-pressed oil that’s really the essence of what makes the best avocados so special. The flavor, like any of the great extra virgin oils we sell, is complex, beautifully balanced, and has a lovely, long, lingering finish. It tastes, as you would expect, intensively of what you would expect from the best ripe avocados (which, to be clear, we rarely get around these parts)—buttery, subtly sweet, amazingly aromatic with a little hint of licorice and a titch of tarragon! Food & Wine journalist Kyle Beechey says west~bourne’s is the best avocado oil she’s ever had. Ever since it arrived at the Deli a few weeks ago I’ve been saying the same!

Use west~bourne’s extra virgin avocado oil to dress salad as you do olive oil. Make bruschetta with it—toast some Bakehouse bread, and while it’s hot, pour on some avocado oil and sprinkle with a pinch of good sea salt and some freshly ground black pepper. (I love the top grade Tellicherry at the Deli, and also at the Roadhouse, where it’s on all the tables and those incredible Pepper Fries.) Drizzle it on avocado toast, and you’ll take your usual favorite to new culinary heights. Great on a tin of high-quality tuna—try Salade Nicoise with avocado oil. Superfine on a salad with fresh fennel and oranges and, if you want, slices of ripe avocado as well. Great on pasta with grated Parmigiano Reggiano (the Valserena is tasting particularly great right now) or Pecorino, a bunch of freshly ground black pepper, and avocado oil, along with maybe some sautéed spring asparagus or fresh English peas. You can bake with it too—here’s west~bourne’s recipe for lemon cake made with avocado oil.

Camilla Marcus’ marvelous new cookbook, My Regenerative Kitchen: Plant-Based Recipes and Sustainable Practices to Nourish Ourselves and the Planet, is full of great recipes, including many for avocado oil. Oh yeah, chef and restaurateur Alice Waters wrote the foreword! A big part of what makes west~bourne’s work so special is the significant commitment to work towards ecological sustainability. It is, from the outside looking in, what appears to be the essence of the business. In fact, west~bourne was founded with one simple mission:

… to cure the climate crisis through regenerative food. With a focus on our collective decisions around food and the kitchen, we create products to shift the current paradigm while repairing the relationships between ourselves, our food, and our Earth.

Want to emulate west~bourne’s wonderful efforts at sustainability? west~bourne’s writer Angela Fink offers this sound suggestion:

Start small and stay consistent. In fashion, focus on buying fewer, better-quality pieces that reflect your style. For food, support local farmers, plan meals, and opt for seasonal produce. Sustainability isn’t about perfection—it’s about progress and making mindful choices that align with your values.

Your new favorite finishing oil?

P.S. You won’t see the extra virgin avocado oil on the Zingermans.com Mail Order website, but we’d love to ship you some—just send us an email at [email protected].

Amazingly good anchovy sauce from Italy’s Amalfi Coast

If you, like me, have a high affection for anchovies, this special sauce from a tiny village on the Amalfi Coast could take your affection for these fine little fish to new heights!

About an hour south of Naples, Cetara is known in the food world for having some of the best seafood in Italy. Old-school anchovies are one of its specialties. Fresh little fish are cleaned as soon as they’re off the boats (which are out fishing only a single night at a time), filleted by hand, and then layered with coarse sea salt into barrels. When the barrel is full, the top is replaced, and rocks are set on it to add steady, gentle pressure. The curing takes at least until the next season a year later, sometimes longer. As the weights press the slowly curing anchovies, liquid collects in the barrels. (Colare means “to drip” in Italian, hence, “colatura.”) Before the finished anchovies are taken out to sell, the slightly fermented liquid is drained off, aged in wood for a bit longer, and then you and I can buy it.

You could actually call colatura convenience food. With a small bottle of it on your counter, some pasta, and a salad, you can craft an exceptional, really world-class meal in minutes. Our colatura comes from the Delfino family, who began bottling the centuries-old “local secret” in 1950. On this side of the Atlantic that year, the McCarthy hearings were starting in Washington; in Asia, the Korean War was under way. In Cetara, though, things were pretty much as they’ve always been. Fishing every day, good cooking every evening, and church every Sunday. The Delfino family are the same folks who make the inspiring IASA peperoncino that I love so much, the beyond amazing spicy red pepper sauce I wrote up last week on that wonderful IASA Taco at the Roadhouse. We also have another colatura on hand from the small family-owned firm of Rizzoli Emmanuele as well.

Using colatura really couldn’t be simpler. Cook some pasta with less salt than you usually would since the colatura will bring its own salinity to the supper. I like bucatini—Rustichella or Gentile brands. Meanwhile, mix some extra virgin olive oil in a bowl with some colatura (at about a two-to-one ratio). Add chopped fresh parsley, some slivered garlic, and some peperoncino. Add a touch of the pasta cooking water and whisk until it’s smooth. When the pasta is very al dente, take it right out and mix it ASAP with the oil and colatura mixture. It’s very good topped with toasted breadcrumbs.

Alternatively, try brushing the bread of a grilled cheese (fresh mozzarella is marvelous) with colatura while it’s still hot, right after it comes out of the pan. Toss cubes of olive oil-fried Paesano or Rustic Italian bread with colatura and black pepper to make the best Caesar salad croutons you’ll come across. Rolando Beramendi, my friend, food guru, author of Autentico, and all-around really good guy, has a wonderful recipe in his book for a thick, hearty farro soup that gets finished with a drizzle of colatura. Colatura is also excellent drizzled over fish, sautéed or roasted vegetables, or mashed potatoes.

Anchovy elixirs

Send Colatura to your cousin in California

A spicy and simply delicious way to start your day

After eating one of these the other morning, I was reminded that, to my biased palate, this Texas breakfast taco at the Roadhouse is one of the tastiest foods you’ll find in the ZCoB! I could happily eat a couple a day!

It’s one of a trio of different Texas breakfast tacos on the Roadhouse menu right now during the week. A warm flour tortilla, filled with freshly scrambled eggs, dressed up with some freshly grated Monterey Jack cheese and a bit of that zesty IASA Peperoncino from Italy.

What makes it so good? Like so many things we make here, each of the ingredients is lovely on its own, and then they all come together in a singular, super tasty way. The Monterey Jack might be one of the more underappreciated of the exceptional ingredients we work with. We’ve been buying it from Vella Cheese in Sonoma—just a couple miles from Sam Keen’s house for over 30 years. While probably thousands of dairies make Monterey Jack, to my knowledge, only TWO make it using old-school artisan methods. The cost, of course, is far higher, but the result is radically more flavorful. The Roadhouse probably pays 20 times more to get the Vella Cheese than it would to get some standard commercial offering, but man, is it good. At every level, our determination and dedication to this special cheese, I believe, is one of the many ways we turn our food philosophy into real-life values.

From the time we started buying the cheese in the late ’80s until he passed away a bit over a decade ago, Vella Cheese, for me, was almost synonymous with the man who ran it. Ignazio (Ig) Vella was an amazing supplier with whom we shared so many guiding principles. Now that I think about it, in Sam Keen’s context, Ig was very much an insightful if informal philosopher of what we could call “the world of curd.”

Writing for the Los Angeles Times, journalist Valerie J. Nelson described Ig as:

The elder statesman of artisanal cheeses … He was a gruff straight shooter, and the salvo was his way of warning that success required a willingness to toil for uncertain financial gain. Once that caveat was spelled out, Vella invariably became an unselfish teacher and tireless advocate for small-scale producers of cheese, according to those in the industry.

I would agree. To me, he was also a friend and mentor. Ig passed away in the spring of 2011 at the age of 82. In reflecting on his life and work, I find a kind of spiritual calling—a reminder that dedication, integrity, and craftsmanship matter. A reminder that when we do our work well—honoring our values and staying true to the hard-working, down-to-earth, community-conscious commitment to quality that Ig embodied—special things are very likely to emerge. In that sense, each of these tacos is more than just food—it’s a testament to the values that Ig Vella lived by his whole life.

The IASA Peperoncino is what really takes this taco to a special place. It comes from Italy, where Ig’s father, Tom Vella, was born. IASA is an outstanding “spread” of spicy red peppers in olive oil. At our house, we buy quart jars and use it nearly every day! At the Roadhouse, it’s already appeared on a number of specials. It’s also on the menu as an optional condiment and as a part of the Bakehouse artisan bread appetizer. The eggs, the creaminess of the cheese, and the umami-spice of the IASA all come together on the taco to make for what I think is a wonderful way to start your day.

If you like a bit of spice, you’ll love it. Swing by the Roadhouse during the week for breakfast, order a cup of that really good Roadhouse Joe coffee, and get your day off to a solidly delicious start!

Really good chocolate made from raw cacao in the world’s happiest place

One place that we don’t—yet—take you on a Zingerman’s Food Tour is Finland. I forecast that down the road, there may well be one. About a year ago, BBC Radio reported that “for seven consecutive years, Finland has been named the happiest country in the world, followed closely by its Nordic neighbours Denmark and Iceland.”

While we’re thinking about making our way to Helsinki to try out the terrific local food scene, here’s an easy opportunity to try a really tasty artisan offering. Made in the city of Sisu (the almost mystical Finnish term that is something akin to “inner strength”), Goodio is a craft bean-to-bar chocolate with a really good brand name. Goodio was founded a decade ago by designer Jukka Peltola, who also developed games at Rovio, the company responsible for Angry Birds. After a creative career in technology and entertainment, Peltola came to food through a personal journey for better health. He started by thoughtfully challenging himself to answer the question: “What if there was a food brand you could trust?” Goodio was his answer.

The chocolate line was designed around the principles of sustainability, well-being, and supply chain transparency, with the idea of incorporating Nordic-inspired ingredients and flavors into artisan chocolate bars. All the bars are made with organic raw cacao, which means they’re especially high in antioxidants. They sweeten the bars with raw coconut sugar, which also gives a subtle difference in the flavor profile from the majority of chocolates made with cane sugar.

The Dark Chocolate 71% is my top pick. It’s made with hard-to-find Nacional heirloom cacao from Peru. Highly prized for many years, the already rare Nacional beans suffered tremendously in a blight back in 1916. They were thought to have essentially disappeared until some trees were found growing wild in the jungle. From that small source, the bean has been brought back. It has a creamy, non-astringent flavor.

We also have a Finnish Wild Blueberry Chocolate—in a great way, the blueberries are present in the flavor, but chocolate remains what you taste first. We also have their lovely, lighter caramelized Finnish Rosemary Chocolate, very creamy Coconut Milk Chocolate, and Dark Chocolate with Sea Salt. All are vegan, gluten-free, and very good. Each, in its own Finnish way, is wonderful! Eat some and see if, indeed, a small bit of happiness doesn’t follow.

Available at the Candy Store, inside Zingerman’s Coffee Company, on Plaza Drive!

Deliciously beautiful bread made with freshly milled grain

One of the great things about artisan food is that every day, or every batch, is just a little bit different. And while the Country Multigrain Bread (formerly known as Country Miche) is always really good, every once in a while all of the many elements involved conspire in the best possible way to yield an exceptional loaf. For that to happen, the weather, the grain, and the culinary spirits over on the Southside come together to create a loaf that is over the top, amazingly good!

I had one of those especially excellent breads last Friday evening. It was from the bigger, 4-pound loaf, which comes as a round miche (French for “loaf”)—which, to my taste, offers an even deeper, more complex flavor and moister interior crumb than the smaller size. It had a beautiful super dark crust like I like—the darker crusts have far, far more flavor thanks to the caramelization of the natural sugars in the grain, aka “the Maillard Effect.” The crust, the crumb, and the salt level were so terrific that they made me want to write about it here and remind everyone just how darned delicious this bread is.

The Country Multigrain Bread might be a near-perfect manifestation of French food writer Maguelonne Toussaint-Samat’s statement in History of Food: “… really good bread makes you feel happy just to smell it, look at it, bite, chew and swallow it.” It is one of the breads that debuted after we began the wonderful work of milling our own grain at the Bakehouse in 2018. It’s a blend of four grains: Regionally grown and stone-milled organic hard red spring wheat, organic rye and organic spelt from Janie’s Mill, and organic buckwheat from Natural Way Mills. While the first one is slightly sifted (i.e., high-extraction flour), the other three are whole-grain flours, all capturing the true essence of the grains they come from. Like I said above, the quartet comes together to make for a compelling set of flavors.

The Bakehouse’s Country Multigrain Bread is so exceptionally marvelous it would be wholly at home in a top-notch French country bakery circa 1880. Beautiful chestnut-colored crumb with big holes (which artisan bakers are always working to make happen) with lovely flecks of bran. The aroma is lively, slightly sour, substantial but not strong, and comforting. The bread’s flavor is big, almost meaty, very wheaty, complex, and fascinatingly full. I love it simply as is, toasted with great olive oil. Perfect for sandwiches. It’s terrific with the Creamery’s Cream Cheese, olive oil, and our 5-Star Black Pepper blend. Being naturally leavened (with nearly 20 hours of rise time), the Country Multigrain stays marvelously moist for days. You can buy the 4-pound loaf as a quarter, half, or whole, or choose the smaller 1.5-pound batard. All of which also makes the Country Multigrain Bread perfect for Mail Order shipping or for taking to cottages or on cross-country drives.

If you’re feeling stressed these days, good bread could be a big help. As the great Spanish scribe Cervantes once said, “All sorrows are less with bread.”

Marvelous multigrain