The Mediterranean · Volume 02, Durum, Oil and the Arab-Norman Kitchen
Crapiata Materana
Basilicata
Illustration
- Time
- Hands on 2 hours · Waiting 8 hours
- Researched
- 16 sources cited
Traditionally eaten communally on 1 August, one source gives 2 August as a minor variant, at the end of harvest, each household contributing whatever remained of the previous year's dried harvest, cooked together in one large cauldron. A workable home ratio is given.
As tradition built it
Serves 8, in the true communal spirit. About 2 hours, plus overnight soaking.
Ingredients
- 100 g dried cicerchie
- 100 g dried fagioli
- 100 g dried ceci
- 100 g dried fave
- 100 g dried lenticchie
- 100 g dried piselli
- 200 g wheat berries
- 4 new potatoes, quartered
- a generous drizzle, at the table olive oil
- to taste salt
Method
- Soak the cicerchie, fagioli, ceci, fave and wheat berries together overnight in plenty of cold water. Lentils and peas do not need soaking; add them later.
- Drain, cover generously with fresh water, and bring to a simmer.
- Cook about 1.5 hours, until the beans are tender, adding the lentils, peas and potatoes for the final 30 minutes.
- Season with salt only near the end, since salt added early toughens the pulses' skins.
- Finish with a generous drizzle of raw olive oil at the table.
What a modern chef changes
Each legume cooked to its own correct point, then combined
Rung 4
Method
- Cook each pulse separately to its own doneness, rather than one pot where the fastest-cooking legume turns to mush before the slowest is tender. Combine only in the final 15 minutes.
- Toast the wheat berries dry before soaking, a few minutes in a hot pan until fragrant, for a nuttier base note that a straight soak-and-boil does not develop.
- Serve it as the communal dish it is, in one large vessel at the table rather than portioned in the kitchen, which is not sentimentality here but the actual traditional format the dish is built around.