Straight to the recipe The Opera from this recipe has nothing to do with music, and everything with the opus magnus of Italian cook Bartolomeo Scappi, which appeared in print in 1570. Opera means ‘the work’ (in Italian, in Latin it would have been ‘the works’). Nowadays the cookbook is mainly known for its magnificent engravings which illustrate all kinds of…
broccoli
Home-made vegetable stock
Stock gets most of its taste from meat and bones (poultry, cattle or fish). What to do if you are vegetarian? This vegetable stock has an incredibly rich taste, without the help of salt, meat or stock cubes. Even real carnivores will appreciate this stock. You can use it for soups and sauces, and of…
Roman broccoli
A recipe for broccoli from De re coquinaria, a Roman cookbook with recipes from the 1st to 4th centuries. If a vegetable like broccoli already existed, it was probably something that looked like Brassica rapa var. Cymosa, also known as Cima di rapa or rapini (broccoli raab): thin stalks with leaves and small flowerbuds. Where I live (the Netherlands), Cima di…