let’s eat

Like many parts of Italy food is an important part of life in Sardinia, more a way of life than a necessary act of consumption.

Meal times are a coming together of family and friends to share in the spoils of home grown vegetables or the fresh fish catch of the day. The sharing and pride of fresh quality produce makes for a great part of what food is about in Sardinia.

featured recipe

cassola (seafood casserole)

ingredients

Serves 4 – 6 1.5 kg of mixed fish (octopus, squid, eel, dog-fish(palombo), monk fish e.t.c)

300g of tomato ‘passata’

5 sun dried tomatoes

3 cloves of garlic

One and a half onions Half a carrot

Half a stick of celery

A bunch of parsley

Vernaccia di Oristano (or another dry white wine)

Salt Extra virgin olive oil

method

You can use whatever fish you like for this dish but try to get an even balance of shellfish and fish.

Clean all of the fish as is necessary cutting larger fish into chunks so as all of the pieces are all of roughly the same sort of size.

Place any fish heads fins e.t.c that you removed in a pan with about 2.5l of slightly salty water, half a carrot, half an onion, half a stick of celery and some olive oil.

Bring to the boil then turn down the heat and simmer for about 30 minutes.

Filter the stock through a sieve and keep warm. (Alternatively you can buy some pre made fish or vegetable stock.)

Finely chop the other onion, the garlic, the sun dried tomatoes and a handful of parsley and lightly fry in a terracotta casserole (or large pan) with 6 tablespoons of olive oil.

Add the squid and octopus to the pan with a little salt and a glass of white wine and cook over a high heat until all of the wine has evaporated.

Now add the tomato passata with a ladle of the fish stock and cook over a medium heat for about 20 minutes.

Add the rest of the fish and another ladle of fish stock, lower the heat and cook for another 15 minutes adding more stock if necessary.

When cooked the sauce should be quite dense.

Garnish with freshly chopped parsley.