From The Sopranos Family Cookbook by Allen Rucker and Michele Scicolone
Nuovo Vesuvio. The ‘family’ restaurant, redefined. Home to the finest in Napolitan’ cuisine and Essex County’s best kept secret. Now Artie Bucco, la cucina’s master chef and your personal host, invites you to a special feast – with a little help from his friends.
From arancini to zabaglione, from baccala to Quail Sinatra-style, Artie Bucco and his guests, the Sopranos and their associates, offer food lovers one hundred Avellinese-style recipes and valuable preparation tips. But that’s not all! Artie also brings you a cornucopia of precious Sopranos artifacts that includes photos from the old country; the first Bucco’s Vesuvio’s menu from 1926; AJ’s school essay on ‘Why I Like Food’; Bobby Bacala’s style tips for big eaters, and much, much more. So share the big table with:
Tony Soprano, waste management executive. ‘Most people soak a bagful of discount briquettes with lighter fluid and cook a pork chop until it’s shoe leather and think they’re Wolfgang Puck.’ Enjoy his tender Grilled Sausages sizzling with fennel or cheese. Warning: Piercing the skin is a fire hazard.
Corrado ‘Junior’ Soprano, Tony’s uncle. ‘Mama always cooked. No one died of too much cholesterol or some such crap.’ Savor his Pasta Fazool, a toothsome marriage of cannellini beans and ditalini pasta, or Giambott’, a grand-operatic vegetable medley.
Carmela Soprano, Tony’s wife. ‘If someone were sick, my inclination would be to send over a pastina and ricotta. It’s healing food.’ Try her Baked Ziti, sinfully enriched with three cheeses, and her earthy ‘Shcarole with Garlic.
Peter Paul ‘Paulie Walnuts’ Gualtieri, associate of Tony Soprano. ‘I have heard that Eskimos have fifty words for snow. We have five hundred words for food.’ Sink your teeth into his Eggs in Purgatory-eight eggs, bubbling tomato sauce, and an experience that’s pure heaven.
As Artie says, ‘Enjoy, with a thousand meals and a thousand laughs. Buon’ appetito!’
Ingredients
- 2 pounds baby octopus
- 2 cups tomatoes peeled, seeded, and chopped fresh or chopped canned Italian, peeled, tomatoes
- 1/4 cup olive oil
- 1/4 cup parsley chopped, fresh, flat-leaf
- 2 large garlic cloves finely chopped
- Pinch red pepper crushed
- salt
- 6 to 12 friselle (black pepper biscuits) or slices toasted Italian bread
Instructions
- Rinse the octopus and drain well. Remove the hard round beak at the base of the tentacles of each octopus.
- In a large heavy saucepan, combine the octopus, tomatoes, oil, 3 tablespoons of the parsley, the garlic, red pepper, and salt to taste. Bring sauce to a simmer. Cover the pot and cook over very low heat, stirring occasionally, for 45 minutes.
- Uncover the pan and cook for 15 minutes more, or until the octopus is tender when pierced with a knife and the sauce is thick.
- Sprinkle the friselle with water to soften them slightly. Divide the friselle, or slices of toast, among six plates. Top with the octopus and sauce. Sprinkle with the remaining 1 tablespoon parsley and serve.
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