SUNDAY SAUCE ITALIAN GRAVY COOKBOOK

SUNDAY SAUCE

Sunday Sauce - When Italian Americans Cook is the defineing book on the subject of

the Iconic Italian-American dish Sunday Sauce, a.k.a. GRAVY .. This dish is held dear to the hearts of millions of Italian-Americans all over the country and particularly in the major Italian conclaves of; New York, New Jersey, Boston, New England, Philadelphia, Chicago, Pittsburgh, and other parts. Sunday Sauce as Mr. Bellino Z puts it, is the most Supreme Diah of all, and is not just a dish, but also and event and cherished ritual of this ethnic group known as Italian-American.

Sunday Sauce is a book that goes more indept on the subject of Sunday Sauce then any book ever created. The author has included several recipes with instruction and stories of the Sunday Sauce, a.k.a. Gravy .. The stories are absolutely wonderful and are sure to get any reader all hopped up to make one soon. "One" being a Sunday Sauce Gravy that's laden with; Sausage, Meatballs, and Braciole according to which recipe you choose. The author says that there are any number of ingredient one can put into their Sunday Sauce Gravy, such as the most popular being; Meatballs, Sausages, and or Braciole, with other ingredients that might include; Veal Shank, Pork Neck, Pork Chops, Chicken, Pic Skin Braciole (Coteca), or as is one othe authors favorites of Pork Spare Ribs in his Bellino Family Sunday Sauce Gravy. Daniel says that not many people put the Spare Ribs into their Gravy, but whenever he makes it and serves the Sauce to his friends, everyone goes "Bananas" for the Ribs and say that they "din't know you could put Ribs in the Sauce."

Daniel has recipes for: Clemenza Godfather Sunday Sauce, along with one from martin Scorsese's Mob Movie Goodfellas, and there's a recipe for Momma DiMaggio Sunday Garvy (Joe DiMaggio 's Mother) and Spaghetti & Meatballs alla Sinatra from Old Blue Eyes Frank Sinatra fame .. Though a central them of the book is the great Italian Dish Sunday Sauce (Gravy), the book is not just about Sunday Gravy, but about Italian-America's favorite most popular dishes and stories of the kitchen, the Table, and Italian-Americans themselves (the people). This book is quite a treasure, especially if you're Italian-American yourself or just happen to love great Italian Food or the Italian-American lifestyle. You want be disappointed, in fact, I'm sure you'll love it. Sunday Sauce the dish, and Sunday Sauce the book and the stories and recipes within, is an absolute Gem by one of America's greatest Italian-American cookbook authors Daniel Bellino-Zwicke ...

 

 

 

 

Review by Anthony Abruzzo

 

 

 

 

ALSO by Daniel Bellino-Zwicke

 

SEGRETO ITALIANO

 

SECRET ITALIAN RECIPES

 

 

 

 

 

THE ITALIAN CHRISTMAS

 

THE FEAST of THE 7 FISH

 

 

 

 

La TAVOLA

 

 

 

IT'S NEW YORK ITALIAN

 

 

 

 

 

 

ITALIAN AMERICAN NEW YORK

 

At my family's home in the Bronx, we ate slices 

of fresh, milky mozzarella with seeded bread from the Italian bakery down the block, macaroni shells stuffed with Polly-O ricotta, lasagne with little meatballs between the layers, baked rigatoni, eggplant parmigiana, chicken cacciatore, beef braciola. We drank chianti that came in a straw-covered flask and espresso from a drip pot, with a sliver of lemon peel. This was the 1950s and '60s, and though Mom was always cooking for our family and friends, Dad knew his way around the kitchen, too. He took to the stove on weekends, concentrating on a single dish: lobster fra diavolo, because my mother hated handling live lobsters.

 

 

We thought we were eating authentic Italian food, because the dishes were the same ones all the other Italian families we knew cooked and ate. But in reality, our cuisine was an American invention: an amalgam of hearty, rustic dishes brought here, primarily by southern Italian immigrants (my grandparents came from Abruzzo and Campania), then adapted and embellished upon in American kitchens. By the time I started writing about food in the mid 1970s, this homegrown cuisine had fallen out of favor as northern Italian—inspired dishes, deemed (sometimes erroneously) lighter and more authentic, became all the rage. I can't say that I didn't welcome the new trend of delicate fresh egg pasta, or celebrate the fact that grilled branzino had replaced shrimp scampi on so many Italian menus. But I will never deny my love for a supersize plate of spaghetti with homemade meatballs, or an eggplant parmesan hero, with its ample breading and sauce and molten mozzarella. There's a beauty and succor to Italian-American food, and it's for a good reason that so many chefs have been returning to those classics recently, preparing them with a newfound zeal and sense of respect.

FRANK & AVA "MANGIA BENE"

 

Frank Sinatra

The story of the rise and fall and rise again of Italian-American food is a fascinating one; it's an American story, its plot interwoven with the entrepreneurial drive, embrace of pop culture, proliferation of convenience foods, and creativity of home cooks that has informed our country's culinary spirit. It began authentically enough, with Italian immigrants who were skilled at making the very most from the very least. The abbondanza for which Italian-American cooking is known stems from the fact that these immigrant cooks, most of whom came from dire poverty, took pride in being able to feed family and friends sumptuously on the kinds of foods they couldn't afford back home. Ingredients like mozzarella and ricotta were no longer used as accents, or as meals in themselves: They were added to dishes with abandon. My father's lobster fra diavolo, which was likely inspired by tomato-based seafood stews made with small spiny or inexpensive rock lobster in Italy, was another example: When it was popularized in the 1950s in Italian-American restaurants, it became a lavish dish—far bigger in size and flavor than its predecessors—of fat New England lobsters cooked in a fiery tomato sauce. Another ingredient considered an extravagance in southern Italian cooking, veal, could be found on early Italian-American menus in myriad forms: alla parmigiana (breaded and covered with sauce and cheese), alla marsala (doused with fortified wine), and as massive one-pound veal chops, often stuffed with mozzarella and prosciutto, then smothered with tomato sauce.

 

The MASTER of PIZZA

Dom DeMarco

DiFara Pizza

 

BROOKLYN, NEW YORK

Foods from the homeland became springboards for invention in the States. Take pizza, which evolved from its simple Neapolitan roots into styles unlike anything found in Italy (see Any Way You Slice It), with more cheese, more sauce, and more toppings. Or, tomato sauce, for that matter: When my wife and I first traveled across Italy, on our honeymoon in 1977, we saw neither marinara (that quickly cooked sauce of just tomatoes, garlic, and oil) or the long-simmered "Sunday sauce," stocked with all kinds of meats, which most families I knew while growing up served on Sunday. Of course, tomato sauce exists in Italy; the irony is that tomatoes were brought to Italy from the Americas in the 16th century and considered poisonous by all but southerners, who found them a delicious addition to their meager diet and discovered that they flourished in their sunny clime. Which explains why when more than 4 million Italians, a vast majority of them from the south, immigrated to America between 1890 and 1910, they brought tomatoes, and tomato sauce, with them. Every cook had a version, and it became the food on which immigrant mothers staked their eminence within their neighborhoods. Growing up, we would no more insult a friend's sauce than we would his mother or grandmother. The sauce was sacred.

READ MORE ... CLICK HERE by John Mariani

THE FEAST of THE 7 FISH

ITALIAN CHRISTMAS

by Daniel Bellino-Zwicke

 

 

New York Best Italian Restaurants

BEST ITALIAN RESTAURANT In NEW YORK

BAR PITTI Is The BEST

# 1

NEW YORK'S BEST ITALIAN RESTAURANTS

1.  Bar Pitti  ... Greenwich Village

2.  Rao's ...  East Harlem, New York, NY

3. PATSY'S ... 56th Street, New York, NY

4.  Manducati's,  ... Long Island CIty, Queens

5.  DeGrezia Restorante ... Midtown Manhattan 

6.  Elio's ... Upper East Side Manhattan

"FRANKIE NO"

Frank Pellegrino Sr.

RAO'S # 5

*

*

PATSY'S 56th STREET

FRANK SINATRA 'S 

FAVORITE ITALIAN RESTAURANT

*

*

DeGrezia Restorante

A Hidden GEM In Mid-Town 

Ranks an Impressive # 4

POLP alla GRIGLIA

GRILLED OCTOPUS at DeGREZIA

Is The BEST in TOWN

ELIO'S MAKES THE BEST LASAGNA BOLOGNESE

Sunday & Monday Nights Only

Lasagna Bolognese

MANDUCATI'S 

Long Island City, Queens New York

GREAT OLD SCHOOL ITALIAN

The BAR at MANDUCATIS

"La TAVOLA"  

ITALIAN In GREENWICH VILLAGE

SUNDAY SAUCE

WHEN ITALIAN AMERICAN'S COOK

by Daniel Bellino-Zwicke

Learn How to Make Bolognese, Sunday Sauce, 

Meatballs, and more ...

BRUNELLO

BRUNELLO Di MONTALCINO  

 

Vines of Brunello in Montalcino

 

Brunello di Montalcino is a robust Italian red wine grape produced in vineyards in and around the town of Montalcino, about 120 km south of Florence in Tuscany.

The word Brunello is derived from the Italian masculine form Bruno, which means “brown.” 

 

BRUNELLO FACTS

1. The origins of Brunello di Montalcino can be traced back as far as the 14th century. A red wine praised by the nobles of Tuscany as the “best wine in Tuscany,” Brunello is considered the youngest of Italy’s prestigious wines.

2. Brunello is made from 100% Sangiovese Grapes, also know as Brunello .

3. Originally, in Montalcino, it was believed that Brunello was a single individual grape grown just in that region. Extensive study was done in 1879 by the Province of Siena’s Amphelographic Commission and concluded that it was in fact a particular clone of the Sangiovese grape.

In 1888, Ferruccio Biondi-Santi bottled and formally named the first Brunello di Montalcino. Biondi-Santi is also credited with isolating the superior Sangiovese clone found only in the Montalcino wine region.

4. By WW II, Brunello developed a reputation for being one of Italy’s rarest and most expensive wines. More producers wanted in on the action.

By 1960 there were 11 producers following Biondi-Santi’s success. Brunello evolved into a designation of wines made with 100% Sangiovese grapes. In 1968, Brunello di Montalcino is awarded DOC status.

BRUNELLO

aka SANGOVESE

ON THE VINE in MONTALCINO

5. By 1980, there are 53 Brunello di Montalcino producers and the wine was awarded the higher level DOCG status.

Today, there are 200 producers of Brunello di Montalcino in Italy and it remains one of Italy’s best known and most expensive wines.

Climate has the most influence on the deep characteristics of Brunello di Montalcino. Montalcino sits south of Florence and enjoys warmer, drier growing seasons than that of the other popular Tuscan Sangiovese region Chianti. It is the driest of all Tuscan DOCG zones.

Cool, south-west maritime breezes also help ventilate late afternoon warmth and bring cooler nights. Sunshine on the northern and southern facing slopes are used to full advantage creating earlier or later ripening as desired.

The particular isolated superior Sangiovese clone unique to Montalcino region imparts distinct characteristics in Brunello di Montalcino. Aromas include blackberry, black cherry, black raspberry, leather, chocolate and violets. Perhaps fleshier in taste than Chianti.

Brunello di Montalcino producers divide their production into two categories: normale or riserva. By DOCG law, Brunello di Montalcino must be aged longer than the majority of Italian wines.

Normale requires 4 years, two of which must be in oak. Five years of aging are required for riserva Brunello di Montalcino, 2.5 years of which must be in oak.

The kinds of oak varies. Traditionalists will use the large old Slovanian oak casks that don’t impart significant character to the wine.

Modern producers will use smaller French barriques that give more structure and vanilla, but require some management of overwhelming characteristics of oak and vanilla by the winemaker.

Fun fact: 1 out of 3 bottles of wine sold in the United States is Brunello di Montalcino, mostly in restaurants.

Brunello di Montalcino food pairing with grilled meats and game.

 

My Favorite BRUNELLO

 

Fattoria di Barbi

 

 

 

AnothER FAVORITE BRUNELLO

 

 

Me & Conti Francesco Cinzano

at DeGrezia, New York

 

Francesco Tasted Me on All His Current Vintage Wines

Including Rosso di Montalcino

His Awesome RISERVE BRUENLLO Con VENTO

and

MOSCADELLO di MONTALCINO

 

 

 

COL D'ORCIA BRUNELLO Di MONTALCINO

 

 

 

 

Me & My Buddy

 

MARCHESE FERDINANDO FRESCOBALDI

 

with Author ITALIAN NEW YORK WINE GUY Daniel Bellino Zwicke

in

NEW YORK

 

 

 

WHEN ITALIAN-AMERICANS COOK

 

 

SUNDAY SAUCE

 

by Daniel Bellino-Zwicke

 

 

Emilio Ballato Restorante Italiano New York

EMILIO'S BALLATO

OLD SCHOOL ITALIAN RED SAUCE JOINT

EMILIO'S BALLATO

"Wonderfully Delicious" !!!

Dining Room EMELIO BALLATO RESTORANT

East Houston Street, Nohlita NEW YORK

An ITALIAN-AMERICAN CLASSIC

SPAGHETTI & MEATBALLS

at

BALLATO'S

BAKED CLAMS OREGANATA

at

BALLATO'S

Another ITALIAN AMERICAN CLASSIC DISH

Wonderful old-school type Red Sauce Italian Joint of days gone by. Not as old as John's (Since 1908) or Lanza, but definately of the old-school Italian type with dishes like Baked Clams Oreganta, Chicken Parmigiano, Spaghetti & Meatballs and more. A wonderful ambiance and great spirit of a restaurant. Check it out, Ballato's is the real deal!

Quote From BALLATO Regular LENNY KRAVITZ :

Wonderful old-school type Red Sauce Italian Joint of days gone by. Not as old as John's (Since 1908) or Lanza, but definately of the old-school Italian type with dishes like Baked Clams Oreganta, Chicken Parmigiano, Spaghetti & Meatballs and more. A wonderful ambiance and great spirit of a restaurant. 

Check it out, Ballato's is the real deal!

Below:  The MOST UNUSUAL RESTAURANT TIP (Gratuiety) EVER !!!

An  AWNING From LENNY KRAVITZ

The AWNING in QUESTION ?

Note: Famed New York DIVE BAR "MILANOS"

Next Door to BALLATO'S

on East Houston Street, NEW YORK

FAVORITE DISHES at EMELIO'S BALLATO

BAKED CLAMS OREGANATA

SPAGHETTI POMODORO

CHICKEN PARMIGIANO

OSSOBUCO

RIGATONI AMATRICIANA

VEAL MILANESE

SPAGHETTI & MEATBALLS

SUNDAY SAUCE

WHEN ITALIAN-AMERICANS COOK

by Daniel Bellino-Zwicke