- This is a production of PBS, Charlotte.

- The following episode of Charlotte cooks is brought to you by Central Piedmont Community College, and viewers like you, thank you.

- Next on Charlotte Cooks, we're bringing you wonderful flavors from Umbria, Italy.

(bright pop guitar music) Welcome to this episode of Charlotte Cooks.

I'm so glad you're here.

I'm chef Pamela Roberts and joining me and my kitchen today we have an authentic Italian chef, who's gonna be making us some risotto and panzanella salad.

We have a Raffaele Patrizi, did I say that right?

- (correct, Pamela) - You're from Umbria, Italy, Is that right?

- Yes, I'm originally from Rome.

- Okay - Italy, of course.

My dad, he grew up in Umbria, in Norcia, and the plate that I'm doing today is to get all that Norcia, Umbria gives it to us.

- Okay - So they are very famous for sausages, porcini mushrooms, truffles.

And what a better way to do a risotto with these items?

- Absolutely, absolutely.

And so we're here in North Carolina, but you're bringing these wonderful Italian flavors to us, but you're using North Carolina local ingredients too, aren't you?

- [Raffaele] Yes, I do - [Pamela] So that's really kind of fun here.

- [Raffaele] yup - [Pamela] So tell us about the rice.

- [Raffaele] So the rice that I'm using today is from a farmer here in North Carolina.

That they use.

The grain is a 200 year old grain.

- Oh, wow.

- Yup.

And there are up in Moore in North Carolina and the rice is very, very good.

- [Pamela] What are we putting in the dish?

- [Raffaele] This fantastic rice risotto, - [Pamela] Mm hmm - [Raffaele] Local portobello mushrooms from - [Pamela] Nice.

- [Raffaele] another farmer here in North Carolina.

- [Pamela] Oh wow.

- [Raffaele] I'm using local sausages from another family here in North Carolina that are here in Charlotte.

I'm using thyme and parsley from another two farmers here in North Carolina.

So, - [Pamela] Very nice.

- pretty much everything, we are here in Charlotte is about 20, 30 miles away from where we are right now.

- That's fabulous, and fresh.

- And fresh.

- Super, super fresh.

- Nice, important things, yup.

- Okay.

So to get started with our risotto, what are we going to do first?

- We need to clean the portobello mushrooms.

- Oh, okay.

Portobello is when you get them, there are these giant mushrooms.

They're really, really, really, really big.

You could process them, you can do them whole if you want to, but you have to be aware that all of these beautiful black gills under here will make everything that we cook black.

You know, you can handle 'em like this, it's fine, but when you start cleaning 'em, you're going to wanna put some gloves on because your nails, your hands, everything will just, just get stained.

We used to save the portobello scraps and make like a really dark, black custard out of it.

And it had a nice, rich mushroom flavor to it.

- Yup - But sometimes we'd put 'em in beef stock.

- Yeah, you can do a stock - This is how you're gonna clean it.

You're going to take a spoon, cradle that mushroom in the bottom of your hand and then scrape those gills out.

And you're gonna see a nice, creamy white underneath.

And that's what we want to save.

We wanna get those black gills out and just scrape it with a spoon.

You cradle that mushroom in the bottom of your hand, so you don't break the mushroom cap.

And that way it's going to be easier to dice.

If you break it, it's not a big deal.

- It's not big a deal.

- You can use the stems.

You can use the whole cap.

It's a beautiful mushroom to use.

And they also hold marinade really well.

Now, do you peel the mushrooms too?

- I don't peel them - Okay, all right.

- Just because... - [Pamela] You like the flavor.

- [Raffaele] It's a waste otherwise.

- [Pamela] Yeah - [Raffaele] Like what else you do with it, if you peel of course a whole, we said you can do a stock, - [Pamela] Mm hmm - But it gives more richness to the risotto.

- When I talk about peeling the mushroom all you're gonna do is just take the skin and just peel it up like this.

And we would save that for the stock because this also adds a beautiful mushroom flavor to stock.

And that would leave you with a nice, white mushroom cap underneath, but for this, we want that rustic flavor.

We want that, that look, so we're going to leave all that peel on.

How many mushrooms do we need for this?

- [Raffaele] For this, we're going to use only two mushrooms.

- [Pamela] Okay.

- Of course, when you dice the mushroom take out the bottom, just because in this way, it's easier.

- Mm hmm it lays flat.

- Yup.

- And then you don't have to worry about it being all floppy on you.

- [Raffaele] Yup.

- You used to be the chef at Mama Ricardo's didn't you?

- Yeah, I used to be there.

I used to work there for two years it's a fabulous company.

They taught me a lot.

- [Pamela] And you just started your own Italian food business.

It's called Mano Bella artisan Foods?

- [Raffaele] Yes, it is.

- [Pamela] And tell us about what you make with Mano Bella.

- So, we are specialized in a Italian foods.

So we do fresh pastas that is, not dry pastas.

So the difference, like for example, like pretty much the same pasta of the Barilla style, - [Pamela] Right - but it's a freshly made - Fresh, mmm - with the professional machine.

That is an extruder, - Hmmhmm - So how does it work?

Extruding the mix of the pasta through a bronze dice and give a very good texture.

And it's much better because there's not any preservatives.

- Mm hmm - So it's just flour and water, that's it.

- Nice, nice.

- And sometimes I do as well, a whole wheat pasta using a local flour from a farmer here in North Carolina.

- [Pamela] I bet you that's wonderful.

- [Raffaele] As well, it's very good.

So what we are going to do next, we're going to put some olive oil, turn on the fire, - Mm hmm - [Raffaele] put about four tablespoons of olive oil in a pan.

- [Pamela] And that would be enough to coat the bottom, nice and generously.

- Yup.

When you start to see the oil smoke a little bit, - Mm hmm - that is the time that you're going to add the onions.

- Okay.

- And the reason is because in this way, like, you need to hear the hiss - Yeah - Like just (onions sizzling in oil) - Like that!

- [Raffaele] This sound - [Pamela] That sound.

- And, what happens when they do this sound the onions, (pan shuffling on burner) (onions sizzling) they start like, the action of sweating.

And go to release all the sweetness and go slowly, slowly to lose all the water that's inside.

- Mm hmm - [Raffaele] We need to clean the sausages.

- Okay.

- So it's very easy.

These are local sausages and what you do, you can cut the case and open them, but as well, you can squeeze it.

- [Pamela] You can squeeze it on out.

Like a tube of toothpaste.

- [Raffaele] And it's super easy, you just squeeze like this hold the case.

- [Pamela] And so when you're putting the sausage in this risotto, we don't necessarily want the casing on there, we just want to use the sausage meat.

- Yup.

- Okay.

So if you could buy it without the casing, do they sell it with bulk sausage, without the casing?

- [Raffaele] Yes, as well.

And they are pretty much like the same.

- [Pamela] And these are Italian sausages, right?

- Yup, these are thyme from a farmer that is he here in Charlotte as well.

- Awesome.

- [Raffaele] We're just going to do small pieces.

The reason is because doing small pieces, they're gonna cook faster and it's going to go to give much flavor to the risotto.

So the onions, it took about 10 minutes to sweat in there, How I say, they are nice and soft and translucent.

So we go just to add the mushrooms.

- [Pamela] Oh, this is going to smell so good.

- [Rafaelle] And we just to let the mushroom just do the same thing that the onions did.

Let them cook down for about five minutes.

Up to there as well, they're going to lose all the water.

- [Pamela] Now you people at home watching him flip this stuff in the pan, just stir it, if you don't wanna flip it (both laughing) - I love flipping in a pan.

- Yup.

- It's fun.

This is going to be a really rich risotto, isn't it?

- [Raffaele] It is, it is.

- [Pamela] Yeah - [Raffaele] This risotto is going to feed between like two to four people as like a smaller side, or even as well, If you wanted to just this for you and your other, for dinner, it can feed very nicely two people.

And then at this point, what I'm going to do now - We're using our rice and our white wine now.

- So just pretty much like any kind of white wine that you like, because like for this, we are going to use a pretty much half cup of white wine and the rest you can drink for dinner!

- Yeah, so make sure you have a wine that you can drink, not just a cooking wine.

You want to drink wine you can drink because like you said, you're only going to use about half a cup.

- Yeah.

We are going to use now one cup of arborio rice.

- Okay.

- And what that does right now, you're going to just put down toasting the rice for about one minute.

So what did this is going to do, it's going to make the rice being a little bit more, like, good to open up the cross of rice.

So in this way, good to absorb better the liquids that you are going to do, to add, and let it come out the starch better, when you do the risotto.

- [Pamela] Okay.

- [Raffaele] You just like generally stir around.

- And the cream and the risotto comes from the starch that comes out when you're stirring it and the stock.

It's not cream at all.

It's just the starch that makes a nice, creamy, creamy sauce with it.

- Yes.

When you do the risotto, just you need to take your time, - Mm hmm - and just enjoy step by step.

- Exactly.

And that's what, that's the key to Italian cooking, isn't it?

- Yup, it is.

- Just enjoy every step because every step has something beautiful, like the onions and the sugars coming out of those onions and that beautiful, earthy smell coming out of those mushrooms.

- [Raffaele] And you're going to add your half a cup of white wine.

So just turn a little bit the fire up again in the way as soon as you add a cup of white wine, go to the glaze.

(wine sizzling in pan) - There you go.

Oh, this smells amazing.

- [Raffaele] So your next step now what you're going to do, you're going to add one cup of chicken stock that you previously warmed up.

And the reason is why you warm it up, the chicken stock is because if you go to put the cup of chicken stock to our warm, like the cold the chicken stock, to our warm risotto, you're going to do like a shock temp, temperature.

So you're going to ruin the cooking process of the rice.

In this point, what they're gonna do, because it's just the beginning.

- [Pamela] Mm hmm I'm going to add the sausages - Okay.

- How I said earlier.

So, the reason why you want to add the sausage, as soon as you've added the stock and don't use the sausage in the beginning, is because if you use the sausages in the beginning, you're going to make them crunchy and you're going to lose a whole all the flavor immediately.

So, adding the sausages right now and the stock, you're going to give to the rice all that delicious flavor of homemade sausages.

So you going to send it out to hold the fennel and the the black pepper that the sausages have.

And all that goodness.

- So it's basically just going very slowly, almost poaching there, isn't it?

- Yep.

- And we don't want it crispy like you're putting it in a pan.

You just want it to softly cook and put that beautiful sausage flavor all over that rice and those mushrooms, and oh, yummy.

- And put the fire on a medium low.

- [Pamela] Medium low.

- So you're going to add about one cup of chicken stock at a time.

And, from now is going to go to take about 20 minutes for the risotto to be done.

- [Pamela] How many times do you add stock to the risotto?

- We have about five cups - [Pamela] Okay.

of chicken stock.

- So depending on the kind of rice that you can find, should remain like about one cup left - Okay.

- in the, in the pot.

So pretty much like in a 20 minutes, the liquid, in a medium low is going to absorb one cup, every two, three minutes.

- [Pamela] Mm hmm - You're going to the about like five, six times.

- [Pamela] Okay.

- More or less.

- [Pamela] Okay, as it dries up.

- Yup, as soon as it dries, you just add more.

- You test it to make sure that that rice is just al dente.

- Yes.

- Cause you don't want it soft and mushy.

- You don't, but before 15 minutes, the rice is not cooked yet.

So, when you are going towards the 18 to 20 minutes you can start to taste how you prefer the al dente.

- [Pamela] Yes, of course.

- Of the grain.

- Okay, good.

- If you, Pamela can start to stir.

- Sure, absolutely.

- I'm gonna do panzanella.

- [Pamela] If you've heard of panzanella before it is an Italian bread salad.

- What do we need?

Just some beautiful cucumbers, tomatoes, Italian bread, some garlic, - [Pamela] Garlic - [Raffaele] and a little fresh oregano.

- [Pamela] There you go.

- So everything that you see in this basket has been sourced locally.

So these here tomato and cucumbers are from my wife and I's garden.

- [Pamela] This is from my garden!

(laughs) - The oregano as well is sourced from her garden.

- Ahuh - The garlic is sent, is sourced from another farmer that is here in North Carolina.

And this garlic is very, very tasty.

And the Italian focaccia is just another item that we do like for a our company does as well.

- Okay, all right, good.

- You just grab the, the bread and you go to cut the bread.

Pretty much like a crouton.

You're just going to slice the bread, like, like this, like sliced.

(knife scraping on cutting board) So meanwhile, turn on the pan the fire on and put the pan on it, and put about four tablespoons of butter and let the butter melt.

After that, you just keep dicing the bread.

Just like nice squares.

- [Pamela] And you don't wanna use really fresh bread, do you?

- [Raffaele] The more old it is, the better it is.

Because what you're going to do for these items, like right now, you're just going to let it crisp up, pretty much like how you do croutons.

- [Pamela] Mm hmm - [Raffaele] And you want the bread nice and crunchy.

So when the butter starts sizzling, you just add your bread on it and you have two ways how to let it toast this bread.

So, you can do it how I'm doing on a, on a pan, and just let it cook with butter and just let it crisp up all the bread or an easy way, just in the oven.

You can turn on the oven to 350, and let it bake for about 10 minutes.

- Either way it's gonna dry out and get nice and toasted, right?

- Yup.

And the thing is because a toasting with butter, you're going to give more flavor - Yes - and no better thing than butter!

Just put the bread like this on the side when it's just how you like.

You're going to use two cucumbers for this salad.

So, the cucumber, because it has a nice and crunchy skin, you need to peel.

But how I like, I like to peel just, so one side, because in this way, you can have a little crunchiness.

- [Pamela] And leave the green on there a little bit, but not all of it.

Yeah.

- [Raffaele] A little bit, yeah.

- You know, that's true a lot of cucumbers.

A lot of cucumbers will have like a really thick skin on them.

Like my yellow cucumber's got a really thick skin on it.

But instead of taking the whole skin off, you can just leave part of it on there.

'Cause it's got a nice flavor to it and it adds a nice, beautiful color.

- [Raffaele] Yup - [Pamela] But you want a thick skin on a cucumber if you're making pickles.

- [Raffaele] So what you're going to do after, you're just gonna slice the cucumbers, you can use a mandolin, if you don't feel much confidence with a knife or just do like how I'm doing, and just do little rolls.

Just grab a bowl, put the cucumbers in it.

- And this panzanella's just really, it's just wonderful, fresh vegetables over some nice toasted bread.

Isn't it?

- That's it.

- And it's so good.

- [Raffaele] So next thing I'm going to do just I'm going to get about three tomatoes, clean from the top.

(knife scraping on cutting board) And you're going just to dice them.

- So you're not going to worry about getting any seeds out or peeling them or anything?

Just do 'em whole fresh.

- Just as is, because like Italian cooking, you don't waste anything - [Pamela] No - [Raffaele] and yes, with the inside, you can do a nice tomato sauce if you want, - [Pamela] Yeah, yeah - [Raffaele] but they are a local and fresh tomatoes, so they are very rich on flavor.

- [Pamela] They really are.

- So, as soon as you chop down the tomatoes, you're just going to add them to your cucumbers.

Just grab about two cloves of fresh garlic.

If it is local, it's even better because how I see, - Yes, everything.

- Local produce tastes much better.

How I do the garlic, I'm going to smash it.

And it's going to give all the flavor, and the water that is in the garlic is going to come out and then, you mince very fine.

- So these are some very, very classic Italian flavors.

Aren't they?

- They are, yes.

- Very.

- So how I would say, Italian flavors it's just like easy cooking and like just things in chunks when you cook, because it's going to let it come out, all this sweetness and the flavor, and the acid of each ingredient.

We're going to add a little bit of fresh oregano.

- Now I want you to pay attention to how he's getting those oregano leaves off folks.

Watch this.

This is a, I mean, you don't have to stand there and pick the leaves off the stems, just grab the stem and go backwards from the bottom to the top.

And you pull those leaves off really, really easy.

And then just put them in.

You don't have to worry about standing there picking all the little leaves off, especially when you're doing thyme.

Thyme has got so many little leaves.

- So you're going to add about two tablespoons of fresh oregano.

- All right.

I'm gonna put one more thing of stock in here - Yup.

- And then I need you to evaluate.

- I'm gonna jump back over there.

- Okay.

- [Raffaele] So after you add the oregano you're going to add salt and pepper.

And it's about one teaspoon of black pepper and one teaspoon of salt, as well.

And, another Italian secret.

When you cook, you don't need to be afraid to use extra virgin olive oil.

- That's right!

- So just go like for these, you can use a two tablespoons of olive oil, but the more olive oil you use the more tasty this salad is.

- And it's really important to use a good quality olive oil, isn't it?

- It is.

It is, because one of the basics of Italian kitchen cooking, is extra virgin olive oil.

You're just going to toss it and sit aside and just let all the flavor of the cucumbers, tomato, garlic come all together and become very rich.

But don't add your bread yet.

- [Pamela] Mm hmm - [Raffaele] The bread you add before you serve because what it's going to do, it's nice to have a little crunch, you know, when you eat a fresh salad.

- So you don't want your bread to be totally soaked in.

- No.

- Okay.

We got our panzanlla, ready to go, We're gonna finish up our risotto, now the thing about risotto too, you can't make it ahead of time.

- Yup.

So, risotto needs to be made and served because it's okay, like first of all, risotto is no good cold.

- Right.

- Like, you're going to eat like a piece of glue - Right.

- Like it's no good at all.

- Right.

- And the, the nice thing of the risotto is that if it's just made, and served, like you have all this creaminess.

- [Pamela] Mm hmm - The important thing is that the risotto needs to be how you can see, Pamela.

Needs to be completely without liquid.

- Mm hmm - Because when it's like this and thanks to you to help me to make this a wonderful job.

You're going to add the butter and what the butter does, it's going to give the creaminess - Okay - To the risotto.

So, we are going to add the butter and let it melt very nicely, the butter.

You want to add about one teaspoon of fresh thyme.

So just fold the thyme in, grab a nice, generous handful of fresh grated Parmesan cheese, - Hmmm - [Raffaele] and just put on top and just go to finish, yup.

And fold it in that's nice and creamy.

- [Pamela] Oh, look at that.

How beautiful.

So your cheese is the very last thing you put in there.

- Yup.

And the reason is because if you're going to add the cheese before, it's going to be like a whole too gooey - [Pamela] Yeah - And it's not going to even hold.

- [Pamela] Right, right.

- That much - [Pamela] Right.

- [Raffaele] Now's the time, Pamela!

- [Pamela] Okay.

We get to serve this up.

This has done.

Oh, it looks so yummy.

Nice and creamy and not a bit of cream in there.

- Not any.

- No cream in risotto.

- All right.

So you just, for serving, just grab it and just put on your plate, what plate you like, whatever you prefer and how you can see, the rice keeps nice the creaminess.

- [Pamela] Mm hmm, it sure has.

And then there's that sausage in there and it has that nice fennel flavor to it, 'cause it's that Italian sausage.

- [Raffaele] Yup.

- [Pamela] And we've got those mushrooms in there with that.

Oh, this is beautiful.

- And if you like, you can add on top for decoration some nice and fresh parsley.

Or just, if you want to do something cuter, can put parsley on top.

And why not?

Let's put more Parmesan cheese on top.

- Why not?

- Why not?

- [Pamela] Parmesan is awesome.

- Let's get the panzanella back.

- Okay.

Here's our dish for the panzanalla.

- [Raffaele] So you toss it again a little bit.

- [Pamela] Give it a little toss.

- [Raffaele] You just add half of your bread in there, and just toss everything.

The bread is going to get all that fantastic juice that is on the bottom.

- [Pamela] Mm hmm And it's still going to maintain a little bit of crunch 'cause it hasn't been sitting there just (slurps) absorbing everything.

- And then just serve.

- This looks fabulous.

Fabulous, fabulous, fabulous.

- You just add a little bit more bread on top.

- Crunchy bread on top.

And you guys make this too don't you?

- Yes, this is a whole focaccia as well.

It's an Italian focaccia that we use a little sourdough starter.

- Oh, nice.

Let's show them what we've got here.

Look at this beautiful, beautiful risotto.

Tell us the name of this risotto, Rafaelle?

- So this is named 'Risotto alla Norcina'.

- [Pamela] This beautiful panzanella salad made with local ingredients and a focaccia bread made by Mano Artisan Foods?

- [Raffaele] Mano Bella Artisan Foods.

- [Pamela] Mano Bella Artisan Foods.

- [Raffaele] Yup.

- Here's the flavors from Umbria right here, fresh from North Carolina for you.

If you want to grab the recipes, you can get them off of our website at pbscharlotte.org, or send me an email at Pamela (P-A-M-E-L-A) dot Robert (R-O-B-E-R-T-S) @cpcc.edu And I'll be happy to send you a copy of our recipes.

Thank you, Rafaelle, this was really great.

- Thank you, thank you so much to you, Pamela for having us.

- Oh, you're very welcome.

And I'm going to come see you at the farmer's market, okay?

- Thank you.

- And y'all go see him at the farmer's market too, grab some focaccia, grab some fresh pasta, stop and say hey and say, 'I saw you on Charlotte Cooks'.

Thanks for watching.

And we'll catch you next time.

(upbeat guitar music) - Production of PBS, Charlotte.