So, after 3 months of summer holidays, Italian schools are back this week. My kiddo is starting Superiore, high school, so bittersweet, where-did-the-time-go, wow these kids are ready to fly kinda excitement.
Another gush of excitement has me feeling boosted this week, as we’ve seen a dip in the mercury, and summer’s sweltering days are seemingly behind us. I adore the fresher temps of autumn and allowing myself just to sink into the season’s rich colours … don’t know, something about it just leaves me feeling, like so much is possible. Optimistic I guess you would call it.
Today, my energy and renewed buoyancy took the form of me switching on the oven (I have been shying away from it for months) and throwing together a pinsa with woodsy mushrooms, salty pancetta, and tangy taleggio and mozzarella cheese. Yumm. You may know, that I am a big fan of pinsa. A rustic, bready base from the pizza family (and Rome), it delivers the perfect balance of crunch, and cushion, and a flavour that leaves you swooning every time.
What you may not know, is that preparing pinsa at home, frequently comes with a good workout. In my case, a step-aerobics one. To prepare pinsa, like pizza, you need a smoking hot, oven. Smoking hot. And for the standard Italian home where the incoming electricity levels are low, having another appliance running at the same time as a smoking HOT oven, will likely exhaust the power supply and very likely, shut it down.
Although I know about domestic energy allowances, I always forget it. Always. So, prepping pinsa guarantees at least one, if not 2, 3 or 4 trips, down three flights of stairs and outside to our electricity box to turn on the power, then back up three flights of stairs to the kitchen.
I have heard it explained, mostly to foreigners like myself, that “2 plus 1 = out” when it comes to household electricity. Meaning, switching on a third appliance (excluding fridges and freezers) well … you are just asking for a power outage. When it comes to a smoking HOT oven, I would change that formula to “1 plus 1 = out”. When cooking pinsa – nothing can be running at the same time. Nothing.
Sometimes finding the culprit after a power cut is easy enough. There are the obvious big energy consumers like the washing machine, a toaster or a kettle (“banned” from our house by Massi). Other times, the hunt varies in intensity between a guessing game and a showdown with other family members as to who, has what appliances running … an electric shaver, a computer, a phone charger??? Fortunately, the promise of pinsa tops everyone’s priority list, so any power protests fall over pretty feebly. Scissors cut the paper. Paper wraps the rock. The oven stays on. The pinsa is cooked.
For all the commotion, I’ve a great workout complete every time I cook pinsa. I swear I’ve more muscle tone in my thighs than I did when I was in my 20s. Also, and more profoundly, the lower kw running into the average Italian house, compared to say what I knew growing up in Australia, has certainly heightened my awareness of our energy consumption, (and the room for improvement).
Getting to the recipe – well, the lazy recipe as it is really is just a matter of layering delicious ingredients together and letting them dance together in a HOT space.
If you can find them, use a selection of woodsy mushrooms. If not, the little button guys are equally delicious. I use pancetta in cubes, but bacon or prosciutto cut into strips would rock. For the cheese, I use a combination of taleggio and mozzarella. Taleggio is a semi-soft, rind washed Italian cheese. The flavour is pungent, sweet but slightly tangy. It is somewhat sticky and isn’t easy to slice, so I usually just cut small blobs straight from the block and drop them directly onto the pinsa. Although I haven’t tried it, I imagine a soft melting fontina or brie cheese might work as a substitute. For the mozzarella, buffalo is always my pick but honestly, there is such full flavour going on with the mushies, pancetta and herbs, that this could be a time to hold back on the more deluxe buffalo and use a more economical mozza. My tip, would be to go cautiously with the cheese, too much (especially with the water heavy mushrooms) and you will lose the crispness of the pinsa. For the base, I shortcut it, and buy ready-made pinsa bases. As a guide, I use a 500g dough, that is divided into 2 bases, roughly 15cm x 30cm. Adjust any quantities according to the bases you are working with. If you can’t find pinsa, pizza bases are a great substitute.
For myself I have added the instruction in bold, font size 72 (one for every step from the kitchen to our electrical box) to first turn off ALL electrical appliances, but if you are living outside of Italy maybe you don’t need this step. In which case start with…
Mushroom, Pancetta, and Taleggio Pinsa
- 100g mozzarella cheese, drained and sliced
- 2 pinsa or pizza bases (approximately 15cm x 30cm each)
- olive oil
- 2 small garlic, crushed
- 250 – 300g mushrooms
- 80 pancetta cubes
- 100g taleggio, cut into small pieces
- fresh thyme, washed and leaves picked
Preheat the oven to 250° C.
To avoid a soupy pinsa, drain and slice the mozzarella and place it between two layers of paper towel to absorb some of it’s water. Set aside for around 15 minutes or until you are ready to roll.
Wash or rub clean the mushrooms then, depending on the type of mushrooms break them up using your hands or slice them.
Place the pinsa bases on a tray lined with parchment paper.
Combine the garlic and olive oil then, spread this mixture over the pinsa bases. Next, layer the mushrooms, and scatter over the cubed pancetta, the taleggio and mozzarella pieces. Finish with the thyme leaves and a good grind of black pepper.
Bake for around 10minutes or until the edges are golden brown, the cheese is gooey, and the underside is well cooked. Drizzle with some extra virgin olive oil. Serve smoking HOT.
