Pasta e Fagioli with Coppola's Tuscan Sauce

Bringing lunch to school

Every child has had the experience of swapping their lunches with fellow students at the lunch table. Kids speak of certain mother’s in reverential tones because of what they packed for lunch. However, when you’re the child of an Italian immigrant your lunches are not looked at in the same way.

While little Jimmy may have a lunch box filled with chocolate pudding, cookies and a peanut butter and jelly sandwich on Wonder Bread with the crust cut off, I would have a pepper and egg sandwich on very crusty home baked bread complete with a home grown mega-peach that was the size of a small child’s head and maybe a couple of Ritz crackers.

While my friends would have their fancy lunch box with Scooby Doo on the outside, I would have a brown paper bag, not the small ones, but the big shopping bags with Grand Union stamped on the outside. Sometimes, the bag would still have the grocery receipt in it. To a child of 10, this bag looked like something you would use to go on vacation. To me it was the lunch bag from hell. My pepper and egg sandwich, wrapped in aluminum foil not a neat little zip lock lunch bag, would be dripping oil. The bottom of the bag was soaked, the peach was covered with pepper juice, the Ritz crackers smashed from the mega-peach rolling around in my lunch bag from hell.

Other times, my friends would bring in neat little soup containers, this time with G.I. Joe on the outside, with Campbell’s Chicken noodle soup. Neatly packed in their designer lunch box, would be Saltine crackers and some other great desserts. Not me, I would have pasta fasul in a quart sized Polly-o ricotta cheese container complete with a piece of that same crusty Italian bread in the same Grand Union bag, my lunch bag from hell. If I was lucky, mom would pack me some home canned peaches from last fall.

Now, as an adult, the soup and the sandwich sounds wonderful. However, at ten years old, my classmates would take one look at what I was bringing to school and instantly get very enamored with what they either bought from the cafeteria or whatever their mother packed for them. There was no trading of lunches for me.

I would beg my mom for some tradition American lunches. Plead for chocolate pudding or cookies. She would take one look at me and laugh. She would try to make me understand that the lunches I brought were far better that those other lunches. All I knew was that there was no way anyone would trade lunches with me and I didn’t like it.

One morning, I was walking out the door to the bus stop and she handed me my lunch bag. She had a huge smile on her face. Mom told me she made me peanut butter and jelly for lunch. My heart skipped a beat. I couldn’t believe it, I was finally getting an American lunch. On the bus and during the first part of school, I was so excited. I was finally going to get a chance to trade with my friends. Lunch time came, and I had a certain swagger walking into the lunch room.

I sat down. I could hear the theme music from a Clint Eastwood western, in my head. There I sat with my lunch bag from hell. I looked over the table. Eyeing each person’s lunch to see which one I would want. I was slow and methodical. I had dreamed of this day and no one was going to rush me. Once my evaluation was complete, I asked the table who wanted to swap. They all looked at me like I had three heads. They had seen what I had brought into school plenty of times. One of them laughed. I was undeterred. They didn’t know, I had an ace up my sleeve. I opened up my Grand Union shopping bag from hell and I pulled out what I thought was a peanut butter and jelly sandwich on Wonder Bread with the crust cut off. Instead, what I got was homemade grape jelly on the same crusty Italian bread with some smashed nuts on it. No top piece of bread. I was mortified. Next I pulled out a piece of leftover Easter grain pie wrapped in aluminum foil, no chocolate pudding. There would be no trading. I tried explaining that this was a gourmet sandwich and that the pie was awesome. Needless to say, no one wanted to trade with me. I unwrapped my “peanut butter and Jelly sandwich” and to my utter surprise, it was the best sandwich I ever had. The salt from the nuts and the sweetness from the jelly was awesome. The Easter pie was awesome!

That night when I got home, I could smell the pasta fasul boiling in the kitchen. There was bread baking in the oven. I knew the next day I would have pasta fasul for lunch and for the first time, I didn’t mind.

Pasta e Fagioli

Ingredients

1 tablespoon olive oil
2 stalks celery, chopped
1 onion, chopped
3 cloves garlic, minced
2 teaspoons fresh chopped parsley
1 teaspoon fresh chopped basil
1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes salt to taste
1 (14.5 ounce) can chicken broth
2 medium tomatoes, peeled and chopped
1 jar Coppola’s Tuscan Sauce
1/2 cup uncooked ditalini pasta
1 (15 ounce) can cannellini beans, with liquid

Directions

Heat olive oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Cook celery, onion, garlic, parsley, basil, red pepper flakes, and salt in the hot oil until onion is translucent, about 5 minutes. Stir in chicken broth, tomatoes and tomato sauce, and simmer on low for 15 to 20 minutes. Add pasta and cook 10 minutes, until pasta is tender. Add un-drained beans and mix well. Heat through. Serve with grated Parmesan cheese sprinkled on top and of course a slice of crusty Italian bread

Class and Dignity

When I was a kid, I was very overweight. Not only was I overweight, I also had braces on my teeth. I was teased constantly being called fat, brace face, etc. On one particularly bad day at school, I went home and was very down about the constant teasing at school. My father watched me get off the bus, observing as I walked up to the house with my head down. As I came inside looking like I had lost my best friend, he asked me what was wrong. I told him about being teased and being made fun in school. My father looked at me and as was always the case, Pop had a story.

During WWII, everyone in his town was very poor. Not only was there not enough food to go around, but the Nazi’s would steal from their gardens and take any livestock they might have. However, in spite of all the hardships, my grandmother always held her head high. She always told my father and uncles that they were to conduct themselves with class and dignity no matter what the circumstances. She also told them something that he would repeat to us many times: "While we may not have a lot of money, we have our name, and that is worth more than anything else."

On Sundays they would all go to church as a family, except for my grandmother who went earlier in order to make pasta for Sunday dinner. She would mix in the flour and eggs by hand, rolling out and cutting the pasta before hanging it outside to dry. She would make a tomato sauce with any scrap pieces of meat she could find, stretching every last ounce out of her ingredients. She also made the bread that we would have with our dinner. She always sent my father down to the sea to collect salty seawater to mix into the bread. This was highly illegal, because the government held control over the sale of salt. One day a carabinieri (police officer) caught him sneaking the seawater. He took the jar from my father, smashed it on the ground, and kicked him in the behind.

Flour was bought every week for Sunday bread and pasta. They would buy on credit until their bill became so high that the grocer wouldn’t sell to them anymore. During the lean periods, he wouldn’t even return my family’s greetings on the street because he was so angry with them. Years later, when my father would come visit his mother from America, he would great him with “Hello, Don Antonio!” Remembering the lessons my grandmother taught them about class and dignity, he would stop and speak to him about his wife and children. It was during these times that he realized his mother was really teaching them about respect, and what it took to be respected.

After Pop got done telling me this story he asked me if I understood what he was trying to tell me. I looked at him as said, “Don’t steal salt water or you’ll get kicked in the behind” My father slapped himself in the forehead and told me to go do my homework.

Homemade Pasta

Ingredients

1 egg beaten
½ teaspoon salt
1 cup flour
2 tablespoons water

Method

In a medium sized bowl, combine flour and salt. Make a little well in the flour, add the slightly beaten egg, and mix by hand. Mixture should form a stiff dough. If needed, stir in 1 to 2 tablespoons water to loosen it up bit. Roll the dough into a ball and let sit for 10 minutes.
On a lightly floured surface, knead dough for about 3 to 4 minutes. With a pasta machine or by hand roll dough out to desired thinness. Using a pizza knife cut the pasta into strips of desired width.
Using a broom handle balance between two chair, hang the dough to dry.

Bringing lunch to school

Pasta e Fagioli

Ingredients

Directions

1 egg beaten

½ teaspoon salt

1 cup flour

2 tablespoons water

In a medium sized bowl, combine flour and salt. Make a little well in the flour, add the slightly beaten egg, and mix by hand. Mixture should form a stiff dough. If needed, stir in 1 to 2 tablespoons water to loosen it up bit. Roll the dough into a ball and let sit for 10 minutes.

On a lightly floured surface, knead dough for about 3 to 4 minutes. With a pasta machine or by hand roll dough out to desired thinness. Using a pizza knife cut the pasta into strips of desired width.

Using a broom handle balance between two chair, hang the dough to dry.