Our Family History
Lora's Sicilian Family
Benvenuti a Savoring Pasta! I'm the founder of Savoring Italy (our sister blog). Sit back, grab a cup of espresso, and take a little time to explore the blog. My daughter Gabby and I welcome you to la nostra famiglia!
Just like my mamma and nonna, I show my friends and family I love how much I care through my food. Cooking and baking from scratch does take time, but there are so many simple Italian recipes to make. I hope to inspire and teach you about the Italian food way of life. (not sure about this paragraph).
I'm a first-generation American, but I spent my first summer in Sicily before I was even 1 year old. I learned how to walk in Sicily. My dad was one of seven children, four were sisters.
Family + Roots
- Dad grew up near Agrigento, right on the magical Mediterranean.
- Sunday dinners were a part of my dad's life in Sicily, and then when he moved to the States. Sicilian food was carried over into their cucina! Mom learned how to make my zia's and nonna's recipes and then taught them to me!
- Spending Ferragosto in Sicily and Italy was when I learned how Italians really know how to relax and enjoy a big meal. Christmas in Sicily is always magical, and the sweets and dishes they make in the holiday time are delectable.
- I grew up with Italian heritage and family traditions, and I began to teach my children these when I married my Italian husband.
My mom is Hungarian, and when she married my Sicilian dad, she became completely immersed in the Sicilian food and social culture. She learned all the recipes my dad loved from his sisters and his Sicilian community back home in the States, and Sicilian family traditions. My mom even learned the Sicilian dialect (not an easy feat!), so she could communicate with her new extended Sicilian family.
Sadly, mom's mom had just passed away from breast cancer right before she got married. She was officially adopted by this big Sicilian family. She was their new daughter.
No matter where they lived in the Cleveland area, they were surrounded always by Italians from Sicily, Calabria and some from Naples area. My mom quickly learned how to entertain like a proper sicilian moglie and mamma. There were lots of big Italian Sunday dinners and/or lunches. My mom learned recipes passed down from nonna that she was taught spending summers with my zia's in my nonni's house.
My parents brought me to my nonni's house the first summer of my first year, and I was surrounded by so many nonni, aunts, uncles, and cousins. There are photos of me on the beach and on my nonno's farms in the arms of all the different zia's (aunts)and my dear nonna.
When you grow up with family in another country that you're close to, you grow up having your heart in two places. It was normal for my brother and I to get on a flight as little kids, sometimes alone, and fly to Sicily to go spend our summer there.
I didn't know how lucky I was to have this whole other life awaiting me when I would get off that plane. I always tear up when I land in Catania and see smoke surrounding the peak of magnificent Mt Etna. I know that I'm arriving home.
It's complex because I feel the same way coming home to the States when I'm in Italy for a long period of time. It's like having a chord tugging me across the ocean in two places.
That first summer of my life spent in Sicily was just the beginning of many more summers and even school years spent on this magical island. My cousins and I would play on my nonno's farms. We would eat figs just picked from the trees, and drink pear juice that was kept cold in the well.
My dad had four sisters that could cook and bake the most amazing breads and pizzas. He rated them on their cooking levels and expertise, and who cooked more like nonna (his mom), because she was the ultimate Sicilian cook and baker. He did compliment my focaccia, I'll never forget. He came over when I just took it out of the oven and his eyes lit up. He had a memory of his mom making focaccia and folding a slice around warm sheep's milk ricotta cheese. I wish I had more memories of what his mom would make them.
My brother and I would always be in Sicily for Ferragosto. My zia's would cook pasta al forno , roasted chicken, and eggplant parmigiana. These aromas and flavors are still fresh in my mind. I grew up knowing that I had a home in Sicily and a home in the States.
When I was going to school in Sicily, I had a chance to even experience the sites sounds, and flavors of a true Sicilian Christmas.
That's mini me and dad eating the most amazing spaghetti with meatballs that mom made.
A little bit about Nonno Rosario
My father was born right on the Mediterranean Sea in Sicily in the 1940's in the Catania area. Licata is famous for its spectacular beaches and seafood. My dad was born to a family of landowners in t This wasn't land that they grew vegetables just to feed their family. Their land was used to grow produce that was sent to markets not only in Sicily, but even to Italy's mainland.
My family's produce was sold in different parts of Italy. Those summers in Sicily as a little girl, I ate their own artichokes, tomatoes, eggplants, melons, beans, and so much more. Explain how being raised in a Sicilian household shaped your cooking style.
I have memories of going by the port with my Sicilian dad to buy the fish that the fisherman just caught. Fresh Sicilian sardines that would be made into a simple pasta con le sarde. My Sicilian heritage affected my cooking where I am always drawn towards recipes using classic Sicilian ingredients like eggplants, pistachios, citrus, and ricotta.
I grew up knowing what real food was, because that is how my family lived. I remember as a little Sicilian girl eating arancini, cannoli, pasta alla norma, caponata, and real Sicilian pizza.
Here is dad dressed in his Italian army uniform. He did his 2 years of obligatory service.
My dad worked on this Sicilian land that was in his family for generations, side by side with his father, brothers, cousins, and uncles. This was all he knew before he left for the States. That is how his life would be destined to carry on. Working on the family land, alongside his older brother and his father.
When he moved to the States, he still grew fruits and vegetables in our yard. I grew up watching him tend the zucchini and tomatoes. He could take any seed and magically grow the plant or tree.
That's my nonna and one of my zia's on the farm and that's me and dad on one of the tractors. When I look at this photo, it takes me back to Sicily and that Sicilian land. How proud my dad was to show us what his family was producing that summer. How exciting it was to get to ride the tractor with him!
That's dad on the top right with some cousins and friends at a big family lunch when he first arrived in the States. It was a typical weekend family lunch. I can see they were eating my zia's Sicilian pizza. There were bottles of red wine, and of course, plates of antipasti.
My dad was working very hard and learning English as soon as he arrived in the States. He completely embraced the opportunity he was given and he dutifully sent money every month to help his family in Sicily. He was a very good son and a very good brother. My nonna anxiously awaited his weekly letters with updates.
When my dad passed away in 2013, I was able to read letters my nonna wrote my father. Most of the letters began with her worry and curiosity for how he was faring in this new, faraway land. She wanted to know if he was eating enough and if he was working.
Many of the letters discussed the situation of the produce they were growing for the markets. My nonna discussed with my dad how the cauliflower production was going. She reviewed all the business affairs and the wholesale prices of the vegetables. She kept him involved in decision-making in letters and in phone calls. It was fascinating getting to know my family's history through these over 400 letters. I hope to one day publish them as a piece of Sicilian history.
My father forged his own way in the land of opportunity. My dad became a successful entrepreneur and my parents were restaurant and pizzeria owners for some years.
Besides those ventures, mom worked as a private chef for many years, and my father also learned how to run a kitchen, as the chefs taught him how to cook. I grew up working in their restaurant, in the front and back of the house. I was raised knowing what really great food is, and I also learned how to cook at a very young age.
Nonno was the king of Italian and Sicilian quotes and proverbs. One you could often hear him say is, "“A tavola non si invecchia.” At the table, one does not grow old.
That's me second on the left with many of my cousins, zia's and zio's in Sicily at a big lunch.
My husband's Calabrian family
At one point in my life, I had made the decision to finally move back to Italy. Not to Sicily, but to the beautiful Adriatic coast. I had spent some summers there with American friends and all of my new Italian friends, who became like family to me.
I found a town that captured my heart in Italy, and I got a job in marketing. I have a degree in International Business, and I speak four languages. Deciding to work in Italy and create my adult life there was a pretty simple and logical decision. Life had a different plan for me, and I met my Italian Executive Chef husband in Florida.
We married and have two incredible kids. You can learn more about Gabby here.
My life changed and became very influenced by Calabria and the Como area. I had a crash course in learning all about the Calabrian way of life and their way of cooking.
My husband is from a little town near Lake Como. His parents married in Calabria and raised their family in Como. My children spent their summers with their nonni in Como and sometimes in Calabria with their great-grandmother (who recently sadly passed away at 94), nonna Antonia.
Learning from my executive chef husband Fabrizio
I married Fabrizio, who was born in Italy and studied at culinary school in Como. For decades, he’s worked as an executive chef and restaurant owner, bringing authentic Italian flavors to the table.
The question we always get asked is, “Who cooks at home?” The truth is, we both do! On his rare days off, Fabrizio still loves to cook, and I’m proud to call myself his sous chef—at least in our kitchen.
Over the years, I’ve learned countless recipes and techniques from him, from the secrets to a perfect risotto to making a rich, comforting Italian beef stew. I'm proud to say I had over 20 yeas of training with an executive chef!
Even our son has been learning the tricks shadowing on some Saturday mornings.
Cooking with Calabrian nonna Teresa and nonna Antonia
My mother in law is quite an amazing home cook and a very talented bread baker. She grew up in Calabria baking loaves of Calabrian bread in a brick oven with all her cousins.
I have participated in the bread baking process and tomato canning many times in Calabria and in Sicily with my zia's. Summers with Nonna Teresa are all about the food. When you're taking the last bite of her delicious lunch, you are planning what dinner is going to be.
Here is my mother-in-law making her famous Saturday night pizza. Every Saturday night, rain or shine, you better show up for pizza night. She makes the sauce in the summer time with the summer tomatoes she cans.
My children grew up watching their nonni (grandparents) working in their orto (vegetable garden) and bringing the bounty home to be enjoyed for lunch and dinner. Fresh zucchini, cucumbers, lettuce, tomatoes...the list goes on and on.
There are plenty of recipes passed down from nonna. Trust me, it has not been easy to get her actual recipes. In the last 15 years, I have shared many summers spent at their home in Como and my efforts to document with photos, and writing, all that she makes. It did finally progress (after 20 years)to her trusting to let me help her by prepping vegetables and stirring sauces. But do not expect to have her let me actually cook a meal in her little cucina.
My kids learned what zero kilometri "zero kilometers" (literally, farm to table) means. They learned what it means to grow what you eat and taste the true flavors of food. I am proud to say they are pretty discerning food experts and can taste the subtle differences even in Italy, of what makes a sauce very good, or bad.
As I'm writing this, my almost 80-year-old mother-in-law is at home in Como canning 5 kilos of tomatoes every day to use all winter for her extra delicious sauces and homemade pizza. My kids don't know anything different. They just think that this is what nonnas do, and they know that this is how real food is made.
I'm not going to lie to you and say I test all the recipes many times because many of the recipes I make I learned from my mom, mother-in-law or my chef husband, and I've made them, and still make them all the time.
Some of them I memorize by heart, not requiring any recipe. I add seasoning and taste as I go. I've baked countless sauces, cakes, breads, and I can even SMELL when they are ready, even before a timer goes off.
So if I say it's a recipe my family loves, you better believe it is truly a recipe we make here and enjoy, and I believe you and your family will also enjoy it. I'm not here to convince you that I'm a great home cook. I'm here to inspire you to make something wonderful for yourself, your friends, and your family, and to get you sitting around a table talking and enjoying great food!
And then there are new recipes that I have learned and am excited to share, like my beet gnocchi or my Sardinian Culurgiones that I perfected to make sure you can also recreate them at your home.
Food is tradition, joy, and family history told at the table. It weaves together laughter, memories, and the bond that links one generation to the next, carried into every recipe we share with you.