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Neapolitan-style cod for Christmas: the greatness of a humble preparation that resists every fashion over time in the recipe of Baccalaria, a devotional restaurant

Cod and Naples, a love at first sight that has lasted for centuries and revives every year especially during the Christmas holidays. Expression of popular cuisine exalted in the 600s by Lo cunto de li cunti by Giovan Battista Basile. His fortune was the Council of Trent which ordered to eat lean food after the accusations of the Church's debauchery launched by Martin Luther

Neapolitan-style cod for Christmas: the greatness of a humble preparation that resists every fashion over time in the recipe of Baccalaria, a devotional restaurant

Cod and Naples, a love at first sight that has lasted for centuries and revives every year especially during the Christmas holidays - it is impossible to imagine a Christmas Eve or a New Year's Eve dinner without seeing it proposed - when it is rigorously served on the tables in all forms: fried in batter, with salad, with tomato, with potatoes, in a pan or in the oven, 'arrecanato' with olives and onion, in soup or as a condiment with paccheri.

A marriage historically consummated in the sixteenth century when, with the development of sea routes, huge loads of this fish reached Somma Vesuviana from the Scandinavian seas of the Norwegian Lofoten islands and also from Iceland, requiring careful processing. The first to engage in this activity were the monks of the Sanctuary of the Madonna dell'Arco of Santa Anastasia, a center of great popular devotion built around the aedicule of a Madonna with child which in the 95th century began to bleed profusely after a young avid player of volleyball, angry at the defeat suffered, threw a ball at her while swearing. The friars had the intuition to create large tanks fed by the waters of the Sebeto river, now disappeared, with particular properties in which the cod was "soaked", recovered and processed. But to respect the sacredness of the place and not to pollute the pilgrims with the smells of production, these tanks were built a little far from the sanctuary of the Madonna dell'arco di Santa Anastasia in the Somma Vesuviana area. Cod soon became the food of the poor and was widely consumed especially following the Catholic counter-reformation. In fact, with the Council of Trent the Church, shaken by the XNUMX tables with which Martin Luther denounced ecclesiastical corruption, the wealth squandered by the Church, the sale of indulgences and the right of the pontiff to trade in them, wanted to give a signal starting from the table by pushing the clergy to greater rigor by imposing the concept of "eating lean" during Lent and the holy days. At the same time, a Swedish priest, Olao Magno, with good connections in the Curia, extolled the goodness of "a fish called merlusia, dried in the cold winds that German merchants barter for venison, wheat and wood".

Poor fish, tasty, cheap, easy to preserve, cod experienced sudden great fortune, while the clergy in lean periods fed on noble fish, the common people filled themselves with "Merlusia". But in 1800 Gioacchino Murat with his territorial reform separated the town of Santa Anastasia from that of Somma Vesuviana. As a result of the first, the Sanctuary remained, in the second a flourishing trade developed and the town transformed into a real cod hub, becoming the largest production base in southern Italy, thanks to the numerous companies that were born in the area over the course of Some years. Over time, relations between the Nordic countries and Italy extended to various regions, especially Veneto, Marche, Calabria and Sicily. And cod spread throughout Italy taking on different names:  Merluzz, Bacalà, Stochefiscie or Stocche, Stocco, Stoccu, Pescestocco, Piscistoccu, Baccalà, Bertagnin, Bertagnì and so on. Venice stands out by choosing to call stockfish “baccalà” or “bacalà”. In Naples it became and still is a true object of worship.

Antonio Parlato, a scholar of economics, southernism, social issues and medieval history, dedicated a book to him “His Majesty the Cod” from which we draw a funny nursery rhyme: “In the Northern Seas, between a dive and a splash the Cod fish lived blissfully. But one day the Vikings with ibex helmets saw him, and then they killed him. Torn by the millions from the placid Abyss and dried in the air: it is the stockfish. The Basques, who were a little further down, seeing the cod, were stunned: and the fish, caught with bestial fury and stuffed into barrels, were shocked. Great news is spreading throughout the world: what a great flavour! Things? The cod".

Of the many traditional Neapolitan cod recipes, apart from the fried cod on Christmas Eve, the most faithful to the popular spirit, the most heartfelt in homes, the most celebrated in restaurants and trattorias is Neapolitan cod, prepared with fried cod, sauce of tomato and seasoned with olives, capers and pine nuts. The simple poverty of its seasoning fully interprets the cuisine of the less well-off strata of the population, a poor cuisine that nevertheless expressed all the flavors and aromas of the territory. Concept represented in one of the seventeenth-century classics of Neapolitan literature, Lo cunto de li cunti by Giambattista Basile, in which the son of a rich merchant had to leave Naples. The boy turned back, looked at the city in the distance and full of nostalgia saw it as a city to eat: "he galloped out of the city but as soon as he came out of Porta Capuana facing backwards I began to say: hold on tight, I'll I'm leaving my beautiful Naples, who knows if I'll ever be able to see bricks of sugar and walls of royal pasta again? where the stones are made of manna, the beams of brown sugar, the doors and windows of puff pastry. Goodbye carrots and beets, goodbye zeppole andgliacci, goodbye broccoli and belly, goodbye tripe and offal, goodbye stews and pasties, goodbye flower of the cities, luxury of Italy, little painted egg of Europe mirror of the world. Goodbye Naples non plus ultra where virtues have set the boundaries and grace has marked the boundaries. I am leaving to remain forever the widower of the married pignati, I am leaving this beautiful Casale, my broccoli, I will leave you behind." A poor dish certainly, with a great history, protagonist of the rituals of the end of the year celebrations, easy to prepare and able to stand out well with its entirely Neapolitan authenticity, alongside much more demanding recipes.

If a true cod sanctuary was created in Somma Vesuviana, in Naples there is a secular sanctuary where cod is the absolute protagonist and is offered not only in its rigorously traditional versions but also in its contaminations of international cuisine.

In Piazzetta del Sedile di Porto, an original place has arisen, "Baccalaria", which is simplistic to consider just a restaurant. In reality, the owner, Toti Lange, an entrepreneur in love with cod, which forced him to constantly travel to Somma Vesuviana, has given life to a concept that is based not only on the exclusive quality of the raw material, but also on its history, its culture, its traditions, also connecting to the traditions of other Mediterranean countries such as Portugal and Spain to also reach more as distant as Iceland where cod fishing takes place. Not only. He also promoted the Neapolitan Academy of Baccalà or the Academy of Baccalajuoli, also known as the "Confraternity of Mussilli and Coronielli" with the aim of protecting all the arts developed and developing around cod, both in the salted and dried stockfish, protecting traditional preparations and encouraging their improvement and diffusion in Italy and abroad. The brotherhood has strict rules. studies the problems of the presence of cod in gastronomy within individual Italian realities, formulates new proposals, gives free opinions on the matter upon request of desperate housewives, public and private institutions, chefs in difficulty, and works to promote better knowledge of this generous food. Furthermore, it promotes initiatives aimed at historical and scientific research capable of bringing more and more layers of the population, especially young people, closer to a source of protein hitherto considered the prerogative of the humblest and most underprivileged classes, spreading knowledge of its notable healthy and nutraceutical properties, of its value as an expression of customs, civilization, culture and science.

The recipe for Neapolitan cod by chef Rosario Coppola

Ingredients for four people

Icelandic cod fillet 600 grams

Half a kilo of Piennolo tomatoes

Parsley and olives 100 grams

Capers 30 grams

Two cloves of garlic

Flour as needed

Salt and pepper

Sunflower oil

Extra virgin olive oil

Method

For the cod broth

fillet the cod and cut into nice slices, keep them aside. With the scraps of cod bone and skin, prepare a broth by browning them with a drizzle of oil, some poached garlic, parsley stems and basil. wet with two liters of cold water and ice. Leave to cook for the time necessary to reduce the broth to half the starting liquid, filter with a sieve

For the sauce

Brown the garlic with the olive oil and the capers, add the piennolo tomatoes cut one in half and one part leaving them whole, wet with the cod broth

For the fried cod

After having dabbed the cod steaks well, flour them and fry them in plenty of sunflower seed oil at a temperature of 170°

Finishing

Fry the previously fried cod slices in the sauce for 3/4 minutes, taking care to continuously fry them. Implanted

The chef's secret

For the recipe to be successful, you must take care to flour the cod slices well before frying them. This way the sauce will do its job and the cod will preserve its consistency and bite.

Baccalaria restaurant

Porto square, 4,

80134 Naples NA

Phone: 081 012 0049

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