"Against the wear and tear of modern life", recited the claim of a successful television advertisement of the legendary "Carosello" for many years, while Ernesto Calindri, impassive, drank his artichoke-based Cynar in the midst of the convulsive traffic of Milan. Everyone has long known that the properties of the artichoke are a panacea for the liver. Less known is that the ancient Romans only used and appreciated the inflorescences of the thistle. They used the stems and tried to make them more fleshy with crosses. Artichokes weren't available to everyone, they were very expensive, Diocletian even established a controlled price. It will be necessary to wait for the 1500s for the artichoke to make its appearance in cooking treatises.
Catherine de Medici was so greedy that she got indigestion during a banquet. Even other famous people of more recent times appreciated the artichoke: Sigmunt Freud called it “his favorite flower" while Marilyn Monroe was crowned artichoke queen at a festival in Castroville, California. As a flower it also had the honor of appearing in many still life paintings, Arcimboldo he used it for his allegorical heads. And also in literature he made an appearance of him: Pablo Neruda dedicated an ode to him.
The artichoke (Cynara scolymus L.) is a plant well known and appreciated in Italy of which we consume firm, full and closed inflorescences. It belongs to the Asteraceae family and is used both for food and for medicinal purposes, as well as others belonging to this family: chamomile, calendula, sunflower, arnica and lettuce, just to name a few. There are different varieties of artichokes: with or without thorns, autumn or spring and green or purple. All very good!
Artichokes are indeed a mine of active ingredients and boast a number of properties that have been known and used for centuries. They have few calories: only 22kcal in 100g of raw food, 2.5g of carbohydrates, 2.7g of proteins and 0.2g of lipids (CREA nutritional value tables). I'm very rich in mineral salts: 133mg of potassium, 86mg of calcium, 45mg of magnesium and phosphorus, zinc, copper and iron; the vitamins present are those of group B, Vitamin A, Vitamin C and Vitamin K.
Artichokes contain a lot of water and fibers which allow you to regulate your appetite by increasing the sense of satiety and stimulate good functioning of the intestine. Furthermore, a large part of carbohydrates is present in the form of inulin, a polysaccharide which the body metabolizes in a different way from other sugars and does not use it for energy purposes. This makes artichokes a lot healthy for people with diabetes, because inulin improves blood glucose control, but be careful, they must be very fresh otherwise inulin turns into other types of sugar. Inulin is therefore a good source of carbohydrates and fiber, some interesting properties have been attributed to it: prevention of colon cancer, prebiotic effect on intestinal flora and positive effects on the absorption of calcium and magnesium, important for preventing osteoporosis.
But the virtues of the artichoke go much further and its beneficial effects on the body are numerous: diuretic, detoxifying, digestive, choleretic (increases bile production), cholagogue (increases the transport of bile), hepatoprotective and antioxidant. We can say that it is a true ally of the liver and this thanks to the presence of cynarin, a polyphenol that gives the artichoke its typical bitter taste, in fact, this aromatic compound stimulates the production and outflow of bile, protects and detoxifies the liver cells. The liver is a very important organ and does a lot of work, just think that it filters about 1.5 liters of blood per minute. Its main functions are: detoxification, central role in the metabolism of macronutrients, demolition of hemoglobin and production of bilirubin, synthesis of coagulation factors and albumin, transformation of ammonia into urea, production of bile and storage of vitamins. One of the most common liver diseases is hepatic steatosis non-alcoholic, i.e. an accumulation of fat in the liver cells. Steatosis has increased in recent years, unfortunately also in children. According to the Bambino Gesù hospital, between 3% and 12% of children of normal weight are affected and this percentage rises to 70% in conditions of obesity. Often the causes concern an excess of calories in the diet and little physical activity, while metabolic or genetic causes are less frequent. Non-alcoholic fatty liver disease in adults appears frequently between the ages of 50 and 60 and is present in 75% of type 2 diabetics and 90% of obese people. These data demonstrate that liver health should not be taken for granted also because this disease is often asymptomatic. Changing your lifestyle, improving your diet and increasing physical activity are among the first things you can do to prevent this disease. Can artichokes be useful? Certainly yes, often consuming 300g of artichokes can help because they are a real panacea for the liver. The most important bioactive substance present in artichokes is cynarin which derives from caffeic acid. A recent study confirmed the numerous previous researches on cynarin and its effect on hepatocytes. Supplementation with artichoke leaf extract showed an improvement in liver conditions in a group of patients with steatosis. This improvement could be appreciated both with ultrasound examination and with blood parameters: cynarin improves the AST/ALT ratio, reduces bilirubin, reduces cholesterol and triglycerides. All this translates into a hypolipodemic and antiatherogenic effect. The antioxidant action of cynarin has a protective effect against cardiovascular and arteriosclerotic diseases. Finally, a study was published a few days ago which demonstrated an effect of cynarin on the immune system, in particular cynarin lowers delayed hypersensitivity.
In phytotherapy, preparations such as the herbal teas or mother tinctures of artichoke to treat a series of gastrointestinal and digestive disorders, but you must never do it without the advice of your doctor because there are contraindications, such as pregnancy and breastfeeding, the presence of stones in the biliary tract, peptic ulcer or hyperthyroidism.
Artichokes are grown all over the world, mostly in Europe where Italy holds the record with the production of 500 tons. Our product is characterized by very high quality and boasts 3 IGP varieties (Brindisino, Paestum and Romanesco) and a DOP (Spinoso di Sardegna). Italy and France are certainly the countries that most appreciate artichokes from a culinary point of view. Perhaps the most delicious is the Carciofo alla Giudia, a typical Roman dish, belonging above all to the Jewish-Roman cuisine. It is rigorously Romanesco cimarolo artichoke which is cooked in quality olive oil twice. The first is needed to make it soft enough to be able to stick a fork in it, then it needs to be cooled, dried with paper and then gently crushed to open the leaves better. The second time the artichoke is fried until it becomes golden and crunchy. What can I say, you have to taste it at least once in your life! But apart from this typical recipe, there are many ways to cook artichokes because they lend themselves well to any dish, from appetizers to liqueurs.
Buon appetite
First&Food's suggestion
Kitchen.eat
Piazza Galileo Galilei, 1
09128 Cagliari
Closed Sunday
Holidays in August
30 place settings
+39 070 0991098
www.shopcucina.it
Cucina.eat is what is defined as a "Concept restaurant", a place to eat of course but also where you can buy, taste, take cooking lessons, come from late morning to after dinner even just for a coffee.
Cucina.eat was born in 2013 by the will of Alessandra Meddi, Roman, but in love with Cagliari. The kitchen, both at lunch and dinner, is entrusted to Mauro Ladu, a pupil of Cristiano Andreini and Francesco Vitale with experience at Berton in Milan and Blumenthal in London.
Few dishes on the menu, all conceived according to the offer of the nearby San Benedetto market. Therefore local raw materials, traditional, but cooking techniques and modern combinations that have earned the restaurant the "three cocotte" of the Gambero Rosso. Recommended dishes are free-range chicken salad, potatoes with basil and sour onion. The gastronomy instead (to be purchased or consumed on the spot) sees packaged products from all over the world, according to the pleasures and experiences of all the staff.
Ample space is also given to Italian wines with as many as 250 national and foreign labels. Wine courses, tastings and dinners with producers enrich the offer of Cucina.eat.
Lastly, the last project is all about bread-making. Already in the restaurant in Piazza Galilei 1, bread is made daily but a laboratory dedicated exclusively to bread and leavened products will soon see the light of day.
Tortelli with artichoke, prawns and wild garlic by Francesco Vitale and Mauro Ladu
For pasta:
150 g semolina
60 gr water
Salt to taste
Mix everything until you get a smooth and homogeneous mixture.
For the artichoke cream:
artichoke leaves (external)
1 potato of approx. 100 g
water
spring onion 200 g
extra virgin olive oil
Brown the cleaned potato and cut the spring onion into slices, bay leaf, add the artichoke leaves, brown everything and wet until covered with water and cook for 4 hours.
Blend, sift the mixture and season with salt. Cool the cream in a blast chiller.
For the filling:
250 grams of artichokes
80 g cheese
roe to taste
mint
oil, salt, pepper to taste
Take the clean artichoke, vacuum-pack it with oil, salt and pepper. Bake at 90° for 40 minutes.
Once cooked, blend with ricotta cheese, salt, pepper, oil, bottarga and mint; then put it in a sac a poche to fill our tortelli.
For the marinated shrimp:
10 fresh prawns
thrombolotto oil to taste
ramson
salt and pepper to taste
Clean the prawns, season them with thrombolotto oil, wild garlic, salt and pepper.
Plate finish:
Cook the tortelli in water, place the artichoke cream on a plate, the tortelli sautéed with extra virgin olive oil, the prawns marinated in thrombolotto oil, the artichoke cooked at low temperature and roasted, the garlic orsino, artichoke powder and nasturtium and mint leaves as a garnish, lastly a drizzle of oil on the plate.
