Mariuccia Roggero, is a chef who boasts 30 years of a Michelin star placed on the San Marco restaurant in Canelli, the town of Monferrato which with its underground cathedrals, cellars dug into the calcareous tuff in past centuries which descending up to 32 meters underground ensure the fermentation constant temperature of 12-14 degrees of Asti Spumante, it was proclaimed a world heritage site in 2014 UNESCO, an integral part of the territory of the Vineyard landscape of Piedmont: Langhe-Roero and Monferrato.
The Chef together with her husband Piercarlo Ferrero, sommelier and true authority on truffles, in thirty years of hard and passionate work has made the San Marco restaurant a temple of safeguarding the most authentic traditions of Piedmontese gastronomy of which she is a true and own champion. Mariuccia Roggero, representative of Italian cuisine abroad (Europe, USA, Canada and the UN Meeting) and at home (Turin 2006 Winter Olympics) as well as a teacher at ICIF, the cooking school for foreigners in Costigliole d'Asti, is the creator of a cuisine of the territory and of the Monferrato tradition in constant evolution, which aims to rejuvenate the oldest recipes without distorting them, adapting them to today's tastes and needs.
In the menu that accompanies its patrons on a journey into the roots of the gastronomic traditions of the area, the raw material, all strictly local, is treated with a very delicate and passionate hand, one perceives study and love, and above all the desire to involve those approaching their cook in a thermosphere of feelings, respect and values so that the history of this area is lost. Obviously, the list of his proposals could not miss the hunchback thistle, which in its tartare loses its humble and peasant aspect and is recovered in a preparation that enhances its delicacy and light taste that has been neglected for a long time.
In the recipe proposed for First&Food readers, Mariuccia Roggero brings the delicate taste of thistle closer to the more vigorous taste of truffles by combining an interesting marriage between two excellences from Monferrato in an unusual version: a hunchback cardoon tartare with poached egg, and a fragrant lamellata of Alba White Truffle, the inevitable "diamond of the earth", capable of ennobling the most important recipes.
The recipe: Cardoon tartare, bagna cauda, poached egg, white truffle from Monferrato
Doses for 6 people:
For the anchovy sauce:
gr. 80 cloves of garlic already peeled and without sprout
gr. 100 anchovy fillets desalted and preserved in oil
gr. 200 milk
gr. 150 olive oil
gr. 100 fresh butter
To prepare the dish:
Alba white truffles
gr. 500 small hunchbacked thistles of Nice
no. 1 tablespoon of flour
no. 6 very fresh local eggs
no. 2 tablespoons of white vinegar
no. 3 lemons
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Procedure:
For the Bagna cauda:
Blanch the garlic in boiling water three times, cover with milk
cook for about 10 minutes, stirring often, until the milk is completely reduced. Crush the garlic, add the anchovies, the oil and, stirring constantly, cook for another ten minutes, stir in the butter cut into pieces.
Clean the cardoon and soak it in cold water with the juice of a lemon.
In a separate saucepan, dissolve the flour with a ladle of cold water, add the juice of two lemons, add two liters of water, a handful of coarse salt and bring to the boil, add the cardoons and cook for about 40 minutes. Drain the cardoons, cool them and dry them on a tea towel.
Separately, bring about two liters to the boil. of water with a spoonful of salt and the white vinegar. Carefully break each egg in a cup, and slide it delicately into the lightly boiling acidulated water, cook for about 2 minutes, when the egg white begins to set, turn the eggs with a slotted spoon to give them the right shape, cover the pan with a lid and leave to simmer for another two minutes. Drain, pass quickly into a bowl with water and ice, to stop the cooking and remove the taste of the vinegar; lay on a tea towel and even out the margins.
Cut the cardoons into pieces of the desired size, season them in a pan with a knob of butter, add 4 spoonfuls of the prepared "bagna cauda", mix and keep warm.
Introduction
Spread the remaining bagna cauda on each plate, arrange a “ring” with a diameter of about 10 cm. and fill with the seasoned cardoons, form a small hollow in the center and place the prepared egg inside; grate a grind of black pepper and white truffle on the latter, remove the "ring" and serve immediately.
