The origin of the name is complex: but the prevailing thought refers to Arabic word Bourrida which means small pieces. We certainly find this term widespread with the appropriate variations in Liguria, Provence and Sardinia. Let's talk about Ligurian buridda, one of the most typical fish soups of Italian cuisine like the Tuscan caciucco, and the brodetto from the Marches. In Provenza is a seafood stew called Bourride while in Sardinia it assumes the more complex name of Burrida in sa casteddaia and becomes a sauce made up of dogfish liver, chopped walnuts and vinegar with which the fish is seasoned.
In Liguria and Provence the order of factors changes – there are infinite variations – but the product does not change: the basic preparation of white fish in chunks with seafood and shellfish remains.
Certainly in Liguria the buridda is something more than a tasty fish dish, it is something that enters the Ligurian DNA. “Genoa and so be it / the sea in a tavern” so wrote the great Genoese poet George Caproni in the 900s by ennobling a poor dish that was recurrent in all taverns, appreciated by the Camalli of the port of Genoa as from the upper middle class of the Riviera. So widespread as to even become a way of saying.
Even today, walking around Genoa, it can happen to hear someone say: «She's really a buridda», or "Today I'm doing a buridda" in the sense of chaos in the first version, something more threatening in the second. But above all, the Buridda has also taken on a ritual value in Ligurian gastronomic habits, especially in Cesio, in the province of Imperia: it is the obligatory dish for dinner on Holy Thursday.
Being a very popular dish and loved by the population, there are different preparations.
Originally the buridda was a mixture of fish cut into small pieces (stockfish, conger eel, dogfish, etc…), stewed with olive oil, pine nuts, mushrooms, capers, parsley and/or other flavourings. More recent recipes also propose the use of mullet, cuttlefish and baby octopus, monkfish, as well as the use of onions, tomatoes and white wine instead of or in addition to the classic vegetable ingredients, and then there are the versions with conger eel, dogfish and mullet, with stockfish. potatoes and tomatoes or with artichokes and tomatoes. In the past, in the province of Savona the recipe books reported the replacement of mushrooms, onions and carrots with beets, olives and anchovies, thus differentiating the Savonese stockfish buridda from the Genoese one. but the most widespread is that of cuttlefish.
Fabio Fauraz, born in 1977, chef of Il Michelaccio restaurant, defined by Michelin guide a real gastronomic bistro, is a scholar of the culinary traditions of the area, so passionate and motivated that it was enough for him to attend the Marco Polo Hotel Institute, then as a self-taught he did everything by himself, with great passion and great willpower and already at the age of 20 he managed to opening his first restaurant where he puts himself to the test and begins to appreciate the depth of his cuisine. Five years later it was time for a leap in quality with the opening in 2002 of the "Violino Rosso" restaurant which immediately became a destination for "gourmands", connoisseurs of good taste and which attracted the attention of the main Italian guides.
Awarded as best Emerging Italian Chef by Gualtiero Marchesi at the "Alma" Cooking School, he further refined his techniques with some of the greatest Italian chefs, passing through the Osteria Francescana Massimo Bottura, seeking his own style of cooking between tradition, innovation and territoriality.
In 2006 is among the Ten Emerging Italians under 30, chosen by Luigi Cremona and Paolo Marchi.
In 2014 he opened "Il Michelaccio" in Genoa, a bistro restaurant where he offers a cuisine that expresses all his eclectic personality that knows how to tastefully interpret the raw materials interpreted in an essential but not banal way, in the name of lightness and digestibility. Obviously, the Ligurian gastronomic tradition is present in all its most original facets, from squid focaccia to steamed Genoese ravioli with a touch of meat, to meat Zeraria, to Genoese Panera.
Its menu offers both traditional dishes as well as memories and suggestions of international and exotic cuisine with great attention paid to vegetarian and vegan proposals. His rigor for the raw material and for the traditional cuisine, albeit revisited in a modern key, is also found in an interesting list of wines, all rigorously authentic (obtained only with spontaneous fermentations, without the use of selected yeasts) and with a level of very low or no sulfites.
And so that his studies and insights into Ligurian gastronomic traditions do not remain just a personal matter, he has also set up a very popular cooking school to train new generations of cooks who know how to innovate while respecting the past.
For FoodFirstonline readers, Fabio Fauraz offers the most classic of Buridda's recipes in view of the Holy Thursday dinner.
FABIO FAURAZ'S BURIDDA RECIPE
Buridda for 4 people
1 onion
½ carrot
1 leg celery
2 cloves of garlic
Parsley
1 glass of white wine
20 g dried mushrooms
1 tube of tomato paste
1kg of cuttlefish cleaned and cut into small pieces
Salt, pepper or chilli
½ kg peas
Prepare a sautéed celery, carrot and onion, brown well and add the minced garlic with parsley, the dried mushrooms previously soaked in warm water and minced. Leave to flavor for about 2/3 minutes.
At this point add the cuttlefish and cook for a few minutes then blend with a glass of white wine, let it evaporate and add the concentrate diluted with hot water, salt, pepper and a pinch of chilli pepper. Add hot water until the cuttlefish are covered, lower the heat and cook for about 30 minutes with the lid on.
Separately, cook the peas in boiling salted water for about 5 minutes, drain and cool immediately in iced water.
After half an hour of the cuttlefish, add the cooled and drained peas, cook for another 10 minutes and switch off.
Serve with chopped parsley
