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The recipe for cardoon omelette with seafood and mixed salad: the starred cuisine of chef Daniele Usai suspended between flavors of land and sea

A dish inspired by the poor cuisine of the fishermen of the village of Fiumicino takes on an original nobility in the recipe of Chef Daniele Usai of the restaurant Il Tino, one Michelin star. The nutritional benefits of cardoon, a poor vegetable but rich in quality

The recipe for cardoon omelette with seafood and mixed salad: the starred cuisine of chef Daniele Usai suspended between flavors of land and sea

Similar in appearance to celery, the cardoon (Cynara cardunculus), also known as the wild artichoke, is a vegetable that belongs to the artichoke family. Known since ancient times, its history is attested by various legends that associate this flower with the Sicilian shepherd Daphnis, upon whose death (thanks to the intervention of Pan and Diana), the Earth, full of pain, gave birth to a plant full of thorns, the cardoon. It can also be remembered that in the Norwegian literary tradition (both in the motherland and in the Western colonies, especially in Iceland), in the 9th century, that is, in the Viking age, the cardoon was associated with the god Thor (god of war and lightning). More peacefully but also more solemnly, the cardoon is the symbol of Scotland. Legend has it that a group of Vikings was about to surprise the Scots in their sleep; but the ambush failed because an invader trampled on a thistle with his bare foot and began to shout, which is why in Scottish banners the effigy of the thistle is associated with the Latin motto which translated means "No one will have defied me with impunity".

Although it is a poor plant and even considered a weed in the United States and Canada, cardoons are appreciated here in the kitchen not only for their savoury but delicate flavour but also for their nutritional benefits, in fact they are rich in sodium, potassium, iron, calcium, phosphorus, vitamin B1 or thiamine.

Thanks to the contribution of fiber and water, cardoon facilitates intestinal transit and regulates blood glucose levels. The limited energy intake makes it an ideal food in low-calorie diets. Cardoons – as stated on the Humanitas website – are rich in calcium (involved in the mechanisms of muscle contraction and relaxation, blood coagulation, regulation of cellular permeability and transmission of nervous impulses) and potassium (essential for the human body to maintain normal water balance and blood pressure, to regulate neuromuscular excitability and heart rhythm).

How to choose them: cardoons should be picked with taut, compact and whole leaves. Choose those that are as white as possible, with few traces of green, they will be sweeter. To clean them, remove the outer leaves, and then with the potato peeler remove the toughest ribs, until you get to the soft heart. To cook them, proceed by cutting the stems to a length of 15-20 cm, being careful to carefully remove all the external filaments of the ribs; then, after having passed them in abundant acidulated water, leave them to cook for 2 to 3 hours, to ensure that the stems soften. After that, they can be cooked in the oven or sautéed in a pan with oil and garlic.

And cardoons are the protagonists of an original, delicate and regenerating dish that is good these days after the excesses of end-of-year holiday lunches in which we have overindulged in fats. It is a soft cardoon omelette with seafood and aromatic mixed salad that bears the signature of Daniele Usai, starred chef of Il Tino, a renowned restaurant in Fiumicino, fundamental experiences spent in his youth in London with Antonio Carluccio at the Neal Street Restaurant, then in Rome, at Duke's and at Le Terrazze dell'Hotel Eden and above all at L'Albereta di Gualtiero Marchesi, in the province of Brescia.

“This recipe takes inspiration from the territory,” explains the chef, “in fact in Ostia (where I was born), on the Canale dei Pescatori, a small hamlet of a few houses was born, where the inhabitants, fishermen, had very few resources available to support themselves, including the seafood they caught, and the eggs produced by their chickens. This seafood omelette was born from this.”

To describe Daniele Usai's cuisine, one can use the image of a pianist playing in a concert with two pedals to express his harmonies: the sea and the garden. A sailor chef, as he has been defined, Usai succeeds in his cuisine in excellently combining the scents and flavors of the sea with the scents and flavors of the land that are expressed in the careful use of aromatic herbs that he personally grows in two gardens where more than fifty varieties of plants ensure a wide range of nuances to his preparations.

The recipe for the soft cardoon omelette with seafood and aromatic mixed salad

Ingredients for people 4

For the cardoon cream

500 g of cardoons

1 shallot

Salt and Pepper To Taste

50 ml of white wine

For the omelette

4 Livorno chicken eggs

Salt to taste

Pepper as needed

100 g of cardoons

Extra virgin olive oil

Aniseed

Frutti di mare

4 fresh sea urchins

100 g of clams

100 g of lupins

100 g of mussels

100 g of razor clams

Add seafood to taste depending on the catch (truffles, clams, scallops, etc.)

Garlic, extra virgin olive oil to taste

Other ingredients

Aromatic mix (manta, dill, lemon balm, rue, mugwort)

Method

For the cardoon cream

Clean the cardoons from the filaments and cut them into large pieces, immerse them in water and ice and blanch in plenty of salted water for 7 minutes, then immerse again in water and ice.

In a saucepan, cook the finely chopped shallot with a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil, add the cardoons, brown for a couple of minutes, add wine, let it evaporate and leave to cook on low heat for about 10 minutes, adding a little water if necessary. Blend finely and sieve.

For the seafood

Open the various types of seafood and divide them by type into individual pots, where previously you will have placed a clove of unpeeled garlic and extra virgin olive oil. Stop cooking as soon as the seafood has opened, blast chill to a positive temperature, shell and store in their filtered liquids. Unlike other seafood, sea urchins will only need to be cleaned.

Composition of the dish

In a hot non-stick pan, brown the cardoons cut into brunoise with a drizzle of oil for 1 minute, add the eggs, 4 tablespoons of seafood water, a few anise seeds and turn off the heat. Stir quickly with a spoon to obtain a “slimy” consistency.

On the plate, place a base of cardoon cream, the eggs, the shelled seafood and the mixed herb leaves.

Restaurant: Il Tino

Monte Cadria Street 127

00054 Fiumicino (RM)

Tel. 06 5622778

www.ristoranteiltino.com

info@ristoranteiltino.com

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