FOOD | Julianne Glatz
For years, my husband Peter’s entire dental office eagerly anticipated the arrival of Velma Viele Mayes’ Italian Christmas cookies. The large foil-covered cardboard box overflowed with anise-flavored pizzelle, fried knots of wine-infused dough, cookies filled with dates, cookies covered with sprinkles, and too many others to name or even remember. I used to work there part-time, but even when I wasn’t working, I’d sneak in and grab some.
Mayes is no longer making cookies or her other renowned specialties, but the Springfield area’s Italian-American community, as always, has many outstanding home cooks. And nothing showcases their traditional dishes and abilities more than their Christmas feasts.
Sandy Pecori is one of the best. Not only is she fun and an excellent cook, she’s also organized. Since 1992, she’s kept a file of each year’s Christmas Eve menu. The Pecoris follow the tradition of La Vigilia, wherein seven fishes/seafoods are served on Christmas Eve. La Vigilia owes much to the now-abandoned Catholic practice of forbidding meat on Fridays and Holy Days. As for the seven fishes, “The number seven is significant to Catholics,” Pecori says. “It’s associated with perfection, with the days of creation, the number of sacraments and the number of virtues.”
And it provides a creative framework. “I have recipes, but I don’t always follow them,” Pecori says. La Vigilia – aka the Feast of the Seven Fishes – is the Pecoris’ biggest Christmas celebration. Some dishes appear yearly, others vary. “We always have shrimp cocktail,” Pecori says. “It’s not Italian, but we love it. I have a big fish platter that we line with lettuce and top with smoked oysters, smoked salmon, anchovies, sardines and whatever else looks good. There’s always a baked fish – sometimes as many as three – and usually scalloped oysters.” Some years there may be a fritto misto (mixed fry) of scallops, cod, smelts, oysters and/or other seafood, simply dredged in flour and fried in light olive oil; other years perhaps a seafood salad.
The huge kitchen island that displays the Pecoris’ Christmas Eve buffet also contains non-fish dishes. There’s always a fresh salad, mushroom, artichoke and olive relish; and whisper-thin fettuccini made by Pecori’s mother-in-law, Giovanna, dressed simply with a marinara sauce made with tomatoes canned from Pecori’s own garden, or a white clam sauce. A separate table holds desserts: cookies, including Italian spicy chocolate drops, bread pudding made with Italian panettone, and Giovanna’s incomparable nut ring.
Springfield’s best Italian-American home cooks aren’t all women. Incoming Roman Cultural Society President Larry Trapani who, like Pecori, cans sauce from his garden’s tomatoes, had me drooling as he described what he makes for Christmas. Trapani doesn’t follow the La Vigilia custom: Christmas Eve at his son’s home features pizza, “although we do have anchovy pizza.” Trapani prepares his big feast for Christmas Day: “We’ll have stuffed manicotti. I make my own sausage, and my own bread.” He starts his bread a day ahead with a biga – an Italian pre-ferment made of yeast, flour and water that increases flavor.
The centerpiece of Trapani’s Christmas feast is braciole, thin steak rolled around a stuffing of a multitude of heavenly ingredients, including three cheeses, two cured meats, breadcrumbs, herbs, wine, olives, garlic, onion, hardboiled eggs; then tied and braised in that homemade marinara.
Much as I’d love to be part of a big Italian-American family Christmas celebration, my own roots are decidedly German and Irish/Welsh. At least we non-Italians can co-opt some of their Christmas specialties for our own celebrations. Buon Natale!
Contact Julianne Glatz at realcuisine.jg@gmail.com.
