Italian-Argentine Cuisine: Pasta and Pizza
My instinctive reaction to pasta dishes in Buenos Aires is that the pasta is more varied, chubbier, more likely to be filled, less shiny, and softer than the pasta you get in the United States.
More varied: Perhaps it’s just that the names are different, perhaps it’s because dried pasta is less common and gnocchi-style and filled pastas are much more common.
Chubbier. Argentinians relish a wide variety of ñoquis (gnocchi), including the delicious malfatti (spinach gnocci).
Filled. Restaurants offer ravioli with a wide variety of fillings as well as other filled pasta such as sorrentinos, panzottis, and agnolotis.
Less shiny and softer. Part of this is that dried pastas are offered much less often than in the States (I can’t speak for Italy). No neighborhood is without a fresh pasta store selling all kinds of pasta, ñoqui, and ravioli with a wide variety of stuffings (as well as crepes and kreplach, there’s no need to be provincial about this). Part of it, I think, is that Argentinians are much less concerned that their pasta be al dente and much more concerned that it be suave and creamy.
The sauces tend to be much less red, much creamier. Yes a wide range of tomato sauces are available, their names varying with their ingredients, including pomarola, scarpedo, filetto, napolitano and putanesca. And there’s bolonesa, and carbonara, and cuatro quesos. But there is also crema (bechamel), rosa (bechamel with a little tomato ketchup added), verde (bechamel with spinach added), scrofa (fileto with cream, basil and cheese), and parisienne (bechamel with chopped sliced ham, chicken, and sliced or chopped mushrooms).
For an idea of sauces that are popular, visit this site for the Knorr sauces sauces for pasta that are available in Argentina. No snide jokes, here, please. If all of us interested in food knew half as much about the preferences in different parts of the world as Unilever does we’d be preaning ourselves. When I’m traveling I always make it a point to check out what Knorr seasonings and sauces are available on grocery store shelves.
As to pizza, it’s excellent. The toppings seemed to me to be pretty much what you’d get in the States though whether that’s the result of the recent globalization of pizza I have no way of knowing.
Pizza is often topped with a slice of faina (a flatbread made of chick pea flour that is common along the coastline of the Italian and French rivieras).
And because I’m not a great tomato fan (no really, not everyone loves tomatoes) I became addicted to fugazza (from the Italian focaccia) which is made of the same dough as the pizza but topped with onions or fugazzeta, topped with onions and cheese.
So, you will say to me, this all points to a northern origin for the Italians in Argentina. And certainly many Argentines do come from northern Italy, Genoa or Liguria to be more precise. I’m not sure this is the whole story though and I’ll explain why later.
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The pasta you mention looks Northern Italian cuisine as you say, especially Liguria. Which is interesting as usually I would associate Italian immigration with the South.
“Al dente” is something that somebody needs to research. I’ve go a quote somewhere that it has only been used in regards to pasta since the 20th century. Fresh pasta, especially made from soft wheat flour is never really “al dente”, so maybe the term is associated more with the use of dried pasta and the term has spread with the more widespread use of dried pasta, rather then the homemade stuff.
It was complicated in Argentina and, I think, more complicated everywhere than the usual south story.
Agreed about al dente. I have a reference or two I’ll post soon.
Nice post. I didn’t know there was italian migration into Argentina. Food history as you cover it is fascinating.