Holding it in my hand, I seem to see one of the fifth-grade exercise books of yesteryear, the ones with the black cover and the light-coloured label outlined in amaranth red. The name also smacks of the past, “La Cusinascia”, which, however, is not derogatory, it indicates the environment where people lived and performed many tasks.
A plunge into the past with this recipe book that is the result of the “Mapping Bianzone” project, proposed by the Ecomuseo of the Rhaetian terraces to the Region, which recognised it from a cultural point of view and financed it together with other initiatives in the area, such as the book on trades produced by the school and the search for place names. is a return to the 1950s and what people ate back then. The recipes come from some of the village elders who shared their secrets in the kitchen.
The book is divided into 14 parts, each section referring to a specific foodstuff, the cultivation and use of which is explained: buckwheat, maize, rye, wheat, barley, garden produce, potatoes, vines, pork, eggs, fruit. And then the recipes such as fuiadi, fritulini, pulenta al furan, cui patati, cui tartifuli, pancot, pan dei munt, minestra de ors, taroz, vin coc, ris e lac’, tripa, marsala all'uovo, farudi. Pleasant pages, reading them one understands how people lived, what they ate, simple but genuine food.
