Fiadoni
Buona Pasqua
(Happy Easter)
It started with Fiadoni
The night before Easter I asked PKP “would you like Fiadoni tomorrow…”You know those little cheesey pastries that I made last year, the traditional Abbruzese ones, that are eaten over Easter.
I had him at ‘little cheesey pastries’.
Like so much of Italian cooking, the combination of local flavours come together to produce something very special. In this case it’s a tiny, warm pasty, the dough made with olive oil and wine and then filled with delicious local cheeses, that ooze out when they cook and fill the home with their aroma.
In Kenya we would have called them bitings.
So I proceeded. A measure of local olive oil was combined with a generous splash of Sauvignon blanc. I could have use Pecorino or Trebbiano wines, to keep it really local.
The sdiuno is the breakfast taken early on Easter Sunday morning in Central Italy. The day starts with a filling meal, followed by a lunch later. This Easter breakfast tradition is so important. Traditionally, after the abstinence from food on Good Friday and Easter Saturday, the Abruzzo Easter feast is a breaking of the fast.
Last year I brought a bit of Abruzzo to Norway, making Fiadoni in our tiny cabin on Hisøy. I couldn’t find any Abruzzese cheeses in the supermarket, so I improvised with some Norwegian hard cheese. I shared them with my friend and her boys, as we walked by the river Nidelv.
This year, we switch. I’m bringing a bit of Norway to Abruzzo. These were the paper eggs that our friend Dee gave us, filled with Easter treats. I carried these delicate ‘egg shells’ in our hand luggage, everywhere that we went travelling in Norway last summer; up the West Coast, sailing on the Hurtigruten, to Tromso and then on to Oslo. The four shells finally made it in tact to Rome, via two flights. This year they are filled with Italian Easter treats.
The bad news this weekend is that the whole of Italy is in a nation-wide lockdown for Easter, as the new Coronavirus variants continue to spread across various European countries. In an attempt to control movement during this Easter weekend, the authorities have placed the whole country in the harshest of Covid-19 restrictions. Each region has been moved into ‘zona rossa’; a ‘red’ zone. Easter mass will go ahead, with social distancing. People are permitted to have two visitors at home.
We made no plans.
The good news is that we don’t have to share the Fiadoni with anyone else.
Buona Pasqua
Are you embracing any new Easter traditions, where you are?
© Maggie M /Mother City Time