Saba, Savòr and Sughi - Food From Carpi, Emilia Romagna
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In the past more than today during the vintage time the freshly-made must was promptly utilized to arrange: saba, savór and sughi.
They are typical dishes with a rich taste like the whole local cuisine.
All three products, even if on a small scale, may be easily found on the market.
Nowadays the tradition of this preparation is held by the families of the tenant farmers and many are those who get the must (essential food) at the local wineries.
Saba and Savór, besides being foods with high calory content, have a great value as far as the symbolic aspect is concerned.
They represent the best of the cultivations of our territory, as a matter of fact they are both intentionally included in the recipe of the Christmas bread corrisponding to the nth power propitiatory porpuse contained in the Milanese panettone (spiced brioche with sultanas).
Of course, the use of Sapa or Saba, made with the must of the grapes which has to boil down in order to lose one third of the initial volume, goes back to a very old tradition.
The ways of using and eating it were varied: from essential food for cooking the Christmas bread, once sauce for polenta (maize porridge) when the pork fat was lacking, watered down it becomes an excellent refreshing drink during summer, in the same time pregnant women took it for its mild and salutary laxative effects, to substitute of the aromatic winegar since, mixed in equal parts with vinegar, it quickened the healing process of a wound.
The already quoted doctor of Bologna Baldassarre Pisanelli in his treatise "Della natura dei cibi e del bere", (About the nature of food and drink) drew up in 1611, he wrote: "[...] The cooked most commonly known as Sapa, if done with red wine, it nourishes very much, provides great nourishment, but it also melts and takes the catarrh of the chest away ...used to do poultices together with semolina and salt relieves pain vigorously."
"Savôr", is the dialect word meaning flavour (or savour), given to what it might be defined the triumph of jams, so savoury as to precisely deserve the aforesaid name.
The autumn fruit: apples, quinces, pears, pumpkin, some orange peels expressly kept from the last season and a few nut kernels are boilt down in the grape-must.
This compound doesn't need sugar at all, it has a very fine taste and is very special, it is used for cooking cakes during Christmas time: fried sweet tortelli, jam tarts, Christmas bread.
More rarely, even if very good especially for its preciousness, it was spread on to a slice of bread as we normally do with the common jams and preserves.
Sughi, the basic food for this recipe is the freshly-made must of the grapes which has to boil dry, then it has to be skimmed. At this point the white flour must be added in the proportion of a tablespoon for each ladle and mixed together.
The result is creamy sauce, particularly saporous that may be served at the end of a meal or become a nourishing snack in late Autumn and Winter.
Substitute of the aromatic vinegar
recipe book handwritten by Foresti family - Carpi
Ingredients and preparation
Take 5 pounds of cooked wine, popularly Saba plus five pounds of common vinegar
add 5 pounds of liquorice juice
6 ounces of cloves
leave them boil till the liquorice is fully melted.
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