Food for Life

FRIDAY, 8 MAY 2015

One important reason to why we have fallen in love with Sardinia and Cuglieri is the food.

Food here is straightforward, with distinctive flavours. The subtlety lies in the freshness of the raw materials. Almost exclusively local and seasonal, the raw materials are not picked before maturity, trundled around in lorries, and then left in storage. Things are so local, that in Cabras by the sea you will be hard put to find any restaurant that does not focus on fish. Likewise, a thirty-minute drive along steep and winding roads across the Montiferru mountain takes you to where meat is best. Animals roam freely across the countryside. This gives them a wonderful flavour. However, the meat is rarely tender. Buying large enough fridges to hang meat long enough is out of reach for most butchers and restaurants. Food here is the kind of food that you can eat and enjoy every day of the week. Much like home cooking, restaurants sometimes do not make the most of the raw materials. Fish is surprisingly often overcooked, but saved by its freshness. All things considered, most of the food is cooked well most of the time.

We have eaten superb ham at restaurant Desogos in Cuglieri. The quality of pork is far better than the industrial pork you find elsewhere and it has not been excessively salted and cured, but remains perfectly balanced, moist and rich in flavour. However, the next time the ham was not as good, although far better than most. The time we struck lucky must have been the time when the ham had matured to its very best, and we got the slices that came from the finest part of the ham, close to the bone. Many restaurants have only one fixed menu. Therefore, it is worth thinking about that meals are often very large here, if you just let them bring on the dishes. You arrive hungry and start by eating some bread. The soft bread is not up to much, it is mainly good for mopping up sauce. However, the Pane Carasau, the thin and crisp flat bread is often great. It has an ancient origin, from when shepherds spent long periods of time away from home. They needed to take something with them that would keep. With a good quality olive oil drizzled on to it, it is especially delicious. After the bread, a big array of antipasti (‘before the meal’) rapidly arrive. Here it is easy to get carried away, because of the many flavoursome choices. Then come the primi (firsts – pasta or risotto), followed by secondi (main courses). The secondi are rarely more than your basic fish or meat, with perhaps some sauce. You choose your contorni (side dishes – salad, vegetables or potatoes) separately. The meal is rounded off with dolci (sweets) and coffee. Often the coffee is served with a selection of local biscuits and generous helpings of Limoncino (lemon liqueur), Mirto (a ubiquitous Sardinian liqueur flavoured with myrtle berries that precariously balances just on the right side of toothpaste) or Grappa (a distillation of what is left after grapes have been pressed for wine-making, with a wide range of qualities). It is enough to knock just about anybody out. So allow plenty of time – up to two hours, sometimes three. If you are eating lunch, you can always have a siesta afterwards. Alternatively, you can explain that you want to skip one, two, or more of the dishes, or divide one pasta dish between two people. That is perfectly acceptable, but if you say nothing you will get it all. Generally speaking food is price worthy. Although, because meals at lunch are exactly the same as those in the evening, you might find it odd spending 25 or 30 euros for lunch. The best restaurants can serve exquisite food at a fraction of the cost that would be charged elsewhere. They can keep their prices low by using local raw materials and having low rents, but above all by only serving you if you have pre-booked and arrive at the same time as everybody else. If the chef knows how many people are eating, what they are eating, and when they are eating, he or she (it is quite common with female chefs here) can provide the absolute best with the minimum of cost and labour. In London or Stockholm only some of the finest restaurants dare limit the menu to this extent. Service is almost always friendly, and informal. Tasting the wine before it is served to everybody is normally dispensed with. Wine will not be served at all. A bottle or carafe will be put on the table and you have to pour it yourself. Few speak more than a couple of words of a foreign language, although it is becoming more common among young people. You can always get by with hands and feet and a smile. You can also cook in your house. You can go to the supermercato in Cuglieri to pick up the basics, but the fruit and vegetables are more likely to be fresher, local produce at the fruttivendolo, greengrocer. The climate is such that whatever time of year, there are going to be some fruits and vegetables that are in season. Some things are imported, but they are better steered clear of. Meat at the macellaio, butcher, is mainly local. At the fishmonger, pescheria, you choose between di mare ('of the sea', meaning freshly caught), congelato (frozen), d’allevamento (farmed), and decongelato (defrosted). Di mare can be a jumble of all different types of fish in a box. More expensive, but worth it. And finally, there is the market on Saturday mornings. Most things (like clothes, shoes and pots and pans) is of little interest. However, the nuts and torrone (nougat) are perfect. It is not until one has tasted them that one understands that what is sold in shops elsewhere is second-rate. Even after several years, we find food here an enjoyable surprise. We are looking forward to our next experience.

Jonathan Clyne