The Sanseverese pancotto recipe is one of the traditional peasant dishes of my hometown, made with stale bread, field greens, and potatoes, seasoned with a generous drizzle of extra virgin olive oil.
Like all humble peasant dishes, it is also found in other parts of our region, and as always happens, some add dry broad beans, chickpeas, or zucchini because it’s a recovery dish, often using a handful of legumes or some other ingredient.
The wild greens used to be gathered in the countryside; even my grandfather did so. Nowadays, they are found at the market where there are still farmers selling their products, and they are a mix of vegetables such as chicory, arugula, wild fennel, turnips, and chard… then you need bread; strictly durum wheat, homemade, and especially stale.
The other important ingredient for the success of the Sanseverese pancotto is extra virgin olive oil. Here, there’s still the custom of buying olives from the farmer and then taking them to the mill to be ground; because my beautiful San Severo is surrounded by olive groves! I myself lived for many years on the outskirts, so I saw olive groves as far as the eye could see.
You may ask, what if we can’t find these local delicacies? Well, you can still make it with the greens you find at the greengrocer and try to get good bread and excellent oil.
Let’s move on to my family recipe and prepare a fragrant and tasty Sanseverese pancotto.
YOU MIGHT BE INTERESTED IN OTHER SANSEVERESE RECIPES:
- Difficulty: Very easy
- Cost: Very cheap
- Preparation time: 20 Minutes
- Portions: 2 people
- Cooking methods: Slow cooking, Stove
- Cuisine: Italian Regional
- Region: Puglia
- Seasonality: Autumn, Winter
- Energy 223.04 (Kcal)
- Carbohydrates 18.76 (g) of which sugars 6.29 (g)
- Proteins 6.87 (g)
- Fat 15.24 (g) of which saturated 2.18 (g)of which unsaturated 0.28 (g)
- Fibers 7.94 (g)
- Sodium 260.36 (mg)
Indicative values for a portion of 200 g processed in an automated way starting from the nutritional information available on the CREA* and FoodData Central** databases. It is not food and / or nutritional advice.
* CREATES Food and Nutrition Research Center: https://www.crea.gov.it/alimenti-e-nutrizione https://www.alimentinutrizione.it ** U.S. Department of Agriculture, Agricultural Research Service. FoodData Central, 2019. https://fdc.nal.usda.gov
Ingredients
The vegetables can vary in quantity; you can add or subtract according to personal taste. For 2 people, I used about 2.2 lbs of mixed field greens
- chard
- arugula
- wild fennel
- chicory, field, raw
- 3 potatoes
- cherry tomatoes (3 or 4)
- 1 clove garlic (or powder as I do)
- extra virgin olive oil (to taste)
- water
- chili peppers (to taste)
Steps
Since they are field greens, they need to be cleaned of any roots and dry parts and then washed several times to remove impurities.
– Repeatedly wash the greens after cleaning them of roots or yellowed leaves. (field greens are obviously dirtier compared to pre-packaged ones, so they need to be washed well)
– In a high-sided pot, sauté the oil with fresh or powdered garlic and quartered cherry tomatoes, and let it flavor well over low heat.
– Peel and cut the potatoes into rather large pieces and add them to the sauté. Add the greens, which at this stage take up a lot of volume.
– Pour in one or two glasses of water, cover, and cook until the potatoes yield when pierced with a fork. (about 20 minutes)
– Salt and just before serving the Sanseverese pancotto, add the pieces of stale bread. Wait for them to soften and turn off.
– Serve the Sanseverese pancotto only after drizzling with a swirl of oil directly onto the plates.
Advice:
– If necessary, add enough water to make the Sanseverese pancotto moist.
