Bitter Is Better: Puntarelle Salad

We Italians love bitter. We love the dark bitterness of coffee and the warm bitterness of nuts. We especially love the bracing bitterness of our chicories: escarole, endive, all the ruffled radicchios such as Castelfranco, Verona, Treviso and Tardivo, and puntarelle (cicoria catalogna).

Many of these bitter greens (or reds) have been cultivated in the Veneto region since the 15th century. Puntarelle, named for the core of fat, pointy-tipped stems hidden within spiky outer leaves, thrive a little farther south. They are cultivated in the countryside around Rome, and their season extends from late fall into early spring.

The Romans serve puntarelle as a salad, aptly called puntarelle alla romana, dressed with a simple anchovy vinaigrette. A puntarelle salad brightens the stodgiest stew; it adds star power to a plain roast chicken. It will roust you from the deepest winter doldrums.

What's not so simple is a) finding puntarelle, and b) prepping them. They're not yet available in most supermarkets, or even at most farmers' markets. But I keep hearing more and more about them, and as our interest in this, and other more obscure vegetables ~ hello cardoons! ~ grows I'm hoping availability will follow.

I found these through a California company called Royal Rose. Or, I should say, they found me. They emailed asking for permission to post my recipe for Chicory Salad with Anchovy Dressing from The Glorious Vegetables of Italy on their Facebook page. When I said yes (of course!), they graciously offered to send along some samples. Royal Rose, which also cultivates several types of radicchio, sells mainly to chefs and retailers. But they're getting a growing number of requests from individuals, so they've created this card, which allows you to request their products from your grocer. It's a step.

Also, if you happen to be a gardener, Seeds from Italy has several different varieties of puntarelle. They also sell seeds for dozens of other chicories with fabulous names like Pan di Zucchero (sugar loaf) and Cuor d'Oro (gold heart), and more than a dozen types of radicchio.

Now for the prepping, which takes a little time and some elbow grease, but isn't difficult and is certainly worth the bit of effort required. Produce vendors in Rome use this clever wire grid gadget to make quick work of it. But we just have our knife and cutting board so that's what we're going to use.

First, remove the skinny outer leaves (above), which you won't need for the salad ~ you can sauté those with garlic in olive oil or save them for soup. Pull or cut apart the fat, hollow stems at the core of the head (shown in the second photo). These are white on the bottom, with pale green asparagus-like tips.

Now cut off the tough bottom part of the stem.

Slice those stems in half lengthwise, and then slice each half into long, thin strips. They don't have to be perfect.

Here's another shot of the sliced stems.

Fill a large bowl with ice water and plunge your sliced puntarelle stems into it. Let them soak for a good hour. After about 30 minutes, you'll see them begin to curl.

When they're done soaking, drain them in a colander; then pat them dry with a clean kitchen towel or paper towels. At this point you can either dress them with your anchovy vinaigrette or put them in a bag and store them in the refrigerator for a couple of hours.

Make your anchovy dressing (this one is not traditional, but I love it on puntarelle):
1. In a small bowl, mix together 1 teaspoon fine salt with 1 pressed garlic clove to form a paste.

2. Whisk in 4 chopped best-quality anchovy fillets (I like Rizzoli Alici in Salsa Piccante) and 1 tablespoon of the anchovy oil.

3. Whisk in 1 tablespoon smooth Dijon mustard, 1 tablespoon mayonnaise (Duke’s or Hellman’s), 2 dashes of Worcestershire Sauce, and the juice of 1/2 lemon (a juicy one).

Serve your salad:
Arrange your prepped puntarelle on a large, deep platter or salad bowl and drizzle the dressing over them. Grind a little black pepper on top, toss and serve.

By the way, don't despair if you can't find puntarelle. You can make this salad with other types of chicory, including frisée, radicchio, or leaves of Belgian endive, which you can slice into long strips (a tip I learned from Marcella Hazan). Whichever greens (or reds) you use, be sure to soak them in ice water, which will give them extra crunch and curl.