Mamma Mia! This Recipe for "Winter Caprese Salad" Will Transport Your Tastebuds to Capri
CULTURE

Mamma Mia! This Recipe for "Winter Caprese Salad" Will Transport Your Tastebuds to Capri

Our friends at MAMMAMIA share a winter-y take on the classic Caprese Salad. The light and tasty recipe, as well as their infused chocolate almond cake, both originate on the island of Capri. Dig in!

Published on December 5, 2017

MAMMAMIA is a California-based edibles company run by some cool fucking Italian dudes who can seriously whip in the kitchen — like, hurricane wrist style. Originally from Salerno, chef Simone D'Antonio started the brand to add some classic Italian flare to the world of infused cuisine, and they make an almond flour chocolate cake that will make you weep with joy.

As the MERRY JANE team knows all too well, these G's can take any recipe and bring it from a 10 to an 11, thanks to their magic touch. To get a taste of their culinary wisdom, the MAMMAMIA fam will be sharing an Italian recipe with MERRY JANE on the regular, including instructions how to make the meals both with and without THC. Peep their last installment here.

Today's recipe was inspired by a recent visit to the Di Stefano Cheese factory, a family-owned business in Southern California that takes credit for introducing burrata to the North American palette. The company also specializes in mascarpone, ricotta, Scamorza, Caciocavallo, and mozzarella — the latter which is a key ingredient for the Winter Caprese dish we're sharing. Shout-out to Di Stefano Cheese!

Above, Simone of MAMMAMIA, and Noah Rubin (Editor-in-Chief of MERRY JANE), make magic in the kitchen. Photo by Zach Sokol

Before we breakdown the recipe steps, MAMMAMIA had this historical anecdote to share:

Insalata Caprese dates back to 1920, when it first appeared on the menu at the famous Hotel Quisisana of Capri for an event organized in honor of Filippo Tommaso Marinetti, a poet and founder of the Futurist Movement. It's said that Marinetti had repeatedly criticized traditional Parthenopeo cooking for being too fatty. Thus, in order to astonish the writer and his colleagues, the restaurateur at Hotel Quisisana inserted the Caprese Salad among the courses — a light but tasty dish that had a striking success! From then on, the salad became a legend on the island of Capri and subsequently a gastronomic icon of Campania and all of Italy. Plus, the dish's colors — red, white, and green — recall the country's flag.

Worth mentioning, MAMMAMIA's infused chocolate almond cake was inspired by traditional Torta Caprese, and their recipe today is a winter-y take on the classic Caprese Salad. In other words, serving these dishes together makes for the ideal Campania culinary experience to electrify your tastebuds.

While "Winter Caprese" does not exist in traditional Italian recipes, the ingredients MAMMAMIA includes — including rapini — are all in-season. Not to mention, sauteed rapini is also a traditional recipe from the Campania region of Italy, as is mozzarella. Simone says the bitterness of the rapini perfectly complements the sweetness of the mozzarella. Peep their recipe below!

Winter Caprese Salad

Ingredients:

1 rapini bunch
1 habanero pepper
2 garlic cloves
2 balls of Di Stefano mozzarella
Squid ink bread
5 sundried tomatoes
2 tablespoon cannabis oil

Sauteed Rapini Instructions:

The first important step is to clean the rapini. We wanna make sure we're using only the buds and leafs, so begin by splitting the leafs and buds from the stems.

Next, slice the garlic and habanero peppers and cook them in oil over medium heat in a large skillet until the garlic sizzles. Add the rapini — as much as you can fit in a pan at a time — and sprinkle with salt (the salt will help release the water from the rapini). Keep the pan covered and cook for 10 minutes until it's simmering. Cook for another five minutes without the cover to let the water dry.

Plating Instructions:

Plate the rapini over a grilled peace of bread, add a few sun dried tomatoes, and finish with the mozzarella.

Wine Pairing Suggestions:

Marisa Cuomo Fiorduva is fermented for about three months in oak barrique. The wine is bright yellow with golden hues. The scent is reminiscent of apricots and broom flowers, with a hint of tropical fruit. The taste is smooth and will perfectly balance the bitterness of our appetizer.

Cannabis Oil Instructions:

(Makes about 3.5 cups, at 81mg of THC per cup)

2 ounces of cannabis flower
2 cups of olive oil

Start decarbing the weed for 40 min at 160 degrees fahrenheit, to transform the THCA to THC. Place olive oil and cannabis in a crockpot, and set the crockpot on low. Simmer for 8 hours, stir occasionally.

Place cheesecloth inside strainer and pour the oil through while it's still warm to catch cannabis solids. Squeeze every last bit of oil out of the cheesecloth and compost the remains. Voila!

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