People are divided into two: those who love butter and those who also choose margarine indifferently. Rika used to be one of those in the second group. In the fridge she had a stick of margarine because butter costs a lot and was difficult to find. It happens in Butter, a novel by Asamo Suzuki (HarperCollins). But then the protagonist changes her mind. And she does it in prison, when she meets Manako Kajii, the main suspect in three deaths that occurred in mysterious circumstances in the Tokyo metropolitan area. Mannaro is also a food blogger and teaches Rika, a journalist who wants to interview her, the pleasure of food and butter in particular.
The book is based on a real-life case, the “Konkatsu Killer,” in which a con artist and talented home cook named Kanae Kijima was convicted of poisoning three of her male lovers. But it is also an opportunity to reflect on how Japanese women are judged by society. Rika will try to get Manako to tell her story, and to convince her she will use her love for food.
The descriptions of the desserts are extraordinary. Asamo Suzuki studied pastry making before writing the novel.
A TV series, worth binge watching
It’s been out for a while now but it’s worth catching up on. The story told is true and concerns a news story that actually happened in Spain. You will find a lot of the protagonists of La Casa de Papel, including the main actress: Úrsula Corberó (Tokyo era). Few episodes, with a plot that will also seem exaggerated. Except that in the end Netflix will also recommend you as a sequel to On Fire, the documentary with the story of Rosa Pedral who gave an interview at the end of the trial. The case in Spain is known as the Guardia Urbana Crime, which occurred in Barcelona on the night between 1 and 2 May 2017.
A Date (on YouTube)
On June 3, 2024 Michela Murgia would have turned 52. Mondadori and the Carcano Theater in Milan, where she was at home, celebrated her with her closest friends and with the screening of unreleased video content. On stage, Lella Costa, Teresa Ciabatti, Marcello Fois, Alessandro Giammei, Alessio Vannetti and Fabio Calabrò will remember her. The event, free of charge, is sold out. The full video of the evening will be available in the days following the event on the Mondadori YouTube channel. Michela Murgia’s new book, Remember me as you like, just published by Mondadori, is indeed her autobiography, but also a testimony to everything she leaves us as a legacy. “If they had asked me what I wanted to do I would have answered: “I want to change the world”. I certainly haven’t changed it all, but the part of time I’ve lived through perhaps couldn’t be called what it is if I hadn’t been there”.
On the eve of a death that found her joyful like a martyr capable of singing while advancing towards the lions, Michela Murgia spent a week telling herself about herself to Beppe Cottafavi, her editor and friend. The recordings of her last summer, still full of stories as the fifty previous ones had been, give substance to this extraordinary book of hers, enriched by four splendid rediscovered stories and other lost texts that the author has chosen and indicated among a memory and the other.
A recipe to save
There are things to grasp quickly. Fragolina di Tortona is definitely one of these. The “perfumed”, this is the official name even if it has always been known as the Fragolina, is a small strawberry, a Slow Food Presidium, grown exclusively in the Tortona area: as large as a raspberry, firm, aromatic and very fragrant, it is also rare, it is found only for 20 days a year approximately from the end of May to mid-June.
Anna Ghisolfi, chef from Tortona (in Piazzetta Giulia), dedicates a spring menu to this typical fruit – which, having almost disappeared, has been proudly recovered by a group of producers.
“Mine are recipes of memory and memory of taste – explains the Chef -. I use simple ingredients, possibly local, and my personal challenge is to play with the appearance they have, re-propose them in different consistencies, transform them and make what is unexpected and surprising who knows each other very well.”
Anna Ghisolfi’s symbolic dish, which expresses the essence of spring, is “Rice, strawberries, tomatoes and the scent of roses” where the Tortona strawberry marries the classic strawberries, their aromas mix and are enhanced, enhanced by the rose that smells of the countryside in this time.
A dish to try at home too, here is the recipe.
Ingredients (5 people)
For the tomato and strawberry sauce. 300 g of strawberries; 300 g ripe tomatoes; fresh garlic; laurel, savory; 20 g of olive oil, salt
For the rice. 250 g of Carnaroli rice; 750 g vegetable broth or water; onion; white wine to blend the tomato and strawberry sauce; olive oil, salt, toasted capers, dried strawberries, tomatoes, candied datterini tomatoes, scented roses
How to proceed. Stew the strawberries and tomatoes with a spoonful of oil, the garlic and the herbs until the vegetable water has evaporated and you obtain the consistency of a classic sauce. Toast the rice with the onion cut in half, add the white wine, add the broth and half of the previously obtained tomato and strawberry sauce. Cook for 8 minutes on high heat. Strain the rice, cool it in the refrigerator and recover the broth. Blend the recovered broth with the other half of the sauce to obtain a sort of pink and fragrant cream.
At the last moment, cook the rice in a saucepan, gradually adding the blended broth. It will take a few minutes and thanks to the starches in the broth, the rice will be creamy without the need for creaming. Season with salt and pink pepper. Finish with toasted capers, dried strawberry slices, candied datterini tomatoes and roasted rose petals.
