Nothing beats nanna’s food! Here are 3 recipes from 3 Maltese nannas to try for yourself
We'll just have one more helping...
Tan-nanna helu manna - this Maltese expression basically means that granny’s food is always better, sweeter and so totally moreish. The good thing is that she’s always willing to feed you and there’s always some extra left in the pot. God forbid someone goes hungry at nanna’s table!
There are so many reasons why nanna’s food is better - maybe it’s the ancient cauldrons she calls pots, or the gentle hands that pinch the salt as she throws it into the boiling water. I wonder what it is which makes us love her cooking the most. Is there a secret ingredient which has us clamouring for more?
To find out, we're revisiting three recipes - two savoury and one sweet - from three great nannas, two of which are my own and one is someone I’ve inherited so proudly through marriage. Here we go!
Nanna Margaret’s red sauce
This tomato sauce is unbelievable. Growing up I never understood what my nanna could have done to make this basic sauce so mind-blowingly good. Luckily, I lived with her for three or four months during my teenage years and found out some of her deepest secrets. I haven’t asked permission to share this, so these words may very well be my last.
Red sauce recipe
A generous portion of fresh tomatoes, the long and dark type, are blanched in hot, salted water until the skin start to come off. They are then peeled entirely and roughly chopped. A large frying pan is then unleashed from the cupboard and heated. Nanna would place her hand over the pan and make sure it was hot before she'd threw in quite a large amount of olive oil, followed by garlic which was gently fried in the pan.
Kunserva is added to the pot and cooked off to bring out the sweetness; a teaspoon of sugar follows. The fresh, peeled tomatoes are added and cooked down, with a spot of bouillon, to balance out the sweetness. This need to cook on a low flame for some time. Nanna always added some salt to the tomatoes after they cooked to help bring out the flavours and she would then whip out a large tablespoon, pick up some sauce and plunge it directly into her mouth. It is at that point that she would nod and say, ‘good, ready’. She’d boil some spaghetti (always no. 5) and serve it al dente with a big ladle of sauce and about half a wheel of parmigiano.
This is something I’d kill for - any time, any day of the week.
Nanna Mary’s pulpetti
This is one I didn’t really grow up with. I grew up vegetarian so my mother’s version was pretty different to this one. Also, this is a dish I only started eating in recent years as this Nanna Mary (yes, there are two of them - every Maltese family has at least one) is my nanna-in-law. She knows I love them so whenever I visit her, she’s always proud to say, “I made you pulpetti today - you like them ux?”
Pulpetti recipe
This all starts with quite a few potatoes - about 3 per person for a main course portion. Nanna Mary boils them in salted water and allows them to become rather soft, but not too much - they need to retain their texture. Once boiled, she strains them and allows them to cool completely. Once they've gone down to room temperature, or just about, she adds a tin of corned beef, fresh garlic and parsely, an egg and edam cheese. She sprinkles salt and pepper and she begins to form the patties into rounds. By the end of it all, they are pretty much identical. They get coated in flour and are carefully placed on a dish, covered and left to set in the fridge. Later, she takes them out and shallow fries them, resulting in the crispiest, fluffiest corned beef patties you’ll ever try! There’s never any leftovers here though - especially when I’m around.
Nanna Mary’s bread pudding
This is the nanna Mary - my nanna Mary who fed me throughout my childhood and who always prepared home cooked meals whenever my sister and I visited. Our fondest memory has to be her pancakes, which would tower over our breakfast plates well before we took our seats on a day-off school. But since these are not entirely Maltese, I’ll let you in on another of her secrets: the coveted bread pudding.
Bread pudding recipe
It all starts with day-old bread that’s soaked in infused milk. Nanna Mary's choice of flavour here is dessicated coconut which gives the entire dish a new and exotic flavour. Once the bread has soaked up enough moisture and flavour, the rest of the ingredients are added to the strained bread, eggs, butter, sugar, chocolate powder, raisins, chopped almonds and a few glace cherries. These beauties are mixed together and baked till the top browns, the inside is squiggy and the bottom is slightly burnt, with the crispiest bits at the corners.
These are three magical dishes by three wonderful women who throughout my life and, in recent years, have shared their wisdom and their sacred kitchens.