Miagawerita

I have mentioned on a number of occasions that Italians aren’t adventurous when it comes to food and drink. They tend to be very parochial, sticking to what they know well. And they don’t really need to apologize for that. After all, how many people visit Italy to eat at a fill-in-your-favorite non-Italian-ethnic-or-regional-food restaurant? Still, it goes deeper than that. They are such creatures of habit that some won’t even eat pasta for a meal other than lunch. Ask them why and they don’t know. It is just the way they were brought up.

Some cuisines also use ingredients which do not appeal to the Italian palate. One example is Mexican food. The climate of both countries is similar; the same kinds of crops grow in both places. They share a Latin sensibility of time and urgency. And yet REALLY hot spices are hard to find in Italian food and cilantro is basically taboo. To many Italians cilantro has an unpleasant taste I have been told is not unlike eating soap. Limes are also almost impossible to find which is interesting given the amount of citrus grown and eaten in Italy. Thus, it is nearly impossible to find the ingredients for Mexican food in all but large cities. Here in Viterbo there is a single ethnic market selling not only ingredients for Mexican food, but all of the Asian and Indian cuisines as well. And it is a tiny two room shop that barely survives.

In late September a unique opportunity arises when the miagawi hit the fruit and vegetable stores. The miagawa is a cross between a grapefruit and a clementine. It has a green to yellow skin when ripe and is orange-pink inside.

The combination of grapefruit tartness and clementine sweetness makes it a nearly perfect substitute for limes in a margarita.

We recently tried it out and thus was born the Miagawerita, available for a limited time only while the fruit lasts! Yes, that is a 2 liter bottle which is over 3/4 full. All in a day's work.