''Bagna càuda'' (; ), also spelled ''bagna caouda'' in

Alpes-Maritimes Alpes-Maritimes (; ; ; ) is a Departments of France, department of France located in the country's southeast corner, on the France–Italy border, Italian border and Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean coast. Part of the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'A ...

, is a hot dish made with garlic,

anchovies An anchovy is a small, common forage fish of the family Engraulidae. Most species are found in marine waters, but several will enter brackish water, and some in South America are restricted to fresh water. More than 140 species are placed in 1 ...

red wine Red wine is a type of wine made from dark-colored grape varieties - (red grapes.) The color of the wine can range from intense violet, typical of young wines, through to brick red for mature wines and brown for older red wines. The juice fro ...

, and extra virgin olive oil, typical of Lower Piedmont, a geographical region of

Piedmont Piedmont ( ; ; ) is one of the 20 regions of Italy, located in the northwest Italy, Northwest of the country. It borders the Liguria region to the south, the Lombardy and Emilia-Romagna regions to the east, and the Aosta Valley region to the ...

, Italy, and

Provence Provence is a geographical region and historical province of southeastern France, which stretches from the left bank of the lower Rhône to the west to the France–Italy border, Italian border to the east; it is bordered by the Mediterrane ...

, France. The dish is served and consumed in a manner similar to

fondue Fondue ( , , , ; ) is a Swiss dish of melted cheese and wine served in a communal pot ( or fondue pot) over a portable stove () heated with a candle or spirit lamp, and eaten by dipping bread and sometimes vegetables or other foods into the c ...

, sometimes as an

appetizer An hors d'oeuvre ( ; ), appetiser, appetizer or starter is a small dish served before a meal in European cuisine. Some hors d'oeuvres are served cold, others hot. Hors d'oeuvres may be served at the dinner table as a part of the meal, or th ...

, with raw or cooked vegetables typically used to dip into it.

Overview

''Bagna càuda'' is a hot dish and

dipping sauce A dip or dipping sauce is a common condiment for many types of food. Dips are used to add flavor or texture to a food, such as pita bread, dumplings, crackers, chopped raw vegetables, fruits, seafood, cubed pieces of meat and cheese, potato ch ...

Piedmontese Piedmontese ( ; autonym: or ; ) is a language spoken by some 2,000,000 people mostly in Piedmont, a region of Northwest Italy. Although considered by most linguists a separate language, in Italy it is often mistakenly regarded as an Italian ...

and Provençal cuisine, used to dip vegetables in. It is prepared using olive oil, chopped anchovies, and garlic. Additional ingredients sometimes used include truffle and salt. Raw or cooked vegetables are dipped into the sauce, which is typically kept hot on a serving table using a heat source such as a candle or burner. Cardoon (edible thistle) is often dipped in the sauce. Additional foods used to dip into it include

cabbage Cabbage, comprising several cultivars of '' Brassica oleracea'', is a leafy green, red (purple), or white (pale green) biennial plant grown as an annual vegetable crop for its dense-leaved heads. It is descended from the wild cabbage ( ''B.& ...

celery Celery (''Apium graveolens'' Dulce Group or ''Apium graveolens'' var. ''dulce'') is a cultivated plant belonging to the species ''Apium graveolens'' in the family Apiaceae that has been used as a vegetable since ancient times. The original wild ...

carrot The carrot ('' Daucus carota'' subsp. ''sativus'') is a root vegetable, typically orange in colour, though heirloom variants including purple, black, red, white, and yellow cultivars exist, all of which are domesticated forms of the wild ...

Jerusalem artichoke The Jerusalem artichoke (''Helianthus tuberosus''), also called sunroot, sunchoke, wild sunflower, topinambur, or earth apple, is a species of Helianthus, sunflower native to central North America. It is cultivated widely across the temperate z ...

, pepper,

fennel Fennel (''Foeniculum vulgare'') is a flowering plant species in the carrot family. It is a hardy, perennial herb with yellow flowers and feathery leaves. It is indigenous to the shores of the Mediterranean but has become widely naturalized ...

, and bread. It is sometimes served as an appetizer. In the past,

walnut A walnut is the edible seed of any tree of the genus '' Juglans'' (family Juglandaceae), particularly the Persian or English walnut, '' Juglans regia''. They are accessory fruit because the outer covering of the fruit is technically an i ...

oil or

hazelnut The hazelnut is the fruit of the hazel tree and therefore includes any of the nuts deriving from species of the genus '' Corylus'', especially the nuts of the species ''Corylus avellana''. They are also known as cobnuts or filberts according to ...

oil would have been used. Sometimes,

truffle A truffle is the Sporocarp (fungi), fruiting body of a subterranean ascomycete fungus, one of the species of the genus ''Tuber (fungus), Tuber''. More than one hundred other genera of fungi are classified as truffles including ''Geopora'', ''P ...

s are used in versions around the Italian ''

comune A (; : , ) is an administrative division of Italy, roughly equivalent to a township or municipality. It is the third-level administrative division of Italy, after regions () and provinces (). The can also have the City status in Italy, titl ...

'' (municipality) of

Alba ''Alba'' ( , ) is the Scottish Gaelic name for Scotland. It is also, in English-language historiography, used to refer to the polity of Picts and Scots united in the ninth century as the Kingdom of Alba, until it developed into the Kingd ...

, in the Piedmont region. It is traditionally eaten during the autumn and winter months, particularly at Christmas and New Year's, and must be served hot, as the name suggests.

Consumption in North and South America

It is also a popular winter dish in central

Argentina Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic, is a country in the southern half of South America. It covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest country in South America after Brazil, the fourt ...

and prevalent in Clinton, Indiana; Rock Springs, Wyoming; Coal City, Morris, and Benld, Illinois; as there were many northern Italian immigrants to those places. ''Bagna càuda'' was also prepared in the coal-mining community of Madison County, Illinois (including Collinsville, Edwardsville, and Maryville), due to the numerous Italian immigrants that came there to work in the mines.

History

''Bagna càuda'' has been a part of Piedmontese cuisine since the 16th century. The recipe is typical of Lower Piedmont, a geographical region of

, Italy, as in past centuries in that area it was very easy to obtain the salted

anchovy An anchovy is a small, common forage fish of the Family (biology), family Engraulidae. Most species are found in marine waters, but several will enter brackish water, and some in South America are restricted to fresh water. More than 140 speci ...

, the fundamental ingredient, still used today in many typical Piedmontese recipes, especially among appetizers, for example, ''anciove al bagnet verd'' or ''al bagnet ross''. Ancient Piedmont obtained its salt from the saline of

and the mouths of the Rhône, through a series of commercial routes crossing the passes of the

Maritime Alps The Maritime Alps ( ; ) are a mountain range in the southwestern part of the Alps. They form the border between the regions of France, French region of Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur and the regions of Italy, Italian regions of Piedmont and Liguria ...

and known as "salt roads"; in fact at the time

Nice Nice ( ; ) is a city in and the prefecture of the Alpes-Maritimes department in France. The Nice agglomeration extends far beyond the administrative city limits, with a population of nearly one millionSavoyard. Legend has it that the trade in salted anchovies was a way to trade salt, thus avoiding paying the high duties: tubs full of salt presented a layer of salted anchovies in the upper part to the control of the tax collectors. In reality, throughout the Piedmont of the old regime, the salt

gabelle The ''gabelle'' () was a very unpopular French salt tax that was established during the mid-14th century and lasted, with brief lapses and revisions, until 1946. The term ''gabelle'' is derived from the Italian ''gabella'' (a duty), itself orig ...

was a compulsory tax and not linked to consumption. Not only that, salted anchovies were much more expensive and their price was sustainable only in relation to the modest purchase quantities. The "anchovy seller" (''ancióaire'' in

Piedmontese language Piedmontese ( ; autonym: or ; ) is a language spoken by some 2,000,000 people mostly in Piedmont, a region of Northwest Italy. Although considered by most linguists a separate Romance languages, language, in Italy it is often mistakenly regar ...

) was the itinerant merchant who with the typical cart pulled by horses or oxen brought the anchovies in barrels and wooden casks. ''Bagna càuda'' was rejected for a long time by the wealthier classes, who considered it a coarse food and unsuitable for a refined diet, in particular, due to the presence of garlic and the effects of its intake on the breath, where it remains for a considerable time (in some cases even up to twenty-four hours). For this reason, written information about this dish is rather rare in Piedmontese gastronomic texts. The first detailed description of ''bagna càuda'' in its current version is due to and dates back to 1875.

Similar dishes

''Pinzimonio'' is a similar

made with olive oil, salt, pepper, and occasionally wine vinegar, which is served with raw vegetables and is typically served cold.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bagna cauda Cuisine of Piedmont Anchovy dishes Creamy sauces Dips (food) Fish sauces Garlic dishes

Overview

Consumption in North and South America

History

Similar dishes

See also

References