When did the habit of cooking dried cod (baccalà) the way we best know and that is famous worldwide become established? "The story goes that in 1269 the inhabitants of Vicenza who were trying to assault the Castle of Montebello, defended by the Veronese, thus answered to the guards ordering them to stop: how nice! We bring polenta (maize porridge) and baccalà. And soon afterward the gluttonous Veronese flung the gate wide..." As everybody knows, baccalà is fighting against Palladio to dominate as the symbol of Vicenza all over the world. More than four centuries ago (1432) an expedition under the Venetian captain Pietro Querini's orders was shipwrecked in Rost, one of the most remote among the Lofoten Islands, off Norway, and there, owing to a peculiar long-term effect as a result of that adventurous landing, people still cherish Vicenza deep in their hearts. The credit for such popularity should be taken by the stockfish (or dried cod) Captain Querini brought back home with him and which inspired some enlightened gourmets with the creation, by previous treatment, of the dish called baccalà, to be best served with polenta. The inhabitants of Vicenza looked upon stockfish as a an alternative to the expensive fresh fish which, moreover, went bad quite soon. In October 1580, at the beginning of the Palladian Era, Michel de Montaigne arrives in Vicenza; Vicenza appears to him as "a big town.... full of noble palaces", but nothing more than this In his famous "Journal de Voyage en Italie", he leaves poor notes about Vicenza but his literary enthusiasm revives only when writing about a meal including the famous " national dish" of the inhabitants of Vicenza: baccalà.

"SIORA VITTORIA", THE CONCEIVER OF "BACCALA' ALLA VICENTINA "1890 : far-off time, almost unreal.. The town was dozing: the titled people used to meet at their circle, which was precisely called "noble's club", and they used to spend long evenings in virtuosities of billiard or commenting on gazettes; young ladies, chaperoned by watchful mothers, walked at sunset along the Corso with café "Cavour" as a destination to enjoy an orange juice or an icecream to gluttonously sip. One of the most popular meeting place was the trattoria "Polenta e baccala' " opened by Mrs Giuseppina Terribile in Bianco, friendly nicknamed "siora Vitoria". "Siora Vitoria" shortly became a real institution for the town.
Around midday on Mondays, the day of the week which was especially consacrated to goldsmiths' outings, Siora Vitoria's trattoria was crowded with customers who cheerfully enjoyed the typical dish from Vicenza, the only infallible recipe whereof belonged to the selfsame innkeeper.." A good choice of raw material, plenty of very good oil, little concoction and a lot of cookery which means preparation and very slow cooking..
" Orders and exclamation of satisfaction met in every dining room, from courtyard to courtyard ". In the following years "Siora Vitoria" still went on looking the same as ever: the popularity of "bacalà alla vicentina ", in the meantime, had passed the borders of the province; cars, first noisy but slow, then slender and slender, more and more silent and modern stopped by the trattoria: elegant ladies and fashionably dressed lords got out, they stopped in the shade of the pergola and enjoyed our traditional dish.
The clock of time has been telling many an hour, but the "baccalà alla vicentina", siora Vitoria's personal creation, still attracts customers from every place in the province and from other regions. -bon apetito (enjoy your meal in Venetian dialect)!- the old nice landlady seems to say from the photograph that dominates on a wall in the big hall.
And her eyes are shining. Perhaps she feels nostalgia for the cooking stove in her kitchen..

(edited by TETO LUCANGELI)

BACCALA' OR STOCKFISH?
Baccala' !! It is a synonym for a tasty encounter, a great gourmet dainty, which has been punctually repeated on Friday every week for centuries now. Right because of this tradition, which is rooted in people, the inhabitants of Vicenza, meticulous when customs are concerned, refuse to change that word, which is made up of centuries of history but nonetheless mistaken in its genuine etymon. The Baccalà that people from Vicenza have in mind, honour and enjoy, is nothing less than dried cod or stockfish. The names baccalà and stockfish, actually express two different ways of treating the same fish: the cod, or "gadus morrhua", from the Gadidae family, a bony fish belonging to the suborder of Anacantinae. The choice of different treatments is due to precise climatic and environmental conditions necessary for its preservation. The Gadidae family has a good 140 species which are themselves grouped in 15 genres. Norway, Iceland, Greenland, The Baltic Sea and Terranova, where the water is clean and freezing, are very teeming with this fish. The vulgar cod, also known as hake, is to be found in the Mediterranean Sea, but it has different characteristics. The one we are interested in is Gadus Morrhua of the Teleost order, it is greenish or brown in colour, with yellow speckles on its back and a white line on both sides, its belly being brownish. It can be from 1 to 1,5 meters long can weight about 50 kilograms.
The Lofoten Islands are a fishing centre on the northern Norwegian coast which swarm with thousands of fishing boats between December and April. Fishing is carried out with nets and hooks. Sqids fish slices are used as baits. Therefore "baccalà" is not actually baccalà, its name is dried cod or stockfish (stoccafisso in Italian): people from Vicenza perfectly know the difference between the both of them but still go on and will go on calling dried cod "baccalà". Why then? It is not a matter of ignorance, rather a sensible and deliberate terminological dissimilarity suggested by a phonetic reason. It suited them well also because "baccalà" was more similar to our Venetian dialect and its pronunciation was easier than "stoccafisso". The name, therefore, although incorrect, will be resisting for centuries and still continues today, so much so that it gives rise to discussions and not little confusion among the other Italians who are used to call baccalà fresh or salted cod and stockfish the cod which has been dried by the northern winds.

(edited by ALDO DALL'IGNA)

THE TREATMENT THAT IDENTIFIES AND DISTINGUISHES BACCALA' FROM STOCKFISH
Once the cod has been fished and its head, fins, tail and intestine have been removed while still on the boat, it is immediately stocked in barrels with plentiful of salt that ensures its drying up and long-term preservation. This is baccalà. When cod, on the contrary, is wharfed and dried on wooden grills for months at a temperature of about 0° degrees, and it is exposed to cold air and to the faint sunbeams of a northern sky, it is called stockfish, the name being made up of stock (stick) and fish. In fact it thus appears in form and toughness. What is then the reason for such different treatments? The reason may be found in environmental conditions during fishing periods, since the treatment must favour the preservation of fish. It is obvious that cod, being fished in winter at the highest latitudes and in the coldest waters, is easily suitable to drying up, since it is exposed to cold air. In summer, on the contrary, when temperature rises and yet fishing goes on, this proceeding is no more feasible since fish is in danger of going bad and it is difficult to preserve it. The problem is solved with the method of barrels and salt. Cod is split and cleaned, abundantly salted in barrels ready on board of fishing boats.
Therefore baccalà may be defined as book-like split, cleaned, deboned, salted and barrelled cod. Stockfish is split cod, but it is dried out in the cold northern air, exposed on Norwegian wooden grills for a long time and caressed by that feeble light which seems to surface again through simmering oil on Vicenza-style stoves when terra cotta slowly warms up on the fire.
A further precise piece of information: the best quality is the one called "spider".

La copertina del quaderno contenente gli atti dell'incontro di studio "Vicenza e la tradizione del baccalà" a cura dell'Accademia Italiana della Cucina.

La copertina dell'opuscolo promozionale pubblicato dalla delegazione di Vicenza dell'Accademia italiana della Cucina su iniziativa di Vicenza Qualità e dell'Ente Fiera di Vicenza.

Click here for to know Sandrigo.	BACALA'S PARTY AGENDA IN SANDRIGO The party is to the last Saturday and Sunday of September

ODE AL BACALA' e la sò confraternita

L' OMELIA DEL PRIORE VIRGILIO SCAPIN