These beans are a photographic joy! They are variegated in colors and their shape is full of undulations!

These Vicia faba are from Sardinia and they are especially special!

Fava beans, scientifically known as Vicia faba, have a long history that spans thousands of years, with evidence of their cultivation dating back to ancient civilizations.

These beans are believed to be one of the first domesticated crops, with their origins in the Near East, around 6,000 to 8,000 years ago. Their widespread cultivation eventually spread to other parts of the world, including Europe, North Africa, and Asia.

Fava beans were cultivated by ancient Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans. In ancient Egypt, fava beans were often used in religious rituals, and they were sometimes buried with the dead as offerings to the gods.

In ancient Rome, fava beans were a staple food for both the poor and the wealthy. The Romans used fava beans in a variety of dishes, often cooked with olive oil, garlic, and other vegetables.

They also believed that the beans had medicinal properties and were used to treat ailments such as ulcers, gastrointestinal issues, and even relieve colic.

Fava beans are an excellent source of protein, fiber, vitamins (particularly folate), and minerals like iron, magnesium, and potassium.

Favas are one of the few varieties of beans that contain a compound called levodopa (L-DOPA), which is used in the treatment of Parkinson's disease. Historically, they have been used in some cultures for medicinal purposes, although modern medicine now uses synthetic L-DOPA for treating Parkinson's.

How cool is that!

All this is cool stuff, but the best thing about these beans is the recipes that have evolved and been created around them! That and they are strangely gorgeous....

Shop now for Sardinian Dried Fava Beans!

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Simple, fast, easy and you can add almost anything you want to the base to make it your own. And you can dress it up when you're done, as well.

See the Easy Fava Bean Creamy Soup Recipe here!

Semolina Rimacinata flour is perfect for making dried pasta.

Made with a 100% hard durum wheat which has a high glutenous content of 12.5% and if finely milled achieves a very fine, like powdered sugar, texture.

This flour grind produces a smooth and elastic dough that's ideal for making pasta and pizza. Durum wheat is known for its high protein and gluten content, which gives pasta and bread a desirable texture when cooked or baked.

You can also use it 50/50 with chef's or all-purpose flour when making fresh egg-based pasta to achieve a slightly firmer "al dente" texture.

Shop Now for Caputo Semolina Flour!

Minestrone is a classic Italian soup that dates back to ancient times. The word "minestrone" is derived from "minestra," which means "soup" or "dish" in Italian, and "one," meaning large. The soup has evolved over centuries, but is characterized by its use of a variety of vegetables, beans, pasta, and sometimes meat.

Minestrone was originally a peasant dish, made from whatever vegetables were in season or leftovers from other meals. This is why the recipe can vary widely by region and season. It's particularly common in the colder months when root vegetables and beans were staples. The soup is traditionally made with ingredients like tomatoes, onions, garlic, beans, carrots, celery, and spinach or other greens, as well as small pasta or rice.

The recipe for Fava Bean Minestrone evolved as regional variations of minestrone spread across Italy. Some versions use just fava beans, while others might combine them with other beans, like cannellini or borlotti beans, to create a heartier dish. The soup may also include ingredients like zucchini, leeks, or greens such as kale or chard, depending on what's in season.

See the Sardinian Fava Bean Minestrone Recipe here!

Dried cranberry Beans (also known as borlotti beans) are cream-colored and speckled with red. They're very popular in Spanish, Italian and Portuguese cuisine. When cooked they lose their speckles, and have a distinct and delicious nutty flavor.

Shop now for Cranberry Beans!

Smaller in stature than their brother, the York, these dried garbanzo beans swell to the challenge by 15% after soaking. These really smooth beans, with a bit of nuttiness, are a favorite with chefs wanting to make the very best hummus. As versatile as all garbanzo pedrosillanos are, they also are great in salads and soups.

How are these garbanzo pedrosillanos different than the commodity beans you see in the market? Traceable and fresh. From planting to harvest, from bagging to us, every bean has a route we know! It's this freshness that makes them better. I expect the natural growing process doesn't hurt, either.

Shop now for Pedrosillano Cafe Garbanzo Beans!

Don't be fooled by this can's diminutive size. This can of olive oil is 500 mL just like all those much taller glass bottles.

From a practical standpoint, I like this can. Remove the plastic ring, then pull up and you get a little spout which works perfectly. If you have a small apartment or a yacht, this is the right size can for you.

To the nose, you can smell the ripe olives inside.

To the eyes, it's a rich olive green. It's a rich, yellow olive green.

To the tip of the tongue there's lots of flavor and taste: artichoke, banana, a classic taste of a full-bodied olive oil. It is a very inviting olive oil.

The first sip emphasizes the same flavors, but comes across rounder and in some ways fuller.

There is an ever light presence of pepper in the back of the throat. The pepper is a very broad point with the classic bitterness on the edge of the tongue. The sharpness is more muted than usual.

Very nicely rounded oil very, very enjoyable.

It has a very nice finish that warms your chest!

Shop now for Fattoria di Petroio Tuscan Olive Oil here!

Passata, loosely translated as tomato puree, is made at home during the months when tomatoes are fully ripe in southern Italy and Sardinia.

These slow-cooked tomatoes from Sardinia have their skins and seeds strained out before the sauce is bottled. The low temperature preserves all the super aromatic, fresh tomato flavor, whereas a typical tomato sauce that's been long simmered has much less vibrant tomato presence.

Use this bottle of Posardi Passata tomatoes when making lasagna, eggplant parm, or a simple bowl of spaghetti. It's also a superstar in soups and meat stews.

Stuff a tomato with cooked wild rice, caramelized onions, and a spoonful of passata and bake until the tomato is easily pierced. Glorious!

And perhaps the best way to make your life easier is using passata for a pizza!

Shop now for Posardi Passata - Finely Chopped Sardinian Tomatoes!

The term "fregula" (also "fregola") may derive from the Latin word "fricare," meaning chopping up: little fragment, splinter, crumb, scrap, corpuscle. These tasty little pasta balls are created by rubbing coarse semolina into small balls in the presence of water.

Unlike North African or Middle Eastern Couscous, the small Sardinian couscous balls are then toasted in an oven, giving them a toasty, rustic, homey taste. This medium-sized fregula is a staple in the Sardinian kitchen, both on the coast and in the interior.

Fregula Sarda pasta is suitable for meat and seafood dishes. You can also try it with a bean dish like Fregula con Fagioli, the Sardinian version of Pasta e Fagioli, or Pasta with Borlotti Beans and Kale.

Fregula Sardinian Pasta may be seasoned with tomato and sausage or used to make its most famous dish, "fregula con cocciula" (fregola with clams) from Cagliari. Given its density and texture, it can absorb a lot of liquid without becoming mushy, making it a great pasta for soups. Serve it like the locals, in "brodo" (broth) - either beef, chicken, or mushroom.

Fregula Sarda pasta is at its best when cooked in boiling water for 10-12 minutes.

Shop now for Fregula Sarda Couscous!

These large, black Italian olives are from Cerignola, Italy and are incredibly delicious. Unlike the much smaller olives you normally eat, these are gloriously giant with so much flesh they are a joy to pop one in your mouth!

If you have a small mouth you might have to bite a little off at a time.

The pit itself is as big as some olives are. The saltiness of the brine and firm flesh is delicious and satisfying, so much that one olive, plus sucking on the pit, lasts longer and is more satisfying than a bag of potato chips!

The big, mouth-filling olive is firm, with a great crunch, lots of meat to eat, and just the right brine; they are soooo gooood! Get some giant black olives here!

Shop for Fratepietro Premium Black Bella di Cerignola Olives here!

Winter cheese can often have hints of summer or spring depending on when the milk is harvested. Its main flavor comes from the hay which creates this season to have a wonderful smooth flavor.

We anticipate cutting the cheese in the third week of April.

Preorder your Parmigiano-Reggiano Now!

This is an easy, delicious asparagus recipe that works as a side dish just as well as a main dish. Since this is a showcase for the green spears of spring make sure that you get the freshest asparagus you can.

See the Asparagus Risotto Recipe here!

Turmeric is one amazing aromatic perennial herb of the Zingiberaceae or ginger family. This tuberous rhizome (root) is a flowering plant that grows in tropical locales and is most often ground fresh like wasabi, or boiled, dried, and ground to make a powder.

Once upon a time it was called Indian Saffron (in fact, it is still used to dye impostor saffron) for it's deep orange color. It is also know for it's powerful health benefits that Indian Ayurvedic medicine and Chinese medicine have been using for 4,000 years to reduce inflammation, help with toothaches, and jaundice. Perhaps the true route to its success is how it helps with flatulence and digestive issues.

Like a high-quality fresh olive oil, turmeric is showing that it might also be a fighter of Alzheimer's and diabetes (caution for diabetics as it can thin blood, always ask your doctor).

Curcumin is the active ingredient in turmeric, and it is curcumin that is believed to destroy mutated cells associated with prostate, breast, and colon cancers.

But, it's not just these reasons to have turmeric in your cupboard. It should be in your food for its palette enhancing pleasing bold color. And its not just palette pleasing, it is also palate perfect for your lentils, you can sprinkle on veggies, or use it to brighten your eggs up. Simply add it to your favorite dishes like Moroccan Fried Rice or Singapore noodles.

It seems that turmeric is a good "preventive" food, enhancing dishes and in turn your body!

About turmeric: Turmeric is a member of the Ginger family. Though it is also used in the Caribbean, Africa and Asia, it is cultivated and eaten most frequently in India. Turmeric is peppery, woody, warm and musky with a pleasantly bitter aftertaste. It is at once peppery and citrusy, with a hint of the gingerroot it resembles.

Curries, pickles, pilaus and spice mixtures would be absolutely bereft without the color and flavor of turmeric. Its very mild taste lends itself well to rice, vegetables and pulse dishes.

Shop now for Organic Ground Turmeric!

A famous French chef was asked once what his favorite "sauce" was, and he said simply, "Soy sauce and butter".

Called Asian-Fusion Soy Sauce and Butter Sauce in the hip world of modern cooking, it is most likely a combination recipe that has been around after soy sauce was invented in the third century combined with the formula for butter which was carved out some 4,500 years ago.

It is this wonderful marriage of two "can’t live without" ingredients, that combine into a wonderfully rich and hearty Asian butter sauce, that when used on a white fish to both, marinate and cook will create bliss.

The umami recipe varies, but most often it is lots of butter with soy sauce to create this ingredient.

We have taken the basics and have experimented and tested. What we liked is this. Keep in mind that this is a baseline and modifying to match your personal taste as well as the "dish" you are making should be the norm.

We like a mix of equal parts of good butter to a combination of Ketjap Manis and Soy Sauce. We like 75% Ketjap Manis with 25% Soy Sauce ( 3/4 cup Ketjap Manis 1/4 cup Soy Sauce). This means 1 cup melted butter and 1 cup soy sauce mix.

We then whisk in 1 tablespoon of Dark Muscovado Sugar and 1/2 teaspoon of Sesame oil.

The addition of minced ginger, and sprinkling chopped green onion in the final stages of cooking when making a protein is optional. We also have used plain rice with wonderful satisfaction. The key here is the better the ingredients the better it is.

See the super easy Soy Sauce and Butter Recipe here!

This bottle holds 4 times the amount of La Vecchia Despensa 10-yr balsamic, and normally we only sell it to restaurant chefs. But we've decided to offer this incredibly delicious deal to all of our customers!

This relative youngster is oh so much more versatile than any balsamic made with wine vinegar - regardless of age or price.

As they will tell you at La Vecchia Dispensa, creating a young versatile balsamic with the right balance of acidity and sweetness is a true art; the art of blending—without using any wine vinegar of course. Just the right amount of old balsamic with its sweet but complex flavor profile needs to be added to younger balsamic with its feisty acidity. That's what they've done with their "Quadrato" - called 10-yr balsamic here in the States to give people a sense of the aged vinegars used in the blending.

It has a refreshing level of acidity, despite the fact that it is made solely from cooked grape must. Sweet and sour act in harmony toward a slow, dry finish. This is one of our favorite, all-purpose balsamics - its depth of flavor gives it a versatility that outshines all cheap imitators, and many authentic balsamics, as well.

Shop now for La Vecchia Dispensa 10-Year Balsamic!

Bonito is a type of fish that is often associated with katsuobushi.

Katsuobushi is made from bonito fish that has been filleted, simmered, and then dried and smoked.

Bonito is known for its rich umami flavor and is widely used in Japanese cuisine to make dashi, a versatile and flavorful stock that forms the base of many Japanese dishes, including soups, broths, and sauces.

The combination of bonito flakes and kombu seaweed is particularly popular in making dashi, as the flakes add depth and complexity to the stock.

In addition to its many uses in traditional Japanese cooking, we think Katsuobushi dried bonito flakes is a great addition to any pantry.

These Skipjack tuna flakes are a versatile, easy-to-use seasoning that adds a slightly smoky flavor to all sorts of salads, dips, and dressings. It's also terrific for enhancing steamed or sauteed vegetables, with or without tofu.

And you might want to keep it out of reach of your gourmet-inclined cat! They can't seem to get enough of the stuff.

See the Bonito Flakes here!