With a side order of charm and anecdotes, the actor and gourmand makes our reviewer crave a plate of his zeppole
Zeppole are deep-fried balls of a dough made with flour and, sometimes, mashed potatoes. The sweet version, dusted with sugar, are often filled with pastry cream, like the more famous cannoli. The savoury version, favoured in Calabria, in southern Italy, may contain anchovies, and go down very well indeed with a martini, or a glass of something cold, fizzy and unforgivably expensive.
I sound authoritative, but to be truthful I hadn’t heard of these parcels of deliciousness – bring me a crate of them and I’ll show you what a good appetite looks like – until the other day. There I was, innocently reading Taste: My Life Through Food, a memoir by the notable actor and gourmand Stanley Tucci, when the word zeppole (doesn’t it sound elegante?) roared, metaphorically speaking, right up to me on a mint-coloured Vespa, wearing a black polo neck and flashy sunglasses. Hello, I thought, closing my eyes in anticipation of an afternoon reverie. Not too long after this, I began frantically searching for recipes for zeppole on Google.