If you enter the Santa Monica Farmers Market from Fourth Street, you'll be struck by the striking pink and green display of chicories festooning the tables of The Garden Of…
Angelo Emiliani, culinary director of Pizzeria Bianco, demystifies these stunning winter greens with the bitter flavor. "I think bitterness is sort of an unsung hero in cooking," says Emiliani. "A lot of people are scared of bitterness. Radicchio and chicory is definitely one of those. When you have a lot of fat, a lot of acid, it kind of gives you a full, rounded dish."
At the restaurant, chefs are using the Costarossa and Castelfranco varieties of radicchio in a simple salad with a yuzu vinaigrette, shaved and roasted apples from Cuyama, pancetta, and a young goat's milk gouda. The fat, salt, and acid from the ingredients creates a balance. For home cooks, Emiliani suggests taking a few pointers from the Italian cooking canon. A sweetness comes from cooking the greens down for a long time. He compares the technique to the Southern way of preparing collard greens. The restaurant is working on a Piedmontese agnolotti dish using escarole, beef, and rice.
With its purple and white stems, the Tardivo variety of radicchio looks like it belongs in a coral reef. "It looks almost like, not like a sea urchin, but one of those spiny fish," says Ky Takikawa of The Garden Of… "It has these fingers that come up out of the head.
It's not a tight leaf head or a flat leaf head that has these quills.”
The farm started growing the Rosalba variety four years ago. With a thicker stem and tender leaf, it's a "happy middle ground" radicchio, with a mild bitterness while being slightly sweet.