Vermicelli with parsley sauce alla Sophia

For ➍
2 garlic cloves
12 tbs loosely packed fresh flat-leaf parsley leaves
1 small onion, sliced
4 anchovy fillets, rinsed, patted dry & chopped*
4 tbs brine-cured green olives, pitted
2 ts drained bottled capers
½ ts salt
¼ ts black pepper
8 tbs olive oil
1 ts olive oil
500 g vermicelli or linguine

Finely chop garlic in a food processor. Stop motor and add parsley, onion, anchovies, olives, capers, salt, and pepper. Process until finely chopped. With motor running, add oil and blend until incorporated.**

Cook pasta in a pot of boiling salted water until al dente.

Drain well in a colander, then return to pot and toss with 1 ts oil. Transfer pasta to a large serving bowl, then pour sauce over top and toss well. Serve immediately.

*Discard for a vegetarian version.
**Sauce can be made 1 h ahead and kept, covered, at room temperature.

From Sophia Loren's In cucina con amore.
Read more Sophia Loren recipes: Sophia Loren's raw tomato spaghetti, Sophia Loren's tiramisu.
The sauce is a variation on Italian oil & garlic sauce from spaghetti aglio e olio.
Read more spaghetti & linguine recipes: a quick spaghetti, spaghetti with scallops & tomatoes, scallops & rucola spaghetti, spaghetti alla carbonara, spaghetti with vegetables, shrimps fra diavolo, raw tomato spaghetti, spaghetti with clams, spaghetti with small clams, spaghetti with oil & garlic, spaghetti alla puttanesca, Palermo spaghetti with tomatoes & mint, American-Italian spaghetti with meatballs, shrimps & Brie linguine.

Sophia Loren's omelet Napoletana

For ➍-➑*
150 g spaghetti
50 g unsalted butter
8 large eggs
3 tbs olive oil
1 tbs whole milk
⅛ ts freshly grated nutmeg
¼ ts salt
¼ ts black pepper
75 g ham, cut into 0.5 cm dice
50 g fresh mozzarella, cut into 0.5 cm dice
10 g finely grated Parmigiano cheese

Cook spaghetti in boiling salted water until al dente. Drain well in a colander, then return to pot and immediately toss with 2 tbs butter.

Lightly whisk together eggs, oil, milk, nutmeg, salt, pepper, ham and mozzarella in a bowl.

Preheat broiler.

Heat remaining 2 tablespoons butter in a skillet over moderate heat until foam subsides. Cook egg mixture, lifting up cooked edges with a heatproof spatula to let raw egg flow underneath, until set on bottom and almost set but still moist on top, 3 to 5 m. Arrange spaghetti over eggs, pressing lightly with spatula to help pasta settle into eggs, then sprinkle with Parmigiano.

Broil omelet 10 to 15 cm from heat until top is pale golden, 2 to 3 m.

Cut into portions. Serve immediately. Add some tomato sauce if wanted.

*4 as main course, 8 as starter.

This recipe comes close to a frittata, the Italian oven finished omelet. Read more Sophia Loren recipes & history: tiramisu, vermicelli with sauce or spaghetti. Picture shows her as a Naples' Materdei neighbourhood pizza maker in Vittorio di Sica's “L’Oro di Napoli”.

Sophia Loren's spaghetti con pomodoro crudo (raw tomato spaghetti)

For ➍
500 g spaghetti
600 g tomatoes, not quite ripe, chopped
150 g fresh mozzarella, thinly sliced
1 big (or 2 small) red onion, thinly sliced
50 g (Sicilian) green olives, pitted & roughly chopped
1 tbs capers, drained
1 tbs Italian parsley, minced
8 fresh oregano leaves, chopped
1 clove garlic, crushed
salt & freshly ground pepper
4 tbs extra-virgin olive oil
Parmigiano, freshly grated*

Cook the pasta al dente.

Meanwhile, put the tomatoes, mozzarella, onions, olives, capers, parsley, oregano, garlic in a large serving bowl. Add salt and pepper to taste. Pour the oil over and toss gently.

When the pasta is ready, pour it into a colander and quickly rinse it under cold water.

Drain well. Add the warm spaghetti to the bowl. Toss to combine, remove the garlic and serve.

Pass the cheese at the table*.

*Optional.

Italian movies' diva Sophia Loren claimed she owed everything to pasta. Hence this recipe from her second cook book.
Read more Sophia Loren recipes & history: Sophia Loren's tiramisu, vermicelli with sauce alla Sofia, omelet Napoletana. Read the similar no-cook pasta sauce suggestion or cold tomato sauce. Read more spaghetti & linguine recipes: a quick spaghetti, spaghetti with scallops & tomatoes, scallops & rucola spaghetti, spaghetti alla carbonara, spaghetti with vegetables, shrimps fra diavolo, spaghetti with clams, spaghetti with small clams, spaghetti with oil & garlic, spaghetti alla puttanesca, Palermo spaghetti with tomatoes & mint, American-Italian spaghetti with meatballs, vermicelli with parsley sauce, shrimps & Brie linguine, butter & tomato pasta sauce, lemon pasta with sea spinach.

Sophia Loren's tiramisu

For ➑
3 eggs, separated
5 tbs sugar
170 g mascarpone
36 Savoiardi (lady finger biscuits)
25 cl orange liqueur
25 cl espresso coffee
50 g black chocolate, grated
10 g cocoa powder (or 50 bittersweet chocolate, grated)

Combine egg yolks and sugar in a medium-sized bowl and beat well.
In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites to stiff peaks.
In a third, larger bowl, combine the egg yolk mixture with the mascarpone, then fold in the egg whites to produce a creamy mixture.
Arrange a tight layer of ladyfingers in a 22x30 cm serving dish.
Using a spoon, drizzle about half the liqueur and half the espresso over the ladyfingers.
Cover the ladyfingers with the mascarpone mixture and the grated chocolate, and dust it with a little more than half the cocoa.
Cover the filling with a second layer of ladyfingers and drizzle with the remaining liqueur and espresso.
Top with the remaining cocoa before serving.

Italian cinema diva Sophia Loren has published two collections of her favourite recipes, Italian of course, Neapolitan by proxy, la cucina sfiziosa, hearty food with a little extra. Here she gives her version of the tiramisu dessert, substituting the classic amaretto by orange liqueur.
The forerunner of the tiramisu, with custard, rather than mascarpone cheese, was popular in Tuscany, as zuppa del duca, a dessert for the ducal visit of Cosimo III de' Medici to Sienna, or the closely related zuppa inglese, the Italian version of the English trifle. No written sources about the recipe are available before 1983, pointing to its appearance in 1971 in Veneto's Treviso . The name means 'cheer up' or 'give some strength', giving birth to legends that the dessert was invented by Venetian lace-workers, or women of a casa chiuso**, or by Northern Italian wives making it for their soldier husbands in WWI. It became widely popular in the 1980's.
Read more Sophia Loren recipes: Sophia Loren's raw tomato spaghetti, vermicelli with sauce alla Sofia.
(**Several Italian dishes are rumoured to have been invented by women of the trade to regain their strength, such as the spaghetti alla puttanesca.)