75 Pine Street by Joe Pignatello
There was a man outside the window of "75 Pine Street". He was one of the Suppa brothers, and I was watching him excitedly since what he was doing was hanging multi-colored festival lights on the pole outside of my Grandmother’s apartment. It was funny how they did the lights back then; they had one man on top of an "A" ladder and four others on each leg. Then when the man on top had hung the lights or changed the bulbs the others would just pick up the ladder with him still on top, and move it to the next position. In this Calatrani neighborhood, the "big" feast was the "Festa di San Sebastiano", and it was coming soon which put all of Pine Street and the surrounding neighborhood in a buzz of activity getting ready for the weeklong activities. The feast was held yearly and sponsored by Our Lady of Mt. Carmel RC Church which was the main building on Pine Street. The church will be celebrating its 100th anniversary soon. When the feast first started, it was as big as any around with crowds of people shoulder to shoulder, and food stands lined up along the curbs one after the other. My favorite was the nut man. He would have all kinds of nuts, but he also had a nougat candy with nuts in it that was hard as a rock, and had to be hammered to get small bite size pieces. I love "Torrone" as much today and go out of my way to find it.
In the kitchen, my grandmother Anna was there fixing me lunch while I continued to watch the lights go up. There was noise from the side of the apartment building so of course I had to investigate. I looked out the side window and there was Mr Filiaci in the alley next to his meat market. He was moving trash cans, hosing down the alley with water and sweeping it out to the curb with the large street broom. He then started to string lights and set up tables. Every year at feast time he would go through the same ritual transforming the alley into an eatery where during the feast he would specialize in clams or oysters on the half shell and other fish delights like calamari, mussels and scungilli. I remember my uncles taking me in with them. They used to order a couple dozen "sliders" as they called them and suck them off the shell after dousing them with Tabasco sauce. I remember that during one of the feasts I tried one and that was the hottest sauce I ever had. It was a good laugh for all as I drank down all my coke from the bottle in what seemed like one gulp. Other merchants in the area did similar things. In a two block area there was Mr Russomano's Deli, DelVecchio's Deli, Adorno's Butcher Shop, and Andolino’s Deli and Meat market. There was also a chicken market, which my uncle Dan DiPrenda, would eventually own along with his father-in-law, Angelo Ruccio. There was Mr Sgroi's Ice Truck, which supplied the neighborhood ice boxes with its primary ingredient, ice.
My grandma, calling me from the kitchen, brought me back to earth and I went in to have my lunch. As I was eating my lunch my grandma would go about here business straightening the place and getting ready for dinner. As I looked around it made me appreciate the routine of her life. She had come to America in 1896 with her mother Antonia (Margotta) Lungaro. Her father Salvatore had come three years earlier to establish himself and save money to bring his family over from Calitri, Italy to Grant Street in Montclair New Jersey where he had settled. In 1908, my grandmother was 15, and married Nicolo DiPrenda formerly from Aquilonia Italy (about 30 kilometers from Calitri), and now also of Montclair New Jersey. Soon after the marriage, they gave birth to their first child, Mary. Mary was to be followed by Angelina (Julie), Josephine, Gaetana (Gertrude), Salvatore, Michael, Concetta (Sara), Philomena (my Mom), Angelo (Tony), Geraldine (Gerry), Lucy, Donato (Dan), Vito (Tom), Vincent (Sonny), 14 DiPrenda children in all. It wasn’t long after Angelina was born that her father Nicolo found them a new place to live; 75 Pine Street, a 3 story, 3 bedrooms and kitchen cold water flat in the heart of the 4th Ward where many Calitrani families lived.
It was a great neighborhood where many people from the old country bonded and continued their heritage. There were a number of Italian American clubs on Glenridge Ave.; The Montclair Civic League consisted mainly of Calitrani. The men would socialize there and have a friendly game of bocci. It was fun watching them measure to see who was closest to the "pallina." They would use two little twigs and that's when the fun would begin. Across the street was the St. Sebastian Club for the Sicilians, and up the street was the Son's of Italy for the younger Italians.
My grandfather passed away when his youngest son was 10 yrs. of age and my grandmother had the task of raising some of her kids that were still single and living at home. My uncles tell me she never complained and was very strong willed. I could see that in her as I watched as she put the ever present pot of minestre on the stove to simmer. It was amazing to see her make home made pasta and turn out cavatelli or "la jingles", as I called them, with such precision and with just the flick of a finger. There was always an ample amount of eggs and flour around in case she had to whip up a quick meal. It's great to reminisce and to keep traditions alive. She continued to maintain the traditions of the "old country", making her own pastas, and breads. Today though, she was going to prepare my favorite ravioli. Italians always had a love affair with food and I believe because people like my grandmother took such care in making it. She brought out her pasta board on which all types of pasta was made. She would pour out the flour and then scoop out a hole in the middle for the eggs and water. She would know how much flour to start with and how much to add to the water as she began to incorporate it. When incorporated, she would then flour the board and begin kneading the dough. She then would get the rolling stick from the pantry and begin the task of rolling the dough out to a thinness that would make the ravioli a nice size. I would be somewhat mesmerized by the continuous flap, flap, flap of the dough as it flipped over the rolling pin and hit the board. What resulted was a huge flat circle of dough about a 1/8" thick. When grandma had the dough perfectly positioned on the board she would bring out the ricotta cheese. To the ricotta she added parmesan cheese as well as eggs and seasonings which she would hand mix with the many-purpose wooden spoon. This ricotta transformation was what gave the ravioli its filling and grandma would place small but equal dollops of ricotta on the dough. She would then fold the dough over the ricotta and with her pinky define the space between each square. With her hand held rippled-edge dough cutter she would eye a line from end to end and run the blade straight across as if she had set up guidelines. They were always straight lines and produce equal squares of my favorite pasta. She would seal each square by pressing the sides together with the edge of the fork. Grandma would lay out a white sheet on the bed adjacent to the kitchen where the ravioli were lined up in rows which seemed endless and perfect. Only today’s computer-based machinery can rival my grandmother’s precision.
To top off any pasta meal there had to be the gravy; the red sauce that is the staple to any Italian diet. My grandmother had a triangle shaped sieve which she placed over a pot and loaded with ripened tomatoes. With a wedged shaped rolling pin she would press the tomatoes against the sieve relieving the tomatoes of their juice. She would add tomato paste, salt, pepper, and basil and simmer it for hours to thicken.
She would then send me down to the butchers with a dollar for a pound of ground beef. When I returned and gave her the dime change, I noticed she would have bread from previous days soaking in water. She drained the water from the bread and added it to the ground beef with some eggs, parmesan cheese and other ingredients. I knew it was my job to get the black iron skillet from the pot closet so she could fry up the meatballs she created. Again, rolled evenly and not a millimeter of difference between them. Once fried and cooled they went into the sauce. She would turn her back for a second before she took the cooling meatballs from the plate to the sauce, and that was her little signal to me that it was ok for me to "steal" one.
The big holidays, Easter and Christmas, we knew we would be having homemade ravioli, but on these holidays there was always an assortment of cookies and pastries. Grandmas knew I liked a special type cookie which I can only call chocolate spice cookies. They were made during the Christmas holiday with dark chocolate, walnuts, and raisins in the dough. They were rolled like meatballs and baked in the oven. As they came out of the oven and cooled my grandma would use confectionary sugar and water to "ice" them. When finished she would place them in rows on the table and could tell at a moments glance that I had taken one. If I did this too often I found out the other uses of the wooden spoon.
Nevertheless, whenever it was time for the Sunday or holiday eating festivities to begin, usually at 3:00pm. For my uncles and aunts still at home on 75 Pine Street along with my Mom and Dad, we would all crowd around grandma’s kitchen table, and she would serve us; most of the time with a tired face, but always with a big smile.
After the meal, we would normally take a walk around the neighborhood, but tonight we were heading for the feast. No matter, we could anytime take a walk around the neighborhood since all but two of Grandma Anna’s children lived within a 2-3 block range of 75 Pine Street. As we walked the streets, everyone in the neighborhood, out of respect, called my grandma, "Comare Annuccia", and she would acknowledge them with a friendly wave and a twinkle in her eye. Grandma was a proud woman; she was the matriarch of a fine family and she knew that all her children had grown and raised families of their own. Though she is no longer with us, her children and especially her grandchildren still remember her fondly and think of her as the "Grandma who made the ravies" on 75 Pine Street.