Terracotta Design

When I was little, I remember my Nonna telling me that clay “remembers” all the Workmanship delicious dishes that are cooked in it, so the older and the more “used’ the pot is, the tastier the result. I would have laughed this off as an old wives’ tale — but my mom, who is a pharmaceutical chemist, confirms that it’s all true, thanks to the porous nature of clay. This means, she adds, that (no matter how gorgeous my authentic Tuscan cookware is, and how many cooking classes I teach) my stew is never going to taste as good as it would have in our family heirloom (one’s I threw away as a rebellious teen).

People have been cooking in clay utensils since the beginnings of time. From Morocco to Italy, from Mexico to Japan, terracotta is favored for slow cooked preparations, from minestrone to stew, from legumes to meat sauces. Unlike metals, earthenware heats up extremely slowly, and releases the heat to its contents just as slowly! So much so, that the food keeps cooking for a while once the heat is turned off.

Before the first use, most manufacturers recommend that clay pots be soaked in water for several hours to be tempered and made heat-resistant. Some even rub the surface with garlic as a kind of “toner” to close the pores. Note that natural pots (unglazed) also need to be “seasoned.” There are different ways to do this (rice, pareve milk, etc.) and you can simply follow the manufacturer’s instructions.