Italians, is it "sauce" or "gravy"?

[Principled Man]

I am 50% Italian. My paternal grandparents came from central and southern Italy. We had no shortage of Italian cuisine when I was growing up.

 

Just yesterday, Ma made a nice big pan of lasagna. My favorite, though, is ravioli made from scratch. Ricotta/mozzerella filling, with rolled-up steak cooked in the simmering sauce.

 

We call it SAUCE. :ebert:

Edited January 2, 2016 by Principled Man

[circumstantial tree]

It's just that we have a restaurant in Raleigh called "Gravy" and it bills itself as "Italian American" cuisine, so I was just wondering. I posted this on FB and an Italian friend of mine just had to post that calling it Gravy was the first thing wrong with the place. His family is from Italy, and by that I mean, his father and close relatives come from Italy (Naples I think) and they call it sauce.

 

Oh, and for the record, the food I had there was pretty good. I've come to believe that whether or not certain foods are "authentic" or not really doesn't matter to me as long as I like it. Although, I do draw the line with Chef Boyardee. LOL

Edited January 2, 2016 by circumstantial tree

[satchmothesnowdog]

I've grown up in and lived in Italian areas in Chicago most of my life, most of my friends have been dagos and all the restarants I've ever been to along with all of these hundreds of people all called it sauce, except my friend's wife from Milwaukee. She says there's a root word in Italian that means gravy translated, but salsa always was sauce in my house.

[goose]

I've heard that calling it gravy is a New Jersey thing, but I don't really know . . .

Makes sense. The Italian word is "salsa". It stands to reason that Jersey-based Italian Americans are dumb enough to call it "gravy". No offense to any gumbas out there.

 

Your posts are always worth the read :laughing guy:

 

It confused the shit out of me when I first had salsa. I spoke Italian until I was five and never was exposed to much messican food, them my grandmother had made some salsa with tomatoes and jalapenos from her garden and I was like what the f**k is this?

OK< who cares, it's good :)

Salsa is good. So is Mexican "mole". But I digress.

 

"Salsa picante" is the spicy stuff we typically associate with Mexican food. And there's "salsa verde", the green variation made with green tomatillos. Worcester is called "salsa inglesa", or English sauce. "Salsa" can also be used for gravy, but you'll usually hear "jugo de carne", literally meat juice.

 

Sorry for the tangent. 2016 is Year of the Pedant.

[goose]

It's just that we have a restaurant in Raleigh called "Gravy" and it bills itself as "Italian American" cuisine, so I was just wondering. I posted this on FB and an Italian friend of mine just had to post that calling it Gravy was the first thing wrong with the place. His family is from Italy, and by that I mean, his father and close relatives come from Italy (Naples I think) and they call it sauce.

 

Oh, and for the record, the food I had there was pretty good. I've come to believe that whether or not certain foods are "authentic" or not really doesn't matter to me as long as I like it. Although, I do draw the line with Chef Boyardee. LOL

http://cdn.teamcococdn.com/jokes/65650/1,1/650//jokes/dec-7-2011-a-new-study-found-that-the-number-one-celebrity-americans.jpg?dl=1

[goose]

My Sicilian grandmother (who was born in Cleveland but grew up in LA) and her sisters made sauce. Big pots of sauce. With meatballs, sausage and brijole (thin meat rolled with egg and vegetables tied together) all cooking in the sauce.

Sounds delicious...but did she call it "gravy"?

[Crimsonmistymemory]

I am Irish but I love itallian food. Our family called it sauce if it was red and gravy if it was brown or cream based. It seems that even true Itallians debate this issue quite extensively, but calling sauce gravy is primarily an Itallian American tradition. I also did a little internet investigation and this link seems to be the best explained :finbar:

http://italianfood.about.com/od/pastarecipesandsauces/a/aa060200.htm

[The Analog Grownup]

To me (and I'm definitely no Italian) it's more a distinguishing of consistency. Sauce is more fluid where gravy is the kind that can hold a fork upright. Circa.

[The Analog Grownup]

And thanks a lot you guys, now I'm hungry and it's in the middle of the night here

Think I'm going to make Italian meatballs tomorrow :drool:

[Lorraine]

A few of my friends from real Italian families always called it gravy. But that was New Jersey, so there might be something to that rumor floating around. ;)

 

And the only time I ever heard soda referred to as "pop" is out here where I presently live. But I refuse to conform and will call it "soda" until the day I die!!! :madra: :d13:

Edited January 3, 2016 by Lorraine

[Lorraine]

 

Lasagna

 

 

Sausage and peppers

 

 

stuffed veal ribs

 

 

Ravioli

 

 

Braciole (sorry blurry)

 

 

All with sauce, no friggin gravy

 

From our annual Dago fest with all the cousins right after Thanksgiving

 

Oh yeah, don't forget the fried eggplant :)

 

 

Satch, can you get me a really good Lasagna recipe?

 

This thread has made me very hungry too. Nothing like an excellent and authentic Italian meal.

[CygnusX-1Bk2]

My Sicilian grandmother (who was born in Cleveland but grew up in LA) and her sisters made sauce. Big pots of sauce. With meatballs, sausage and brijole (thin meat rolled with egg and vegetables tied together) all cooking in the sauce.

Sounds delicious...but did she call it "gravy"?

Did I say gravy? Gravy is what you get from the drippings of cooked meat thickened with some other ingredient. My grandmother and her family made sauce. That's what they called it. In fact they called it "THE" sauce. On big holidays my grandmother and her sisters would make it together in a couple or three pots. It resembled the big pot pictured above (minus the peppers). My great aunt Gina made the ravioli and my grandmother and great aunt Rose made cannoli. Sometimes one of them made cannelloni. But just about every Sunday we had dinner with my grandparents when I was a kid and we always had pasta with grandma's sauce.

[Tombstone Mountain]

My Sicilian grandmother (who was born in Cleveland but grew up in LA) and her sisters made sauce. Big pots of sauce. With meatballs, sausage and brijole (thin meat rolled with egg and vegetables tied together) all cooking in the sauce.

Sounds delicious...but did she call it "gravy"?

Did I say gravy? Gravy is what you get from the drippings of cooked meat thickened with some other ingredient. My grandmother and her family made sauce. That's what they called it. In fact they called it "THE" sauce. On big holidays my grandmother and her sisters would make it together in a couple or three pots. It resembled the big pot pictured above (minus the peppers). My great aunt Gina made the ravioli and my grandmother and great aunt Rose made cannoli. Sometimes one of them made cannelloni. But just about every Sunday we had dinner with my grandparents when I was a kid and we always had pasta with grandma's sauce.

must've been awesome. Have you carried the traditional recipes forward?

[fraroc]

I've heard that calling it gravy is a New Jersey thing, but I don't really know . . .

Makes sense. The Italian word is "salsa". It stands to reason that Jersey-based Italian Americans are dumb enough to call it "gravy". No offense to any gumbas out there.

 

A fanabla!

 

 

 

:)

[JohnnyBlaze]

It's just that we have a restaurant in Raleigh called "Gravy" and it bills itself as "Italian American" cuisine, so I was just wondering. I posted this on FB and an Italian friend of mine just had to post that calling it Gravy was the first thing wrong with the place. His family is from Italy, and by that I mean, his father and close relatives come from Italy (Naples I think) and they call it sauce.

Italy is bigger and more diverse than it looks on a map.

[CygnusX-1Bk2]

My Sicilian grandmother (who was born in Cleveland but grew up in LA) and her sisters made sauce. Big pots of sauce. With meatballs, sausage and brijole (thin meat rolled with egg and vegetables tied together) all cooking in the sauce.

Sounds delicious...but did she call it "gravy"?

Did I say gravy? Gravy is what you get from the drippings of cooked meat thickened with some other ingredient. My grandmother and her family made sauce. That's what they called it. In fact they called it "THE" sauce. On big holidays my grandmother and her sisters would make it together in a couple or three pots. It resembled the big pot pictured above (minus the peppers). My great aunt Gina made the ravioli and my grandmother and great aunt Rose made cannoli. Sometimes one of them made cannelloni. But just about every Sunday we had dinner with my grandparents when I was a kid and we always had pasta with grandma's sauce.

must've been awesome. Have you carried the traditional recipes forward?

I've made it once but that was a good while ago. My mom made it regularly (despite not being Italian, but an excellent cook) until recently because she doesn't see well anymore and stopped cooking. I intend to start making it myself though. I've considered trying to market it because there isn't anything like it but I'm not sure how it will translate large scale for jarring. Even good Italian "family" style restaurants I've tried are very different. There's a rich, rustic and homey quality to my "family sauce" that I've never tasted anywhere else but within my family. The meatballs are especially good because they cook in the sauce. They are particularly flavorful and moist but don't break apart. So many people frown upon cooking meatballs in sauce but those are dry and flavorless compared to what I grew up with. Nothing like it.

Edited January 3, 2016 by CygnusX-1Bk2

[Anthemic]

the only place i ever heard sauce called gravy is on the sopranos.

[goose]

I am Irish but I love itallian food. Our family called it sauce if it was red and gravy if it was brown or cream based. It seems that even true Itallians debate this issue quite extensively, but calling sauce gravy is primarily an Itallian American tradition. I also did a little internet investigation and this link seems to be the best explained :finbar:

http://italianfood.a.../a/aa060200.htm

:goodone:

 

Seems to align with the Spanish/Latin American take on sauce vs. gravy.

[goose]

My Sicilian grandmother (who was born in Cleveland but grew up in LA) and her sisters made sauce. Big pots of sauce. With meatballs, sausage and brijole (thin meat rolled with egg and vegetables tied together) all cooking in the sauce.

Sounds delicious...but did she call it "gravy"?

Did I say gravy?

 

That reads like this...

 

http://mafiatoday.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/Tony-Soprano.jpg

[satchmothesnowdog]

I've heard that calling it gravy is a New Jersey thing, but I don't really know . . .

Makes sense. The Italian word is "salsa". It stands to reason that Jersey-based Italian Americans are dumb enough to call it "gravy". No offense to any gumbas out there.

 

Your posts are always worth the read :laughing guy:

 

It confused the shit out of me when I first had salsa. I spoke Italian until I was five and never was exposed to much messican food, them my grandmother had made some salsa with tomatoes and jalapenos from her garden and I was like what the f**k is this?

OK< who cares, it's good :)

Salsa is good. So is Mexican "mole". But I digress.

 

"Salsa picante" is the spicy stuff we typically associate with Mexican food. And there's "salsa verde", the green variation made with green tomatillos. Worcester is called "salsa inglesa", or English sauce. "Salsa" can also be used for gravy, but you'll usually hear "jugo de carne", literally meat juice.

 

Sorry for the tangent. 2016 is Year of the Pedant.

 

See, that's the other word we always used for sauce, Jugo, or sugo in the Napolitano dialect of my family

[satchmothesnowdog]

the only place i ever heard sauce called gravy is on the sopranos.

 

And Jersey Wops are Gospel to the rest of the USA

 

Thanks to that show and Jersey Shore, Italian Americans were pushed back 40 years, again

[LedRush]

My grandparents called it gravy though growing up we were more likely to call it sauce. Either is fine.

[LedRush]

My Sicilian grandmother (who was born in Cleveland but grew up in LA) and her sisters made sauce. Big pots of sauce. With meatballs, sausage and brijole (thin meat rolled with egg and vegetables tied together) all cooking in the sauce.

 

At least 2 Sundays a month my family does the same. My grandparents called it gravy, but my mom called it sauce. We're having meat cakes tomorrow morning and braciole/meatballs/sausage and pasta tomorrow night.

[goose]

I've heard that calling it gravy is a New Jersey thing, but I don't really know . . .

Makes sense. The Italian word is "salsa". It stands to reason that Jersey-based Italian Americans are dumb enough to call it "gravy". No offense to any gumbas out there.

 

Your posts are always worth the read :laughing guy:

 

It confused the shit out of me when I first had salsa. I spoke Italian until I was five and never was exposed to much messican food, them my grandmother had made some salsa with tomatoes and jalapenos from her garden and I was like what the f**k is this?

OK< who cares, it's good :)

Salsa is good. So is Mexican "mole". But I digress.

 

"Salsa picante" is the spicy stuff we typically associate with Mexican food. And there's "salsa verde", the green variation made with green tomatillos. Worcester is called "salsa inglesa", or English sauce. "Salsa" can also be used for gravy, but you'll usually hear "jugo de carne", literally meat juice.

 

Sorry for the tangent. 2016 is Year of the Pedant.

 

See, that's the other word we always used for sauce, Jugo, or sugo in the Napolitano dialect of my family

So there you have it. Settled culinary science. :cheers:

[CygnusX-1Bk2]

My Sicilian grandmother (who was born in Cleveland but grew up in LA) and her sisters made sauce. Big pots of sauce. With meatballs, sausage and brijole (thin meat rolled with egg and vegetables tied together) all cooking in the sauce.

Sounds delicious...but did she call it "gravy"?

Did I say gravy?

 

That reads like this...

 

http://mafiatoday.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/Tony-Soprano.jpg

So no phuckin' ziti then?