Antipasti — ‘before the meal’

They are in the same heated kitchen. The steam billows off the boiling pasta water like a special effect. But it’s authentic, right down to the shiny sweat beading the brow of chef Ralph Conte.

Conte has GQ good looks. At 43, he still appears much too young to have been in the restaurant business for more than 20 years. He moves through his spic-and-span kitchen with confidence, but also with the eagerness of a child trying to please his parents. Here at Providence’s Raphael Bar-Risto (“Raphael” is Conte’s first name in Italian), he and his staff have taken all day to prepare a dinner for about 75 people to promote John Mariani’s latest book, The Italian-American Cookbook: A Feast of Food from a Great American Cooking Tradition (Harvard Common Press, 2000; $16.95).

Author John Mariani has a picky palate. He has made his living as Esquire magazine’s food and travel correspondent for the past 20 years, and has also written numerous food-related books. He and his wife, Galina, spent months testing and refining his new cookbook’s recipes. With his debonair platinum hair and boyish looks, Mariani, at 55, could also grace the cover of, well, Esquire.

He’s in the kitchen with Conte, who is giving him a preview of the evening’s meal. Dressed in a suit and tie, the author displays keen interest as he follows the chef. He peers into pots and leans in for a look when Conte pulls away some aluminum foil to reveal tubes of simmering beef — the braciola, pronounced “brah-j’YOH-lah,” according to Mariani’s book. “Good,” he says of the brown meat snugly rolled in the pan. (Mariani writes: “In Italy, the term braciola refers to a slice or chop of any kind of meat, whereas in America the word has taken on a meaning of a slice of meat that has been wrapped around other ingredients.”) The food writer has eaten more braciola stateside than in Italy, where, he says, it is less likely to be fussed with or overstuffed.

“Use up all the sauce you can,” he instructs Conte.

“It’s going to be very sloppy,” the chef says, almost as a warning, then quickly adds: “It’s going to be rustic, okay?” He slides the pan back in the oven to join the others. Mariani gives an absent-minded “Aya,” and they move on to the next thing.

Both men specialize in Italian food, but their personal tastes and philosophies put a wedge the size of a fine pecorino romano between them. Conte likes to throw oregano cream on his tagliatelle and a candied-ginger reduction on his honey-orange-mustard roast pork loin. Mariani would rather keep it simple and do without the fancy sauces or multiple garnishes that can mask a dish’s basic ingredients.

Tonight, it’s Mariani’s show. The menu is not chef Conte’s “progressive Italian” cuisine, which focuses on modern presentation of the classics. Rather, it comes directly from the more traditional Italian-American Cookbook (which just won first prize in Forward magazine’s cookbook category and has been nominated for the International Association of Cooking Professionals awards).

And so, in his own kitchen, Conte is biting his tongue — sort of. He is complying with Mariani’s wishes, although asking a chef not to prepare food in his own style is like asking Michelangelo to paint by numbers. But Conte, wearing his starched chef’s coat and a white napkin tied at his Adam’s apple, is doing everything in his power to please his guest.

While Conte explains exactly how the dishes will be executed, Mariani nods with thoughtful approval, saying little. What Mariani wanted for tonight’s dinner is what you and I might find if we sat down to Sunday dinner at the ancestral table of the Contes or the Marianis: simple Americanized Italian food.

This Italian-American cuisine, says Mariani, is a legitimate genre worthy of attention — and veneration — on its own merits. The question is: what exactly is Italian-American cuisine, and how is it different from, well, Italian? For starters, there will be no fancy garnishes, nor will there be any “progressive” presentations.

In other words, tonight’s menu reads like that of a typical Italian-American restaurant: clams casino, fried calamari, beef braciola with polenta. And at the end, pears in red Chianti, with cinnamon, clove, vanilla, lemon, and ginger.

In the kitchen, the fragile collaboration continues. The most significant communication occurs in what remains tacit between the two gourmets. The halibut is just in today, says Conte. It is a pearly-white flat fish with some of its flesh cut away. Mariani says the portions are “perfect.” The fish will be sautéed and served with puréed potatoes and wilted arugula. Nearby, the freshly cleaned calamari drains in a colander. It will be lightly dusted with flour and cornmeal, then fried. Green asparagus spears slumber in their prosciutto blankets, ready to be lightly breaded, fried, and served to guests who will swoon and coo over such simplicity.

The kitchen is caught in the quiet before the storm: later, everything will be cooked à la minute. The steam gathers over the pasta water, awaiting the penne that will be cooked al dente, drained, and then, according to Mariani’s recipe, slightly buttered before saucing.

Politely, the chef and the author trade techniques. “Why do you sauce the penne with butter?” Conte asks Mariani.

“It just gives a little gloss to it,” Mariani responds. “And it helps pick up the sauce. “ In the United States, he says, “they foolishly rinse the pasta, which gets rid of the starch that holds the sauce.” The Italian chefs drain the pasta, then put it back in the pan with a little butter. It gives the pasta a nice flavor, and it helps make the sauce stick.

Conte delves deeper: “Is there a term for that?”

“Mantecato,” says Mariani, in an accent that reflects his frequent travels to the Boot. “It’s the term they use when you put it back in the pan and bring it all together.”

The steam from the pasta water rises like thick smoke and then evaporates into the air.