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We have a “passatutto” in our kitchen (picture on the left). When we first arrived we discovered that no self respecting italian kitchen should be without it. Not only do we have it but we also use it when making tomato sauce. I put cut up the organic tomatoes grown by Bill in his vegetable patch. I put them in a pot and simply add some chopped celery, onion and carrot and then let it all simmer for about 45 minutes. Then using the passatutto (pass everything), basically a hand blender/sieve, I grind the mixture down until I am left with a thickish tomato sauce with all the seeds, skin etc. left behind. If necessary I thicken the mixture, pour it into jars and then boil the jars for 15 minutes. The sauce is then put in the store cupboard for winter use.
Yesterday our friend Alba talked about using a “Bamby” in the kitchen. She was very surprised that we had no idea what she was talking about. “You don’t know what it is?!!!”, she cried. “But every kitchen in Italy has a Bimby!”. So we were taken into the kitchen and shown the Bimby. It is basically a blender/cooker combined. You can make blend soups and heat them at the same time. It can make bread and cakes etc. It is another masterpiece of German design. So if you want to give your kitchen the “italian look” then buy a Bimby. Searching on the web I discovered that in English it is a Thermomix. The Bimby/Thermomix website has all the details on how to use it. However, even with an english name I had never heard of it.