Technical and artisanal knowledge
From the garden to the flame
Preparing roasted peppers in Ornano
In mid-August, when the peppers in the vegetable garden have reached full ripeness and begin turning from green to red, households in Ornano, among the countryside of the territory of Colledara, begin preparing the first large preserve of late summer. Harvested and left for a few days to wilt slightly in the darkness of the cellars, the peppers are then roasted over an open flame before being carefully peeled, cut into thin strips and preserved for the winter, when they will release onto the table the aromas and flavours of the warm season now far away.
“First of all, they have to be grown. The red pepper is the classic variety, even though personally I prefer the green one — it has more flavour. Still, we harvest them when they are already almost red. They are left for three or four days to wilt just slightly, very gently, until they turn red. Then they are washed, cleaned and roasted over the flame.”
Claudio D’Archivio, 17 August 2024
The preparation of roasted peppers for domestic preserves is a practice widely attested in the countryside of the Teramo area, linked to the end of summer and to the need to transform the produce of the vegetable garden into provisions for the colder months. In Ornano di Colledara, a hillside hamlet of the Valle Siciliana at the foot of the eastern slopes of the Gran Sasso massif, it is documented as a recurring family activity, transmitted through direct observation and repeated every August in forms that have remained substantially unchanged over time.
The example of the D’Archivio family offers an emblematic representation of the structure of this domestic ritual and of the small innovations that have emerged over the last thirty years in order to ensure its continuity. The peppers used come from the family vegetable garden and belong to local varieties traditionally cultivated in the area. Harvesting takes place when the fruits are transitioning from green to red: in the past, people waited until they were fully red, whereas today they are harvested earlier and left to wilt indoors for three or four days, so that they complete their ripening at a more controlled temperature and acquire the consistency required for roasting.
The preparation process unfolds through several fundamental stages. The first consists of washing the peppers, cleaning and drying them, followed by roasting: each pepper is exposed directly to the flame until the skin blackens on all sides, swells and begins to detach itself from the flesh. A coarse peeling then follows, removing most of the skin and the stalks; this is succeeded by a careful trimming stage, during which the remaining thin membranes of the skin and the charred fragments still attached to the flesh are removed. The peeled peppers are then dried on a cotton cloth, an essential step in reducing moisture before preservation; after being cut into thin strips, they are left to drain for a couple of hours so that the residual vegetable water may settle and evaporate.
Finally, the peppers are placed inside glass jars, covered and hermetically sealed. At this point, two preservation methods are possible: sterilisation in a bain-marie, according to the traditional technique, or freezing. Claudio D’Archivio’s testimony clearly highlights the technical issue that gradually led the family to favour the second option: peppers are vegetables that ferment easily, and preserves sterilised in a bain-marie carry a high risk of premature deterioration; freezing, by contrast, eliminates this undesirable occurrence and, once thawed, returns a pepper that remains intact and ready to use.
The secular ritual of preparing preserves has always represented a moment of intergenerational gathering and neighbourhood sociability, with several family members engaged in different stages of the process and with continual exchanges of varieties, techniques and jars between neighbouring households. Seasoned raw with extra virgin olive oil, garlic, parsley and salt, roasted peppers serve both as an appetiser and as a side dish in domestic cuisine; they traditionally accompany salt cod on winter festive tables and enrich bruschette, omelettes and sandwiches. Their presence in the pantry is perceived as a marker of food self-sufficiency and of the bond with the vegetable garden: having one’s own preserved peppers means being able to return, during wintertime, to the luxuriant flavour of summer, when they were harvested and carefully prepared.
The example of the D’Archivio family offers an emblematic representation of the structure of this domestic ritual and of the small innovations that have emerged over the last thirty years in order to ensure its continuity. The peppers used come from the family vegetable garden and belong to local varieties traditionally cultivated in the area. Harvesting takes place when the fruits are transitioning from green to red: in the past, people waited until they were fully red, whereas today they are harvested earlier and left to wilt indoors for three or four days, so that they complete their ripening at a more controlled temperature and acquire the consistency required for roasting.
The preparation process unfolds through several fundamental stages. The first consists of washing the peppers, cleaning and drying them, followed by roasting: each pepper is exposed directly to the flame until the skin blackens on all sides, swells and begins to detach itself from the flesh. A coarse peeling then follows, removing most of the skin and the stalks; this is succeeded by a careful trimming stage, during which the remaining thin membranes of the skin and the charred fragments still attached to the flesh are removed. The peeled peppers are then dried on a cotton cloth, an essential step in reducing moisture before preservation; after being cut into thin strips, they are left to drain for a couple of hours so that the residual vegetable water may settle and evaporate.
Finally, the peppers are placed inside glass jars, covered and hermetically sealed. At this point, two preservation methods are possible: sterilisation in a bain-marie, according to the traditional technique, or freezing. Claudio D’Archivio’s testimony clearly highlights the technical issue that gradually led the family to favour the second option: peppers are vegetables that ferment easily, and preserves sterilised in a bain-marie carry a high risk of premature deterioration; freezing, by contrast, eliminates this undesirable occurrence and, once thawed, returns a pepper that remains intact and ready to use.
The secular ritual of preparing preserves has always represented a moment of intergenerational gathering and neighbourhood sociability, with several family members engaged in different stages of the process and with continual exchanges of varieties, techniques and jars between neighbouring households. Seasoned raw with extra virgin olive oil, garlic, parsley and salt, roasted peppers serve both as an appetiser and as a side dish in domestic cuisine; they traditionally accompany salt cod on winter festive tables and enrich bruschette, omelettes and sandwiches. Their presence in the pantry is perceived as a marker of food self-sufficiency and of the bond with the vegetable garden: having one’s own preserved peppers means being able to return, during wintertime, to the luxuriant flavour of summer, when they were harvested and carefully prepared.
Continuing the tradition
Claudio D’Archivio, voice.
Ornano di Colledara (TE), 17 August 2024.
Recording by Gianfranco Spitilli,
Don Nicola Jobbi/Bambun Study Centre Archive.
Ornano di Colledara (TE), 17 August 2024.
Recording by Gianfranco Spitilli,
Don Nicola Jobbi/Bambun Study Centre Archive.
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Preparing roasted peppers
Claudio D’Archivio demonstrates, by way of example, the principal stages in preparing roasted peppers for domestic preserves: roasting a pepper over the flame, peeling and trimming it, and cutting it into strips.
Ornano di Colledara (TE), 17 August 2024.
Footage by Gianfranco Spitilli,
Don Nicola Jobbi/Bambun Study Centre Archive.
Ornano di Colledara (TE), 17 August 2024.
Footage by Gianfranco Spitilli,
Don Nicola Jobbi/Bambun Study Centre Archive.
Cultural transmission and protection
The preparation of roasted peppers for domestic preserves forms part of the traditional food practices still widespread in the countryside of the Teramo area, with particular continuity in family contexts where a vegetable garden is still cultivated and where an older generation remains the bearer of knowledge. It is not a codified production method nor a practice subject to formal recognition, but rather an ordinary form of rural knowledge transmitted within the family through observation and direct participation in the work of preparation.
Today, the vitality of the practice depends upon several converging conditions: the persistence of the domestic vegetable garden, the investment of time and labour required to produce significant quantities of peppers within a few days, and the presence of an intergenerational chain including elderly transmitters and descendants willing to inherit this knowledge. In the case of Ornano di Colledara, for example, the practice is actively maintained by Claudio D’Archivio, a physician by profession, who chose to preserve and transmit to his children the techniques learned from his mother, historically responsible for the domestic preparation. The adoption of the freezer as a preservation tool alternative to traditional bain-marie sterilisation represents a technological evolution that has made the practice more sustainable from the perspective of food safety and more manageable for families that no longer possess cool cellars and dedicated equipment: an example of how food traditions may continue to survive through functional adaptations without losing their foundational core.
From the point of view of documentation, although the preparation of homemade summer preserves has been the subject of ethnographic surveys and promotional initiatives by regional administrations and professional associations in its many forms, there is still no systematic collection of local variants, family techniques and associated dialect vocabulary capable of adequately safeguarding a dimension of culinary heritage that industrial production and large-scale distribution increasingly tend to reduce to the finished product alone.
Today, the vitality of the practice depends upon several converging conditions: the persistence of the domestic vegetable garden, the investment of time and labour required to produce significant quantities of peppers within a few days, and the presence of an intergenerational chain including elderly transmitters and descendants willing to inherit this knowledge. In the case of Ornano di Colledara, for example, the practice is actively maintained by Claudio D’Archivio, a physician by profession, who chose to preserve and transmit to his children the techniques learned from his mother, historically responsible for the domestic preparation. The adoption of the freezer as a preservation tool alternative to traditional bain-marie sterilisation represents a technological evolution that has made the practice more sustainable from the perspective of food safety and more manageable for families that no longer possess cool cellars and dedicated equipment: an example of how food traditions may continue to survive through functional adaptations without losing their foundational core.
From the point of view of documentation, although the preparation of homemade summer preserves has been the subject of ethnographic surveys and promotional initiatives by regional administrations and professional associations in its many forms, there is still no systematic collection of local variants, family techniques and associated dialect vocabulary capable of adequately safeguarding a dimension of culinary heritage that industrial production and large-scale distribution increasingly tend to reduce to the finished product alone.
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