111030 Fri Jul 12 08:56:13 -0700 2002 12 7 Chicago Area 0 600235 As an Italian American, I get a little uncomfortable when I sense the strange “ethnic” pride in things Mafioso. Hey, I’m a big fan of Sopranos and Sinatra, but I can’t help but feel it strange to admire criminal behavior (even if, historically, the cosa nostra stepped in to protect folks who were ignored or worse by regular law enforcement, it sometimes seems easy to forget that these original gangsters specialized in “protection,” prostitution and simple murder to make a living). That’s all by way of setting up an experience I had yesterday afternoon at Alpine Foods on North Avenue in Elmwood Park.. I’ve had very good Italian subs from this place, but today I was poking around on the shelves and found a new pasta sauce. Giancana brand marinara. On the label is a picture of Antoinette Giancana, and the tagline is – I kid you not – “Just like my Dad’s, maybe better.” Dad, of course, is Sam “MoMo” Giancana, syndicate boss, co-conspirator in various Kill Fidel and possibly Kill Kennedy plots, who got whacked in his basement, grilling sausages, a few blocks from Alpine Foods. Around the corner on North Harlem, there’s Caponie’s (“the pizza you can’t refuse”), named, of course, after Scarface Al, another local boy who made it big and bad. No doubt, Hollywood glamour burnishes mafia imagery, but is it not strange to sell a pasta sauce by trading on the name of someone who was described in a police report as “a snarling, sarcastic, ill-tempered sadistic psychopath”? I mean, you don’t see Vlad the Impaler brand Paprika, Joseph Stalin borscht, or Pol Pot-stickers. So, I bought a bottle of Giancana pasta sauce for my middle daughter, who’s currently reading “The Outfit.” And she was thrilled. “Is that Antoinette?” she exclaimed when she saw the picture of the mafia princess on the label. It’s that same strange pride – the pride I see in my youngest daughter when she relates that her friends think I’m in the mafia (they just assume that because I’m Sicilian, wear a goomba fedora and strap-shoulder t-shirts, and sometimes consort with known criminals/attorneys, baddabing, I must be mobbed up). Anyway, I intend to try Antoinette’s sauce this weekend. If it’s good, I’ll post about it; if not, I’m going to dummy up. No sense asking for trouble. PS. I showed my oldest daughter the bottle of Giancana sauce and she said, “Hey, I thought that name sounded familiar. I know these guys! I’ve been in their basement. It’s totally sound-proofed. You can yell and yell and nobody hears you.” Cool? Fuggedaboutit. Fri Jul 12 08:56:13 -0700 2002 0 David Hammond 1 600238 I thought it was ceci and scarola he was cooking. Fri Jul 12 10:01:35 -0700 2002 600235 0 annieb 2 600243 Annieb, Ceci and scarola -- that would certainly have been healthier for Sam, though I guess, given the turn of events that evening, that the nutritional value of the late night snack didn't really matter. At any rate, my sources say it was sausage. I quote from the site linked below, "On June 19, 1975, Giancana was in the basement kitchen of his Oak Park, Illinois, home cooking a little snack before bedtime. Someone was with him: his murderer, but Giancana never suspected. As Giancana had his back turned, minding his sausages, a gun, a .22-caliber automatic with a silencer, was placed inches from the back of Giancana's head." Sausages were also on the menu of Momo's last meal in the recent HBO special, featuring John Turturro. Link: http://www.carpenoctem.tv/mafia/giancana.html Fri Jul 12 10:21:30 -0700 2002 600238 0 David Hammmond 3 600248 Can't remember what book I read that detail in, but to my mind, "minding his sausages" sounds like a euphemism for all food Italian. Erica Kane was so horribly awfully good in the movie. Fri Jul 12 13:36:17 -0700 2002 600243 0 annieb 4 600251 Annieb, Okay, here's a resolution to this major historical question that should satisfy both of us. I quote from "The Outfit" (Gus Russo, Bloomsbury, 2001, page 482): "On his last night alive, Giancana had been cooking his favorite meal of sausage, escarole and beans." Fri Jul 12 14:26:13 -0700 2002 600248 0 David Hammmond 5 600252 Hope they were ceci. Wasn't Erica Kane great as the princess? Fri Jul 12 14:55:35 -0700 2002 600251 0 annieb 6 600254 Probably cannellini. Fri Jul 12 15:05:13 -0700 2002 600252 0 JeffB 6 600255 Annieb, I was so excited about finding confirmation of both our historical accounts that I mistakenly left out a key word from the quote: the word is "ceci" and it comes before beans. Now, on to other pressing issues. Isn't Erica Kane the Susan Lucci character on "All My Children"? In the HBO movie, "Sugar Time," Phyllis McGuire (MoMo's squeeze) was played Mary-Louise Parker, but I have a feeling that's not who you're talking about. Fri Jul 12 15:18:15 -0700 2002 600252 0 David Hammmond 7 600257 Ceci beans w/delicate escarole. He really was a monster. (Sorry to butt in.) Fri Jul 12 15:51:12 -0700 2002 600255 0 JeffB 7 600265 Yes, that's Susan Lucci as Erica Kane, who also played a thinly-veiled Antoinette Giancana in a truly tacky made for tv movie "Mafia Princess". When she was say too old for the part (her neck was like a stack of dimes, as a description of her age) and she definately looked out of place in the Catholic school girl uniform. Fri Jul 12 18:51:12 -0700 2002 600255 0 annieb 1 600245 Romanticism sells. Francis Coppola made a couple of great movies romanticising the mob and that image has persisted in our culture to this day (aided and abetted by numerous other films piggybacking rather shamelessly on the themes and style of The Godfather). It also feeds in with a certain romantic strain in which outlaws in general are sometimes held. Weird, but what are you going to do? Speaking of pasta sauce in a jar, a couple of nights ago we tried Mia Francesca's version, labelled as "Tomato-Basil" but don't let that fool you, the basil is just for decor. This sauce is a tomato sauce rich with onion flavor, in a way I haven't sampled in any other Chicago restaurant. I love Francesca's oniony staple red sauce and this stuff in the jar was every bit as good. It's not cheap (seven bucks for a jar) and I've only seen it sold in their restaurants. But it is by far the best jarred red pasta sauce I've ever tried. Also, just a quick correction: Al Capone was born and raised in Brooklyn so he probably doesn't count as a Chicago local boy. For better or worse. Fri Jul 12 12:48:59 -0700 2002 600235 0 Harry V. 2 600246 Harry the Fifth, You are right that "Al Capone was born and raised in Brooklyn," but he operated out of Cicero (as I'm sure you know)-- and Cicero is right next store to Oak Park. Actually,part of current Oak Park used to be in what is now Cicero; Hemingway was actually born in an area that was, technically, Cicero. Attached link addresses this topic. There's a Mia Francesca on Madison in Forest Park -- I'll check out their bottled gravy next time I'm in the area. Incidentally, on the subject of local mafia lore, Chuckie English, a Giancana associate, was hit in the parking lot of Horwath's, one of my favorite Elmwood Park supper clubs. If you ever visit there, ask for Pattie -- she's a good waitress and she will regale you with lore related to crimes committed on restaurant premises. Link: http://www.theatlantic.com/issues/2001/11/kotlowitz.htm Fri Jul 12 13:15:23 -0700 2002 600245 0 David Hammmond 3 600253 My next alderman (alderman-to-be) is named Chuckie. And he's suspicious, nothing to do with ethnicity, Chicago is wonderfully pan-ethnic in that you can be embarrassed/ashamed of whatever ethnicity you are. Personally, I crawl into a hole on St. Paddy's Day. Fri Jul 12 14:59:41 -0700 2002 600246 0 annieb