Our Principles
In Italy, food is always best from your own village and from people you know and Squisito use that as our guiding principle. Above all our food has to taste good!
Squisito makes food that is fresh, local and seasonal from ingredients that are good, clean and fair. When we can't grow or rear ingredients ourselves we look first to our own locality and our friends. This means our food reflects the seasons and all the ingredients have provenance which is traceable. We subscribe to the principles Carlo Petrini outlined when he founded Slow Food and Squisito are proud to be winners of a Slow Food Good, Clean & Fair Producer's Bursary to exhibit and demonstrate at the BBC Good Food Show.
Wherever possible Squisito food is made from authentic Italian recipes made with ingredients and methods typical to that area but grown or reared locally in England. This is reflected in the fact that over 85% of the ingredients in the food Squisito sell at accredited Farmers Markets is grown, reared and sourced locally. Squisito are the only accredited Italian food producer in the Midlands accredited Farmers Markets.
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Squisito like to cook Italian food with passione and flair so we like to create new family favourites based on our experiences in Italy. Whilst out heart is in Italy our stomachs are in England so we sometimes adapt our recipes to take advantage of the richness of local ingredients. But we never compromise.
When we are at home in Cisternino in Puglia, we like to visit the Bar Centrale and sip a Caiphirinha cocktail watching the evening passagiata and listening to the day's chit chat and family news. Back in rainy England, Sara has recreated that experience with our Caiphirinha Cocktail Sorbet ice cream made with Brazilian rum, fresh lime and mint from our garden. It's Squisito!
Sometimes we copy classic recipes like Pesto Genovese. Squisito Genovese is made from fresh local basil grown by Blackdown Growers on the Fosse Way, fresh pinenuts, Parmesan Reggiano and Italian olive oil and sometimes we make a local English Parsley & Walnut Pesto using English Moss Curled Parsley, walnuts, Lincolnshire Poacher cheese and Welland Valley Extra Virgin Rapeseed Oil. You will not find sunflower oil, potato, cashew nuts, preservatives or any other funny business in our pesto. Squisito food is fresh pure and simple and if you don't see what you want we expect you to ask.
One of our favourite dishes isWild Boar Cacciatore which we love in Tuscany just as much as we do in England. So, our Squisito Wild Boar Cacciatore is made from purebred wild boar reared in Leicestershire with local red wine grown by Chevelswarde Organic Vineyard in South Kilworth in Leicestershire - an Italian recipe with fresh and local provenance exactly as you would expect to find on any osteria table in Tuscany. Nobody says wild boar is cheap but if you want the real thing we think you will get it from Squ!sito.
Growing up and living in a village makes you respect animals and the environment so we use only biodegradable or recyclable packaging wherever possible. We have an experienced team of recyclers at Squisito - our rare breed hens love leftover pasta and vegetables!
We like to grow and buy organic and protected status ingredients but we know that these things do not guarantee quality so at Squisito we follow our noses and rely on our tastebuds first.
Squisito produce fresh food without additives or preservatives. We take care to use and sell ingredients at our online shop which contain the minimum preservatives required or use ingredients which are naturally cured and preserved. Check out our ice creams and
Tuscan Meatballs as examples and you will see why we had to start Squisito as a business.
We don't make a big fuss about our commitments because we think it should be the norm as it is in Italy.