Скачать или смотреть Cleaning and Cutting Fennel

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Mountain fennel.At first glance a word like fennel seems pretty unambiguous. It's a plant with feathery yellowish-green foliage and yellow flowers that yields seeds with a distinctively spicy taste. Fennel is, in fact, often classified as a spice.

Would that it were quite so simple. To begin with, there are two Mediterranean plants often referred to as "fennel," and one happens to be what Italians often call anise. Then there's liquorice - actually an Asian plant bearing no near kinship to the fennels - which has a flavour similar to anise root. The Italian "liquorice liqueur" called anisette is, of course, made from local "anise root," not liquorice bean, and the idea that it contains elderberries is, well, just an idea.

"True" fennel is the plant known scientifically as foeniculum vulgare, and this is a case where the English and Italian words come directly from the Latin. Here in Sicily it's often called finocchio di montagna or "mountain fennel." This perennial, which actually grows wild in many areas, is in the apiaceae family (formerly umbelliferae). Indigenous to the Mediterranean, it thrives even in relative dry climates. Mountain fennel (shown here) rather resembles dill and in Sicilian cuisine is is usually served with pasta or as an ingredient in fritattas.