1/2 pound lamb giblets (liver, heart and lungs)*
6 eggs
3 tablespoons Pecorino cheese
3 garlic cloves, cut up
1/4 of a pound of fresh pork belly with skin, cut up into small pieces
2 tablespoons olive oil
Salt, pepper

2 cups of water for boiling stew

* Veal slices, cut up into tiny pieces, can be used instead of giblets

Fry garlic till golden in vegetable oil.

Add fresh pork belly, render some of the fat.

Add giblets or veal pieces and stir-fry for about five minutes.

Add about 2 cups of water and stew for about an hour (if it dries out, add a touch more water, the resulting mixture shouldn't be too dry or too wet).

Beat eggs.

Add the eggs to the stewed giblets or veal mixture.

Add 3 tablespoons Pecorino cheese.

Cook over medium heat until the eggs are cooked.

Serve warm with salad greens.

Prior to World War II "spezzatini" was considered a delicacy in the South and served only on very special occasions, in particular Holy Saturday and/or Easter Sunday. At that time any dish that required a large number of eggs would have been seen as both expensive and extravagant, and that's why this dish was perceived as a delicacy. Nowadays fewer and fewer Italians and North Americans are eating animal organs, so this dish might upset the pre-teen crowd. In fact, this dish as it was originally made [with lamb liver, lungs and heart] is slowly disappearing. Few North Americans of Italian origin recognize the dish's name, and if they do, they assume it's just another frittata (omelette), which in a sense it is.... Burton Anderson, the author of the book, "The Foods of Italy" which is available for free on-line, notes that in the region of Basilicata the dish called "spezzatina di agnello" refers to "lamb stewed in an earthenware pot with potatoes, onions, bay leaf and peppers." .... Photo: Mary Melfi.

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