On an overcast afternoon in early October, Francesco Palmieri swings by his mother’s home in Bloomfield. He pulls up in front of the modest, two-story, brick- and vinyl-sided house and walks to the rear, passing the fruit and vegetable garden that fills the entire backyard. Breezing through a storm door into the long, narrow basement kitchen, Palmieri—on a rare day off from his Bloomfield restaurant, The Orange Squirrel—gives his mother a peck on the cheek and sets to work making lunch.
Mrs. Palmieri—born Consiglia Cozzolino, but nicknamed Nanette early on—is already boiling water for pasta and heating up a cast-iron skillet for the fritto misto Francesco has planned. Though her once-lush garden is showing signs of the waning season, there’s still plenty to be tapped: plum tomatoes, basil, bulging zucchinis and their delicate blossoms, figs and persimmons, all of which she now retrieves for the day’s lunch. Returning to the kitchen minutes later, she can’t help but check on her son’s progress. Has the water boiled yet? Is he over-frying the zucchini blossoms?
“Don’t worry about this, Ma,” says Palmieri, motioning his mother away. “After 30 years, I think I’ve got it.”
Actually, it has been more than 30 years since Palmieri began hanging around his mother’s kitchen. His first culinary foray, at age six, consisted of helping her shape homemade pasta. Nanette, a sprightly 72, remembers Francesco, or Frank as she calls him, being an adventurous eater, the only one of her three sons who showed any interest in the kitchen.
“I learned to cook from my mom,” he says, but adds, “I went to cooking school to learn the proper procedures.” At times, the two sets of lessons clashed.
“I’d cook my vegetables until there was no color left in them, and my teachers would get mad and say, ‘These are overcooked,’” says Palmieri, 42, remembering his first months at the Culinary Institute of America in the late 1990s. “There was a lot of relearning.”
Nevertheless, he held onto his mother’s reverence for fresh, seasonal ingredients as well as some of her recipes. His first job after graduating from the CIA was at Windows on the World atop the World Trade Center. When it was his turn to prepare dinner for the staff, his go-to dish was Nanette’s manicotti, which got high marks from the staff and from the restaurant’s legendary chef, Michael Lomonaco.
Nanette, born in Corigliano Calabro, in Italy’s Calabria region, immigrated to the United States in 1961. She still embodies Old World Italian culture. Palmieri, with his porkpie hat, scruffy facial hair and elaborate neck tattoo, is the updated version. The menu at the Orange Squirrel represents both poles. There are handmade pastas, veal Milanese, whole roasted branzino—and, more adventurously, lamb chops with mint pomegranate glaze and pistachio powder. Palmieri says he doesn’t want to dictate customers’ eating decisions, but hopes they’re willing to “try it our way.” That attitude comes from his mother, who expected her sons to eat everything put before them, even tripe, which Palmieri liked, and eggplant, which he did not.
But perhaps her greatest influence lies in her garden, located just a few blocks away from the restaurant.
“When the garden is really going and we’re bringing stuff from there all the time, that’s when the restaurant is really hopping,” says Palmieri. “Nothing is better than fresh off the vine.”