By the time you read this, the Italian Festival may already be a memory, but it would be a shame not to share the wonderful spread of Italian foods that brought me back to being four years old, sneaking rainbow cookies from the kitchen before dinner. The saying ‘a kid in a candy shop’ is the truest phrase I could think of while wandering through the delicious stalls that pulled me back into different memories of my life. For those of you not familiar with rainbow cookies, they are a three-layered almond-flavored Italian-American cookie with raspberry jam between each layer and a chocolate coating around the outside. One of my favorite treats is petit fours, and before I knew what a petit four (sponge cake with jam filling and an icing coating) was, rainbow cookies felt almost identical to them. To be honest, I have no idea why they call it a cookie when it’s really more like sponge cake. The first layer is green, the second white, and the third a pinkish red, inspired by the colors of the Italian flag.
Carlo’s Bakery, a Hoboken classic, was founded in 1910 by Italian pastry chef Carlo Guastaferro. Italian immigrants had been settling in Hoboken since the 1840s, and they paved the way for the city’s food culture and traditions that are still around today. Carlo’s brings the best cannolis to Hoboken, and they did the same for the Italian Festival. My sister and I got ours dusted with a cloud of powdered sugar, with a perfectly flaky shell and a fluffy, sugary-sweet filling topped with chocolate chips on both sides. The first bite sent me to another dimension. Right after quarantine, my family and I would often visit Hoboken, and we always stopped by Carlo’s for their famous cannolis and sometimes a slice of their rainbow cake. Now quarantine feels like a distant memory, although I need to make more stops at Carlo’s this year to get lobster tails, the pastry and cake slices.
Speaking of lobster, as soon as I saw a lobster roll stall, I immediately grabbed my family and ran there. I am glad because lobster is the most divine delicacy to ever grace my taste buds. It is just so melty, creamy, and buttery at one time in a perfectly toasted roll. Our lobster roll was accompanied by a side of fries, and like most Americans’ complaints about Italian food, it wasn’t salted enough for my liking, but the texture was on point and sprinkled with parmesan cheese. I also got to enjoy the iconic Italian creation that everyone loves: pizza. A traditional style wood oven-baked Italian pizza, true to the original pizza you find in Italy according to my mother. The freshness cannot compare to the greasy $14 pizza you order in five minutes. We got the Margherita pizza and a mushroom pizza with truffles, both just so fresh and delicate. The last time I went to Italy, I was only two, and the Italian Festival made me realize just how long overdue I am for another visit. Until then, I can wander the streets of Hoboken, where Italian immigrants brought a little piece of their homeland to us, and savor a taste of Italy in every bite and every shop.
