Angelina's Pizzeria and Pasta

PANAMA CITY At one point in the latest "Emerald Coast Chefs" profile on Beach TV, host Margit Bisztray tells Chef Dominic Demarco that Angelina's Pizzeria and Pasta is "authentic."

"And you're authentic too," she then tells Demarco. He responds with a smile and a shrug: a simple "What can I say?" gesture.

Demarco comes from a long line of Italian cooks. "Everybody in my family cooked," he tells Bisztray. "I grew up thinking that's what you do."

His son is a chef in New Jersey, he said, and he has a cousin in New Mexico whom he supplies with homemade Italian sausage. But "when you make something or create something," he says, "you always call Mom, you know."

Demarco gained experience away from home as a cook in the Air Force and in culinary schools and as an apprentice chef in Virginia and New Jersey.

The dishes he prepares with Bisztray are veal piccata and linguine frutte de mar, which he says is popular at Angelina's. "Actually," he says, "it's probably my favorite there, too."

Frutte de mar means fruit of the sea, and the dish as Demarco prepares it includes shrimp, scallops and clams. But up north, he says they use mussels. You also can use lobster, fish or oysters.

In Demarco's practiced hands, preparation is fairly simple. To hot olive oil in a pan, he adds the seafood, garlic, salt and pepper, and crushed red pepper, if you like your seafood spicy. He also adds white wine and parsley. "You can't put too much parsley in this dish," he says.

He finishes with a pat of butter to thicken the sauce, then fresh-cooked linguine tossed with the sauce in the pan and served.

The veal piccata, he says, is another mainstay on the Angelina's menu. It includes capers, the tiny green flower buds that give Italian and Mediterranean sauces a distinctive tart but salty flavor.

Cooks who want to try the dish themselves can watch the "Emerald Coast Chefs" segment" to pick up precise measurements and techniques. It's at 6:30 p.m. Wednesdays and Sundays on Beach TV through June 24.

Here is a sneak peek, though: a summarized recipe taken from a video preview of the show.

Veal piccata

1 or 2 tablespoons olive oil

2 to 4 pats of butter

Juice from one lemon

Veal cutlets, pounded thin and coated with flour

1 tablespoon capers

Brown the veal on both sides in hot olive oil and a pat of butter, about 4 minutes total. Drain the oil and add pats of butter, lemon juice and capers. Reduce heat and simmer until sauce thickens, then serve with pasta topped with tomato cream sauce.

Angelina's Pizzeria and Pasta, (850) 747-0086, is in Panama City.