Prosciutto e Melone

About Prosciutto e Melone

Prosciutto e melone is one of the most disarmingly simple starters in the Italian repertoire: sweet melon draped with thin slices of cured prosciutto. The magic is in the contrast, the cool juicy sweetness of ripe melon against the salty, savory, silky ham, a study in the sweet-and-salty balance Italians have long loved. There's no cooking involved at all; the dish is entirely about sourcing a fragrant, ripe melon, usually cantaloupe, and pairing it with good-quality prosciutto sliced whisper-thin. A crack of black pepper and a thread of olive oil are all the seasoning it needs.

Eating it, the salt of the ham pulls the sweetness forward while the melon keeps everything light and refreshing, so it wakes up the palate rather than filling you up. It's a summer antipasto through and through, the kind of thing set out before a warm-weather lunch with a glass of chilled prosecco or a dry white. Because it comes together in under ten minutes with no heat, it's the starter to reach for when the point is to let good ingredients speak for themselves. The only real skill is in choosing the melon: it should smell sweet at the stem end and give slightly when pressed.