Mangia Tutto!

Vallucciole...senza alcuna colpa

2009-04-13T12:26:00.001+02:00

Vallucciole, senza alcuna colpa. Without fault of their own.

2009-04-13T11:32:00.010+02:00

It could have been a day just like today. April 13, 1944, early spring, blue skies, trees blooming, Good Friday. At Mulin di Bucchio three Nazis disguised as escaped American POW's were driving an unmarked car and and taking measurements for the logistics and maneuvers that would enable the Germans to prepare a line of defense against the growing number of partisans in the area and to break these partisan formations. The Gothic Line, ordered by Field Marshall Kesselring would have crossed Tuscany and Romagna in the Appenine Mountains. The Nazis believed the best way to ensure all available security was to transform the whole territory into "la terra bruciata", burnt earth. The plan was was to clean out all the villages, a mopping up or "rastrellamento" with such horrible ferocity there would be no resistance from the population.
That particular spring day they Nazis met up with some partisans who had come to the mill to stock up on flour. The partisans killed two of the Germans and the third escaped into the woods.The next day, at dawn, the tiny village of Vallucciole which sits across from the mill high up on the road was burnt to the ground in reprisal. Goering's S.S. troops came without warning and with the villagers still in bed, began systematically dragging people out of their homes, half naked, killing the women and children first using machine guns, clubs, knives, rifles. I talked to my neighbor Pasquita who was seventeen at the time and living here. She told me the babies were thrown against the wall. Everything was set on fire. The men were collected from house to house and made to carry the German munitions up to nearby Mt. Falterona. Each man was guarded by his own Nazi. There is one man who escaped and wrote a terrifying account of this march. When the mission up the mountain was finished the men were executed. From sunrise to sunset the massacre continued until at the end of the day one hundred and eight people were dead and Vallucciole was a smoldering village of ash and death.
Today most of the houses are rebuilt and have become summer homes. There is one house that has not been rebuilt which you can see in the slideshow. There is also a slide of the bread oven outside the home. I never see anybody when I go to Vallucciole. There is a man who built a house a few meters from the cemetery. He's from Stia and comes to his house to get out of town to the quiet. It is very quiet there except for a few friendly dogs that bark at Lucy in the car. The tiny cemetery tells this unforgettable story.It happened sixty five years ago on this day.

Sounds Like a Motorcycle, Tastes Like a Cake

2009-04-02T08:19:00.017+02:00

It's called "il berlingozzo", a traditional Tuscan cake that dates back to the Renaissance. It would very likely show up on the table of Cosimo I (1389-1464). Now a little history. The Florentines loved sugar. In fact, the blackened teeth resulting from the overindulgence in sugar was actually seen as a sign of their affluence. Those that could afford it, that is. I've read that some would actually rub their teeth with some sort of black substance to give the illusion of wealth. They loved sugar so much that rather than waiting for dessert, they would put sugar in the pasta. So, the berlingozzo would show up on an antipasto table as sweet hors d'oeuvres, which was a popular start to a Renaissance meal.
Berlingozzo comes from a very old Tuscan dialect verb "berlingare", to enjoy. And the Florentines were such lovers of all things delicious they were called "i berlingatori'. The Florentines got this name as they ate and drank with abandon before assuming the abstemious practices of Lent. (I don't think anybody does this anymore.) This cake was traditionally eaten on Giovedi' Grasso" or Fat Thursday right before Carnevale. So somewhere along the way this wonderful little cake became known as "il berlingozzo".
Just like any other kind of food in Italy you'll find different spins on recipes from province to province. Or for that matter, from village to village. if I went over to Pasquita's right now she'd pull out her grandmother's recipe and there would be something unique about it. That's the fun of the whole Italian regional cooking experience. Near Pistoia, not too far from Florence, the cake might be flavored with "semi d'anice" or crushed fennel seeds. Nearby, in Prato it might be flavored with orange zest. Here in Florence it's flavored with lemon zest. I must admit though I've made the cake with a dash of almond extract when a lemon wasn't around and it was just fine.
This is a quickly put together cake, a one bowl cake. Get everything measured and then one, two three, it's finished.
It's very moist and has a lovely density that's great for "inzuppare", or dipping, dunking, in coffee, caffe l'latte, milk, even red wine.
When Peter's son comes to visit, I could have three or four dolci made for him, and he always goes for il berlingozzo.

2 whole eggs
2 egg yolks
1 cup sugar, about 217 grams
3 cups flour, about 410 grams
3 1/2 oz. butter, about 100 grams, melted
zest of one lemon
1 T of baking powder or 1 envelope of leivito per dolci
250 to 300 cl. of milk...about 1 1/2 cups or 12 oz. and a little more
pinch of salt.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees, 180 C.
Beat the eggs with the sugar until they become light yellow. I use a hand mixer for this and it's the only time I use it in the recipe. So you can throw the beaters in the sink if you want.
Add the flour a little at at a time , the melted butter, the lemon zest, salt, and stir well to combine everything. It takes some patience to get that flour mixed in.
Add the milk and keep beating. It will eventually come together. Sometimes I might add a tablespoon or more of milk to ease the batter a little.
Add the baking powder. Some directions call for sprinkling it through a strainer because you don't want any lumps. That's not a bad idea. Stir it into the mix but don't beat it. Just stir until you don't see it anymore. Make sure that's the last thing you do.
Have a buttered and floured cake pan ready to go. For some reason I always use a tube pan. I don't think it makes a difference.
Pour in the batter and bake for about 40 minutes. After the 40 minutes do the toothpick check in the center. Clean toothpick? Finished.
Now, I have a very quirky oven as you know. I set my timer for 25 minutes and start checking. The cake will rise and be golden but it will still need more time. The second I sense the fragrance change from bake to burn I need to turn my top burner element off or it will grill the poor thing. And then I switch to just cooking it from the bottom. But you've got ovens that aren't manufactured by Fisher-Price so you should be okay. I can get this cake made in 20 minutes or less. It's the cooking part for me that's tricky. This is a delightful cake and I can assure you anyone can make it successfully.
Put some berries over a slice and a dollop of whipped cream. Dunk into a glass of milk. You'll see what I mean.

Santuario di Santa Maria delle Grazie

2009-03-20T10:56:00.013+01:00

Buona Giornata, ai miei amici!
Please see the video at the end of the post. Grazie!
It never fails. Once you pack up your scarves and hats for the season you get a blast of winter again. That's exactly what I did and what's happening today. It snowed overnight and although we can't see anything here I saw some cars coming down from the montain this morning with a fair amount of snow on them. And of course the mountains in the distance confirm this.
I've been on a popover kick since I tried a recipe I found in last week's New York Times Magazine written by Amanda Hesser. This seemed to be a cinnamon sugar popover morning with all the fierce winds and snow blowing down from the mountain. Sometimes you can't tell if it's real snow or the snow from the mountains. These popovers are great and, sorry to say, addicting. They're in the "betcha can't eat just one" category.
So if there's a little snow whooshing around down here you can be sure up at the Santuario di Santa Maria delle Grazie you can leave footprints. Unfortunately, we don't have a Madonna's footprints as we did at Santa Maria del Sasso, but nevertheless the Madonna has shown up here too.
This pretty little country church sits high above the main road. You can tell just how far you've gone up by the temperature change. The road going up is unpaved and One Way so it does present some challenges coming and going. Someone is expected to be nice about it and I don't know how gli italiani interpret the protocol of who does the backing up so it's good to keep your eyes trained at a distance. But there is a rule and that is that the driver closest to the wall pulls over or backs up, in this case the latter because the road isn't much wider than a bathtub. Piero took me here on my first summer visit in 2003 and I was enchanted with the whole property. The second time P took Marybeth and I up there so she could see it. When we got there we were right in front of a funeral procession. No turning back now. When we saw that old hearse huffing and puffing up the hill and the 20 cars behind it we knew we were in for the long haul. We were parked in but good. P wasn't happy, Marybeth was along for the ride and I was in absolute, unadulterated HEAVEN. I come from four generations of undertakers, funeral directors, morticians..whatever's the most comfortable title, and I was ready for the show. And what a show it was. The banners, the procession, the country pallbearers dressed in their best camouflage,the ancient silver Mercedes chug- a- lug hearse stalling at the very top of the hill in front of the church, the mourners sniffing with tissue packets ready, the heave ho handling of the casket into the church. I flinched and winced...the poor deceased. It was great! We were there for every Pater Noster and Ave Maria and Requiem in Pace there was. Then it was over and the cars started down the hill. We were free.
Here's the story of Santa Maria delle Grazie.
In 1428 a young country girl named Giovanna took advantage of the nice spring weather and left her house to do some work in the field. There was a flash rainstorm and she couldn't get back to her house but found shelter in a cave covered in branches whose entrance was marked with a white rock. As soon as she got into the cave she started to pray. All of a sudden there was a light of exceptional splendor and there appeared before her the celestial figure of a woman of extraordinary beauty standing with her foot on the white rock. Giovanna knew in her heart that this was the Mother of God. The Lady spoke to her in a motherly way telling her that if the people wanted to be relieved of sufferings and punishments and misfortune, that a church should be built here, in this same spot. And here,the people will give homage and veneration and constant prayer. Giovanna continued to be surrounded with this splendid aura when a shepherd, Piero Campodonico, approached and witnessed the event and understood it's significance.
Giovanna told her story to the Rector Luca of Stia and he, knowing the goodness and simplicity of Giovanna, believed her without question.The local parishoners quickly made a procession to the spot and a religious reawakening spread through the whole Casentino Valley and as far as Arezzo, Florence, and Sienna.
And so the church was finished in 1432. In 1474 a sudden fire totally destroyed the building and everything inside. Reconstruction was started immediately with funds offered by the faithful and the church of Santa Maria di Nuova di Firenze.
The reconstruction was completed in 1490 and this is what we see today. A simple church of elegant Florentine architecture with a single nave. The sanctuary was called Santa Maria delle Grazie...Saint Mary of the Graces. Every May 20 the people in the nearby villages make a procession to celebrate the apparition.
There are some beautiful works from the Della Robbia school (Andrea della Robbia 1435-1528) in the church. The apparition of The Madonna to Blessed Giovanna at the Nativity, the lunette of the Annunciation, and the "tondi" of the Evangelists, the little rounds encircling the arches. Above the sacristy door there is a fresco that Bernard Berenson attributed to Ghirlandaio (1452-1525). And just to give you some historical perspective, Michelangelo was a student in Ghirlandaio's workshop.
It was a Sunday that I took these pictures in the church. There was a Mass scheduled for 4:00 and there were a few people in the church saying the Rosary before Mass.I was a little concerned about my presence with the camera but I hoped that they understood that I was a "turista". Today, I could go back there and do the whole thing over again. These small country churches are bursting with treasures. You take a seat in a pew, in the soft candlelight of the church, and just let yourself wonder.

Strozzapreti..betcha can't eat just one.

2009-03-08T12:14:00.006+01:00

It must've been about twenty years ago when I was having dinner with my brother Bill, his wife Joanne, and the kids at an Italian-American joint in the Pocono Mountains that I first encountered what Joanne and the kids called "spinach balls". They were served on a gratin dish, bubbling with butter and cheese. Nobody could figure out how they were made or what went into them. I remember Joanne, saying years later to Cait, the middle child (all grown up now and a popular high school music teacher who plays a mean funky sax) "I've almost got it Cait. I think I've figured out the spinach balls!" That gives you an insight that we are definitely NOT Italian.
"Strozzapreti" or priest stranglers, where else but in Italy could you find such a fantastic name for a food item? Who needs opera when you can eat it? I tasted strozzapreti my first summer here in 2003. Piero told me they were called priest stranglers because when the priest was an invited dinner guest he ate so many of them he would choke. When I first started researching them the only thing I found about strozzapreti was the pasta shape which indeed looked like a rolled towel ready to do the job. I just googled today and found that strozzapreti now has a wikipedia entry and what I'm talking about is strozzapreti in the baked form and along with that a few fascinating reasons about how they got their name. I've almost forgotten that they are also called "gnudi" (that's in Tuscan dialetto) which means naked..take that a little further and it's ravioli without shirts.
So, after all this..what are they? Priest stranglers are a mix of chopped greens, ricotta, an egg, grated parmigiano, a hearty grating of nutmeg, salt and pepper and the least amount of flour possible. Too much flour will toughen them. You should need very little. Now to give you the recipe I have to get out of my gram head and into my ounce head. I could even let that go and do the "a'occhio", which means by the eye..and I'm getting pretty good at that these days.
P came home with a container of fresh ricotta the other day and a gorgeous bunch of bietole (beet greens). As everybody knows, once you cook those greens you haven't got much. You need to go out and get a few more bunches. Which is what he did.I had less than a pound of ricotta and I was looking for equal the amount of green stuff or more. P cooked the greens in salted water and then chop, chop with the mezzaluna (once again, Italian ingenuity, rocking back and forth, less effort and twice as much accomplished). I mixed about a pound of chopped greens(drain very well, squeeze out all the water) with about 320 grams of ricotta, one egg, etc. Taste it along the way. Enough salt, cheese..? Now get a big spoon and start to shape them. The mix will be damp. I like about a little smaller than a golf ball for size and I toss it back and forth in my hands and then roll in flour and toss again to get rid of any excess. That last step is important. The first time I made these with my best friend Marybeth we didn't do the flour stage and our stranglers disintegrated in the boiling water.
So I've got a few stranglers ready and my salted water is boiling. I like to do a test drive to make sure they will hold up in the water. For those of you who may not be sure you've got it right this is a good thing to do.
If everything "va bene" gently add four of five stranglers at a time. You might even turn down the temp on the burner so the boil isn't rapid. I lower them in with a flat strainer. They will sink... but if you put a lid on the top for a minute or so and say an "Ave Maria" (the great Tuscan chef Alvaro Maccioni taught me this) they will rise and bob like happy stranglers in a minute or so. Remove from the water, drain and when all of them are cooked you can move onto the next step. Piero and I like ours sauteed in butter and sage. For this you need a great dollop of butter and a few nice big sage leaves. I like to use a non stick pan to keep my stranglers from sticking. Melt and add the stranglers. I let them go long enough for the butter to give them a tiny brown bottom. Then serve and pass the cheese. They are delicious.I served my friend Susan's "Chocolate Obsession" for dessert with a big helping of vanilla gelato. Everything killer.

Boar and Porcupine..but not in the same pot.

2009-03-03T12:24:00.006+01:00

It started raining again the night before last and as P says (and he's usually right),"Once it starts it doesn't stop." So while the rest of my US Eastern seaboard friends are having fun shoveling their walks and sledding on their Fleixible Flyers, I'm looking at the fog and wondering when I can do laundry again and listening to the drop, drop, drop of the rain off the roof.
Peter, of course, has a new mission...to get that porcupine in the garden. To be honest, I don't think there's anything left for the poor animal to eat since it's eaten all of the winter vegetables. P was talking to a guy who walks up our road every day and the guy said that the people higher up the mountain are having a terrible time with the porcospini. They get into the potato field and eat everything. The Casentino potatoes are a specialty and when P plants our potatoes I'm right with him on capturing the beast. I don't want to lose our little plot of potatoes. But how many porcupines are there? P is now devising a trap along the lines of two chambers of netting. A larger chamber for the animal to enter into and a smaller chamber where there is bait. He's figuring once the animal is in the smaller chamber of netting it won't be able to back out because it's spines will get caught. This is what keeps him up at night. He actually mentioned eating it in a stew if he manages to bag it. No thanks.
Now, onto other beasts. Yesterday was an easy lunch of Spaghetti alla Carbonara. Who can ask for more? Pasta, bacon and eggs, and cheese. Today will be leftover cinghiale ragu'. I just want to eat a salad. I feel the need for green. Lunch is the centerpiece of the day but sometimes I just want to glide past that centerpiece. On Friday night P brought up two bags of wild boar (from that wonderful humming freezer in the cellar) that our neighbor Purgatorio got for us in November. I marinated two large pieces in a substantial amount or red wine (to cut down on that gamey taste), chopped onion, carrot, celery and a few bay leaves. In the morning I was all set up to cut it into small pieces but there was a pretty thick bone in the larger piece which called for bringing out the meat cleaver and P's muscle. Little shards of boar bone flew around for a few seconds and then I washed it all and selected pieces for the cinghiale in agrodolce that I was cooking that morning and the boneless pieces for the ragu the next day. Boar meat isn't pink or pretty like the antiseptic packages of beef or pork we get in the market. It's dramatically dark red and purple and to be honest, it has a bit of a strong smell It also leaves an oily residue on your fingers, even the lean pieces.
"Agrodolce" means sour and sweet. Sometimes you might see it written as dolceforte, or sweet and strong. Of course, I started wondering where this preparation came from and I did a little research. It dates back to the time of The Crusades when the knights returned from the Holy Land influenced by the aristocratic Middle Eastern traditions which included using sugar as a kind of sweet salt. The vinegar was used as a way to preserve the meat. In my preparation, after the meat cooks a good three hours in red wine, I heated some sugar, bitter cocoa powder and vinegar and added it to the pot along with pine nuts and raisins. There is just enough of the chocolate flavor to give it a mystery and just enough of the vinegar to keep you guessing. Very nice. This is a very old recipe in Tuscan cuisine and you don't see it around much any more.
Unlike the ragu' I made the next day with the remaining meat. This is something you'll see on almost every menu in every trattoria in Tuscany. Because this is a very hearty sauce it's traditionally served with a noodle that can handle all that brute strength, pappardelle. To lighten up the whole experience I made something called a lemon pudding cake for dessert. I'd found the recipe on the internet and it looked fast and easy. I'm still wondering how it was supposed to come out. What I got at the end wasn't really pudding and not really cake either. But it was lemony and that's what I was shooting for.
So, that's it for the wild boar in the freezer this year. We'll have to put our order in for more when the boar hunting season starts again on November 1. God knows there are enough of them to go around for everybody. I just hope I don't run into one in the garden. I'll take the porcospino any day.

Carnevale Stia 2009

2009-02-26T18:14:00.002+01:00

The kids really stole the show. So much fun to watch them get excited in their outfits..and then to throw "coriandoli" (confetti) at the grownups.

The great music is played by the group "Unnatural Ax" featuring Stephen Di Bonaventura on tenor banjo.

Porcospini, Zuppe, e Lasagne

2009-02-20T14:14:00.008+01:00

Greetings from Sunny Tuscany. This week it was either snow or sun, mostly sun and it was great to just bundle up and sit in it. Which takes me to the garden. We've been hit again The morning after P had picked three gorgeous heads of creamy white cauliflower (just in time) he told me that we had a visitor. Like the last time, the broccoli and brussel sprouts seemed to be the food of choice. Since the garden looks like a federal prison with wire fencing that would surely keep out the deer, what are we looking at now? Purgatorio said "il tasso". That's a badger and yes, the European badger will eat plants but that's on the far end of its likes and preferences. Then this morning, our vegetable guy (P calls him Il Principale) said it was a "il porcospino", and that's a porcupine. Now P is securing the fencing from the bottom. This guy will be a tough one to keep out because he likes to dig which apparently he's been doing. So that's the end of the broccoli and brussel sprouts. The porc did leave some broccoli behind and P brought it in. I cooked it (for myself, three minutes boil then a little olive oil and salt and pepper) and it was heavenly. Deeply green and with a flavor you just don't get from what you buy in the stores.
We went out to our favorite place for a pizza on Tuesday night. We always order two Napoli. That's tom, cheese, anchovy and capers. SImple, and each bite packs a punch. I always take a little bottle of peperoncini (I leave it in the glove compartment of the car) with me to add more kick. My head almost swiveled off my neck when the guy next to me got his pizza. Could I believe my eyes? There were french fries and sliced hot dog on top of the tom and cheese. Now THAT deserves an exclamation point!
Lots of neat things in the kitchen this week, too. We've been working through this cookbook of old Tuscan recipes and it's been fun choosing what we'll try next. P made "zuppa ripiena" this week, stuffed soup. The carrot, onion and celery are simmered with tomatoes for a while. Spinach is added next, just enough to cook it. Then that Tuscan staple is added to the mix, stale bread. Combine it all, put it in a big bowl and make a hole in the center where you put sauteed, seasoned chicken livers. 'Stuffed'.
I made a very simple chicken soup, Zuppa di Tarlati, cooking the whole chicken in a pot of boiling water which was first enhanced with a little roux. After adding the odori it's all cooked until the chicken falls off the bone. The chicken is taken off the bone and the breast meat is saved and cut into matchsticks. The rest of the meat is either very,very finely chopped or put through a food mill and added to the cooking liquid (strained) which is now really tasty with the chicken broth, along with the breast pieces. Seasoned with salt and pepper and served very hot over that ubiquitous sliced bread. At first I thought it should be jazzed up a bit and on second thought it was wonderful the way it was. And Guido Tarlati, I later discovered was bishop of Arezzo in 1312. The city prospered while he was bishop before it was taken over by the powerful Florentines. It looks as if there is a significant monument to Tarlati in the duomo there and a Tarlati triptych in another Arezzo church. Road trip with zuppa.
P made his wonderful lasagne again yesterday and I found myself in the danger zone by last night..taking little stabs at it the rest of the day. Growing up in the Philadelphia suburbs, lasagne was always the dish that was brought out to serve the masses. Somebody would always bring a big dish of lasagne to a party or a buffet. And it was always made with ricotta. So when my friend Marybeth and I first ended up in Bologna she ordered the lasagna. Boy, was I sorry I didn't order it, too.
The lasagne slouched on her plate like a creamy dream and I'd never tasted anything like it before. That is until I ended up here and started eating P's lasagne. What is it with the lasagne made with ricotta that I had as a kid? Nobody around here ever heard of such a thing. Of course I'm very close to the home of lasagne in Emilia-Romagna so that makes a difference.I've been taking a little survey of my stateside friends and the ricotta version is the most familiar. There are many ways to make lasagne that's for sure but the ricotta version really got played out quite a bit in my youth. What's your lasagne experience?
We got to the Carnevale "sfilata" (it means a kind of parade or thread) last Sunday and I took lot of pix and will go again this Sunday and take more. I want to post a slideshow of the pix as soon as I figure out how to do it.
Today was fish day in Pratovecchio and P brought home "pesciolini di mare", little fish from the sea. Tiny little things, no cleaning necessary. Just tossed with flour and fried..and while the oil was hot we fried a few tomatoes, too. A simple Friday lunch. I'll hit that lasagne again later on tonight.

Valentine's Day nella cucina.

2009-02-14T11:00:00.014+01:00

Happy Valentine's Day a tutti! The morning is cold and brisk with clear skies and since it's already midmorning it looks like a good day, weatherwise. I'm dressed in P's red sweater, a red vest and my red glass heart earrings. Maybe I'm overdoing it?
P and I have been busy in the kitchen, as usual. We have been in contact with the proprietor of a pretty little agriturismo up the road here in Papiano http://www.borgotramonte.it/ and he is interested in offering some cooking classes when the season begins again in the late spring. Naturally, we'd be introducing Tuscan cuisine to the guests and that essential part of the cuisine known as "la cucina povera". P and I brainstormed one night and I wrote down everything I've made since I've been here (I keep a kitchen journal). and he consulted a prized, very old book that contains many old recipes that nobody makes anymore. I left it to P to make some menus. We will present them to the proprietor on Monday and make plans for the upcoming season. The three of us would like to extend this to a lunch and dinner menu as well. So,"la cucina povera" it will be. Everybody's hurting these days in Italy, too. So these old recipes will be stylish once again. It's a revelation for me to see the variety of immensely diverse dishes that you can get out of bread, a few vegetables, stock, some meat, and whatever else is leftover.
The other night I made "acquacotta" (first pic) which translates to cooked water although it's much tastier than what that brings to mind.
Just a sofritto (finely chopped onion, celery, parsley and carrot ) with some pancetta cooked until soft and added to that a couple pounds of thinly sliced onions cooked until soft but not browned. Give it some color with some tomato paste, add broth and let it cook away. Then you layer it in a big dish with thinly sliced stale country bread and grated parmiginao, and put it in the oven to bring the flavors together. But I assure you, if you walk across the street your neighbor's recipe will be different.
Last night I made "scottiglia", another thing you don't find on menus much anymore. Scottiglia comes from the Maremma, the southern part of Tuscany which some books have called the "wild, wild West" of Tuscany. The scottiglia story is that the dish is based on whatever the hunters bagged that day and they cooked it with whatever seasoning they had. The other story is that the meat comes from whatever the young guys in the country could come up with after a late night raid. So, there is a variety of "meat".....chicken, duck,, rabbit, pigeon, veal, guinea hen, etc. Brown it in a big pot and the add the sofritto to brown, or soften, as well. Add due bicchieri, (that's 2 glasses based on a small wine glass measure) of red wine, evaporate slowly and then add peeled tomatoes and stock and let it go for 2 hours. We'll see what that's all about at lunch today.
Meanwhile on the dolce side of town... My friend Marybeth sent me a wonderful dessert cookbook, "Dolce Italiano". Written by Gina De Palma of "Babbo" fame, it is a wonderful book of recipes covering tarts, cakes, cookies, spoon desserts, frozen things, etc. I am so happy with it! I've made two tarts so far, one lemon, which took me to the very edge of lemon madness and the other chocolate with polenta that honestly had me swooning. And that's only me..P says, "Take it away or I will finish it all." What I like about this book is that there aren't any candied violets and no degree in architecture is necessary.
P just came home from Stia and presented me with a Valentine's flower arrangement. It is beautiful but I don't know what it is. Pretty exotic for these parts. The man in the shop told him to water it with one drop of water right where the next shoot is growing. Anybody know what this it?
Dopo Pranzo..
The scottiglia was great. Early this morning I slipped one peperoncino and a pinch of cinnamon into the pot and reheated it. I served it with toasted bread rubbed with garlic. We were pleased.
While writing this today, I recalled that on February 13, six years ago, I arrived in Florence to visit P and see whether or not this love was the real thing. I met him the the end of November 2002 and came home with the intention of sending him a postcard. Eleven weeks later I was back on a plane because, evidently, he had other ideas. Two and a half years and 6000 euro in phone calls later (his euro, not mine) I made the move to Tuscany so we could be together without phones or planes. When he met me at the airport on February 13, 2003 he was wearing the red sweater that I have on today.
Happy Valentine's Day everybody!
Love,
Marta and Piero

Rain, rain, go away. Little Marta wants to play!

2009-02-08T14:21:00.009+01:00

All it does is rain. Everyday. Yesterday at around 8:30 in the morning the kitchen was so bright I had to close the shutter a bit so I could see the computer screen. It looked like a strong sun and I could actually see some blue behind the clouds as they broke a bit. After P and L left to go into town for the paper I quickly threw in a load of wash which obviously was the cue for the sky to turn dark grey and pour. And that's the way it stayed for the rest of the day. Even as I write this sitting on the bed and looking out the window the sky has brightened but it's still raining. Today was to be the first of Carnevale parade in Stia. There is one every Sunday up until the First Sunday of Lent which is called Quaresima. The parade is held in Piazza Mazzini one of the two large piazze in Stia. There are a few floats but what's really fun are the costumes that people wear and the general craziness of the whole scene. The floats are spewing smoke and playing really loud music and everybody is throwing confetti and generally carrying on with the help of their identity concealed behind a mask. I had somebody in a paper plate mask throw a handful of confetti right in my face point blank, last year. I loved it and thought it was a wonderful idea. Wouldn't it be great to do that any time of the year, to anybody? So, the parade is cancelled today, Sunday.
Did you catch that? I'm writing this sitting on the bed looking out the window... Yes! I'm wirelss now! No longer tethered to the modem in the kitchen where there's human and canine traffic of all sorts. No more squeezing behind my chair because you can't go the other way around because of the wires. And let me tell you installing it wasn't easy. I'm in no way techincally proficient with the computer. Basic stuff, very basic okay, but I can't say I know the vocabulary and certainly not enough to follow the drop down menus that prompt one along. I watched my fairly tech savvy friend Valerie try to install this thing twice and for each hour she couldn't make a go of it she spent another hour trying.
So, I looked in the Arezzo phone book..Arezzo being the closest and most convenient big city. I couldn't even find a listing for "computer". And since the yellow pages (or in questo caso, il pagine gialli) aren't really that big I looked through every page for something that even resembled the word computer. Surely, I was missing something. Time to call in P. The white pages are significanly easier to navigate and there is was "Computer Discount". He called and spoke to a techie and we took the train to Arezzo and met the guy, computer in my bag. We met the guy and after commentin that my computer was old (mi dispiace!) he said he'd come to the house and do it sometime around the 26th of Jan. That was the 13th of Jan. The 26th comes and goes. P calls. Techie says Feb.4. The big day arrives and we wait..and wait. P calls him and techie says early afternoon. At 4 P calls his cell and techie said he got lost but he's in P'veccio. So he's on his way. I wait at the window and see the unfamiliar car about to take the wrong turn and I shout "la su" (up there) at a piercing pitch that I'm sure he'll here below. P flags him down in front of the car park a few meters ahead (believe me, in these little towns you can get lost between the road and the car park) and we're on our way. He sits down after remarking how small the house is and for about 25 minutes his fingers flurry across the keys like he's playing the presto movement in a piano sonata. Then he says," e' completo!" And then I realize his inglese is pretty good so I could ask him a few questions as well as his name, Alessandro, and his contact info.
It's terrific to sit in bed and read the NYTimes in bed on a Sunday morning.
There was a hair appointment this week and a different person applied my color. I'm sure I told him the correct number of my color but after 45 minutes my hair was rinsed and my usually pristeen white roots were screaming red. The boss of the salon (the one who applies the color) was trying to reassure me that it would look different after it dried. This situation was definitely a test for my l'italiano..and in a slightly agitated state, I might add. Next time I'll be prepared with a cheat sheet of useful phrases. Really though, I think I did very well explaining that this was "non va bene" and the color was wrong and that he was mistaken. Everything corrected after that. Whew! But this salon does a great job..and the cuts are 20 euro.
And then, really needing some liquid refreshment and food P and I went to L'osteria del Tempo Perso (The Osteria of Lost Time..love that name) for an excellent plate of affettati, proscuitto, pecorino cheese, bread and vino. The little bowls on the table are filled with marinated artichokes, sun dried toms, tiny little mushrooms, and peperoncini. Amazing..everybody in the place was eating the same thing. These gorgeous meats and cheeses resting on brown paper on a metal tray. And lots of it Hold the mayo,please. More about the affettati later..but these are slices of the wonderful salumi that this area is known for. They aren't the "cold cuts" that I was brought up with. I tried to explain to P about cold cuts. The slices of American cheese or "square cheese" as my mother called it, the baloney, the boiled ham, the turkey (I was losing him at this point) and the occasional appearance of what we called "American salami". Can anybody tell me what that was?
Let's hope that the rains end soon. The forecast was rain until Wednesday. Meanwhile, the clothes are drying on the radiators, the ragu' is bubbling and there's another week of lunches ahead. Ciao for now.

Peter nella Cantina

2009-01-26T16:54:00.017+01:00

We've had a forecast of snow for the last two days but all we saw today was heavy rain until about an hour ago when they sky opened up with snowflakes the size of ravioli. P spent the earlier part of the day trimming the acacia trees on the road outside of our house and that's what we're burning right now. The wood is damp but the smaller branches are burning and throwing some heat. My center of operation is the kitchen table so it's pretty cozy now with the fire right next to me.
P's operation central is below..nella cantina. The cellar is a very handy spot for doing just about everything. Silly me, I thought when I settled in here four years ago it would be MY operation central. Afterall, P said, "It's the coolest spot in the summer and the warmest in the winter." I had all kinds of visions of dolling it up with a desk and chair, a flea market rug,oriental perhaps and without the fleas for the floor, a bookcase for my cookbooks, novels, art books and files, a lamp with a green glass shade. Maybe a little Puccini in the background for inspiration while I try to figure out my life and what's for lunch.
HAH! Once I saw what really went on down there I knew my little hide-a-way was a dream. What most people do with an attic we do with the cellar, plus more. Right now, P is down there chopping the branches that he pruned today. The acacia wood is very hard and loaded with big, ugly thorns so he has to be careful. In the springtime these trees are dripping with the most fragrant blossoms. We pick the blossoms and after checking for bugs, etc. we drag them through a simple batter and fry them. Then dust them with sugar while they're still hot. Like eating a delicate, sweet, perfume fritter.
The cellar is where the furnace is, the freezer, the summer clothes, the tools, all the wood for the fireplace, the overflow of my books, the tomatoes and peaches we put up in the summer, P's homemade limoncello, marmellate, the demijohn of vino, jars, bottles, Nativity projects. Plus everything that P won't throw out because he just might need it. He has built shelves and ripped them out to make them bigger so they can hold more stuff. There's even a little mattress down there for nights that get too hot upstairs. I tried sleeping down there once and it was okay until about three AM when I heard something buggy and grabbed the flashlight and saw a big round black bug crawling along the edge of the pillow case. Never saw one like it before. P's not so faint of heart and can manage the whole night down there.
I also like to think of the cellar as a time out room for grown-ups. We're in pretty close quarters here and when things get the other kind of "hot", the cellar is a little refuge. It's very comfortable and can be very entertaining. I think it was my first summer here that I told P that I wanted a purple cellar door. I've seen a lot of purple doors and really don't know their significance. If anybody knows would you please drop me a line? Anyway, I wanted one and I was a little surprised when he said okay. You don't see many purple doors around here. The biggest profusion of purple in these parts is when the Fiorentina fans come out for a soccer match. So, my beloved P, who has absolutely no interest in soccer and has never watched a whole match in his life, mixed the three cans of paint to get just the right color I wanted. And during that incredibly hot summer the door went from red to purple. While P was sweating out this labor of love, our neighbor Franco walked by. He stopped, watched for a minute and remarked,"Formichi, I had no idea you were such a Fiorentina fan!"

The January Drearies.

2009-01-21T17:56:00.020+01:00

I was happy to see that there was some sun in Washington DC on Tuesday because here it was just terrible. Heavy rain and ripping winds all day. January is sooo dreary here. The whole winter is a sorry grey and the only spot of color besides the pine trees here in the National Forest of The Casentino is the occasional pansy in the flower box that hasn't lost it's last bloom. Peter and I went for a ride last week to a tiny little village called Borgo alla Collina. I asked him to just surprise me and then see where we end up. Borgo alla Collina means little village on a hill. And that it was. But this sleepy little village was down with the drearies and I figured it would be best to go back in May when the flower pots are bursting and the soccer balls are kicking. Stay tuned.
Meanwhile, the kitchen has been busy at lunch time. Sometimes, I tend the fire and sometimes it's P. Here are few lunches that we've enjoyed lately.
First up is octopus with peppers or in italian "polpi coi peperoni". This was a real treat. P had brought up the octopus from the freezer and I eyed it as it was defrosting. It looked like four suction cupped bathroom appliques for holding soap. P says it's always best to use octopus that's been frozen because the freezing helps tenderize it. The recipe came from one of P's Tuscan cookbooks that features old recipes with unknown origins.I love these recipes that have a handful of ingredients and that's it. Here we have onion and a little garlic, octopus pieces, vino bianco, tomatoes and bell peppers and then you cook the hell out of it. The recipe calls for a healthy addition of vinegar at the end of the cooking but P and I were so pleased with the flavor we left it out. The red and yellow peppers gave a wonderful sweet lift to what I thought might be something too fishy. It wasn't at all. And except for the little suction cupped tentacle rising from the peppers and the tomatoes now and then you'd never know you were eating octopus. A real winner for P! By the way, the pot we used to cook the octopus is called a "tegame di coccio". These are great cooking vessels made from terra cotta. I use them as I would a Dutch oven, which I don't have. I swear that things taste better when cooked in a tegame di coccio. Great for risotti, ragu, soups, stews.
Next to that on the right is bucatini all'Amatriciana. Another simple dish with even fewer ingredients. Pancetta, tomatoes, one peproncino. Bucatini are long hollow noodles that are essential for the dish. Marcella Hazan says, "the two are as inseparable as Romeo and Juliet." Some recipes call for the addition of finely chopped onion sauteed before the addition of the pancetta. Take your sides on this one. The diehards say "assolutamante, no!" And I agree. Let the pancetta flavor the tomatoes and you'll see that the onion will really change the character of the dish. Oh, and of course, pass the cheese when serving. I always cook it in my beat up very old La Creuset pan. In fact, I cook just about everything in that pan when I'm not using the tegame di coccio.
And here we have the celebrated dish of Emilia Romagna, Modena to be precise. The Zampone! Here's the story on the origin. This pig's trotter came to be over a question of who was the rightful heir to the papacy. In 1510-1511 there was a war between the French and the Italians and the people of Mirandola were sure their city would fall. Not wanting to leave anything behind for the French they killed their pigs, cut up the meat, highly seasoned it and stuffed it in the pig's trotter. Another example of the marvelous inventiveness degli italiani. Zampone is traditionally served on New Year's Day and served with lentils (they represent money) and puree di patate. P isn't a lentil fan so we have the potatoes. Now, you can buy the zampone already cooked and packaged in a special bag that you put into boiling water. Keep it there for about half and hour and it's ready. Just open the bag and plop that baby on a dish. Otherwise you buy it, wrap it and tie it in cotton and soak it overnight and then cook it for 3 hours. Let it cool in the water and then cook it again for another 3 hours. P likes the prefab ones better not only for convenience but the flavor. How to explain the flavor...it's like a very spicy pork sausage. To be honest, it's delicious. Definitely a once a year treat.
We're not very high on the hog here..next we have pork livers, "fegatini di maiale". These precious little things are rolled in crushed fennel seed and then wrapped in caul fat which is the thin fatty membrane of the abdominal cavity of sheep or pigs. If you hold it up it looks like a lace tablecloth. Then they are threaded on a stick or "spiedino". Sometimes they are threaded with bay leaves, chunks of bread...and chunks of fat. As if the caul wasn't enough. These are terrific grilled but we just put them in the oven and then served them over a bed of sauteed spinach with shallot and raisins. The spinach was a nice complement to the dense flavors of the livers and fennel. And these are very inexpensive. Maybe 5 euro for the two spiedini.
Now, we have a break from all the pigginess. This is a typical Friday lunch. And another cheapie (about 6 euro for about 1 kilo), sardines. The biggest drawback here is the time spent cleaning these little buggers. I stay out of the kitchen for this one. I think it takes P (with Lucy's help) about 45 minutes to clean all of them. Nothing fancy here. We just rinse them, pat them dry and dredge them in flour and into the hot oil until they crisp a bit. A sprinkle of salt and lemon juice and they're ready. We like to lighten things up with a simple salad to go along with them dressed with red wine vinegar, olive oil and salt.
Today is Friday and P will be leaving shortly to go to Pratovecchio to buy fish at the Friday mercato. He better get moving if he wants baccala because that seems to always go first.
Buon Appetito a tutti!

Breakfast of Champions Italian Style

2009-01-14T13:58:00.008+01:00

Whenever Peter and I head out of Stia and we're near Antonio's, I always look out of the corner of my eye to see if his hand is edging toward the turn signal. This is the BEST place around for a panino.
Panini are such elegant creations in their delicious simplicity. But not all panini are created equal. The meat must be superb and the bread even more so. At Antonio's you get both. When you enter his osteria there is the bar on the left and a dining room on the right. Straight ahead is where the goods are. He makes his panini each morning and carefully wraps the bottom of each one in a napkin. Most days these are the choices: proscuitto crudo, tonno and pomodoro,tonno and capperi, salsiccia and crema di funghi and sometimes proscuitto cotto and fontina. Translation: raw ham, tuna with tomato, tuna with capers, fresh sausage (uncooked) with a spot of porcini flavored mayo, and cooked ham and cheese. How fresh is fresh? He makes, cures and smokes his own meats. His bread of choice is something unbelievable. What in the States you'd call focaccia is the closest I can come to explaining it. Not very puffy though and perfectly dimpled and flavored with salt and olive oil. These babies he doesn't sell separately. We know because we've tried to get him to sell us a few pieces saying anything...."We have no bread and everyone else is closed. Please Antonio,sniff, sniff." He'll sell big hunks of the everyday Tuscan stuff but not his dimpled beauties. After going there a million times you pretty much know the selections but he proudly announces them each time as if he were introducing top of the line Ferraris at the Auto Show. Proud man and he should be. These panini are great. My favorite is the plain proscuitto. Just a slice or two in the bread. That's all. He smokes his proscuitto with juniper so there is a little kick to it. Peter often gets the tuna and capperi. That's olive oil packed tuna flaked on the bread with a few briney chopped capers. In the cooler months we have a small glass of vino rosso and when it's warm we like the vino bianco to wash everything down Of course you can get the brioche and cappuccino breakfast if you want. But when you see the quiet little display of pastries you know that the main attraction is il salumi, the meat. When you get to Antonio's in the morning there are usually a few locals there and a couple of trucker types all dressed in various combinations of camouflage, day-glo orange, and masculinity. Sometimes a few carabinieri wander in. Always fun for me so I can check out those uniforms. Everybody with their paper wrapped panini. He'll make you a bigger one if you want, too. Maybe add a few more slices but nothing remotely near the jaw dislocators that are called sandwiches in the USA. Drive past in the evening and you'll see the same types maybe with their hand around a big slice of pecorino.
Now Antonio's isn't the only bar in town where the locals go and have their breakfast. There's a little bar in Papiano that's always filled with the locals from sunrise to sunset. Formichi's Tit Bar is a favorite among the feathered set. We serve coal tits, blue tits, and marsh tits. The real guest of honor is, wouldn't you know it, the great tit. He/ she flies in and out with a startling flash of yellow and black making all the little stubby tits fly away for a little while. And while we're on the subject, our bar is sometimes graced with a gorgeous warbler. A dusky grey blue beauty with a ruddy breast. A skittery little friend who comes and goes before the other tits gang up and take all the panini crumbs. Mangia tutto, my friends!

Santa Maria del Sasso

2009-01-05T10:29:00.007+01:00

Two weeks ago Peter and I took a ride to Bibbiena, about 30 minutes or so from here. Just out to travel the back roads, we came across Santa Maria del Sasso, a church that I had seen listed in my guide to Il Casentino. I love going into these little mountain churches. You never know what you're going to find. As it is, Santa Maria del Sasso is also a Dominican monastery.
I was immediately taken in by this little church. Here's the story..
In 1347 there was a vision of a white dove on a huge stone (il sasso) in a crevice where the church is now built. The dove stayed on the rock for a few months. Farmers noticed that the dove only allowed children and the hermit Martino who was from nearby Camaldoli, to appraoch. On June 23, 1347, at almost evening, a beautiful woman in white appeared to seven year old Caterina and gave here some fava bean pods which she later took home , opened, and saw they were filled with blood. This later confirmed the foreseeing of the plague of 1348 in which Bibbiena and places around were spared. And so they built a church on the site of the huge stone where the apparition took place.
Now, you can see the stone, actually a huge boulder, where the Madonna appeared. The church is built around it and the top of the stone is partly visible behind the tabernacle in the main church. You can really get an idea of it's size when you go down to the crypt below which is part of the original church (The main church burnt down in 1486 and shortly after was rebuilt to a larger size.) You can see in the pictures I took that chapels were built around the stone.
There were two things that really seized me in the church. First, was the fresco of the main altar, Madonna con Bambino, painted by Bicci di Lorenzo (1373-1452), a Florentine artist. The fresco is dated around 1430-1440. It's positively beautiful. The colors are so rich and if you take a closer look there are rays of light coming from Mary and the Baby. My book says that these "raggiere" were painted in 1598, long after Bicci was around. The two crowns appear to be applied after the fresco was painted and are not actually part of the frescoes themselves but another substance applied to the fresco. I got up as close as I could and it looked like the crowns were cut out metal of some sort, probably gold, and studded with stones. Notice the Madonna's gracefu,l elongated finger pointing to Il Bambino as He gently holds her hands. As if to say, "He's the One." He seems to fit into the cut out and exposed portion of her mantel. The cherubs surrounding the figures blend into an organic whole that gives the piece a breathtaking fullness in its space. There is a stunning silver frame around the whole fresco which was a gift from the people of Bibbiena in 1954. Notice the small round medallions in the frame. It's hard to take your eyes off the colors and the details of the altar piece. And this is only the altar piece. You should see the tabernacle itself.
Downstairs, I found the Madonna del Buio, or the Madonna of Darkness, sculpted in 1500. Don't know why she has this name because there is nothing dark about her. As you descend the steps the first thing you see off to the right is a little altar with a Madonna statue. She is a painted lady, elegant as can be with her gold hair and crown. But she was originally unpainted. The paint came in 1688. She is sculpted "in the style" of Michelozzo di Bartolomeo (1396-1472), another very famous Florentine architect who was a pupil of Ghiberti and collaborated with Donatello. But who knows who sculpted the piece. It may very well have been Michelozzo, architect to the Medici.
Now, there's a great story about this Madonna. Seems the people of Bibbiena moved her from the church to an oratorio, another place of worship in 1512. But the Madonna walked back to Santa Maria del Sasso on her own as evidenced by her footprints in the snow.
There are so many of these gems here in the mountains. I have so many questions in my head...I didn't even get to mention the huge Della Robbia of John The Baptist on the right as you enter the main church. I love the Della Robbia school. I can't get an answer as to why there is so much Della Robbia up here in the mountains. There's a big Della Robbia exhibition taking place between here and Arezzo until June. All the masterpieces highlighted. I think I'll get an answer, maybe this time.

Buon Anno a Tutti!

2008-12-31T17:26:00.006+01:00

It's 5:30 New Year's Eve and I can hear the firecrackers starting already. At midnight they will explode in full force and what's really neat is that Peter and I can watch them from our bedroom window. It's not exactly the fireworks scene in "To Catch a Thief", but it is awfully convenient when it's freezing out.
Peter has been a kitchen wizard all week. I've been out of the kitchen since Christmas Eve because I came down with a whooping case of bronchitis and was really down for the count. I couldn't even entertain myself with any reading for the first few days but then managed to get through The New Yorker Fiction issue. It's been one of those illnesses where you have intimate knowledge of all the twists and tributaries of the tangled sheets but you're just too sick to straighten everything out. Dr. Peter and Nurse Lucy were excellent caregivers all week. Lucy keeping me warm and Dr.P keeping the fires burning. Peter is very old fashioned about what you shoudn't do when you're sick...like keeping your hands out of water. So, I didn't wash a dish all week! I really didn't have much of an appetite but that's okay. Peter's son Marco came for a visit from England and he took care of any leftovers from Christmas dinner. Peter made sure Marco had plenty of ragu with pappardelle and his favorite, the chicken liver crostini. For lunch the next day he made him polenta and sausages. Poor Marco really misses his Tuscan food in England and Peter makes sure he has plenty of everything while he's here and sends him back with jars of marmalade and tomato sauce. And Lucy especially loves having a visitor because it's a new person to sleep with.
Yesterday Peter made tortelli. His pasta is just fine but our machine is really thwarting his progress by tearing the pasta more than rolling it. He filled them with lamb and potatoes from Christmas dinner and then cooked them with butter and sage. They were delicious.
At midnight tonight he will serve quadrucci (tiny little ravioli) with cream and proscuitto and I made an apple crostata. We will toast the New Year at the bedroom window as we watch the fireworks. Tomorrow, our dinner is stinco di maile (a large ham shank for two) roast potatoes and sauteed spinach.
Don't forget to bring out the red undies tomorrow to ensure a Happy and Healthy New Year. Buon Anno a Tutti!

Buon Natale a Tutti!

2008-12-25T18:47:00.004+01:00

Piero and I had a wonderful Christmas dinner. We started with my favorite, crostini con fegatini di pollo, That's chicken liver spread on toasted bread. Following that we had the tortellini in brodo. You can see the steaming broth in the picture. Very soothing. I asked Piero why these are called tortellini when they are actually cappelletti. He said everybody calls them tortellini. Then the gorgeous leg of lamb with the roasted potatoes and tomatoes, plenty of rosemary perfuming the whole dish. (And how about the beautiful new roasting pan from Thanksgiving?) And of course, the mighty panettone as the grand finale with some bubbly and vin santo.
Piero surprised me with a book of the history of Stia in photographs. I will have hours of pleasure looking at the pictures. Some dating from 1889. What's really great is that things haven't changed too much since then.
The weather is changing as I write this on the evening of Christmas Day. I can hear the winds and Piero just came up from the cellar and said it's starting to snow.
Buon Natale, Much Love, and Buon Appetito to all!

Peter's Polpette and Maria's Tortellini

2008-12-24T14:44:00.004+01:00

Peter's still in the kitchen these days..fine with me! He just made a wonderful lunch, polpette and fried potatoes. Right before lunch our neighbor, Purgatorio, dropped by with a bottle of wine for us. His family makes it in Orvieto. A red wine softly "amabile" or sweet. It was wonderful with lunch and it's all gone.
Polpette are another one of those creation based on leftovers. Peter bought some meat and bones to make stock for tomorrow's tortellini in brodo. When the meat has done it's job we trim it and chop it a bit and then pulse it in the food processor until it is very fine. Then it's mixed with some mashed boiled potatoes. About 2/3 potatoes to 1/3 meat. In those times many years ago, if la mamma had some leftover meat she would mix it with the potatoes to stretch it and feed la famiglia. So Peter seasons the mix with a little chopped garlic and lots of parsley, an egg to bind it, some grated parmesan and nutmeg, some chopped rosemary, and salt and pepper, of course. He rolls it into a small ball (a little bigger that a ping pong ball but smaller than a golf ball, or any shape you want), rolls it in some flour and then fries it in hot oil. One of my favorite lunches and he doesn't mind if I dip them in a little ketchup! Not many things I can use ketchup with here. Anyway, this is a great way to use leftovers and it makes a great easy meal with french fries or a salad or a great finger food for a party.
Big treat yesterday. When P can home from buying bread and the paper he said that Maria was going to make her tortellini for tomorrow starting at 4 in the afternoon. Not to be missed. So we went over and I took some great pictures and helped out a little. Now Maria can do this blindfolded and with her hands tied behind her back. Her pasta is like silk and stretches with ease.She was up to 500 by the time we left. That was about 40 minutes including time to answer the phone and the doorbell, the arrival of her grandson Fillipo and Umberto, and talking to Peter and me.
After that Peter and I strolled through town and stopped at Bar Roma for a little warm up grappa. Filled with men at this hour, I often wonder where all the women are. One of our former neighbors was in the back playing cards. It must have been a good day for him..he was smiling.
I really wanted to get a picture of Piero, Lucy, and myself for Christmas. The only one to ask was Pasquita. You remember Pasquita, 80+years old and the go to gal in Papiano? Peter knocked on her door to ask her to take a shot. She had never used a digital camera before so that was one hurdle. Then Lucy was decidedly unhappy with the satin bow her silly owner (me) wanted her to wear. Once I got it on her she tore up and down the road trying to reach around and get the thing off. Meanwhile Peter is trying to show Pasquita how to take a picture. She got one shot of the three of us and then Lucy ran into the house and refused to come down again. That was that.
Tonight I will make eggnog. Peter's never had it before and I hope he enjoys it. I love Christmas Eve.
He will be busy preparing a traditional Christmas dinner tomorrow and I'll give you the menu with some pictures tomorrow.

Peter's in The Kitchen

2008-12-21T10:05:00.009+01:00

C'e' il sole oggi! It's sunny today! And yesterday,too. Lots of things to accomplish while the sun shines. Like doing wash and getting it on the line to dry. Peter has been busy fencing in the front part of the garden, the side where the beasts got in to feast. He bought the fencing in Pratovecchio last week and has been bringing the pieces home one by one. Everything can't fit in the car at once. But now with all the mud in the garden, he keeps slipping when he tries to get the pieces in line.
He's also been busy in the kitchen. He's quiet and efficient and sometimes I never know what he's up to. He makes a stunning orange marmalade and with the winter oranges available now, the kitchen was bubbling the other night with his pots of jam. Last night he made a salsa verde, a green sauce that accompanies boiled meat dishes. He's been enjoying the freezer so much that when he goes to the macelleria he brings home all kinds of interesting things. The other day it was veal tongue. Eventually, it will be boiled, skinned, and sliced. That's why he made the salsa verde. And this is how I learn what goes with what. When you have the boiled meats you serve them with salsa verde and puree di patate. Oh, and yes, there are about 6 pounds of young wild boar in the freezer now. Out neighbor Purgatorio came by and asked if we wanted some from his friend's latest shoot.
Yesterday, with the sun still shining after lunch, we took a ride and we visited a beautiful little church about 30 minutes from here in Bibbiena, Santa Maria del Sasso. I took some great shots of the altarpiece and an absolutely elegant wooden Madonna (from the 16th century) in the crypt below. Will write about that later. On the way back we stopped to food shop and picked up the last few things for the 25th. I can see it in P's eyes.. he loves this buying and prep. Now everything is in place for Peter's Christmas Dinner. He's in charge of the kitchen next Thursday.
Friday, we went to the market in Pratovecchio. Each one of these little towns here has a market day, and outside market. Stia's market is on Tuesday, But Stia is so small it can't handle all the vendors in it's small piazza. So we go to P'vecchio on Friday because we know the fishmonger ("pescivendolo") will be there. I took some pictures but what I didn't get in the shot was that the whole display and work area is part of his refrigerated truck. People take a number and wait to be served. Better that way because standing in line isn't part of Italian protocol (everybody stands in a clump and tries to remember who's next) and there are lots of people who want that great fish on Friday morning. Peter bought mussels and clams. And the rest I'll let him tell you. One thing I'll say, he gets the most flavor out of all his ingredients now matter what he's cooking. Remember, you don't throw anything out.
Ti passo, Peter.
As Marta said, we bought some clams and mussels from the fish guy to make a spaghetti sauce.
Put the mussels and clams in some water with salt in it for about one hour, Clean the mussels taking off the baffo - we call it beard in Italy.
Get two handfull of fresh parsley, one clove of garlic and a small chili pepper. Chop everything very fine with the mezzaluna and make a quick soffritto (that is, saute the garlic, parsley, and chili on medium to low heat) otherwise the parsley and garlic will burn. When the soffritto is soft throw inside a small can of peeled tomatoes and cook for a few minutes. , breaking them up. Put the clams and mussels in a pot and let them open with a strong fire shaking the pot every now and then. Shell the fish one by one throwing it with the soffritto. With a fine strainer strain the water from the shellfish and keep it aside. Start cooking the spaghetti in the ordinary way. After the pasta water has begun to boil, cook the pasta for about three minutes and then take it from the boiling water and put it together with the soffritto and fish. Start adding the water you kept aside so that the pasta cooks in it. You should have enough water to finish cooking the spaghetti, if not add some more pasta water until ready.
Remember to buy more mussels that clams because of the water content in the mussels. Buon Appetito!

Lucy and Peter's Nativity Set

2008-12-16T10:17:00.007+01:00

Raining again today. I think we've had maybe two of three days without rain for over a month now. And if it's not raining in the morning it will be raining by the afternoon. Peter said that the spinach in the garden needs water, "But not this much!" But there is good news..the artichokes, broccoli, and cauliflower that the deer enjoyed so much last month are growing back. And the newly planted fava beans are coming up. too. So this is all very good.

There was an anniversary here over the weekend. We brought Lucy home from the kennel four years ago on December 14. Naming a dog is quite a big deal. For me, anyway. The calendars here always have the feast days of the saints listed for each day. Even if it's a calendar for a garage or a tire store. When we brought Lucy home I checked the calendar and saw that the 14th was the feast of St. Giovanna..."Joan". That didn't do it for me. So back up to the 13th and there is St. Lucy.

Now, before Lucy came bounding into our life, we had a short run through with a dog I named "Lucky". He was a rescue dog and we picked him up at the Chocolate Festival in Pratovecchio one November night. Lucky was a good looking beagle mix, two years old. We made him a little bed of rugs and towels for the night and helped him to get used to his new digs. The next day Peter went into Florence and Lucky and I stayed home to cook and bond. That night Lucky got a little nervous as Peter walked past his territory on the way to the bathroom and Peter was almost rendered a castrato. So ciao, Lucky. The guy from the kennel came the next day and took not so Lucky back to the other inmates.

I said to Peter after that, "No cuccia, no dog." ("Cuccia", pronounced coo-chuh, means dog bed.) So, I see Peter taking apart an aluminum lawn chair that he found on the side of the road. And then he goes into Stia and buys some screening. I can see what's going on here. His Tuscan ingenuity is working, the wheels are grinding. "I am making a bed for the dog", he tells me. I told him we were getting a puppy not a rabbit. That afternoon he goes out and buys this huge crate (I call it the guest room.) for the puppy we don't have yet.

December 14 we start out to find the kennel.We stop somebody and ask. Now we're really in the mountains here so it's difficult to even find anybody to ask. Somebody tells us to go up the road and we'll see a sign. No sign. It goes on this way for about an hour.

We finally find the place, It's raining hard and it's cold and tempers are tight. The kennel guy say that he has seven pups. "Seven choices!", I think. This is great. He stops hosing the doggie diamonds from the kennels and opens door #1 and five little poopy white pups come tumbling out. Peter says,"He tells me that they are Pastore Maremmano." These dogs grow up to be as big as Volkswagons and we were really hoping for something on the smaller side. Door #2 opens and these two abandoned sisters explode out the door. They're both about a foot high but one is a tiny bit smaller and we grab her. No time for interviews and puppy chat. Peter puts a leash around her neck and she trots off trying to keep up with him. I'll never forget the sight of them walking in front of me, little Lucy and Peter and the red leash. We sign the papers, etc. and I hop in the back seat with our new bundle of joy wrapped in the spaghetti rug. ( A chenille bathroom mat that unravels.)

We take her right away for her shots. I waited in the car...and waited. Peter finally comes back with Lucy dazed by her sudden new life. He tells me that when she got the last shot and she was placed on the floor that she promptly collasped! The Vet said it (the reaction) happens one in 500 dogs. So an antidote was administered and she was all puppy-liscious all over again.

Now, she's a big girl and she's is our sunshine on a rainy day, believe me. She loves to ride into town each day with Peter when he goes to buy the paper and bread. She is his shadow while he works in the garden and sits by him when he stops to take a break. She barks at strangers but given the chance she will smother them with kisses. She's crazy about Umberto's woods. And we even buried a few truffles and she followed the scent (we rubbed her nose with truffle oil) and found them! All that, and she's bilingual, too.

I know that you can really bore people if you talk about your dreams or your dog. So pardon my indulgence.

I must get Peter to post his recipe for spaghetti with mussles and clams. That was Friday's lunch and it was exceptional. Peter can really step up to the plate (please pardon the pun) when I'm not inspired to come up with something for lunch. Sunday I was pleased with my rabbit with mustard and tarragon sauce. There were plenty of buttery boiled potatoes with parsley to take care of the sauce. An apple and amaretto torta followed the rabbit. Today is somewhat uninspired country fare. Tortelli con patate (a kind of ravioli stuffed with potato which this area is known for) with the ragu' I made last week. Fast and filling on this rainy day

Peter put up his own Nativity Set last night. I think it's terrific. All the little tools of daily life that he made to accompany the main act....I love the well and the bucket and the lamp to heat the oil. Look for the cooking pot over the fire. And don't miss in the stable, the broom made out of a rosemary branch. You just have to love this guy.

December 8, Italian style

2008-12-09T08:22:00.010+01:00

Yesterday was a lovely day here in Stia. The morning was bright and frosty and Peter and I made a few plans for after lunch. December 8th is a national holiday in Italy, L' Immacolata Concezione. Everybody's off. I said to Peter, "I can't imagine December 8th being a national holiday in the States." And he answered, "You must remember that in Italy we have the Pope." But first, lunch. Always the primary focus of the daytime hours. I hadn't pulled anything out of that new freezer of ours so I had to think of what was ready to go. Aha! Polenta with sausages and tomato sauce. It's always nice when that decision is out of the way. I found this great way to prepare polenta without ending up with Popeye arms. After you've salted the water and it's boiling, drizzle the polenta into the hot water stirring the whole time.When you've got it all mixed take a brown paper bag and put it over the top of the pot and then cover it with a lid. Put it on the back burner as low as it will go and forty minutes later, Polenta! Funny, when I told Peter about this technique he said that he'd overheard two women in the pasticceria talking about a way to cook polenta without all the stirring but they didn't know how it was done.

I browned the sausages in some olive oil for a bit and then added our own canned tomatoes, threw in a little rosemary (a nice little shot of flavor) and let it simmer away. Amazing the changes that tomatoes go through when they have a thirty minute simmer. It's a satisfying feeling to get a lunch on the table that Peter enjoys and is simple and delicious as well.

We were headed into Pratovecchio later in the afternoon. The Christmas fair was in the main piazza and on a few side streets. I found no turtles but plenty of underwear (a table or red undies that gli italiani wear for luck on New Years Day) lots of made in China stuff, tons of purple clothing (the "in" color this season), household items, shoes, handmade jewelry and crafts, cheese and meats, tools like wrenches and other objects who uses I don't know about but Peter does. He bought something from the made in China table..a set of earphones for ten euro that he can wear when he watches TV at night. He tried them out last night and they work.

After that, we headed back to Stia where we checked out the Presepe in Piazza Tanucci. Il Presepe is the word for the nativity scenes that are so popular here. This one in Stia had life size figures dressed as shepherds, etc. I especially loved the area that was prepared for Mary, Joseph, the Baby and a few beasts. As you walked into the enclosure there was a hidden recording of mooing cows. I could hear it before I went in and was somewhat disappointed to see the real things weren't wandering around. Obviously, someone in town had recorded their own cows. The rest of that part of the piazza had small groups of the figures pointing to the Star of Bethlehem and other nativity eve scenes.

As we walked down the piazza towards the church the Stiani were gathering for the celebratory Mass for La Festa della Madonna. Extra excitement today because Don Carlo, the parish priest, had just been made a Monsignor and I was able to catch a shot of him in his new Monsignor colors (purple!) as he exited his quarters and entered the church to say Mass. I noticed there were tables across from the church with platters of tin foil covered food for a celebratory antipasti after Mass before heading home for dinner. Looks like everybody lent a hand in the preparations.

It was almost dark and as we were headed home Peter suggested we stop at Cafe A-Go-Go for some hot chocolate. It gets quite chilly once the sun goes down and we needed something warm for our ride back up the mountain. Maybe I've never had real hot chocolate before, but the hot chocolate here is actually chocolate that is hot, almost like hot chocolate mousse. It's more for spooning than for drinking. And to really gild the lily, Peter ordered mine with a shot of Amaretto in it. In a word, divine.

Piero's Ribollita

2008-12-07T18:22:00.009+01:00

Dear Readers,

First of all, let me introduce myself, my name is Peter from Florence, as they call me in the States and I think that Marta has already mentioned me a couple of times.

Today I want to write about one of most famous soups in Tuscany, ribollita.

There are two steps before the soup becomes ribollita. First you make minestrone, then bread soup, and finally ribollita. This is a typical winter soup since in this season we can get all the winter vegetables we need for it.( I planted the cavolo nero, black cabbage, in September and it's ready now.)

First of all you must have a big pot for the minestrone because you need to put in a lot vegetables. The"must" for the ribollita is cavolo nero. I think it can be found in the States as well in some speciality shops. If you don't have cavolo nero, kale would be fine. Here is a list of the vegetables you need - cavolo nero or kale, cabbage, cannellini beans, one small carrot, (if you put a lot of carrots the minestrone will taste sweet), a stalk of celery,( too much celery would give it a strong bitter taste), potatoes, and spinach.

Wash the vegetables and chop them up, fill a large pot with everything and add cold water up

to two fingers from the brim, salt it and boil for about two hours. Put the cannellini beans in

some cold water and let them soak overnight. In the morning, cook the cannellini with plenty of

water adding some rosemary, one clove of garlic, a small ripe tomato and a sprinkle of olive

oil. Once the cannellini are ready take out the garlic and rosemary and pour the bean water and cannellini in the minestrone.

Now you need some crusty, rustic bread.. better if 2 or 3 days old and not fresh daily bread.

Slice the bread and put it in a large, wide pot and cover it with some minestrone, add more slices of bread and keep on until everything is finished. Let it soak for about one hour. This stage is called "minestra di pane". Before eating, put some good olive oil over it. If there is a lot left over, don't panic. Refrigerate what's left. When you feel like eating it again, put what you think would be the right serving for as many as you are in the family in a pot and boil it until steaming hot . This will be the ribollita; the word "ribollita" in Italian means

re-boiled or boiled again. While cooking stir the bottom of the pot with a wooden spoon so

that it does not stick to the bottom. Put it into the plates, add some good olive oil and buon

appetito!

If you are able to get from your butcher a ham shank usually once that the ham is finished they

throw it away, put it together with the minestrone and then let me know how it tasted.

This was a typical farmer's dish in the winter. Farmers baked their own bread in those times,

I am going back 50 or 60 years as I remember it.

I have some relatives who own a huge farm just after Arezzo and I used to go there for a month

in the summer or winter so I know first hand what farmers used to eat in those times.

They were baking their own bread every two weeks. I was shocked at the amount they were

baking but they were two families living together, 3 women and 9 men!

Everywhere in Italy farmers used to make these bread soups. They were baking their own bread and they had their own vegetables so it came as a nourishing and cheap dish. They did not have to buy anything since the flour for the bread was their own. They were growing their own wheat. Sometimes they had some bread left over from the previous weeks and they were using it to make bread soups so that nothing was wasted.

In the summer instead of making ribollita, since they did not have winter vegetables - it was not like today that you can get anything you want in every season - they were using the stale bread to make panzanella, a cold dish. They were putting the bread in cold water, squeezing it to take the water surplus off and seasoning it with fresh chopped tomatoes, cucumbers, olive oil and vinegar with some finely chopped onions and basil.

By the way, a while ago one newspaper started printing Italian cook books, one for every region. So we started to buy them. We got to n.4 which was Tuscany recipes and I gave it a quick glance. I was horrified to see what they sold for typical recipes. They were putting everything but the proper ingredients into these classic Tuscan recipes. It's like if somebody was putting a hat on Mona Lisa.

The trouble with me is that I have been a waiter for 40 years and I know how food is prepared.

If you want to be a good waiter you must know how every dish in your restaurant is prepared

with all the right ingredients. If you write a cook book with the classic, local recipes stick to them without adding or taking something out. These recipes have been around a very long time and they are still enjoyed by everyone today. There must be a reason why the classics endure!

Umberto and His Woods

2008-12-02T10:15:00.007+01:00

The rains really haven't let up since Friday. Yesterday we had hail, rain, sun, and extremely high winds in the night. So high that the shutters blew open at 3 AM. The Stia Christmas fair was a washout but there will be one in Pratovecchio, the next town over, very soon.

The kitchen is closed today, as far as I'm concerned. Peter went into Florence on the 6:30 bus this morning and won't be home until 2:30. I know he had some things to take care of in town but to tell you the truth, I think he didn't want to see another round of turkey showing up on his plate. I made turkey noodle soup yesterday and offered him a bowl last night. He looked up from the paper and said,"Again?"

He contributed to turkey-philia on Sunday by making turkey polpette alla Fiorentina,turkey meatballs. This isn't what you think. These meatballs are made with very finely chopped cooked meat, chicken, whatever you have, (you can use a food processor), and then mixed with plain, well mashed, boiled potatoes. Use an egg to bind the mix and season with salt, pepper, cheese, a little grate of nutmeg, chopped parsley and garlic. Use your imagination. Shape them round or as cylinders, roll in flour and then fry in a neutral oil. They are delicious.

Potatoes are used to stretch the leftovers. In very poor times this was what "la mamma" did to feed her brood. Which gets me to the next subject.

I wanted to write about Umberto's Woods the other day but the deer got my attention, instead. Peter's cousin Umberto lives in Stia. I always say that if you sit in the piazza for twenty minutes and don't see Umberto, something's wrong. Peter's father and Umberto's father were two of a brood of thirteen. There was Bruno, Brunetta, Nello, Nella, Giulio..that's as far as I could get but based on those names I'm pretty sure there was a Giulia. Giulio ran a "drogheria" in the main piazza. This was many years ago and he sold sugar, flour, all kinds of dried goods. You don't see drogherie around any more. They've been replaced by the "alimentari",(from the verb "alimentare", to feed) more of a little grocery store.

Anyway, Umberto's father, Bruno, won the lottery when Umberto was young and with the money he bought the two apartments where Umberto and his wife Maria live now and the storefront below where they opened a store. They were selling their own sopressata, fresh pasta, tortelli, ravioli, you name it. You could walk in and Umberto would slice the proscuitto for your panino. Maria was making the all the pasta. She is a lovely woman. One that you would call "handsome" in a complimentary way. Always dressed in a good wool skirt and sweater and classic earrings. As many times as I've sat in her kitchen I've never seen this woman sit down. One time I watched her make about 75 tortellini in about 5 minutes. She's so fast I couldn't get the count. She always uses the same knife. It looks like a sword it's so long. But it's her favorite knife and her brother has mended the handle many times, she says. I've seen the brother pass through the kitchen and pop a few tortellini in his mouth right from the cutting board.

Unfortunately, the store closed about ten years ago when the COOP, a communist cooperative, opened a market in town. Umberto and Maria have never stepped foot in it.

One of the other things that Umberto and his father bought was a nice patch of woods. This must've been a long time ago because Umberto is in his seventies. They built a little hut, shack, cabin, I can never decide what to call it. Our friend Chris was right on target when he said it reminded him of "The Beverly Hillbillies". It is very Jed Clampett, indeed There is a beautiful fireplace with a chestnut mantle, a plastic medicine cabinet (band aids and brandy), another cabinet where we put our cooking stuff, a rickety table and equally rickety chairs. And this is where we have had our Sunday feasts.

As soon as we get there and unload our cooler, Peter goes and collects the wood for the fire as well as wood to bring home for our fireplace in the kitchen, Lucy goes wild and free, and I start the prep. Our favorite is half a chicken, one of those scrawny, free range beauties that taste like heaven. I give it a massage with a dry rub that I concocted with rosemary, sage, garlic, plenty of pepper and some lemon zest and olive oil. Then I chop plenty of parsley, basil (if we've got it) and garlic, s&p, to put on the tomatoes halves after they've been grilled. I slice bread for the fettunta...we grill the bread and when it comes off the fire I take a clove of garlic and rub it over the toasted surface. Then it's drizzled with olive oil and sprinkled with salt. That's the REAL garlic bread, my friends. I usually pack some pecorino and a pear, and whatever cake I've made the day before. And of course, vino rosso. Sometimes, I absolutely cannot wait and I rip off a hunk of bread and wash it down with some vino. How can something so simple be so good?! If only the magazines could see our rustic feast. And there's not a sound anywhere except for the cowbells that I hear when the sheep are herded down the road to another pasture. I love it.

"Il Giorno del Ringraziamento

2008-11-29T09:50:00.006+01:00

That's what I heard Peter telling our neighbors about Thanksgiving. The Day of Thanks. And a beautiful day it was. After some rain the night before, (By the way, the heating guy came Wednesday AM and fixed the water pipe in no time.) the skies had cleared and the morning sky was a breathtaking blue. The fields were crisp with frost and the chimneys in the village below were already busy burning off the damp. What a great beginning for T'giving 2008.

First, after trying to fit the bird into our largest roasting pan, I had a novel idea. (I never did find out how much it weighed. Peter told me that the butcher said a little over 4 kilos. I think it was heavier.) When Peter goes out to buy the paper and his bread, ask him to go to the hardware store and buy a bigger pan. And he brought home a real beauty for 15 euro! That done, I put the turkey on top of some chopped vegetables, breast side down and put it in the oven. With the timer set I'd turn it over after an hour. The cream cheese frosting (or, as we call it in the Philadelphia area,"icing") was a learning experience. I'd often seen the silver foil packages of Philadelphia Cream Cheese in stores here. Never tried it, though. I looked at a recipe for cream cheese icing in "Joy of" and saw that you could do it in the food processor. Good idea. So I followed the recipe, everything good and cold and gave it a whirl in the FP. The cream cheese promptly turned to a soup. I just stood there looking at it. The butter was suspended in tiny dots in the cream cheese soup and the sugar was just going along for the ride. A lovely goop. But it tasted just fine and I spooned it over the carrot cake and figured my audience would never know the difference. So, that's that for Philadelphia Cream Cheese in Italy. Same way with the gravy. I didn't make any. The turkey was so moist and delicious I figured why cover it up. Now I think that the compulsory gravy was needed to cover up the sins of the many dry turkeys our mothers cooked over the years. I started everything off with little puff pastry tarts made with gorgonzola, walnuts and pear with a savory custard poured on top. Everything was "tutto bene" as we say. Just fine. I ate quickly. I couldn't get enough of the flavors of Thanksgiving. And the cranberries were right next to me. Not a tomato or head of garlic in sight all day.

Yesterday, I was up by seven and the turkey was already morphing into stock and whatever. Lunch was hot turkey sandwiches. I explained the concept to Peter. You don't pick them up...you eat them with a knife and fork. When he came in from the garden and saw them covered with gravy (I finally made it.) he quickly said, "We must have bread on the table." I explained that there was plenty of bread under the gravy and not to fear.

Today is Turkey Tetrazzini. Named after Luisa Tetrazzini (1871-1940), born in Florence, an Italian coloratura soprano. Legend has it that chicken tetrazzini was created for her in San Francisco. This turkey will keep me busy for the next few days.

I hope the rain lets up today. The big outside fair for Christmas is in Stia tomorrow. Vendors come from all over and sell everything you can imagine. You can buy everything from turtles to a bra.

Ciao.

"Ce ne ha sempre una." It's always something.

2008-11-25T18:13:00.008+01:00

This is a very handy sentence to memorize in l'italiano because you're sure to need it more than once. I wanted to write about our Sunday lunch in Umberto's Woods and today there was a quiet time after lunch this afternoon. Piero was napping with Lucy (our gorgeous diva dog),the lunch dishes were in the sink (braised cabbage with sausages with polenta), my Red Bull was cold..and then BANG! A water pipe exploded under the sink and water was blasting all over the kitchen and into the bedroom with a mighty force. Piero shot out of bed and went outside to turn the water off. Thank God he was home.

So, now we are without water until the heating guy comes. Piero called him right away and found out he was at the dentist. When we finally got in touch with him he said that he'd come tonight and look at it and return in the morning to do the repairs. No water until ?

My first thought was brining the turkey. Where am I going to get the water? Fortunately, here in Stia we have a spa where the water is always flowing. The water is actually bottled and sold under the name "Maxim's" and it's owned by Pierre Cardin (aka Pietro Cardin) but he left open taps for the common use here in town. The water is known for it's curative properties...especially for reducing cellulite. So watch out Faith Popcorn.... There could be a new trend. Brining your turkey in spa water!!! All turkeys should have that lean, smooth look before heading into the oven.

Piero headed for the Terme (we call it the "water place") with a carrier filled with one and a half litre plastic bottles and more for whatever we might need in the way of cooking and drinking. As for our plumbing needs, there is a lavatoio (old stone tubs with water from a spring) at the end of our road. Once upon a time you could drink the water but now it's used for washing cars and watering plants. Pasquita uses it for some laundry from time to time. The slabs of stone in the front of the tubs are angled just so for slapping and kneading the clothes.

Piero filled up some five litre wine jugs and brought them up the road and I put them in the bathroom. What would we do without these sources? It sounds like we're roughing it but this is the way it is here. We're really very fortunate to have these two water sources so close by.

Tonight I'll put the turkey in the big plastic laundry tub with the spa water and brine it. I'll ask Piero to get a piece of wood to put over the top and we'll put it outside overnight. It's cold enough. We had snow yesterday and today, so glorious and silent. Today was one of those extra brilliant days you get the day after a snowfall. Bright and clear but with everything thawing you really can't do a wash or hang anything on the line. Plans go awry. It's the way of the world here.

But I have a turkey in the fridge waiting for it's spa treatment..

Ciao, I hope to get back to you domani.

P.S. It's 6:30 the next morning..

The fun didn't stop there last night. As we were attempting to rearrange the turkey in the bucket for maximum coverage of the brining solution it split sending another few litres of water over the other side of the kitchen floor. And the heating guy never showed up, naturally. I hope he's here in the next few hours.

Ciao for now.

Turkey Day in Tuscany Part 1

2008-11-22T10:27:00.008+01:00

Peter ordered the turkey from the macelleria (the butcher shop) last week. I'm pretty sure he told him that it should be a small turkey, I didn't ask him, but he knows if it's too big I can't fit it in the little Fisher-Price oven. That happened the first year and I had to do some serious pre-cook carving to get the bird comfortably set in a pan and on the rack without it grazing the top of the oven. Didn't make a very nice presentation but I learned something..get a small turkey.

I really don't know why I'm doing the whole T'giving thing at all. I mean it has no significance here in Italy and Peter doesn't really like "meat" (he calls everything meat...two legs or four) or leftovers. Although I made turkey tetrazzini last year and that went over well. Probably because it was half pasta. This will be my fourth T'giving here. The first two were without cranberries and believe me, I really missed them. Last year, my best friend, Marybeth, sent me two cans from the Publix in Florida, one jellied and one whole berries. That was a big decision and I guess I chose the whole berries because the jellied is still on the shelf in the black hole. Sometimes I think I'm doing it because of that can of cranberries. I mean what else can I eat it with? Chicken, I guess, but not the same thing, really.

I'm a big fan of brining so when Peter brings the bird home on Tuesday I'll stick him in a brine (laundry basket works) for a while and then air dry him in the fridge. We'll have a potato puree, that much I know. Not mashed but pureed like silk. Peter does that brilliantly. There will be a stuffing.. probably one with chestnuts and sausage since they are favorite foods for both of us. One of the more problematic dishes is the vegetables. Italians like their vegetables well cooked,"ben cotto", really well cooked. Pasta is al dente. Vegetables are not. And there isn't much room for compromise. Green beans, carrots, cauliflower all are reported to be "hard" when I cook them. Maybe the next generation of Italian cooks can popularize vegetables tender but firm, but for now I'm eating...dare I say it...soft vegetables. Not quite ready for Gerber Kids, but on the way. Awful.

I don't know about dessert yet. I was clicking through the NYTimes T'giving recipes and saw a pecan and apple pie. I'd love to do something like that but there isn't any maple syrup or Karo syrup here. That chocolate/pumpkin cake looked good and I might look at that again. Or I just might do a carrot cake with buttercream icing. My cakes are usually a hit because all the recipes are from somewhere in Italy but the few "American" cakes I've made have been graciously received and disappear quickly.

When I really think about why I do this it's clear I do it for myself. For Peter it's just another meal. I enjoy all the prep, the amazing, evocative aroma of the turkey, carving that first slice (P does it all with a plastic handled steak knife...tender bird.), the sage in the stuffing, the tang in the cranberries, all the flavors of home and the memories of my mother stuffing the turkey the night before and making me laugh every year when she made the turkey "chew" the stuffing. I remember the agonizing temptations of the prepared dishes waiting to be warmed up, the sound of the electric beaters whipping the cream for the pies, the scraping and shuffling of the turkey pan when she was making the gravy. It's about family and tradition no matter where you are. The only thing I'm missing is the Macy's parade and the football games.

Artichokes for Them and Mushrooms for Us

2008-11-19T13:50:00.007+01:00

Peter had a successful morning in the woods looking for mushrooms and came back with a basket full of mazza di tamburo, or drumsticks, because they grown on tall stalks and the cap is a tight, knobby, elongated. dome The chicken and dumplings were ready to be served (it passed) and after we sat down to eat I mentioned that it looked like we were down a few more artichoke plants. "Not again", he said. I wasn't really sure because I just took a quick look when I went out to get some parsley. Sure enough and I could even see the hoof prints. He's down there now stringing up another kind of barricade in the front of the garden, the terrace side. "We cannot go on this way anymore. I must get more fencing," he sighed. If you could see the mangle of thorny bushes that the deer have to get through to get to the garden you'd really wonder how they did it. Poor Peter. He spends hours in the garden planting the vegetables and turning over the earth. It's really his baby.

Let's change the subject for now...The mushroom hunt is a very, very, big thing in this neck of the woods. With all the rain we had last week the woods will be filled with funghi now. Our neighbor, Pasquita, came up the road with a basket yesterday. I could hear Peter ask her where she got them and then laugh. Cardinal rule of mushroom hunting is never (never!) disclose your particular spot. It a known fact that a husband won't tell a wife where he finds his mushrooms. Our neighbor, Purgatorio, has a spot off road and three hours into the woods where he has found plenty of porcini that he can sell for a great price. Anyway, back to Pasquita. She's a Papiano girl, born and bred. At eighty something we should all look so good and be so interested in life. I've seen her come up the hill with her basket filled with these really tiny mushrooms called chiodini, "little nails". She must have to get on her hands and knees to get them. Whenever Peter finds a mushroom he's not sure about he says,"I'll ask Pasquita. She'll know." And not only about mushrooms! She knows everybody and dare I say it, everything about them, too. (If you know what I mean.)
Driving along the roads up here in the mountains you see cars parked in the middle of nowhere at an ungodly early hour. And I can hear Purgatorio's motorbike start up and down the road he goes with a basket and a long stick attached to the back. It's all about i funghi. It becomes even more of an experience when you bring them home and cook them. Peter brought some home recently and threw a couple of big ones in a pan with some olive oil and salt and pepper. That's when it becomes a religious experience. The flavor is rich and earthy and exquisite. Those were the kind he found today. Everybody thinks porcini are the best but there are plenty of other gems in the woods. Besides the salt and pepper the mushrooms are also seasoned with nepitella, a wild mint that grows along the side of the road. I'll go out and pick some now. I'm sure we'll have these beauties for dinner tonight. Another fantastic budget meal courtesy of Mother Earth.

Feeding The Man

2008-11-17T12:52:00.009+01:00

There was a lot of cooking going on here last week at lunch time. Pork chops braised in Chianti and Marsala,, spaghetti alla carrettiera, baccala with potatoes (our own home grown!), and apple turnovers. I went against my grain and prepared Roman broccoli (a fascinating and beautiful vegetable) with a bechamel sauce and baked it. And yesterday there was a gratin of leek, artichoke and those potatoes again. I threw a little fresh thyme in there too and it worked out very well along with chicken with rosemary and lemon and a chocolate amaretti cake. I usually don't adulterate the vegetables with a sauce but I know Peter (he's the guy next to me in the picture) loves bechamel and that sort of thing...and after all it was our anniversary. We met in Florence six years ago, November 16, 2002. Yes, that's another story.
But some things don't go over well at all with Peter...case in point, last week's Hungarian cauliflower soup. Some are a mystery to him-cole slaw. And some are a surprising success- wilted spinach salad. He said he'd never eaten raw spinach before. Some flavors aren't part of the everyday Tuscan palate at all but I've held my breath and watched the verdict. Indian food and apple spice cake have both been a hit, although Peter keeps wanting to add water or some kind of liquid to the basmati rice. "No Peter, it's not risotto, darling."
Now I know that he likes my Bolognese sauce (thanks, NYTimes) but one time I noticed he was shoving the pasta around the plate. He's usually happily stabbing away at the tortiglione. He never says what's on his mind so I had to go into the sleuthing mode. The perp was the penne. Doesn't like it. Something about the consistency. I pulled out a bag of the tortiglione. "Look, one's cut straight and one's cut diagonally, and you can taste the difference?" Evidently, he does. Same thing with fusilli. It makes him gag. I'm positive this has got to be an Italian thing. My friend Susan, her family won't eat pasta that can't be twirled. So which on are you? A stabber or a twirler?
Today we had lasagne for lunch. Peter made it last night before we went out for a pizza and some bubbly. He said it would only take a few minutes to put it together. He went to the cellar for a jar of our sauce, started, the bechamel and within a few minutes, just as he said, it was made and we were out the door. The result? It was just fine. But I can't possibly tell anyone what he did. I'll just call it "Don't ask, don't tell Lasagne".
I want to make chicken and dumplings for him tomorrow. My mother used to make it and my father would always lovingly tell her that she just couldn't make it like his mother. I don't think I'll run into that response because Peter has never heard of dumpling, in English anyway. I'll keep him guessing and see if he figures it's "passatelli" in Italian.

Midnight Salads for All

2008-11-15T15:54:00.004+01:00

The stove and the freezer (!) arrived at 9:40 this morning. Right on time. I saw the delivery truck winding its way up the road as I looked out the window and I quickly ran down to the garden to tell Peter. As he came up through the gate he said, "They got in again. They ate all the brussel sprouts, the broccoli, most of the cauliflower and a few artichokes." Our friends, the deer, must've had a feast last night. Damn!
The garden, or l'orto, as well call it here, sits high above the road on a terraced hillside. Peter really thought he had reinforced the fencing well enough on three sides especially after the deer had helped themselves to all the lettuce at the beginning of the summer. As it stands now the garden looks like a very large cage. The back wall of the garden is just that...a 15 foot high stone wall. But there's one spot where the fencing isn't very secure and that's where they got in. Just like in the summer, they smashed a few tomato plants on their way in, but didn't eat any. No pomodori in their salads, I guess.
So Peter's in the garden right now assessing the damage and seeing what he can save and I'm sitting here with the new stove. It's on and so far it has effortlessly sailed up to 450 degrees. What a difference a door makes. The burners..well, 3 work and the tiny little thing doesn't work. I can live with it. Believe me, I can, I can! I didn't watch my old friend go out the door but I did take one last picture of her this morning when Peter went into town to buy the paper. Her tin foil smile lit up that corner of the kitchen.
Here I was all set to write about "Feeding The Man" today and then the beasts got in the way. Oh, they must've had a blast last night. Surprised they didn't knock on the door and ask for some olive oil.
The freezer is a beauty. It's of the chest variety and quite large, too. Now, all we need is for our neighbor Purgatorio to go out and bag a wild boar (are there any other kind?) to put inside. We've wanted a freezer for so long and were so lucky to find it and the stove on the same day. Anyway, it's humming along nicely in the cantina. We thought we'd finally have plenty of room for all our winter vegetables in the new freezer, but now--- well, kind of an O. Henry twist to the story, don't you think?

The New Stove and My Old Pal

2008-11-13T11:12:00.006+01:00

We'll be welcoming a new stove into our kitchen on Saturday, we hope. And I say hope because we've had some really bad luck getting a stove delivered, but that's another story. The stove I inherited was a mess to begin with. There are four gas burners. Two on the right side work without any problem....although it's hard to get a large pot and a large saute pan back to back. On the other side we have a burner that won't light without an extremely delicate touch (and then it can't be regulated) and the other is a tiny little thing that's good for warming tiny little things. The oven door blew out before I got here and has been variously replaced with a flattened olive oil can, a lasagne pan and now, a pressed out piece of an old washing machine. (Tuscans, at least the one I live with, don't throw anything out.) There are gaps in the door that I have plugged up with heavy duty Reynolds Wrap and more flattened aluminum take out pans. Some of the knobs have fallen off and they get a wad of Reynolds Wrap ,too
Baking is a real dicey project for me. I have two oven thermometer from the States hanging on the racks and depend on them, stealing quick little peeks at them to see if the old girl can hit 350 or better yet 400 degrees without getting flustered and losing heat. I'd named her early on the Hail Mary stove.
Now, the "new" stove isn't really new. In fact it's the same model and color as the one we have now. It's just the better looking twin. We found it at a used goods warehouse near Arezzo. Great place, it has everything. And there she was the long lost twin just sitting among the other has beens.And she's brown just like her sister. I'm thinking if this stove is 40 years old it was probably called "autumn bronze" or something like that, in Italian of course. (Can't imagine having to keep a white stove white.)
To tell you the truth, I'm a little sorry to see the old girl go and I'm thinking about the last things I'll cook with her. I remember how I'd button her up with tin foil before a big project and set her on her way. There's no last lap for the old girl. I'm just about crying right now...
Addio, my friend.

Room With a View

2008-11-12T11:21:00.006+01:00

Welcome to Mangia Tutto! In Italian that means "eat everything" and to illustrate that the day before yesterday I made risotto alle ortiche for lunch.

Ortica (plural is ortiche) is basically a weed and it is otherwise known as"stinging nettle". I know this because in the summer when I walk to the garden in flip-flops my toes always hit the ortiche and there is an annoying little tingling sensation that lasts for a few minutes.

Piero, who otherwise will be known here as Peter, my Florentine sweetheart, has often mentioned ortica as something to cook with. And he has picked bags of it to take to his friend Eva in Florence. (Poor lady lives in the city and doesn't have the pleasure of weeds.) So this week I came across a recipe for this risotto with ortiche and I decided to try it. Not bad at all and really economical considering it's a weed.

Italians really do make the most of everything that nature gives them in the way of food. We're in the midst of chestnut season right now. During the war the country was so poor that chestnuts were a plentiful source of food for them. Drying them and making flour and then making the simple cake, castagnaccio, of the flour and water. Just this past weekend we had the Chestnut Festival here in our little town and I had a steaming piece of castagnaccio and washed it down the vin brule..red wine steeped with cloves, sugar and an orang peel. It really hits the spot. Peter had polenta made of the chestnut flour and a dollop of sheep's milk ricotta. And then you could have the polenta fried and dusted with sugar or the whole chestnuts with cognac...you get the idea. Everything chestnut. In the center of the piazza there was a huge chestnut roasting pan spewing smoke and the irresistible aroma of roasting chestnuts and people come from all over to walk around and look at the craft tables, eat chestnuts, drink the steaming wine and enjoy the music and a day in the country.

In Mangia Tutto! I hope to write about these little snippets of country life here in the Casentino. And also to keep you posted on what's for lunch this week. Right now, I have to get the cake out of the oven. It's an olive oil cake. Today's pasta is tagliatelle with chicken liver sauce.