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Everyone into the pool~

Going to a friend’s house for dinner is always a wonderful way to spend an evening. When that friend is someone you haven’t seen in 20 years, it can turn out to be an incredible evening. And when that long lost friend, his wife, and two kids happen to live in a small Italian town an hour’s train ride north of Venice, where you just happen to be vacationing—well, watch out. The evening is going to be spectacular.

We arrived later than expected (no thanks to a train strike in Venice), but my friend Mark picked us up at the Sacile (pronounced “sah-CHEE-lay”) train station and drove us along twisting roads at the base of the foothills to the Dolomites, through quaint villages, past vineyards and pastures, pointing out local points of interest and filling us in on the area’s history before finally arriving at his house in Budoia (“boo-DOY-yah”). After a few minutes in the car, the 20-year void in our friendship felt like it had only been a two-minute gap. Once inside, the rest of our visit was all about food and wine. 

Mark and his wife Lena are both US military and, after only three years in Italy, they have fallen into quite the Italian lifestyle—a cellar stocked with bottle upon bottle of local wine and a solid knowledge of Italian cuisine with fresh local ingredients.

Lena has taken some cooking lessons and she was really showing out for our visit. We started with several glasses of prosecco and a selection of two local, artisanal cheeses (Montasio, young but aged in beer, and a fresh Asiago). For the antipasto, Lena made ricotta, goat cheese, sun-dried tomato, garlic, and shallot crostini. She was not very thrilled with it because the phyllo shells she was pre-baking to hold the cheese mixture were not turning out as she had planned. Trust me, they were great. Mark served a Tocai Friulano made by local winemaker Valter Scarbolo.

From the antipasto we moved to l’insalata—the salad, which for Italians would have been served after the meat course, but Lena chose to go American and serve her lettuce, sliced pear, local Gorgonzola cheese, and walnut salad before the pasta course. Very, very good.

We continued drinking the white Tocai through the pasta course…Lena made a pumpkin filling for her handmade pasta. She allowed me to make the ravioli and it was great fun to roll up my shirtsleeves and jump into preparing this course. I rolled out the pasta, spooned on the soft and velvety pumpkin filling, before folding the dough over, sealing and cutting into individual ravioli. Her filling was very similar to a pumpkin gnocchi that Nonna taught me how to prepare in 2005. I love eating delicately spiced pumpkin in November. Lena served the ravioli in a sauce of brown butter and sage with chopped hazelnuts and amaretto cookies grated over the top. BUONISSIMI! The brown butter was nutty, the sage and hazelnuts were earthy, and the sweet but bitter almond flavor of the grated cookies put the dish over the top. I hope you enjoy the photo of it above. Pity you can’t smell the aroma or taste the flavor.

From here, Lena and Mark kept pulling out the stops. Mark has become quite the wine guy while in Italy and besides the Tocai, he also served one of Scarbolo’s merlots with Lena’s meat course of roasted pork tenderloin. Lena had really outdone herself by also preparing homemade potato gnocchi—similar to dumplings. We each took turns forming the pasta in our own styles—I used a fork, rolling each dumpling down the tongs leaving an indention on both sides for the sauce to adhere. Lena rolled hers with a grooved little paddle/board, curling up both sides of the dumpling like a seashell. Our gnocchi were indeed homemade. While Lena prepared the tomato sauce with mushrooms for the gnocchi, I cooked them.

The first time I cooked gnocchi with Nonna I was terrified that I had ruined them.

“Nonna, questi gnocchi non sono giusti.”

“Marco, pazienza, saranno nuotare.”

There is a mystic aura surrounding gnocchi…they are made from dense, starchy potatoes and yet they should be light and airy. If they are not made correctly they can be heavy, tough, and gummy. I was terrified of that as I placed the gnocchi Nonna and I had made into the simmering water and watched them sink to the bottom. I just knew that I had kneaded mine too long or treated them with too much force causing them to be tough—ruined. But Nonna reassured me, “Patience, Mark, they will swim.”

Sure enough, one by one, our fat little dumplings rose from the murky depths and started a little water dance at the top of the pot. They would swim, taking turns floating around the top before disappearing back down to only reappear again.

“Nonna, guarda!” (“Nonna, watch!”)

“Si, si Marco. Vanno bene, no?"

 “Si, vanno bene!”

As I placed the gnocchi that Lena and I made into the simmering water, her son came over to watch. I told him that this was the moment of truth. If his mother had ruined them, there would be no swimming in the pot. He looked at me oddly and I told him to watch and, sure enough, mystically, one floated up, then a second, and a third, fourth, fifth. Soon the pot was alive with the swimming gnocchi. “Well, looks like your mother is a great cook,” I said. “Yep, she is,” he said, with complete conviction, pleased to know that I had confirmed what he already knew as the Gospel truth. The gnocchi were tossed with the tomato and mushroom sauce and served along side the pork.

We sat at the table telling stories, laughing, eating, drinking…well, they kids had juice…and it could not have been more pleasant. Mark told how the kids had picked up the language pretty quickly so I tried to chat with them as much as I could in Italian. It was a lesson for the three of us. We all knew different words and phrases and tried to stump each other. It was fun.

WAIT~

Do you think dinner was over yet? Hell no…there was still dessert, a local dessert wine, and caffè. Lena sliced her mango tart and topped each serving with shaved chocolate, raspberries, and a mango coulee. Mark’s fruity and sweet dessert wine, again from a local winemaker, really brought out the brightness of the raspberries and tangy mango.

Our evening was cut way too short by the fact that we had to catch the last train back to Venice, which we managed to do successfully.

I cannot wait to cook with Lena again and drink Mark’s wine cellar dry…problem is, they are soon to be transferred to Alaska. Mamma mia! I am not sure we’ll be visiting them again in November any time soon. But, come to think of it, that night in northern Italy last November was chilly and rainy and yet we were warmed to the core. Maybe we will give Alaska a try…but only if the gnocchi are swimming.

 Ciao e a presto~

Mark

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I Love You—now hush~

Yesterday Richard sent a book title to me that perfectly captured a lunch experience with a French couple that we had in Venice. But before that, let me tell you about one of our first lunch experiences in Venice—a very popular inn and restaurant that was ours alone one day.

Before we take any trip to Italy we always chat amongst friends to see who has been where and where they ate while they were there. Facebook had enabled this line of questioning to go far and wide. A friend of mine in New York mentioned that he had an incredible meal in Venice at Antica Locanda Montin. Best known for their outdoor garden dining area, covered by a huge wisteria arbor, this inn and restaurant is packed during the warmer months of the year.

We weren’t exactly sure of where the restaurant was, which ended up being par for the course for us in Venice. It is on the island of Giudecca, the island just across the lagoon, which has a more open-air feeling to it than the rabbit run atmosphere of Venice. Trust me, we twisted and turned, took the wrong footbridges, and doubled back before we arrived at the doors of Antica Locanda.

When restaurants are not open in Italy they appear to be much more than closed. They look as if they are out of business. Shutters are closed, curtains drawn, and sometimes, as in Rome, the protective garage door, which covers the entire restaurant front, is down and locked. Outside there are no tables or railing enclosures, no potted plants, and no appearance of any recent activity. The complete flipside of this is when an Italian restaurant is open. Magically, the non-existent seating tables with their chairs, potted plants, railings, and menu placards appear from nowhere crowding the front of the restaurant with life. The shutters and curtains are opened wide, and in warmer weather, the front door is propped open allowing the hustling waiters to efficiently serve their hungry clientele.

The front of the Antica Loncanda was neither fish nor fowl. The outside was void of warmer season dining and, although the shutters and curtains were open, there seemed to be a “we’re not open” atmosphere about it. We paused for a moment outside the door wondering what to do. We were starving and had no other options in mind. Suddenly a white-coated waiter opened the door and invited us in. In Italy, waiters, in addition to their table duties, are also street hawkers, who lure and entice passing pedestrians into becoming patrons.

In America, if you walk into a restaurant and there is no one there, I bet your immediate reaction is the same as mine—“Uh-oh, this place must suck.” We paused again, looking at each other trying to quickly assess if we wanted to eat here. We had been walking all morning and it was almost 2:00 p.m., so we decided we’d suffer through this restaurant and remind our friend that his recommendation was way off the mark.

There was one other customer, a round little man with a large lens camera sitting at a table with an Italian man who seemed to be the owner of this inn. The table was strewn with the remnants of a large, multi-course meal and several opened, but not emptied, bottles of wine. I wondered if the camera man was a photo journalist or a food writer for a travel magazine.

The menu was full of wonderful sounding dishes, mostly seafood, and our expectations for this meal started to change for the better. We ordered our antipasti: smoked tuna carpaccio, thinly sliced, served on a bed of celery greens with olive oil, lemon juice, and pomegranate seeds; polipetti (small baby octopus), grilled and served with the same oil and lemon vinaigrette and pomegranate seeds. WOW! The tuna was the most amazing thing. My grilled octopus were great, but the tuna was the star of the show. (Check out my guest video on dishKarma where I talk about this meal.)         

 We only ordered a primo (the first course, usually pasta), opting to keep lunch light by skipping a secondo (the second course, usually meat). Two plates of handmade tortelloni with arugula, tomato, and basil were brought to the table. Buonissimi! (*see the photo above)

After our meal, I poked my head out the back door, which revealed the famous garden arbor. There was something beautiful about its early winter desolation. I can only imagine what a wonderful place it must be to dine in the summer—under lush green leafed vines dripping with purple, grape-looking wisteria blossoms. We will definitely have to suffer the summer crowds to come back here and find out.

The biggest lesson I learned here was “Don’t judge a restaurant by the amount of filled tables.” Our lunch was so good and had we given in to our initial misgivings and left, we would have missed one of the best meals of our trip. Our friend in New York was spot on. Thanks David!

Now on to our next day’s lunch with the French couple:

We don’t always look for 4-star restaurants to dine at while we are on vacation. Many times we look for what is around us when we decide that we have seen enough sights and NEED to eat. Sometimes we stumble upon an amazing meal and if not, we always come away with a fun story.

We spent the morning wandering our way through the streets of San Marco, stopping to photograph a really cool building, and ending up at the Fortuny museum. A morning of modern art can make you hungry, so we decided to walk back to our hotel and stop for lunch when we passed something that looked interesting.

We walked for a while, window-shopping, before finally crossing over a footbridge, deciding we were starving, and passed a restaurant where the people seated at outside tables, along a canal, were mostly eating pizza. Pizza and a couple of glasses of wine sounded like a great way to spend lunch so we stopped at this trattoria/pizzeria and were tightly seated at a table next to a middle-aged French couple.

Richard ordered a pizza Napolitano—a simple red-sauced pizza with anchovies and capers. I had the pizza Diavolo…Devil’s pizza…a simple red-sauced pizza with spicy salami. Any time you see the word diavolo be prepared for spicy. The Devil likes it HOT!

We were enjoying our pizza, watching the gondolas pass by our outside table, using our Italian with the waiter—he was very patient—when the French gentleman, who might as well have been our dining companion we were packed that tight, leaned over and asked if he could borrow the olive oil bottle on our table. To say he “asked” really means that he leaned over and said, “Excusez-moi” pointing at the olive oil bottle and then to himself. Hand gestures truly are the one language we commonly share, regardless of our country of origin. “Certo, certo,” I said, answering in Italian since we had just been speaking to our waiter and my brain hadn’t made the switch to English yet. (I have to admit that when I meet someone speaking a foreign language I always want to answer them in Italian, since it is the only foreign language I know. If someone Asian were to ask me a question in their native tongue on the streets of Chicago my knee-jerk reaction would be to answer them in Italian. It makes no sense—I am just silly like that.) “Of course, of course,” Richard said to the Frenchman at the same time, his response was colored with a little Southern flavor.

This little exchange opened the floodgates of conversation with the Frenchman. He asked if we were Americans…that was an easy enough question to decipher from his French. We asked if he spoke English or Italian and his answer was “No.” His wife, a beautiful dark-haired woman, smartly dressed with a pashmina expertly draped about her shoulders said that she spoke a little English. She instantly became her husband’s translator. He started asking us questions, which at times we could get the gist of because the French was similar enough to Italian and English words. When we were utterly at a loss for what he was asking, we three men turned our gaze upon his wife who would pause, put her fork down on her plate, and translate.

Having lived with Italians for a month, I have learned that when speaking to someone who understands only a little English it is best to keep one’s responses simple and to the point—save the 3+ syllable words for someone who gets it. She was being a very good sport, but at one point her husband asked her to translate something into English for us and she paused, still holding her fork this time, considered his request, and answered, “Mon chér, il est trop difficile à traduire.” We all laughed. Even we could figure out that she was at a loss on how to translate his complex French question using her very simple knowledge of English. Slowly we all figured out that he was asking us how life had changed in America given the financial crisis. We answered and again he asked another complex question. We all gazed at his beautiful wife, who put down her fork this time, reaching across the table to kindly touch his forearm, and said,“Mon chér…” We all knew her difficulty and understood her touch—“I love you…now hush!”

The conversation continued on through dessert and caffè and continued to be peppered with her “Mon chér…” when he exceeded her translating capabilities. We said goodbye to our luncheon companions and headed off toward our next adventure, pleased with the fact that we had been good ambassadors between America and France. For the rest of our trip we used “Mon chér…” between ourselves any time we asked the other something beyond our knowledge.

“Richard, how low did the water used to be in Venice?”

“Mon chér…” he would answer, grabbing my arm and shaking his head, as if he had been there 500 years ago.

“Mark, what is this incredible taste in my dish?”

“Mon chér…” I said shaking my head, as if I had the ability to identify some of the complex flavors in his simple pasta dish.

When Richard sent the book title to me yesterday and I discovered that the subject of the book was about the different natures of men and women. “I Love You—Now Hush” was the perfect translation of our lovely French translator’s care for and exacerbation with her husband.

 What a lovely way to tell someone to be quiet—“Mon chér…” “I love you…now hush.”

 Ciao e a presto~

-Mark

(* the photos above are of the outside dining garden at Antica Locanda, our tortelloni, the building on the way to the Fortuny museum, and the restaurant where we encountered the French couple--if you look close enough through the bridge railing, they are the couple seated at the first table. His back is toward the camera in the black sweater, and you can just see her beige pashmina.).

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Una bella vista~

We were only there five nights, but Venezia made such a strong impression that it needs more than the previous blog posts to do it justice.

With Carnevale season here, I think it is appropriate to talk about the two sides of Venice that are reflected even in the weather. Previously, I have written about how people wanted me to notice the quality of light in Venice. When we first arrived it was overcast, drizzling, and grey. It remained that way for most of our time there. Life went on as usual, the Grand Canal was busy with boat and gondola traffic. However, we did have one incredibly sunny, clear, and warm day. That is when the other side of Venice showed its face, too.

With the weather perfect, we headed up the bell tower of San Giorgio Maggiore, designed by Andrea Palladio and begun in 1566. From here there is a 360-degree view of Venice, the surrounding islands, and the snowcapped Dolomites off in the distance. Every time the elevator opened at the top of the bell tower, the gasps of delight, each with their particular accent, from the exiting tourists were always the same~ 

“Ohhhhhhhhhhhh~”

“Ehhhhhhhhhhhhhh~”

“Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh~”

 When you are walking the streets of Venice the city seems an unending twist of rabbit runs, an enormous wild warren of shops, ristoranti, leaning towers, museums, and piazzas. From above, the warren is revealed as a small and finite “land,” contained, restrained, and threatened by its watery perimeter. Water is Venice’s master and it is only when viewed from above that one feels its crushing impact upon the city.

We did not stay in the bell tower long enough to hear the bells rings next to us. We descended and walked the adjacent boat landing, turning to face the tower as the bells struck twelve and noticing the moon still visible next to the tower. Venezia is magical even at high noon.

Italians seem to have gardens tucked away everywhere. When we are in Rome, we are notorious for stopping as a car exits a palazzo or an alley from behind a large wooden door. While the door is open, the gate light flashing, and the car slowly pulling out, we are usually bent over or standing on our toes to see past the car into the now revealed courtyard. Without fail, a lush green garden with statuary or a fountain, or both, is on display for a brief and shining moment. Sometimes the security guard will give you a dirty look, thinking you are plotting a way in, but after the car leaves and the door starts to close, you catch their eye and say, “Bel giardino—Beautiful garden.” They smile, nod their head, and are secretly proud that you took a moment to revel in what they protect. Italians appreciate beauty and the acknowledgement of that beauty.

The cloister on the grounds of San Giorgio had a sweet garden—tucked behind locked gates and iron-barred windows. As well-dressed Italians, seeming more like dignitaries than everyday employees, let themselves in and out of the gates, I was lucky enough to capture a glimpse of the cloister. As I took my photo, one of the “dignitaries” stopped, caught my eye, gave me a nod of approval that said “Yes, it is beautiful, isn’t it?”—allowing me to snap the photo before he continued on. 

The rest of the sunny day was spent much the same way…churches, buildings, towers, museums, hidden gardens as small as a window box, and an intimate lunch at Antica Locanda Montin.

There is never enough time to talk about everything one does in a day while visiting Italy, so I will end this post here knowing that there is always domani—tomorrow—to tell the rest.

The next posting will be about the restaurants in Venice and then we might move on to another town…maybe. 

Ciao e a presto~

Mark

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It’s all a ride~

My father was in the Navy when I was very young and for a couple of years he was stationed in San Diego, CA. While my father was away in the Pacific for months at a time, my mother was at home with my sister and me. I am sure that was a daunting task to have been 23 and home alone raising two children under three. 

When my aunt would come out to visit us, keeping my mother company, we would go to Disneyland. I can vividly recall riding the teacups, or sitting in Dumbo as he rose up and down as we twirled in a circle, or pulling down the brim of my Donald Duck hat and making it squeak as we plummeted down the rushing water of the Pirates of the Caribbean. But the ride that seemed to ground us back in reality and return us to our sugarcoated, picture perfect lives was “It’s a Small World.”

Why that ride and this blog entry, which is about Venice, are connected in my head at the moment is beyond me. I think it might be the vibrantly bright colors that I associate with those singing peoples of the world and the colors bursting from the shop windows in Venice. It could also be that, like the ride where everything seems so small and compressed together, the streets of Venice feel more like sidewalks bordered in shops than actual thoroughfares where traffic blurs the window displays. In Venice, if you are not in a boat, then you are on foot walking everywhere. There are no bicycles, motorcycles, or mopeds. You either float along, like the Disney ride, past the brightly colored buildings and people, or you are walking through tight and narrow streets crowded full of people who “float” you by the displays of masks, trinkets, and restaurants.

Displaying how fresh and beautiful your food is happens to be what the Venetians do. Window after window, restaurant after restaurant, bar countertop after bar countertop had food displayed on it. Sometimes raw, sometimes cooked, it is always there for your viewing.

It is midnight, as I sit here finally eating my first meal since lunch earlier today—after a very long day at the theatre where I listened to beautiful singing, in a foreign tongue, by 80 people dressed in a wide array of clothes. Now if I was just sitting in a boat and wearing my Donald Duck hat…

I am looking down at my blandly cooked chicken over romaine lettuce that I quickly threw together and thinking of all the beautiful food I saw and ate in Venice. How I would kill for some calamari, prawns, sea bass, or cooked octopus right about now. I need some vibrant color--that is what I really need.

It might be a small world, but tonight my dinner plate and the plates I experienced in Venice are worlds apart.

Ciao e a presto~

Mark

**Enjoy the photos of some of the food sights of Venice.

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“Venezia, Venezia…Chi non ti vede non ti prezia”~

What can I say about Venice that hasn’t already been said over the centuries by people more brilliant than I? Nothing.

The above quote is from Shakespeare’s play Love’s Labour’s Lost and translated in the play it means, “Who understandeth thee not, loves thee not.” Shakespeare obviously loved Italy and Venice. He set many of his plays in Italy’s Veneto region…Verona, Venice, Padova (Padua as it is called in The Taming of the Shrew).

I was excited about finally traveling to Venice—Venezia. It had been on our list of cities to visit in Italy for years, but we held off until this past November. Part of the decision had to do with economics. Venezia è una molto cara città—Venice is a very expensive city, which is why we decided to travel there off-season. Hotels are a lot more affordable—not necessarily cheap—during the off-season. We stayed at the Hotel Paganelli (http://www.hotelpaganelli.com/hotel-venice/chisiamo.php?szLang=en) and had a room overlooking the lagoon—where the Grand Canal connects to the Lagoon. It was a perfect location.

Several Italians friends in Montgomery were thrilled to know that we were going to Venice in November. “The light on the city is so beautiful that time of year. The light is more gray and does wonderful things with the marble. It is much more magical in November than in summer.” I believed them. Venice is notoriously hot, crowded, and displeasingly aromatic during Summer’s high tourist season. I am glad that we were able to avoid the sweltering throngs and go in November.

When we arrived on that Friday morning, it was chilly and rainy in Venice. Gray light, indeed! Arriving into Venice is like no other place in Italy…the train pulls into the station and you are almost immediately at the water’s edge waiting for a valporetto—a water taxi—to take you to your destination along Venice’s canals of “streets.” There is nothing glamorous about the valporetto. It is an inexpensive way for the masses in Venice to get from point A to point B. In a sense, it is Venice’s “on water” subway system. There are private taxis for hire, but those boats can be expensive and, sometimes, just as unglamorous.

Our room at the hotel had tasteful, golden fabric-covered walls, rich woodwork, and a nice marble bathroom. The room wasn’t terribly spacious, but we could fling our window wide open and, standing side-by-side, lean on the sill and gaze out over the lagoon. Directly across from us sat Palladio’s San Giorgio Maggiore and gondolas bounced with the waves in their moorings directly in front of our hotel.

There is something magical about this city and, as the title of this entry points out, there seems to be two views, two perceptions, two atmospheres of Venice. Even in the mist of the afternoon’s overcast sky there was a richness about Venice. It was a friendly elegance. Sophisticated, but elegant. At night, walking through the narrow, twisting, rat-maze-like streets one could imagine the masked and cloaked figures of the Carnevale turning the corner and making you gasp, only to disappear into the misty, yellowed streetlight night. Here, Venice was mysterious, ominous, and disorienting.

I will write more about Venice, its people, and its food over the next several posts. Enjoy the photos and maybe put on some opera—Don Giovanni—to get into the masked and cloaked mood!

Ciao e a presto~

Mark

(**The photos: Statue is in the courtyard of the Doge's Palace, view from the Hotel Paganelli, and San Giorgio Maggiore at night.)

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STUPEFACENTE~

This is one of my favorite Italian words, if only for the fact that it is one of the few words I know to express astonishment. The word is pronounced “stoop-ay-fah-CHEN-tay” and you can no doubt see that it is similar to the English word “stupefying,” so you already know how to translate it.

Lately, “stupefacente” has been swimming around in my head. I find myself thinking it during rehearsals as I listen to the singers rehearse Verdi’s AIDA at Opera Birmingham (www.operabirmingham.org). There are moments when the Italian music and lyrics are so luscious, even when played on a clavinova and sung sotto voce (quietly), that I find myself caught up in the “amazing” work being rehearsed. I also think “stupefacente” when I consider that in two weeks we will be adding dogs, ponies, a camel and an elephant into the mix—beyond the 80 performers!

The February House Beautiful article (http://www.housebeautiful.com/decorating/home-makeovers/remodeling-old-southern-home) about our home and the loads of blog chat across the blogosphere about our kitchen has me thinking “STUPEFACENTE,” too. Thanks to everyone for discovering and checking out this blog in response to the magazine article. Stephen Drucker, from House Beautiful, even noticed all the response our article was getting.

I first learned today's "Word of the Day" while in Viterbo, during my first cooking lesson with Nonna. She was demonstrating how to de-bone a chicken without cutting the chicken into pieces. She was de-boning it whole and stuffing it with a mixture of ground veal and pork.

I asked Alessandra, “Come si dice “amazing” in italiano?” as I watched Nonna cleanly remove a thighbone via the center cavity of the chicken.

 “Stupefacente, Marco.”

 "Stupefacente, indeed.” (*)

Each syllable seemed to wrap itself around my awe of Nonna’s knife work. “Amazing” sounded good, but “stoop-ay-fah-CHEN-tay” really seemed to imply an active astonishment. Maybe it was the stress on the syllable “CHEN.”

Try it yourself.

Say “amazing” giving it all the wonderment you can—“a-MAZ-ing.”

Now say “stoop-ay-fah-CHEN-tay”— really hitting the “CHEN.”

Try it again: give it an Italian flair by holding the thumb and forefinger of your right hand together, shaking your wrist, as you stress that syllable: “stoop-ay-fah-CHEN (shake, shake, shake)-tay!”

Va bene, no?

There is your Word of the Day and your Italian lesson all rolled into one.

I think my next posting is going to be about Venice, unless the elephant gives me problems. If so, the next La Parola del Giorno might just be my first Word of the Day~ DISASTRO! (http://www.mark-leslie.net/la-parola-di-giorno-the-word-of-the-day)

Ciao e a presto~

Mark

(* The whole story of Nonna teaching me how to de-bone a chicken is in one of the chapters of my manuscript “BEYOND THE PASTA: 28 Days of Recipes, Language, and Life with an Italian Family.” I still have letters out to literary agents and hope to post some good news soon about the manuscript moving closer to becoming published.)

(**THE PHOTO: Villa Pisani just north of Padova (Padua, for us English-speaking people). This place is truly “STUPEFACENTE!!!!! Check it out at: http://www.villapisani.beniculturali.it/en/index.php . We spent four hours there and were awe-struck the entire time.)

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Day 5: Verona~

Having worked at a theatre specializing in Shakespeare for over 20 years, it is no surprise that the first thing that comes to my mind when hearing “Verona” is the tragic tale of Romeo and Juliet. I know—predictable. Luckily, it was one of the last things we concerned ourselves with when we went there. Tragic love might be the most famous thing about Verona to the English-speaking world, but it is hardly the main reason to visit this ancient Italian city. Verona is an ancient town. It has a Roman arena that dates back to AD 30 which is still being used today for opera performances (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Verona_Arena).

Our main purpose of going to Verona was to visit i Giardini Giusti (http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=it&u=http://www.giardinaggio.it/unagitaa/giusti/giusti.asp&ei=xXQ6S8DiJYa1tgeZ-ZSLDA&sa=X&oi=translate&ct=result&resnum=5&ved=0CCUQ7gEwBA&prev=/search%3Fq%3Di%2Bgiardino%2Bgiusti%2Bverona%26dq%3Di%2Bgiardino%2Bgiusti%2Bverona%26hl%3Den%26client%3Dfirefox-a%26rls%3Dorg.mozilla:en-US:official%26hs%3DCUP ). We spent the better part of 3 hours enjoying the gardens and the views of Verona by ascending the hill and a spiral staircase enclosed in a tower at the rear of the gardens. It is no wonder that Mozart and Goethe visited here. The above link gives a great description and history of the gardens, though I think my photos are a bit more enticing.

With our brains swimming with images of hidden statuary, garden mazes, and sweeping views we headed over the Adige River by way of the Ponte Nuovo (New Bridge) and worked our way through the crooked streets toward the bell tower—Torre dei Lamberti.

One of the things I love most about Italy is the ability to climb ancient structures and towers. The climb up the 276-foot Torre dei Lamberti was a bit exhausting, but worth it. At the top, it provided a 360-degree view of Verona and an unexpected encounter with a very enthusiastic Croatian girl.

The tower’s belfry is split in two with the larger of the two bells being hung above the smaller and being reached by a separate staircase that continued up past the small bell to the top of the belfry. We had gone all the way up to the larger bell before making our way back down to the lower part of the belfry to kill time until the bells would strike 1:30 p.m. Regardless of where we are on vacation, Richard loves to stop everything to listen to bells ring, and we were only 10 minutes from having the bell next to us strike—we had to stay until he could experience the “strike” up close and personal.

“Hello. Do you speak English? Can you take our picture? I am from Croatia. Are you on vacation also? I am with my friends and my husband. We were married last month. This is our honeymoon. I am scared being up so high…”

“Smile,” I said, as this young, Croatian girl huddled next to her girlfriend against the belfry railing. “Say “cheese.” “Cheese!”

“Thank you for taking our picture. Have you been to Italy before? This is my first time in Verona. We have been to Germany and to Venice and we are going to Rome and to Florence. We are making a big trip. 3 weeks.”

She was tall, dark-headed, slim, and very pretty. She introduced herself, although for the life of me, I can’t remember her name. She had the energy and personality of a cheerleader or a sorority girl—better yet, a bow-headed Southern sorority cheerleader! I am sure she was in her mid 20s, but she was so bubbly that she seemed 16. We could hardly get a word in edgewise, because she rarely came up for air in her excited barrage of questions.

Her friends laughed as they headed up the stairs to the belfry’s second level to see the larger bell. They called to her to come join them, but she only took a couple of steps before stopping to continue her conversation with us.

“I hope my English is good. Have you ever been to Croatia? When you come, you will stay with us. We will show you around our beautiful town and country. Why have you never been to Croatia? You should come…” she said, as she finally stepped far enough away from us to take the stairs up to join her friends.

Richard and I laughed. She was a lot of fun. We imagined what her wedding night must have been like—with her never shutting up.

“BONG!”

The moment we had been waiting for: however, only the largest bell on the level above us struck, and when it did, our Croatian friend must have been standing right next to it—because she let out a shriek that could have been heard back in her homeland. Well, the bell might have caught her off guard, but her shrieking sent Richard over the edge. The clock struck, the girl shrieked, and Richard whooped. He let out a huge laugh and, even though the bell only struck once, she kept shrieking—and he kept whooping. “SHRIEK!” “WHOOP!” “SHRIEK!” WHOOP!” Finally, his whoop turned into a sinister laugh. “AH-hahahhaahaha!” The tourists on the upper level were laughing at her, and the ones around us had Richard for their entertainment. Between the two of them, they were an unlikely, yet in sync, comedy team.

We giggled ourselves down the tower and headed into the now sun-drenched Piazza delle Erbe to grab some lunch, “al fresco,” at one of the many ristorante. We ordered “Papparadelle con funghi e zucchine”—wide, handmade pasta served with porcini mushrooms and zucchini. The piazza sits in the shadow of the bell tower and is ringed with frescoed buildings. Many of the frescoes have not been restored, so, at times, the piazza seems haunted by its fading, once vibrantly-colored images. Reaching out from the past are the shadowy memories of heroes, both fallen and victorious, facades of villas and palaces, and the flora and fauna of the surrounding countryside.

A bottle of wine later, we decided to wander Verona’s streets, the ancient city center, to get a sense of the "vibe" and stopping to do a little window-shopping. Many of the old buildings throughout the center remained frescoed and the churches were as varied as they were plentiful. What struck us most about Verona were the rather posh and sophisticated Veronese people themselves. Italians, as a general rule, tend to be well dressed, but the Veronese, as a general rule, seemed even more stylish than the norm. They seemed to elevate this ancient town from the status of “old” to the status of “richly antique.”

As afternoon turned to dusk and into early evening, we decided to stay late and eat dinner in Verona. Biba Caggiano, the Sacramento restaurateur, has a list of Italian ristorante in one of her cookbooks (http://www.amazon.com/Trattoria-Cooking-authentic-family-style-restaurants/dp/0025202529/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1262155796&sr=1-6 ) and luckily for us, she listed Al Pigna in Verona—the only trattoria  she listed in Verona. Restaurants in Italy usually don’t open for evening service until 7:30 p.m. and most Italians don’t arrive for dinner until 8:30 p.m. or 9:00 p.m. Since this was the case, we decided to take the plunge and find Verona’s most touristy attraction—Casa di Giulietta (Juliet’s House) to kill some time before dinner.

Tucked down a little side street, with its buildings’ walls graffitied with thousands of love notes addressed to Giulietta, there is no doubt that you are in the center of a tourist trap. This papered street ends in a little piazza where a bronze statue of Juliet stands for all to capture on film—and to also capture a quick feel. Yes, this statue of Juliet has been groped to the point that one of her breasts gets rubbed daily by enough hands that it is as shiny and untarnished as the day it was created. Her other breast, like the rest of the statue, is dark and tarnished. Poor Juliet. Not only did she lose her love and poison herself, but her right breast gets groped and photographed daily. There is a marble balcony off of a second story door that is supposedly the place where she first dreamed of her Romeo. The house, now turned museum, originally belonged to the dell Capello family—never to the Capulets. We decided not to take a tour of the house and its museum. Having killed enough time, we headed for Al Pigna.

Our waitress suggested that I try the asino—donkey—but I passed on the ass. The day before I had ordered smoked horse—puledra, which was very good, but I thought that tonight I should leave alone the barnyard animals that we consider inedible in our country. I started with roasted radicchio with brie, pine nuts, and raisins, while Richard had prosciutto served with Roquefort and fresh local honey. My entrée was Baccalà (salt-dried codfish that had been reconstituted in milk) served over polenta. This is a very classic dish from this region of Italy. Richard ordered the gnocchi with duck. Both were wonderful. I finished with the homemade tiramisu and Richard rounded out his meal with biscotti that he dipped into a dessert wine from the Fruigli region. Biba’s list has never failed us and tonight was no different. Brava Biba!

On the drive home, we passed a stretch of industrialized road that seemed to be populated with a lot of scantily dressed girls standing alone, each about 100 yards apart. Each time we passed one of these lovely ladies, Richard would scream out to me “Look Mark, LOOK! Oh my God, LOOK!” Poor thing, I don’t think he had ever seen someone employed in the world’s oldest profession. Come to think of it, I don’t think that I have either. But after seeing people of both sexes and all nationalities grab the shiny right breast and smile while a camera flashed—maybe a girl has to do what she can to attract a Romeo of her own.

Felice Anno Nuovo~ Happy New Year,

Mark

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 Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Last week I ran into a friend from Mississippi and asked him how he was doing. In true Southern form he replied, “Blessed and encouraged.” I laughed because only in the South would you hear that response.

Surprisingly, “blessed and encouraged” has been running around in my Yankee head ever since. It is such a simple saying, but it is having a profound affect on me—it speaks to me in a way that I find difficult to explain. Maybe it is because as I look back over this past year and set my sights on the coming year, I find myself in the same place as my friend from Mississippi.

My wish for all of you this holiday season and 2010 is that you find yourself in a Mississippi “blessed and encouraged” moment of your own. Whatever you choose to call it, however it dawns on you, whenever it reveals itself—I hope it happens and, in that moment, brings you joy.

Con affetto,

Mark

***In 2010, videos of Nonna in the kitchen are coming to the site and some recipes, too!

-The photo is from a wood panel in the Vatican Museums, Rome.

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The last tree~

Since my return from our Italian vacation at the beginning of November, I have been working for friends at their quite popular flower shop in Birmingham, Alabama (http://www.flowerbudsinc.com/).  We have been decorating houses for Christmas—the first house was on November 15 and today was the last house. There is complete disbelief and seasonal horror at setting up an artificial tree on that first day of houses in November, but today there was something very joyful about hanging a fresh mixed pine and fir garland over the doorway of a large, lovely stone home out in the woods of rural, but developing, Alabama.

In Italy, the Christmas season does not seem to begin until December 1. Here, in America, we can barely get the jack-o-lanterns blown out and the vampires back into their coffins before we are decking the retail halls with boughs of holly. Thanksgiving, naturally, is not an Italian holiday and, except for the literal day, it barely seems a holiday in this country. There is a build up to Halloween and then the immediate shift to Christmas on November 1. I sometimes think that Thanksgiving is just a gluttonous trial run, a kickoff, to the impending holiday season—if you can gastronomically survive Turkey Day you are given the falsely satisfying notion that you’ll be able to survive the four-week onslaught of eggnog, cookies, and parties which culminate in a SECOND turkey with all the trimmings. I feel like loosening my belt again just thinking about it.

Our vacation to Italy this year was the first two weeks of November and last year’s vacation was the last two weeks. This year, the Italians were just starting to bring out the civic street decorations to hang as we were leaving (November 15). Last year, the last few days of November were when shops started converting their windows to Christmas displays and city crews were still in process of hanging street decorations. At the beginning of that late Nov. ‘08 vacation, the already hung snowflakes, bells, stars, and strings of colored lights in the streets remained unlit until the end of the month. We rounded the corner the evening of November 28 and the Christmas tree outside the Fendi shop on Via Corso, previously dark on other evening strolls, was lit—as were all of the street decorations throughout Rome. It seems that December 1 is the retail start of Christmas in Italy. Brava!

So, as I sit here listening to “Frosty the Snowman” on Sirius radio on a relatively chilly “wintery” night in the Deep South, I am paging through my red notebook of recipes that I cooked with Nonna. She gave me a recipe for Biscottini di Natale—Christmas Cookies—which are made with dark chocolate, almonds, hazelnuts, amaretto or limoncello, sugar, flour, eggs, butter, and lard. Ha! I think Nonna has one-upped Paula Dean’s fascination with butter by using lard. I have not made this recipe yet, so I have not converted it from metric. Maybe I’ll do that this week since I am in the holiday spirit—and my holiday shopping is done. If I do, I’ll pass it on; however, while living with the family in Viterbo, we did make two “holiday” treats—Crostoli and Ciambelline con patate.

Crostoli are diamond-shaped pieces of dough made with white wine and grappa, which are then fried in oil and dusted with powdered sugar. Ciambelline con patate are yeast doughnuts made with potatoes, marsala wine or limoncello, and fried in oil. They are then rolled in sugar while still warm. Buonissimi!!

Sirius is now “walking in a winter wonderland,” so I think I’ll start planning which of these Italian desserts to "walk" to some parties this weekend. Now that my belt has been loosened, post Thanksgiving, how can fried potato doughnuts be that bad??—Mamma mia!

 Buon Natale~

Mark

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Cazzo~

In high school I studied French—well, it would be closer to the truth to say that I sat in a class for three years where the teacher and two other students spoke French, while the rest of us were just thankful to not have to take Spanish from the hateful Seńora.

Regardless of one’s age, when learning a new language, one of the first tasks is to try to figure out how to cuss in that language. Remember how titillating the song lyric “Voulez-vous coucher avec moi, ce soir?” was in the 1970s? Instantly millions of Americans knew how to speak some sexy and slightly naughty French, or so they thought.

I remember the day in the first week of French class my freshman year when someone secretly shared the word merde—sh*t—with the rest of us in class. How we howled with laughter in the hallway going to our next classes. For the next month, we tried to incorporate our new foreign word into our everyday conversations. If a friend did something stupid, he was a merdehead. Drop something out of your locker and you could proudly disclaim “MERDE!” in front of everyone—they didn’t know what you meant and, since the word was foreign, technically, you weren’t swearing. Not know an answer in algebra and you instantly had merde for brains. There was no cleverness in our hunt for the perfect use of merde. The most nonsensical usage would send us all into hysterics for hours.

In America, we seem to have different levels of appropriateness for cuss, curse, or swear words. As children we all learn how to cuss—politely. Words like “shoot” “darn it” “crud” “gosh” “fudge” are all used in place of the swear words adults use. When I was little, the word “crap” would cause a flurry of condemnation from my parents. It was considered a cuss word. I was mortified when I came home year from college on Spring Break one year and heard my sister, who was 10, use “crap” at the dinner table in conversation. When she said it I flinched, because I knew she was going to get scolded, at the very least. But I flinched for nothing, no one else at the table reacted to it. My father kept eating, my mother filled her glass with pop, and my other sister and brother did not snicker at a “dirty” word being used at the table. It was as if she had used the word “daisies.” I was pissed—where had my family’s decency gone?

As we get older, the swear words we used as children get replaced by the adult versions. These adult versions are more acceptable in a wider, more public setting, but there are still limitations on when and where they should be used. It would be inappropriate to say to your grandmother at the table during Sunday lunch, “Shit grandma, you are one funny woman.” That same comment made to a friend over a beer at the local pub on a Saturday night would hardly make anyone blink twice. The slang names for certain body parts, both male and female, are included in this group, too. Naturally, there are words that one should never use, regardless of the situation and people present. The “c” word and the “f” bomb fall into this category.

Today’s “Word of the Day” is CAZZO. It is an Italian swear word—a not so very polite Italian swear word. It is a word that I learned from an American friend of mine before I traveled to Italy for the first time in 2001. Cazzo falls into the “male body part” category, but it also falls into the “I just spilled a glass of milk all over my desk” category. This is not something typical of an American swear word. My mother might say “s**t” under her breath if she screwed something up, but she would never say “c**k.” Naturally, it makes no sense in English and I have yet to figure out how it works as it does in Italian.

Several weeks ago, while we were in Venice, we stopped by a Pasticceria—a pastry shop—to purchase several special and very Venetian desserts to take with us to Viterbo and give to the family. Usually we arrive with flowers, but this time I thought it would be more appropriate to arrive with some Venetian treats, since Nonna is from that part of Italy.

We entered the shop and I waited for the woman working there to finish with other customers before trying to be cute and use my infantile Italian to show her how charming I was by attempting her native tongue. Just as I started, another customer entered the shop. Knowing that my transaction was going to take some time, given that I speak slowly and that I wanted an assortment of pastries, I waved the pastry woman on to help her newly arrived customer. The customer was French and this seemed to irritate the woman. As she begrudgingly helped the French customer, more French citizens arrived to ask her questions about products, pointing to objects and indicating that they wanted to “look” at the item with their hands and not only with their eyes. With every interaction and transaction, the woman would say “cazzo.” And she was not trying too hard to conceal her frustration with France—she was speaking in full voice.

Finally, the traffic in and out of the shop ceased and it was again my turn at bat with the woman. In Italian, I explained to her that I going to be traveling to see my grandmother in Viterbo and that I wanted to bring her some pastries from Venice because she grew up in this area. I then apologized—Mi dispiace, il mio Italiano non è buono—for how bad my Italian was. Usually, this garnishes a complimentary response from my Italian counterpart—No, no, no. Il tuo Italiano è molto buono. I usually thank them for thinking that my Italian is really good and then I continue to speak and slaughter their native tongue right in front of their smiling and encouraging faces. I did not get the usual response from this Italian woman.

“Don’t worry. In Italian schools, they don’t teach Italian either. My son is taught English as a primary language and either French or Spanish as a secondary language. Cazzo! It is true. They expect our kids to learn Italian at home. Cazzo!” she replied, in an unending tirade about Italian schools.

I couldn’t believe that she was cursing in front of me. I had never heard an Italian swear in conversation with me. When I lived with the family, they never swore—or, at least, I never figured out that they were if it indeed was happening. Nonna would drop something on the floor and instead of saying “damn,” she would just huff and call herself an idiot. I never learned any choice expletives while staying there.

“Cazzo!”—Another French tourist had walked in, and the woman tiredly swore and left me to help a guy buy a bottle of water.

She returned shortly and muttered something to me, which was spoken too fast for me to understand, and then said, “Va' fa'n culo.” WOW! That expression is quite vulgar (it tells a person to go "f" himself) and I have no idea why she said that of the Frenchman as he left. As we continued to select pastry, she continued to complain about the linguistic deficiencies of her son’s school—all the while, peppering her conversation with “cazzo.” Eventually, we left with two bags of pastries, burning ears, and a great story.

The next day we traveled to Viterbo to see the family and I plated the pastries, serving them after we finished our meal—Nonna made short ribs in a tomato sauce. The sauce was served with penne pasta and the ribs were served separately as the second course.

There were “ohs” and ahs” as we were thanked for being so kind in bringing treats. Well, I immediately had to tell them the story of the “Cazzo donna”—c**k lady. The table erupted when I said that and they wanted to know more.

I explained the process, and conversation, of buying the pastries. They howled with laughter every time the woman swore in the story. When I got to the “va' fa'n culo”  moment, Marianna (Alessandra’s 29-year-old daughter) jumped in the conversation and said, “Oh Mark, you should have told her, “I see you were educated at Oxford.” I choked on my pastry as we all laughed with Marianna. She is very clever, as is the entire family for that matter.

Merde, I love Italy!

Mark

**The photo is of a statue in the exhibit of Etrsucan and Roman artifacts at the Vatican museums. The statue is complete above the navel, but I thought this angle was more apropos.

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