Taking a Break: what's to come

Unfortunately, the past two weeks have been extraordinarily crazy. I have had papers, midterm reviews, collections to finish, people and museums to see, and things to cook. I am finally ready to take a break, but that means I will most likely not be able to blog for another week. So I will compile a short list of things to look forward to that I have already done but still need to write about.

Truffle-infused pecorino cheese from Perugia
roasted chicken
Our all black themed halloween party
THE SECRET BAKERY!!!!
Il Latini (known to be on of the best restaurants in Tuscany)
Picnic in the Boboli Gardens

Also, I am traveling to Barcelona and Sicily this week so I will be on the look out for some delicious food opportunities. Again, I apologize for the lack of posts (not that there are many people reading), but I promise to have a plethora of good ones as soon as possible!

Ciao!!!

Fiera Del Cioccolato

Tartufi

        There comes a time when one has a particularly intense craving for the sweet, versatile, energizing, feel-good sensation of a good piece of chocolate. In Florence, there is certainly no shortage of the stuff and it comes in many forms, but once a year a little city just a few hours north of Firenze dedicates a few whole weekends to the creation, visualization, consumption, and sale of just chocolate. It is the Fiera del Cioccolato (The chocolate fair) and as soon as we heard about it, my friends and I knew we would be frequenting this unbelievable event. And so last Sunday, we arrived in beautiful Perugia ready to eat some delicious chocolate. The fair was located in the heart of the city which happens to be at the top of a mountain so we ended up working up a little bit more of an appetite just getting there. After stopping to take in the beautiful views, we entered the crowds of people yelling, shoving, eating, buying, smelling, tasting, and loving chocolate. It was a sight to behold. White tents lined the old city streets. Each one had something special to share and something new for us to try. It wasn’t the outlandish American-like fair I was expecting. Instead it was simply chocolate as far as the eye could see. We first stopped at a stand selling piadine with nutella and nuts – your average Sunday lunch. We then strolled along sampling various chocolates, chocolate liquors, truffles, chocolate covered fruits and snacks, fudges, caramels, chocolate pastas, and hot chocolate drinks (pretty much just melted chocolate).  The other thing that struck me was that there were not too many outrageously strange combinations of chocolate or things that you wouldn’t expect chocolate to come in the form of. It was more about perfecting the art of chocolate in its pure form and using traditional complementary flavors such as various nuts, fruits, liquors, puffed rice, caramels, preserves, grains, and some cheeses. Although we were stuffed after only two hours, our bodies were craving something salty so we got delicious piadine and enjoyed them on a balcony overlooking the countryside. As we sat and munched we concluded that our lives were pretty fantastic. Studying art in Florence is enough, but then taking a break even from that to taste chocolate in a ancient Italian town cut into a mountain and eat fabulous sandwiches overlooking breathtaking Italian vistas: we really have it made. 

Banana 

Palle d' Oro

         I know I have been writing a lot about enjoying food through pot lucks, cooking, and entertaining in instead of going out. In fact, many of the best meals I have had here in Florence have occurred at pot lucks or at home simply because of the quality and freshness of the food here. For example, bread goes stale within a day or two because it has absolutely no preservatives in it. However, even though we enjoy cooking for each other and sharing company and food in our own apartments, every once in a while it is nice to take the “pot luck” out of pot luck night and go out for dinner. It has been a while since I have enjoyed a meal out so when we found a place we knew would not disappoint, I was ready to enjoy an evening of simply enjoying eating good food – not cooking it. The place was Palle d’ Oro, a family trattoria founded in 1860. To this day, they specialize in home-making mostly everything on their menu: bread, pasta, wine, sausage, and olive oil just to name a few. The menu was extensive and confusing especially since I insisted on using an Italian one. I had no clue where to begin and the pressure to make the right decision was piling up on me. Luckily, my trusty food buddy, Aviva was right there beside me and we made the decision that together we would share a fabulous guilt-free meal. We promised each other not to hold back…and we didn’t. After a few glasses of the red wine, we started out with the “Penne della casa,” penne with ground veal and a tomato sauce with fresh porcini mushrooms and basil. Aviva and I “cheersed” our forks (such foodies) and from that point forward, we were in our own, Tuscan world. Next, we enjoyed a salty seafood risotto that was incredibly fresh, fishy, and wonderful. That seems like enough, right? WRONG. We had to have some kind of meat so we decided on the homemade sausage with fagioli (beans). I can honestly say it may have been the best sausage I have ever tasted. It was perfectly succulent, simply seasoned, and cooked to perfection. We finished the meal with a plate of various types and stages of Palle d Oro's own pecorino cheeses. It was a marathon of flavors and textures from the earth and the sea and we took it on with empty stomachs and eager taste buds. For under 20 euros, it was an extremely fulfilling meal. After a nice, long, greatly needed walk around Florence, we sat down at a warm little café’ for tea and tiny little pastries. I couldn’t have asked for a more pleasant evening. 

It is an american custom to eat bread before a meal.
Therefore, restaurants do not provide bread plates with
their bread (you are actually supposed to sit and wait for
the meal to arrive without even touching the bread...WHAT?!),
so instead of suffering, we have just gotten used to olive oil
dribbling down our wrists - it is part of the experience!

Penne della casa

Risotto frutti di mare

Salsicce con i faggioli

formaggi

Te' e Paste

Aviva's Curry

Aviva and her Curry

          Having the opportunity to have the best Italian food at my fingertips whenever I want has been one of the greatest experiences of my life and I have thoroughly enjoyed sharing it with friends through dinners, pot-lucks, and restaurants. However, there comes a time when one wants a little something different. In New York, I am used to having a variety of different cuisines at my fingertips. Some of my favorites are Thai and Indian. Although Florence certainly has other cuisines, I have been hesitant to try them out in fear of them being mediocre and pricey. However,  I suddenly realized that I had a craving for the strong, spicy, robust flavors of a good curry. That’s when my friend, Aviva stepped in with a Thai curry recipe she learned from her brother.  It was exactly what I needed: a simple, slow-cooked, spicy, creamy, fragrant curry sauce served over chicken and a plethora of good vegetables from the market. It left my mouth buzzing, my sinuses cleared, and my stomach feeling warm and satisfied. My contribution to the meal was a bottle of wine and some coconut rice (I highly recommend this side dish- you simply replace half of the water you would normally use in cooking rice with coconut milk), a creamy, nutty, flavorful addition to any good curry. It was yet another evening of good friends and good food. 
        Aviva’s curry not only brought our immediate friends around the table, but it also attracted some newcomers. My friend, Buddy has been playing piano at a local thrift store and has gotten to know the owner, Valentina very well. So, he invited her and her girlfriend, Cristina over for dinner. Surprisingly they actually came and I am beyond glad that they did. They were so kind, charming, intelligent, outgoing, and fun and it was so great to talk to real Italian people who did not see us as stupid, young, naïve, American, tourists. I don’t want to sound like a twelve-year-old but I was definitely squealing with excitement because we had found new, cool, Italian friends.  After dinner, we went out for drinks with Cristina and Valentina at a bar called Mayday. It has become one of our favorite spots because it is chill, very artsy, plays great jazz, and has a delicious selection of organic cocktails that are out of this world. That evening was exactly the type of evening I hoped I would have in Florence and I will never forget it. The next day I went to the thrift store to listen to my friend play piano, draw, try on some clothes, and just hang out. As I listened to the soulful jazz and blues songs Buddy was playing, I couldn’t help but think of how lucky I am to be here in this amazing city. I got nothing done all day, but it was my first lazy day in Florence and for once, it didn’t involve me sitting on a couch, watching episodes of Sex and the City and feeling guilty because of all the work I was not doing. Instead, it was just really nice. 

Thai Curry

Il Mercato Sant'Ambrogio

          On Thursday, my friends took me to a smaller, less touristy market in the Santa Croce area of Florence called Sant’Ambrogio. It is similar to the Mercato centrale except it is smaller and all of the fresh produce is sold outside under tents. There was also something different about the atmosphere as well. There was an abundance of local people: old ladies yelling at the macellaio for cutting their prosiutto too thick, young couples buying fresh fruit while pushing their children around in strollers, or a group of butchers standing outside taking a break over a cup of espresso and a cigar. It was a colorful, sensational experience that I will not soon forget. And that was just on the outside. The inside was filled with tiny, individualized stands each of which specialized in something different. We goggled at the floral displays of ravioli, tortellini, and various other handmade pastas that I could not begin to remember let alone pronounce and I will definitely be going back to get some ravioli stuffed with pear and pecorino cheese (if your mouth is not watering right now you should know that you are officially deranged and should seek medical attention). But I stopped myself and only purchased a variety of fresh pears, a few onions, some chicken, and a good amount of basmati rice (stay tuned for my friend, Aviva’s thai curry dinner!) for that night’s dinner.

          I love going to the market because it is more than just shopping for food. You are experiencing where the food comes from, the people who make it or grow it, and you are spending less money and saving the fuel and plastic it takes to ship the same food to supermarkets and grocery stores. It is a colorful, fresh, flavorful, local way to get acquainted with a city and it’s people and I would highly suggest it even if you are just visiting.

Prosciutto 

Prosciutto being hand-sliced

Seasoned pancetta

Ravioli pecorino e pere

Pasta fatti a mano

Riso

Sorry to gross you out but this is a
huge part of the mercato experience 

Mantova

          Last weekend, I went on a trip to Mantova, a historical city home to gorgeous old palazzos, charming markets, beautiful vistas, and good food. As usual, the trip was with my art history class so we didn’t get too much time to browse the lovely squares filled with fresh baked goods, cheeses, homemade pastas and breads, and various local crafts. The aroma was incredible and tantalizing and for the first time in Italy, it both felt and smelled like fall. Granted we were up north a little bit, but it was definitely a beautiful fall day where the sun was warm but the shade was cold. For lunch I was able to stop at a restaurant specializing in their squash ravioli. It was a sweet, savory, “cinamony” treat that was the perfect, comforting meal on a cool fall’s day. Afterwards I was able to stop at a local stand in the market for a sfogliatella, an Italian pastry that involves layers and layers of thin, crispy pastry wrapped around a creamy custard. It was divine and tasted like a few of the Sunday morning brunches my family used to have when my parents would treat us to a few pastries after church (if I could sound more Italian-American). All in all, Mantova was yet another breathtaking city that combined ancient architecture with modern life. It was a great day.  

I formaggi

Il Mercato

Il Pane

Le Olive

Apples in the Isabella Deste's
(Famous 1600's female patron of the arts)

Sfogliatella

Ravioli di Zucca

Il Giardino di Isabella Deste

View of the Palazzo Te gardens
from the window

Tiramisu

        In order to redeem myself for showing up to last weeks pot luck dinner empty handed, I decided that this week I would make tiramisu, a seemingly good decision seeing as this is a classic Italian desert and is relatively simple if you have the right ingredients and tools. Of course, I had all the right ingredients and it wasn’t until after purchasing them that I realized I was missing one essential tool: an electric mixer. And so I was thus transported back to a time without electric mixers, when people beat egg whites into soft, glossy peaks by hand, egg yolks into a thick custard, and cream into whipped cream. It was me, a whisk, and a two-hour arm workout. Another bonus of making this lovely desert was that I finally figured out how to use my mocha espresso pot! I needed a good amount of espresso and kahlua for dipping the lady fingers so I went online and discovered that there are many tricks to making the best poor man’s espresso (it is called that because a mocha does not have the full benefit of pressure that is allowed by actual espresso machines so the coffee is slightly weaker than actual espresso). In the end, I turned out with a dish that I can actually say was completely hand-made down to the coffee and the chocolate shavings on top, and even though I was exhausted and sore afterwards, I learned a valuable lesson about cooking. Before all of our gadgets, the most important kitchen tools were the arms, the hands, and a whole lot of love and patience. Italian cooking is a craft that is rooted in the recipes, stories, and labors from the kitchens of people’s homes. These recipes are the ones that still fill our own kitchens with heavenly smells and fond memories.  Almost everything one does in the kitchen was and still can be accomplished by hand and in the end, the result is so much sweeter because you are a part of the process. There is therefore something to be said about the physical handling of food: it is essential to one’s relationship with cooking because it builds an understanding of food that is greater than the look, the smell, and the taste.  I now actually understand what makes cream turn into a frothy, fluffy, light-as-a-cloud mixture because my arms spent twenty minutes making it that way. And so without rambling any longer, I will leave you with the fruit of my labors: a fantastic, creamy, sweet, rich tiramisu that I was proud to share with friends.   

Cinque Terre

Brilliant Blue

          Last weekend, I took a day trip to the beautiful scenic towns of Cinque Terre, a coastal region famous for it’s fertile soil, towns built into the mountains, hiking, and fabulous beaches. As much as I love the hubbub, of Florence, it was wonderful to get away and do something that involved being in and around nature for a while. My housemate and I enjoyed a day of hiking through olive-filled, scenic mountains, walking through old farm towns one prettier than the next, and relaxing in the perfect, turquoise water of Monterosso, the fifth of the five towns. It was like a different world. Although Cinque Terre has become a favorite tourist spot, you can still get a glimpse of what life was like for the farmers living in these tiny towns carved into the mountains. Little did I know that the fourth town of cinque terre had something else to offer: the best pesto pizza I have ever had. Salty, garlicky, slightly burnt, nutty: it was an explosion of flavor. Unfortunately, we did not have time to stop and enjoy a full meal (cinque terre is famous for sea food), but my pizza definitely hit the spot after a good hike. Here are just some of the fabulous views of the day:

a boy gets eggs fresh from his farm

pesto pizza