Food and Wine Archives - Page 6 of 11

A day in Italy. Dinner and a show in Florence(continued from previous blog)

We came early (7:30. Early on Italian Standard Time) and it was a bit like being at a symphony hall watching the musicians setting up, getting instruments organized and tuned. The laughing happy people blessed with reservations keep trickling in. Which, with the door really being shut and locked, is a bit of a trick.

Part four. No rest for the restaurant goers.

FLORENCE, Italy – On your feet, walkers. Museum walking done, we do shopping walking and then head off to “the bad side of town.” Here we find our Aussie friends to have a far better grasp of Florence than the two locals we have met so far. Midge thought the part of town was questionable, but all I saw were businessmen in suits, gentle old people holding each other up, people pushing, not drugs but baby carriages.

dinner in florence, italy. The street where we find this unique Italian restaurant is not really even what I would call a street. It is more of a tiny tunnel connecting two streets. The restaurant and its sister sandwich shop are the middle two stores of the four stores that make up their entire “street.” Hey. Door’s locked. Lights are on. People are inside. We’re not. But here comes a demure, deferential waiter. He opens the door about oh, three inches and lets out part of a nose and one eyebrow to ask if we have a reservation. And adds, “se, no . . .” We get the drift, we know the drill, yes, yes we are Mr. Stuardo. He blanches a bit, probably dazzled by my Italian (humor), and says they only have a reservation for an Eduardo. Ok, sure, fine, that’s me too if it gets me fed. “Yeah, that’s him, I talked to him on the phone” says a rough sand paper voice from behind the waiter. Oh, there he is. Face is twice as tough as the tough voice. A reformed boxer? Rough shaved head, classic four o’clock shadow, widely gaped teeth. It would be off-putting but for the mischievous eye twinkle and half grin. Which is good. We’ve pretty much got to be friends here. This place is small and packed already. No chairs. They were surely considered and rejected in favor of small, rattan topped square, backless stools. And those are packed in here with hardly any space between them.

Now that we’ve broken in here, we thread our way past an old red metal Coke cooler, an even older wooden madia (an Italian standard, sort of a large, freestanding bread box), crates of dark purple artichokes, and baskets of Tuscany’s best looking porchini mushrooms. These were all where an aisle really should rightly be – so it is really crowded. Stepping over and around obstacles like this brings us to a tiny balcony two steps above the main level. Wrought iron railing, our table and three other dinky tables complete the entire “balcony.”
plates of fine tuscan food. florence, italy
We came early (7:30. Early on Italian Standard Time) and it was a bit like being at a symphony hall watching the musicians setting up, getting instruments organized and tuned. The laughing happy people blessed with reservations keep trickling in. Which, with the door really being shut and locked, is a bit of a trick. Everyone gets the same quiz we got. No reservation? No entry to the kingdom. Consolation prize is that sometimes the door watcher fights their way back to the counter and grabs a business card and passes it though the narrow opening, with a polite, non-judgmental, Try Again. Maybe Next Time. With Reservations.

A quietly elegant black man, in sport coat and turtle neck comes in and stands calmly by the counter. Doesn’t say a word. And is instantly poured a glass of wine. Brandy? Then he becomes for a while the designated doorman, vetting the hopeful and hungry applicants. It’s futile for the hopeful applicants to ask. Every tiny table either has a name on it or someone already sitting there. Midge looked at me, looked at the man, and cut her glance to an old photo on the wall. A younger version of him and the rough character that let us in. Arms around each other, posed, smiling out at us from the black and white world of some long past event. Wine finished, the volunteer doorman nods, waves goodbye and a huggy young couple takes his place by the counter, drinking wine and eating the house rolls, sort of a biscuit-like thing. They do door detail now. And dozens are turned away. One couple, by the grace of god, got in because a person with a reservation had not shown up. Of course those late people showed up as soon as the fill-in people had been seated. And now there really isn’t anyplace even to stand, let alone an aisle for the waiter to work. But he and the owner seemed to have a real zen way about them and took the chaos in stride even though you could hardly move or hear orders being given.

dinner in tuscany, and music too. The food is great and plentiful. And random. We didn’t order either of the first two courses. One was hot salted focaccia drizzled with fresh, green olive oil. The next course to arrive unbidden was a huge plate o’ meat. All sweet treats served under balsamic. I told the waiter they were great and all but I was worried that we had eaten what we had not ordered. Was this meant for some other table? Note, Concerned Citizen Stew reported this AFTER he gobbled it all up. “No, no” the angelic waiter smiled. “It was a surprise for you.” Thank you very much.

Funky place. White marble walls and big hooks in the ceiling. Meat curing? Local torture chamber? Be easy to hose down at night for sure. But the austere aspects of the cold hard white marble were off set by old radios, beat up old guitars, and I can’t remember what all because the people-watching was just too insanely interesting. I’d stay tuned to this channel round the clock if they had a remote cam. Ooop. There goes the chef. He’s just a blurr. He’s a burnished mahogany, shaved head kind of guy who knows half the people here and has a word and a wave and a wink for each of them but never breaks his stride coming zipping in or zipping back out. High theater plus good eats makes this a big big favorite with me. I say to Midge several times I feel like I am in a stage production and have a tiny part in it. Can you see it in the credits: “Annoying Tourist No.7”?

THE SHOW MUST GO ON

Look at some the other characters in this Italian movie. We’re seeing their act at just the next table. I’m so trying to act like I’m not Totally Into It. The man there, you remember the lucky duck who scored the only non-reservation seat of the night? Ok. He is holding forth on who knows what subject. I can hear him and hear parse out that it seems to be Italian but it is just noisy enough to not be able to pick up the drift of it. His lady friend has that long-suffering, furitive hang-dog look about her and never gets two words in between his constant, modulated, unhurried but never-ending, flowing like a river of words, monologue. She’s dark and moody. He’s youngish (40?) but with a silver lamb’s wool head of shaggy hair. And patently clueless. He has an open book in his hand. Here? Yes, here. And he is making eye contact with the girl and talking all the time. I can hear enough to know it’s Italian but not enough to tell if he is reading it out loud, but he looks at it every now and then. And never stops moving his lips. Oh, oh, what’s this? Still talking but now it’s to the hurried but infinitely patient single waiter for this circus. Wool Head is pointing at his bottle of wine. And pouring the waiter some in a spare glass on their table. The more patient than average waiter swirls it, he smells it. He drinks. He thinks. Drinks again. Both hands on the edge of their table, leaning into it in a thoughtful, engaged way. Says not a word. If ever there was going to be a cartoon balloon over a guy’s head it would be this guy, now. And it would be saying “Buddy. We let you in. You scored this aces corner table. You’ve drunk 2/3 of the bottle. It’s wine. This ain’t The Ritz Carlton.” He shrugs, leaves. A few minutes later he is back with a bottle they are all touching reverently and wide eyed. He insists they take it and keep the other one too. Does killing with kindness ever really kill? Would that it could?

Ok, ok, it is crowded and more crowded and we’re going to do something helpful. And leave. The show must go on, and we hate to go, but it’s the right thing to do. I mean the food was great, but it’s gone. Plates are shiny clean where minutes ago artichoke on pasta was sitting. The porchini on chicken plate looks the same. We give up our table and take the few steps to cash out. There is absolutely no space to move here. And yet, somehow, there is now an old accordianist playing away. Music to pay by. The bill, with wine, is 65 euros. They already threw in two courses and, unasked, the waiter rounds it down to a nice round 60 with a raised eyebrow sort of “is that ok?” look. For dinner and a show? You bet. We unlock the door and let ourselves back out into the real world. Someone inside flips the key and now we are on the outside looking in. Was that real? Must have been. Don’t think I could have made all of that up. Here’s an attempt at a mini movie to prove we were there. And help us stretch the moment out and relive it from afar.

Good night, Florence. Lets do this again sometime.

See you in Italy,

Stew Vreeland

A day in Italy. A story in several parts. And in several parts of Italy.

I cleaned madly and ceremonially closed one set of shutters after the others, and as a final act of love, I talked to the mason about a wall that needs fixing. See, house? We do care, even though we are leaving you here by yourself. Then it is off to the piazza for coffee and hugs goodbye, “tante cose belle!” and we are Siena bound.

cuppa Joe, Simone? coffee at bar gallo, panicale, italy PANICALE, SIENA, FLORENCE – Or, as we say: Breakfast/Lunch/Dinner.

Part one. Breakfast in Panicale.

Today really is the proverbial Movable Feast. Lovely, busy, interesting day. Slightly on the maudlin side to start with because the trip had wound down to these final moments. But, onward and upward, there are many fun things to do today. I cleaned madly and ceremonially closed one set of shutters after the others, and as a final act of love, I talked to the mason about a wall that needs fixing. See, house? We do care, even though we are leaving you here by yourself. Then it is off to the piazza for coffee and hugs goodbye, “tante cose belle!” and we are Siena bound.


Part two. Lunch in Siena.

Pulling into Spannocchia, I see Midge in the midst of a sundrenched tableau. Sitting on a stone bench, her back to a warm stone wall, her friend Gail beside here, other friends left and right, a big shaggy white dog dozing at their feet. I hated to break the spell.

But what the heck.

It was lunch time.

We filled our plates in the kitchen and moved this Magic Moment to the veranda in front of the main villa and just let the sun wash over us. Cukes freshly cut from their vines lying in the warm Tuscan dirt that morning, plus fennel also from the garden and pieces of oranges made up the salad. And see the pasta in red sauce in the photo? Not at all. It’s just not pasta. It is eggs, if you can imagine, cooked like a thin omelet and cut in strips. What will these people think of next? Well, that was all swell but we have places to go and yet more food to eat. And plus, it is time to go. Midge and the Spannocchia board have been to so many meetings they must be getting punchy. Over lunch the conversation turned to cats. Not a good sign in the best of times. And that turned to the potential of cat-a-pults as a way of effecting population control. Everyone slaphappy, we pack and exit stage left.

Pulling out we take a minute to see if we can get into a restaurant in Florence we heard about when we were olive-picking. It is Saturday and some Australian friends said it was great, but tiny and reservations were sort of mandatory. Ok. We’re in. They are expecting a “Mr Stuardo” at seven thirty. That’s me. Stuardo T. Vreeland. And we’ll do that story in an upcoming blog. Stay tuned to this channel for Part Three and Part Four in this Day in the Life series.

Water, water everywhere. Life on an Italian peninsula.

CASTIGLIONE DEL LAGO, Umbria, Italy – Not a bad place to be on a sunny day. The “del Lago” part you’ve probably already figured out is all about being right on the lake. Strangest, no – I think the chamber of commerce people would say most unique – geography I can imagine. First, you have this nice round lake in the middle of the Italian peninsula. There are some hilly approaches to the lake but mostly on the far east and some on the north. On the south it is all an agricultural plain around the lake, same with the west where this peninsula, for no reason at all, inexplicably juts straight out into the lake. And there it is. A long, tall rock in the middle of a lake. How did that happen?

I suppose it really doesn’t matter how it came to be there. The point here is that the peninsula is very interesting and when you get up there, the town built there on the peninsula has water on all sides. And you have enough elevation to pull up a gelati and enjoy the view. Look, isn’t that Panicale on that hill over there? If I squint I think maybe it is.
castiglione del lago in umbria, on an italian lake
FURNITURE CAN BE FUN

When you first drive through the main gate you will likely be parking in front of a big palace where there are art shows and exhibitions. That palace is connected to a long skinny defensive corridor to an imposing fortress where the views get really grand and wild. You can sometimes see outdoor movies in the center of the fortress on a summer’s eve. Been there, done that, quite liked that. People smoke, they talk, kids run around, there is a long intermission. Very much not like a night at your multiplex back at the mall in your home town. Meanwhile, along the main, and almost only street, are frame shops, books stores, restaurants, hotels, and pastry and fruit stores of every stripe. And lots of stores with mounted cinghales where you can get wild boar sausage, wine, cheese and other necessities of la dolce vita. And down by one arched entry to the city (you can just barely see it in one of our photos here) is an eccentric “antique” store. Its merchandise is all over the map, just like the owner. He’s tiny and busy as a bee. We usually talk in Italian but every now and then he surprises us with his English. Something about South Africa? I disremember exactly where he misspent his youth. But what I do remember is pushing in through the clutter and inching my way sideways like a crab past decorative farm tools and glass dishes to the furniture cavern at the back and being kind of bowled over by the lofty, seemingly optimistic, prices. I expressed my “concern” over the cost there and the owner said “oh, you need my ‘cose povere’. We have a whole building full of poor things” He herded us out of his building, locking the door behind us, jumped on a long suffering Vespa and motioned for us to follow him. And we were off. The cinder block building he led us to was just a few blocks away, down the hill. And when he opened the doors it was like Ali Baba’s cave to us. Great, fun and funky stuff, dirt cheap. And choices? You bet. This was a nice size place and full to the rafters. In more, shall we say, our price range. We bought things we loved, he steered us to a cousin who is an aces restorer, we picked new marble tops for all of the pieces. That made them seem to match, we had them all stained to match, and a few months later we had a set of bedroom furniture to be proud of. They look old money but they cost hardly any money. And we got what we wanted.

HERE WE ARE AT SEE LEVEL.

Below the walled town itself the ground goes almost to sea level – ok, lake level. And there are beaches and ice cream vendors, and ferries to the islands and parks. And a nice drive around the peninsula. Being Italy, it is a bit of circuitous route with a baffling one way / non one way kind of pattern to it. Someone in their department of transportation decidedly thought about this way too long. But along the drive, on a sunny day anyway, the lake can be an almost unnatural Caribbean turquoise blue. And should a storm come up, I’ve seen that that blue can change to black water and white caps in a flash. When we took these pictures it was sort of an in-between kind of day. Just recently along this lake drive there is a new modern crop of sculptures that have sprung up. Their job seems to be to frame views of the lake the way their ancient ancestors in the city up above have framed their views for centuries. You remember Katia the broker of course. The people shown next to the sculpture are Katia’s parents celebrating life, good health and Italy on a summer day. Wouldn’t mind being there with them right now. Ciao, Mario, Ciao, Angela!

See you in Italy,

Stew Vreeland

The big cheese keeps on rolling. Things you may see in Italy during Easter

cheese rolling in italy on the day after easter. tradition?
PANICALE, Umbria, Italy–At Easter, I often like to ponder which came first: the Bunny or the Egg. I was almost starting to make headway on that abstract chocolate-based concept, when from out of the clear blue day-after-Easter-sky comes: Cheese Rolling. What could the seasonal tie-in be? Panicalesi are known to eat cheese; but, as far as I know, they don’t make any of it. Wine, yes. Olive oil, yes. The sport itself seems to be the slightly demented offspring of the marriage of bowling and golf. Not a very wide spread sport, it may be only practiced in the Umbrian hilltown of Panicale, for all I know. What I do know is that it takes place every year on the Monday after Easter, Pasquetta (little Easter), and is called by the locals “Ruzzolone” or The Big Wheel.
cheese rolling in italy on the day after easter (Pasqua). a Pasquetta tradition?
There is a course (of course, of course) laid out in the streets around the village walls. Whoever “bowls” their Big Wheel O’ Cheese around the course in the fewest “strokes” wins. The gioccatori (sounds like jokers, but means players) wrap leather straps with wood handles around the cheese and send a perfectly good nine pounds of round cheese lurching wildly down the curving street with somewhat of a yo-yo and string effect. The cheese rolls, the crowd runs along side of it and someone marks where it wobbles to a stop with bit of chalk on the street. That is, when it stops on the street. Being cheese, it is a bit hard to control and the pecorino often wheels off the course and starts bouncing off down the hillside, through the olives, local officials in hot pursuit like kids chasing after the Gingerbread Man. Or, the unwieldly wheel of pecorino will stay on the road, whew, but get wedged, rats, under the one Fiat Uno that didn’t get the No Parking message. The winner takes the wheel of Pecorino home our friend Francesco tells us. Not that I know what someone would want with a cheese that has really “been around” like these have. As Francesco says “maybe they should give it to the losers”! If the cheese hits one of the village’s stout stone walls wrong, then the game and the cheese are all over, anyway. Si Mangia! Pecorino is local cheese made from sheep’s milk. Milking a sheep. Can you picture that?
cheese rolling in Italy the day after Easter. the cheese goes off course. later a bad band
Regardless, long before our first outdoor cheese race had concluded, the crowd had heard the band “music” off in the piazza and had wandered that direction for the milling about, for the free wine and for the ever popular, post game hard boiled eggs, all being served by the apt sounding Pro Loco. I know it means Local Promotion Group, plus or minus, but doesn’t Pro Loco look like it could mean Pro Crazy? Curiously, as soon as the music started, no one seemed to know or care if the annual cheese rolling contest had a winner or not. And what a sight the band was! Reminiscent of the finest Fellini. The band we saw was named “Bandaccia” (Bad Band) and pots and pans and car horns and stuffed animals were involved, as you can see in the photo above. In spite of their name, they weren’t actually all that bad, but quite loud and festive – in a Spike Jones sort of way! Even though we’re going to miss the festivities this year by a few days, we’re happy to know that somewhere there is something this dizzy and whimsical signaling the happy start of spring. I know all our friends in Panicale are counting the days till this year’s Running of the Cheeses. Happy Pasquetta to all!

See you in Italy!

Stew Vreeland

LOOKING AT LIFE. ROSÉ COLORED GLASSES.

MONTEPULCIANO, Tuscany– OK the calendar says Fall. Late Fall. I checked. And the lazy November sun was punching in later and checking out earlier – every day. But! When that sun is out and about, so are we. We spend our days strolling about in short sleeves. And our nights sleeping with the windows wide open. And according to my Plant Diary, it was exactly like this last year at this same time. In Maine, the colors have run away and left us with shades of grey. But here in Umbria? Things are just starting to get their autumnal glow. When we got to Umbria on the 24th of October, I noted the left behind vines of recently harvested grapes were still rather green. The next week they went momentarily golden and now they are turning nut browns and drifting down to the still warm ground.

Almost insincere shades of lush bright green cover hillsides. And flowers mix with red vines climbing up and over walls in the village center. And there are bright blue skies overhead every day. It all puts me in high spirits maybe higher than on a summer’s day. I’m tempted to stay home and laze about. But it is just too nice. You have to be out. And coffee at “our local” is not a bad idea either so we’re off to the piazza for a soft launch into the day. So many people to meet and greet, so little time. This morning we saw at least Paulette, Susan, Mauro, Gigi, Biano, Adelmo and was that all? Light day but excellent.

Today we are blessing Montepulciano with our presence and buying a few Christmas presents while we are at it. The town is abuzz and people are in their Sunday best. Which is maybe as it should be since it is Sunday after all. Looks like there are more than a handful of End of Summer neighborhood festivals, a chestnut festival, public dinners (you can hear and smell the sizzle of sausages being grilled, mid-day bells ringing, there is accordion music in the air outside one festival. Way too many stores are open so our progress is slow as we roam up and down the steep, stone streets. We dropped in the Osteria di Borgo that Paulette spoke of in glowing terms, and it is way up at the apex of the town. The better to see your view, Montepulciano. One of a million vantage points with panoramic vistas here in this crows’ nest of a town. After awhile, incredibly, you just start to take the fabulous overlooks in Montepulciano for granted. An embarrassment of Tuscan riches? Yes, indeed.

And the best part? The crazy clock on the village tower says it is LUNCH TIME! And we are in Italy. And, and, we are eating outside. In November!

La dolce vita, in fatti.

THE GLASS IS HALF FULL . . . BUT NOT FOR LONG!

We had many things at the Osteria – including a rosé Prosecco that I really liked. But then, there really isn’t a bad Prosecco. Not in my unsophisticated way of looking at the world. I expect Prosecco to be good and it almost always is. But the cheese plate we had here and the ribollita WOW they were both real Dear Diary entries. Montepulciano is famous for its Vino Nobile but they love to Say Cheese here, too. And we had an especially nice collection on our sampler plate, and the sauces to dress them with were serious fun, too. Green, red, mahogany brown, they were representatives from all over the color wheel. The green pepper sauce you could sort out for yourself but the almost purple black one, I had to taste it several times before I caught its onion origins. There was one spicy, spicy one I really liked but really never pinpointed the principal ingredients. The ribollita soup, on the other hand – it was brilliantly obvious what it was made of. Perfect texture, not just a big old mush, which I also like just fine but this one was visually attractive with bright primary colors clearly defined the full range of the Vegetable Kingdom. Did I say it was great? Hey. Hey, get your own bowl!

HUGS AND KISSES

To hug or not to hug? Being from the Midwest, it is a curious thing to me – all this hugging. When I was growing up on the Great Plains, physical contact was pretty much limited to football practice. In my life to date, I’ve gotten along fine without an overabundance of social hugging. Well, I think I have. Who knows if I would have been a better or a worse person with more or less hugging?. Even though I’m a native of a relatively hug free environment I’m finding I’m rather OK with all the hugging going on around here. Maybe the times are changing. Is it me or are people, even in middle America and New England, huggier that they use to be? Hard to put a stake in the ground and compare. Here, in central Italy, it is really almost not all that optional. You may have noticed. You see an Italian friend, their eyes light up, their arms open wide and the next thing you know you are sure enough hugging. And there is the option when a handshake becomes, of all things, the double kiss option.

So, now look. . . if you are going to get sucked into this whirlpool of hugs and air kisses I say you may as well do it Right. Literally. See the kissee’s head? You go to the right. Your right. Airkiss. Then go left. Repeat airkiss. But it all starts to YOUR right. It’s not the end of the world if you don’t go to the right first, but it does throw everyone off a bit. So get out there and practice, practice, practice. Kiss. Kiss. XXOO

See you in Italy,

Stew