Donna La Donna

jacques simon

2010-02-15T15:53:00.001+01:00

http://www.muratkorkmaz.com/go.friend.php pierre rappasse

NADINE NOLLET

2010-02-15T15:52:00.001+01:00

http://vaskavaska.idoo.com/go.friend.php pauline toucheboeuf

Homeward Bound

2007-09-29T20:14:00.000+02:00

I can hear the planes overhead that will take me to Rome and then home tomorrow morning. I booked a hotel near the airport since I have a 7 am flight and this room is a good place to remind me that I am not a real member of the leisure class, but merely a happy interloper. I arrived late morning and was told that the center of Florence was 3 km (about 2 miles), so I decided I needed a nice long walk. Window shopped and had a salad for lunch, with a glass of prosecco of course, but I am already transitioning back to my real life. I’m hoping I faced the last big challenge of my trip, figuring out the Florence bus system with no route map to get me back here.

I’m ready to come home, ready to see my friends, ready to get back to work, ready to traipse around my neighborhood with the utmost confidence in where I’m going. This has all been a marvelous dream, but I’m ready to see what happens next back where I live. I think I’m a little homesick. I’ve got good timing.

I’ve really enjoyed blogging. I think it has saved me from loneliness knowing that I’ve been sharing this with you and getting to tell you about it. I know I promised not to get too self-reflective, but do indulge me a couple more paragraphs while I have your attention.

Something remarkable throughout Europe is that most of the towns and cities have very few traffic lights, especially in proportion to the number of intersections, but they are still very pedestrian-friendly places. There are marked crosswalks and all you must do is step into one to stop traffic. You are allowed to cross peacefully, no honking, no yelling. This takes some getting used to -- scooter after scooter whizzing by and all those little miniature cars – something about the smaller the vehicle, the faster they seem to be going. However, you just have to take a deep breath, say a little prayer, and go, because the fact is, if you don’t step off the curb, you’ll be waiting there forever.

So I leave you with theses three morsels of advice. Eat good food, try new things, and step into traffic.

Dinner tonight – pizza in my room!

The Last Supper

2007-09-28T23:20:00.000+02:00

We got to sleep in this morning, and I think it was because we needed to be well rested to tackle the pastry portion of our week. At 10 am we were making profiteroles – pastry puffs filled with chantilly cream and topped with a dark chocolate sauce – and Florentine petite fours – small cookies great with coffee made of dried fruits, toasted almonds, and honey, held together by egg whites. We also made a panna cotta – a beautiful Italian custard that has to set for several hours-- for dessert this evening. The profiteroles and petite fours were for lunch of course , along with that lasagna we made earlier in the week. (I am still fitting in my clothes . . . just not as well. It’s very possible that I may have some sort of lactose withdrawal when I return).

Remember that lasagna? It was Neopolitan-style with meatballs, and smoked mozzarella, hard-boiled eggs, grated parmesan, and both tomato and béchamel sauce. Crazy good and different.

And look at these profiteroles. I may recount this statement later, but making those puff pastries was not as difficult as I expected.

This afternoon, we had an olive oil and wine tasting in a wonderful wine shop in Lucca, Enoteca Vanni, named best wine shop in Tuscany by one of the wine magazines which is an impressive feat. I liked the place’s controlled chaos. Things seemed to be in no particular order, a bottle priced at 12 euros sat next to one priced at 95 euros. Underground there was a vast maze of cellars laid out much the same, with the addition of cobwebs, dust, and humidity. For the tasting, we were taken down into a particular Roman cellar that dated to 200 AD when it had been used to store vegetables and was probably at street level. Emmet with a PhD in organic biochemistry wanted very much to take a scraping of a spectacularly-colored mold on the brick back to his lab.

The things we prepared for our meal tonight, our last supper, make my top five list of all the things I have eaten this entire two weeks, and god, that is saying something because I have eaten like . . . what comparison do I use here? . . . I have eaten like some combination of the Queen of England, the late Julia Child, and Shaquille O’Neal.

These three items just fell perfectly into my tastes and preferences:

Orecchiette with Broccoli prepared with broccoli rabe, pancetta, and some heat with red chili pepper
Ossobucco Alla Milanese – veal shanks with a rice pilaf prepared in the oven on the side
Panna Cotta served with a berry sauce

Here we are trying to make those damn ear-shaped pastas. Needless to say, many parts of the anatomy were produced, probably only 40% in any way resembling ears.

Unfortunately, there is no picture of the veal. Terrible I know, but I forgot and ate it. But what about this beauty? This stuff was smooth as silk with a hint of lemon, downright heavenly.

It was our last day and we had a small celebration before dinner and received certificates stating what we had mastered. I don’t think it’s going to get me a job at Babbo, but I’m pretty proud of all that we did. This really isn’t a beginner’s classroom, and Chef Valter said as much while reflecting on how much it is a pleasure and a challenge taking on students for a week in this manner.

We were challenging and I’m chuckling as I write that – loud, opinionated, obsessively inquisitive. Seriously, Diane lost a 50 euro bet to her brother that she couldn’t not ask a question for one hour. She went double or nothing, and lost again! I love her curiousity and it just goes to show you how serious we all took this and how much we wanted to learn while we were here. You just don’t get the consultation of a professional chef every day.

And I do feel like I have been adopted into several new families. This could be like summer camp and we promise to stay in touch and never do, but we’re grown-ups, not teenagers, and we didn’t seemingly have much in common when we arrived, but we have our love of food and now we have this experience together and our profound appreciation for the skill, knowledge, and artistry it takes to prepare it well.

Tomorrow, I am back to Florence and then fly home on Sunday morning. I think I’ll make one more entry in this here blog and then call it a vacation.

Tip of the day
Ignore the expiration date on olive oil. They put it there just to move inventory out of store in order to make room for this year’s production. Olive oil is best used when it’s new, but will last long after the expiration date.

On hidden gems

2007-09-28T00:23:00.000+02:00

This morning, we had a wonderful guide and native Luccan tell us more about Lucca and its remarkable history. In the war-happy region later known as Italy, Lucca miraculously managed to avoid attack and maintain its independence from the mid-15th century on. Their neighbors weren’t friendly peace-lovers. The Pisanos were very aggressive. There’s no love lost even now between Lucca and Pisa. And during the Renaissance period, no one was more aggressive then the Medicis in Florence who were even able to defeat and occupy Pisa in the 14th and 15th centuries, and to this day, the Pisanos have not forgot. Lucca, however, not only had their impressive wall protecting them, they also had an advanced practice of diplomacy and a very diplomatic sense of pragmatism.

Lucca maintained a neutrality, for which they are now praised but were historically criticized, but still evident today is the way that they masked their wealth. The buildings are mostly plain and modest from the outside, but inside they reveal Lucca’s riches. Lea, our guide, said that Luccans “have very long pockets” and she told a funny anecdote. Take a Milano (from Milan) wearing Gucci and Valentino and turn him upside down, nothing will fall from his pockets. Take a modest-looking Luccan and turn him upside down, and out will fall untold riches.

Here is an example of a typical building exterior -- no elaborate molding or expensive materials, very unlike Rome -- and a luxurious villa garden that might be tucked away somewhere behind it.

Quite a treat was our unscheduled visit to Attelier Ricci, a friend of Lea’s, who allowed a small group of us to walk through his home. He is a custom designer tailor with an affluent clientele. His building is completely nondescript and here is his studio/commercial space that fronts the street, but the following are his quarters off the street hidden like a pearl.

Chef Valter arranged for us to enjoy a tasting menu for lunch at Buca di Sant’Antonio, one of Lucca’s oldest and most renowned restaurants. It was quite different then Pizzeria Irma which now has a special place in my heart, but was as warm and enjoyable. Our entrée was goat meat and veal served with an artichoke puree. Lunch is such an enjoyable meal in Italy because the shops close from 1 pm – 3:30, so Italians take their time and drink wine and visit and laugh with their friends.

I must mention that I’ve learned that the siesta is an apocryphal concept. Italians are not napping from 1 – 3:30. They are having lunch or running errands or picking up their kids or getting haircuts. Shops are not open from 1 – 3:30 because the government imposes strict overtime pay on a workday more than 8 hours, so in order for shops to be open until 7:30 or 8 pm at night, they must close to give their workers time off the clock, and besides that, most Italians are at lunch so it does not make sense to pay the overtime to keep the shops open at those hours when there are so few people on the streets.

Fish was on the menu tonight – tuna carpaccio, sea bass, and cod. The tuna and the cod preparations were outstanding. Chunks of raw tuna were pounded between parchment paper until transluscent and were served with a lemon olive oil and a garnish of finely diced red, yellow, and green bell peppers. The cod was cooked with leeks and turned into a mousse served atop a pool of smooth chickpea cream. Mom and Bill, I put my trout-filleting skills to good use on the sea bass.

We also prepared a lemon sorbet made with sage. Remember when I was talking about how little I saw sage? It seems a staple of Tuscan cooking – it’s used so often and with such variety. Chef Valter called our lemon sorbet sexy because he added some Italian meringue which amped up its creaminess, but I think the sage is what made it sexy. I know you’re thinking sage in sorbet ? It was a knockout. If there ever was a sexy herb, it is sage. Someone really ought to just bottle its oil and sell it at the counter in Bloomingdales.

It rained today, very hard a while, even a bit of hail, thankfully, after we returned home. Here is a picture after it began clearing up.

Tip of the day
A joke around here has become “extra extra virgin olive oil, “ or “virgin virgin virgin olive oil.” There is only one acceptable olive oil at all times – extra virgin olive oil which is such because it has an acidity below .08%. Anything labeling itself different is either an inferior product that should not ever be used or it is marketing b.s. to get more of your hard-earned dollars which goes for “cold-pressed.”

All Hail the Cow

2007-09-26T22:46:00.000+02:00

I had my tripe today. Did I tell you that of the 10 of us, 6 are from Italian-American families (which might be the undoing of our Chef Valter)? Tripe they definitely did not recommend. But it became known that I wanted to try it, and so in the market in Pistoia this morning, it was bought and this afternoon prepared. The first piece I tried was actually with the vendor in the square. He asked me if I was “una donna forte?” (a strong woman) and I said, “Si!” He cut off a piece, cut it in half, sprinkled a little salt on it, and he ate it with me.

I will admit there was some trepidation, but I wasn’t about to hesitate, not in front of like 12 curious Italians watching this strange Americana and the Chef. It tasted sorta like the stringy part of white meat turkey.

Here he is selling us the tripe we bought to take home with us and the dish we ultimately made.

Everyone, even the naysayers, was very pleasantly surprised by the dish we made above which included finely diced onion, carrots, and celery, but was the serving dish scraped clean at the end of our meal? No.

We made 12 separate dishes for lunch and it was probably the first time I really really overate. Oh but there was so much to try. The idea in Pistoia was to see what looked good and bring it home and cook it. The Chef had a few things in his head, quite a few, and a couple of people, very bravely I thought, also prepared their own recipes. Highlights for me were a panzanella which is a traditional Tuscan bread salad and pasta fagioli which is a popular Olive Garden item with the all-you-can-eat salad and breadsticks – a soup made with pasta and beans – and not surprisingly completely unlike what I thought it to be.

Click here for more picks from the market and of lunch.

This evening was dedicated to the Florentine steak, and let’s just take a few minutes of silence to reflect.

The Florentine steak is a T-bone, and Chef Valter maintains that world-wide, if you order a Florentine steak, you will receive a T-bone. I’m not so sure the term is so well known, but I am convinced it should be. For one, Florentine is much prettier word than T-bone.

With it, he served us a Brunello di Montalcino Riserva. Produced as well in the Chianti Classico region, it is a very well know variety of wine and expensive, and it was exquisite with the beef. Also exquisite but much more lowly was the wonderful zucchini accompaniment. We hollowed out “eight-ball” zucchini, and cooked them in the oven a bit, diced up their insides, sautéed them with olive oil, garlic, onion, fresh oregano, and tomatoes, restuffed them with a small piece of mozzarella in the middle, and cooked them a bit more. Beautiful.

Tips of the day
#1: Try panzanella. Make an ordinary cucumber and tomato salad with olive oil, red wine vinegar, basil, salt and pepper, but combine it with cubes of good italian bread that has been toasted into breadcrumbs. The bread soaks up the dressing, but still stays a bit crunchy. Yummy.

#2: Always bring your meat to room temperature before grilling or cooking.

More wine.

2007-09-26T16:25:00.000+02:00

So both vineyards we visited yesterday which were about 90 minutes from Lucca are in the region officially designated by the Italian government as producers of Chianti Classico – 170,000 acres of hilly forest with sandy soil south of Florence and north of Siena.

Only wine from this area is allowed to call itself Chianti Classico and it is so marked with a rooster on its pink label on the necks of their bottles. However, other regions may produce Chianti and very good Chianti outside of this border, so it is important to keep in mind that the “Classico” designation does not indicate quality. It is like so many things mostly a marketing tool.

Chianti Classico Riserva however refers to wine produced on special vines. Riserva, whether of chianti or another wine, was traditionally the wine reserved for the family itself so it was of higher quality, but it was also kept ”in reserve” should anything happen – drought, flood, lenthgy siege. It is of a higher alcohol and sugar content so it matures more slowly. The higher the alcohol and sugar content of a wine, the longer and better it will age. Color of course is a good indicator of age – younger wines are more of a ruby while older wines take on the color of garnet.

This I learned at the Castle of Verazzano which became home to the Verazzano family in the 7th century. The “vineyards situated in Verazzano” are mentioned in a manuscript which dates back to 1170. Giovanni da Verazzano, who discovered the Hudson Bay in 1524, and for whom the Verazzano Narrows Bridge is named, was born at the castle there in 1485.

After touring the cellars and learning about the process by which they make their wines and other products which include vin santo, balsamic vinegar, olive oil, and wild boar salami, we sat down to a wine tasting with lunch. (There are wild boars all over the hills of Tuscany and are quite a problem because they like to eat the grapes especially at this time of year during harvest).

The wines were all wonderful as was the lesson from the sommelier on smelling and tasting them, but probably the best part of our time there was the small spoonful of balsamic vinegar that we were each given to taste, available for purchase at about $67 for 3 oz. I will take that medicine any day. It was mind-blowing and so unlike what I thought was balsamic vinegar. “Real” balsamic is aged over many years in small barrels and moved from barrel to barrel made from different wood (mulberry, chestnut, oak, cherry, ash) so that it takes on the flavor of each wood. The result is a dense syrup of very complex flavors and it is not something one would waste on lettuce but serve drizzled sparingly on fruit or chunks of parmigiano reggiano.

Our time at the Antinori vineyard was also very enjoyable and also included a tasting. Again Antinori is a much larger producer so this winery at Badia di Passignano is one of several in Italy. It is an old abbey founded in 395 and monks of the Vallombrosian Order still live there but Antinori leases the property from the church. Here Chef Valter arranged for us to meet with the winemaster, the head guy in charge of the winemaking at this location.

Most interesting was his perspective on the wine market. He said that Italian winemakers recently did a survey of the US market and found that the large majority of Americans drink the wine they buy within 50 minutes of purchase. Sounds about right. What this tells them is that, as the US is the driver of the market at this time because it is the biggest, is they need to concentrate on producing more reasonably-priced wine meant for drinking and less wine meant for collecting, and they have made changes in their vineyards and practices to account for this.

But this does not mean they are concentrating on producing an inferior product. It means they have turned over much of their acreage reserved for the expensive varieties to the less expensive ones, that they have reviewed and reformed production techniques looking for efficiencies so as to keep costs low but quality high, and that especially they will try hardest to get their products directly to consumers rather than distributors who will hoard vintages in an effort to artificially manipulate the market. There is only so much wine that can be produced. The US wants more and more because we are beginning to understand wine and eat better, but there is only so much land in Italy and it is a crop influenced by the whims of nature – blight, disease, global-warming. For instance, this summer was very dry and hot and much money had to be spent hauling water up a very winding rough road for the vines.

Wine producers in Italy know that this is inability to meet demand is a temporary situation, however. And the same could be said about French producers. It is not that they think they will be able to produce more and more or that demand will decrease. It is that soon there will be a glut of good wine competing with Italian and French wines from every corner of the world as word of the profitability in wine spreads and different countries turn their focus to producing quality wines. We are already seeing this in Chile, Argentina, South Africa, Australia, Washington State, Long Island, etc. That’s a lesson in our free market economy. As soon as you create a demand, there will always be someone preparing to supply that demand when you cannot.

Click here for more pics of wine country.

Wine Tips of the Day
#1: Chianti Classico Riserva reaches its peak 5 – 8 years after bottling, so look for vintages from 1999 – 2002, or buy a 2004 and wait . . . yeah, right.

#2: Antinori wines are widely available in NYC and online of course. Their top of the line is Tignonello which can go for hundreds a bottle at a restaurant. Look for their Peppoli label which is the same aging process, same varieties, just on younger vines than the Tignello and at $30 on wine.com as opposed to $90. The Peppoli vines are currently about 10 years old. When they are 15, they will be turned over to produce the more expensive wine.

More wine?

2007-09-25T23:48:00.000+02:00

No one slept last night.Well a couple of people did – Emmet and Joanne, and David (a doctor who learned how to sleep at the drop of a hat as a resident and who is said to be able to fall asleep between floors on an elevator) did. The rest of us, very little. Maybe I fell asleep after 1am but was awake by 5 and the sleep was fitful.

The Italians eat even later then New Yorkers. I first noticed this in Rome. If in New York on a weeknight, we are eating around 7:30 – 8, Italians seem to be sitting down to their evening meal around 9. Last night’s meal did not wrap up until nearly 10:45, and we all suffered from trying to go to bed so full of food and drink. Touring vineyards in Chianti seemed a bit of a task this morning at 8:30, but no worries, we pulled through brilliantly.

But for this reason, there will be an abbreviated blog entry today. I have to go to bed. We toured and tasted two wineries of differing production volumes – Castello of Verazzano and the Antinori vineyards at Badia di Passignano. Castello of Verazzano, a small producer, will produce less than 1 million bottles of wine this year while Antinori, a very large one, will produce more than 14 million of which a large percentage is shipped to the United States. I will tell you about them tomorrow as we have the afternoon off after we square off in a kitchen challenge preparing a lunch buffet using ingredients we find in the market town of Pistoia, but that’s domani.

Let me appease you with pictures of the pizza we ate for dinner at a fabulous local pizzeria in Lucca, Pizzeria Irma. Chef Valter ordered ahead and we sat down to mugs of beer (thank god because none of us could stomach more wine today) and pie after pie arriving to our table – procuitto and pancetta and mushrooms and anchovies and calamari and fried eggs and olives and salamis and zucchini and eggplant and peppers and cherry tomatoes -- you name it we had it on pizza tonight. It was heaven.

The last pizza was a dessert pizza made of nutella (a sweet hazelnut spread) and marscapone cheese (what is known as the Italian cream cheese).

Survivor Tuscany

2007-09-24T23:33:00.000+02:00

I’m a little tipsy. I don’t know if it’s the alcohol or exhaustion. We started with white wine infused with sliced peaches before dinner, red wine with dinner, and we ended with limoncello . . . that we made ourselves! It could definitely be the alcohol, but what a day.

We were out by 9 am when Valter took us on a walking tour of Lucca and its city wall which was built in the 12th or 13th century to keep out neighboring factions like the Pisans. It is quite high and quite thick and still completely encloses the old city center.

We met Roberto in his shop where he sells meats and cheeses and things fantastical, and he and Valter, in cahoots, showed off his wares. “Try this parmesan reggiano. Try this pecorino (sheep’s milk cheese). Note how it’s different than this pecorino which has been aged longer. You must try this carpaccio of beef, this prociutto, this salami of wild boar, this truffle butter , this paste of olive oil and garlic, this mortadello . . . “

Here is a pic of Valter and Roberto, and a pic of me cutting a piece of the huge mortadella, which is sorta like a balony, but instead of pimento, pistachio . . . yup pistachio.

And here’s everyone – the handsome Chef Valter with the ladies and the gentlemen.

We returned to the villa to learn how to make pasta. We each started with a pile of flour in front of us, then made a well in the center where we cracked two eggs, added a pinch of salt, and got our hands dirty. We kneaded and kneaded and then all took turns at the Kitchen Aid using the pasta attachments (why not use technology?), spitting out with varying success different kinds of pasta.

We made tagliatini (fresh square spaghetti), ravioli, and sheets of lasagna, for a very special lasagna that we will be eating later in the week (I’ll just tease you a bit and tell you it has hard boiled eggs and smoked mozzarella in it).

Here is our pasta workshop.

Lunch was our pasta, followed by a spectacular cheese plate for dessert. We were instructed to eat it counter-clock wise. The cheese all had incredible names that I can’t remember, but the first was mild and soft and served with green grapes, the second was a little stronger with a dark red rind because it had been soaked in red wine served with a pear, the third was a pecorino served with an onion jam that we had made that afternoon (my favorite), and the fourth was a blue cheese served with a spicy chili pepper jam.

After lunch, we took a short 30 minute drive into Pisa, and yes, that tower is leaning. Pisa was a rich, influential port town and the tower was built as nothing more than a status symbol, something special to display the town's wealth. The first architect was fired after the first three tiers were constructed and they began to lean -- the tower was built unknowingly on an ancient river bed of unstable sand. One hundred years went by and Pisa again decided to take up construction on the tower and an architect was brought in to try to rectify the leaning. He added two more tiers trying to correct for the lean with columns longer on one side than the other. A third architect added the final two tiers and the belfry another century later and if you look at the final three layers, they are actually straight. So the tower is less a leaning structure, and more a banana-shaped one.

And after Pisa, we returned for more class.

We made dinner:

Spelt soup – sounds so simple, but was amazingly rich and complex with beans and spelt (a grain, also known as faro), and pancetta and onion and sage and yum.
Eggplant parmigiana
Amaretto Peaches with Cinnamon Ice-Cream – yes we also made ice cream.

Here's some of us after relaxing a bit after class, before sitting down to eat.

It’s wacky being thrown together so intimately with these other people. We’re going to know each other very well by the end of the week. It’s like one of those reality shows. What happens when 10 strangers are picked to live in a house, cook together, and have their vacations intertwined? Find out what happens when people stop being polite, and start being real.

Well, most of them are from the tri-state area, so polite is already out the window. They will undoubtedly drive me crazy, but I think I could love them like family.

Tips of the day
#1: Always pair cheese with an accompaniment that matches the cheese in power – neither should overwhelm the other. A mild cheese with a mild accompaniment, a strong cheese with a strong one.

#2: Make your own limoncello! Fill a mason jar full of grain alcohol – in the Midwest, that’s Everclear – and put in it the zest of 6 lemons. Let sit a week, then strain. Combine juice with a simple syrup (1 cup sugar and 1 cup water, boiled until sugar dissolves, let cool), seal in a bottle, and keep in the freezer.

The Medicis got nothing on me . . .

2007-09-23T22:55:00.000+02:00

I was picked up this morning with several other of my classmates and driven to the town of Lucca, specifically the village of Vorno, an hours drive west of Florence, for 6 days of cooking classes with The Tuscan Chef.

Casa Felice Matteucci, the villa where we are living and cooking, dates back to the first half of the 17th century. The estate became home to the man who invented the stroke engine (Matteucci), which was a prototype to the motorcar, and includes a family chapel, olive oil press, mill and servants quarters, most of which have been renovated by a local Italian family who are one of Italy’s biggest cheese producers. This villa was a farmhouse but a decade ago housing John Deere tractors – that’s what they said – John Deere! It seems it was in quite a state of disrepair -- ceiling caving in, walls collapsing -- and it has been turned into this breathtaking place. Somebody pinch me.

Here are the views from my windows, a pool out the back, and on the side, those very light green trees on the terraced hill are olive trees.

Click here to see more pics of the villa and the rest of the estate.

I wanted to say a special hello to my grandmother who is reading. I took these pictures of the chapel thinking of you.

There are 10 of us – Emmit and Joanne from the Boston area, Tom and Debbie from New Jersey, Diane and David from Connecticut, and a daughter, mother, aunt combo, Dana, Teeda, and Angie from Connecticut, North Carolina, and Florida respectively. All of us East Coasters. We got to know each other over a lunch buffet and some wine.

Here are our hosts Chef Valter Roman (pronounced Walter), his wife Julia, and William their 3-year old is on his lap. They also have a 4 year old, Olivia. Julia is from northern England and it seems they met while working in the hotel industry, she in sales, and he as a pastry chef.

After a couple of hours of settling in, we were in the kitchen and we had our first class. We made our dinner.

Zucchini flowers stuffed with a filling of ricotta, parmesan cheese, and parsley, accompanied by a crisped parmesan basket of rucola
Porcini mushroom risotto
Almond biscotti with Vin Santo

Here are the zucchini flowers battered and fried and our biscotti which we dipped in Vin Santo – a sweet “holy” wine made from grapes that have been dried for months prior to fermentation.

Chef Valter is ardent about local ingredients and quality, and he makes his points with that arrogance that is exactly as you would want from a man passionate about food. He has already stated twice that the problem with the United States is that it is too big, and one can’t control quality when one has to produce 10 million units of something and then ship it 3000 miles.

Tips of the Day
#1: When making vegetable or chicken stock (for the mushroom risotto in this case), slice onions width-wise, leaving their skins on, and grill them a few minutes cut side down, until black grill marks appear, and then toss them, skins still on, in the water with your carrots, celery, etc. The grilling removes the bite from the onion, sweetening it, and the skin colors the stock a lovely caramel.

#2: Risotto should be cooked for 18 minutes no more. At 16 minutes remove it from the heat.

No really, pinch me.

Oh nuts!

2007-09-22T22:20:00.000+02:00

My morning began at the Mercato Centrale. Yesterday at Trattoria Sostanza, I asked the waiter where I could get some good finocchiona and he circled Florence’s central market on my map and wrote down the name Bronzin. The market is an enormous, enclosed two-story structure, the size of a small stadium, and inside are stalls from which food of all sorts is sold. It took me a bit to find Bronzin as most of the stalls aren’t labeled. However, the fish guys are with the fish guys, the bread guys with the bread guys, the cured-meat guys with the cured-meat guys, and so I inquired around until the stall was found. The vegetables are on the second floor which seems to make sense. Look at the size of those porcini mushrooms!

I had a 10:30 reservation at the Uffizi Gallery (again for 3 additional euros, no waiting in a 2 hour line), and unlike the David, I did not walk out let down. I sorta limped out though – 45 rooms and 1555 masterpieces. I let one of those headphone audio guides steer me around. No photography, but I did get this great shot of the Ponte Vecchio from one of the windows.

I’ve seen a lot of art at this point and I’m saturated, but Botticelli’s The Birth of Venus is really something to behold and I got really obsessed with the clothing in Bronzino’s portraits of the Medici family.

The Uffizi was the palazzo of the uber-powerful Medici family. They had a pope too. Palazzo means palace and that’s what the Uffizi was, their palace. Have to keep in mind that Italy was not united until the late 19th century and that prior to that, it was but a collection of individual kingdoms. Construction began on the Uffizi in the 14th century and it is strongest in Gothic and Renaissance art. I’ve learned that the chronological order is thus: Gothic/Medieval > Renaissance > Baroque. I wonder how much of this I’m going to retain . . . where was I?

Lunch! Lunch was at Enoteca Boccadama. One of Erin’s Italian friends who owns a restaurant in a neighboring town (which I just may get to) recommended it. I had a salad of apples, raisins, cheese, chunks of ham, and sesame seeds. There are many salads on the menus which I have been happy to see, but they are never dressed. They just put down some of the most fragrant and delicious olive oil and balsamic vinegar on your table and it’s do it yourself. My entrée was ravioli stuffed like pillows with ricotta and spinach in a parmesan and sage cream sauce. So so good. The plate looked like it had just come from the dishwasher when I was done.

When sage is on the menu at the better Italian restaurants in NYC, it is only in one preparation – ravioli stuffed with butternut squash in a brown butter and sage sauce. It’s one of my favorites -- it pretty much defines the word “savory” -- but I was excited to see sage used differently. Here’s a pic of it along with a pic of what I’m having for dinner as I type. 3 plums and some kind of nut tarte with hazelnuts, almonds, pinenuts and some nut I don’t know on top of an orange marmalade-like filling with orange peel in it. Oh dear god. And mom, that’s a half bottle of wine. They sell little half-bottles here and I had the first half last night ; )

Tomorrow I’m going to get in the kitchen instead of only eating from them! Rome was big enough to absorb the tourists; Florence is bursting at the designer seams with them. I’m ready to get off the beaten path.

I’ve been telling myself that I must have tripe while I’m here (the beef stomach) – it’s a specialty -- but I saw it today in the market, and I’m a brave girl, but ooh boy:

Click here for more pics of the market, the Duomo, and others of Florence.

And oh yeah, here’s a decent pic of me. There have been others, but they weren’t fit for public consumption. For some reason, the people I ask to take my picture have this knack for cutting me off in the most unattractive places, like exactly the widest part of my thighs.

P.S. I fixed the gelato pic from yesterday. You gotta scroll down and check it out.

Red Roof Inn

2007-09-21T23:02:00.000+02:00

Arrived in Florence by train around noon, and the first order of business after checking into my hotel was of course, lunch. Florence is such a small city. I traversed the map from north to south in less then 10 minutes. My first impression was one of warmth – the warm sun, the yellow and orange worn stucco buildins,the terra cotta tile roofs. Warm and intimate. Somehow the streets are even narrower here,

Erin had me searching for one of the oldest trattoria in the city, Trattoria Sostanza Troia. I found it in an alley of a street, a very unassuming place with just a handful of tables and a kitchen that closed at 2pm.

I ordered a plateful of pomodori, thinking about the tomatoes from the day before, and I asked the waiter of their specialities. He pointed out a few in Italian. I ordered the first one he chose, tortino di carciofi, though I had no idea what was going to be placed in front of me and when he put it down I still didn’t.

I recognized egg but the middle was a mystery. It ended up being artichokes that had been lightly fried but there was a richness to it, perhaps cheese or cream. I loved it. After seeing some fantastic-looking cured meat at the table next to me, I asked for a taste of “whatever they were having.” The waiter brought me a piece of sopressata which I had had before and finocchiona which was a revelation. I had him write down the name of it. It is made with fennel seed and before you dismiss it, thinking oh I don’t like licorice. I’ve been discovering recently just how versatile and unlike licorice fennel seed is (thanks to Juliet who got me some along with a spice grinder for my birthday!). Ask me sometime about my turkey burgers made with ground fennel seed and feta cheese.

Dessert was a plate full of raspberries soaked in chianti and topped with sugar, another Tuscan specialty.

Lunch would have been perfect had it not been for the obnoxious New Yorkers at the table next to mine. They were an elderly couple with their grown son and his boyfriend. They bickered the entire time loudly while the two men just hung their heads silently. However their ostentatious display of wealth reminded of how much a fashion center Florence is. Much of their conversation centered on a Hermes bag -- “the garden party bag in that new color” -- that the wife had purchased. I happened to walk by the Hermes store and out of curiousity put on my best air of entitlement and went in. That bag in canvas was 1,300 euros, in leather 1,700. 2K on a handbag. Florence is a place for the wealthy. It is full of ridiculously expensive handbag stores and every designer has a boutique. Don’t think Paris Hilton, more Ivana Trump.

I had my first disappointment today – Michaelangelo’s David. They’ve put it in a gallery by itself with some other minor religious Renaissance paintings. 13 euros for an advance ticket -- could have been 10 had I wanted to stand in a ridiculously long line -- and I was in at 3:45 and out by 4. Sure he’s very pretty and he’s huge (photography forbidden) but I found him underwhelming and disproportionate. With such big hands and feet, I’ll just say he got the short end of the stick.

What was a wonderful surprise was the Ponte de Vecchio. I had heard that it was the most beautiful bridge in Florence and I thought that must mean that each brick is painted with its own individual fresco and it’s plated with gold and inlaid with rubies, but no, it’s a bridge that’s like a street with shops and homes built along it. Ironically though, all the stores are jewelry shops selling gold and jewels.

Will get pics of the Duomo up and of Florence when I can find a better connection. My accommodations have improved and I have a terrace!

A note on gelato. Erica had a very relevant question. What about gelato!? Yes, gelato. I’ve had it a few times and it's yummy and I especially like the way it is displayed with such aplomb here in Florence.

But is it sacrilege to say that it’s just not my thing? Ice cream has never been my thing. I like it, but it’s never top of mind when I’m craving something. I’ll keep trying, don’t worry. And also, just between us, sometimes when I’m taking in all this stuff, I think, “This looks just like Vegas.”

Ciao Roma!

2007-09-21T00:15:00.000+02:00

One of the last phone calls I had at work before I left was with Dr. Steven Zucker, Dean of the Graduate School at FIT and professor of art history. I mentioned that I was going to Rome and he said that I must visit the Villa Borghese, that I would have buy tickets well in advance, but that it was not to be missed. I am embarrassed to say that I had not a clue as to why, but I agreed heartily with him. Well of course I will, but until I showed up this morning, I didn’t know whether it was a museum, a church, or a ruin, nor what I was going to see there.

Only advance tickets are sold, none at the door, and on Monday evening, the soonest I could get in was Thursday morning. I chose 9 – 11 am thinking that was when I could arrive, but it actually meant that I would have to arrive by 8:30 am to retrieve my ticket or I would not be admitted and that at 11 am my visit would end. Only a certain number of people are allowed in the villa at one time. They confiscate all cameras, video recorders, and bags, and they are serious. I could have used 30 more minutes, but at 10:59, I was standing on the lawn dazed and emotional.

Villa Borghese is actually an enormous park with 6 museums, a zoo, a theatre, outdoor performance spaces and the like – Rome’s Central Park, but just not central, kinda north. I visited the Galleria Borghese.

The Borghese family was very wealthy and powerful. Pope Paul V (1605 – 1621) was a Borghese and he made his nephew Scipione a cardinal. The Italian word for nephew is nepote from which the word nepotism is derived because of this appointment . To say that Cardinal Scipione Borghese was obsessed with art collecting would be understating the facts. If a painting or sculpture or other object caught his eye, he would use his power and any means possible to obtain it, and he was not above unjust imprisonment , blackmail, tyranny, or theft. He was responsible though for discovering some of the greatest painters and sculptors of his time, and with his patronage, ushering in an entirely new style of painting, the Baroque, which was a much more realistic style than that of the Renaissance painters, The villa was built to house his ever-growing collection and the Borghese family continued to add to it and to embellish the villa through the 19thcentury. What you see (but can’t photograph) is perhaps the most famous and coveted art collection in the world in the setting where much of it was originally displayed, in many of the arrangements that the Cardinal himself and his descendants oversaw.

I could go on and on. Click on the links below if you would like to see some of my favorite pieces. The one that brought tears to my eyes was actually an early 19th century sculpture by Canova of Pauline Bonaparte (sister to Napolean) and it was the cushion she is reclining on. It is carved out of gleaming white marble but the cushion looks as if it is soft, plump, and sumptuous with creases where her weight is distributed. I’ve seen so much and a futon makes me cry.

Canova: Pauline Bonaparte as Venus Vitrix
Bernini: The Rape of Proserpina
Caravaggio: David with the Head of Goliath
Raphael: The Deposition of Christ

After walking off my art buzz in the park, I got on the subway and headed down south to find another restaurant recommended by Erin, Trattoria Bucatino. It is in the Testaccio region of Rome very near what I believe to be the southern border of the city. I was very nearly in the suburbs which I could tell by the presence of children in the streets and the fact that all of the shops that I had made a mental note of checking out once I my belly was full were closed for afternoon siesta which I had read was common in most of Italy.

An indoor market was closing its stalls as I strolled through, but this one was still open. A stand devoted entirely to tomatoes! Those are pomodoro tomatoes on the right still on the vine.

But let me tell you about lunch . . . This is the Italian version of a salad bar.

All of those platters are full of different kinds of antipasti. I saw one yesterday at La Gallina Bianca, but it was not nearly as extensive as this one. There was eggplant three ways, zucchini two ways, peppers three ways, olives, two marinated seafood salads, some pink beans, cherry tomatoes in olive oil, mushrooms, dishes I can’t recall, and my favorite, marinated pearl onions

The page from which I chose my entrée had English translations –“Venetian-style lamb’s entrails,” “Roman-style tripe” (which is usually made from beef stomach),” "Rabbit cacciatore-style,” and the best, “Tail in tomato sauce” (no idea). (There were other pages with normal sounding grilled meats and pastas and whatnot). I went with the rabbit. It was superb, strong with thyme, and they seemingly gave me the whole bunny.

Dessert was what I can only describe as a deconstructed cream puff with the cream in a bowl like pudding with the puff crumbled into bits on top and sprinkled with powdered sugar. Fantastic meal.

Some notes on prices. I asked the waiter the cost of the salad bar and he explained it depended on how much I ate. On the menu, it appeared 5 – 12 euros. I ate 6 euros worth. I believe the concept of all-you-can-eat is an entirely American one. Bread is not free. It is automatically placed on your table, and if you eat it, you are charged a flat 1.5 for the basket, but if you do not touch it, you are not, and I would suppose it is recycled. Of course, what’s the equivalent of $2 for some of the best crusty bread on earth? I have found that for the quality of food, the prices here are phenomenal. Remember that Argentinian steak? 11 euros, which is less than $15. I haven’t had a meal that was over 25 euros ($35), and you have all been witness to the gusto with which I have eaten -- wine, appetizer, entrée, dessert, espresso. I guess New York City prices make everywhere else but perhaps Tokyo seem like a bargain.

This was my last day in Rome and I am thinking about all I have learned and seen. (And there was so much I didn’t see!) As I type, my window is open and below me I can hear the accordion player who comes here every evening to play for the patrons eating on the street at the ristorante on the corner. Rome -- this city and the confluence of beauty and art and invention from the Greeks, to the Romans, to the Renaissance and the Baroque. The cradle of civilization. I understand that phrase now in a way I didn’t before.

But is it a gilded cage? I haven’t seen a single tattoo shop. No one is tattooed. No one is pierced. No one has purple hair. In a city of this size, it’s so strange not to see some evidence of counter-culture. Most wear a uniform of some sort whether a dark suit or a laborer’s uniform, or a policeman’s uniform, or a cook’s uniform. Romans are so welcoming to tourists of every stripe and they speak with such pride of their city and its treasures but I wonder how much difference the culture tolerates. Where are your disaffected youths, your huddled masses yearning to self-mutilate or otherwise rebel? And international cuisine? Well with little more than no international population, one better be satisfied with good Italian food. Rome is 99.9% caucasian. There’s more diversity in Hays, KS.

I saw something heartening though. I was on the A subway line before, but today I was on the B line which have older cars and every single one looks like this:

Art and self-expression still live in Rome!

A relaxing day

2007-09-19T22:25:00.000+02:00

I barely left my immediate area today. Slept until 10. Man I was pooped. Skipped breakfast and did a little work, and went out around 1 to get lunch. Yesterday at Restaurant Pallaro I asked an Australian couple how they had heard of the place as it is hidden away in one of the thousand tiny piazzas here accessible only by scooter or smart car. They had been given a list which they shared with me, and on it was a restaurant not but two blocks from my hotel.

La Gallina Bianca was bustling with Italians at lunch – men and women in beautiful suits – and nary a tourist to be seen. I had a huge spinach salad with mushrooms and cheese and a plate of orecchiette (ear–shaped pasta) in olive oil with broccoli and clams. Orecchio is the Italian word for ear; they often name their pasta very literally (think bow-tie pasta). While drinking my espresso, the waiter brought me a complimentary glass of limoncella.

I suppose, at this point, limoncella is best known for intoxicating Danny DeVito prior to his drunken appearance on The View, but it is a delightful after-dinner liqueur made from lemons. It is sweet, but not overwhelmingly so and widely available in small gift sizes at the tourist stores. I was inspired to bring some back. Luckily, I stopped at an actual liquor store though and somehow while he spoke no English and I no Italian, the owner conveyed to me that the best limoncella comes from Sorrento or Amalfi and that most of the stuff in the tourists stores comes from other regions where lemons do not grow as well. In Sorrento and Amalfi, which are in the south, they grow to gargantuan sizes. Unfortunately, he did not carry gift-size bottles, only normal-sized ones. I bought one to keep in my refrigerator -- he explained it must be drunk freddo, molto freddo (very cold) as he gave me a sample – but armed with this knowledge, I was able to find some smaller bottles of the good stuff elsewhere.

In general, the fruit here seems bigger and more beautiful. There are fruit carts everywhere, and the fruit looks artificial like it is part of a Hollywood set – the strawberries redder, the lemons yellower. Here are some pretty plums, but those are not apples; they are nectarines.

These last couple of evenings I have been eating a couple of pieces of fruit as dinner. I can’t outgrow the clothes I’ve packed, but I’ll admit I did my best at obtaining a new Italian wardrobe this afternoon. Look at this dress and these shoes!!

Holy Holiness

2007-09-18T23:57:00.000+02:00

Took the subway out to Vatican City this morning. (The subway is great, but of limited convenience as there are only two lines – an east west and a north south). What is to be said about the Vatican? It is a 109-acre country bounded by a wall that does not belie the untold treasures within. I had no plan of attack and was happy to take up the offer of a 3-1/2 hour guided group tour. What I know of art, architecture, and early Christian/papal history can fill a tupperwear container, so having an intelligent, passionate guide (erstwhile Ph.D. candidate?) makes all the difference. Without him, I would probably still be there right now hugging my knees tightly to my chest crying quietly somewhere lost among the sculpture, tapestry, and frescoes. They would have to send in the Swiss!

The Vatican and the Pope are guarded solely by Swiss soldiers. Seems back in the day (my brain is chock full of new info and I’m a little fuzzy on the details), Swiss soldiers were world-renown for their bravery and skill. When Rome was invaded by the Germans, 140 Swiss soldiers hired as mercenaries fought to protect the Pope and while over 90 lost their lives, the remaining successfully saved his life. Zero Italian soldiers lost their lives because they all fled when they heard the Germans were coming. Ever since, the Swiss, and only the Swiss, protect the Pope. Don’t they look ferocious??

The Sistine Chapel really was the highlight for me. Of course, photography was forbidden there, but I have lots of other pics. Click here.

I had my first Italian love affair this afternoon at Trattoria del Pallaro. This restaurant was recommended to me by Greg’s step-mother Erin who owns a small Italian wine import business in Seattle (thanks Erin!). It is prix-fixe with no menu so I sat down and courses just started coming. 1st -- prociutto, olives, tomatoes, lentils, 2nd
-- 2 small rice balls and a meat ball, 3rd -- pasta in some sort of knee-buckling pink sauce, 4th -- veal like none I’ve ever had before, eggplant soaked in a mild vinegar (?), mozzarella, and freshly made potato chips, 5th -- a shot glass of freshly-squeezed apricot juice and a gorgeous slice of pastry with preserved apricots and a lightly sweet filling.

The proprietor, in his 70s, much enjoyed my great enjoyment of his familiy’s food – two elderly Italian women in aprons and traditional head scarves came out on occasion to take some air. He cupped the back of my head, he pinched my cheek, he took my hand and guided me in carving away the crust of my pastry and showed me how to dunk it in my wine. We embraced as I left and he kissed me full on the mouth. I was very tickled. A good time was had by all.

I ended my day with a concerto of enchanting opera arias. A small company with an orchestra and singers puts together a very accessible show in an intimate setting in a beautiful church. The arias are greatly edited – 14 arias in 90 minutes including intermission. Opera-light. Tomorrow, no real plans. Shopping I think.
When I die of gluttony, please wedge my body into something like this:

TGIM

2007-09-17T23:31:00.000+02:00

Oh Mondays in Rome are so much better then Sundays. On Sundays, it’s only tourists everywhere, clogging the incredibly narrow streets with their t-shirt and short-wearing selves, but today, the Romans went to work and they were at the restaurants and on the streets and in suits. Beautiful men in beautiful suits. I’m going to make some gross generalizations and say that from my vast visual experience, Roman men are divided into three main groups – laborers, shopkeepers, and businessmen who wear suits seemingly no matter what their business. And they ride scooters. And they fill their scooters up with gas from self-service gas stations that are right on the sidewalk.

Took in the Coliseum and the Pantheon, both of which I enjoyed very much. Click here for pics. I loved the Coliseum. It’s one of those sights that doesn’t in the least fail to live up to its hype. An absolute marvel.

Decided it would do my stomach well to front-load my day with food rather try to sleep full of pasta and grappa again, so dinner was "light" -- pizza. There is a lightness to it, really. Had a wonderful lunch – a salad with sliced pears, shaved hard cheese, and olives and an Argentinian steak that was heavenly – and I would never say that lightly. It was so tender that I suspect the filet mignon on the menu had the texture of marshmallow. Looking forward to having steak in Florence as the region is known as cattle-country, though I suppose they don’t use that exact phrasing.

Check out my monastic living quarters. All that’s missing is a crucifix above the bed and some gravel to kneel on to say my prayers at night. That picture is actually taken from the hallway. It’s very clean though and a true single, but I have to remind myself that too much pizza, and I’ll have to upgrade to a double. I keep bumping into things the way it is. Trust dear readers that my accommodations improve as my journey continues.

Piazza Navona

2007-09-17T08:57:00.000+02:00

Dinner last night was good, not mind-blowing, and I blame myself. I spent the evening in Piazza Navona which is lovely -- en enormous plaza full of artists, musicians, and street performers and lined with cafes. I suppose it's a little like eating in Times Square but I was hungry, I had to go to the bathroom, there was a table right on the square where I could linger and look at all the people go by . . . See below the two items of note. Exhibit A: Bresaola. The plate with the shaved parmesan is not red. That is a very-thinly sliced dry aged beef called bresaola. I thought it was remarkable -- lean, very flavorful. Exhibit B: not the pretty berry cake but the innocuous-looking espresso. That is caffe correto -- espresso with a shot of grappa in it. I've been reading Donna Leon's smart, enjoyable series of crime novels set in Venice, and Commissario Brunetti's brute underlings always order caffe correttos in the morning. It will make you breath fire, but it's brilliant I think as an after-dinner drink.

P.S. I take back what I said about the ease of navigating Rome. There is a caveat. Navigating north-south is a breeze. East-west is nearly impossible. There doesn't seem to be a single street that travels east-west uninterrupted. It's as if it just isn't meant to be done. Piazza Navona is west of where I am staying. After getting hopelessly turned around, I admitted defeat and jumped in a cab.

God Bless Pizza

2007-09-16T17:41:00.000+02:00

Got a few things in this afternoon in the hot Roman sun. Checked out the Spanish Steps which seem a lot like Union Square in NYC -- a coming together of the masses -- tourists, teenagers, vendors, mimes. I got lunch at a pizza place on Via Del Babuino (your old street Carol!) and just look at it. Sigh. I knew I would be overwhelmed by the beauty in Italy. It's a completely different animal then New York pizza (please I can love you both). My slice had anchovies, a nutty hard cheese (guessing asiago), and an unidentified mystery-green that I'm still thinking about it -- seemingly from the the onion family but with a dark green feathery-top?

Made my way to the Piazza del Popolo, the Plaza of the People, where I ran into an enormous NBA event complete with a Playstation tent and American hip hop. Good thing too because I hadn't heard 50 Cent for at least 36 hours. Yeah, that's a huge blow-up Addidas basketball next to the Egyptian obelisk that was brought to Rome in 10BC.

After taking in some of the future Italian 'Melos and Kobes (no freakish Odens though), I was in serious need of a nap. Armed with my plastic street map, navigation is fine. Most of the main streets and avenues travel in straight lines (ah the Romans). I felt confident in checking out the side streets here and there while I snaked my way back. Suddenly, there was a huge crowd of people. I thought perhaps the WWE was having an exhibition or something, but no, it was Trevi Fountain.

All Aboard the Leonardo Express

2007-09-16T11:01:00.000+02:00

It's a lovely day in Rome. It's about 11 am here which is 5 am New York time. Was able to sleep a bit on the plane, but in general, I'm feeling a wee discombobulated. The train from the airport was easy and I found my hotel easily too though schlepping all that luggage on ancient cobblestone streets at an incline was not. Nothing is open as it is sunday and the romans are good catholics. I was directed to a Mcdonalds which is open. Oh Dio Mio! I have some granola bars in my bag which will have to suffice. Going to walk around and get my bearings. My hotel has wireless in the public spaces so expect pics this evening!

I've probably overpacked...

2007-09-15T18:22:00.000+02:00

Geek Talk

2007-09-11T02:56:00.000+02:00

What do they say about the best laid plans? My camera could get stolen, my Blackberry left in a cab, and my computer accidently crushed under the buttocks of one of my rowmates on the plane, but here's how I intend on keeping in touch with you all.

The Sony Vaio TX series notebook. This is the sexiest little computer ever with a 6 hour battery life, and at 2.84 lbs, it's truly ultraportable.
My Blackberry 8700. I just saw the 8800 and it somehow makes my 8700 seem clunky and bloated : ( but it's still my crackberry and I can use it as a modem should wi-fi not be available. Interested in how to set this up? Click here. It's not as slow as you would think.
An unlimited international data plan with T-Mobile for $19.99/month. This is key. I don't want to be paying international roaming data charges. Have you heard about those iphone bills, not the 300 page ones, but the $3,000 ones?? T-Mobile doesn't advertise this plan option on its website, but if you call and ask them about it, you can get it and then deactivate it when you return stateside.
The Nikon Coolpix S7c. This camera takes gorgeous pictures, has a huge viewing screen, this neat wheel for naviating through your photos, and using wi-fi, you can email directly from it.
And for that crazy European current, I bought myself a European surge protector and a couple of Italian outlet adapters.

And ablogging I shall go ...

2007-09-10T04:48:00.001+02:00

So here I am blogging. Perhaps talking to the world. Perhaps talking to myself. Well my trip to Italy commencing in approximately 6 days will be a social experiment in more ways then one. About the name of my blog. You try naming your blog. It's not easy. My blog name refers to the fact that in Italian, my name means woman, so literally translated, it's Donna the Woman, and that just seems apropos actually. I am curious to how my name will be understood in Italy. I don't think Italian people name their girls Donna (and they hardly do in the English-speaking world either anymore). Italians name their girls Paola, Sophia, and Isabella, not Woman. I keep invisioning this who's-on-first kind of bilingual conversation. "Mi chiamo Donna." "Yes, crazy American lady, I can see that you're a woman. Now what's your name?"