Life...Italian Style

Onion Roundup

Please read this great post from Elizabeth Minchilli in Rome Blog about the spring onion dinner I did a few weeks ago at La Tana Libera Tutti hostel here in Cannara!

La Cipolla di Cannara fa il giro del mondo in una cena!

To celebrate spring (and especially fresh onions and garlic) I will be taking our friendly neighborhood onion on a trip around the world Thursday, May 12 at La Tana Libera Tutti hostel in Cannara.

Please join us for this gastronomic delight!!!

Antipasto

Cipolla fritta (jappone)

“Chutney” di cipolla (india)

insalata di cipolla e avocado (cuba)

 Primo

zuppa di cipolla (francia)

 Secondo

puntarelle di maiale alla cipolla (china)

 Contorno

cipolle speziate (morocco)

 Dolce

cheesecake al profumo di cipolla (usa)

Il costo della cena è di 20,00 euro.
Su prenotazione.

Questa iniziativa è favorita anche dall'Amministrazione Comunale di Cannara...che speriamo di avere ospite per l'occasione!!!

Menú di Pasqua a Casa Nostra

Menu for Easter at our house- the Easter meal is usually centered around a baby lamb - we had a whole baby goat from a cheesemaker in Cascia.

Colazione (breakfast):  the ONE and ONLY day of the year that Italians don't eat sweets for breakfast - I don't know why...

• La Coratella - goat innard stew
• Pizza di Pasqua- a dryish cheese bread
• hard boiled eggs - I had colors sent from the States
• Salami
• Coffee
• Vernaccia - sweet wine from our town, Cannara

Pranzo (lunch):  the main meal of the day

• Paparadelle with goat and artichoke ragu
• fried goat chops
• fried artichokes
• Easter chocolate

Cena (dinner):  if you can still eat...

• roasted goat
• boiled asparagus with lemon and olive oil
• La Colomba - a sweet bready cake shaped like a dove

Pasquetta (the day after Easter):

• roasted split goat head
• leftovers
• SALAD

Is it Spring yet???

enough for dinner, originally uploaded by jennifer mcilvaine.

It was raining all last week, and now it will rain again for the next 3 days, but yesterday was really nice (until 8:00 when it started raining..)  so I went into the hills to try to find some wild asparagus.  Last year people were finding asparagus in February, but this year the seasons are respecting themselves, and February was wintery, March came in like a lamb, and went out like a  lion, and April is at least starting with the showers.  Great for the environment, but bad for those of us who are impatient for warm weather and spring veggies...
Here in Umbria wild asparagus (and the wild fennel) are always the first true sign of spring, because they don't pop up until the ground starts to thaw.  The best place to find them is in the unkempt olive groves covering the hills, the more natural and "weedy" they are, the better.   In fact the spiny weed that drives you nuts when harvesting olives (because it catches and tears the nets) is the signal for exactly where to find the asparagus.  Besides in the hollows of the olives trees, this weed, or herbaccia, likes to grow out of rock groupings, always on the steepest part of the hills.  While this makes it easier to find the asparagus, its also a little more dangerous because the rocks are home to vipers and bats.  If you ever see a viper, run like hell, because from what I hear, they bite without hesitation.   Other warnings......don't leave your stuff around....I left my jacket hanging on a tree because it was hot, and luckily I came back to it just in time as an old woman was about to carry it away.   She talked my ear off for 20 minutes about everything that had ever been stolen from every person she knows, and how she wouldn't want that to happen to happen to her because everything comes back to you....I guess with the story she earned the change she nabbed out of my pocket...poveraccia......

Le Terme di Viterbo

  Terme di Viterbo 
  Originally uploaded by jennifer mcilvaine

What to do when winter's got you down, you feel overworked, and summer is just too far away... (though I've heard they've already started swimming in the sea in Sicily, damn them!) ?
Head to the spa! or in my case, the hot springs - they are free!  You smell like rotten eggs for 2 days (sulfur), but its definitely the best way to relax and rejuvenate for spring here in Italy...without spending una barca di soldi!!!

My favorite people at the springs:  the guy on his cellphone - there is always a cellphone .... the director - I know he's there everyday telling every single person not to put the mud on their faces (the minerals are only present in the water - not the mud - and he doesn't want to here that the mud helps to clean your pours!)... and all of the winter clad onlookers who make you feel like you are in the zoo...

The Year in Review...

One year and 2 days ago, I arrived in Italy and turned a new page in my life - looking back, its been quite a year!   In 2007 I ....

• moved to Italy
• learned to speak Italian, abbastanza bene...
• experienced a little culture shock
• survived working at Il Bacco Felice with Salvatore, and
• probably enlarged my liver a little doing so...
• turned the big 3-0
• adopted 2 kittens, Lilla and 'Cino
• took a month-long motorcycle trip, through the Balkans, and helped orphans in Montenegro learn how to cook (new years resolution:  finish writing about that)
• worked the Trampetti Olive Harvest , and learned that age truly is all in the mind
• got married!
• opened Basilikó Trattoria here in Foligno

to follow along visually, check out my Flickr photo site .

Buon Capodanno a Tutti !!!!

a word about favas...

I got my first mosquito bite the other day, which means that spring is coming to an end, and summer is here. But I realized that I never had a chance to write anything about my favorite spring vegetable: the fava bean. The favas here in Umbria are excellent, and everyone eats them all spring. The most poplular way is just to eat them raw (in the shell) with spring pecorino - at Il Bacco Felice, Salvatore would just pass around a basket of favas from his garden still in the pods - that's the way to do it! Also, even though the favas here are about twice as big as anything I've ever seen in Seattle, they are completely tender and sweet - no wonder they don't want to cook them! We did make a fantastic spring soup with favas (unpeeled), artichokes, english peas, spring onions, and asparagus tips. When it was finished it had that classic brownish-over-cooked-italian-vegatable look, but, I have to admit that the tast was incredible!
I did break down one day, and cooked and peeled all of my favas - I was making fava puree for bruschetta, inspired by my days working at the Boat Street Cafe last spring with Renee...for some reason while peeling the favas, I instantly started craving a glass of Rosé...why could that be, I wonder???
But what's missing in this picture of spring? Morels. Morels are virtually non-existant in Umbria, and its a shame because there is nothing better than favas cooked with spring garlic and morels...maybe next year...

First Signs of Spring

asparagi selvatici di Sardegna
Originally uploaded by jennifermcilvaine.

Spring is early this year, at least on the southern coast of Sardegna, where this wild asparagus comes from. Not seeing the price (€33 per kilo - that's about $20/lb -yikes!), we bought a half kilo. It had a very woodsy, pissy (sorry), kind of smell, and tasting it raw reminded me of raw fiddlehead ferns from the NW.
I first made it in risotto, by cooking it in the classic method with the rice - this was okay, but definately not worth the money. Then a few days later, I seared the aspargus in a cast iron, and cooked it with anchovies, & garlic for pasta - much, much better! In this way, the apargus took on a earthy, peppery flavor - buono.
I saw yesterday that the price went down to €22, so maybe if it goes down a little more, I'll buy some for pickling.