Boots in the Oven

And onward to Elba, Napoleon's home away from home... for almost a year.

After Napoleon got his butt whomped the first time, the powers-that-be thought he could be contained on a small island 30 kilometers off the Tuscan coast, called Elba.  After living there for just under a year, he escaped - stowed away on a ship - reformed his army, and went on to launch the Hundred Days.  After his defeat at Waterloo, he was sent to much more remote St. Helena, where he died just a few years later, probably from arsenic poisoning.  (Whether it was his hair pomade or an assassin is still a matter of debate.)

History lesson over!  Today, Elba is mostly renowned for its beaches.   Though we were going to see Napoleon's house and get ourselves a good dose of the pretty.

The main town of Portoferraio is indeed lovely.  We arrived somewhat the worse for wear, since the ferry ride from Piombino had been extremely rocky.

Actually, we were feeling so under the weather that we skipped dinner and went to bed early.  I KNOW.  Can you believe it?

Whatever - the next day we got up, availed ourselves of the rather inadequate Italian-style breakfast at the hotel, and grabbed a bus to Marciana.  It's a small town, high up in the interior of the island.

Thing is, since Marciana is higher up than Portoferraio, it was also quite a bit colder.  Did I mention in my post about Livorno that we were unprepared for the weather, having brought only lightweight jackets and no gloves?  Repeatedly?  OK.

Marciana was a delightful small town for wandering, though.

The views of Marciana Marina on the coast below were lovely.  We thought of the swimsuits we had optimistically packed and shook our heads ruefully.

After an hour or so wandering Marciana, looking at the walls of the closed Fortezza Pisana (Pisan Fortress) and the door of the closed Archaeological Museum, we had pretty much exhausted the town's tourist possibilities.  So we went into a small bar and ate an enormous bowl of vegetable soup and a sandwich and warmed up a little.

We took a bus the hour back down into Portoferraio (the bus driver left the back door of the bus open for a good chunk of the way down, adding to the interest of the ride).  Portoferraio, unlike Marciana, was sunny.  A good thing.

We had been unable to locate a good map of Portoferraio.  The tourist office didn't have one, and neither did our hotel - luckily, at the bus station that morning, we found a stylized one complete with bus routes.  Thus, we got a little lost in our wanderings - but Portoferraio is pretty small, so there's only so much lost you can get.

We did find the crumbling Medici fortress.

The town was pretty quiet, but certainly pretty for wandering around.

We found Napoleon's house when he lived in town, the Villa dei Mulini, but the hours listed in our book were wrong and it was closed for the day.  Ah well, we'll come back in the morning.

Portoferraio seems to be a bit of an odd town, under the surface.  We saw a lot of things that made us chuckle, if not laugh out loud.

I'm not really sure what market they were going for here...

This graffiti was on a basketball court.  Kids these days - where's the Natalia + Lorenzo = 4ever?  Who graffitis a fried egg?  Awesome.

Their political graffiti is also a little on the strange side.  Mortadella-butt here seems to be having a bad day.

And is this really common?  I don't think I've ever seen a panty dispenser before.  It was with a gum machine.

This is not particularly Elban, but is certainly Italian - here's a gentleman riding his scooter down the drainage trench in the middle of a long flight of stairs.  (At least this made us feel better about the time we drove down the stairs in the Gargano.)

We ended up finding a good place for dinner.  The handwritten menu was encouraging, even if the restaurant was right on the main piazza - Piazza della Repubblica.

As we worked our way through our tasty pizzas, we watched big burly Italian men making wine spritzers out of white wine, fizzy water, and lemon.  I've never seen this before!

The next morning, we returned to the top of the town to check out the inside of Napoleon's residence.  The house actually turned out to be pretty small, but the Imperial-style furniture inside was quite nice.  Not sure why Napoleon put a bed in the ballroom, though.

We toured the downstairs and the upstairs, and as we rounded the corner to head back downstairs our way was blocked by a beautiful large couch that had been in restoration.  Two men were maneuvering it up the stairs, so we got out of the way.

(Yes, then did bang it into the wall a bit trying to get it around the corner.)

So, we were downstairs admiring the last couple of rooms when we heard an argument behind us in Italian.  "I think that couch is supposed to be in this room," one of the curators said.  Next thing we knew, here comes the couch again from back outside.  Now, you'd think that before bringing the big expensive old couch into the house, and CERTAINLY before jimmying it up the stairs, the workers would have figured out where it's actually supposed to go?  Nah.

The gardens outside weren't in particularly good shape, but oh, the view...

All in all, the house was interesting - but I could definitely understand it chafing pretty hard if you've come from ruling most of Europe and a good chunk of Egypt.  It was small, especially coming from Fontainebleau, I'm sure.

With a little bit of time left before the ferry, we found an inviting little place and had a couple of plates of pasta.  Oh so healthy.  Shaddup.  I really wanted a big plate of gnocchi with gorgonzola, and that's exactly what I had.

We made it to our ferry, the Moby Baby (the one we arrived on was the Moby Lally... who names these things?).  I loved what the ticket-checker scrawled on our ticket.  OK, baby!

This ferry ride was a lot less... eventful? than the one to Elba.  We had some lovely views of the receding town.  Bye, Portoferraio!

And bye, Napoleon's house!

For some reason, being on the ferry made us crave french fries.  I think it's because the first nice ferry we ever took, from Santorini to Naxos in Greece, we got a big order of fries.  Unfortunately, they weren't to be found on this ferry.

By the time we changed trains twice and reached Pisa, the craving had become a full-blown obsession.  Therefore.

We shall never speak of this again.

And now, we are off to the airport to gather Jodi and Keith for their Italian adventure!  Look for posts about the wonderful time they're having sometime later this week.

A foodie pilgrimage: To Leghorn for Cacciucco!

This week is Husbear's Spring Break - time to get out of Florence and see a little something!  Since we're in full-on saving money for Southeast Asia mode (yes, we are going to Southeast Asia for a month in May/June!) we decided to stay pretty close to home.

So, Leghorn and Elba it is!

Firstly, let me address the silliest Anglicized name I've heard so far in Italy.  Apparently, we have the poet Percy Bysshe Shelley to blame for the conversion of Livorno to Leghorn.  Personally, I can't say "we went to Leghorn" without giggling, so, if you don't mind, Livorno it is.

We left Firenze on a warm Spring day.  Monday.  When we arrived in Livorno, it was obviously still December - probably 30 degrees colder outside and drizzling.  We were woefully unprepared for the weather and immediately broke our umbrella.

We didn't have too much trouble finding our 40 euro/night pensione, the Pensione Dante.  Luckily, we had no plans to go to the Museo di Storia Naturale del Mediterraneo, since we might still be searching for it.

The pensione itself was fine, a traditional bathroom-down-the-hall dealie run by a friendly older lady.  Signage on the outside was a little off-putting, though.

That handwritten sign hanging under the window says "Pensione Open," though if I didn't know better I might have guessed it said "Danger: Ax Murderer."

A nice lady at a tourist information kiosk gave us some very slick promotional materials, including six different walking itineraries we could take around Livorno.  Now, Livorno isn't considered one of Tuscany's prettier towns - it's not its fault, though, since the town was all-but leveled by bombing during World War Two.  It had been one of the main Fascist naval bases, which is perhaps why it's now one of Italy's most left-leaning cities?

Anyway, we found the beginning of the "Historic Livorno" walk, the Ponte di Marmo (or Marble Bridge).  It became a little clear that Livorno was having to reach pretty far to find tourist attractions.

The bridge is actually more interesting than it appears at first glance, though - there are etchings on the top, left by the Livornese as tributes to fallen comrades.  They are now pretty much impossible to decipher, though.

At this point, it was well on towards lunchtime.  The place we had wanted to go appeared closed, so we walked back to a little establishment Husbear had noticed nearby.  His eye was caught by the name - "Enostuzzicheria dal Capino."  This appeared to be a mash-up of Enoteca, or wine store, with Stuzzicheria, or buffet-style snack place.  We went in and were immediately warmed by the sight of a large display case with several different dishes set out for our perusal.  We made our choices, ordered a bottle of house wine, and sat down.

Things got off to a really good start with a great bread basket.  This particular Tuscan bread, though saltless according to tradition, was delicious with a nice soft center.  The schiacciata, another traditional bread that's flatter and salty, was also quite good.  We felt ourselves begin to warm up.

The Zuppa Toscana (Tuscan soup) banished the remaining cold.

Like Husbear says, you can tell a traditional Tuscan soup by the way it can be eaten with a fork.  Thickened with bread, this vegetable soup really hit the spot. 

Our other choice for primi was something that honestly didn't look all that great in the case, but was more than inviting when it made it onto the table.

I suppose you could call this an eggplant napoleon, grilled eggplant layered with meat and bechamel sauce.  Oh my god - so simple, so easy to prepare ahead of time, but so good.  Husbear is going to recreate this at home if I have any say in the matter.

For our secondi, we ordered a plate of marinated anchovies and some sliced meats and cheeses.  The plate was extra generous - so large that the two types of pecorino didn't make it into the picture.  Oops.  The prosciutto and pancetta and other sausages did, though.

Definitely warmed, and really full, we decided to skip dessert in favor of asking about an after-dinner drink mentioned in the tourist brochures.  Ponce alla Livornese, or Livorno Punch, was not what we were thinking it would be...

Turned out, rather than something like Planter's Punch (a sweet, bright red New Orleans concoction), Ponce alla Livornese is coffee with liquor in it.  Rum and Italian cognac, to be precise.  Again, perfect for a cold day.

This enormous meal was really quite reasonably priced.  And everything was so good!  It's truly one of the nicest things about a town that doesn't get a lot of tourists - it's much easier to find good restaurants just by chance than it is in Florence or Rome or Venice or Paris, for that matter.

Well and thoroughly warmed, we left dal Capino to see a little more of Livorno.  This church was bombed during World War Two - only the center nave remains of the original structure.

The church of Santa Caterina was a bit of a surprise.  Lately, I've been noticing more and more churches here built in the round - I'm not sure if I just hadn't been seeing them before, or what?  The literature was silent over whether this Church ever had a decorated facade.

We went by the Fortezza Vecchia, or Old Fortress, left by the Medici after they took over.  Now, it looks like it might break apart any second and tumble into the sea.

Another of the walks we wanted to do sent us along the waterfront for a good ways.  We saw a large statue dedicated to Ferdinando I de'Medici.  Around the base are arrayed four men in chains who are supposed to be Turks.

Honestly, we didn't make it very far into the 6-kilometer waterfront walk before we just got too cold and covered with sea spray.  We did see the Scoglio della Regina, or the Queen's Bathing House.  Doesn't look like much today, but I guess in the latter half of the 19th century it was quite the fashionable place to go for a swim. 

I have to say, our first reaction on seeing it was "We froze our butts off for THIS?"

At this point, it was obviously time for another ponce.  Seriously, it had been really warm all week in Florence - we weren't ready to deal with this cold again!

We walked along one of Livorno's main shopping streets, admiring the stores and the graffiti.

(Mouse over or click on the picture for a translation.)

At this point, it was definitely time to go back to the hotel to change for dinner.  Livorno's main contribution to Italian food is a spicy tomatoey fish stew called Cacciucco, and we were determined to search some out for dinner.  (Actually, we had been meaning to come to Livorno since the first time we heard about this soup.) 

We ended up at a restaurant called L'Ancora, where we had been promised a solid and yummy rendition of cacciucco.

Our waiter recommended we start off with their Antipasti di Mare.  This ended up being several tiny plates, including fried crab croquettes, sauteed tiny clams, puff pastry filled with salt cod paste, stuffed mussels, and polenta topped with a crab ragu.  And a nice big bowl of steamed mussels in a garlicky wine broth, not too salty for sopping, for once.

We preferred some things over others (I don't think Husbear has ever met a stuffed mussel he liked), but all in all a solid start.

Then, things started to get tentacly.  Our order of grilled seppia (cuttlefish) was done perfectly, served with a lemon wedge, olive oil, and balsamic vinegar for flavoring.  Very good, though certainly a lot of squid.  Note to self - balsamic vinegar + squid = YUMMY.

When our cacciucco arrived, we were surprised to find that it was pretty heavy on the tentacly bits, too.  There were some octopus legs, along with a couple of enormous cuttlefish steaks and some assorted fish meats.  The broth was rich and thick, with a nice spice.

We really enjoyed the cacciucco, and the fact that all of the tables around us seemed to be locals and everyone was ordering it really confirmed our choice of venue.  We do wish the stew had been a bit heavier on fish and lighter on octopus and squid, but with a price point much lower than we saw elsewhere, that's probably just what you get.

Completely stuffed, we ordered limoncino for dessert.  (That's limoncello, by a different name.)

The next morning, we woke up to find that it was sleeting.  Yay!  How fun!  So, we put on all the clothes we had brought with us and went to check out Livorno's Mercato Centrale, in a large 19th century covered structure similar to the one here in Firenze.

The differences between Livorno's Mercato and Firenze's were telling.  Firstly, Livorno's was a little more dilapidated... not as much tourist money changing hands in here.  Also, there were a lot of dry good stores, selling boring everyday things like detergent and cereal - the kinds of things people living around there actually need, not the kinds of things tourists want to buy in an Italian market.

There were a couple of deli counters, one of which was selling what we can only describe as an octopus sausage.

One area in which Livorno really beat Firenze was in eggs.  There were at least two stands in Livorno's market dedicated to eggs and eggs alone - and they had lots of different varieties.  These guys sold goose eggs, quail eggs, and ostrich eggs!  We haven't seen these here at all, though I hear they are possible to get.

We bought some pears and mandarins and gorgonzola and dark bread and yogurt for the train and ferry to Elba (after our meals the previous day, we were a bit meated out for the time being).  Unfortunately, we then had to go back outside, where the sleet had redoubled its efforts to freeze the Livornese.  We took a bus to the train station and got on a train to Piombino, the ferry terminus for Elba.

Thank god the train was heated. 

Not that Piombino was any warmer than Livorno... but at least it wasn't sleeting.

Livorno did make a very nice stop on the way down to Elba, but I couldn't see spending more than a day there, at least this time of year.  We are thrilled to have tried cacciucco, though.

Tomorrow, look for a post about how we tore Elba apart, yo!  Or at least saw the main town and took a bus to another one.  And it was cold.  But we saw Napoleon's house! 

Enostuzzicheria dal Capino, Via Carraia 18, Livorno.  388.180.6469

Ristorante L'Ancora, Scali delle Ancore 10, Livorno. 0586.881.401

BB and MR a Roma

Welcome to Italy, BB and MR!  I am a little out of date here, since these two lovely ladies are in fact already back in Texas... blogging is like a constant game of catch-up.

(For the last time we were in Rome, including more pics of the Colosseum, St. Peter's, and the Trevi Fountain, look here and here.)

I whisked myself off to Rome last weekend on the Eurostar train to meet BB and MR, two women who worked with me back in Austin, at the Spanish Steps.  I noticed on the Metropolitana on the way from Termini to Spagna that I was surrounded by people wearing bright red T-shirts with the word "BRAINS" emblazoned across the front.  A zombie cartel?

No, as it turned out - Welsh in town for a rugby match between Italy and Wales.  (Italy would go on to win that evening.)

I sat on the raised platform at the bottom of the steps, surrounding a fountain of a sinking ship, waiting.  Suddenly, hands clamped down on my shoulders and I was being hugged - The Texas Ladies had arrived in Rome!

They were in for a whirlwind tour of Rome.  Unfortunately, I'm not nearly as familiar with that city as I am our adopted home of Florence, which led to a tense standoff with a Floridian we met near Trajan's Column.  (MR jokingly called me their "guide," and this woman got really upset with me when I didn't know the location of a particular prison for which she was looking.)

However, I was able to take them to the Colosseum, where we learned an awful lot about Roman culture and history.

We also found the Pantheon, which, when we were there, was being taken over by a group of people inexplicably chanting "Singin' in the Rain" while doing a stylized call and response in English.  And wearing togas, of course.  ?

Update: The Pantheon is still my favorite building in Rome.  I showed the ladies where Brunelleschi was allowed to cut a chunk out of the dome while he was trying to design the Duomo here in Florence, and this time we even found the drainage holes scattered around the floor for when rain comes in through the round sunlight high above.

We strolled through Piazza Navona, where Bernini's Four Rivers fountain is unfortunately under scaffolding.  Lots of people were out, enjoying the first days of lovely spring weather.  La Dolce Vita is right.

This flood marker caught my eye.  They're all over the place here in Florence, but I didn't realize the Tiber jumped its banks on occasion, too.

But, the sight we visited that I think we all enjoyed the most was Vatican City.  I had been here during the summer of 2001, but the Sistine Chapel has been restored since then so I was really looking forward to seeing the now brightened colors.

We got there on Monday morning and saw a line snaking away from the door, around the corner.  Gulp.  We rounded the corner, but the line kept going.  Another corner.  And another.  After walking almost all the way around the Vatican walls to St. Peter's, we finally found the end of the line.

An earnest young blonde walked up to us with a clipboard, saying that the line was 2 hours long.  "But we have a guide twenty minutes from the front!" 

Meh.  We're hardcore, we'll wait it out!

As it turned out, we were glad we did!  The line moved the whole time, and it only took an hour for us to make our way to the front.  No thanks to the line-jumpers.

Of course, the inside was PACKED.

This didn't really affect our enjoyment too much.  The Vatican Museums are beautiful, jammed full of interesting artifacts from all over the world.  There are actually something like 12 separate museums under the banner of the Vatican, from Egyptian to Renaissance.  And it's all housed in stunningly decorated hallways built on the grandest of scales.

I really enjoyed some of the sculpture we saw.  There were enormous showpieces, but the smaller ones were what really caught my eye.  Beware of Monkey.

I felt sorry for this poor bird.  Nobody deserves to be sat on by a fat baby eating grapes.

There were so many beautiful details.  How does one move a mosaic?  I guess the easy answer is "carefully."

And every once in a while, a view just stopped me, causing whatever tour group was currently shuffling along behind me to run into each other.

I think the museum I enjoyed the most was the map museum.  The walls of the long hallway had been painted in the mid 1600s with current geographical knowledge of the regions surrounding the Vatican - in other words, modern Italy.

I found Sicily and Calabria and Liguria, but one region really stood out.  Etruria.

Better known today as Tuscany.  There was a small inset map of Fiorenza, too. 

Soon enough, though, you find yourself wedged into smaller and smaller hallways, which are ugly and claustrophobic.  Warning signs abound - don't dance your way down these stairs, people.

And then, a door is in front of you, and you are through... and there is a large rectangular room teeming with people, being watched over by three or four testy security guards who keep clapping and yelling "NO FOTO!"

And you realize you're in the Sistine Chapel.

I am a bad person.  Though pictures are prohibited, I took a couple.  Without flash, of course - I'm not a Neanderthal!  But one guy nearly blinded me when his flash went off in my face.

The Chapel is amazing.  Full of people and paint and beauty, it's really hard to take everything in at once.  There's the famous ceiling, of course, but then there are frescoes all around the walls by artists amazing in their own right, like Botticelli, Perugino, and Ghirlandaio.

The rest of the museums really pale in comparison.  We worked our way back to where we could return our audio guides, and then discovered that the fastest way to St. Peter's Basilica was to go back through the Sistine Chapel.  We fought our way back against the crowds and had the opportunity to see the Sistine Chapel one more time.  Then, St. Peter's.

I have better (and more) pictures from our last visit, so suffice it to say that the Basilica is still enormous and stuffed with riches.

Of course, being in Rome wasn't just museums and churches.  We also had some terrific food, with the exception of one meal.  About that meal, I'll just say - what is it with the damn CORN on every salad?

We did also have some really good food, including Carciofi alla Romana (Roman-style artichokes) - mrinated in mint with lots of yummy olive oil,

as well as Saltimbocca alla Romana, that more-than-good veal/sage/prosciutto dish with lemon-butter sauce so famous in Rome.  (We've had this before in Rome.)

We also, in a little sidewalk cafe just two blocks or so from the Pantheon, had a really nice meal (with great Tuscan salumi, of course?), followed by the best dessert I've had in a restaurant in a while - a gooey chocolate cake with ginger sauce.  Rich, but with three people sharing it we had just the right amount.

The three of us had a great time in Rome, though we did have to share two twin beds... sleep's overrated, if you ask me.  (No, it worked out fine, really.)  On Monday, we came back to Florence, where the ladies stayed for just a couple of days before their visit to Venice.  Just about all of my Florence pictures involve food, so perhaps I'll write a post about that after Spring Break.

Yup - Spring Break!  No big plans for this break, certianly not Egypt or Southern Italy - but we are planning to go to Elba.  I'm excited to see where Napoleon was exiled... the first time.  So, no more posts until the end of the week, though I guess that's not really different from normal operating procedure.

Meet Balsamic Vinegar of Modena!

First, we have had two lovely guests this week - Betty and Marita arrived, stayed for just a couple of days, and departed in a whirlwind of leather and sunglasses.  As we speak and read, they should be enjoying themselves immensely in Venice!

Not to worry - I have some lovely pictures of my visit to Rome with them, as well as some nice shots of their brief sojurn in Florence.  But first...

Aceto Balsamico Tradizionale di Modica.  Not to be confused with a mere condiment, Traditional Balsamic Vinegar of Modena is made as it has been for years in farms around the Emilia-Romagnan town of Modena.

On our school foodie trip a couple of weeks ago, we got to visit a small family producer, Agricola Fabbi.  We arrived in our giant tour bus and were led up a flight of spiral stairs to a dim room lined with wooden barrels.

An awful lot of confusion ensued, largely because some students were preferring to wander amongst the barrels rather than listen to the woman who was trying to give the tour.  Further difficulties arose because of mistranslations - the woman leading the tour didn't speak English, and many of the students don't speak Italian.

So.

Balsamic vinegar is made from cooked grape must.  During its lifetime, it will travel through a series of 7 progressively smaller barrels made from different local woods, which include acacia, cherry, juniper, oak...

When the balsamic vinegar in the smallest barrel is harvested (after at least 12 years), 2 liters are moved from the second smallest barrel to the smallest, and from the third smallest to the second smallest, and so on.  Then, two liters of new grape must are added to the largest barrel.  It isn't possible to age the grape must into vinegar in just one barrel... you get jam, apparently.

We learned some interesting things about balsamic vinegar.  Often families that produce it will give each newborn child their own battery of 7 barrels, which become theirs when they come of age.  The vinegar barrels used to be included in dowries, and the vinegar itself is still lauded for its medicinal properties, including settling the stomach.

This particular famliy has been making balsamic vinegar for 5 generations.  Each year, their product (along with the year's production of all the other farms) is tasted by a group of 5 Grand Masters, who evaluate the vinegar on mostly subjective points.  If it passes, it's allowed to be sold as Aceto Balsamico Tradizionale di Modena, in a specially designed bottle, with a label around the neck.  Small bottles can't really be found for under 50 euro.

By this time, we were chomping at the bit to taste it!

Down in the tasting room, we found a table with Parmigiano-Reggiano sprinkled with vinegar, as well as a sweet little lady carefully placing a few drops of the precious liquid onto plastic spoons.  We tried the agricola's 12 year and 25 year varieties, as well as one flavored more assertively with juniper.

I don't know... they were good, but not wonderful.  All of the varieties were quite a bit more acidic than other true balsamics we've been able to try.  The prices were good and low, and quite a few students whipped out their wallets and purchased a bottle or two or three to take home.  We refrained... 3 pounds of Parmigiano-Reggiano would have to be our souvenir for the day.

It was terrific, though, to be allowed to visit a small producer of traditional balsamic vinegar, as well as an organic Parmigiano-Reggiano farm.  I'm so glad Apicius offered the trip and let me tag along.

Check back in a couple of days for, hopefully, a tasty food post as well as a bit about Rome!

girlie

International Women's Day and Parma (the two are unrelated, as far as I know)

Happy International Women's Day!  AND HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO JODY.  Also long-overdue congratulations to Jody on the publication of his first comic - how awesome is THAT?

This day last year, I was given a rose on the street by a bunch of crazily-dressed women.  Sometimes I really miss Austin.  I haven't seen any celebrations yet today, unless you count that there was a huge crowd around I Frattelini, where I went to grab a small glass of vino (my first in a week - I've been sick!) and a little panino with mortadella and melanzane.

How about a little Parma before we visit the balsamic-vinegar making family?

On the way to Parma, we saw a ducal palace dominating the countryside.  Impressive, isn't it?  No, it's not really that blue around here - the auto white balance on the little camera keeps erring on the blue side.

We pulled into Parma at 12:30.  Since our schedule showed that we were supposed to be leaving at 12:45, we weren't expecting much time there - but a quick schedule shift gave us until 1:45.  Woo!  75 minutes in town!

We made the most of the time we had.  First, we cut through the imposing mass of the Palazzo della Pilotta.

Our first stop was at the Baptistery, certainly an impressive example of this type of building.  Not sure why you need a four-story tall Baptistery, but it is pretty, with the pink Verona marble.

Imposing doors, too.

We also took a look at the Duomo, which was unfortunately closed for the pausa.

A scuffle broke out over whether these are gryphons or lions.  Thoughts?

A Baroque church put us back in Sicily for a moment.

We bought some gelato for lunch... but the less said about that, the better.

The streets of Parma exuded prosperity and contentness.  Unfortunately, at the pace we ran through town, none of it rubbed off on us.

This bubble reminded us of the glass entrance to the Louvre (though more... bubbly), though we of course weren't able to investigate further.

We definitely have to return to Parma... for one, we didn't have any time there at all, and for two, how could we miss an Italian blues show?  (I love that they take the American blues handles - it's such an incongruity seeing them with Italian names!)

Bye, Parma!  We'll be back.  Someday.

And now, I'm off to a Cezanne exhibit at Palazzo Strozzi.  Ta!

Bow down before the King of Cheeses!

Ever since we arrived in Italy last August, the small city of Parma has been at the top of our “must-see” list. Why? Well, it has one of the highest standards of living in Italy, but that’s not the reason we wanted to visit. It’s for the two gastronomic specialties that share their names with the city, Parmigiano cheese and Prosciutto di Parma. Not only that, Parma is very near the town of Modena, famous worldwide for its balsamic vinegar (named for its, well, balsamic medicinal properties.)

So, when we got word that the school was organizing a trip to this region, with a stop at a working biological farm making Parmesan as well as a visit with a family that’s been making balsamic vinegar for five generations, we jumped.

Unfortunately, this meant being at Piazza della Indipendenza, near Husbear’s school, at 6 in the morning. At least we had a comfortable touring bus for the ride to the farm.

We were supposed to arrive at 8:30, but somehow a half-hour stop at a rest area in the middle of nowhere made us almost an hour and a half late. We arrived at the farm, which was set in a ridiculously beautiful Reggio-Emilian valley.

A dog barked at us and a grandma waved us in.

Our Parmigiano lesson began posthaste. The King of Cheeses (so christened by Mario Batali) is made from the milk of cows fed on local grasses, and has been for 800 years. The evening milk is skimmed, while the morning milk is not. In the first of several cheese-making rooms, the milk is heated (but kept under 55 degrees Celsius!) and rennet is added. This is done in steam kettles built into the floor.

The rennet causes the curds to separate and settle under the whey. After this separation is complete, the workers take a large oar and dislodge the curd plug (appetizing description, I know) from the bottom of the kettle.

They work it back and forth in a large cheesecloth until it’s a vaguely round shape, weighing 70 kilos (that’s 154 pounds!). It takes 1100 liters of milk to make this 70 kilo ball.

Then, the curds are split in half,

and somehow, magically, the cheesecloth becomes two. The two 35-kilo balls of curd are hung to dry a little bit while the whey is drained from the kettle with an enormous vacuum hose. Often, this whey is sent to nearby pig farms to feed the pigs who will become Prosciutto di Parma. The circle of life.

After dripping dry for a short while, the curds are hefted over to a nearby table, where they are put into a cylindrical plastic mold. Stamps are applied to signify that the cheese is Parmigiano-Reggiano from a biological (read: organic) farm.

The rounds are then kept under weight for a day, being turned every few hours so they are pressed evenly.

Their next stop is a three-day rest in a metal collar, which is lined with a plastic sheet imprinted with the month and year the cheese was produced, as well as a code for the farm and the words Parmigiano-Reggiano.

Then, they get a 21-25 day salt bath. During this time, we were told salt penetrates about ½ inch into the cheese – while the cheese is aging over the next months and years, it continues its trek to the middle. You can clearly see the stamps on the sides of these cheesewheels.

Then, to the drying shed… where the cheeses age. And age. For months, or years. (The two that this farm sold had been aged for 18 and 26 months.)

Yay, cheese!

After they’re almost completely aged, a representative from the Parmigiano-Reggiano Consortium goes to each farm to test the cheese. He brands the cheeses that pass his tests, which include thumping the cheese with a hammer to listen for its resonance. After all, this cheese is one of the prides of Italy – it’s a DOP, meaning that it’s a special agricultural product protected by law.

And if the cheeses don’t pass his test? Well, if they fail but just a little, we were told, a strip is taken out of their hides and they’re sold as regular parmesan, not special parmigiano-reggiano.

But if they really fail, like over half of the ten or so tests they’re supposed to pass, their whole rind is stripped and they are sold to restaurants (or Apicius, Husbear pointed out) for use as table grating cheese. How sad for these cheeses - and their makers!

Our understanding of the life cycle of Parmigiano-Reggiano mostly complete, we took a brief hike to see the cows whose milk goes into this wonder product. They smelled like cows.

They had chips in their collars which regulated which cows were allowed into the feed barn at which time, to keep them from overeating.

We even got to see some adorable bebes, though one kid was heard to remark “Ah din’t come all the way from TEHN-esee to see no cows, man.”

How could you resist this face?

Our tour of the family farm over, we returned outside to see a veritable feast laid out for us. Barbara, the school liaison, had asked if the family who runs the farm would be so kind as to set out a small snack for us… and they really ran with the request!

We given three types of cured pig meat (the famed Prosciutto, as well as Lardo – delicious cured pig fat – and Pancetta – like bacon, but they ate it raw?) and delicious Emilian bread, a treat to us since it contained salt unlike Tuscan bread. Plus, there were the family’s two types of Parmigiano, the 18-month and the 24-month.

This would have been plenty, but after a few minutes Grandma came out with a delicious potato torta, kind of like baked mashed potatoes with a bit of phyllo surrounding it, and then… the piece de resistance, FRESH FARM BUTTER. I don’t think I’ve ever had fresh farm butter, much less butter made from that morning’s milking.

Moans of joy rose up from all over the farm, probably helped by the delicious local sparkling Malvasia.

Unfortunately, we soon had to leave… but we did get to see a beautiful town as well as a terrific producer of balsamic vinegar! More to come.

Many thanks to the Brugnoli farm for their patience and willingness to let a bunch of culinary students tramp all over their property.  Not to mention their generosity with their wonderful food!

Benvenuti and Arrivederci to Robert and Margaux

Apologies for the lack of posts last week.  We had company!  And then we went to Parma!  (More on that later.) And then I got sick! (That's all you'll hear about that.)

Robert and Margaux arrived last Sunday from Rome, a little jet-lagged and a little under the weather, but all in all ready to paaaa-rteee, Florence Style!

A little drizzle didn't stop us - we took a bit of a passeggiata around the center of town, showing off the Duomo, the Piazza della Signoria, and of course the Ponte Vecchio.

As always, it was so wonderful for us to show people around the city.  I'm definitely starting to feel a little pride of ownership, here, even though we've only lived here about 6 months. 

We took them to see the Fontana del Porcellino, or the fountain of the little porker.  This is sort of like Florence's Trevi Fountain, in that people who let a coin drop from the hog's mouth through the grate at his feet will come back to Florence.  The similarities end there, of course.

I can't imagine how this happened, but somehow both Robert and Margaux... missed the grate!(Guess that's the last Florence will see of these jerks.  Geez. -L.Pants)

Because of our classes and everything, we didn't get to spend as much time with them as we would have liked - though they had a good time hitting the Accademia and the Uffizi and even taking a day trip to Siena.  We took a long walk one day up past San Minato al Monte, a beautiful Romanesque church Husbear and I hadn't yet had the chance to visit.

We went out to a couple of great places for dinner - they liked Antica Porta, which is a definite point in their favor.  Though they did agree with us that if you call a menu item "Zuppa di Fragole" (Strawberry Soup) that serving something much more akin to strawberry shortcake was a little odd.

Husbear was able to cook one night, what with his classes and internship, so he and Robert and Margaux went to the Mercato Centrale to pick up ingredients (and to have a delicious lunch at Mario's).  Having seen Husbear's Bistecca post, they had a request...

Awww, yeahhhh.

But first, an antipasta platter with bresaola di cavallo (that's horse sausage) (Actually it's just plain horse, no sausage about it. -L. Pants) prosciutto, lardo di colonnata, olives, and a delicious, only-available-this-time-of-year sheep's-milk cheese called Marzolino.

And then, the steak... with cauliflower puree and sauteed chicory.

It was so great to see those guys, who are by now hopefully safe and sound back in New Orleans.  We'll be seeing you in just a couple of months!

And, to leave you with a little taste of Florence in your mouths, here's one last glass of Vin Santo with yummy almondy cantuccini.

girlie