When Nutmeg Met Basil

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In 9 days, I am moving out of the house I grew up in here in Stamford, CT.

When I was 18, I left for college in Vermont and thought I would leave and never come back.

After a six weeks of college, though, I was thrilled to come back to Connecticut, sleep in my own bed, and use my own bathroom (one that I didn’t have to share with 22 guys who were incapable of shutting their stall doors.)

Throughout my college years, my house was my haven over Thanksgiving and Christmas breaks, a place to renew and regain strength before facing more exams and more sleepless nights.

As they say, you can take the nutmegger out of the Nutmeg State–but you can’t take the nutmeg out of her.  The thing about memories is, anyway, that no matter where you go, you’ll always hang on to them.

November Mums

AP news reports that Italian Prime Minister Berlusconi’s latest folly involves restoring the manhood of a second-century statue in the Chigi Palace, which houses Berlusconi’s offices.

Apparently a a statue of Venus was missing her hand, and a statue of Mars was missing his penis.  Berlusconi refused to tolerate the lack of either appendage.

To critical art historians concerned about the integrity of these works, Berlusconi’s administration responds comfortingly that the new parts are only attached by magnet.

I finally got around to creating my very first header for this blog.  A million thanks to my good friend Betsy for helping me with her Photoshop expertise (check out her other work on her blog.)

The photos included are, left to right:

• Peach Blueberry Crostata at Villa Italia Restaurant in Stamford, CT, July 2009
• Laundry Hanging on Balcony in Palermo, Jan 2009
• Sicily Street Scene near Mercato Storico in Palermo, Jan 2009

ItalyTutto

It’s a blog about blogs from Italy.  The site is very useful for discovering new blogs publishing content about Italy.  Essentially a directory of blogs, it includes categorization by region in Italy and by content (food & wine, photos), as well as interviews with some of the bloggers.  Check back every week for the top ten posts from the blogs.

ParlaFood

A great source for food stories and news around Rome and Europe.

Sample post: Eataly Roma is taking shape.

Elizabeth Minchilli in Rome

This is one of my favorites.  Great photos and reviews with a few recipes sprinkled in.

photo credit Elizabeth Minchilli

Sample post: Street food at the Salone del Gusto

Read more…

That’s chicken skewers with rosemary, and this is the only recipe I’ve ever prepared from a youtube video.

Ingredients:

• Chicken breasts
• Fresh rosemary
• Garlic
• Olive oil
• salt & pepper
• onion

1. Cut chicken breast into cube sized pieces.
2. If your rosemary is on long stems, peel off the bottom half of the leaves (as shown in the video), and put them aside.  I used rosemary from my garden, so my stems were a lot shorter.  So I removed all of the leaves and discarded the stems.  Instead of skewering the chicken on the stems, I used wooden skewers.
3. Combine the rosemary leaves, garlic, and olive oil in a food processer (or mordar and pestle, as shown in the video.)
4. Toss the olive oil mixture with the chicken.
5. Assemble the skewers, alternating chicken with small chunks of onion.
6. Grill the skewers on an indoor grill or in a ridged pan.   Season with salt and pepper as they cook.

Like most Italian recipes, this one is simple, straightforward, and delicious.  It uses only a few basic ingredients.  Also, it doesn’t provide exact quantities.  Most Italian recipes I’ve read assume a level of competence that American recipes do not.  I know it’s not just the language barrier…

Check out this awesome baking blog from fourteen-year-old Adriana Smith.  In her “About Me,” she says,

Hi! My name is Adriana.

I’m 13, 14 years old, and I love to bake.

Adriana's Pretzels

And she’s a girl after my own English major’s heart.  She incorporates her own poetry (fixed form, no less!) into her baking.  In A Sonnet for My Pretzels, she writes,

No snow is more striking than your pale flesh,
Your white flecked skin, and tan limbs embracing.
The cold fragrance of dew at dawn is fresh,
But your perfume appealing, comforting.

Meant to be savored, like an idea,
You know no boundaries to your delect:
Crisp exterior to soft euphoria.
You smile, showing me- you, I can’t reject.

Enthralling me, you’ve accomplished a feat,
If your skin be rough, then the devil is blessed.
Nothing compares to you blushing in heat;
Rising from the shallowest of depths.

You’ve entered my life a short while ago,
And now that you are here, you cannot go.

Noi italiani non mangiamo la colazione americana, my host parents explained to me on my first night in Italy.  Italians don’t eat an American breakfast.

Voi mangiate pancakes, uova, bacon, ma noi no. You eat pancakes, eggs, and bacon for breakfast, but we don’t.

Italians often will tell you what you (because you are American) do or do not do.

You love hamburgers and giant cups of coffee.  You like to bake but don’t know how to cook.  You don’t spend time with your grandparents; instead you send them to “living cemeteries” in Florida.  You don’t know how to dress for the weather (shorts in October?  And no umbrella in a drizzle?  What would your mother say?)

The best I heard had to be, In Italy we don’t have the easy access to guns that you Americans do–in America you can buy a gun in a supermarket.  I could not shake the speaker free of this conviction.

Moving on.

Back to my first night with my host parents.  They pointed out all of the breakfast options, which would be available for me in the kitchen.

Espresso with milk. Little slices of pre-toasted bread (like melba toasts.) My host dad’s amazing home-made marmellata (different flavors for different seasons: apple, pear, cherry, fig.) Little yogurt cups (in super-creamy flavors like coconut, coffee, and strawberry.) Nutella. Milk. Fruit. Corn flakes.

Italians generally eat sweets, dairy, and caffeine for breakfast.  Just enough to get by until lunch, which is the real meal.  They don’t waste calories on breakfast.

I tried to tell them that most mornings in America I ate cereal and yogurt or a fried egg, not pancakes and bacon, for breakfast.

When I was growing up, though, Sunday mornings usually meant some combination of pancakes, eggs, bacon, waffles, or bagels.  That weekly brunch played the same role in my family life that the late Sunday lunch plays for Italian families–bringing everyone together in a moment of pause from other commitments, it’s a meal after which you linger contentedly over coffee or dessert, loath to resume chores or studying. As Lidia Bastianich says in an article in this week’s Parade Magazine,

I love when the main course is finished and the kids are beginning to leave the table, running around. You hear them playing in the background. I sit back and savor that moment when everybody’s contented.  Then you look around the table and people have paired off. They’re having discussions about family, or achievements, or plans. They’re talking about life and it’s beautiful.

That sentiment captures the essence of what I loved about living in Italy–it’s all in that moment that she’s talking about. This Sunday, I made pancakes and bacon for my family.

Pecan Banana Pumpkin Seed Pancakes

• 2 1/3 cups whole wheat pastry flour
• 1/3 cup corn meal
• 1/3 cup flax meal
• 2 tablespoons honey
• 3 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 3 1/2 cups buttermilk
• 2 teaspoons cinnamon
• 2 teaspoons vanilla
• 4 eggs, beaten
• 1/3 cup unsalted butter, melted
• 1/3 cup turbinado sugar
• 2 cups pecans
• 3 bananas
• 1 cup pumpkin seeds

1. Mix dry ingredients in one bowl and wet ingredients and sugar in the other.
2. Add the two together and fold quickly, just until well blended.
3. Pour batter onto a hot griddle and make pancakes as usual.

I got the basic recipe from blisstree.com, then made some changes and additions.

This Gluten-Free Pumpkin Roll with Mascarpone and Nutella Filling is the best marriage between Italian and American flavors I’ve seen this week.

Bell’alimento, by the way, is one of the Italy-centric bloggers I’m planning to mention in the second part of my favorites list (coming up soon.)

Trader Joe’s has always been my favorite supermarket.  If they had hired summer-only employees, I would surely have worked there during summer breaks from high school and college.

They actually have quite a few products directly imported from Italy.  The other night I tried their Butternut Squash Triangoli.  They were very good.  The filling is sweeter than other squash ravioli that I’ve tried.

My serving suggestion: Microwave and then puree a bag of Trader Joe’s frozen butternut squash cubes with a lump of butter.  Add rosemary and thyme and salt and pepper.  Toss with pasta.

Here are a couple of test photos I shot using my new camera, a gift from my dad.  He’s a great photographer and I asked him if he had any cameras to spare for me before I went to Italy.  I took these photos in my garden with a Nikon D70S.

He gave me my first photography lesson today.  I have a lot to learn.