Enoteca

Lois here- yesterday Kathy Curtis and I made a requisite tour of the enoteca otherwise wine tasting. We visited three spots-each giving us a different experience. The first spot was down this very old cellar alley way. Not sure of the age of the architecture but it was very interesting. Thank heaven the location was glorious cause the gent who was introducing us to the chianti in the region was less than enthusiastic  aka without any personality.  I made a little fool of myself when i asked where my glass was cause he made us share glasses. I mean what's that all about. I had to explain my unfamiliarity with sharing glasses. I mean I am used to better things.  i want to say he gave a damn but he didn't. We didn't purchase from the first place but Kathy did.  The second locale offered four tastes of very nice wine  with graduated flavor and escalating price. The guy did not speak more than a few words of English but was very smiley.  We purchased a bottle from this place. The third was the best mostly because the guy was informative  He is an organic wine producer. When we asked where his vineyard was located he responded with "over the next hill" literally  He was explaining how his grandfather lived till 95 while drinking a litre and a half of wine (organic wine of course) until he died and that was the explanation for his long life.  Needless to say, between the three of us, we purchased a few bottles that we drank the next night. You will read about our great final meal together on our last night at Tuscany in another blog entry  We all figured we would have something to bring either home or to the next location from the enoteca but alas it has now all been drank. I am signing off now with the lovely memories of wine tasting with friends and my man.      

Fawlty Towers

Rory - Bianca, Bianca. What a gal. She, the proprietor and gardener at our villa. We didn't expect to see much of her during our week at Aia di Ama.  She lives elsewhere in the area and said she'd be by early Monday morning to water the plants and clean the pool -- all this communicated without the benefit of English on her part, or Italian on ours.  So we thought we'd see her once during our week at the villa. She keeps a nice villa, but she also keeps popping up at odd times and places, until finally everyone agreed that it was just a little odd. The first encounter was perhaps the most bizarre. I woke early Monday morning, went into the kitchen, opened the windows and shutters over the sink, looked down to pour a glass of water, looked up again to drink the glass of water, and there was Bianca standing outside the window, eye level, smiling directly at me, as close and friendly as if we were at a cocktail party, with nothing between us but the walls of her house. It was like the daily appearance of Jerome the Giraffe at the window of the Friendly Giant's castle (for those who like to rock). Remember? He could stick his head right into Friendly's castle and look around? Well just about the same with Bianca. It was a real Sesame Street moment -- like she was going to start counting to ten or singing the alphabet or something. But then out came the Italian, starting with "Buon giorno" and taking off from there, leaving me in the dust. In her kitchen. 
Another time I woke very early to the sudden and startling sound of water hitting the stone walkway directly outside our open bedroom window. 
It was the spill-over from Bianca's overly enthusiastic plant-watering on the terrace above our window. I took the opportunity to find her and bring her inside to check out the faltering wi-fi connection. She put all her plant-watering enthusiasm into this problem, asking questions loudly in dense Italian then turning her vocal energies to her cell phone, calling out loudly "Pronto!" and shooting off a volley to her figlio somewhere nearby. I tried to get her attention and mime to her the fact that people were sleeping upstairs, but it was too late: the first casualties stumbled sleepily down the stairs, miming to me "What the..."
I found the operating manual for the wi-fi router -- printed handily in five languages -- found the problem first in English, then in Italian, pressed it in Bianca's hands along with the faulty router and, as kindly as possible, showed her her own door, before any more sleeping house guests might appear. Faulty router indeed. We all laughed and agreed there was more than a little bit of Fawlty Towers at Aia di Ama.   

Be steak, ah

Rory - Home-made Bistecca alla Fiorentina here at the house called Aia di Ama near Lecchi in Chianti. We went to the Coop store in Radda. Nothin co-op about it; just like walking into a Metro in Ottawa except everything is in Italian and there are three ages of  pecorino sheep's milk cheese to choose from, and at the meat counter there is a butcher's block with a giant slab of lumbar (loom-barrrrrr) sitting out waiting for the giant cleaver to come down and make super-thick 
T-bone steaks out of it. We ordered two and were instructed to stand back as the butcher went at it.
 Decided to cook the steak Acquacheta-style, al forno a legna, in a wood-burning oven. Just happen to have one outside at Aia di Ama. Found some firewood already chopped and partly dried. It looked like mostly pieces of almond tree. Built a fire in the oven with all the skill of a new boy scout, using the few scraps of paper to be found around the house. Put match to paper, watched a flame grow under the wood, prayed to Akela, blew like mad, tasted the smoke of almond bark and paper, watched the flame die. Curtis came back with shiny pieces of cardboard box, our last hope. Lit the cardboard, watched the shiny coating turn into dancing blue and green flames, and then watched them die. Curtis went off in a last ditch search for paper. Started losing courage for the Bisteccaal Forno a legna and started thinking of the electric broiler. Curtis reappeared with a look of victory and enough paper to light any fire. "Shhhhhhhh......don't say a word" as he ripped the first corner off a very good and very useful roadmap of Italy. We both new that this was an inspired risk and that the folly of burning such a valuable navigational tool would surely spark a very great fire, and it surely did. The fire burned bright and quelled in time to give hot and steady embers to the thick steaks, and we all enjoyed wood-smoked bistecca and everything else delicious that came out of this Tuscan kitchen. And Curtis had the last laugh because he still has something even better and more useful than a good roadmap of Italy, and that is a GPS that tells him exactly where and when to turn and does so in perfectly good English. 

Musica

Rory - Outside Music. Right now, sunrise, Aia di Ama, there is an early morning concert featuring bird and beast, man and machine. The ostinato is played by unseen farm machinery in the valley below us.  Steady ticking hum from a tractor and intermittent whining grinding from the plow or something it is pulling through the vineyard.  The whining emulates the sounds of an unhappy ox pulling the same plow, mixed with the honking of geese. Another layer is a pretty regular chick-chick-chick-chick-chick-chick-chick-chick from birds closer at hand, underscored by the subtle tenor of pigeons, contraltos perhaps, rolling their R's.
One distant dog  sings in the register of the pigeons but with more percussive force.
An elaborate melody is repeated overtop at intervals by a lone bird. It could be taken as three bars of three perhaps.
A tractor climbing a paved road with a familiar slow upward glissando, repeated every time it changes gears.
Another farm vehicle keeping a steady beautiful interval, a low C it seems, with a whining high G two octaves above.  
Now the long slow arc of a distant train crossing the landscape, gathering steam as it passes through time, modulating gradually, fading partway, then stopping abruptly, proving it is no train at all, but something else.
A snare drum rattles into the soundscape in the form of a heavily laden wagon bouncing it's load over an uneven dirt road. Later another snare drum enters, an engine of some sort, playing a long fast roll. Then for a moment everything stops except the birds. The birds never stop. Now there are numerous elaborate melodies playing at once outside, too numerous, too elaborate to possibly explain.

More outside music, three days ago in Siena. Walking in the fading light of day through small unknown streets in search of our small unfound car, we heard the growing sound of a cello being lovingly abused by it's owner. When we reached the cello, the bow was bouncing and scraping against the strings, inserting rough percussive interludes between passages of lovely melody more usually associated with the cello. A lovely warm interlude in our rushed effort to get onto the road before dark, which was unsuccessful in any case, and we should have stayed for more cello abuse.

Another string player, yesterday in Firenze. Old man sitting on a low stool in the shade in narrow Via Ricasoli playing simple tuneful repetitive unadorned fiddle music, unadorned but for a wonderfully microtonal trill at the end of every line. I asked in best broken Italian if this was music of Firenze. He answered in much better Italian, no, then waved his hand into the distance and said something including the word borgata Ah.......village. I made a big circle with my arm, meaning village from around here? And he said si, and graze for the euros that dropped in his violin case.

Another street player in Lucca a week ago. A beautiful tall, buff, smiling young black man, ready for a leading role, played impossibly good, nuanced, exciting accordion music with no apparent effort to a crowd of diners at a nearby cafe in a little piazzale. We speculated as to whether this was an electronic gimmick requiring only the push of a button -- one button once and not many buttons in precise rapid succession. He finished, approached each table for a coin or two, pocketed them and went on his way. Another accordion (called fisarmonica here, with a soft s) played at two separate sightings in Lucca, with much less musical panache or depth, but by a man who could certainly play the part in a cheap Italian movie.

No shortage of music around here, and no wonder. The language itself is deeply musical. Something as simple as a friendly volley of insults between two young men in the main corso in Riomaggiore (which is music itself when you roll the R's and soften the G's and hold the E for an extra beat) turns into an aria. And it doesn't hurt that the setting is as beautiful as any opera stage set come to life. The great composers like Puccini and Verdi and filmmakers like Fellini, they didn't make it all up. They just watched and listened and took notes.

   

Malborghetta (bad little village?)

Rory - Ristorante Malborghetta in Lecchi in Chianti. Lovely Simone Muricci sharing his small kitchen with seven of us yesterday, showing us the basics of Tuscan cuisine. Cinghali, wild boar marinated in milk, vinegar, water, rosemary, sage, juniper, cloves. Three parts red onion, two parts minced carrot, one part celery, too much olive oil, way too much salt, very tasty. Also tomato paste. Garlic, chives, parsley, oregano sauteed in more olio. Mix it all together. Stew long. He told us of a customer once sending word back to the kitchen of foreign object in their dish of boar. Turned out to be lead from the hunter's bullet and the customers were pleased to know they were getting the real wild thing and not the tame boar they might get elsewhere. He also told of his grandmother who gave him first first taste of Tuscan cuisine, and how she herself refused to eat asparagus. They tried to grow asparagus in the family garden. Every year they would plant the seeds and sprouts would appear, but then nothing. Eventually it was revealed that she would let the chickens out to feed themselves in the yard and send them straight to the asparagus sprouts, and then later throw her hands up in feigned innocence.     

at the Villa in Chianti

Iris, Kathleen, and Emma here-
We met up this past Saturday at a Villa in Tuscany. When we arrived, we hopped straight into the pool at our house! It was the perfect temperature- nice and refreshing after a long, boring car ride.
So far, we have...
Went into the town of Siena. There, we shopped, looked at museums, Kathleen and her mom Lois climbed up the Civic Tower (660 steps!!!!), went out for a nice dinner, and of course... Ate GELATO!!!We saw amazing views!
And... We watched Espagna (Spain) win the FIFA World cup 2010 against Netherlands (Holland) 1-0!!!!!!!!Kathleen had her Spain shirt on and everything! And when they scored, she ran around the whole house, then we all went swimming in the pool 'till 12:30a.m!!!!!!!!

Today, we got the chance to cook a professional meal for ourselves! We took a cooking class! We made 4 courses which were;
Homemade Bruschetta (bru-sketta) topped with liver heart paste, and some topped with regular tomato topping.
Next, we had a Ravioli course (,which we all agree was fantastic!). We took some ravioli dough and stuffed it with a ricotta cheese and spinach filling, and then spread egg yolk on one edge to seal it together, then freeze them for a bit. when the ravioli is finished in the freezer we smothered it in tomato sauce!
Our next course was wild boar with white beans! It was delicious!
And finally, for the dessert, we made chocolate souffle! The souffles were so yummy! When they were done in the oven, the inside was melted chocolate, the top was covered in sugar with chocolate drizzle on the plate! It was all wonderful!
As you can see, we have had a wonderful time so far, and we will tell you more later!
Ciao!   



Kathy Here- Just wanted to add my praise to the wonderful cooking class! Simone loves food, loves food chemistry, loves teaching and is very patient in his small kitchen with seven people. We were there from 9:30am to 3:30 pm. He brought us into the restaurant which was closed for the day, offered us coffees, water and then presented us with an apron each, complete with our names and the date (in Italian) embroidered on each one. We were hooked. We cooked for three hours then slowly ate each of the courses one by one, with a wine he had chosen for each, pausing to enter the kitchen to put the finishing touches on each dish. It was heavenly.

Juliet's House

Iris here-
We had a great day yesterday!
It started off by us having a wonderful croissant at breakfast, and then drove off into Verona.
When we got into the city, we got a tamarin (A strong but delicious type of fruit) granite (Like a snow cone), sat in the central park, and did some emailing.
After we were done that, we went to grab a shawarma at a little take out place, and then we took it to some steps in front of a church and sat and ate. It was delicious!
We then made our way onto Juliet's house. I had just seen the movie Letters to Juliet, so I was really excited to go see the actual thing!
Before you get to the actual lot where her house is, you go through a tunnel which is full of graffiti with a whole bunch of names on it. It was really cool! There is a small courtyard with a statue of Juliet and I posed with her and my Mom took a picture.  Dad and I then went into her house. It was a an old medieval stone house. we only got to go in one part of the house but from the view of the window, we got to see the other half and there are tons of rooms. When we were finished checking out all the rooms and paintings in the house, we got to go onto the balcony and my Mom took a picture of us from below.

On the way back to the parking garage, we stopped at her tomb.  After we bought our tickets, my Mom and I headed out into a courtyard with a wishing well and an engraving with the story of Romeo and Juliet. We went down the staircase into two small rooms joined by a door thing where it was very cool. On the other side of the wall, is Juliet's tomb, a long plain stone rectangle. We took more photos!!!! 
It was one of the highlights of my trip!!!