Cene italiane # 4 e 5

Sorry, folks, I don't have photos on the latest two, but I will report on food.

#4 was a last-minute birthday dinner for my friend Kathy. When I realized I would be out of town on her birthday, a party seemed necessary. I think we conferred on Wednesday and Friday night we dined. I got out the highly starched lemon yellow jacquard tablecloth and napkins, put red roses on the table and we partied. Well, I had a lot of wine that night, anyway. I made mushroom risotto, Bill brought fresh tomatoes from his yard for a stunning insalata caprese. I did a re-run on lemon chicken with wilted spinach. And incredible chocolate gelato.

#5 was last night. My friends Jon and Jack got married in DC earlier this year and my wedding present to them was some home cooking. Very upscale home cooking. LOL. Crostini spread with goat cheese and olive oil with green chiles and roasted garlic. Another mushroom risotto, this one including both dried wild mushrooms and fresh baby bella mushrooms (when did they stop calling them crimini?). This was very rich and wonderful. Sauteed chicken breasts in Marsala with wilted spring greens & minced orange pepper. Then lemon gelato that is light and tart and very lemony. Heaven.

This is the recipe I used last night. Killer result if you are a lover of tart lemon desserts, as I am. From Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking by Marcella Hazan, p 614.

(To be prepared and frozen at least two hours in advance.)

The peel [zest] of 4 lemons with none of the white pith beneath, about 1/2 tightly packed cup.

1 cup plus 2 Tablespoons granulated sugar

2/3 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice

2/3 cup heavy whipping cream

1. Put 1-1/2 cups water, the lemon peel, sugar, and lemon juice in a small saucepan, and bring to a boil. After 2 minutes, take off heat, remove the lemon peel, and pour the syrup into a bowl. Let it become completely cold.

2. Add the heavy cream, stirring to incorporate it evenly into the lemon syrup, then pour the mixture into your ice-cream maker and freeze it following the manufacturer's instructions. Store in the freezer in a tightly sealed container until you are ready to use it.

One thing to know about the lemon gelato recipe. It came out like a cross between soft-serve and very stiff whipped cream. So the texture is as light as the flavor is tart.

I am happy to report that the dishes from last night are all done and put away, including pots and pans, table silver, and wine glasses. Got two loads of shirts washed, dried, and hung up too. I feel at least somewhat ready for the work week.

--the BB

Cena italiana # 3

The "experiments in Italian cooking" series continued yesterday.

La tavola

For Antipasto we had bruschetta. (I am not sure I have ever heard a server in any restaurant pronounce this correctly. The "sch" before "e" or "i" has the sound of "sk," just as it does in the English word "school." English-speakers will come close if they pronounce it as Bruce+Kate+Ta, with that "ta" as in "tata for now," accent on KATE. Of course, it you order it that way you may get an uncomprehending stare.

Anyway, last night's was done the old-fashioned way, brushing slices of bread with olive oil and sticking them briefly under the boiler. The tomatoes used were freshly picked from Bill's garden. And cheers to Bill, the sous-chef, who did lots of chopping and stirring for the meal.



Primi consisted of risotto al radicchio, a dish we had in Florence. It turned out really well and I am eager to have risotto more often. This is the fourth time I have made it and it is so very good, well worth the half hour one spends stirring it constantly. It's not fast food by any means but it certainly has moved into my personal category of comfort food.


For Secondi we had Marcella Hazan's drunken pork roast. The pork is "larded" with carrot sticks and cooks in wine for three hours. I added some baby bella mushrooms, sauteed zucchini, and a few slices of Bill's tomatoes.


I picked these grapes from my vine just before the meal. They are small but very sweet and we polished them off by the end of the meal.


The ricotta cake with lemon zest and juice in it. A thin cake with a lovely crumb. We had slices of it with mixed fresh berries.

There were many empty wine bottles in the trash at the end of the evening and I was very gratified to have pulled this off, especially given that I had a tooth ache all day. What a fun way to learn new recipes and techniques!

--the BB

Heart thread - 08/08/2011

David@Montreal has some prayer requests for us.

dear Giants
in the generosity of your gracious hearts i'd ask prayers this morning for my cherished cousin Frank, his wife Carol and their family
Frank was re-admitted to hospital this past week-end: barely able to walk, yet incredibly he walked from the car into the emerg..
at first it was believed he had c-difficile again, but it is something new going on, along with MAC, a fungal infection in the lungs.
Carol called Mam late yesterday & it would appear that after a rather extraordinary life my dear cousin might be living through his very last days

prayers also for his latest grandchildren please, born less than a week ago: Katherine and Charlotte- both still in the icu: Charlotte with kidney and oxygen level issues.

prayers for the people of Syria who continue to be assaulted daily by the madman who claims leadership of their country. one for the international students who worked for me at the university is apparently still in the country with her parents.

prayers for President Obama (enough said)

and prayers please for the several Giants, each in their own way undergoing serious trails or discernment at this time ( you know who you are).

thank-you beloved Giants

David@Montreal

And let us remember David who faithfully carries so many in his heart.

--the BB

Cena italiana #2

One of the current learnings is that I love to feed people. Now, this is not news. It is something that goes way back to my college years. I worked in kitchens in the summer, cooked now and again while in college, asked cooks lots of questions.

Bill and I entertained a lot and enjoyed doing it together. I loved ironing linens while he was working on sauces.

Doing it on one's own is another story. Since I work full time and I'm a lousy housekeeper, tidying up for company, planning, shopping, organizing, and cooking is much harder now. I really needed the several years I lived as a "hermit" but it is a huge shift to start entertaining. Nonetheless, I was determined this would be the year and I do want to learn the techniques of Italian cuisine.

So tonight was Italian Dinner Number Two. I only decided late Wednesday night to do it.

There is psychological significance to my entertaining with dishes and table linens that I did not use when I was part of a couple. Branching out on my own in a fresh way.

Here is the table with lots of black and gold.


Antipasto included goat cheese mixed with roasted garlic, green chiles, olive oil, salt and pepper. This could be spread on thin hard slices of French bread. Some guests also brought a corn salsa that was very tasty, full of fire and tang, and that was yummy on the bread also. There were kalamata olives, all washed down with pinot grigio and/or blood orange soda.

Primi, for which I have no photo, consisted of whole wheat fusilli (made in Italy) in a sauce of olive oil, butter, chile flakes, roasted red pepper, and parmigiano reggiano. I was going to make homemade egg noodles but, once again, punted. Today I went to church, shopped, and went to brunch instead of staying in the kitchen all day.

Segondi included veal scallopine in a Marsala and cream sauce, wilted spinach with roasted garlic, and grape tomatoes halved and sauteed in butter and balsamic vinegar. I got to practice the technique of pounding meat (clean up your minds, you naughty chipmunks!) as described by Marcella Hazan.


Dolci: egg custard gelato with fresh blueberries. The gelato was flavored with orange zest simmered in the milk and with Grand Marnier.


And that was Sunday Dinner. Hope you enjoyed it.

Oh, we toasted those who wished they were here with us. Y'all may not have been fed but you were not forgotten.

Ci vediamo!

--the BB

Una cena italiana

After our visit to Italy in April I have been wanting to try my hand at more Italian cooking. Well, my first big feast was an Armenian meal, but tonight was Italian Meal #1.

La tavola

Antipasto consisted of squares of fried polenta topped with a mixture of goat cheese and sun-dried tomatoes and a bit of roasted red pepper. There were also three varieties of olives.

Primi consisted of a pasta with peas, ham, eggs, and parmigiano reggiano. I was going to make home-made egg noodles but with everything else going on I just used packaged farfalle. They were lovely nonetheless. I've made egg noodles and they fall in the category of something I know I can do, so it was not a problem to give that up on this round.

Segondi had thin-sliced chicken breasts briefly sauteed in butter with lemon juice and parsley, accompanied by sauteed haricots verts and grape tomatoes that were halved, sauteed in butter and some balsamic vinegar. The tomatoes were heavenly and the rest was pretty damn good.

I forgot to take a photo of the Insalata. Mixed spring greens with minced green onion, gorgonzola, oil, white balsamic, salt, and pepper.


And Dolci! Fresh raspberry gelato with Meyer Lemon cookies.

Every course was a success and I am very pleased. Kathy kept commenting that it was such a light meal and she expected something heavy. I told her Italian cooking takes many forms and this was intended to be a light summer meal, in spite of having five courses. I don't feel stuffed at all. Can y'all see the smile stretched from ear to ear.

God bless Kathy; the dishes are all done.

I look forward to more adventures in Italian cooking and will try to take you along with me (well, in photos at least).

--the BB

For Kirstin - upsdated with link

The butterfly prepares to rise and all creation cries, "Glory!" and "Alleluia!"

Update from Andee is here.

I love you, KP.

--the BB

Day Four - Ara Pacis

From the diary:

20 aprile 2011

This morning we took the Metro to Spagna then walked up to the Piazza del Populo, spent a few minutes in Sta Maria dei Miracoli. (Bill commented that it was the first place we've been that felt vaguely religious.)

Then we walked along the Tiber embankment to the Ara Pacis in its modern museum. I thought, first time of several today, of Betty Wiley.

Setting out on our little street toward the Piazza Barberini where we caught the Metro.

The Piazza del Populo lies just within the northern gate of the Aurelian Walls and was once the Porta Flaminia of ancient Rome from which the major road north headed toward Rimini. Travelers from northern lands had their first sight of Rome here. You may read more about it at the link.

An overview of the Piazza del Populo [Wikimedia Commons]

Obelisk of Rameses II in the center of the piazza and the "twin" churches of Sta Maria Montesanto (on the left, referring to Mount Carmel) and Sta Maria dei Miracoli (on the right). [Wikimedia Commons]

My shot of the piazza. Firemen were out taking collections for the Red Cross.

I wanted a closer shot of the fire fighters because, well, I like fire fighters (and their trucks, esp. the red ones).

Sta Maria dei Miracoli, named for miracles attributed to the image over the high altar. [Wikimedia Commons]

High Altar [Wikimedia Commons]

Above the Main Altar [Wikimedia Commons]

A fresco [Wikimedia Commons]


The Ara Pacis Augustae (Altar of the Augustan Peace) was commissioned by the Senate to honor the triumphant return of Emperor Augustus from Hispania and Gaul. It was located on the Field of Mars and unearthed in the 20th century. It has walls of Parian marble and is housed in a controversial new museum next to the Mausoleum of Augustus. Mussolini had hoped to have a center celebrating Fascism. The Mausoleum appears incredibly overgrown but the altar is pretty cool.



Upper panels on the sides show processions of dignitaries and priests, including members of the imperial family.

Wonderful scroll work.

There are many interpretations of this goddess. Is she Peace, Tellus (Earth), Italia, Venus, or some other deity? In any case she holds twins and symbols of peace and prosperity.

If you have ever wondered where all those garlands and skulls come from in neoclassical buildings, Rome is your answer.





The standard sacrifice when Romans made peace treaties was a sow and here we have such a sacrifice. All manner of scholarly debate has taken place over the identity of the figures here. Sieveking said it was Aeneas making sacrifice to Juno on his arrival in Italy, basing this position on Vergil's descriptions. Richardson challenged this and later claimed it is Numa Pompilius.

Well, with the impression Vergil's Aeneid made on me in high school (and again, re-reading in graduate school), I inclined to Aeneas, a warm-up for later on Day Four (another post). Lines of the Aeneid kept running through my head. Betty Wiley was my Latin teacher at Fresno High School, hence the diary mention of her.


A plain yet lovely marble wall separating the altar from the stairs to the lower floor.


Yours truly in front of the sow sacrifice section.

More to come on Day Four, but at least I can relax having sifted through some more photos and put them up.

--the BB

Day Three - I Fori Imperiali

Temple of Saturn - trust me, these columns are monumental. The entire scale of the fora (and yes, I insist on using the Latin plural of forum because it hurts my brain to type "forums") is meant to impress on the viewer the might of Rome and its rulers.

I return to the tour and it is midafternoon of Day Three. Following the restorative lunch on the terazzo of the Palazzo dei Conservatori and the conclusion of our museum tour we climbed the steep and sloping steps to the Chiesa di Santa Maria in Aracoeli. I wanted to take photos but it was forbidden to do so and, unlike most of the tourists with cameras inside, I behaved. The church dates from the sixth century and is situated on the Capitoline peak where a temple of Juno Moneta once stood. The following photos are taken from Wikimedia Commons.

Interior of Sta Maria in Aracoeli

Fresco of Madonna and Child by Pietro Cavallini

Central fresco by Pinturicchio
in the S. Bernardino Chapel (1486).

There are some nice bits in the church, as shown above, but I was not kind in journal comments:

... a horrid clash of too much with an excess of chandeliers - source of immigrant bad taste. Ugh. And the Santo Bambino of olive wood from near Gethsemane in Jerusalem allegedly carved by a Franciscan and painted by an angel is one of those fat ugly babies like so many Gothic & Renaissance Madonna and Child paintings where the baby is butt ugly.

My attitude is most uncharitable but there you have it. There is also a factor that truly puzzles me. Why are so many of the babies in late Gothic and Renaissance paintings lumpy and homely? Seriously. With all the painterly skills of the artists and some lovely women in the role of Mary, were there no pretty babies to be found? I really do wonder and would be interested in any theories.

For now I will pass over our visit to the Mamertine Prison in silence.




Looking down on the eight surviving columns of the Temple of Saturn and the three columns of the Temple of Vespasian. The Capitoline Hill (Campidoglio) is on the right.

Detail from the Arch of Septimius Severus

Massive inscribed stones

Remnants of the Basilica Aemilia. This vast area housed law courts.

Looking up toward the Palatine Hill where the
imperial palaces were located

There is a reason many of our formal typefaces are based on the carvings from imperial Rome. The letters are beautiful.

Would you care to guess the significance of this spot where folks leave flowers and other offerings to this day? You cannot see these unless you walk behind a wall to look.


It is the Altar of Caesar in the ruin of the Temple of Julius Caesar. This is the spot where his body was cremated after his assassination in 44 BCE.

Temple of Saturn and Arch of Septimius Severus

Arch of Septimius Severus

The lone Column of Phocas is the last monument placed in the Fora. It was dedicated on 1 August 608 to honor the Eastern Roman Emperor Phocas who had visited Rome and donated the Pantheon to the Pope.

The Arch of Septimius Severus (yet again) viewed from near its base.

The Temple of Saturn. I wish I could convey the scale. Wait, I believe I can. A photo taken from the Campidoglio overlooking the Fora:

The large columns to the right of center are the Temple of Saturn viewed from their side. Note the people in comparison to the monuments.


Some interesting floral scroll work on a stone fragment.

Remnants of the Temple of Castor and Pollux. There was a temple here from the fifth century BCE but these "modern" bits are from a rebuilding in AD 6.

Some wildflowers growing amid all the stone.

Foundations and retaining walls of palaces as you look from the Fora to the Palatine Hill.

Remnants (with lots of restoration) of the Temple of Vesta where the Vestal Virgins tended the sacred flame.

The Basilica of Constantine and Maxentius with Bill standing in front of it so you can grasp the immensity.

Chiesa di Santa Francesca Romana

The Arch of Titus (19th century reconstruction)

Domitian built the arch in AD 81 to honor the victories of his brother Titus and his father Vespasian. In this panel you can see a menorah being carried forth from looting the Temple in Jerusalem when the Jewish rebellion was put down.

The emperor in his chariot attended by the winged Nike, goddess of victory.

The Senate and the Roman People (SPQR) to the divine Titus son of the divine Vespasian, to Vespasian Augustus.

Looking down the Via Sacra toward the Colosseum

One of the cats of Rome viewing us with indifference

Arch of Constantine

Detail

The Colosseum

Our visit to the Fora was rushed as the sun was close to setting and the area was closing as we departed. We returned to our hotel and had snacks and a bottle of wine, quite sufficient at the end of a tiring day.

And that concludes Day Three.

--the BB