Learning to Cook - Tuscan Style

I had the best night's sleep in a month. It was incredibly quiet and comfortable here. I woke up to fresh capaccino and saffron ricotta cake with home made fig jam. Not a bad start ;) I chatted with Luigi in my limited italian (how are you, sleep well, etc) and got the inside scoop from Paola and Simonetta about the cooking class ahead. There were two other couples there, two women from Israel who were traveling around Europe in a camper. What a neat idea I hadn't even thought of. The other was a couple from Monteal Canada spending a couple weeks in Italy. It was a nice group to learn tuscan cooking with.

We started off making dessert, since it had to rest in the fridge for a while. We made a traditional style tiramisu, with the lady fingers, mascapone cheese, and a bit of coffee and rum. Then on to the frittata, made with potatos and green beans. In making this, I realized that there are a few kitchen utensils I definitely need to get when I get home - potato ricer and a half moon knife (this thing is awesome).

We also made home made pasta called Pici. It was a rustic, thick spaghetti type of pasta that you roll with your hands. We made a tomato, garlic and olive oil sauce for it that had just the right touch of pepperoccini to give it a mild spiciness. Along with that, we made bruschetta. Now, I make bruschetta all the time but it has never, ever, come out as fantastic as this. I'm not sure that I'll be able to recreate it, but Simonetta assured me that I could email with questions if I needed to when I got home.

After the cooking festivities, we sat with the family and enjoyed this feast for lunch with some Chianti of course. The one thing I'll mention is that to make real Tuscan cooking, you can't be shy with the olive oil. When you think you have used enough, add a bit more.

Once the class was over, Paola took me around Tuscany to look at middle century villages and small towns. At one, we stopped in a supermarket and she asked me if there was anything there that I never had before. Of course, there was a bit, so she purchased it so we could try it for dinner. Along the way, we stopped into a small wine shop where I tasted some Chianti dessert wine. It had a similar taste to port wine, but a bit lighter. Traditionally, this is served with some biscotti dipped in the wine. I need to try that at some point. Back at home, we had dinner. Not like I really needed it after the rest of the food today.

Dinner, not like I had room for it, was a cheese plate with some bread and salad. There was mozzarella, but not like we know mozzarella. It was more similar to buffalo or fresh mozzarella, but the inside had a softer consistency, more liquid than solid. To round it out, we also had two kinds of pecorino, one young and one aged, along with a smoked cheese that was similar to gouda. They served the cheese with two kinds of spiced jam - one fig and one apple, both of which were very tasty! They were particularly good on the harder, aged pecorino cheese.

There was left over tiramisu, but there was no way it was fitting in my stomach. As I have learned well since I have been here, "Sono pieno."

^k