Celsius to Fahrenheit: More Than Just Simple Math

            I am not one that deals well with discomfort in the elements. I have been known to take drastic measures to change my situation immediately when too cold or too hot, like when I was taking a walk on a chilly beach without a sweatshirt, and instead of going back to my condo a mile away, had to buy a new sweatshirt at the nearest gift shop. Or the time when I was wearing jeans in a tailgating parking lot at Notre Dame, and was so hot I went to the bookstore to buy shorts. In sum, the idea of “sucking it up” or “toughing it out” does not register with me when it comes to temperature. You’d think, logically, that I would be very aware of the weather reports in order to avoid impromptu purchases of tacky souvenir sweatshirts, and I am. However, I am further impeded by an inability to correctly comprehend exactly what the temperature is suggesting I wear. 73 degrees: Is that shorts weather? But I get cold easily. I’ll put on jeans. But what if I’m hot? I’ll bring shorts. Or maybe wear shorts with a cardigan. Basically, I end up wearing shorts with a cardigan, bringing jeans, and changing when I reach the place that I am at because I’m too cold. It’s not a great system, but it works, and it gives me options.

Sicilian summer house - You could fry and egg on those 45 degree stones.

        Recently, a wrench was thrown into my method of dealing with the weather: I began working, traveling, and living in Italy. And there, they use Celsius. My Italian boyfriend would warn me about Sicily’s summer: It’s going to be 42 degrees every day. Prepare yourself! I’m not so naïve that I didn’t think it was summer, but I did bring light scarves and jackets just in case 42 meant it was chilly at night. Long story short, 42 (107 degrees Fahrenheit) is not scarf weather. It’s wear-as-few-clothes-as-is-considered-decent-in-order-to-prevent-completely-melting-into-nothing weather. 

            Another instance, again in Sicily, but this time in November, involved extra layers of confusion because Sicilians have a particular view of weather (anything below…65°F - again, guessing on the numbers, but I think it’s something around there - is cold). Anyway, it had been drizzling on and off all day, and I had been in the house helping Nonna cook (…okay, helping is a little strong, watching the master and hoping that some of her skills would transfer magically via osmosis to me is more like it). Our cousins asked if I would like to join them for a freshly mixed soda at the kiosk around 10PM. I agreed, and was immediately forewarned that the weather was 13 degrees and I needed to bundle up so that I wouldn’t get sick. They donned me in a wool scarf, told me to zip up my jacket and decided that we had to take the motorino because it was too cold to walk. I was ushered out the door, but too focused on how to get on the motorino without looking like a fool to notice the temperature. It was only when I began to sweat after driving the two blocks to our destination that I realized…13 degrees does not equal cold. I peeled the layers off and after a refreshing Italian soda, walked home, beating the motorino.

            I’m beginning to learn to adapt to my inabilities: in addition to buying large purses that allow me to cutely conceal all extra accessories/changes of clothes in case I guessed wrong about the weather, I have learned how to quickly convert Celsius to Fahrenheit, which at least gives me a ballpark idea of the temperature. Fahrenheit is officially Celsius x 1.8 + 32, but to make it easier you can just multiply by 2 and add 32, taking away a degree or two (luckily I am blessed with being able to do simple math in my head). With this new trick, when I visit Italy I’m at least not bringing my winter boots for 25 degrees or wearing a wool scarf in 13. And I still have hope for the future…or maybe I’ll just get a bigger purse.

Arancini...Proof that Leftovers are Delicious

            My family has never been one that wastes…anything. Being the oldest daughter of an ecologist and an Italian-American who was raised the daughter of a poor Italian mining community in the Pittsburgh area hit hard by the Depression, I have it in my blood to not throw anything away.

            My parents are champions at keeping EVERYTHING, especially my mom, who throws nothing away until it is utterly and completely ruined, and even then not everything gets the boot. She still has all of her college t-shirts, and she keeps food until every single drop or crumb is gone or it is obviously non-edible (expiration dates are merely a suggestion). There have been so many times in which I, cleaning the kitchen, have found three crumbs of a muffin on a plate placed on the counter. Thinking this is the plate of someone who did not take the time to put the plate in the dishwasher, I throw the crumbs into the trash. Like clockwork, a few hours later my mom enters the kitchen asking Where’s my muffin? Marti…did you throw away my muffin? I was keeping that for snack! I pretend not to hear her or know what happened, which rarely works, and in time I have gradually learned to keep to my crumbs and let others take care of theirs.

            My grandmother survived the Great Depression with no mother and three brothers in a poor Italian immigrant community,  She is always thinking about how we can save or not have to go to the store to buy something new. Grandma makes rags out of old clothes, sews holes in socks, and even saves the bags that sliced bread comes in to use instead of Ziplock bags when she makes too many cookies or needs a bag of ice for a grandchild’s boo-boo. My grandma is also the Grand Master of using left-overs to create new and inventive meals, such as using leftover mashed potatoes to make some of the best gnocchi I’ve ever eaten, or using leftover meat to make a ragu’ by shredding it and serving it with red sauce. She’s brilliant, my grandma.

            I have a little bit of both my mother and my grandmother in the way that I live. I will keep a bottle of balsamic vinegar until there are two drops left, and I love to make creative new dishes out of leftovers.  (I do step out of line with mom’s habit of keeping all food  and throw away things that have expired…my less-frugal boyfriend has made that influence on me in that way.) In a quest to not have to make the decision of throwing away old food, I try to use leftovers as quickly as possible the next day, creating a new meal out of the old one, and I find that the Italian cuisine lends itself beautifully to this. You can always throw some leftover meat or vegetables into a sauce or stew (ribollita was made just for this – a stew of leftover vegetables served over day-old bread). My favorite thing to make, however, comes from leftover risotto (rice made with short-grain, or arborio, rice), and is a Sicilian specialty. Literally meaning “little oranges” arancini are traditionally friend balls of rice, similar to croquettes, stuffed with cheese or ragu’ (made of meat or vegetables). In order to save myself some stomach aches and the pain of using a deep fryer, I bake mine in the oven with a drizzle of olive oil and serve these as a side dish or tasty snack.

**You can also use sticky rice if risotto is not on hand – as the forming of the balls is based on the idea that the rice sticks together by itself, basamati or long-grain rice might not have enough starch. However, if you would like to try with regular rice and maybe throw an egg in the leftover rice to give it some binding agents, go for it!

Arancini

1 ½ cups leftover risoto

½ cup cubed cheese (any kind that you wish)

½ cup Sauce or Ragu (optional

1 egg, beaten

¾ cup breadcrumbs

¾ cups flour

olive oil

           

 Preheat the oven to 425. Line a baking sheet with aluminum foil or parchment paper, and place the flour, egg, and breadcrumbs in three separate bowls, one after another.

Form six patties with the leftover risotto and place them on a plate. Take a patty in the palm of your hand. Place the cheese (and sauce if you choose) in the middle of the circle and reshape the rice around to form a ball.  Repeat with the other five patties. 

 Once each ball of rice is stuffed with cheese, dip the balls into the flour, then the egg, and then roll in the breadcrumbs to create a breading, and place back on the pan. Drizzle the balls with olive oil if you like and cook for 25 minutes. 

Let cool for five minutes and then, serve immediately.

Eggplant Endeavors

           Eggplant. It’s not a beautiful name. It’s not romantic or appealing. The name doesn’t even invoke curiosity to find out what is behind the unfamiliar word – maybe instead it does the opposite and repulses you. Say it to yourself. Eggplant. Kind of awkward; definitely unattractive. What has this innocent plant done to deserve such a name?  Poor thing, it’s not just in the English language that it has a less-than-alluring name. At one time all plants in the nightshade family, of which the tomato, eggplant, and potato are a part, were believed to be toxic. This is reflected in various names for the plant. The Italian word for eggplant is melanzana, from mela non sana, or “unhealthy apple”, because it was once believed that it was poisonous, and is still believed to be toxic when eaten raw. Other Mediterranean populations called the fruit (like its cousin the tomato it is, in fact, a fruit) mala insana, “crazy apple” because they believe it would make anyone who ate it crazy.

            My first experience with eggplant was also not the most wonderful. I remember it vividly – I was in the third grade and we were writing a play for school. The characters were different fruits and vegetables: there was a jolly blueberry, a stupid but lovable stalk of broccoli, a sexy strawberry, an intelligent zucchini squash, and an unpleasant eggplant who was always in a bad mood: Eggbert Eggplant. At this point in my life, I had never eaten an eggplant…and this play assured that I never wanted to eat one. You know the TV shows for kids in which the characters are likeable fruits and vegetables so that kids will feel comfortable towards them and eat more? This experience had exactly that effect but opposite – every time I thought (and still sometimes when I think) about eggplant, I thought about unlikable and unpleasant people.

            My disinterest in the eggplant was amplified by the uncomfortable sound of the word itself: eggplant. To write this blog, I decided to do a little research on the history of the name. In reality, the name does not reflect any qualities of the eggplant we know today. The word was created in the 1600-1700’s when European traders brought back the fruit from its indigenous Asia. The species of eggplant that was brought back was a white-yellow fruit about the size of a goose egg. So it looked like an egg, but was a plant…the Europeans were faced with a difficult task in naming this new specimen? The first name that they tried, plantegg, didn’t go over well, so the imaginative  Englishmen choose the ever-more creative eggplant. With the years, Americans kept this name, but our English cousins opted for the more "fancy" French trend of aubergine, originally from the Arabic al-badinjan. This difference in names reflects the differences in our historical stories and our rebellious American spirit. In England the French language enjoyed a high prestige as the official language in various sectors of society for centuries after the Norman Invasion (it actually remained the official language of the courts until 1731). Therefore, it is highly likely that the English choose the French aubergine over the creative and beautiful eggplant for reasons of prestige. However, for us Americans, prestige was found in doing exactly what the English weren’t doing or the opposite of whatever they were doing, and therefore we choose to go with the other word. If the English call it aubergine, no way we’re doing the same. God bless America and its eggplants!

            Although I love eggplants today, I honestly did not even begin trying to eat them until I was 23 years old, when I was living in Chicago and worked at a Lebanese restaurant. Lebanese cuisine is famous for its baba ghanoush, a delicious puree of roasted eggplant, made very similarly to hummus and DELICOUS. My lunches became baba and pita several times a week, and from this discovery that I liked the food, I branched  out a bit and came more in contact with the food. My travels in Sicily resulted in the most delicious bites of pasta alla norma (made with rigatoni, eggplant, ricotta salata, and red sauce), parmigiana (not the kind we think of, but something more like a layered casserole of fried eggplant, Emmenthaler cheese, and red sauce), and my personal favorite, grilled eggplant. These were all delicious, but I hold dear my first experience with eggplant in that taste of baba ghanoush, and today that is the recipe that I want to share, in addition to how to choose a good eggplant when buying it and how to prepare it for cooking.

            Finding a good eggplant and treating it correctly before cooking are the most important factors to creating a delicious dish. The eggplant is part of the nightshade family, which also includes the potato and tomato. Members of this family contain alkaloids, cousins of nicotine and morphine and which can be toxic when eaten in very large quantities, and the eggplant has the highest level of alkaloids in the family. Never fear, however! Unless you are planning on eating 36 raw eggplants at any time in your life (the amount you’d have to eat to get a harmful effect), you are safe! Alkaloids are found in the seeds and even if they aren’t going to kill you by eating one of the fruits, they do give a distinct bitterness that is often quite unpleasant. So, first thing when choosing an eggplant: avoid the unpleasant bitterness. Older eggplants are usually bigger, which means they have more seeds. Therefore, choose the younger, smaller ones. If you are faced with only large, old eggplants, consider the sex.  Eggplants are male and female, and can be distinguished as such by looking at the bottom end (away from the part where it was attached to the vine). Female eggplants, recognizable by the light brown, deeper oval indentation, have more seeds and therefore more alkaloids. Male eggplants, which have a shallow, round naval, contain less seeds and less bitterness. In addition to avoiding bitterness, it is important to choose a fresh and healthy eggplant. The skin should be firm without any wrinkles or pronounced imperfections. The stem at the top should have a clean cut and not be too dry (a dry stem means it was harvested a long time ago). The last thing to do is press on the skin, it should give a little but then spring right back to its original form.

            After choosing an eggplant, it is necessary to rid the fruit of its water, which carries a lot of the bitterness. This can be done in several ways: cut the eggplant into rounds or long pieces, place in a colander in the sink or on a cooling rack with a pan underneath, and salt heavily. This breaks down the cells and releases the water; leave the eggplant to drain for 2-3 hours (sometimes I even do more), and then rinse, squeeze, and pat dry. The other option, as is the case with baba ghanoush, is to roast the eggplant whole, peel the skin, and put the roasted meat in a strainer with a bowl underneath for 30 minutes. (Side note: I’m really emphasizing the importance of avoiding the bitterness because it really ruins the dish for me – if you’re into it, go for it! After all is said and done, it’s you who has to like your dish).

            As I ‘ve mentioned, today I will share the recipe of my first experience with eggplant: baba ghanoush. Baba ghanoush is a typical dish of Mideastern cuisine, particularly in the region that contains Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Israel, and Palestine. This puree is made with roasted eggplant and a paste of ground sesame seeds called tahini (found in Arabic specialty stores and increasingly in American groceries and markets). If you do not feel like putting tahini in the baba, you can try substituting a sesame oil (I might only do one tablespoon) or leaving it out all together. This food is traditionally served with pita, but can also be eaten on top of crostini for a twist on bruschetta or however else you choose to eat it.

Baba Ghanoush (adapted from Alton Brown’s Recipe)

1 eggplant

2 cloves of garlic

¼ cup fresh lemon juice (bottled has a much milder flavor, and this recipe needs the pop that you get from fresh lemon juice)

2 tablespoons of tahini paste

parsley

salt, pepper

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Poke holes with a fork in the eggplant and then place it on a cooling rack with a pan underneath it to catch any water that might escape and roast for 30-45 minutes. *If you do not poke holes in the eggplant to allow gases to release, it will explode, which might be cool to watch but much less so to clean.*   

When the eggplant looks a little shriveled, take it out and let cool for 15 minutes. 

Then, remove the skin and place the meat in a colander over a bowl and let drain for 30 minutes (throw away the alkaloid-laden liquid at the bottom). 

Place the pulp, garlic, lemon juice, and tahini in a food processor or blender and mix. Salt and pepper to taste – if the baba is still too bitter, you can always add a bit of honey or sugar to balance the flavors. To finish, add parsley and lightly pulse to give the leaves a few chops. 

Serve cold or at room temperature with pita or anything else you desire.

What's in a Name?

            One thing I love about America is its diversity. We are founded on the idea people are from different places, have different backgrounds, speak different languages, and follow different cultural traditions. We are founded on these and we cling to them. Growing up, my friends and I constantly compared stories of what our families did at home; my Russian friend recalled stories of a quiet game involving a story about a dead cat, my Bosnian friends brought in baklava on school Food Days, and I proudly compared differences between my Catholic upbringing and that of my protestant friends. I took the fact that people come from different cultures as a general assumption of life…but maybe that’s not always so.

            While I was recently teaching my students from Saudi Arabia and China, a question popped in my head: Do people ask others how to spell and pronounce their names in other countries in the sense that is a standard, regular question?  America’s being used to and appreciation of various languages and cultures is a rarity in the grand scheme of the world’s cultures. You can tell an Italian name, a Spanish name, an Chinese name, or an Arabic name by just looking at it, and most of the indigenous people in said countries carry names that show so. An American name, however, can be deceiving in the fact that you can’t look at it and say it’s American. You can have an American who knows no Spanish and never set foot in a Spanish country with a name of blatantly Spanish origin (take my sister’s half-Swedish boyfriend with a Mexican last name…his family goes back to Spanish conquistadors), or one with Indian, Asian, Irish, or any origin.  How cool is it that our diverse uniqueness is present not only in the fact that there is not one stereotypical “American” color or physical features (such as dark African skin, Arabic almond eyes or large Italian nose) that peg us as American, but also that there is no one type of name. Our demarcation is the fact that we are different.

Food Tourism and Nonna's Swordfish Recipe

          I love to travel (let’s be honest – who doesn’t?) - I love to visit new cities and countries, to see new things. But when I go to a new place, I don’t get excited to go to the museums. I don’t wake up in anticipation of visiting the monuments or seeing the shows or the important buildings (this being exemplified when I was in Paris and spent an hour at the Louvre - I know, I know, I’m sorry). I am the one that walks aimlessly through the city, with her eyes on everything but what’s in front of her, taking in the people, the smells, and the sounds. I walk miles, observing those around me, seeking out the markets or any place where I can find the actual inhabitants of the city and what they eat. I go on a not-always-fruitful (no pun intended) search for what everyday life in the city is, of which food plays a starring role. I eat. And I try as much as I can –because I believe that a culture manifests itself in its food and its traditions surrounding the food. For me, eating, particularly sharing the eating socially, is much more than nurturing your body. It can be a glimpse into another way of life in its purest form. In eating the typical dishes of another culture with those who are native of the culture, one sees the people doing one of most basic and human of few things. As I mentioned in my kitchen blog, the good and the bad is revealed through the act of eating and cooking. The same goes for at the table – people sharing meals together experience smiles, tears, heavy, life-changing discussions, jokes, and small talk. And they eat. In a traditional dish of a region, you are not only eating the cuisine insomuch as it is prepared, but you are eating the fruits of the earth of the place you are visiting - it’s indigenous plants and resources built the tradition cuisines that can still be found today. You sense and feel the region in every way at a traditional meal – you  smell the aromas of the food, feel the texture of the fruits of the earth and the labor, observe the culture, its people and its food, taste the flavors, and speak and listen to the sounds of cooking and your new friends.

       Eating the typical cuisine of a new city or place is a beautiful thing, but it has definitely not always come easily or without problems for me. Even if I love to try new things now, my passion for doing so began without a strong foundation or background in being exposed to new foods. I have been one of the fortunate people to have grown up and lived in the same house in the same city until I left for college. This consistency was an enormous gift from my parents, considering most of my friends at least moved houses growing up. However, my experience also meant that I also pretty much ate the same food for the first 18 years of my life. This food consisted of southern cuisine (so super grateful for the fact that I grew up with good Southern food), the occasional dish from my Italian-American heritage, and the wildly popular packaged and frozen food of the ‘80’s and ‘90s. I didn’t know what sushi was until a friend introduced me to it in high school; I had never eaten hummus until I went to college; and despite my Italian roots, I didn’t know what gnocchi were until my grandma made them out of leftover mashed potatoes when I was 14. Basically, I didn’t have a large scope of knowledge of cultural food or different kinds of cuisines.

         The first time I really traveled and ate was when I was 16. My family went on the proverbial American road trip – something that I am constantly asked about by my foreign friends and students - to explore the west. We bought a new van (more like a house on wheels, complete with two TVs, a Nintendo, and a backseat that folded into a bed), packed our bags, and then drove around the US for five weeks, from Georgia to California to Colorado and back through Tennessee. During this time I was able to taste America in the beef brisket of Texas, sopapillas at the Hillside Taco Stand in Winslow Arizona, and real Chinese food in San Francisco's China Town. While on the trip, I kept a diary with the intention of detailing the things and places we’d seen, but when I return to my writings I realize they are full of long descriptions of the food I ate. The other things I saw, like the Grand Canyon, take a back seat with one quick mention, but the food fills pages. This is the point in my life that I pinpoint as when I became a “Food Tourist.”

         I wasn't a great food tourist at first. My first experience of Food Tourism in Italy was when I was in Rome, the second being that when I was in Bolzano doing research for my senior thesis. I ate decently on these trips, but was alone trying to discover the food. By being alone, I was was unable to discover the food with the guidance of a local and missing the insider’s scoop as well as the social aspect of the typical cuisine, and my experiences were nothing to write home about (with the exception of the one time I visited my Italian family in Turin and write 7 pages about our meal – it still remains the favorite meal I’ve ever had). 

          In 2009, however, we visited my boyfriend’s family in Catania, Sicily. During this trip, I was finally able to truly discover an Italian city through food. I was so excited to go, and had asked my boyfriends hundreds of questions in preparation: What is that thing like gelato, but more like Italian ice? (Granita) It’s not like shaved ice, is it? Because I don’t like shaved ice. (Just try it.) Now let me get this straight. The lunches are 4-5 courses? What all do you eat during that time? Don’t you run out of different kinds of dishes? How do you eat it all? Etcetera, etcetera. One day I found that one of his grandmother’s specialties was octopus. During this time, I enjoyed a good fried calamari, but stayed away from the tentacles, which massively grossed me out. I was against the idea of eating tentacles, but my fear of being rude by not eating something I was served in an Italian house, specifically that of my boyfriend’s grandmother the first time I met her, won. I began practicing, first by ordering fried calamari and considering eating the tentacles, then by eating one or two, then by eating equal parts, then by eating grilled calamari, which became preferring the tentacles. I'm proud of my hard work in conditioning my taste buds to be open to new flavors. I can now say that not only did I eat the octopus, caught that day, boiled in seawater, and served with parsley and lemon, but it was my favorite dish and remains for me the dish in which I taste the essence of Catania. It isn’t just the fact that the octopus was delicious; the dish is the manifestation of the experience that summer - the sea that I swam in, the people I ate it with, and the memories we created together.

         Every once in a while, I long to revisit my experience in Sicily and turn to the food that I ate there. Unfortunately, it hasn’t been easy to find octopus in Ohio and even we I were to find our eight-legged friend, I’m not sure it would be completely…fresh. Therefore, we often skip the octopus and make another Nonna specialty – swordfish (pesce spada). This is actually the my boyfriend's favorite dish and was part of our first lunch in Sicily. The fish is simply cooked in a frying pan and finished with olive oil, parsley, and lemon. We make it whenever we find beautiful swordfish at the market or Whole Foods (shiny, not dried out, white/light pink in color), and I have even tweaked the recipe to depend less on oil for cooking while maintaining the moisture of the fish. In this blog, I’d like to present to you my version of Pesce Spada alla Nonna.

Pesce Spada alla Nonna (for 2-3 people depending on how hungry you are)

1 pound swordfish (in comparison to the thin cuts of the fish in Italy, the US cuts the steaks very thick, so this weight might just be one filet – cook whatever pieces you do get whole to maintain the integrity of the fish while its cooking and then cut into desired portions)

water

juice of one lemon

parsley (fresh or dried – in Sicily she used fresh, but I don’t always have it on hand)

salt, pepper,

olive oil or cooking spray

            Salt and pepper the fish on both sides. Spray a frying pan with cooking spray or put 1-2 tablespoons of olive oil in the pan and heat to medium-high. When the pan is hot, place the fish in and let cook until it begins to brown (the length of cooking depends on the thickness of the fish – if you have one piece, it might be 2-3 minutes, thinner pieces will cook faster). Once the fish is browned on one side, flip it and allow to brown on the other side.  Then put 2-3 tablespoons of water into the pan and  cover – let the fish steam for 2 minutes and then remove the cover to allow the water to evaporate (1 minute) and maintain the crust on the outside. Flip fish and repeat. Check doneness – a finished fish will be white the whole way through, and flake away easily, but still look moist. If the fish is not done, repeat with the water. As soon as the fish is cooked (be careful not to overcook!), place on a plate and dress with lemon juice and parsley. You  may also finish with oil if you’d like – I personally don’t because the fattier juices of the fish mix with the lemon juice for what I consider a perfect sauce. 

This recipe is a trial and error based on the thickness of the filet - if you have any questions or confused email or comment and I'll steer you in the right direction! 

Read the Italian version here!

Espanol poro dummies-o! O Spangolo peres stupides

Yesterday, like any other day on my hour and a half drive home, I was listening to my usual Italian radio food and wine podcast. This podcast is right up my alley - it talks about a variety of topics topics, from how to taste wine to genetically engineered food to the dangers of aspartame to suggested foods to detox after the holidays. I get a lot out of these listenings and learn useful and useless facts like Stevia is 300 times sweeter than sugar and aunts can carry up to 50 times their body weight. Often, however, listening to a radio show in another language and culture reveals to me another set of assumptions about the world that is different than mine. It never ceases to amaze me that so much that we consider "truths" are actually just reflections of our world view - and how that is reflected in language.
Yesterday the podcast was about Guatemalan rum. The hosts, who were interviewing a woman who did not speak Italian from Guatemala about her production of the sweet liquor, began the podcast with the usual simple Spanish. Hola! Bienvenido a Decanter! After a bit of the general Spanish welcome, one of the hosts (who could at least speak Spanish proficiently enough to translate the guests responses into Italian) commented on the Italian way of attempting to speak Spanish. He said something along the lines of Come on, let's not do like the Italians always do by just adding -s at the end of the words to speak "Spanish". This comment was taken lightly by the other host and the show continued on, but for me it raised a red flag. What? I thought to myself.  Add an -s? This statement, presented as a truth, was not a truth for me. In the US, I'm accustomed to hearing people speaking "Spanglish" (which can at times be quite offensive) by adding an -o at the end of words - Why-o don't-o you-o comprehendo?  If someone came up to me and said Whyes don'tes youes understandes?, I would be confused why this person was making everything plural, but not the fact that they were speaking made up Spanish would not even cross my mind. How interesting - another instance of culture and language's inseparable connection - a world view reflected in a linguistic element.
Small revelations like this make me realize how much the world's citizens would benefit from truly learning another language. By this I do not mean just studying its grammar and structural application, but how the language is used by its people - its' pragmatic elements, its culture, its living, breathing reality. If languages classes were like this, or if people took learning language like this, or if people just even understood this, maybe we would have less cultural misunderstandings. Less people might harbor hatred for those who are different. Maybe we would have less wars. It's a lofty vision to think that world peace can come from one person learning language, but as we say in English, you've got to start somewhere.

Kitchens: The New Living Room

            “Kitchens are the new living rooms.” These words, written in an interview with Rossana Orlandi on the last page of the magazine La Cucina Italiana, stopped me as I read them. I had reached the point at which I quickly skim through the last few pages of a magazine because I’ve already been reading for at least an hour. I’m a little tired of reading but won’t allow myself to put the magazine down without having flipped through every page and at least glanced at every article. (I’m one of those people who have trouble leaving things unfinished).  Anyway, I was not being super attentive of the words – I don’t even remember the other questions or subjects of the interview – but with these six words I hit the breaks on my speed reading. “Kitchens are the new living rooms.” I’ve said the word living room a thousand times in my life, but seldom reflected on the meaning of the term. Living room…a place in which you live; not in which you sit or stay, but live. And for me, my kitchen is the place in which I live. I probably spend more time in the kitchen than the living room (which in our apartment is kind of connected to everything else and consists of a designated area with a TV, a sofa, a loveseat, and an ottoman).  When I host people, we usually spend our time together in the kitchen preparing food, chatting, and eating until the main meal, which is at the kitchen table (again, in a small apartment you don’t always have the luxury of separate rooms for cooking and  eating).  In addition, our American kitchens these days, even some of those in apartments, are decently large and may even rival the size of the living room. The kitchen: the new living room - a room in which we live.

            My boyfriend and I love to cook and to eat. We plan our meals like old Italian grandmothers. I wake up and think about food: What will I eat for breakfast? Lunch? Dinner? What should I get ready or prepare now? One of our favorite things to do is go grocery shopping together. I love to create and to share my food, and when I am at home, cooking is a de-stress, relaxing activity for me. Our kitchen is pretty nice for an apartment – we have a good-sized refrigerator, a microwave, oven, ample counterspace, and even an island on which are located the sink and dishwasher (this is what sealed the deal when we were apartment hunting). In sum, it’s relatively spacious and comfortable. However, when there are two cooks (aka both of us) in our kitchen, all of that space suddenly shrinks.

            There are some couples that are capable of cooking together. Not standing in the kitchen together while one cooks, but really cooking together. Sweetly passing each other another spoon to mix the sauce that they have both contributed to creating while saying Here you go, dear and Thanks, honey, giving each other a kiss and a smile while cooking harmoniously.  They joke lightheartedly and at the end of their labors produce a beautiful meal made of bubbly, happy love (or something like that). I have friends like this, usually both of them are shy or quiet people who work together well and happily. When I visit these friends, I watch them in awe. How do they do it? We, both extroverts with Italian origins, are less than tranquil in our food-creating abode. Our kitchen, instead of a pleasant scene of picturesque love,  becomes a bit of a battlefield when we cook together. He is always fixed on the task at hand, moving from left to right, up and down, capable of being in every corner at every counter at once. I am always blocking his way, and he tells me so. I, on the other hand, am small, but agile and fiery, and I like to cook exactly how I like to cook. When we cook together, I am always over his shoulder, criticizing, asking, You sure you want to do it like that? Really? or  So…you’re going to also put  (insert any ingredient that I like more than he does – garlic, for example - here) in the dish, aren’t you? And bless your poor little heart if you cut the onions wrong or touch my frying pan when it’s cooking something. He is also the first to put his “touch” on food – flipping the contents of the frying pan, cutting the onions how he sees fit, or putting an extra spice that I don’t want in the food. The only thing that we have found that we are able to cook together is pizza. He makes and rolls the dough, I get the toppings ready. Then we each dress our own pizzas, not even considering touching the other’s.

            Easter this year was no exception to this phenomenon. My parents drove from Atlanta and my sister traveled from South Bend to join us in Cincinnati for the occasion: we were 9 total that weekend with my boyfriend, his family, my family, and two of our friends. Friday we cooked at our apartment…actually, our agreement was that I would cook at our apartment while he set the table. (See? It’s not that we aren’t a good team!) The next day, we had our big Easter meal at his parent's house. He was the chef, making his famous oven-baked macaroni and cheese, beef roast, and salad. My only job was to do the asparagus and cut the bread.  I prepared the vegetables, cutting them and placing them in a pan with dressing while making sure to stay out of his area of the kitchen, but the oven was completely full with his concoctions. I assessed the situation. After realizing what asking for space and a different temperature in the oven might entail, I asked anyway. He, running from the roast to the boiling water with the macaroni, responded with frustration, “There are too many cooks in the kitchen…too many cooks in the kitchen!” (At this point I would like to remind you that we were the only ones in his parent’s kitchen, whose size rivals that of all of the living space in my apartment combined.) My bad – I should have known better. I smiled to myself – nothing changes even with the holidays – and I left to sit with my family…in the living room.

            In reality, I think that our kitchen really is the room in which live. We cook, eat, fight when someone cuts an onion incorrectly, cry when we discover the pizza crust was made with rice flour and disintegrates when we try to flip it, and even laugh and embrace. Our kitchen holds for us opportunity to feel all emotions and experience life in many ways. It is our own “Living Room.”

            Today, I’d like to share with everyone the recipe that my boyfriend made for our Easter roast. He is the expert when it comes to meat slowly cooking in the oven, and this tender, succulent beef roast is one of the best I’ve had. He forwarded me an email with the recipe that he sent to a friend after the friend tried this bit of deliciousness, and instead of putting my own touch on it by changing it, I’ll share it to you just like he describes.
(to read the Italian version of this blog at Faccio Tutto da Solo, click here!)
 

Best Pot Roast Email

So.

I had the butcher show me the roasts he had then cut off a section of
the rib eye roast he had with the ribs tied on. (about a lb per
person)

set the oven to 450 F

in the pan cut up mixed fingerling potatoes - I like the gold, purple,
and red ones (gives color to the dish), some carrots, and if you like
some celery

take the roast and pat it dry

cut off some extra of the top fat and season it with salt, pepper, and
your favorite seasoning (mine is my secret but others work great too)

put the roast in the pan over the cut veggies and drizzle with olive oil

bake in the 450 over for 15-25 min till its getting nice and brown
then drop the heat down to 325 and bake (time depends on the roast's
weight, mine was 7.5 lbs so it took about 2 hours)

baste the roast every once in a while and rotate the pan every 30
minutes so it cooks evenly

when the times done take it out of the pan and let it sit for at least
5-10 min with tin foil over it

take the veggies out put on a plate or serving dish in the mean time

carve the roast and enjoy alone (its plenty juicy) or with horseradish
or mustard...there u go

 

Okay I lied – but I gave it my best shot - I’m going to append this recipe by sharing the internal temperatures and times that you should cook a roast for medium rare/medium/well, so that you can check the doneness to your liking with your meat thermometer.

Medium Rare: 145°F (63°C)
Medium: 160°F (71°C)
Well Done: 170°F (77°C)

A Love Affair with Pane...and How to Make Good Crusty Bread

                  When the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie…that’s a PANE! Bells'll ring Ting-a-ling-a-ling, Ting-a-ling-a-ling…that’s a PANEEEEE! I sing this song as I dance, twirling, through my kitchen. No, I have not fallen in love with a boy named “Pane.” I am singing this song because I sing it every time I make fresh bread – I become super excited while the bread is still in the oven but almost ready, and I sing. Sounds crazy, but you do crazy things when you’re in love. And I’m in love with delicious, crusty bread.

                  I haven't always been this way. I didn't even know about fresh, crusty Italian bread until I was 20 years old. I began on my bread path when I was a child and fell in love with the typical Southern breads such as cornbread and biscuits. By the way, to this day there is little I wouldn't do for a fresh, homemade biscuit, served next to a veggie omelet or with some strawberry jam or honey. (If you all could please excuse me, I have to take a moment to recompose myself after thinking about the deliciousness of the homemade Georgia biscuit). Anyway, this post is not a post about biscuits, so let's leave that to its own deserving post another day.

                  The cuisine of the southeastern US doesn't reflect a great amount of Italian influence; thus, it can be difficult to eat authentic Italian food, whether it be from the supermarket or at restaurants. In addition, when I was little, my Italian-American mom didn't make homemade bread because she was working full-time kicking butt and taking names as a lawyer. Because of these two factors, the tradition of crusty Italian bread was not present in my childhood world at home or in restaurants. Any "crusty" bread that I had the opportunity to eat was usually previously frozen, soft after being reheated, covered in butter and garlic powder, served during spaghetti night at our house or with Olive Garden's spaghetti and meatballs (fun fact: this dish doesn't actually exist in Italian cuisine - it doesn't make sense to match a chunky sauce with delicate, small noodles - the size of the noodles always goes with the size of the sauce). I didn't know that this bread would not be considered "delicious" in Italy. I ate it voluntarily - there aren't many things that I don't eat voluntarily - but the bread was never anything special. Then, when I was 20, I visited Italy for the first time and everything changed.

                  The year was 2006, and I was a student studying abroad at John Cabot University in Trastevere, Rome. Before the fall of that year, I had never been outside of the United States. Stepping out of the airplane for me was entering into another world. I walked around the city for my first few days unable to shut my jaw... I couldn't believe that these people lived there lives in another language, walking around, living within 2000-year-old ruins e nun se ne po’ frega de meno! (FYI: Roman dialect for they don't give a damn! - it's a super useful phrase in Italy, as Italians usually don't...give a damn that is.) The first day in Rome was a blur of hunger and exhaustion. I hadn't slept well on the airplane because I was so excited and when we arrived in Italy, I didn't have time to grab a bite at the airport. My first opportunity to go in search of food was mid-afternoon when we arrived at our apartments. I remember vividly descending the spiral stairs of my new home, and blindly turning right out of my building. What luck!, I thought, A bread shop right next to my building! (At that point I was unaware of the fact that it impossible to go 100 feet in Rome without finding some place to eat or drink something.) I entered the building - scared to death of speaking the language, but my hunger won over my fear and I asked for some bread. Quale tipo? (What kind?), the woman answered me. There are kinds? I thought to myself, and murmured, Ummm non lo so. Ho fame. Non ho ancora mangiato pranzo (Ummm, I don't know. I haven't eaten lunch).  The woman smiled, and without asking me, prepared my lunch. Spero che a Lei piaccia (I hope you like it), she said, passing me something wrapped in white paper.  Mille grazie, I thanked her, leaving the store. Once on the street, I hastily opened the paper hiding a crusty roll with some sort of spread. I took my first bite of bread and Nutella and died of happiness there on the street. Luckily it was not a crowded street, and after having resurrected from this death of joy, I gathered myself and reentered the bread shop to thank the woman. Buono! Grazie - buono! Grazie – mille grazie – che buono! I exclaimed, almost bursting from joy. In this moment, my love story with bread had begun: it had me.

                  I returned to the United States in January of 2007. There are bread stores here that make very good bread, but not very many in Georgia or at Notre Dame, where I was a student. And even if there were amazing bread places close to me, a good loaf of bread here is costly, and as a poor student, I was desperate. I began looking for a recipe that could resemble the bread I had eaten in Italy. After three years of trial and error, I was finally able to find a recipe that doesn't take much manual labor, but does need preparation a day in advance. I hope to share it with any of you that might miss good crusty bread or any of you that might want to try good crusty bread. Although it might not be made in a forno al legno in Italy, my family and I think it does the trick… and it goes great with Nutella.

                  I will leave you all with my new motto, taken from my Piemontese origins: Ol pà l’istofa mai!! (One never gets tired of [good] bread!!)

Crusty Bread
1.5 cups warm water
1 tbsp yeast
pinch of salt sugar
3 or more cups of flour

Metal pot with lid.

Mix flour, yeast, salt, and warm water in a large bowl (I usually use glass). The dough should be wet and sticky. Cover dough with plastic wrap and let rise for 18-22 hours (I have found that warm means somewhere between 74-85 degrees). After letting the bread rise for 18-22 hours, pour the dough out onto a floured surface. Dust the top with flour and shape into a flat “ball”. Cover again with plastic wrap and let rise for another two hours. During this time, preheat the oven to 450 and put the pot and lid into the oven.  After the dough has risen for the second time, spray the pot with Pam and move the dough into the pot (this will not be easy but since the dough is so sticky and soft it will reform to the shape of the pot once cooking). Cook for 20-25 minutes with the lid on and 15-20 minutes with the lid off until the bread is the brownness and crustiness you desire.

Y'all Don't Know What You're Missin'

            One of my favorite Mitch Hedberg jokes goes like this: When I play the South, they say "y'all" in the South. They take out the "O" and the "U". So when I'm in the South I try to talk like that so people understand me. "Hello, can I have a bowl of chicken noodle s-p? Come on, I'm in the South, you understand. I mean I'm in the S-th, and I want some s-p!" "I stubbed my toe, -ch!" "I need to lay down on the c-ch!" "I need to get the f*** -t of the S-th!" (Mitch All Together (2003), track 14, "Mitch in the S'th")

            Now, Mitch is not the only one that makes fun of my home region for its infamous “y’all”, and although I find this joke hilarious, I beg to differ. The South is often seen as backwards, years behind the industrial north, but in reality, it’s advanced. We have a word that solves English speakers’ pronoun problems; it functions on a higher level and finally answers that annoying question of how to pluralize “you” without being confusing, inaccurate, or sounding ridiculous. How many times have you tried to write something formal, be it an email, letter, or college paper, and struggled with the “you” plural? How many times have you incorrectly addressed a group of men and women as “you guys”? The South has done it right.

            Other languages have already figured out that a specific word for multiple “you” makes sense. I remember discovering German’s ihr in high school and being ecstatic that we in Atlanta, Georgia were the ones doing things like other countries – we were the global ones. This discovery was affirmed with my study of the Italian language and my exposure to the Spanish language, French, and Arabic.

            Upon further reflection, especially during my study of linguistics, I realized that the South is not the only one with the plural “you.” My grandma’s Pittsburghese “youns”, “yinz,” and Northeastern “youz guys” have figured it out as well. This is fascinating, especially from a sociolinguistic standpoint. Maybe we as English speaker don’t have the plural you because in general, the American and English individualistic society focuses more on the individual. However, the plural has popped up in the places of the United States where community is historically very important (usually due to isolation or poverty): the immigrant communities of the Northeast and western Pennsylvania, Chicago, and the South. I argue continuously with my students and foreign friends that America does have a culture (to be diverse), and within that there are several strong cultures and proud communities, one of the most prevalent being that of the Southeast. Case in point: The South was one of the poorest and largest communities, and is also the best known (and most made fun of) for its y’all.

            Not only does it make linguistic sense, but it’s just more friendly. Someone says y’all and you (excuse me, y’all) feel warm, fuzzy, and a part of a welcoming group.  Who doesn’t watch Steel Magnolias and love the ladies and their sweet southern accents? And although in my opinion Paula Dean, bless her heart, overuses the phrase (not to mention butter) for marketing purposes, she still gives you that mamma/grandmamma feeling that you can only get from that word. “Yinz” doesn’t cultivate that same feeling in me, but I think if I were raised elsewhere it might.

             I hold a graduate degree in the Applied Linguistics and TESOL, and yet I refuse to let go of my y’all. In fact, I advocate that we all adopt a form of the plural you. Y'all don't know what you're missing. The freedom of being able to easily call a group of people by a pronoun that makes sense is liberating. Come on Standard English, catch up! You’ve got a whole region two steps ahead of you!

Have any of y’all had experiences with the plural you? What do you think?

Hosting, Being a Guest…and Brownies!

            After having lived in Europe during the fall of 2011, I moved to Cincinnati in January, hoping to establish a more permanent residence. This move came with the usual discovering of a new city and its people, but also included a bit of reverse culture shock as I re-acclimated to aspects of an American lifestyle.  I missed not having the time and option to go to fresh, local markets, but was easily able to make do with Cinci’s Jungle Jims and Findlay Market. Good crusty bread is harder to find, but does exist and tastes delicious when make the effort to locate it.  And although I walked everywhere in Rome, I quickly readjusted to the lifestyle of automobiles in America, and even took it one step further by adding an hour-long commute to and from my new job. However, I am still adjusting to on specific aspect of my fellow Americans, and finding it hard to do so.

            When did the rules of being a guest or a host change? Call me old-fashioned in my great age of 26, but it seems to me that the feeling of entitlement of my generation to have what you want, when you want it, how you want it, has superseded the need to be a good guest or host.  Let me explain. After moving to a new city, I feel the need to meet people. I’m a social person and not having friends does not sit well with me. So, I met a few people from my apartments and invited them to dinner. I soon found out that this experience was not going to be as easy as I had imagined.

            First, I had to take inventory of allergies and intolerances: How many lactose intolerant people? Anyone allergic to nuts? Do we have any celiacs in the crowd? Other strange allergies I don’t know about?  I can’t blame any of my guests for these. You can’t help your gluten intolerance and I can’t help the fact that cheese and my stomach are unfortunately not friends…and I’d like all of my guests to leave my house alive. However, Round 2 of planning gets a little more complicated: Is anyone a vegetarian? How about vegans? Are there any food taboos associated with the religions of my guests? Any other social or cultural restrictions I should know about?  Again, my American respect of individualism prohibits me from becoming too annoyed. Vegetarians should have the freedom to make a statement of principle and, being Catholic with its No Meat Fridays, I not only respect but empathize with those who cannot eat certain foods due to religious prohibitions.

            So I’m driving back to my apartment two days before my dinner, trying to configure a menu to accommodate the gluten-free guest, my cheese intolerance, the vegetarian, and the Muslim guest when I run into one of the invitees in the parking lot of our building. After exchanging small talk, I run my potential menu by him: bread, risotto with sun-dried tomatoes, vegetarian eggplant and zucchini moussaka with no meat and cheese only half of the dish (can be eaten as a side or entrée), and a roasted chicken. He cringes. My heart sinks. “Does that sound okay?” I ask.  “Well….I don’t really like eggplant,” he explains. Okay. So now we’re going to Level 3 of planning of a dinner: accommodating all of the specific food preferences of your guests? “No problem,” I say, “I’ll figure something else out.” I think of another dish all the way up the stairs – I need one filling enough for a vegetarian to eat, but that could also serve as a veggie side dish for the meat eaters of the group. I draw a blank and ultimately decide to tack a salad on the growing menu  so as to accommodate my new eggplant-hating friend.

            The next day I realize I should make a dessert. I have a great recipe for olive-oil lemon cake in one of my cookbooks; it’s different and still really good. I run this by a new apartment friend over drinks. She cringes. My heart sinks…again. “Ooooo, I don’t really like lemon,” she says. “No problem,” I respond, “ How about peanut butter fudge?” It’s fast, easy, and tasty, I think to myself. Take a guess at what happened next…her boyfriend is allergic to nuts. At this point my brain is exhausted and I don’t even feel like cooking anything, and then I throw out my last attempt, “What about brownies?” Her eyes light up, “We love brownies!!” BINGO. I should have gone there first... American can resist the brownie.

            What ever happened to eating what the hosts cooks? When did inviting people to dinner turn into the host being a personal chef for multiple guest, commissioned to appease the tastes and restrictions of each individual? I can’t say that I’m not guilty of imposing my no-cheese or cream restriction on my host, but I am a little surprised at the detailed explanations of “can’t do” foods that I am given by guests.

            In the end, the dinner turned out well – we had a nice showing of 5 people plus us with - this is not a joke - a vegetarian, a no-pork eater, ca eliac, and a no-cheese eater. I cooked all day and presented a buffet of food for the guests to choose from. Some guests ate a little of this or that, and the three non-restricted ate a little of all of the plates. The only food that no one passed up was the brownies. I said goodbye to the last guest, mentally exhausted.

          As I sat on the couch after everyone had left, I reflected on the night. All of my efforts rendered me with two vital conclusions: 1)These days, it’s better to go out to eat with new friends, and 2) You can’t wrong with the food that no American can resist…the brownie.

            I found the recipe for the brownies at www.browniepower.com (check it out – this is the place to go if you love your brownies), and I adapted it for the ingredients that I had on hand. These brownies were some of the best that I have had, and can’t steer you wrong if you’re ever a host or a guest…or if you have a little chocolate craving yourself.

Fudgy Brownies

½ cup white sugar

2 tablespoons unsalted butter

2 tablespoons water

½ cup semisweet chocolate chips

1 cup dark chocolate chunks

2 eggs

½ teaspoon vanilla extract

⅓cup all-purpose flour

½ tsp baking soda

¼ teaspoon salt

            Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Place sugar and water in saucepan and heat on medium low until sugar is melted. Add butter, stirring continuously – do not boil or the mixture will be too hot to add the eggs without them cooking. Remove from heat and let cool for one minute. Add chocolate chips and dark chocolate to the sugar, butter, and water mixture. Add the eggs, one at a time, and then the vanilla extract. Place baking soda, flour, and salt into a sifter and sift into chocolate mixture (stir once or twice while adding). Finish stirring just until mixed and pour into a greased 8x8 pan. Bake for 25-30 minutes or until a knife or toothpick comes out clean.

**Marti’s side note: these are also delicious half-baked after 20 minutes with some sort of cold milky (or fake milky if you don’t do cream…) treat.