Insalata Russa

This caloric bomb hardly counts as a salad, but "Russian Salad" is an antipasto staple, and frequently comes out at Christmas lunch with the Nonna Angela.

Boiled potatoes, carrots, peas, chopped prosciutto cotto (ham), and a jar of pickled mixed vegetables are tossed in an abundance of mayonnaise, and served along side sliced meats, cheeses, olives, mushrooms, and crunchy grissini. It can also be plopped into the middle of a large slice of prosciutto cotto and rolled up.

It's snowing in Sicily!

 

Ok, you may not be able to see it too well, but if you zoom in on the darker parts of the picture you'll see dust like flakes of snow. 

It only lasted a few minutes (the sun came out a second later, and the snowy cloud drifted away) and it didn't even make it to the ground before it turned into rain, but I can't tell you how excited these few ice crystals made me.

But to give you a vague impression of my behavior, imagine a maniac dancing on a balcony in big fluffy green pajamas, squealing with delight.

It's no white Christmas, but I'll take what I can get.

Crik, crok, and how to say "ow!" in Italian

One of the things that perplexed me when I first moved to Italy, is that not even sounds are quite the same. When I say "sounds" I mean those instinctive expressions of surprise, pain, or happiness that I had thought would be international.

The Italian word for "booboo" might be "bua", but I expected that any kid who suffered a minor hurt would still shout out "ow!" or "ouch!" regardless of culture or language. To me the verbal response to pain shouldn't be a voluntary reaction.

But, as I discover more and more frequently here, I was wrong. (Switching cultures is one of life's more humbling experiences.)

Gucciarduni

Gucciarduni, a.k.a. "sweet-goodness-that-I-never-want-to-know-the-nutritional-information-for".

A common pastry made in Sommatino, near Caltanissetta, which is why I really cannot fathom why I'm only finding out about them NOW after living here for three years.

In short: Cakey shortbread filled with sweet ricotta, baked, rolled in honey and toasted almonds, and dusted with powdered sugar.

 Result: crumbs and powdered sugar all over my face as I try to suppress moans of indecent enthusiasm.

Biscotti di San Martino

Ok, technically Saint Martin was this past Sunday, November 11th, and I did really want to post about these cookies then, but I only remembered on the actual day. I desperately wanted a picture, because the elaborate shapes are 50% of what makes Saint Martin Cookies so special, but naturally no self-respecting panificio in Italy would dare be open on a Sunday.

So I planned on going straight to the panificio on Monday and writing about them then... but they are so darn popular that they were already sold out. Then yesterday we caved into the ever present temptation that is the pizzeria and didn't go to the panificio at all... which brings us to today. Wednesday. Three days late. I'm sorry.

Io & Marilyn

As I have said before, one of the great tragedies of American cinema is how few Italian films are ever translated or at least subtitled. So I don't know how many of the films I recommend you will actually be able to watch. But even if it isn't available in English, watching them in Italian with Italian subtitles can also be a very valuable language learning tool. So even if you're not entirely sure what they're talking about, give it a shot anyway. It might give you a better appreciation for body language, which, luckily, the Italians use plenty of!

My first recommendation was actually on TV here last night, Io & Marilyn. Which I'm sure nearly everyone can guess means "Me & Marilyn".

Things you don't realize you need until you're in Italy

1. Mac&Cheese (I know, I know. The pasta looks like wet cardboard, and the "cheese" is about as unnatural as you can get. Still, there's something about that uniquely fluorescent orange macaroni that I can't resist. Sometimes you just need something cheesy and instant. I do like adding parmigiano grattugiato to it though, to dress it up a bit.)  

Il Campo, football fields

This is a typical example of a well maintained football field in Sicily. Indeed, this is AmoreMio's favourite field, and he claims it is the best he's ever played on. His 4 reasons for this are:

1. It's well lit. His team last year couldn't afford to repair the lights at the far end of the field, so all evening practices had to be restricted to the 20 meter radius of light provided by the remaining lamp (about a third of the field).

Ricotta

Ricotta is an Italian staple used in everything from egg frittata and various pasta dishes, to cakes and cannoli.

Though considered a cheese, it is actually made from the remaining whey of the cheese making process. Similar to cottage cheese, it is surprisingly low in fat and has a distinctive curdled texture.

Cannoli

In Sicily, no Sunday lunch is complete without a few of these decadent, happiness-stuffed, pastries.

Why are they so popular?

Maybe it's the crunch of the fried pastry tube.

Perhaps the sinfully rich ricotta filling that gushes from both sides.

Or the colorful flourish of dipping the ends into crushed pistachio.

No, it is indeed the genius of combining all three of these elements that make it one of the most popular sweets in Sicily... my apologies to Gelato.

Pasta con la ricotta

Pasta with Ricotta is one of my favorite Italian lunches. It’s fast, easy, and surprisingly healthy for a “cheesy pasta”.

Ingredients

250g pasta ditalini (short tubes, can be substituted with macaroni) Salt (for boiling the pasta)
250g ricotta (preferably fresh)
Peperoncino and black pepper to taste

La messa dei morti

Last Wednesday marked the sixth anniversary of Nonno Gaetano's death. However, to make sure everyone would be available, the Nonna Angela decided to wait until this weekend to have the memorial mass.

Catholic mass is held daily in the evenings, but with an offering (typically about €10) you can ask the priest to mention your beloved's name during the service.

I Cachi

Cachi (kah-key) or "Japanese Persimmons" are a popular fall fruit in Sicily (though you can hardly consider daily temperatures of 25 degrees C as your typical autumn weather... Even the Sicilians are starting to get tired of the heat).

To me they look like psychedelic tomatoes, more of a florescent pinkish orange rather than red. The taste isn't bad either... but I just can't get past the texture.

We are the negatives that don't do anything...

... we just stay at home and lay around. Sorry couldn't resist. I still nurse a soft spot for Veggie Tales

It seemed appropriate for this blog though, because this frustrating example of the Italian negative really does nothing. It serves no purpose whatsoever that I have been able to discover.

It started when I was paging through a cookbook and found this: "Unite i funghi e cuoceteli per 10 minuti, finche' non sono dorati". Literally translated this would mean "Mix the mushrooms and cook them for 10 minutes, until they are NOT golden."

The first time I read this phrase I was utterly bewildered. What do you mean "until it's not golden"? Should I not actually cook it at all? Or leave it in the oven until just before it starts to color? In which case, how am I supposed to tell when it's seconds away from coloring?

Insalata di Rucola e Bresaola

This is cugina Laura's recipe for Rucola salad. AmoreMio typically avoids any kind of leafy green like the plague (he even goes so far as to pick out the bits of basil in his tomato sauce), and Rucola is right up there on his list of "I'll eat mud first".

However the lemon juice balances out the bitter taste of the greens in this salad, and even Mr. Picky was able to force down a large portion (made easier by the fact that I gave his plate an extra helping of bresaola).

Corvo Duetto Rosso

Corvo is easily my favorite line of Sicilian wines, especially their Glicine white, which was until recently my all time favorite wine.

Lately however, I have found my tastes straying more confidently into the realm of strong red wines, and I believe that the new Duetto outstrips any red wine I have ever tasted.

True, my sadly limited experience of wine has been restricted to the cheaper end of the scales, but that's what makes it so awesome. Great taste for just €5.99.

Duetto, as the name would indicate, is a combination of two wines: Frappato and Syrah. I assume this is achieved by mixing the two varieties of grapes before the wine making process. Or at least I hope. I'd feel a little stupid paying them just for pouring two wines into the same bottle.

San Michele Arcangelo di Caltanissetta

San Michele Arcangelo di Caltanissetta

September 29th celebrates Caltanissetta's patron Saint, Michael the Archangel.

Legend says that while plague swept through the rest of Europe in 1625, Caltanissetta managed to stay healthy thanks to it's relative isolation and carefully guarded walls. One day however, a priest watching from a window noticed a lone figure approaching the city gates. Either this window was very close to the gate or the priest had exceptional eyesight, because the priest immediately noticed that the newcomer was ridden with plague.

Panicked at the thought of what would happen if the disease reached the gates, the priest threw himself into fervent prayer. In answer, Michael the Archangel swooped down from heaven and killed the stranger on the spot.
 Despite the harshness of this story, Saint Michael has since been considered the city's God sent protector. I suppose that it was pretty much a mercy killing since the stranger was doomed to die a painful death anyway, and countless Nisseni might have died otherwise.

You know it's summer in Sicily when...

1. All joggers and dog walkers have to wake up no later than 6.30 in order to avoid heat stroke
2. There is no difference between the hot water and cold water tap.
3. Luke warm is the new "cold"
4. Melons and Peaches overflow the fruit stands
5. There's a sudden spike in the mortality rate among the elderly due to heat stroke. It would not surprise me if that is how I'm finished off in my old age.
6. You haven't stopped sweating since June 20th.
7. You buy three new dresses just to stave off the moment when you have to leave the air conditioned shops
8. Every time you get up from a chair you can feel your skin reluctantly peeling away from the seat with a sweaty slurping sound.
9. The southern beaches, typically considered the "cold" beaches because of the open sea current, now feel like warm bath water.
10. Every morning when you get up a wet ring marks the bed like the chalk outline of a corpse.
11. The city experiences rolling black outs due to all the air conditioners left on all evening.
12. You can cook a pot roast just by placing it next to your laptop's cooling vent. 
13. The high winds, far from refreshing, feel like God turned on the world's largest hair dryer.
14. You can taste the humidity in the air. It does not taste good.
15. The average nightly temperature is 90F/32C... which is high noon temperature where I come from.

Peperoni, not Pepperoni

The first thing nearly every tourist wants once they have landed in Italy is pizza, shortly followed by gelato. So after waiting for the notoriously late opening hour of restaurants, American tourists will rush into the nearest pizzeria and gaze happily upon an Italian pizza menu.

Hopefully this menu won't have a word of English on it. Because let's face it, if you want genuine Italian pizza uninfluenced by the monotony of globalism, it shouldn't be in a glammed up tourist trap where every waiter speaks perfect British English.

It should be in a hole-in-the-wall where the pizza oven takes up more room than the seating area, and the menus are half in Italian and half in incomprehensible dialect.

This is by far the best way to eat pizza in Italy... with one drawback. How to figure out what you're getting on your pizza.

Meal Times and the Starving Tourist

The first time I visited Italy with my family we repeatedly found ourselves waiting outside dark restaurants, our tummy's rumbling, trying to catch a glimpse of movement. A waiter, a light flickering on the in kitchens, a sign posting opening time... anything to indicate that we would soon be able to eat dinner. Usually we would be the first clients to rush in at 7:00pm, and eat most of our meal in solitude before other people finally started trickling in.

I should point out that it is unusual for a restaurant to open at 7:00 in most parts of Italy... in less touristy areas they usually wait until 8:00.

Dogs of Sicily

Italy, Sicily in particular, has a dirty secret. Everyone knows about the terrible traffic. The politics are the butts of jokes worldwide. Petty theft is mentioned in every guide book. The litter filled streets are eventually accepted as "normal".

But there is one thing I had been totally unprepared for, and it will never cease to bother me.

The dogs.

Dogs can be creepy smart...

Early evening, on the way to Nonna Michela's in Caltanissetta.

We're sitting at the intersection, waiting for the light to turn green as a small group of pedestrians pass in front of us. AmoreMio nudges me and points out the stray dog that has decided to cross in the wake of the pedestrians. (He knows I've got a weakness for anything that wags its tail.)

As we watch, the people continue on towards a shop, but the dog stops at the corner of the intersection and sits down with its back to us, vaguely watching the opposite corner.

The stray dogs in Sicily do this all the time, just take a break wherever they like. Tired? Just lie down... no matter if it's in the middle of the road. Cars will go around me.

I figured this one was just a bit wiser than the other dogs, and had decided to take his break on the sidewalk instead of in front of traffic.

I witness the psychological abuse of a Citroen

The car: Papa's Citroen c5, built low and wide for stability on the highway.

The street: about as wide as a motorbike... at least to my easily intimidated eye. To the eyes of Papa', who has years of experience battling the tiny streets, it's an opportunity to demonstrate the Italian ability to alter the laws of physics through shear will power.

The danger of figs

Mistakes are something anyone learning a new language must get used to... because they will happen a lot. And always in the worst way.

Take, for example, the unfortunate day when I decided to brush up on my fruit vocabulary at the dinner table with AmoreMio's family. His father was helping me name various items in the fruit bowl when I delved, rather recklessly, into the realm of figs. 

My sister's a P*ttana

It's beach season! Despite generous lathering of waterproof 50spf and keeping to the shade as much as possible, I still managed to get a bit pink. Don't judge until you've tried surviving a sunny day at 105+ degrees F (40+ C).

It was an especially fun day though because AmoreMio's cousin and her children were able to join us. (They don't live in Caltanissetta, so visits with them are relatively rare).

To top it off, her little 2-year-old boy made me feel better about some of the stupid mistakes I make in Italian.

Corsa dei Camerieri, The Waiter's Race

Though I don't usually follow the local news in Caltanissetta, today it caught my attention. The TV is usually left on whenever we eat lunch with AmoreMio's family, for background noise more than anything else, but everyone stopped eating and looked up when this scene suddenly appeared: dozens of waiters holding serving platters filled with glasses of water... running up and down one of the main streets of Caltanissetta.