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Overview
They are befriended by the mesmeric Barlozzo, a self-styled village chieftain. His fascinating stories lead de Blasi more deeply inside the soul of Tuscany. Together they visit sacred festivals and taste just-pressed olive oil, drizzled over roasted country bread, and squash blossoms, battered and deep-fried and sprayed with sea-salted water. In a cauldron set over a wood fire, they braise beans in red wine, and a stew of wild boar simmers overnight in the ashes of their hearth. Barlozzo shares his knowledge of Italian farming traditions, ancient health potions, and artisanal food makers, but he has secrets he doesn't share, and one of them concerns the beautiful Floriana, whose illness teaches Marlena that happiness is truly a choice.
Like the pleasurable tastes and textures of a fine meal, A Thousand Days in Tuscany is as satisfying as it is enticing. The author's own recipes are included.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781565125902 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill |
| Publication date: | 11/01/2004 |
| Sold by: | Hachette Digital, Inc. |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 337 |
| Sales rank: | 834,646 |
| File size: | 3 MB |
About the Author
An American chef and food and wine journalist, Marlena de Blasi has written five memoirs, a novel, and two books about the regional foods of Italy. She lives with her husband in the Umbrian hilltown of Orvieto. Her work has been translated into twenty-six languages.
Hometown:
Orvieto, a hilltown in UmbriaPlace of Birth:
Schenectady, New YorkEducation:
B.A., State University of New York at Albany; graduate studies in political science, New York UniversityRead an Excerpt
CHAPTER 1
The Gorgeous Things They're Cooking Are Zucchini Blossoms
The scent of them is enough to send up a short, sharp thrill in a hungry person. Seething hot beauties, they repose in a great unruly pile on the white linen. The yellow of the naked blossoms shows through the gilt sheaths of their crackling skin. Skin thin as Venetian glass, I think. But I'm far away from Venice. We live in Tuscany, now. As of this morning, we live in Tuscany. I say it breezily to myself as though it was all in a day's work. Yesterday, Venice. Today, San Casciano dei Bagni. And six hours after arrival, here I am already in a kitchen: in the small, steamy kitchen of the local bar, watching two white-hatted, blue-smocked cooks preparing antipasti for what seems to have become a village festival.
The gorgeous things they're cooking are zucchini blossoms, fat and velvety, almost as wide and long as lilies. And the frying dance is precise: drag a blossom quickly through the nearly liquid batter, let the excess drain back into the bowl, lay the blossom gently in the wide, low-hipped pot of hot, very hot shimmering oil. Another blossom and another. Twelve at a time in each of four pots. The blossoms are so light that, as a crust forms on one side, they bob about in the oil and turn themselves over and over until a skimmer is slid in to rescue them, to lay them for a moment on thick brown paper. The paper is then used as a sling to transport the blossoms to a linen-lined tray. One of the cooks fills a red glass bottle with warm sea-salted water. She fits a metal sprayer onto the bottle and, holding it at arm's length, spritzes the gold blossoms with the salty water. The hot skins hiss and the perfume of them is whipped up and out into the moist June breeze.
Pan-to-hand-to-mouth food, these are sustenance for the twelve-minute interval before supper, and so when the first hundred are ready, the cook, the one called Bice, hands me the tray and says, "Vai, go," without looking up. A kitchen directive from one colleague to another, from one chef to another, she says it with familiarity, as though we've worked together for years. But tonight I'm not the chef. I think I'm a guest — or am I the hostess? I'm not at all sure how this festival got started, but I'm happy it did.
Happy and still unwashed from the morning's journey, from the afternoon's work, I'm salty as the blossoms I offer to people, who take them without ceremony. The same familiarity is at work here as each one smiles or pats me on the shoulder, says, "Grazie, bella, thank you, beauty," as if I'd been passing them hot, crisp flowers all my life. I like this. For one moment it occurs that I might run with the basket to some dim corner of the piazza to devour the remaining blossoms myself, eyes half closed in a lusty swoon among the shadows. But I don't. Some can't wait until I reach them but come to me, take a flower while sipping wine or talking over their shoulders. People are collecting about me now, rooks swooping in for the things until nothing is left save errant crumbles, crunchy and still warm, which I press onto my finger and suck.
I move toward the edge of a small group that is complimenting the farmer from whose patch the lovelies were harvested this morning. He's saying he'll have more tomorrow, that he'll drop a bushelful off at Sergio's by seven if anyone desires a few. Here ensue three separate and simultaneous discourses on the best way to cook squash blossoms. To stuff or not to stuff them? To stuff them with mozzarella and a salt anchovy, to stuff them with a tiny slice of ricotta salata, to stuff them with fresh ricotta and a few leaves of basil, to blend the batter with beer or white wine, to add olive oil to the batter, to leave the oil out? And the biggest question of all — to fry the blossoms in peanut oil or extra virgin? Distracted by these contentions, I don't hear my name called out from across the short expanse of the piazza.
"Chou-Chou," says Bice, stamping her left foot exasperatedly in the doorway of the bar, her arms stretched out with another tray.
This time, careening through the crowd more nimbly, I dispatch the scorching flowers in record time. Though I've neither actually met nor been introduced to most of these people, all of them seem to know that Fernando and I have just moved into the Lucci place down the hill. This intelligence is but a first whiff of the mastery of the intravillage broadcasting system, activated, no doubt, by the small battalion of San Cascianesi who gathered in our driveway to welcome us earlier in the day. And one thing led to another, but still, how did a thank-you aperitivo turn into a supper party, and why am I holding so tightly to this empty tray?
We had left Venice behind in the pale purply hour of first light and followed four Albanians, variously piled into and piloting the big blue Gonrand truck that ported our every material asset. We're moving to Tuscany. Eleven kilometers from our destination, a team of spiffy, high-booted, automatic weapon–toting carabinieri invited our meager convoy to halt on the cusp of Route 321. We were detained and interrogated and searched for nearly two hours. Two of the four Albanians were arrested, aliens without papers. We told the military police that we were intending to move into one of the Luccis' farmhouses and that we needed all of the collected muscle and manpower to do so. They settled themselves in their van and talked on their radio. They stayed a very long time. They got out of the van and parleyed again, roadside.
Some say the carabinieri are selected for their physical beauty, that they represent the glory of the Italian state. Surely these do it honor, their dark brows and pale eyes an aesthetic diversion during the wait. At last one of the booted gentlemen said, "Fine, but it's our duty to accompany you." A much grander colonnade now, we inspired intrigue in the trickle of farm traffic we passed along the way until the big blue truck and the police van came to rest behind our old BMW in the back garden of the house. Let's get to work.
There had been a well-defined agreement with Signora Lucci that the house would be clean and that it would be empty. Neither is the case. As the clandestine Albanians begin to carry in our goods, I requisition the carabinieri to help me carry out the signora's tokens of welcome, all in the form of irrefutable junk. There are armoires with crushed-in doors and tables and chairs that, in order to stay upright, are cunningly leaned up against each other. There are six sets of bunk beds. We heave it all into the barn. In our bedroom, I'm dusting a handsome print of a cypress-lined lane framed in hammered copper. It swings on its wire hanger and behind it I find a wall safe. This house, this barely restored stable of a house, which has no central heating and no telephone and electrical wiring sufficient for a blind hermit, has a safe. Not the little hotel-room sort of safe, this is a grand, official-looking thing with two levels of knobs and a clock, and I call Fernando to come look at it.
"It's obviously new, something the Luccis installed during the renovation. I don't think it's meant for our use," says Fernando.
"But why would they need a safe here? Wouldn't one in their villa suffice? I think it must be for tenant use. Let's see if we can open it."
We fiddle with it, twirl and push at the knobs, until Fernando says, "It's locked, and without the combination, we'd never gain access. If we want to use it, we'll have to ask for the coordinates. Besides, what would we possibly put in it?" We each think for half a minute and begin laughing at our dearth of riches: documents tucked inside a whiskey-colored leather portfolio, a rosary that belonged to Fernando's grandmother, his father's pocket watch, my son's and daughter's birth bracelets, a few jewels.
"I'd put chocolate in it. Not just any kind of chocolate, but my stash of ninety-percent cacao. And my fifty-year-old balsamic vinegar," I say, but my plan is interrupted by one of the Albanians, the one who keeps moving boxes from room to room, seemingly at will. Once again, I tell him about the numbering system and then go back downstairs to see how the rest of the crew is faring. One of the carabinieri seems to be without a job, so I ask him to help me move anundesired sofa out to the barn. Fernando shoots me evil looks that say you can't just tell an Italian military policeman to hoist up one end of a molding brown velvet sofa that weighs two hundred kilos and pull it backward down a narrow, curving staircase while you push the other end with all your might, causing him to totter and lurch on the heels of his shiny black boots.
I remember my first sight of Fernando's apartment on the Lido. Scoured of all vanities, it was the lair of an ascetic, the mean hut of an acolyte. Savonarola could have lived there, all of it bespeaking reverence for a medieval patina, undisturbed by the passing of time or someone's riffling about with a dust cloth. This is already much easier.
By now, a small, trawling knot of townspeople has gathered in the garden, hands behind their backs or folded across their chests. After greeting them and introducing myself, saying how happy we are to be new San Cascianesi, I approach the only woman with hands on her hips. She looks ready to pitch in. I ask if she might recommend someone who would have time today to give us a hand. "Buongiorno, signora. Sono molto lieta di conoscerla. Good day, madam. I'm very honored to know you," I say, extending my hand to her.
"Il piacere è mio. Mi chiamo Floriana. The pleasure is mine. My name is Floriana."
"Ci serve un pò di aiuto. We could use a little help."
"Ci mancherebbe altro. It's the least we can do," she says, as though helping us was already her plan.
We have two new brooms, a plastic bucket, a squeeze mop, and at least one specimen of every gel and foam and spray and wax that promises pine-scented refuge from household dirt. This is a pittance. Our neighbors disappear and soon return with their own arms. Liter-size plastic bottles of pink alcohol, plastic bags full of what seem to be filthy rags, industrial-size mops and brooms.
Soon there are three window washers, a sweeper on each floor, with moppers at the ready. The restoration of the house had been completed less than a month before and the disorder is mostly cosmetic. In less than four hours, things have definitely improved. Windows sparkle, floors are somewhat cleaner, appliances are scrubbed, walls dusted, bathrooms shine. The carefully numbered boxes are piled in their correct rooms. Floriana snaps fresh, lace-trimmed burgundy sheets into place on our pale yellow wooden baldacchino, lately assembled by Fernando and the two carabinieri. And all the squad has had to sustain it were paper cups of warm Ferrarelle, imported from Venice.
Fernando and I conference and, since it's nearly six, we invite the crew to join us in the village at Bar Centrale for aperitivi. By this time, the policemen are in it for the long haul, demonstrating not a whit of rush to depart. Only the Albanians seem furtive, signaling escape routes with their eyes. The now-mellowed policemen let this play out, having already decided they'll be looking the other way when the crew drives off. We trudge up the hill into town, some of us walking, some of us riding, all of us exhausted and satisfied, each in his own way. We've had a barn raising, a quilting bee, and we've all earned our thirst and hunger.
Campari and soda gives way to white wine after which someone begins pouring red. And what better after bowls full of fleshy, salty black olives than a great heap of bruschette — bread roasted over wood, drenched in fine local oil, dusted in sea salt and devoured out of hand? Still, no one seems ready to say arrivederci.
More conferencing ensues, this time among Fernando and I and the two cooks, Bice and Monica, who work at the bar's restaurant. Our numbers have grown to seventeen. Can they feed us all? Rather than giving a simple yes or no, Monica reminds us that each of these seventeen people is related to at least one other person, and that all of them are expected home to either sup or cook within the next half hour. But I needn't have worried. Floriana, formerly with hands on hips, has taken over here just as she did back at the house. Some women scatter. Others move out onto the little terrace, push tables together and spread plastic cloths, set plates and silverware and glasses, plunk down great jugs of wine. More tables are unearthed from the cellars of the nearby city hall and soon the whole piazza is transformed into an alfresco dining room.
The fornaio, the baker, had been summoned and, like some sweat-glistened centaur, peaked white hat floured, bare knees poking up from his aproned lap, he pumps his bike up the hill into the village, alternately ringing his bell and blowing his horn. I watch him and the others and I think how so simple an affair can inspire their happiness.
He unloads rounds of bread big as wagon wheels from his saddle baskets, lays them on the table, stands back to admire them, telling us one was meant for the osteria in Piazze and the others for the folks in the castle up in Fighine. "Let them eat yesterday's bread," he says remounting, yelling over his shoulder to save three places for him at table. After brief raids on their own kitchens, fetching whatever it was they had prepared for their family supper, the scattered women reconverge at the bar. Their mothers and children and husbands in tow, they come toting pots and platters under an arm, a free hand tucking drifting wisps of hair under their kerchiefs. Like a gaggle of small birds, their high-pitched patter pierces the soft ending of the day. Flowered aprons tied — at all times of the day or evening, I would learn — over navy tube skirts, their feet slippered in pink terry-cloth, they move easily between their private spaces and the public domain of the piazza. Both belong to them.
A man they call Barlozzo appears to be the village chieftain, walking as he does up and down the tables, setting down plates, pouring wine, patting shoulders. Somewhere beyond seventy, Barlozzo is long and lean, his eyes so black they flicker up shards of silver. Gritty, he seems. Mesmeric. Much later I see the way those eyes soften to gray in the doom just before a storm, be it an act of God or some more personal tempest. His thick smooth hair is white and blond and announces that he is at once very young and very old. And for as long as I will know him, I will never be certain if time is pulling him backward or beckoning him ahead. A chronicler, a raconteur, a ghost. A mago is Barlozzo. He will become my muse, this old man, my ani-matore, the soul of things for me.
Fresh from their triumph of the squash blossoms, now Bice and Monica come back laden with platters of prosciutto and salame — cose nostre, our things, they say, a phrase signifying that their families raise and butcher pigs, that they artisinally fashion every part of the animal's flesh and skin and fat into one sort or other of sausage or ham. There are crostini, tiny rounds of bread, toasted on one side, the other side dipped in warm broth and smeared thickly with a salve of chicken livers, capers, and the thinly scraped zest of lemon. Again from the kitchen, two large, deep bowls of pici, thick, rough, hand-rolled ropes of pasta, are brought forth, each one tucked in the crook of Bice's elbows. The pici are sauced simply with raw crushed green tomatoes, minced garlic, olive oil, and basil. Wonderful.
Many of the women have brought a soup of some sort, soup, more often than pasta, being the traditional primo, opening plate, of a Tuscan lunch or supper. No one seems concerned that the soups sit on the table while we work at devouring the pici. Soups are most often served at room temperature with a thread of oil and a dusting of pecorino, ewe's milk cheese. "There's more intensity of flavor quando la minestra è servita tiepida, when the soup is served tepid," says Floriana to me across the table, in a voice both pedantic and patient. "People who insist on drinking soup hot burn their palates so they must have it always hotter yet, as they search to taste something, anything at all," she says as though too-hot soup was the cause of all human suffering.
There is a potion made of farro, an ancient wheatlike grain, and rice; one of hard bread softened in water and scented with garlic, oil, rosemary and just-ground black pepper; another one of fat white beans flavored with sage and tomato and one of new peas in broth with a few shreds of field greens.
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "A Thousand Days in Tuscany"
by .
Copyright © 2004 Marlena de Blasi.
Excerpted by permission of ALGONQUIN BOOKS OF CHAPEL HILL.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.
Table of Contents
ContentsPROLOGUE1
Summer
1The Gorgeous Things They're Cooking AreZucchini Blossoms7
2Figs and Apples Threaded on Strings30
3The Valley Is Safe, and We Will Bake Bread64
4Are You Making a Mattress Stuffed with Rosemary?81
5Sit the Chicken in a Roasting Pan on a Pretty Bed of Turnips and Onions, Leeks and Carrots 90
Fall
6Vendemmiamo--Let's Pick Those Grapes105
7Dolce e Salata, Sweet and Salty--Because That's How Life Tastes to Me124
8Now These Are Chestnut Trees150
9 Do Tuscans Drink Wine at Every Meal?170
Winter
10Perhaps as a Genus, Olives Know Too Much 195
11December Has Come to Live in the Stable 218
12Supper Made from Almost Nothing 248
13Fasting Was How We Were Living Anyway264
Spring
14Virtuous Drenches293
15Florì and I Are Shelling Peas303
16The First of the Zucchini Blossoms Are Up314
Recipes
Deep-Fried Flowers, Vegetables, and Herbs28
The Holy Ghost's Cherries62
Schiacciata Toscana, Tuscan Flatbread (or "Squashed" Breads)79
Winemaker's Sausages Roasted with Grapes120
Fagioli al Fiasco sotto le Cenere, Beans Braised in a Bottle under the Cinders122
Braised Pork to Taste Like Wild Boar147
Castagnaccio192
The One and Only True Bruschetta (brew-sket'-ah)What It Is and How to Pronounce It247
A Tasting of Pecorino Cheeses with Chestnut Honey301
Reading Group Guide
1. This book is titled A Thousand Days in Tuscany:A Bittersweet Adventure. What do you consider to be the “bittersweet adventure” of the subtitle? What would you call a book that chronicled the past thousand days of your life?
2. San Casciano is itself a living, breathing character in the book. What is your most vivid impression of the town? How is it similar to, or different from, impressions you had about Tuscany prior to reading this book?
3. How do the author and her husband adjust to living in the rustic world of San Casciano? What does de Blasi see as the most rewarding and challenging aspects of this new life? In your view, what would be most appealing about living a similar existence in a simple, rural town? What would be the most frustrating?
4. How does de Blasi reconcile the tension that sometimes exists between “the simple life” and the march of progress, especially as she acclimates to her new environment? How do the villagers respond to this conflict—of “tradition versus the new”—in their own ways? Have you ever struggled with a similar tension in your life?
5. The author has said that this book is a companion piece to A Thousand Days in Venice. How does the book function as one standalone memoir, and how does it provide another piece in the puzzle of the author’s life? Do you think all readers would benefit from reading these books in tandem? If you’ve read both books, does de Blasi’s mindset change from one to the next, with her change in location?
6. A Thousand Days in Tuscany is separated into sections delineated by season. Discuss this organizational technique. How does the framework of the book mirror the way that rural Tuscan life unfolds? Could you imagine this book organized in any different way?
7. On page 99, de Blasi writes, “Right now all I know is that in love there must be some form of desperation and some form of joy.” Do you agree or disagree with this idea? How is this statement exemplified by the relationships in the book, particularly the one that de Blasi shares with her husband and the one between Barlozzo and Florìana?
8. De Blasi develops a passionate relationship with the land itself. Why does she so enjoy the grape and olive picking she becomes a part of during the course of the book? What connection does this give her to the earth? What activities do you enjoy that might impart that same sort of feeling?
9. “Both my clothes and I are survivors of some other time,” says de Blasi on page 133. How do the clothes that the author chooses to wear evoke her personality and character? Why does she choose to wear one particular ensemble per season?
10. How does de Blasi’s discussion of food throughout this memoir impact your understanding of her life? Do you plan to try any of the recipes that the book includes?
11. Why do de Blasi and Fernando nickname Barlozzo “the duke”? Why do you think Barlozzo immediately takes de Blasi under his wing? What characteristics do the two share? How does Barlozzo’s counsel and involvement shape the life that de Blasi and Fernando construct in San Casciano?
12. How does Barlozzo’s story about his past give clues about the formation of his adult personality? Ultimately, how is he constrained by the ghosts of his parents, and how is he able to triumph over them? Have you ever felt a similar struggle with the past?
13. What about Florìana was so compelling, and to the author and Barlozzo in particular? Why do you think she was so private about her illness? How did her fellow villagers respect her need for privacy and, ultimately, for companionship?
14. The note that Florì leaves for Barlozzo reads, “I wanted death to find me dancing.” How does Florì’s attitude about death mirror the one she holds about life? If you needed to leave someone a similar note at the end of your life, what would it say?
15. In which ways are de Blasi and Fernando a study in how “opposites attract”? How do their different personalities and cultures play a part in their relationship? How are the two similar, both in their approach to their relationship and to their new life in San Casciano? How does their relationship evolve during their time in Tuscany?
16. De Blasi tells Misha that security “is a myth.” Do you agree with her statement? What prompts Misha’s concern about his friends’ safety and security? Do you think that Misha fears change? Why? Does de Blasi value “risk more than comfort,” as Barlozzo contends? What is the largest risk you’ve taken in your life? How was it rewarding?
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