Memorial Day, and Waldo, once again

We’ll be celebrating Waldo’s birthday this coming Monday despite the fact that Waldo, who died stupidly and prematurely last August, will not be around to celebrate what would have been his sixth birthday.

It’s also Memorial Day in the United States, a day that obviously goes ignored in this part of the world. (For those of you who are interested, do please check out last year’s Memorial Day blog for historical trivia.) In Florence, on the same day in 1868, the royal family arrived to take up residence in Palazzo Pitti. Given that there is no longer a royal family of Italy (well, there are a couple who call themselves King and Crown Prince – interestingly enough, they are so not relevant that The Scallion, half Italian he, cannot remember the would-be king’s name), this seems somewhat of less importance.

For those of us of a certain age, we know that now's the time to wear white shoes (this never stopped my Uncle Jack, who wore them year 'round).

Family tradition – dating back to the Days of Tillie more than twenty years ago – dictates that all of us eat hamburgers whenever a canine birthday rolls around. They, naturally, get somewhat smaller burgers than the two of us and, like me, will eat theirs without a roll (The Scallion is always good for a roll).

This will mark the Puppers’ first foray into non-puppy food. It should be quite the occasion.

Fifteen years ago, finding a decent hamburger in Italy was a tough call (if you didn’t want to succumb to the deadly allure of anything at McDonald’s or spend too much money at Harry's Bar). Ten years ago, I went to our butcher in Florence and asked him to please grind a couple of pounds of Chianina beef (the beef that becomes bistecca fiorentina) so that Tillie could offer burgers to a number of friends (non-canine) at a special dinner party held in her honor.

The butcher was horrified at my desecration.

The dinner guests equally so.

In the past few years in the Tuscan restaurant world, anyone who’s anyone who’s worth anything is grinding Chianina beef, forming it into patties, grilling it, and slapping it between (mostly) lame hamburger buns. And all to great acclaim.

No, we will not be grinding Chianina beef this year. Instead, we will be grinding chicken. A few days ago at Santa Maria Novella, in the train station, I … um … succumbed to deadly allure and yet another McDonald’s promotion. (These are always inexpensive, as they’re testing the waters to see if the new product is marketable/edible.) It was called, inexplicably, the Ciociaro (according to The Scallion, it’s the name of a town in Lazio south of Rome). It bedeviled the whole notion of a fast-food establishment: i.e., I had to wait about 5 minutes ‘til they made it (something tells me that the Ciociaro will not make it on to the permanent McDonald’s rotation).

What was it? Well, it was chicken, breaded and fried, with a Parmesan mayonnaise served on a spinach-laced bun. It had mushrooms, too.

Its potential was enormous, the actual product a major disappointment.
I spent some time on the train ride mulling over this burger, as the ingredients were most enticing.

Here’s what all of us will eat on May 30th. Dogaressa of the Broken Halo will be with us that night, so we will be seven all told. Tomatoes aren’t yet happening, hence the inclusion of sundried tomatoes in the festivities.

Hamburger di pollo con mayonnaise e salsa di pomodori secchi /Chicken burgers with Parmesan/arugula mayonnaise and sundried tomato salsa

1½ lbs. ground organic chicken
2 c. best-quality mayonnaise (Hellman’s, in a perfect world)
1 c. grated Parmesan-Reggiano cheese
1 T. freshly ground/cracked black pepper
3 massive handfuls of arugula
1 c. sundried tomatoes, reconstituted in hot water
Large glugs of extravirgin olive oil
Hamburger rolls for those who want them

Fire up the grill.

Put the minced chicken in a bowl, add sea salt and freshly ground black pepper, and mix. Make three nice-sized burgers for humans, and then form the remaining meat mixture into mini-burgers for Pups and Puppers.

Make the mayonnaise: throw the mayonnaise (preferably, Hellman’s), grated Parm, and 3 massive handfuls of arugula into the blender. Don’t forget the pepper. Purée ‘til smooth. Scrape out the blender, and reserve.

Take the reconstituted sundried tomatoes after having drained the water, and put in the blender along with generous glugs of olive oil. Whirl ‘til a paste results. Scrape it out, and reserve.

Cook the burgers on a hot, fiery grill (for about 12 minutes, depending). Ten minutes into the procedure, toast the rolls for those who want them.

For humans: Put the cooked burgers on a roll, add a generous dollop of the sundried tomato salsa, and an even more generous dollop of the Parmesan/arugula mayonnaise.

For quadrupeds: skip the roll (who cares?) and dispense with mini-burgering. If there’s any mayonnaise left after human burgers have been iced, throw it to the hounds.

(If you have the energy, the penultimate edition of the Joy of Cooking has a most glorious recipe for hamburger buns.)

We miss you, Waldito. Happy sixth birthday, your first of many, in the Happy Hunting Grounds.

ADDENDA

Two Februaries ago, McDonald’s launched a McItaly campaign designed to showcase local ingredients in an American fast-food setting. Tasty though that burger with artichoke mayonnaise was, the project went up in flames. However, it appears that it’s not completely ended, as the McDonald’s at the train station in Florence is serving two burgers (280 grams … consider that a quarter pounder is about 125 grams) featuring Spek from the Alto Adige and cheese from can’t remember where. Interesting that Italians are supersizing us.

For those of you who didn't know Waldo, do know that the funny photo just below the masthead is of Himself.

This ran in last year’s blog. Am not at all concerned if this is repetitious (it is). It’s also simply beautiful.

To the valiant soldiers who have died in Iraq and Afghanistan (must we now add Libya?), we salute you as we salute all those scarred by these wars. We also salute those still fighting and striving to give meaning to these deaths and wounds.

Executive Mansion
Washington, Nov 21, 1864
To Mrs Bixby, Boston, Mass
Dear Madam,
I have been shown in the files of the War Department a statement of the Adjutant General of Massachusetts that you are the mother of four sons who have died gloriously on the field of battle.
I feel how weak and fruitless must be any word of mine which should attempt to beguile you from the grief of a loss so overwhelming. But I cannot refrain from tendering you the consolation that may be found in the thanks of the republic they died to save. I pray that our Heavenly Father may assuage the anguish of your bereavement and leave you only the cherished memory of the loved and lost, and the solemn pride that must be yours to have laid so costly a sacrifice upon the altar of freedom.
Yours very sincerely and respectfully

A. Lincoln

Vials of Blood

Yesterday was May Day, a day with roots in ancient Rome. Some of us also celebrated the birth of spring (in the non-tropical countries of the northern hemisphere), International Workers’ Day (in most countries outside North America depending upon where you are and your political persuasion), and the beatification of Pope John Paul II (depending upon your religious persuasion).

JPII (as some of us refer to him) canonized and beatified 484 (saints) and 1,337 (beatified). He holds the record for papal saint-making.

That’s a whole hell of a lot of holy people.

In order to become a saint, you first have to be beatified. Why didn’t Fra Angelico make the last cut? He probably only had one miracle to his name (i.e., all those marvelous paintings). How invigorating it would be to have a sainted Renaissance painter. One could stand in front of any of his works and say, “SAINT So-and-so painted this when not raising folks from the dead and curing innumerable people from Parkinson’s disease.” (Imagine, if you will, St. Masolino – John’s raising of Drusiana would give the painting an entirely different dimension, like: (St.) Masolino really knew what he was painting about here.)

Pope John Paul II and the House of Windsor have unwittingly formed a close association when it comes to grand occasions. JPII's death in April 2005 caused Charles, Prince of Wales, to put off marrying Camilla Parker Bowles, his long-time love, for one week (it simply wouldn’t do to be rejoicing while a huge chunk of Christendom was waiting in line for sometimes up to 12 hours to pay respects to a dead pope clad humbly in simple shoes though they were, in fact, made by Ferragamo).

Prince William tied the knot with Kate Middleton (whom we are now obliged to refer to as either Princess Catherine, Princess William, or the Duchess of Cambridge) the same weekend that millions, perhaps, thronged to Rome to watch JPII’s commencement on the Road to Sainthood (sounds like a cheeze-y title for the History Channel, no?).

Some scary details about this beatification process from www.cnn.com: “A vial of John Paul II's blood was placed before the crowds, which were expected to be the largest in the Vatican since the late pope's funeral in 2005 ... The blood, which was taken from him by doctors during his final illness for possible transfusion, but never used, was displayed in a specially made silver reliquary.”

This is as prescient as Monica Lewinsky’s mother advising her daughter not to have that Gap dress dry cleaned.

Again, from cnn.com: “John Paul II was fast-tracked to beatification when he died in 2005, and becomes "the blessed" John Paul II barely six years after his death -- the fastest beatification in centuries.” Well, he’s in good company: St. Francis of Assisi died in 1226, and was sainted in 1228.

Let it be noted that this beatification is not without its controversies, and then let us close the subject.

(As an aside, www.cnn.com notes: “Having visiting [sic] more countries than any previous pope and becoming the first pontiff from outside of Italy in 450 years, John Paul II also was the third-longest reigning pope in history.”)

On a secular note: yesterday was May Day. As wikipedia.org relates, “In many countries, May Day is synonymous with International Workers' Day, or Labour Day, a day of political demonstrations and celebrations organised by communists, anarchists, socialists, and activist groups. May Day is also a traditional holiday in many cultures.”

Here are its lovely roots (again, from wiki): “The earliest May Day celebrations appeared in pre-Christian times, with the festival of Flora, the Roman Goddess of flowers, and the Walpurgis Night celebrations of the Germanic countries. It is also associated with the Gaelic Beltane. Many pagan celebrations were abandoned or Christianized during the process of conversion in Europe.”

Let’s think about Flora, the lovely Roman goddess of flowers, let’s think of her reticent pre-Leonardo-esque smile in Botticelli’s Birth of Spring, as she tosses (or is about to toss) flowers to those assembled in Venus’s garden. Let's not think about the beautiful irises, trashed by the Puppers a few weeks ago as they happily romped in a No Dog Zone. Let's applaud their resourcefulness, and give up -- for at least this year -- the very idea of having anything beautiful and blooming.

Perhaps the canonization of Pope John Paul II will happily coincide with either the birth of the heir or the spare.

Recipes and dogs will appear next time. The Scallion proposed a recipe of blood sausage to celebrate JPII’s beatification and the death of Osama Bin Laden, but I wasn’t up to it, nor am I ever up for eating blood sausage, try it many times as I might. However, Lulu and Rosie, working in tandem late this afternoon, managed to cut into at least two pieces a simple garter snake. Explaining to them that we like garter snakes would probably have made no difference. The snake is dead, Lulu’s white coat streaked with blood, and we forgot to save a vial in the event that the snake would be beatified.

Damn.

ADDENDA

For the numbers of holy folk made holier by Pope John Paul II, see www.cbc.ca.
Parkinson’s disease was NOT selected at random, but chosen simply because JPII’s miracle, which led him on the path to becoming St. JPII, was curing a nun of Parkinson’s disease. But substitute anything else, really. Even the common cold would do.

For popes with longevity, they are as follows: St. Peter, exact dates unknown, roughly 35 years; Bl. Pius IX (died 1878), 31.6 years: JPII: 26.4.See www.catholic-hierarchy.org.

Lovely photograph of wisteria by the Scallion, May 2011.

Pasquetta

It’s Liberation Day today. On this day in history in 1945, the Allies liberated Italy, effectively drawing the Italian part of World War II to a close.

Natale con i tuoi, Pasqua con chi vuoi: an Italian expression that means, basically: Christmas with your family, Easter with whomever you want. We tend to do a little bit of both on both occasions.

We have a lot of leftovers from yesterday’s luncheon feast. We were eight in all, but we had enough food to feed many, many more. By the time the time for eating salad rolled around, no one could possibly. Even the desserts (colomba, the sweet cake shaped in the form of a dove; a large chocolate egg, and hot cross buns) were desultorily picked at, allowing most of our friends to take dessert home with them.

Naturally, we ate lamb, as most Italians do. “Flocks of baby lambs begin to appear in the fields as spring arrives, just in time to become the succulent centerpiece of Easter dinner. Lamb is one of the great delicacies of pastoral culture, but as a symbol of innocence it is also the sacrificial dish par excellence. Since 1500 the food of Easter has been the food of the Last Supper, the ultimate meal in gastronomy and history: lamb (the symbol of Christ), bread (from grain, the gift of Demeter), and wine (“the blood of the earth,” Dionysius’ contribution).” This from Carol Fields.

One of our dear Florentine friends present at the table is a dedicated animal rights activist. Just last week she attended a march in protest of the slaughter of these lambs. Another of our friends did not want to add another source of animal protein to her diet, even though she was told it was Happy Lamb – i.e., we know the shepherd, the mother of ours probably spent last summer on the Scallion’s family’s land. (We respected their views.)

(Two legs were deboned, butterflied, marinated in olive oil, lemon juice, smashed garlic, and then thrown on the grill. Opening Season of the Grill, and the most succulent lamb, ever.)

Today is also Pasquetta, or “Little Easter.” (The Italians have a way of making everything diminutive; we tend to be Size Queens (and Kings).) It’s a national holiday, and you’re supposed to go out into the country, eat raw fava beans and a young pecorino cheese. That is, if you’re Roman. Traditions differ from region to region.

An interesting vegetable, the fava bean (or broad bean, as it’s more commonly known elsewhere). My hero Alan Davidison writes: “There is a mysterious shadow over the history of broad beans, and an actual problem which may be linked with it. From the beginnings of recorded history, these beans have aroused superstitious dread. The ancient Egyptians, though they cultivated them, regarded them as unclean, and the Greek writer Herodotus claims that their priests would not even look at one, let alone eat it … There seems to have been a general belief that the souls of the dead might migrate into the beans.” He adds that beans were “associated with the dead and were eaten at funeral feasts.”

Fields continues: “On Easter Monday entire cities become deserted. No matter what else appears on people’s plates, it is traditional to eat a simple antipasto called il piatto benedetto, consisting of a hard-boiled egg, salt, and local bitter greens like arugula or radicchio, fennel, or sarset, the deliciously tart leaves grown in Piemont. It is very similar to the dish included at the start of the Jewish Passover Seder to remind participants of the bitterness of exile in Egypt and elsewhere and to keep those memories alive.”

In Greece, fava beans are eaten during Holy Week. The late, great Patience Gray writes, “During the weeks of fasting before Easter, these lavishly sown beans were eaten raw and represented the main item of diet. They were delicious but a prolonged consumption turned out to be a strain on the digestive system.”

Interesting how something relating to the dead has morphed into something celebrating rebirth and resurrection.

Gray: “The best cheeses to eat with raw broad beans are the Greek feta, salty, and the Sardinian marzotica, a kind of ricotta made from ewe’s milk, well drained, dried and conserved with salt (made in March, as its name implies).

We will eat our beans with a young pecorino, a knob of leftover French blue (not at all a classic combination), and another pecorino made by our shepherd friend. No need to provide a recipe for this: just have a whole lot of fave on hand, pod them, shell them, and eat them with cheese. You can, if you like, dribble extravirgin olive oil over it, and add a twist or two from the pepper mill.

ADDENDA

Hot cross buns are a Lenten delicacy. From Davidson: “In England, hot cross buns are traditionally eaten on Good Friday; they are marked on top with a cross … The mark is of ancient origin, connected with religious offerings of bread, which replaced earlier, less civilized offerings of blood. The Greeks and Romans had similar practices and the Saxons ate buns marked with a cross in honour of the goddess of light, Eostre, whose name was transferred to Easter.” Stefano made the hot cross buns, and his recipe will appear on this blog, as soon as I can extract it from him.

Carol Fields, Celebrating Italy, New York, 1990.

Patience Gray, Honey from a Weed: Fasting and Feasting in Tuscany, Catalonia, the Cyclades, and Apulia, San Francisco, 1990.

Alan Davidson, The Oxford Companion to Food, New York, 1999.

FROM THE ARCHIVES

April 25, 2010 post re: Liberation Day

For past-blogged fava bean recipes, do please check out 4/11/10 (risotto with goat cheese, fava, & peas), 5/8/10 (risotto alla primavera), 5/17/10 (spaghetti with fava and mint), and 6/15/10 (fava bean purèe).

How thrilling to cite oneself.

Pictures of Buster’s fairly recent training session (with mixed results). No relationship whatsoever between today’s text and today’s images; but isn’t he darned cute?

Photo credit of wisteria/roses to the Scallion, April 2011.

You're talkin' a lot, but you're not saying anything

On this day in 1808, Antonio Meucci was born in Florence (on via dei Serragli, 44). Apparently he might have invented the telephone. His was an interesting and colorful life – he worked briefly at Teatro della Pergola (in Florence), lived in Cuba, and eventually settled on Staten Island. According to Wikipedia.org, “Meucci set up a form of voice communication link in his Staten Island home that connected his second floor bedroom to his laboratory.” His failure to renew the patent led to Alexander Graham Bell’s acquiring said a few years later.

How nice, and how appropriate, that an Italian possibly invented the telephone. When riding commuter trains, we can blow a kiss to the Goddess, and thank her for all those obnoxious Italians nattering away on their cell phones (yesterday, a young woman got on the train at Pisa and continued her long, boring conversation with probably an equally boring friend all the way to Florence; we were a captive audience; I wanted to strangle her).

The most civilized Amtrak has silent cars. You pay extra for it, but it’s more than worth it.

We have six dogs who like to bark. This is our aural equivalent of chatty Eyetals on their cell phones. It is, perhaps, more obnoxious. Theoretically, one could ask nattering Italian to lower his/her voice. And yes, in theory, one could ask one’s dogs to stop barking.

“Lulu! Please stop barking,” we plead.

Lulu, oblivious, continues to bark. (She’s outside, barking, as I write. Our neighbors must love us; of course, we have a neighbor who’s not very nice, so when the dogs bark, I sometimes inwardly glow.)

Tillie never barked. She only barked at the mailman, which is appropriate, since dogs and mailpeople have a natural antipathy toward one another.

Waldo yapped. And he yapped at everything. Lulu did not bark until Waldo taught her how to.

Harry’s latest fun trick is to bark at the Puppers while they are crated. He stands in front of the crate and eggs them on. They, being young and impressionable, rise to his bait, and join the chorus. It’s quite the din.

You might wonder why we crate these puppers. Four words will do: They are canine terrorists. They also are only sort of getting housebreaking. They are often outside for long stretches of time. Re-entry requires -- nay, it’s mandatory – to eliminate immediately upon said.

For any of you who has housebroken a puppy, multiply our load (bad pun absolutely intended) by three. Myrtle, cousin to the pups and puppers, is a puppy herself (and somewhat obstinate, according to reports). She’s just recently – according to my sister – really broken through the wall and is no longer peeing on the bed. My mother’s alleged bichon, now 11, has never really gotten it.

This is admirable (Myrtle). That is appalling (Peter).

Googled “how long it takes to housetrain a puppy” and saw 16,200,000 hits. Apparently this is a great preoccupation for many of us. www.drfostersmith.com has these words of (non)comforting advice: “The amount of time it takes to housetrain your puppy is primarily dependent upon you. Do it right and it should not take long at all – perhaps just a few weeks [italics mine].”

Right.

I wonder how long we’re going to have to navigate our apartment wearing flip flops. Pity: terracotta floors feel so nice under (bare)feet when the weather begins to warm.

Lulu barks, and Harry has joined the fray.

Why has no one invented canine cell phones?

ADDENDA

"Psycho Killer, from Talking Heads 77: "You start a conversation you can't even finish it./You're talking a lot, but you're not saying anything./When I have something to say, my lips are sealed./Say something once, why say it again." Lyrics D. Byrne, C. Frantz, T. Weymouth.

Curious about Staten Island, I googled “Famous People who have lived on Staten Island.” This led, of course, to Wikipedia, which lists 18 different categories. “Notorious” – number 12 – included Paul Castellano, Jeb Stuart Magruder, and, most importantly, Sammy “the Bull” Gravano who penned a most readable autobiography with the help of Peter Maas in 1996. According to Wikipedia, Mr. Gravano served as a mess hall cook while doing a stint in the U.S. Army in 1964. Le specialità dello chef? One shudders to think.

Aborted Floral Meristems

What visually marks the arrival of spring? Robin red breasts, with worms in beaks. Daffodils. Hyacinths. Forsythia. Flowering fruit trees. The arrival of asparagus, fava beans, peas, artichokes, and agretti in the markets. Americans who shouldn't be wearing them clad in shorts, wearing flip flops, and entering the Duomo in Florence.

In our case, it would be Lulu with a lizard wiggling from her mouth. Or it would be another lizard, dead, lying on its back, missing a large chunk of its tail, as well as all appendages on one side, nonchalantly hanging out on our terrace.

Our dogs love to chase these harmless, lovely creatures. Once it stops moving – i.e., when it’s dead – interest in the game is off.

What are the aromatic markers of the arrival of spring? Oh, those flowering fruit trees. The strong aroma of narcissi. A soft spring rain. Strawberries. A certain sweetness in the air.

In our case, it would be the aroma – if one can call it that – of a dog who’d rolled in unidentifiable carrion. Dogs do love to roll around on the grass, in the woods. But they’re more prone to doing this when it gets a little warmer outside.

Lulu rolled in just that (some unidentifiable carrion) yesterday. The picture you see at the right is not that of a bloody retriever. No, that is a golden retriever who has been doused in passata (tomato sauce which we made last August). You might notice how the other pups and puppers are enjoying helping apply/dis-apply our remedy. (Because the tomato crop was lousy last year, our passata has leaned to the acidic. This did not seem to deter any of the canines.) Lulu looks like a 70s shag rag gone seriously awry.

918,000 hits occurred after I typed in “why dogs roll in smelly things.” I went to the first that appeared on the screen, the well-written www.schoolforchampions.com. Ron Kurtus, the author, writes, “Although there is a temptation to scold your dog [when he/she rolls in smelly things], it is best to realize it is natural behavior and make sure your pet doesn’t have the opportunity to roll in stuff.”

Given that we live in the country, and that there’s woods, this is virtually impossible.

He continues: “But first of all, you must realize that what smells bad to humans may not smell so bad to a dog.” Eek!

He then lists a couple of reasons why dogs might do this, and here's my favorite: “Advertise to the pack – Another school for thought is that dogs may roll in feces of dead animal remains to ‘advertise’ what they have found to other members of the pack.” Charming. What we know lives in the woods: wild boar (we think); fox (saw one once); porcupine (strong evidence of them rooting): black squirrels; and who knows what else. Let’s say Lulu is wearing eau di porcuspino (porcupine water). Delicious.

Perhaps I should cook up something really stinky as retaliation. Perhaps this is the time to learn how to make kimchi or sauerkraut. Although, since we don’t know what smells good to dogs, they might find the odor of fermenting cabbage aphrodisiacal [sic].

How to say goodbye to wintry foods? Finish up what’s in the refrigerator and move on to asparagus.

In this case, it means using a head of cauliflower that’s been lurking for a long time in the back of the refrigerator.

Curious about this sort of boring vegetable, I consulted Larousse Gastronique, which informed me that it was “[d]escribed by Arab botanists and known to the Romans, the cauliflower originally came from Cyprus and was introduced to France from Italy in the middle of the 16th century.”

Alan Davidson writes, “It is thought that they were first grown in the Near East, but no one is sure when. The belief of Cypriots that the cauliflower originated in Cyprus derives tenuous support from the old French name for it.” He adds that Jane Grigson dismissed the Cypriot connection and gave it over to the Arabs.

Wikipedia says that “Cauliflower is one of several vegetables of the species Brassica oleracea … It is an annual plant that reproduces by seed. Typically, only the head (the white curd) of aborted floral meristems is eaten, while the stalk and surrounding thick green leaves are used in vegetable broth or discarded.”

Now, did you know that you were eating aborted floral meristems while tucking into cauliflower cheese? I certainly did not. Did you also know that you could use the detritus to flavor a broth? Again, I did not. Guess this means said will not go directly into the compost bucket.

Wiki adds that cauliflower didn’t really take off in French cuisine ‘til the court of Louis XIV (who sat on the throne from 1643-1715 … a very, very long time).

The photo above is what we’ll be eating shortly. Does anyone eat cauliflower in the summer (apart from perhaps nibbling on a floret found on a crudite tray?).

Cauliflower can bore at a party, but when it’s roasted it somehow tastes a whole lot better.

Fusilli con cavolfiore, olive, e pinoli/Fusilli with cauliflower, olives, and pine nuts

½ lb. of fusilli (or orecchiette)
1 small head of cauliflower, broken into tiny florets
¾ c. green olives, pitted and chopped
2 T. pine nuts, lightly toasted
½ c. freshly grated Pecorino Romano
3 T. extravirgin olive oil, at least
Freshly cracked black pepper
Handful of coriander, chopped (use flat-leaf parsley if you don’t have coriander)
One hot pepper, minced

Preheat the oven to 400°F. Put the water for the pasta in a pot, and bring to a slow boil (because you have to roast the cauliflower first).

Break the cauliflower into tiny florets, toss with a couple of tablespoons of extravirgin olive oil, and sprinkle with kosher salt. Put in the oven, and roast for about 45 minutes, stirring about halfway through the procedure. You want it crisped and browned; you do not want it brulée’d.

Put the toasted pine nuts, pitted/chopped green olives, grated Pecorino Romano, minced hot pepper, and coriander (or parsley) into a serving bowl.

Remove the cauliflower from the oven, and add to the serving bowl. Throw the fusilli in to the boiling pot of water, and cook following package directions. Before draining the pasta, take a couple of tablespoons of the cooking liquid and add it to the stuff in the serving bowl.

Add the fusilli to the serving bowl, add a couple more jolts of extravirgin olive oil, and taste for seasoning. The olives and the Pecorino Romano will probably provide plenty of saline sensation – so perhaps just check for pepper.

ADDENDA

Jennifer Harvey Lang, ed. Larousse Gastronomique, New York, 1988.

Alan Davidson, The Oxford Companion to Food, New York, 1999. The entry directly below is “cauliflower fungus,” which looks a whole lot like cauliflower. It grows on rotting conifer stumps.

Don't fence me in

The Scallion was very busy over the weekend. He put up fencing to protect the flower beds on our terrace. It will certainly keep the Puppers out of it. It will also keep us out of it, as the fencing is well over five feet tall. Too tall to jump over.

“Many pet owners find it extremely difficult to maintain a garden and a good relationship with the family dog,” is a trenchant observation from the very helpful www.canismajor.com. Multiply that by six.

Do please note the flowering narcissi, and the flowering pear tree. Do note the safely-fenced in Banks rose. You can’t see the holes-to-China excavations conducted by the Puppers in previous research but trust me, they’re there. Today’s plan involves seeding lettuces, arugula, and chervil in pots on steps leading into the garden. Unfortunately, I’ll have to take the long route to get there, since the gate that leads to it is – you guessed it – fenced in.

Riccardo, our young and able dog whisperer, visits us every Saturday. He teaches us to teach them. One of his instructions is to socialize these puppies. Get them used to street noise and cars. Get them used to other people.

Today’s socialization project involves a pupper picked at random, who will accompany me to our little country bar. We took Lizzie a couple of Sundays back. The bar was crammed with local youths. Lizzie walked in, looked around, and promptly evacuated in a big way. Naturally, this caused all the teenage girls to hoot with laughter. (No, those girls don't do that: they have it laser'd out.)

Later, towards the end of our drink, a teenage boy came up to say hello to Lizzie, and she promptly peed out of happiness? Joy? Fear?

Lizzie will not be accompanying me to the bar today.

From Tillie’s sadly-unpublished memoirs: “Snacks and apertivo fare are again one of my favorite eating pastimes in Italy. The whole idea of “taking an apertivo,” as it were, is quite civilized. The aperitivo, which we crassly call “cocktails” in the United States, is taken before a meal, including both lunch and dinner. Italians usually have a glass of prosecco (sparkling Italian white wine) or a mixed drink. Many bars offer their own in-house specialties, and many of the bars are exceptionally creative. As I noted earlier, I don’t really drink except for that occasional finger-licking Veuve Clicquot moment. …

We walk through Piazza d’Azeglio which, at this time of the day, is usually teeming with canines accompanied by their people, little old Italian ladies sitting on a park benches catching up on the events (or non-events) of the day; and shrieking children in the playground while their parents sit and watch them carefully from the benches. Sometimes I run into friends, but I usually don’t stick around to sniff as something more important looms on the horizon: FOOD.

We proceed down those narrow twisting streets, and I shake sometimes as shopkeepers are often in the process of closing down shop for the day. This means pulling down metal doors that make screeching noises. For me, it is the canine equivalent of the human “nails on the blackboard” feeling. It is really one of the most unpleasurable sounds in the world.”

Tillie loved going for aperitivi -- practically up 'til the moment she died.

Pup Picked at Random will not experience any shopkeepers pulling down their metal grates, since they’re really aren’t any shops here where we live. Pup will, however, experience the raucous cries from the elementary school, and will have to endure car noise, and perhaps meet another dog or two (Penelope, a local pug, is often at the bar).

The Negroni is a distinctively Florentine apertivo, its creation credited to one Count Camillo Negroni, who apparently liked to drink this Italian equivalent of a double martini on via Tornabuoni beginning around 1919. (Efforts to -- ahem -- dig up more information about this genius came to naught.) Accounts differ, however, about the bar: was it Caffe Casoni? Was it Giacosa? Some folks from Forte dei Marmi stress it was invented there. (Many years ago, Giacosa closed (it’s since re-opened, but Roberto Cavalli has added his name to it) for seemingly good. They offered free negronis to all and sundry. It was quite a fest.)

To make a negroni, you need an old fashioned glass, lots of ice cubes, and equal parts gin, sweet vermouth, and Campari soda. Add a slice or two of orange, and sip … slowly. Then have another.

My late antiquarian friend Robi drank negronis at evening aperitivo time. He drank this, instead, at lunch time: In a long-drink glass, throw in a couple of ice cubes, and fill the glass 2/3 full with Bitter Campari. Add a generous pour of white wine, and drink. It probably has another name, but we call it the Robi, in his honor. It makes me think of him and his fine spirit whenever we drink them, which is often.

As it turned out, Pup Picked Out at Random was Lizzie. Her comportment was worthy of Georgia, a golden retriever who died many, many years ago but who maintains, as always and ever, the title of Mistress of Deportment.

ADDENDA

The Diggers, according to wikipedia.org, "were an English group of Protestant agrarian communists, begun by Gerrard Winstanley as True Levellers in 1649, who became known as Diggers due to their activities."

How not to keep puppies out of the garden

It’s time to start thinking about planting the garden. Actually, it was time to think about planting the garden many many less-than-large fullest moons-in-the-world ago. In an ideal world (ours decidedly isn’t), a lot of stuff would already be planted. A friend came by a few weeks ago, and roto-tilled it, and it’s been long enough ago that bits of green (weeds, that is – not delicate baby lettuces) are already appearing.

Our excuse for not having planted the peas, the favas, the garlic? Well, we’ll blame it on the weather, or perhaps call it hubris, since I somewhat smugly remarked, upon the completion of the tilling, that we were ahead of our Green Thumb Neighbor who hadn’t, at last sight, tilled his plot.

This Green Thumb Neighbor, besides being the locus of great jealousy on our part, is actually a very nice man. His garden is much smaller than ours. It is tidy, and things grow in it, which is what’s supposed to happen in a garden. His tomatoes are always red when ours are full of stinker bugs (does he spray? we have wondered). A low-fronted rustic stone wall fronts his two-storey casa colonica (farm house); terracotta pots filled with flowers of vibrant hues are a pleasure to look at while driving by and so, too, are the little purple flowers growing through those stones in that wall which come tumbling out. Green Thumb Neighbor has pruned his wisteria to almost bonsai artistry; his roses seem to blaze far longer than ours do. Our wisteria: beautiful, unshaped, unpruned. Our roses? Up in the air given the presence of these three Puppers.

We kind of hate him – Green Thumb Neighbor, that is.

We have a Banks rose crowning the wall just outside our kitchen door. It should bloom magnificently if we can keep The Puppers out of it. Next to it was one of many varieties of lavender plants we have; “was” is the operative word here. Next to that is jasmine, which still has a chance in hell. This part of the terrace forms an “L,” and on the other end, myrtle covered the ground, and crept up the wall. Do please note the use of the past tense in many cases. Scads of terracotta pots filled with herbs and various illegally-imported hot pepper seeds that’d sprung into plants lined that wall. The Puppers, at a tender age, enjoyed eating the stalks of the peppers (I know, I know: what were they doing there, anyway? Why hadn’t we properly cleaned and closed our garden and terrace last fall?). Many of the pots cracked or were broken during heated pup chases; one pup – Buster, it must be pointed out – enjoyed prancing from pot to pot without his fat little paws hitting the ground.

Why is it that puppies go exactly where you don’t want them to go? For example, above you see Buster happily terracotta-ly ensconced in the remains of the mixed Japanese greens, which he and his sisters had joyously excavated while our backs were turned for oh, about 2.5 seconds.

Let the record show that the flower beds on the terrace are fenced. The daffodil bed’s wiring needed to be raised, as The Puppers delighted in prancing through them just as they were at their peak. The bed with the Banks rose, jasmine etc. is also fenced but, apparently, not high enough. Easy to leap over, trash the lavender, and dig a hole, all at the same time.

The internet provided a modicum of sage advice. Googling “Keeping dogs out of gardens” revealed the following. www.associated.com suggested red pepper solution, as well as “How About a Charming White Picket Fence?” The author continues: “I ended up using chicken wire to keep my dog from eating the tomatoes in my gardens. The green chicken wire blended in well with the surroundings, and it was tall enough to keep my dog out but short enough to allow me to step over.”

Unfortunately, making the chicken wire/green mesh high enough to keep The Puppers out also keeps us out because it must be so high. Associated.com also suggested creating a Designated Digging Box, putting some of their toys in it, and encouraging them to dig. We shall try that but since they eschew most of their toys in favor of books (especially Bronzino exhibition catalogue covers and cookbooks by Jane Grigson, cell phones, socks, sponges, wood for the stove), it wouldn’t work. Unless, of course, we ply the sand/digging box with electronic equipment, Ferragamo shoes thrown in just for the beauty of it, and limited edition prints.

This brings me ‘round to sorrel, our really only true Garden Success Story.

At this point, it continues to thrive, even with this cold snap we’re having. Or maybe because of it. This classic Florentine primo is typically made with spinach; mixing in some sorrel gives it a lemony kick.

The recipe comes from Mirta, Florentine sister, lawyer and phenomenal cook.
Perhaps I should invite Green Thumb Neighbor over for an aperitivo so he can admire our sorrel?

Crespelle alla fiorentina/Florentine pancakes stuffed with ricotta

1¼ lb. spinach (fresh or frozen)
½ lb. fresh ricotta, preferably sheep’s milk
2 c.flour + 3 T.
7 eggs, preferably organic
4 c. milk + 3 T., divided
12 T. butter, melted
2 heaping T. tomato paste (triple if you’re lucky enough, double if less so, regular if luckless) diluted in ¼ c. of your already-made bechamel
Freshly grated Parmesan cheese (about 1 c.)
Freshly grated nutmeg
Salt and freshly cracked black pepper

Stem and trim the spinach, place it in a steamer over boiling water. When it’s cooked through (in a couple of minutes), remove and let cool. While you wait for the spinach to cool, put the ricotta in a sieve over a bowl, and let it drain. When the spinach is cool enough to handle, squeeze all the liquid out of it, and chop.
Place the spinach in a large mixing bowl, add the drained ricotta, four eggs, nutmeg, salt, and pepper. Be generous with the spices. Mix well.

Make the crespelle: Combine the flour, 12 T. melted butter, flour, 1 c. milk, and salt. Stir to combine.

Heat a sauté pan over medium-high heat, drop in a 1 T. olive oil and 1 T. butter. When sufficiently heated, using a ¼ c. measuring cup, drop large dollops of the crespelle mix into it. Pick up the pan and roll the batter around: you want it as large and thin as possible. Cook on one side ‘til you can easily flip it with a spatula (about a minute, or less), and flip. You want it cooked through, but only barely, as these go into a very hot oven. Continue cooking until all the batter has been used up.

Preheat the oven to 400°F. Lightly butter a 13” x 9” casserole dish.

Make the béchamel by melting the butter in a small sauce pan, adding the flour, remaining 3 c. milk. Taste for seasoning, and add salt, pepper, and nutmeg. Again, remember to be generous.

Assemble the crespelle placing the ricotta/spinach stuffing on one half of the circle, leaving some room around the edges. Fold over the other half (you will have half moons on hand), and gently tamp the edges. Place in the lightly-buttered casserole dish, gently overlapping them, and continue stuffing the crespelle until either the stuffing’s all gone or the pancakes are.

Take the 2 T. tomato paste, diluted with ¼ c. of the béchamel, mix thoroughly, and pour into the remaining bechamel. Pour over the crespelle, and cover that with 1 c. of freshly-grated Parmesan cheese. Give the dish a couple more gratings of nutmeg, salt, and pepper.

Bake in the oven ‘til lightly browned and bubbling – about 20 minutes.

BOBO suggests pairing Crespelle alla Fiorentina with La Porta di Vertine rosato igt 2008.