~Brush 2 tenderloins lightly with honey. In a mortar or food processor, crush 1 tablespoon of fennel seeds. Add them to 1 tablespoon of finely chopped rosemary, salt, pepper, and 2 cloves of minced garlic. Spread this mixture on the pork. Place in a shallow, oiled pan. Roast in the oven at 400° until the pork is faintly pink in the middle, about 30 minutes. Meanwhile, cut 2 fennel bulbs in ½-inch slices. Toss out the tough root end. Steam for about 10minutes, until cooked but not soft. Purée until smooth, then add ¼ cup of white wine, ½ cup of grated parmigiano, and ½ cup of mascarpone (or sour cream). Place tenderloins into a buttered dish and pour sauce over; top with buttered bread crumbs. Cook at 350°for about 10minutes. Garnish tenderloins with fennel leaves, if available, or with wands of fresh rosemary. Serves 4.
~CONTORNI~
Chestnuts in Red Wine
Even though I'm living near a chestnut forest, chestnuts still seem luxurious. We roast a few every night to enjoy with a glass of amaro, grappa, or a last coffee. Just a short gash or x in the shell before they're put in the pan and they open easily while still hot. Many cookbooks advise roasting chestnuts for up to an hour! In the fireplace, they're ready quickly—15 minutes at the most, depending on how hot the coals are. Jiggle the pan often and remove them at the first sign of charring. Chestnuts taste good with all the flavorful winter meats, especially with guinea hens.
~Roast and peel 30 or 40 chestnuts. Simmer the chesnuts in just enough red wine to cover for half an hour, long enough for the two flavors to intertwine. Pour off most of the wine. Serves 6.
Garlic Flan
Excellent with any roast.
~Separate the cloves from a large head of garlic. Without peeling, place the cloves in boiling water for 5 minutes. Cool, and squeeze out the garlic. Mince and crush the cloves with a fork, then stir into 2 cups of cream. Bring cream and garlic just to a simmer in a saucepan. Add a little ground nutmeg, salt, and pepper. Remove from the flame and beat in 4 egg yolks. Pour into 6 individual molds, well-oiled, or into a shallow baking pan. Bake in a bains-marie at 350° for 20 minutes or until set. Cool for 10 minutes before unmolding.
Cardoons
As long as your arm, prickly, and pale green, cardoons are trouble but worth it. This vegetable was new to me. I learned to strip the tough, stringy exterior from the stalks—the stalks are somewhat like celery—and quickly place the cardoon pieces in water and lemon juice because they otherwise turn dark in a hurry. At first I steamed them but they never seemed to get done. I found that boiling them is best, just to the point of fork tenderness. They have a taste and texture similar to heart of artichoke—not surprising since they come from the same family.
~After stripping a large bunch of cardoons and bathing them in acidulated water, cut in two-inch pieces and boil until just done. Drain and arrange in a well-buttered baking dish. Season with salt and pepper and lightly cover with a béchamel sauce (see recipe), dots of butter, and a sprinkling of parmigiano. Bake at 350° for 20 minutes.
Warm Porcini (or Portobello) Salad with Roasted Red and Yellow Peppers
Serve this colorful composed salad as a first or main course.
~Grill 2 large mushrooms or sauté them topside down in olive oil (this prevents them from losing their juices). Slice and drizzle lightly with vinaigrette. Grill 2 peppers, one red and one green, and let them cool in a bag, then slide off the charred skin. Slice and drizzle with the vinaigrette. Separate a Bermuda (red) onion into rings. Toast ¼ cup of pine nuts. Toss greens—radicchio, arugula, and other lettuces of varying textures and colors—with vinaigrette and arrange on each plate. Arrange the warm peppers, rings of onion, and mushroom slices over the greens and top with pine nuts. Serves 6.
~DOLCI~
Winter Pears in Vino Nobile
Steeped pears are pretty to serve. Their taste seems heightened when served along with some Gorgonzola, toasted bread, and walnuts roasted with butter and salt.
~Peel 6 firm pears and stand them upright in a saucepan. Leave stems on, if they still have them. Squeeze lemon juice over each. Pour 1 cup of red wine over them and sprinkle ¼ cup of sugar over the tops. Add ¼ cup of currants, a vanilla bean, and a few cloves to the wine. Cover and simmer for 20 minutes (or longer, depending on the size and ripeness of the pears); don't allow them to become soft. Midway, turn pears on their sides and baste several times with the wine sauce. Transfer to serving dishes, pour the currants and some of the wine over each, and garnish with thin strips of lemon peel. Serves 6.
Rustic Apple Bread Pudding
I'm surprised that the gnarly apples I find at the Saturday market have intense flavor. Even our long-neglected apple trees bravely put forth their scrawny crop. Too tiny to slice, they at least make a respectable apple butter. For this husky dessert, cut the apples in chunky slices.
~Peel, core, and cut 4 or 5 crisp baking apples in large slices. Squeeze lemon juice over them, then dust with nutmeg. Toast 1 cup of sliced almonds. Remove any hard crust from a loaf of leftover bread (fresh bread would be too soft for this recipe). Cut the bread into slices and lay some of them on the bottom of a buttered rectangular pan, 9 by 12 inches or so. In a sauté pan, melt 6 tablespoons of butter and 6 tablespoons of sugar. Add ¾ cup of the toasted almonds, 2 tablespoons of lemon juice and ¼ cup of cider or water. Toss the apple chunks in this. Layer the apple mixture and bread in the pan, ending with a layer of bread. Beat together 6 tablespoons of softened butter and 4 tablespoons of sugar. Beat in 4 eggs, then 1-¼ cups of milk and ¾ cup of light cream. Pour evenly over the bread. Sprinkle the top with a little sugar, nutmeg, and the remaining toasted almonds. Bake at 350° for an hour. Allow to rest for 15 or 20 minutes. Serve with sweetened mascarpone or whipped cream. Serves 8.
Tangerine Sorbet
If I'd grown up here, I'm sure the fragrance of citrus would be indelibly associated with Christmas. The holiday decorations in Assisi are big lemon boughs on all the stores. Against the pale stones, the fruit glows like lighted ornaments and the scent of lemons infuses the cold air. Outside the groceries all over Cortona, baskets of clementines brighten the streets. Bars are squeezing that most opulent of juices, the dark blood orange. The first taste, tart as grapefruit, quickly turns to a deep aftertaste of sweetness. This sorbet, which works wonders as a pause in a winter dinner, can be made with other juices. Equally good as a light dessert, the sorbet is delectable served with thin chocolate butter cookies.
~Make a sugar syrup from 1 cup of water and 1 cup of sugar by bringing them to a boil, then simmering for about 5 minutes. Stir in 1-¼ cups of fresh tangerine juice, 1 cup of water, 1 tablespoon of lemon juice, plus the zest of the tangerines you've used. Chill thoroughly in the fridge—until cold to the touch. Process in an ice cream machine, according to manufacturer's instructions. Serves 6.
Lemon Cake
A family import, this Southern cake is one I've made a hundred times. Thin slices seem at home here with summer strawberries and cherries or winter pears—or simply with a small glass of one of the many fantastic Italian dessert wines, such as Banfi's B.
~Cream together 1 cup of sweet butter and 2 cups of sugar. Beat in 3 eggs, one at a time. The mixture should be light. Mix together 3 cups of flour, 1 teaspoon of baking powder, ¼ teaspoon of salt, and incorporate this with the butter mixture alternately with 1 cup buttermilk. (In Italy, I use one cup of cream since buttermilk is not available.) Begin and end with the flour mixture. Add 3 tablespoons of lemon juice and the grated zest of the lemon. Bake in a nonstick tube pan at 300° for 50minutes. Test for doneness with a toothpick. The cake can be glazed with ¼ cup of soft butter into which 1-½cups of powdered sugar and 3 tablespoons of lemon juice have been beaten. Decorate with tiny curls of lemon rind.
Rose Walk
IN THE TEN HOURS UPRIGHT IN MY AISLE seat, headed toward Paris, I read with intense concentration a history of experimental French poetry, the flight magazine, even the emergency instruction card. So many crises happened at work before I left San Francisco at the end of May that I wante
d to be loaded onto the plane on a stretcher, wrapped in white, put in the front aisle of the plane with curtains around me, the flight attendant looking in now and then with a cup of warm milk—or a sapphire gin martini. I left a week before Ed finished his classes, fled, really, on the first plane smoking on the runway the day after graduation.
After a short wait at Charles de Gaulle, I caught an Alitalia flight. The pilot wasted no time in heading straight up. An Italian driver, I guess, is an Italian driver; suddenly I felt a surge of energy. I wondered if he was trying to pass someone. Soon he aimed down, almost straight down, toward the Pisa airport. No one seemed alarmed, so I practiced breathing evenly and holding up the plane by the armrests.
I'm staying overnight. If we had been late, the prospect of changing trains in Florence at night sounded exhausting. I check into a hotel and find I'm ready to walk. It's passeggiata hour. Hoards of people mingling, visiting, strolling, running errands. The tower still leans, tourists still take photos of themselves leaning to one side or the other in front of it. The pastel and ocher houses still curve along the river like an aquarelle of themselves. Women with shopping bags crowd into the fragrant bread store. Splendid to arrive alone in a foreign country and feel the assault of difference. Here they are all along, busy with living; they don't talk or look like me. The rhythm of their day is entirely different; I am thoroughly foreign. I have dinner at an outdoor restaurant on a piazza. Ravioli, roast chicken, green beans, salad, a half carafe of local red. Then my elation ebbs and a total, delicious tiredness rushes over me. After a soaking bath with all the hotel's bubble bath, I sleep for ten hours.
The first morning train takes me through fields of red poppies in bloom, olive groves, and by now familiar stony villages. Haystacks, nuns in white four abreast, bed linens flung out the window, sheepfold, oleander, Italy! I stare out the window the whole way. As we approach Florence, I worry about banging my new small computer against something while juggling my bag. Most of my summer clothes are at the house so I can travel lightly. Even so, I feel like a pack animal with my handbag, computer, and carry-on bag hanging on me. But it's fun to get off at the Florence station, which always brings me the fresh memory of my first trip to Italy almost twenty-five years ago, the exotic, smoky sound of the loudspeaker announcing the arrival from Rome on binario undici and the departure for Milano on binario uno, the oily train smells and everyone going somewhere.
Fortunately, the train is almost empty and I easily stow my bags. Midway home (home, I've said to myself), a cart comes through with sandwiches and drinks. The train doesn't stop at Camucia so I get off at Terontola, about ten miles away, and call a taxi.
Fifteen minutes later a taxi pulls up. As soon as I get in, a second taxi pulls alongside us and the driver starts to shout and gesture. I assumed the taxi I got in was the one I called but no, he just happened along. He does not want to give up the fare. I tell him I called a taxi but he starts to take off. The other driver bangs on the door shouting louder, he was having lunch, he drove here especially for the Americana, he has to earn his bread, too. Spit gathers in the corners of his lips and I'm afraid he's about to foam at the mouth. “Stop, please, I should go with him. I'm very sorry!” He growls, slams on brakes, jerks my bag out. I get in the other taxi. They face off to each other, both talking at once, jowls and fists shaking, then abruptly come to terms and start shaking hands, smiling. The deserted driver comes around to me, smiles, and wishes me a good trip.
When I arrive, my sister, nephew, and friends of theirs have been at the house for a couple of weeks. My sister has had all the pots planted with white and coral geraniums. The green smell of freshly cut grass tells me Beppe must have mown the lawn this morning. Despite my severe pruning in December, the roses we planted last summer are as tall as I am. They're profuse with bloom—apricot, white, pink, yellow. Hundreds of butterflies flitter among the lavender. The house has vases of gold lilies and daisies and wildflowers. It's clean and full of life. My sister even has a pot of basil going outside the kitchen door.
They are on a day trip to Florence when I arrive so I have the afternoon to pull the duffel out from under the bed and air out my summer clothes. Since five others are here and settled, I will be sleeping in my study for a few days. I make up the narrow bed with yellow sheets, set up the computer on my travertine desk, open the windows, and I'm here.
Late, I find my boots and walk the terraces. Beppe and Francesco have cut the weeds. Again, I've lost the battle of the wildflowers. In their zeal to clear, they have stopped for nothing, not even the wild (what I know as Cherokee) roses. Poppies, wild carnations, some fluffy white flower, and the host of yellow blooming weeds survive only along the terrace edges. The big news is the olives. In March, they planted thirty in the gaps on the terraces, bringing us up to a hundred and fifty trees. Already they're flowering. We ordered larger trees this year than the ten Ed planted last year; at the rate olives grow, we want to be around to collect a little oil. Beppe and Francesco staked each new tree and stuffed a nest of weeds between the stake and the trunk to prevent chaffing. Ed knew to dig a big hole for each tree but he didn't know to dig an enormous, deep one; Beppe explained that the new trees need a big polmone, a lung. Around each, they've dug to a circumference of about four feet. They also planted two more cherries, to go with the ones Ed planted last spring.
For a week, we cook, run around to Arezzo and Perugia, walk, buy scarves and sheets at the Camucia market, and catch up on family news. Ed arrives in time for a farewell dinner with liberal pourings of several Brunellos my nephew bought in Montalcino, then they pack, pack, pack (so much to buy here) and are gone.
They've had a warm May; now it begins to rain. The run-rampant roses bend and sway in the wind. We run out with shovels and stake them, getting soaked. Ed digs while I clip off the dead blooms, cut back some of the stalky branches, and give them fertilizer, though I'm afraid it will promote even more of the Jack and the Beanstalk mode. I cut an armful of white ones that bloom in ready-made bouquets. Inside, we iron our clothes, rearrange what has been shifted as many people made themselves comfortable to their own tastes. Everything quickly falls into place. Eons ago, it seems, I arrived in June to find ladders, workmen, pipes, wires, rubble, and dust everywhere. Now we just begin living.
A pot of minestrone for the rainy nights. A walk over the Roman road into town for cheese, arugula, coffee. Maria Rita's cherries are the best ever; we eat a kilo every twenty-four hours. All the stump and stone removal and clearing has paid off. Cleaning up the land is easier now. Not as many rocks fly up when the weed machine splits through the weeds. How many stones have we picked up? Enough to build a house? Fireflies flickering on the terraces at night, cuckoos (don't they say whoocoo instead?) in the soft blue dawns. A timid bird that sings “Sweet, sweet.” Hoopoes all dressed up in their exotic plumage with nothing more to do than peck in the dirt. Long days with birdsongs instead of the sound of the telephone.
We plant more roses. In this area of Tuscany, they bloom spectacularly. Almost every garden spills and flourishes with them. We select a Paul Neyron, with ruffled hot-pink petals like a tutu and an astonishing lemony-rose scent. I must have two of the soft pink ones the size of tennis balls called Donna Marella Agnelli. Their perfume carries me back to the memory of being hugged to the bosom of Delia, one of my grandmother's friends, who wore immense hats and was a kleptomaniac no one ever accused because it would embarrass her husband to death. When he noticed a new object around the house, he would stop into the store he figured it came from and say, “My wife completely forgot to pay for this—just walked right out with it in her hand and remembered last night. How much do I owe you?” Perhaps her powdery rose perfume was stolen.
“Don't plant any Peace roses,” a friend and connoisseur of roses advised. “They're such a cliché.” But not only are they dazzling, the vanilla cream, peach, and rosy blush colors repeat the colors of the house. They belong in this garden. I plant several. Last year's gold-orange roses open t
o flagrant size, the rash colors contributing to their beautiful vulgarity. Now we have a line of roses all along the walk up to the house, with lavender planted between each one. I'm coming to believe in aromatherapy. As I walk to the house through waves of scent, it's impossible not to inhale deeply and feel an infusion of happiness.
At the steps up to the front terrace, the old iron pergola remains at the top and bottom, with jasmine we planted two years ago twining around them and down the iron railings of the steps. Now we decide on another long row of roses on the other side of the walk and a pergola at the opposite end of that walk. This restores the impression of the original rose pergola that existed when we first saw the house, but now we want the open feeling to the wide walk instead of reconstructing the continuous pergola. Two roses we choose—one milky pink, one a velvet red—are Queen Elizabeth and Abe Lincoln (pronounced Eh-bay Lin-cÓnay at the nursery). Nice to think of those two forces side by side. My favorites start as one color and open to another. Gioia, Joy, is pearly as a bud and full blown turns straw yellow, with some petals still veined and edged with pink. We plant more of the apricot-dawn roses, one that's traffic-light yellow, a Pompidou, and one named for Pope John XXIII. So many important people just blooming in our garden. I don't resist a decadent, smoked lilac one that looks as if it belongs in the hand of someone in a coffin.
We visit a fabbro, blacksmith, just over the river in Camucia. His two boys gather near as we talk to their father, their chance to see weird foreigners up close. One boy, about twelve, has icy, eerie green eyes. He's lithe and tan. I can't help but stare back at him. All he needs is a goatskin and a crude flute. The fabbro also has green eyes but of a more direct color. By now, I've visited the workshops of five or six fabbri. The craft must attract particularly intense men. This shop is open on one side so it doesn't have the sooty air of most. He shows us his well covers and manhole grids, practical items. I think of the brooding fabbro we first met, now dead from stomach cancer, him wandering in his own world in his blackened shop, fingering the serpentine torch holder and the archaic animal-headed staffs. Our gate still leans open; he died before he repaired it and we've grown used to its rust and bends. The green-eyed fabbro shows us his garden and nice house. Perhaps his faun son will follow him in the craft.
Under the Tuscan Sun Page 24