During my decision of where I wanted to go to study abroad, I considered many different aspects such as culture, language, places to visit ect. However the one thing I considered above all was food. “England: no, their cuisine is (from what I remember) horrible, ok… How about Spain: mmm, its not Mexican food, I’d be disappointed. What about France? Not bad, not bad at all. Oh but wait…I would gain about a million pounds because I would only eat bread, cheese and quish. Well, what about Italia? Oh now that’s it! Pasta, Pizza, cheese, gelato. SOLD” And with that I had made my choice to come to Italy to experience their culture, language, visit their historical landmarks, but most of all, to eat!
Well since I have been here I have not been let down about Italy’s reputation! One of my main stables here is olive oil (my heart is going to be in great health!). I use olive oil with literally everything! I will, on average, eat about four pieces of bread toasted with olive oil and salt a day. When I cook my pasta and veggies every night they are cooking in olive oil and then drizzled with olive oil as well. Between our five roommates, I do not even want to begin to think of how much olive oil we have gone through; it may be boarder line obsession. ☺
Before I came to Italy, I told myself that I wanted to take a cooking class while I was here since I loved to cook and I want to learn more. I talked to one of the school coordinators and she set up a cooking class with a local American chef named Christine Hickman. A class of eight of us walked to her house this last Friday for our cooking class. To begin: she lives in one of the most beautiful Italian houses! It was only a five minute walk from the center, and she had white walls with stainless kitchen appliances, with light yellow couches in the living room and green plants all around the house. It was amazing, I wanted to move it right there and then! She has been living in Italy for 10 years and she has been cooking for 20 or so. She lives half of her year in New Mexico and the other half in Perugia. (She was actually on her way to visit Greece, fell in love with Perugia, and still has not gotten across the Adriatic to see Greece).
So after all of the introductions, we got down to work. Christine gave us each packets with the following recipes in it that we then cooked:
Bread Toasts (Bruschette with beans, tomatoes and olive as well as Bruschette with Tomato and Basil)
Egg Pasta (dough for your own pasta), with Parmigiano-Rggiano and Nutmeg sauce or with Wine sauce.
Directions on mixing the dough, stretching and thinning and some other dough tips.
Basic Marinara Sauce (with some variations including meat etc).
And finally Tiramisu.
I do have to say that before I had the Tiramisu that we made Friday night, I was not the biggest fan: however this recipe is absolutely amazing, not to mention relatively easy! We cooked away for hours and finally got to eat our food ( we were of course famished!).
Then Last night, Wednesday; we went to a pizza making lesion where a restaurant hosted our class. They taught us how to make the dough into a circle, put on the ingredients, place it in the oven, how to turn it and keep it in the same spot also. It was torturous because we were only allowed to make one at a time and although we got a bit of a piece every time someone tried, we were ready for dinner! So we were allowed to sit down and order our own meal and enjoy! While we were enjoying our wonderful pizza, one of the four personalities of Perugia showed up. Now I believe here is where I need to pause to explain myself. There is a small blue book that has all the secrets about Perugia published in it. It states, “to be a true ‘temporary citizen’ of the city, you have to be able to identify the interesting, odd, or just plain crazy residents who make Perugia hum”. These personalities include: Mauro the Prophet who is hard to miss: he wears a bright red jump suit. He gets up on the stairs in the center and screams at the top of his lungs in Italian about politics, religion, name it he’s yelled about it! ( I have seen this personality, yet have not witnessed his ‘craziness’ yet). Lastly I will tell you about Compagno Paolo (translating into Comrade Paolo). Paolo is a diehard communist who preaches at various cafes and restaurants. So low and behold Compagno Paolo shows up at Pizza e Musica and preaches. It made my night! He is around 70ish years old and wears two open ties around his neck ( the best way to identify him by the way if you are ever in Perugia). Needless to say, it was an eventful night, as well as few days ☺
Miss you all! Ciao Ciao xoxo
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