Mission Accomplished

Besides images of gondoliers, leaning towers, and big, round pizzas, the word Italy tends to conjure up images of plates overflowing with pasta. This musing seems to be right on target with what I've experienced. It's not at all weird for someone to eat pasta twice a day. On the contrary, it's considered weird if you haven't eaten your daily portion of pasta. That's why I've found it quite strange that in Italy homemade pasta is such a dying art. Of course, everyone here knows how to boil some water and dump the noodles into it. It's as natural to Italians as bowling a bowl of cereal is to us. I'm talkin' the fresh, dough-made-this-morning kind of stuff. I think it would take heavy bribery to get my host mom to whip up some linguine, and from what my friends have said, only their grandmas will make pasta for big occasions. That was why after three months of living the Italian life, I was disappointed to say I had never made pasta. After complaining about this to a wide variety of people, I discovered that the other exchange student in my region (Fiona) has a host mom who makes pasta almost every Sunday. This got me thinking about just how long it had been since we had had an AFS get together, and how I am just dying to meet Fiona's family...

Without much more talking, Fiona got the hint, and yesterday, my host sister Roberta and I were off to the little town of Moiano "per fare la pasta in casa." I had politely requested gnocchi, and because gnocchi takes a little extra time to cut and form, they had mostly finished the dough by the time we got there, but no harm done. I think I got the gist of how to make it. There is definitely no official recipe for the dough, however. I was told it depends on how watery your potatoes are, but for the most part, it goes one part flour to one part potato. I don't know how accurate that is because Fiona's host mom told me she used one kilo of potatoes, implying she also used one kilo of flour. There's a good chance she was talking about volume and not weight (From other recipes I looked up, they said 300 g flour for every kilo of potatoes) ....Anyhow, the potatoes were peeled, boiled, and pureed in the food processor, kitchen aid type, Italian contraption called the Bimby. The flour was added, and "Ecco!" we had a dough.

With the help of some more flour, we rolled the dough into long, skinny-ish snakes, which were then cut into little rectangles.

Next came what I think was the hardest part, forming the classic conch shells. Using two fingers and a bit of conviction, we gave the dough cute little stripes with a handy little wooden tool. You can also use a fork or go without the stripes altogether, but I found them quite charming.

Handy Little Line Tool

Because of the freshness, you only cook the pasta for three or four minutes, until the gnocchi float to the top and look more or less like this.

Then, you are free to serve them how you like with pesto or a simple red sauce. We went all out and made them "alla taglia," which implies in a pan and baked. We mixed them with a simple ragu of tomato sauce and ground meat, scooped them into individual pots similar to Ramekins, topped them with fresh buffalo mozzarella and parmesan, and baked them at 200 C for about 30 min. They came out with a crunchy, golden cheese crust and soft, warm gnocchi in the middle. Maybe my opinion was a bit biased, but I could seriously taste the difference between our gnocchi and the store bought gnocchi we eat normally. I think it's time for a little pasta Renaissance here in Italy or at least in my kitchen.

Taaaaa Duhhhh

Like a Big Pizza Pie...

In my opinion, when the moon hits your eye like a big pizza pie, you are obligated to eat the whole dang thing. The "amore" is just too complicated. Even my Italian friends would agree that lovely latin lovers come and go, but in Italy (specifically in the same region as Naples), la pizza is securely immortal.

Even here in Sant'Agata exists an extreme pizza pride. Everyone has their own opinion on what toppings are best, how the pizza should be cut, how it should be eaten, what type of oven it should be cooked in, who makes it best, and if it's acceptable to eat it more than 100 kilometers outside of Naples. As a foreigner, these various opinions were overwhelming because frankly all the pizza tasted good to me, but after three solid months of eating pizza at least once or twice a week, I've begun to develop my own narrow minded habits.

First off, the whole, personal pizza is much better than the "American" pizza slices. Maybe it's because it would never be socially acceptable in America to order a pizza the size of a large platter and eat the whole thing without an ounce of guilt, but here that's the beautiful norm. Don’t worry, your stomach magically adjusts to eating that much at once. Secondly, pizza is much better when cooked in a wood-fired oven. You can taste the difference in the vague smokiness, and the heat of the wood gives the crust a slightly burnt, crunchy edge. When your whopper of a pizza comes out of the fire and the waiter at Il Barbaro (my favorite pizza place) gives it to you, it’s necessary to immediately cut it into quarters, leaving four pieces, that are to be folded in half and eaten like a sandwich. Finally, no….no you should not eat pizza outside of the Naples region let alone outside of Italy. I, the American, found pizza in Florence, Italy unappealing, which leaves little hope for my return to America.

Toppings deserve their own paragraph because they can truly make a good pizza. The universal favorite is the basic margarita. Here that entails only tomato sauce, mozzarella cheese, and frequently a piece of basil or two. It’s hard to go wrong with this classic, but it is always made better “buffala” style with buffalo mozzarella. Another good one is a pizza bianca (cheese without sauce) with French fries and occasionally a sausage similar to a hot dog, but really how can you go wrong with carb on carb action. However, in my calm, objective opinion, the perfection of prosciutto crudo, arugula, and parmegiano reggianno over a pizza bianca can never, ever be beaten.

My First Real Pizza: Look at the Pizza and Look at My Face...

The World Could Not Be Happier