First Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving to all our American readers!

We generally don't celebrate this holiday because our family tradition is to go to Michael's parents...which is rather a commute from Italy! A few years ago, Jim and Sharon were here for Thanksgiving, so we did the traditional spread (thanks to Sharon, who by now is an expert!), but that was the only time.

This year was a different story. Although Michael was traveling, we were going to have a guest! Trey, son of my dear friend Tricia, is studying this semester in Rome; he came to spend the night with us prior to getting ready for his final exams.

As always, it was a treat to see him; he's visited us several times now, and swears that it only ever rains in Todi. Given his experience, it's a fair comment, so I was delighted that we had great weather today!

In any case, I'd decided to cook a more traditional meal rather than just an "everyday" dinner. When Ashley and I went to the States in early November, I brought back (legally! I checked) a few bags of cranberries for the cranberry sauce. I bought the pumpkins last week, cooked them up, and Ashley and I made the pie last night.

Foreground:colorflower (brighter than in the photo because of steam).
The green in the background is Umbrian mashed potatoes: cooked with greens!

Umbrian mash plus the stuffing

The pink is where I added lemon-juice; it turned fluorescent!

 Since a turkey is a little large for our oven (and is difficult to get this time of year, since they're being fattened for Christmas), I punked out and decided to do roast chicken pieces. Stuffing, gravy, salad, and potatoes were done today. We also had a new-to-me vegetable: purple cauliflower, dubbed "colorflower" by James! It's the most marvelous stuff: it starts this delightful lilac/magenta, then as it cooks moves through amethyst and into indigo. However, the steaming water turns a beautiful turquoise or emerald green, depending.



As we sat down, I realized that this is my first time ever cooking a Thanksgiving meal! Thanks to Sharon's example over the years, though, I knew what to do and won the highest praise: completely silent chewing punctuated only by "mmmm" for several minutes!

Grand finale!

After dinner, we played sjoelbak (a Dutch bar game) and the kids played with the Spirographs. And then pie! I was pleased with how the color turned out, because it still had a good bit of yellow to it rather than its turning brown. I whipped the cream with brown sugar, which gave a nice complex flavor that worked well with the pie.

All in all a success! And the best thing? Having my sweet kids (a portion of them, anyway!) with me and getting to see Trey.

With thanks for all our blessings,

Alexandra

Smoking pot

While I don't fry often, a copious amount of olive oil disappears from my kitchen on a weekly basis. The ubiquitous non-stick coating does not do well with oil at high temperatures, and nor does standard stainless. I decided it was time for a new pan, and had a heavy-duty metal pot with an enamel lining in mind...like Le Creuset or something similar.

I looked at the market, but the best I could find was a flimsy thing that just didn't seem right.

This week, I finally got to our local kitchen goods shop (Michael doesn't usually allow me to enter, because it is a complete gimme store; I want EVERYTHING they sell, please!) and spent some time looking at their offerings. They had a nice-quality non-stick pan and lovely heavy-gauge metal pans, but not what I was seeking.

True confession time: my Italian was not up to asking them for the type of pot I was looking for. In fact, I forgot some of the basic words I did know in the heat of the moment. I stumbled around, talked about "ceramic" instead of enamel, and was generally just pathetic. Luckily, they know and love me as a customer who pays them a month's rent every time I go in there, so they took me back to the pots and pans section again. I explained everything. I looked pleadingly.

Aha! She had exactly the solution I was craving. She ferretted around in the shelves, pulled out a cardboard box, and...it was a flattish crock. You know, cooked clay with red glaze internally, brown glaze externally, to be put in the back of the fireplace. The dimensions were great, but duh, this is not an item you put on the stove.

I explained the problem. She looked "duh-ishly" right back at me and virtually patted me on the head, while telling me that all Italians use this cookware, it goes right on the stove no problem (not fridge to oven, however, but it can be used in the oven without a problem). I stuttered something about thermal shock and direct heat and she looked at me very kindly and told me to can it and the she knew what she was talking about.

What could I do? I whipped out my credit card, and brought it home. The instructions said to soak it for 12 hours before using the first time, so I took care of that part right away. I'm using it tonight for my greens, but true confession: after all the explosions I've had in my kitchen over the years, I'm staying well away until I trust this thing.

Love,

Alexandra