First! I found N'DUJA!!!!! Unbelievable.
FL and I rode into Udine last night to bring my digital camera to the Samsung store. It had gotten knocked out of my hand at the festival while I was trying to photograph someone spinning mozzarella strands into milky white braids. The lens is jammed, not at all uncommon and totally fixable, but we'll see what price they come up with.
As we were leaving the Samsung store I was obviously all bummed and put-out and boohoo-ing because "I just can't have anything nice", when FL interrupted my grumblings, shouting, "There it is"!
I thought, "my pretty perfectly-repaired-free-of-charge Samsung?!", but no!
It was a tiny little meat and cheese shop, named, simply, Calabria. I gasped, squealed! FL swung the car around and I dashed inside through the rain, up to the counter, where a huge be-mustached man with tiny spectacles opened up his palms and, in an accent that even I could tell was clearly from the farthest Southern depths of Italy, said,
"you look like a girl who knows what she wants; tell me".
"N'duja", I cried!
His face took on a look of surprise, and his eyes swished pointedly from left to right, as though he was suspiscious.
"N'duja? You know what that is? You know what it does to the mouths of little girls like you?"
"Yes! Of course!", I yelped, grinning wildly, practically hopping up and down with excitement, "I love it!"
"Ok, then, beautiful, here's your n'duja", he said with a mock sigh, handing me a lump of pork paste as heavy and red as raw beef. He winked. "But be careful, capisc?"

Second! I found a recipe for ajvar, the serbian red pepper spread I am now obsessed with. One can decide to omit the eggplant, or regulate the amount of spicy chili peppers, or whether to roast the garlic or mash it raw, so it can be fixed to suit anyone's taste. The recipe is incredibly simple, and I think it's a nice one to have on hand for a get together, or even a week-night dinner picker-upper.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6430271

Third! As for the birthday cake...Bentley loved his panino.

I am baking a cake for Bentley's birthday. Chocolate, with cinnamon and coffee, and a frosting made of plum preserves and Nutella. I am making this up as I go, which I know is the #1 rule for Things Not To Do in regards to baking, so we'll see how it turns out. The back up is a giant panino with a kilo of mortadella, a candle on top. Bentley should be happy either way.



When I die I want to go to a place like this, just become a mist in a garden of roses and moss covered fountains and twinkly lights, people dancing about speaking pretty foreign languages that make the twilight echo and ring like a bell choir.

I took this picture this weekend at Gusti di Frontiera, a food and wine festival in Gorizia. The festival grew substantially this year from the last; the newspaper said only 30% of the booths were repeats from the years before, and that this year 12 countries were represented. Gusti di Frontiera means "Tastes of the Frontier", and the mission statement for the festival claims that, for the weekend at least, Gorizia, and Central Europe, is one giant piazza without borders.



I felt like a mouse in a cheese shop walking about the festival, my mouth watering, each booth we passed eliciting tiny yelps of excitement, growls from my tumbling tummy. I wanted just a nibble of everything: the grilled meats, the pigs being turned on spits, huge rounds of aged farmers cheese, buckets of fresh Gorgonzola, being scooped up like ice cream.







Each country in attendance had it's own area, either a side street, or a piazza, or, in the case of frou-frou-france, a rose garden. I LOVE things like this, being able to get lost in my imagination, walking about dreamily, pulling on FL's hand, saying, "oh, darling, let's go to Austria! Let's go to Switzerland! Catalonia! France! Tuscany!", each transplanted, shrunken country filling me with a different emotion, mood. I feel like my tongue transforms to speak the languages, my eyes change colors to reflect the atmosphere.



In France we ate stewed duck, chilled oysters with lemon, and tiny, thimble-sized bulbs of fresh sheep's milk cheese. At the market, I ran my hand over cashmere scarves, basked in the light of hand-painted paper lanterns and saw my reflection holding woven wicker handbags. I bought a beautiful vial of pink sea salt tossed with rose buds, and some green tea.





In Germany and Austria we ate giant sausages with kraut, and saluted the other festival, the mother of all festivals, currently taking place in Munich, Oktoberfest. Giant mugs of beer were ordered and bashed onto the wooden tables as girls in little milkmaid costumes pranced about in beat to the bad Bruce Springsteen cover band.

Italy had a whole road, the main drag through town, with vendors from Marche, Puglia, Liguria, Sicilia. Barrels of olives, slabs of cured pancetta, fresh baked bread, salt-less from Tuscany and the flat kind from Sardinia. I searched in vain for Calabria: I dream regularly of n'duja, the mouth-numbingly spicy pork fat spread that is made there. The stuff is illegal in the US, and virtually impossible to find outside of Calabria, as it is both something that is made personally and eaten by the family, and because it seems that hot peppers and "the likes of them" are abhorred or feared anywhere North of the Po River. The first time I ever ate some was on the farm in Piemonte; a friend of Mario's had sent him some n'duja in exchange for some cheese. I was pretty much the only person who ate it, slathering it over my bread like jam, sometimes unable to sleep for the thought of it, sneaking into the kitchen at night to give my tongue a kick. Pouting over Calabria's inability to represent at the festival, I was calmed by FL, who remembered that Bonelli, the butcher, is from Calabria, and suggested that I should ask him how to acquire that molten delicacy.





In Catalonia we ate honeyed cookies and listened to a Spaniard sing and strum. In Albania I introduced FL to the miracle that is baklava. One of the larger back piazzas was dedicated entirely to Grado, the fishing village about 45 minutes away, and the place was overflowing with bags of fresh clams, muscles, and something suspiciously similar to crawfish. This is where FL and I gorged ourselves on something raw, in a shell. I cannot for the life of me now remember the name, but they were tiny and orange and so beautiful.





I surprised myself as well: In a festival full of almost anything I could dream of or ask for, I went back to the same booth three times to eat the same thing. And the booth was from Serbia, of all places! I was led there by the smell; it was the smell of heat, my nose stung, and I wanted whatever it was bad enough to push myself to the front of a sweaty, rambunctious, oddly-dressed crowd speaking an intelligible and rough language to find out what in the world the fuss was about. Stuff peppers, grape-leaf-wrapped beef, slabs of some meat that I could not place but desperately, savagely wanted, soft, fluffy flat bread, clotted butter and AJVAR. Jesus God, this ajvar.



My eyes poured tears as I ate it, but it was so fresh, positively intoxicating. At one point on of the whole chili peppers, bright yellow and about the size of a tooth, got wedged in that impossible gap beneath my tongue and the backside of my molars. I could not get it out, not with a fork, my finger, a straw. It was stuck, and I clogged my mouth with bread to try and pacify the heat, the pepper slowly dissolving and causing numbness to my entire mouth. I didn't care. One side of my mouth was for gargling beer, the other was for more ajvar. Sausages, ribs, fresh salsas of tomatoes and onions, I don't know what it was, but this place was bangin'. The line at certain points made the wait almost an hour, but we were not swayed. The atmosphere was fun enough, with beer and traditional Serbian music, though the Serbians were pointedly clan-like, nice enough but not at all mingling the surrounding booths of Albanians and Hungarians. Their booth was packed to the gills with nationalists, the rest of us waiting in the drizzling rain for their sizzling meats.



And as for wine, you ask? Porchis, those infallible love-bugs without whom our lives here in Cormons or beyond would be sad and colorless, had rented themselves their own kiosk. Beer, pork, and, of course, Kandie, Fabbio's wine. When our souls were in need of a geographical reality check, a life-saver so to speak, we returned to the Porchis kiosk, and had a little glass of Sauvignon. Ever jovial, ever generous, Fabbio and Simone were like a beacon of home amongst the confusion of the festival. The opening-day party for Porchis is, incidentally, Thursday! That means that fall is here, and Sauvignon is right around the corner.

Bentley's cake is out of the oven, cooled, and ready to be iced. Doesn't look half bad, but I think I'll make him the giant panino, too, just in case.

In a fit of boredom, or as an attempt to ward off the insanity and depression that comes with cabin fever, I decided to leave Cormons yesterday. Yes- leave this town, these vineyards, these quiet cobbled streets, the wine that is starting to make me gag on sight (too much of a good thing). My body and mind had reached a fever pitch of day-time lonesomeness, and I thought another afternoon of sitting in my panties sending our resumes, or wandering about the hills thinking of sending out resumes, or sitting at a cafe trying to study my Italian while knowing that surely my time would be better spent sending out resumes, would drive me mad. I needed to shake things up, see some new faces, practice my Italian on living souls other than those who inhabit this strange snow-globe that is Cormons. In practica, spend some money instead of obsessing over my lack of it. The tips of my fingers had started to tingle, and instead of buying a pack of cigarettes, I bought a train ticket.

Anthony Bourdain did one of his shows a while back on Venice, and it made me weep, literally. Sitting on the sofa at my mother's house, glass of Lambrusco balanced on one knee, my grey kitty on the other, I watched this episode and my chest seemed to swell and I began to have trouble breathing. It sounds scary, but it was euphoric. It happens like this with me and Italy: I see photos, or read books, or watch a film, and something inside me feels like it is mine, like not only that I belong there and know these things intimately, but that it, in a way, belongs to me. Immediately after this wave of pride, however, for years, came the jealousy. Because they belonged to someone else, these images and words would fill me with grief, anxiety. Why wasn't I there, damnit? Roman Holiday was always the worst, but even stupid things like Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen Mystery in Amalfi would make me moody. So the other night when I was watching Bourdain, I went through these waves of emotion, in a matter of seconds, except this time there was something else: the realization that in X weeks I would be there! I could go to Venice, I could eat these things and see these things, anything and everything, and as often as I wanted. This truth hit me like a tumbling stack of biscotti and I just burst into tears. There in my living room, startling the grey cat, as I watched anchovies (which I don't even like) being sucked down Bourdain's throat. "You will be mine!", I cried aloud, shaking my fist at the boney, shrivled, vinegar-cured fish on the TV, "Just you wait!"

And so, I went to Venice, in search of anchovies (which I don't even like), and in search of a restaurant that had been featured on the program, Da Romano.

Opened in 1910, Da Romano is a trattoria on the island of Burano that was for a time "the restaurant", a mecca for the artists of Venice. Burano has for centuries been a tiny fishing island, about half an hour out from Venice. The houses are painted vibrant colors, and the production of lace is the island's major export, giving the place an overall feel of beauty, light, delicacy, and creativity. In the early 20th century, artists and writers from all corners of Europe began flocking there, for the peace and quiet, I imagine, and to convene in a colony-style atmosphere to discuss ideas, trends, or whatever it is that artists discuss. I am not one, so I am not sure.

Anthony Bourdain had come here for the seafood risotto, which is legendary and supposedly the "best" in Italy. Now, I am not foolish or mainstream enough to confuse "the best" with "the most well-known", but I figured it was worth trying. If anything, something to check off my bucket list. And Burano! The island is positively blinding in places, the colors so bright it seems to make even the little old ladies and children glow. Fresh laundry hung in the dazzling sunshine from almost every window, and the tiny streets were filled with carts full of lace, soft and intricate. The smell of grilled seafood permeated the air, bringing the island back to reality, a savory needle to pop the balloon of heavenly surrealism.

I wanted to take photos and wander about the streets, but due to something, possibly a flaw, in my character, that causes me to "go by foot" to the Burano Boat boarding dock on the complete other side of Venice, instead of paying 2 euro more to take the boat that is already waiting outside of the train station upon arrival, I was late and desperate to find the restaurant before it closed.
It was not hard. There is only one main drag through the island, and Da Romano is at the heart of it.

A be-suited waiter showed me to a table, elegantly clothed in silk, and I looked over the menu. All variety of seafood, prepared in a variety of ways. Octopus salad, steamed mussels, anchovies over fresh sheep's milk cheese, pan-roasted rombo, oven-roasted branzino, salt-cured orata. And then the risotti! Risotto with clams, risotto with black squid ink, risotto...Da Romano, al frutto dal mare. This I ordered, and a bottle of aqua frizzante, and I sat and watched the crowed dining room. The front half was packed with tourists, all nationalities. Some had come here because they new the name, some had stumbled in accidentally. There was a lull in the crowd, a space, a row or two of empty tables, and then there were the Italians. Men in business suits, little old ladies, guys in work gear, coated in cement or dust. This half of the restaurant seemed older in a way, perhaps shaded in black and white, or sepia toned. The Italians of Burano and Venice knew why they were here, and probably came often. They ordered as though this were their last supper, not just a Wednesday lunch; steaming bowls of tightly wound pasta, trays of whole fish, mountains of fried shrimp, a jug of wine.
My risotto came, and it was exceptional. Creamy, savory. A seafood broth had been used, but there were no bits or chunks of creature on my plate. Just the essence of the animals, steaming off of the silky white rice. A dash of ground black pepper, it was perfect. Each bite seemed to be the consistency of ice cream, tapioca, soft and lightly textured, though in the end, at just the last instant, my teeth would hit a crunch, the ultimate catch in a perfect risotto. This is not mush, but instead expertly indulged rice, moist until tooth collides with the fine bone in the center of each grain.

I cannot say that it is the best risotto in Italy, but it is delicious, and well worth the trip.
Had a walk about and took some photos. Burano has a leaning tower, too, though it's hard to prove it with photos taken up-close.
At 6 p.m. I found myself back at the train station, boarded my train for Cormons. There's always a relief in heading back to Cormons. FL was waiting for me at the station, had me detail my whole adventure, right down to the nifty device I found on my camera that lets me play with the photos and their colors and shapes.
Ah, though. Today is Thursday and it is back to business as usual. After a hike over the hills, I will take my book and some resumes into town. Thinking of dropping some off at the Enoteca di Cormons; that nice lady knows everyone. Who know's what will become of me?

I feel like all I did all weekend was eat. Saturday's mountain lunch turned into Saturday's spooky Giat Neri dinner (on a budget, we opted only for pizzas, instead of the 6 course "lover's meal", that involves such outlandish house-specialties as giant scallops steamed in-shell, risotto with truffles, and oven-roasted filet of Rombo, sizzling in butter, a glistening fish the size of our torsos), turned into Sunday's all-you-can-eat assault on the region's local favorites.



My only goal for Sunday was to avoid getting completely drunk, which is actually a feat when enduring 8 hours of wine-festival-style hoopla with FL and his friends. I opted out of the wine (or paced myself, at least), and went for the porchetta, instead. The sun was boiling hot, to everyone's dismay, and heavy winter coats and fur-lined boots were discarded across picnic tables and sidewalks, collars unbuttoned and paper plates folded into mock-fans. "Mock" being the operative word. I was sweating bullets, the steam from the grills and fry-ers and spits carrying roasted pigs to crisp perfection causing my eyes to blur. Even this did not inhibit my appetite, which is made of iron and insatiable.



We ate goose, we ate deer, we ate prosciutto and frico with pear. We sampled local cheeses and beer made of chestnuts, porcini mushrooms, fresh breads, mixed seafood (grilled and fried), and, of course, polenta.

About 8 o'clock the festival turned from an apple-cheeked, wholesome cultural celebration- peppered with old Italian men in green tweed caps and babies running about merrily with sponge bob balloons- into an assault on the ears by the local youths, who insisted on proving their flush of our-whole-lives-ahead-of-us glory with blaring techno beats and the introduction of "mojitos". It all just felt wrong to me for some reason, and FL and I parted ways with the kids and went and sat on the steps of the great piazza, eating hazelnut gelato and pretending that it was the year 1880, that we were in a seat of power, that history was still being made here.



The train ride home was brief, thankfully. We fell right asleep, waking to another beautiful day. It is FL's father's birthday, actually. He is 56. I went downtown to a little bakery and bought him a tower of powdered-sugar-coated cookies. One can never go wrong with sweets.

The sun has returned, blue skies have prevailed! Was beginning to think this weekend of Friuli DOC was a wash (har) after the near flooding that ensued after the past three days of downpour. And this on the weekend of Friuli DOC, the regional food and wine festival (which I was pleased to realize I have attended 3 years in a row)! Saturday brought lightening, thunder, and heavy rains, which for some reason reminded FL of how yummy fresh-caught trout is. We forgot about our disappointment for the festival, and decided instead to brave the storm and head into the mountains.



There was a little restaurant on the river that we had seen last fall. At the time it was closed, and we always talked about how one day we would retrace our steps and find it again, one day when the timing was right. I could not have for the life of me recalled how to find the place, a beautiful old wooden hotel in the middle of the forest, a river running by. FL knew where to go, though, and after an hour of gorgeous, smoky scenery we arrived. The river was rushing wildly, and clouds hung low on the mountains, cutting our view of them off at the base, the sky a solid grey. The lights were on in the hotel, and the restaurant, to our surprise, was actually opened for business.



The inside was amazingly cozy, it felt like someone's house; and more than that, it felt like someone's house in Georgia, or Tennessee, the Blue Ridge Mountains, maybe, or the Smokies. Someplace familiar and safe, paneled in fragrant pine and cherry, washed brick floor, a fire burning. Out the windows the wind caused the branches of the magnolias and pines to lash against the windows fiercely. We took off our coats and had a seat.

There was no menu, just a little old lady who bustled over and told us what she had cooked up that morning: un pasticcio (what we mistakenly call "lasagna") with cream, bay and trout; pumpkin gnocchi, with butter and sage; roasted deer with mixed peppercorns; fresh trout, with lemon and white wine. FL told her to bring us one of each.







What with the polenta that comes as a staple with every meal (am thinking that it it surely kismet that I moved to the one region in Italy that upholds grits as a cultural, daily necessity. I can run, but my Southern-ness will follow me to the ends of the Earth), and the salad, the tiny ceramic jug of house white wine, we were stuffed. Sat by the fireside and let our tummies settled, full of butter and lemon and nutmeg.

oooh, must go! we are heading to Friuli DOC, finalmente!

That was entirely painless.

The Livio Felluga estate is beautiful, set inside a newly constructed building of the artsy/organic dark-stripy-wood-and-brushed-cement variety. Walked in the reception area, which is a long room with a long cement table, silvery-swivel chairs and blocks of wood making spaces designed for tasting wines. The walls have little holes carved out that are filled with upended wine bottles, shimmery snippets of glass. The receptionist called Andrea Felluga, the son and "heir", as it says on the website. He was very nice and lacoste-shirted, and led me to what I thought was a solid, padded red wall. But no! It was a trick wall like in movies! And when he pushed on it it turned into another room, which we entered. I was impressed.

He basically said that he had received my resume' and cover letter and was interested in hearing what it was I was interested in doing. I told him I was looking for a position in marketing, that I wished to write and vend the wines, but that I also had experience in the vineyards, etc etc. There was no open position currently in the marketing department, he said, but what about the cantina?

Ah, enology. I told the truth: though I had studied a little enology, and had worked in a lab at the University, enology was not my field. I had little experience and, though I would be willing and more than capable of learning, there was not much I could offer on the subject.

He offered an immediate position in the vineyards for the vendemmia (starting tomorrow), but I would need to have work papers. And there is the catch: without work papers I cannot legally work the vendemmia (FL and I had already tried at another winery). As it would take at least a month for papers to go through, there is no chance of me vendemmia-ing this season.

Therefore, at this juncture, there is nothing for me. If something opens up in the future, and if he hears of anything from another vineyards in terms of marketing and the need for an English speaker, he will surely let me know.

And that was that. I spoke wonderfully, I was calm and cute. For a second I was panicing afterward, thinking, oh my god, was it dumb for me to have told him I didn't have enological experience?? Should I have faked it?

No, I don't think so. That would not have held water for very long.

I really respect this vineyard, they make an incredible product, and if there is ever something that I can do for them, and do well, I would be honored. In the meantime, I will just drink their Chardonnay and remember the cool trick door and be proud that

A) within the first month I was here I was even given the time of day by Signore Felluga

and

B) I totally just went and had a job interview IN ITALIAN.

And I didn't even throw up.

Job interview in 45 minutes. I am calm. I just have to go there and find out what they want from me. I must remember that I am not an enologist, and I am not a viticulturist. So if they start asking me questions about tannins and production I must not try to fake it, I must be honest and collected and secure in my own qualifications and abilities (my list of qualifications and abilities is now alluding me...). I must not throw up.

But why oh why did this have to start with Felluga?! Felluga is top, one of the best wineries in Friuli, in all of Italia, and possibly the only winery that has a personal place in my heart. This could be crushing.

Will be like that time I interviewed for the position in the kitchen at 5&10 in Athens, a 4-star restaurant with a famous chef, having never worked in a kitchen before. The guy at the pre-interview said, "ok, bring your knives and coat" and I was like, oh, sure. Then I was frantic for the next 3 days trying to lay my hands on anything other than the dull wall-mart butcher knife I had at home, the one I used solely for smashing garlic because it had a blade like a broom handle. My father drove to Athens and brought me a "chef's coat" that said Marietta High School, I spent $80 on an pathetic excuse for a set of chef's knives at Target, and my brother came over and gave me a series of lessons on how to chop tomatoes and onions. The "kitchen trial", as they called it, was a disaster: I sliced my thumb within the first 3 minutes (brilliantly I had brought along some band-aids, which I applied in the walk-in freezer), I could not make my pear into the shape of a rose even though some incredibly patient guy named Julio who spoke no English demonstrated it for me at least 7 times, and my potato cubes looked oblong and distorted. I was fed a "shift meal" of swordfish and kale and sent home with a promise being gotten "in touch" with.

But, I tried.

The interesting thing is that I am in no way nervous about my Italian. Like, for the first time ever on this bizarre adventure that is not what is worrying me (in fact, Condor says I just need to go in, cuss the guy out in Friulano and slam my fist on the table shouting, "taj di blanc!" -which means "glass of white"- and I will surely be met with applause and a warm embrace). It is more the prospect of being told, no, we have no use for you, which will in my deluded head mean that NO ONE will have any use for me EVER. and I will be broke and unemployed for all of my life because I have no marketable skills or work experience.

Have gone over the Livio Felluga website in detail, scrounging up adjectives and points of interest on their history and wine. There is this big post about "Who We Are" and it uses the words "courage" and "battle" and "hard work". Sheesh. Reminds me of a story by David Sedaris, where he says, "it's always a bad sign when an employer offers an image of themselves doing anything other than getting drunk and throwing money around".

Ok, now I am giggling. Will remember David Sedaris being unemployable, but coming out on top. Will remember Bridget Jones being unemployable, but coming out on top. Will remember Ignatius J. Riley being unemployable, but managing to make a scene and some money, anyway.

I am in good company.

Wish me luck!

Here are a couple of the recipes from Friday night's cooking class. Y'all will (surely) be happy to know that FL and I went shopping on Saturday and I located long forks like the ones used for the pasta, and fish bowls! I am well on my way to being that much more fabulous.

Zucchini Flowers, Apples, and Kren
I Fiori di Zucca, Le Mele, e Kren

per 4 persone

-2 dozen zucchini (or pumpkin) flowers. These are best picked from the garden in the morning, when they are still cool and strong. You can find them at the farmers market or Whole Foods, as well.
-1 large red bell pepper
-1 red apple, the more bitter, the better
-a nice hunk of Montasio (a cows' milk cheese made in Friuli. There is Montasio at Whole Foods right now! Otherwise, a young i.e. softer, grate-able cows milk cheese)
-Horseradish root


Wash the zucchini flowers thoroughly and gently and allow to dry completely. Empty the bell pepper of it's seeds and all the white parts inside. Slice into long, thin strips.

Heat a pan and add a pat of butter, enough to coat the pan. Add the red bell pepper slices and cook briefly, so that they become flexible but not transparent. You want them to retain a little crunch. Put them aside.

Add a little more butter to the pan, and some fine sea salt. Drop the zucchini flowers into the pan; they should shimmer and puff, not burn or deflate, so watch your heat. They shouldn't cook long enough to lose their color.

On the plates, shave a peeled apple, letting the bits fall into a pile. On top of that, add the grated cheese.

Re-scald the red bell pepper back in the buttered pan with a tad of salt right before plating, so that they become a bit crunchy. Place them on top of the apple and cheese. Top this with the zucchini flowers. Over all of this, amply grate some horseradish.




Scruptous End-of-Summer Pasta
I Girini

per 4 persone

To make the pasta:
-4 eggs
-1 1/4 cups flour

For the vegetables:
-2 small zucchini, grated fine
-3 large porchini muchrooms, sliced fine
-8 zucchini flowers, sliced into ribbons

-Aged goats cheese, or a something strong, like Grana Padano
-butter
-extra virgin olive oil
-sea salt, both fine and coarse
-crushed black pepper
-oregano

Break the eggs into a bowl and beat. Let them sit like this for about 5-10 minutes, the add the flour. Beat vigorously, until the batter becomes runny and smooth. Let this sit for about 15 minutes. Bring some water to a simmer (not a boil!). Pour the batter into a colander and push it through the tiny holes with the help of a spatula. The batter should hit the simmering water and come together in little noodles. They should be done almost immediately, so as soon as they all look formed, fish them out with a netted/slotted spoon. Immerse them in another dish of cold water to cool, then drain.

In a pan, bring a large pat of butter to melt. Add the finely sliced porchini and cook for about a minute. Then add the zucchini and cook another minute, sprinkling with fine salt and cracked black pepper. Add the zucchini flowers, sliced into ribbons, and cook less than about 30 seconds. Turn the heat off and toss with oregano. It is important that the vegetables are just barely cooked, holding their texture and firmness.

Add the drained pasta to the pan and gently toss all together. The pan should still be warm, but be sure the heat is turned off. This dish is not served hot.

Once everything is together, season again with salt and pepper, to taste. Scoop into the serving bowls, and grate large pieces of a hard, sharp cheese over the top. Drizzle with olive oil and sprinkle with coarse sea salt.

Buon appetito!

FL's mother is upstairs making gnocchi- succulent, soft, sweet gnocchi, with a variety of sauces. FL can hardly contain his excitement (his mother physically shooed him out of the kitchen because he kept eating the gnocchi raw, his lips and beard smeared with flour, a wild glaze over his eyes), and the smells wafting in to the garden from the kitchen are making me light-headed with hunger. As a displacement activity, until this miracle of a lunch is ready, I will blog.



The other afternoon I saw a notice for a cooking class being offered at La Subida, which is, in total, an agrotourismo: there are guest houses to rent, a collection of bed-and-breakfast-style rooms, horses to ride and trails to be walked, two restaurants (one a more casual trattoria, the other an upscale osteria), tennis courts, geese, and a pool. All of this is set on two sides of a beautiful road that cuts through Collio, forests and hills as the backdrop. The osteria is called Sirk, and it is one of the best restaurants in all of Collio. The food is typical for this area- Slovenian/Friulian- yet particular, artsy almost. The chef is renowned, but also local. FL's mother cuts his hair. Though FL and I (and Angela, once!) eat every now and then on the beautiful outdoor patio of the trattoria, the osteria has always been sort of off-limits. The prices for individual dishes are not staggering, but we like our wine, and our desserts, and our appetizers, and we are not silly enough to think that we can go to this place and eat how we want (i.e. as much as we want) without throwing down enough money for a weekend in Paris. I saw the advertisement for this course, and the price (only 15 euro!) and figured that this was my shot.



The experience turned out to be me and a woman from Slovenia sitting on plush white chairs drinking sparkly water, watching the gorgeous chef, named Michele, make us a 3-course meal. Everything he made was so simple, taking less than 10 minutes to put together. All the ingredients were fresh, the eggs, the mushrooms, the deer; I have about a month left in this season to try these recipes at home, a month left of zucchini flowers, of red bell peppers and garden-harvested kren.

His first dish was an antipasto, a salad of fresh shaved apples and Montasio cheese, ribbons of red pepper blanched in butter (butter! THIS MAN USED BUTTER!), and delicate zucchini flowers that puffed up and shimmered when they touched the hot pan. Over the top, fresh kren (Slovenian for horseradish) was grated. The whole dish was both sweet and bitter, savory and spicy. Extremely light, and so very elegant.



The only way to describe the second dish is to say that it was "scrumptious". The kind of scrumptious that makes one was to lick the plate afterward. Clearly, the chef knew this and had planned ahead for such displays of pathetic commonality. He served the dish is a fish bowl, a gorgeous blue glass fish bowl, atop a white porcelain platter, with a long, silver fork capable of reaching the depths (though not, no matter how desperately I tried, the little crevice at the base).



This dish was a pasta similar to a german spatzle: tiny droplets and knobs of pasta made by whipping up eggs and flour and sifting the dough through a colander into simmering water. These noddles were then added to a warm, buttery pan containing sliced porchini mushrooms, paper-thin slivers of zucchini, and shoe-lace-cut bits of zucchini flower. Oregano was sprinkled, and the pasta was ladled into the fish bowls. Over the top, a hard Grana Padano was shaved with a vegetable peeler, and course sea salt was tossed in order to add, as he put it, a crunch in the mouth.

I asked Chef Michele why the two different cheeses, what exactly was the point in serving the first dish with a fresh Montasio (cows milk), and this with an aged Grana (also cows milk). He explained that obviously the tastes were a huge factor, the flavors. The fresh Montasio is very light, milky, and therefore is a soothing backdrop for the other, harsher flavors of the kren, the sour apple, and the butter-heavy red pepper. This pasta dish was all-around softer, so the Grana was what spiked it up.



At least I think this is what he said. It was during this interlude that I was lost in a daydream of me realizing that in my furor to eat every last bite I had gotten my face suction-cupped into the fish bowl. I could picture myself suffocating, eyes bulging, my tongue reaching as far as it could to just get that last...tiny...noodle. Like a dog with it's snout stuck in a tin can. The very real possibility of this, and the consequent mortification (or death) that would follow when they had to call FL to come get me ("your girlfriend suffered severe brain damage due to pasta", and he would so not even be surprised) gave me shivers. I put the bowl down and re-focused my attention on the next demonstration.

Which was: RAW DEER! Or, more elegantly, and in Italian, Dadolata di Cervo.



The deer had been sliced into cubes and kryovaked (spelling? The only option blogger spell-checks offers me is "muckracked", and that can't be right), having been sprinkled with thyme, oregano, black pepper, salt and roughly chopped garlic. After 24 hours, the meat was freed and then pulverized with a table spoon into a gorgeous, red blob. This blob of joy was set atop a bed of shaved fennel (everything's shaved, I know), seasoned with lemon juice and the house balsamic vinegar, and placed on a pretty little china plate.



I don't know what it is, but the sight of raw meat, and knowing that it is there to be eaten raw, makes me feel wild and amorous. Primal, carnal, yet highly sophisticated. The Slovenian woman asked Chef Michele to please only make her a very small portion, and I immediately raised my hand and told him that I would be happy to eat what was left. Just make my blob really big. So he did, and I went into food-coma happy as could be.



I am going to translate and post these recipes in just a bit. Right now FL is chomping at the bit to go upstairs and eat the gnocchi!

Yesterday afternoon I ambled down to the Enoteca di Cormons, a little place in the main piazza that hosts the who's-who Cormonese wine (an enoteca is, by definition, a place that serves wine, be it local or not, decent or "green"). The Enoteca di Cormons is spectacular, and a showcase solely for the wines made in these hills. It is here that the town comes together. One can find postings for cooking lessons and jars of fresh pesto, weekend itineraries and maps of the town, little red dots illuminating the various vineyards; mopeds are for rent, German and Austrian tourists directed out into wild Collio. The walls are lined floor to ceiling with shelves holding bottles, all varietals and blends.

Cormons is a mix of new and old, nature and science. There are those vineyards who stress excellence, the brilliance of newfangled "enology", each grape varietal stressed and monitored and tweaked to produce something complex, something with depth. "Be all that you can be", etc. Then there are those vineyards who hold a rigid respect for tradition, season, honesty. The land and the weather, the care during growth and the solid process of production make these wines. These are the wines the people of Cormons know, the wines that can be- upon sip, sight, smell- called out by name and age, point of origin, by those who understand this area, those who were born here.



My glass for the day was from one of my very favorite vineyards, Livio Felluga. It was years ago that I first tasted a wine from this estate. I was shopping at Whole Foods with my ex. We were going to make some sort of cod cooked in parchment paper, lemongrass and citrus seasonings, if I recall. The bottle cost way too much, but the label was so pretty! A map of some sort, of some place far away, in the depths of Italy. I remember looking at it and thinking that if we substituted steamed white rice for the wild...if we used orange zest instead of buying the fancy citrus oil...we could swing it. And what a Pinot Grigio is was! I kept another blog at the time, the web address for which I have forgotten- it is floating around out there somewhere- and I remember blogging about this wine. My ex and I decided it was the very best wine we had ever had. We asked ourselves, what magical land could create something like this, so sunny, so sweet, so chilled?

I had been in Cormons for about a month when I saw this same bottle downtown, same label at least, and I was thrilled with the heavens to realize that that magical wine was from here. Where I now lived. Full-circle, fate, kismet, etc. Though the wine is of the "enologically improved" variety, and therefore rather pricey (and "froo-froo", as FL puts it), it is still on the my favorites, if not only because it is delicious, because it has a place in my heart. And they make all varietals! Pinot Grigio, Sauvignon, Picolit, Rosenplatz, Chardonnay...you name it. Their Terre Alte is, in fact, considered one of the best white wines in Italy.


The weird thing is, I never saw Livio Felluga for sale at Whole Foods again. It is, though, for sale at the wine expo shop on Barrett Parkway. Possibly for cheaper. So if there's a pretty party to go to, or a nice dinner to accentuate, or just a cool late-summer evening to spice up, go find a bottle. A little bottle of Cormons in Georgia; I dream of such things.

Put on a big new sweater and went for a walk in the woods. The forest here is lovely, especially on cool, grey days like today. The trees hang heavy with fog and dew; mushrooms grow wild, their perfume almost overwhelming and earthy; spiky chestnuts rain down, still green. It's too soon. I took a path I had never been down, and it wound all around the backside of the mountain, over into a neighboring town called Brazzano. There's a castle there, and a church, and not much else. I listened to Niko Case, hopped over puddles.



Just as I had made it back to civilization, the sky burst open. Rain came in clamorous sheets, and I scrambled to stick my Ipod under my shirt. I had barely uttered an "oh, hell", when I heard, "Mereca'n"!

Looked to my right, and there was Fabio, Porchis proprietor and entrepreneur extraordinaire. Savior, also, apparently. He waved me into the big, metal gate that sheltered a garden I had often admired in passing. Even in the pouring rain the roses stood tall and proud, their colors not the least bit dulled.

I followed him and Simona, his girlfriend, into a gorgeous old villa. It had been in Fabio's distant family somehow, and just this year he has turned it into an agrotourismo, a bed and breakfast. Antique cherubs and oil paintings lined the stone walls, and the marble floor was etched with glistening golden details, olive branches and paisleys, a scene of a well; the type of decorating that people don't take the time for anymore. they had stopped in just to change a few light bulbs in the chandeliers, they said, and would be happy to give me a lift home.

The conversation on the ride home turned to my on-going job search, a search which is both open-ended and terrifyingly clogged, depending on how I decide to look at it. Fabio said he had meant to tell me, marketing! He could name several vineyards off the top of his head that are looking to expand their exports into America and the like.

Was funny he mentioned this, because just yesterday evening FL's dad came home and said the longest string of words to me that I have ever had the pleasure of receiving. He said, "Angoris wants to sell wine in America". FL took it from there, explaining that one of the larger vineyards in Cormons, Angoris, mentioned to his father (during a routine heater check-up or something, I imagine) that they wanted to begin selling their wine in America, and were looking for ways and people to help market. Obviously, I would be the perfect candidate.

So this morning I woke up bright and early-ish and began to write cover letters for my resume'. I found a template online, and was sure to write each one individually, personalizing them and stressing my qualifications for each post specifically.
Wish me luck!

My goal for the day is to find a proper coat. I have promised myself that this autumn, and indeed winter, will not be like the last two. I will not "wait out" the cold in converse all-stars and a flimsy fleece, suffering from a running case of pneumonia for 5 solid months, thawing my frozen, icy-rain sodden body in a hot bath every evening, while my days are spent coughing up tadpoles and harboring wet squirrels in my lungs. This year will be different. I will find something substantial and thermal, while maintaining a sense of style. I imagine that something like this cannot be too hard to find in Italy. Also, I will buy boots. Or at least something closed-toed. Am too terrified to look at my bank account, though I am sure I have enough at least for a nice sweater.
The nights are getting cold here. I worked this weekend at the festival downtown. What an easy gig! Though the weather was iffy people turned out, to hear the music, sample food and wine from the booths, and to see one super adorable girl in particular. Her name was Eleanor and she was the best beer-pourer this town had ever seen. Cormons is carmingly small, in a way that a festival like this brings into one place absolutely everyone you know; Bonelli, my favorite butcher, Chiara from the Enoteca (she makes me a delicious Cafe' Americano on those days when I feel I just can't take it anymore), all of FL's friends and the porchis crew.

Sunday there was a parade, full of gigantic floats from each of the vineyards. Everyone lined the streets of the town to watch, eating gelato and sipping hot chocolates intermittently, depending on whether the sun was out or clouds were overhead. FL and I ate at a little booth, roasted chicken and sausages, polenta. The wine was wonderful, as always, and it seemed that everyone was in a good mood. All of FL's family was out, his cousins, aunts, great uncles. They all gave me huge hugs when they saw me, exclaiming how happy they were either to meet me or that I had returned. Paola has said so many nice things, and how pretty I am! And they heard about the house, how wonderful! Such nice people.

Perhaps we tired ourselves out, because by the time 11pm rolled around FL was out like a light, and me not far behind him. Today, though, I am feeling refreshed. Ready for a run up the mountain and a shopping trip to Udine. Also, today I am going to make little fliers offering my services as an English tutor, post them all over town and await those interested in learning to call and offer me MONEY.

Wish I had a big, black MasterCard...that would solve my visa issues

All the ex-pat websites say the same thing: unless you're pulling up to Italy in your yacht, expect your plight for living in Italy long-term to be the same plight as all the other immigrants. A difficult, arduous road. Bureaucracy! I have 80 days left on the countdown clock of being here "legally". During that time I hope to find someone willing to hire me, fill out a huge mound of costly paperwork vouching for my employment, and agree to let me return to the US for X-number of days (one month? two? ...three?) in order to file the papers there at the Embassy in Washington DC, where I may have to go personally. Then, and only then, can I return to Italy with a work visa. Or, as everyone and their brother has suggested, I could just get married.
My mother seems to think this is not a big deal. So I will keep a look out and try my hardest to find a job, though I won't stress over it. Worse comes to worst, I'll get FL drunk and drag him to the courthouse. And would that be the worst?
Che palle, it's pouring down rain. I hope this does not jeopardize my evening. Yours truly has been offered a very prestigious position, offered only to those with a capacity for hard-work, fluent Italian, and years worth of prior experience. This weekend Cormons is hosting La Festa dell'Uva, Festival of the grape. There used to be all sorts of hoopla, a parade and costumes, etc. Now a days it's pretty much just bands playing and wine drinking. I will be working one of the kiosks, selling wine and beer for the masses. They said they'd pay me 50euro, which will make up for the cost of my ticket to Sicily. Also, networking! It should be fun (if it happens), and FL and Condor, surely, will be my two primary customers.
I have purchased Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone in Italian, and I am beyond proud to say that I can read it! There are a lot of words that I don't know, of course, but the bulk of the story is crystal clear (and not only because I have read it in English- this version is completely different!). The words I don't know I write down on little flash cards. Growth and Learning.

The house is INCREDIBLE!!! Needs some fresh paint, new tiles, the kitchen and bathroom need to be updated, but it is perfect. And the garden! What in the world do I do with a garden that huge?! We have every type of tree, shrub, herb, flower, fruit...even olive trees!
Here's a link to some photos for those without a FB account.
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2754988&id=4913936&l=d6632a80e4

Aunt Gwynn!!!! Come help me landscape!!!!

Well, I am alive. Which is a huge improvement from whatever state it was I was in this morning. Must remember in future that I am not a Friulian man, and therefore I cannot drink like one. My first rule, after a previous near death experience, is Do Not Drink the Grappa. Lesson learned. A new rule, after last night, is that when one is told, "this wine is green", it is best to translate it to, "this wine is poison". FL took me to a frasca, which is a traditional Friulian pub that is opened out of the side of a cantina in someone's home, or any other place that, in season, produces wine. I believe (and I will ask FL for the full history again when I see him) that frascas (frasca = 'branch' in friulano) came about in a time when it was illegal for bars or pubs to be opened (or perhaps it was a time of complete prohibition, I am not sure). Some people, therefore, when they acquired booze, would hang a branch outside of their home, letting others know that it was safe to come in and drink. The tradition continues today, though the idea of prohibition in these parts is laughable. A friend of FL's has a winery, and called FL yesterday evening to let him know that the frasca was opened. This is a very exciting deal, apparently, because real frascas are only opened a handful of days out of the year. We drove out to an area of Cormons that I had never seen before, like this hidden, I don't know, collection of houses around a tiny town square, v. v. medieval, all made of the same type of dark stone, the roads, the houses, the walls surrounding people's gardens. At the end of the lane there was a huge, gorgeous house with a cardboard sign hanging on the gate that read, "frasca aperta", and a drawing of a branch. We rode around back and, sure enough, tucked into a tiny room with its doors thrown wide, there was a frasca. Tiny makeshift bar, handwritten sign with prices (.50 a glass, 1 euro a liter), a group of old men cackling and "dio boi"-ing and drinking wine out of tiny little glasses. This is when FL said, "be careful- this wine is green", but I was too enamored with the scene to take heed.

We went in and had a seat, heads obviously turning as a young girl is a rare sight in a place like that. We ordered a small glass of wine, and FL's friend came over to chat with us. I don't know how long we were there, maybe an hour, and I was having such fun listening to the men talk. For the most part I can't understand much Friulano- but I know the curse words. Which is pretty much the bulk of what came out of these guy's mouths, so I was cracking up continuously (it's funny when old people cuss, isn't it?).

FL and I drank maybe a liter of wine between us, absolutely nothing crazy...but then i began to tug on his shirt sleeve and mumble, "maybe it's time you took me home". 15 minutes later I was half dead, sick as a dog, voices pounding in my head speaking unintelligible Friulano...


Once again, lesson learned.

Ooooh! FL is here and we are going to go see the house! I will take lots of photos!