Yet again the last week has blurred by in a week of food and books, i've read dorian gray, the life and times of the thunderbolt kid, and half of superfreakenomics... and i've eaten quite a bit too...
I went out on saturday with graham and had my first proper italian pizza, its not the best in town but it sure beats dominoes... i had a lovely one with a bit of spicy sausage on top. I was sat to two italians, one had a pizza, t'othwer had a pasta, that funnily enough came in a foil bag alight... then for dessert one had an almond cake, and the other guy? another pizza... only in italy...
So my not using supermarkets is going well, its pretty easy here really, there are three bars/bakeries/patisseries closer than the supermarket anyway... Three flavours of ice cream to report, biscotti and forest fruits, nice but way too sweet, i'll try it in another one to be sure though.. strawberry and lemon, that was classically lovely... and today was blackcurrant and bitter chocolate, which was special, but then again today was a particularly special day... it had been decided today that i was ready to go to the best butcher in italy. his name is dario, one of his friends is henry winkler. this place was special. an hour from florence into the tuscan hills, we wound our way up, when we arrived in panzano in chianti, it was as lovely hill top town as any around, but the town wasn't why we had come, we sat outside the restaurant, which did have an american party there, in the sun and we ordered, or rather it was ordered for me, a burger and chips, and a collienza. The burger and chips, rosemary sizzled potatoes wedges and a very pink/red mass of minced meat, which was pretty hoopnanny tasty... The collienza, was a collection of things, first, bread, and a salad of crudely chopped crudites, carrot, fennel, celery and red onion. they brought a little bowl, and made you a little dressing of red wine vinegar, olive oil and their special own recipe salt (i bought some). Then they brought four dishes, one was basically steak tartar, which was amazing, another was chianti tuna, i have no idea how they did it, but it looked a little darker than canned tuna, but to coin a phrase, it literally melted in your mouth.. next was meatloaf with a red pepper and chilli jam, never had meatloafbefore, it was a good first go! and lastly was porchetta, they take half a pig,minus its legs and head, remove the ribs, season it, stuff it with herbs, roll it up, and you have porchetta... words dont really do this justice, it was piggle tastic.
it was a meat feast feat to say the least!
we waddled up the hill for a looksie over the hills and mountains, its phenomenally beautiful countryside, i wanted to see old italian men driving their ferraris (which on the way down i did!).
I then just squeezed in the aforementioned ice cream and we toddled on. We arrived at a tiny hill top village called volpaia, and saw the same american tourists (!), the church there is where rahams brother got married, the restaurant with italy's best butcher was the wedding feast, and the cafe there was their aperitivo...
we had a drink and a little biscotti (!) - somehow! and the owners came out and treated graham like a long lost son- i got a nod! :)
we were about to leave, and they came out with panneforte cake and vin santo,the cake was almond and candied peel cake, first bite was a bit odd, but all in all a good experience, i didn't try the vin santo.. (i dont drink - anymore!)
it was a day to be remembered, and funnily enough, my digital camera broke last night, so its all only in my head...
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