Under the Tuscan Sun (16 page)

In the delicious stupor that sets in after the last pear is
halved, the last crust scoops up the last crumbles of Gorgonzola,
and the last drop empties into the glass, you can ruminate, if you
are inclined that way, on your participation in the great collective
unconscious. You are doing what everyone else in Italy is doing,
millions of backsides being shined by chairs at millions of tables.
Over each table, a miniature swarm of gnats is gathering. There
are exceptions, of course. Parking attendants, waiters,
cooks—and thousands of tourists, many of whom
made the mistake of eating two wedges of great sausage pizza at eleven
and now have no inclination to eat anything. Instead, they wander
under the unbearable sun, peeking through metal grates covering shop
windows, pusing at the massive doors of locked churches, sitting on
the sides of fountains while squinting into minuscule guidebooks.
Give it up! I've done the same thing. Then, later, it's hard to
deny yourself the luscious
melone
ice cream cone at
seven, when the air is still hot and your sandals have rubbed your
heels raw. Those weak ones (
mea culpa
) who succumb
possibly will have another wedge, artichoke this time, on the
way to the hotel; then, when Italy begins eating at nine, the
foreign stomach doesn't even mumble. That happens much later,
when all the good restaurants are full.

The rhythm of Tuscan dining may throw us off but after a
long lunch outside, one concept is clear—siesta. The
logic of a three-hour fall through the crack of the day makes
perfect sense. Best to pick up that Piero della Francesca book,
wander upstairs and give in to it.

I know I want a wooden table. When I was growing up,
my father had dinners for his men friends and a few employees
on Fridays. Our cook, Willie Bell, and my mother spread a long
white table under a pecan tree in our yard with fried chicken
cooked right there on our brick barbecue, potato salad, biscuits,
iced tea, pound cake, and bottles of gin and Southern Comfort. The
noon meal often lasted most of the day, sometimes ending with the
swaying men, arm in arm singing “Darktown Strutter's Ball” and
“I'm a Ramblin' Wreck from Georgia Tech” slowly as if on a tape
that warped in the sun.

From the very first weeks we lived in the house, we used the
abandoned worktable, a crude prototype of the table I imagined us
eventually setting under the line of five
tigli
trees.
At a market stall, I bought tablecloths, long to keep splinters
from digging into our knees. With napkins to match, a jar of
poppies, Queen Anne's lace, and blue bachelor's buttons on the
table, our yellow plates from the COOP, we served forth, mainly
to each other.

My idea of heaven is a two-hour lunch with Ed. I believe he
must have been Italian in another life. He has begun to gesture
and wave his hands, which I've never seen him do. He likes to
cook at home but simply throws himself into it here. For a lunch
he prepares, he gathers
parmigiano,
fresh mozzarella,
some
pecorino
from the mountains, red peppers,
just-picked lettuces, the local salami with fennel, loaves of
pane con sale
(the bread that isn't strictly traditional
here since it has salt),
prosciutto,
a glorious bag of
tomatoes. For dessert, peaches, plums, and, my favorite, a local
watermelon called
minne di monaca,
nun's tits. He
piles the bread board with our cheeses, salami, peppers, and on our
plates arranges our first course, the classic
caprese:
sliced tomatoes, basil, mozzarella, and a drizzle of oil.

In the
tigli
shade, we're protected from the
midday heat. The cicadas yammer in the trees, that deeply
heart-of-summer sound. The tomatoes are so intense we go silent as
we taste them. Ed opens a celebratory bottle of
prosecco
and we settle down to recap the saga of buying and restoring the
house. Oddly, we now omit the complications and panic; we've
begun the selection process, the same one that insures the
continuance of the human race: forgetting the labor. Ed starts
drawing up plans for a bread oven. We dream on about other
projects. The sun through the flowering trees bathes us in
gold sifted light. “This isn't real; we've wandered into a Fellini
film,” I say.

Ed shakes his head. “Fellini is a documentary
filmmaker—I've lost my belief in his genius. There are
Fellini scenes everywhere. Remember the brilliant motorcycle that
comes around and around in
Amarcord
? It happens
all
the time. You're nowhere in a remote village, no one
in sight, and suddenly a huge Moto Guzzi streaks by.” He peels
a peach in one long spiral and just because this was all too
pleasant we open a second bottle of
prosecco
and wile
away another hour before we drift in to rest and revive our energy
for a walk into town to case out the restaurants, stroll along
the parterre overlooking the valley, and, hard to contemplate,
begin the next meal.

WE HAVE CALLED THE SHY AND SILENT CARPENTERS, MARCO
and Rudolfo.
They seem amused no matter what work they do here. The idea of a
painted table seating ten seems to stun them. They're used to
chestnut stain. Are we certain? I see them swap a glance with
each other. But it will have to be repainted in two years. Too
impractical. We've sketched what we want and have the paint sample,
too—primary yellow.

They return four days later with the table, sealed and
painted—a miracle turnaround time anywhere but especially
for two as busy as they are. They laugh and say the table will
glow in the dark. It does pulsate with color. They haul it to
the spot with the broadest view into the valley. In the deep
shade, the yellow shines, luring us to come forth from the house
with jugs and steaming bowls, baskets of fruit and fresh cheeses
wrapped in grape leaves.

DINNER TONIGHT IS FOR AN ITALIAN COUPLE, THEIR BABY, AND
our
compatriot writers. This Italian baby girl, at seven months, chews
on piquant olives and looks longingly at the food. Our friends
have been amused by our adventures in restoration, safely amused
since their houses were restored before workmen disappeared and
before the dollar dove. Each knows an astonishing amount about
wells, septic systems, gutters, pruning—minute technical
knowledge acquired by years under the roofs of quirky old
farmhouses. We're awed by their fluency with Italian, their
endless knowledge of the intricacies of telephone bills.
Though I imagine conversations about the currents in Italian
literature, opera, and controversial restorations, we seem to
discuss most passionately olive pruning, grease traps, well
testing, and shutter repair.

The menu: with drinks,
bruschette
with chopped
tomatoes and basil,
crostini
with a red pepper confit.
The first course,
gnocchi,
not the usual potato but
light semolina
gnocchi
(small servings—it's
rich), followed by veal roasted with garlic and potatoes, then
garnished with fried sage. The little green beans, still crisp,
warm, with fennel and olives. Just before they arrive, I pick a
huge basket of lettuces. At the start of summer, I scattered two
envelopes of mixed lettuces as an edging along a flower bed. They
were up in a week and in three, bolted the border. Now they're
everywhere; it feels odd to be weeding the flower bed and
accumulating dinner at the same time. Some look unfamiliar;
I hope we're not eating just-sprouting calendula or hollyhocks.
The cherries, simmered and cooled, have attracted bees to them all
afternoon. One of the tiny hummingbirds made a quick foray into the
kitchen, drawn possibly by the scent of the deep red wine syrup.

When they arrive it will be the soft, slow Tuscan twilight,
fading after drinks from transparent to golden to evening blue,
then, by the end of the first course, into night. Night happens
quickly, as though the sun were pulled in one motion under the
hill. We light candles in hurricane shades all along the stone
wall and on the table. For background music, a hilarious chorus
of frogs tunes up.
Molti anni fa,
many years ago, our
friends begin. Their stories weave an Italy around us that we
know only through books and films.
In the
sixties .         .         . In the seventies .         .         . A
true paradise.
That's why they came—and stayed. They
love it but it's downhill now in comparison to the four armoires
from that nutty contessa.
How alive the streets of Rome were
with people, and remember the theater with the roof that rolled
back, how sometimes it would rain?
Then the talk shifts to
politics. They know everyone. We're all horrified at the car
bombing in Sicily. Is there a Mafia here? Our questions are
naive. The fascist leaning in recent elections disturbs everyone.
Could Italy go back? I tell them about the antique dealer in Monte
San Savino. I saw a photo of Mussolini over his shop door and he
saw me looking at it. With a big smile he asks if I know who that
is. Not knowing if the photo is a campy object or one of veneration,
I give him the fascist salute. He goes crazy, thinking I approve.
He's all over me, talking about what a bold and
bravo
man Il Duce was. I want to get out with my strange
purchases—a big gilt cross and the door to a
reliquary—but now the prices come down. He invites me back,
wants me to meet his family. Everyone advises me to take full
advantage.

I feel immersed here; my “real life” seems remote. Odd that
we're all here. We were given one country and we've set ourselves
up in another—they much more radically than we; they
defined their lives and work by
this
place, not
that.
We feel so much at home, pale and
American as we are. We could just stay here, go native. Let my hair
grow long, tutor local kids in English, ride a Vespa into town for
bread. I imagine Ed on one of those tiny tractors made for terraced
land. Imagine him starting a little vineyard. Or we could make
tisanes of lemon balm. I look at him but he is pouring wine. I
almost feel our strange voices—English, French,
Italian—spreading out around the house, over the valley.
Sound carries on the hills.
(Stranieri,
foreigners,
we're called, but it sounds more dire, more like strangers, an
oddly chilling word.) Often we hear parties of invisible neighbors
above us. We've shifted an ancient order of things on this hillside,
where the tax collector, the police captain, and the newsstand
owner (our nearest neighbors although we can't see any of them)
heard only Italian until we encamped here.

The Big Dipper, clear as a dot-to-dot drawing, seems about
to pour something right on top of the house, and the Milky Way, so
pretty in Latin as the
via lactia,
sweeps its bridal
train of scattered stars over our heads. The frogs go silent all
at once, as if someone shushed them. Ed brings out the
vin
santo
and a plate of
biscotti
he made this morning.
Now the night is big and quiet. No moon. We talk, talk, talk.
Nothing to interrupt us except the shooting stars.

S
ummer
K
itchen
N
otes

ONE SPRING WHEN I STUDIED COOKING
with Simone
Beck at her house in Provence, she said some things I never forgot.
Another student, a caterer and cooking teacher, kept asking Simca for
the technique for everything. She had a notebook and furiously wrote
down every word Simca said. The other four of us were mainly
interested in eating what we'd prepared. When she asked one time too
many, Simca said crisply, “There
is
no technique, there is
just the way to do it. Now, are we going to measure or are we going
to cook?”

I've learned here that simplicity is liberating. Simca's
philosophy applies totally to this kitchen, where we no longer
measure, but just cook. As all cooks know, ingredients of the moment
are the best guides. Much of what we do is too simple to be called
a recipe—it's just the way to do it. I vary the ubiquitous
prosciutto e melone
with halved figs. The cold tomato
soup I make is simply chopped herbs—mainly basil—and
ripe tomatoes stirred into clear chicken stock and popped in the
freezer until chilled. I roast whole heads of garlic in a terra-cotta
dish with a little olive oil—great to squeeze the cloves onto
bread. One of the best pastas is spaghetti tossed with chopped
arugula, cream, and minced
pancetta,
then sprinkled with
parmigiano.
Green beans served with black olives, sliced
raw fennel, spring onions, and a light vinaigrette or lemon juice
must be one of the nicest things ever to happen to a bean. Ed's
invention couldn't be easier: He splits figs, pours on a little
honey, runs them under the broiler, then drizzles them with cream.
Sliced peaches with sweetened mascarpone and a crumbling of
amaretti
cookies have become a standby. Some favorites are
a bit more involved, though nothing to make me wonder what madness
led me to get involved.

Growing such a plethora of herbs induces me to squander
them. All platters are garnished with what's left in the basket: a
bunch of flowering thyme scattered over vegetables, the roast
presented on a bed of sage, sprigs of oregano around the pasta.
Lavender, grape and fig leaves, and airy fennel greens are fun to
use as garnishes, too. With a few wildflowers, cut herbs in a
terra-cotta pot look right at home on the table.

Here are a few quick, personal recipes that guests have raved
over or that have sent us secretly to the fridge the next morning to
taste the leftovers. Italians wouldn't consider risotto or pasta a
main course, but for us, often it is. The oil of choice is, of
course, olive oil, unless otherwise specified. All herbs in these
recipes are fresh.

~ANTIPASTI~

Red Peppers (or Onions) Melted with Balsamic Vinegar

The immense, convoluted, lustrous peppers in primary red, green, and
yellow are my favorite vegetable of summer because they wake up so
many dishes. A quick sauté of a mixture of the three adds
zip to any plate. And there's red pepper soup, mousse of yellow
peppers, old-fashioned stuffed green ones         .         .         .

~Seed and slice 4 peppers thinly and cook slowly in a
little olive oil and ¼ cup of balsamic vinegar until very
soft, about an hour. Stir occasionally; peppers should almost
“melt.” Season with salt and pepper. Add oil and balsamic vinegar
once or twice if they look dry. Run under the broiler (or grill)
about 25 rounds of bread sprinkled with olive oil. Rub a cut clove
of garlic over each piece. Spoon peppers onto bread and serve warm.
Try the same method with thinly sliced onions, adding a teaspoon of
brown sugar to the balsamic and letting the onions slowly carmelize.
Both versions of this are rich accompaniments for roast chicken.
Leftovers are good on pasta or polenta. With cheese and/or grilled
eggplant, very savory sandwiches can be made quickly.

Pea and Shallot Bruschetta

New peas pop right out of the crisp pods. I thought shelling them was
a meditative act until I saw a woman in town sitting outside her
doorway with her cat sleeping at her ankles. She was shelling an
immense pile of peas and already had filled a large dishpan. She
looked up and said something rapidly in Italian and I smiled, only
to realize as I walked on that she'd said, “It shouldn't happen
to a dog.”

~Mince 4 shallots. Shell enough peas to fill
1 cup. Mix
and sauté in butter until the peas are done and the shallots
are wilted. Add a little chopped mint, salt, and pepper. Chop
coarsely in a food processor or by hand and spoon onto 25 rounds of
bread as prepared in the recipe above.

Basil and Mint Sorbet

I tasted this unlikely but tantalizing sorbet at the ancient
fattoria-
turned-restaurant Locanda dell'Amorosa in nearby
Sinalunga. The next day I tried to duplicate it at home. At the
restaurant, it was served after the pasta and fish courses and
before the main course. More informally, it starts out a dinner on
a warm summer night.

~Make a sugar syrup by boiling together 1 cup of water
and 1 cup of sugar, then simmering it for about 5 minutes, stirring constantly. Cool in the fridge. Purée ½ cup of mint leaves and ½ cup of basil leaves in 1 cup of water. Add
another cup of water, 1 tablespoon of lemon juice, and chill. Mix
the sugar syrup and the herbal water well and process in an ice
cream maker according to manufacturer's instructions. Scoop into
martini glasses or any clear glass dishes and garnish with mint
leaves. Serves 8.

~PRIMI PIATTI~

Cold Garlic Soup

As in chicken with 40 cloves of garlic, the amount of garlic in this
recipe is no cause for alarm. The cooking process attenuates the
strength but leaves the flavor.

~Peel 2 whole heads of garlic. Chop 1 small onion and
peel and dice 2 medium potatoes. Sauté the onion in 1 tablespoon of olive oil and, when it begins to turn translucent,
add the garlic. The garlic should soften but not brown; cook gently.
Steam the diced potatoes and add to the onion and garlic, along
with 1 cup of chicken stock. Bring just to a boil, then quickly
lower heat and simmer for 20 minutes. Purée in a food
processor, then pour back into the pot and add 4 more cups of stock and 1 tablespoon of chopped thyme. (If you don't have a food
processor, mince the garlic and onion before you cook them; after
steaming, put the potatoes through a ricer.) Whisk in ½ cup
of heavy cream. Season with salt and pepper, then chill. Stir before
serving with chopped thyme or chives on top. Serves 6.

Fennel Soup

~Thinly slice 2 fennel bulbs and 2 bunches of spring onions.
Sauté briefly in a little olive oil. Add 2 cups of chicken
stock to the pan and simmer until the fennel is cooked. Stir
frequently. Purée until smooth. Whisk in 2-½ more
cups of stock. Season with salt and pepper and cover. Bring to a
boiling point, then lower the heat and simmer for 10
minutes. Whisk
in ½ cup of mascarpone or heavy cream. Remove from heat
immediately. Serve cold or warm, garnished with toasted fennel
seeds. Serves 6.

Pizza with Onion Confit and Sausage

Pizza is endless in variety. Ed's favorite is Napoli: capers,
anchovies, mozzarella. I like fontina, olives, and
prosciutto.
Another favorite is arugula and curls of
parmigiano.
We're also enamored of potato pizza, as well
as all the standard ones. When we cook outside, we always grill
lots of extra vegetables and sausages for salads and pizza the
next day. A great vegetarian combination is grilled eggplant with
sundried tomatoes, olives, oregano, basil, and mozzarella.

~Thinly slice 3 onions and “melt” in a frying pan on
low heat, using a small amount of olive oil and 3 tablespoons of
balsamic vinegar. Onions should be caramel colored and limp. Season
with marjoram, salt and pepper. Grill or sauté 2 large
sausages. Here we use the local pork sausage seasoned with fennel
seeds. Slice. Grate 1 cup of mozzarella or
parmigiano.

Dough: Dissolve 1 package of yeast in ¼ cup of
warm water for 10minutes. Mix the following: ½ teaspoon of
salt, 1 teaspoon of sugar, 3 tablespoons of olive oil, 1 cup of cool
water, and pour into a mound of 3-¼ cups of flour. Knead on
a flat surface until elastic and smooth. If you're using a food
processor, pulse until the dough forms a ball, then remove and
knead by hand. Place dough in a buttered and floured bowl and let
rest for 30 minutes. Roll into 1 large or 2 smaller circles and
brush with oil. Scatter cheese, onions, and sausage over the surface
and bake at 400° for 15 minutes. Cut into 8 pieces.

Semolina Gnocchi

Gnocchi
's usual knuckle shape changes in this grand and
rich dish. Unlike the potato
gnocchi
or the light spinach
and ricotta
gnocchi,
the
gnocchi
made with
semolina are biscuit-sized. I used to buy these from a woman down
in the valley until I found out how easy they are to make.

~Bring 6 cups of milk almost to a boil in a large saucepan.
Pour in 3 cups of semolina in a steady stream, stirring constantly. Cook on low, as you would cook polenta, continuing to stir for 15 minutes. Remove from heat, beat in 3 egg yolks, 3 tablespoons of
butter and ½ cup of grated
parmigiano.
Season with
salt, pepper, and a little nutmeg. Beat briefly, lifting the mixture
to incorporate air. Spread mixture in a circle 1 inch thick on the
lightly floured counter or cutting board and let it cool. Cut into
biscuit-sized circles with the rim of a glass or a cookie cutter.
Place in a well-buttered baking dish. Pour 3 tablespoons of melted
butter over the top, then sprinkle with ¼ cup of
parmigiano.
Bake, uncovered, at 400° for 15 minutes.
Serves 6.

Everything Pasta Salad with Baked Tomatoes

When making soups, ratatouille, or this salad, I steam everything
separately. This keeps the flavors distinct and allows me to cook
each vegetable to its first point of doneness. I've never seen pasta
salad on an Italian menu, but it's a marvelous American import.
This goes easily to a picnic in a big plastic container.

~Prepare vinaigrette: ¾ cup of olive oil, red
wine vinegar to taste (about 3 tablespoons), 3 cloves of crushed
garlic, 1 tablespoon of chopped thyme, salt, and pepper. Shake in
a jar.

Fresh vegetables: 8 medium carrots, 5 slender zucchini, 2 big red peppers, 2 hot peppers, about one-half pound of green beans,
and one bunch of spring onions. Cut in small pieces, except for
hot peppers—mince these. Steam one by one until just done.
Cool.

Chicken: Rub 2 whole breasts with olive oil and place in an
oiled pan. Season with thyme, salt, and pepper. Roast at 350°for about 30 minutes. Cool and slice into julienne strips.

Pasta:
Fusilli,
the short, spiraled pasta, is best
for salad. Cook two 1-pound packages and drain; immediately toss
with 2 tablespoons of olive oil. Season and cool.

Mix everything well in a large container, such as a turkey
roasting pan, and chill until an hour before serving. Toss again
and divide between two large bowls.

For the tomatoes: Select one for each person (plus a few more
for leftovers). Cut a cone-shaped hollow from the stem end and spoon
out seeds. Trim off the bottom. Sprinkle with salt and pepper, then
stuff tomato with a mixture of bread crumbs, chopped basil, and
toasted pine nuts. Drizzle with olive oil. Bake at 350° for
about 15 minutes.

To serve, place tomato in the center of the plate, surround
with pasta salad, garnish with black olives and thyme sprigs and/or
basil leaves. Makes 16–20 very pretty servings.

~SECONDI~

Risotto with Red Chard

Risotto has become soul food to me. Like pasta, pizza, and polenta,
it's another dish of infinite variety. In spring, barely cooked
asparagus, tiny carrots, and a little lemon make a light risotto.
I especially like it with fava beans that have been sautéed
with minced shallots in a covered pan, then stirred into the
risotto. Other good choices: chopped fennel, barely cooked, with
rock shrimp; sautéed fresh mushrooms or dried
porcini
soaked in tepid water until plumped; grilled
radicchio and pancetta. In Italy, you can buy
funghi porcini
bouillon cubes in grocery stores. They're excellent for risotto
when no stock is at hand. Many recipes call for too much butter;
if you have a good stock, butter is unnecessary and only a little
olive oil is needed to start things off. If any risotto is left the
next day, heat a tablespoon of olive oil in a nonstick pan, spread
and pat down the risotto, and cook over a medium flame until crisp
on the bottom. Flip over with a large spatula and crisp the other
side. A fine lunch.

~Chop, then sauté, 1 medium onion in 1 tablespoon
of oil for about 2 minutes. Add 2 cups of Arborio rice and cook
for a couple of minutes. Meanwhile, in another pot, heat
5-½ cups of seasoned stock (chicken, veal, or vegetable) and ½ cup of white wine to a boil and reduce heat to a simmer. Ladle the stock and wine gradually into the rice, stirring each ladle into the rice until it is absorbed before adding more. Keep
both the stock mixture and the rice at a simmer. Stir and stir until
rice is done. It should be
al dente
and rather soupy. Add
½ cup of grated
parmigiano.
Thoroughly wash a
bunch of chard, preferably red. Chop in shreds and quickly
sauté in a little olive oil and minced garlic. Stir into
risotto. Serve and pass a bowl of grated
parmigiano.
Serves
6.

Rich Polenta Parmigiana

This is more of a California polenta than a traditional Italian one.
So much butter and cheese! Classic polenta is cooked by the same
method—don't stop stirring—with two or even three
more cups of water. You then pour the polenta out on a cutting
board and let it rest until firm. Often it's served with a
ragù
or with
funghi porcini.
I've
served this version to Italians and they've loved it. Leftover
polenta, either plain or this richer one, is sublime when
sautéed until crisp.