what’s cooking wednesday: risotto with pancetta & peas
*Don’t forget that all this week is The Ultimate Blog Party!
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I love rice, but we don’t eat a whole lot of it because P was brought up, ironically, on the three Ps: pasta, pane, and pizza. So I figured that maybe if I threw things in with the rice that started with the letter P, maybe that would fly.
Clever, aren’t I?
So for this week’s What’s Cooking Wednesday we have a delicious, quick risotto with pancetta (bacon if you must) and peas, which, if you’re wondering, are “piselli” in Italian, keeping the P theme alive.
FYI, it took me about 35-40 minutes from chopping to eating.
I used fresh peas that had been shelled and then frozen, but there’s no reason you can’t use canned peas–although it will change the flavor and for goodness’ sake, don’t cook them nearly as long or you’ll end up with a big ole mushy mess.
Ah, and another thing, I’m with Karen who says stir your risotto as often as you like and in any direction you see fit.
I trust you.
Risotto with Pancetta & Peas
(serves 4)
2 tbl olive oil
1 onion, finely chopped
1/4 lb of pancetta, cubed
8 oz frozen peas
1 cup rice
1/2 glass white wine
1 1/2 cup broth
1 pat of butter
3 tbl grated parmegiano reggiano
Heat olive oil in large pan and add pancetta and onion. Let them cook for 3 or 4 minutes and then add the peas, still frozen. Mix well and cook until defrosted–just a few minutes.
At this point, add the rice and stir the mixture together, letting everyone get acquainted for a minute or two, and then add the wine.
Turn up the heat so the wine evaporates, and when it does, add some broth–enough so that it covers the risotto.
This will need to cook for about 20 minutes on medium heat with you stirring as you prefer (see note above referencing Karen). If you’re wondering how I do it, let’s just say it doesn’t involve continually stirring in perfect circles, and I think my risotto turned out great.
Within those 20 minutes, when you see the mixture getting dry, add some more broth.
When the rice is cooked to your satisfaction, mix in a dab of butter and grated cheese.
Turn off the heat and let the risotto sit for five minutes, then serve.
Buon appetito!
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[tags]risotto, risotto recipes, peas, pancetta, recipes, what’s cooking wednesday, cooking[/tags]
airing my clean laundry
*Don’t forget that all this week is The Ultimate Blog Party!
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I’m smiling just knowing that so many of you enjoyed the photos from yesterday; it was a pleasure to share a beautiful Calabrian morning with you.
Had I thought ahead, though, I would’ve worn red to stop all that malocchio coming my way from so much envy.
Just kidding, of course–I know it wasn’t *that* kind of envy.
On yesterday’s post, fellow blogger Stefanie commented that sometimes my life seems like a movie, which got me thinking…and you know what? She’s absolutely right. Sometimes it’s more romantic comedy and other times horror or drama, although hardly ever Van Damme action (quite by design).
And isn’t this more or less how all of our lives are when you think about it?
I tend to focus on the positive in my daily life, and that’s what I like to share on the blog as well. Do I never stress about anything? I wish, but I’m human. I have rants and whatnot, but I like to get them out and then be done with it.
Sometimes that’s here on this Internet thing, but most often it’s on the phone with my mom, or even better, with P. Venting in Italian is *so* much fun–probably because it’s the only time I talk really fast in my second language without a care as to whether I’m making sense.
You see, P nods and agrees no matter what. He’s a smart man.
What I’m getting at, I suppose, is that I don’t dwell on mishaps or frustrations because then I feel like the nasty forces in life are winning.
And I hate to lose.
So besides bringing some warm sunshine to cold, snowy days with yesterday’s photos, I also hoped to encourage all of you to appreciate the simple things, the everyday sights in your life, whatever they might be.
And today for me, the sights are laundry (so much that it will spill into tomorrow), a translation project that I need to finish today, and lesson planning for tomorrow and Thursday.
So in lieu of a longer post, I’m going to share more pictures from yesterday’s Marina adventure.
I’ll start with a woman doing laundry the old-fashioned way (note: I use a washing machine although I do hang out the clothes like most of us here…don’t get us started on the dryer situation, right expats?).
“Maria Concetta!” she called out when she saw me, mistaking me for her granddaughter, but she didn’t act the least bit disappointed when she realized it was just a straniera with a camera. She even offered coffee, but I was on a tight schedule so I could catch the bus back up the mountain before lunch.
“La prossima volta!”
Next time, I promised.
Just a few steps away from this woman’s house was this view through the stairway:
And here’s a leftover shot from the beach area:
The flower stand at the small market in the Marina on Monday mornings:
A wider view of the mercatino. That’s my village nestled into the mountains:
And this was my view while waiting for the bus home:
OK, so this was my view *after* I pushed down a plastic orange fence surrounding the property with one hand and leaned over the squished barrier to take the photo with the other.
Sometimes you just gotta go for it and make your own pretty pictures.
P.S. Happy Birthday Dad!
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[tags]calabria, badolato marina, badolato, open air markets, italy, beaches, boats, ionian sea, sea, hanging laundry, trees[/tags]
taking the party to the beach
Don’t forget that all this week is The Ultimate Blog Party!
Check out 5 minutes for mom to learn more about
how you can participate–everyone’s invited!
The weather is absolutely gorgeous today, so I took my first trip to the beach in a long while. I’m not one to spend hours under the sun in the summer, but on days like this, there’s no better place in the world.
Of course, I ran into P’s parents on the way and they kept trying to convince me to get in the car so they could take me home (probably feeding me something first). Mamma asked me where I had been, why I had gone down to the Marina (the part of the village on the sea), so I told her the truth.
Nowhere and to do nothing.
The health care clinic? Nope.
The market? Neanche.
They just don’t get the crazy Americana who wanted to wander around the Marina with my camera for an hour or so.
But I know *you* do.
Shall we?
Turned out it was just Giuseppe and me.
I didn’t know him before today, but he told me that he usually
walks the beach with P’s Zio Antonio.Welcome to life in a small town folks.
Some fishing nets secured on the rocks.
And a final shot of Giuseppe as I made my way back to dry land.
When I got back home, I felt refreshed, energized, and so very alive, and as I write this a few hours later, my face is still warm with Calabrian sun.
I may have to make this a regular thing.
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[tags]calabria, beaches, sea, ionian sea, badolato, badolato marina, boats, trees, fishing nets[/tags]
sunday scribblings: superstitions
Prompt #49: Superstitions
Superstitions–a topic close to my heart having grown up with an Italian-American grandmother and now living in southern Italy, where Roman Catholicism and mysticism live in surprising perfect harmony.
That phenomenon is worth a whole post, and indeed books have been written on the subject. Perhaps someday I’ll wax theoretical, but for today, let’s stick in the here and now, the daily implications of superstition in my life.
I’ve already written about my experiences with malocchio, The Evil Eye, perhaps the greatest superstition of all, especially since it crosses many cultures and religions. Some of my other favorite superstitions are things you should avoid doing lest you invite bad luck: placing a loaf of bread upside down, spilling wine, olive oil, or salt, dropping scissors.
Another of my favorites is that a pregnant woman’s cravings should always be satisfied or else the baby will be born with a birthmark in the form of the desired food or the child will be generally disfigured. You scoff?
I inherited a birthmark that my father has because my pregnant grandmother expressed her craving for chicken while scratching her legs. Yes, we both have chicken-shaped birthmarks on our calves (although I prefer to think it looks more like a heart). Someday I may show you, but sorry, today’s not the day.
All of my pregnant readers are more than welcome to quote me on this topic, by the way.
But my freakiest experience with southern Italian superstition happened about a year ago when P’s mom rushed into the house with tears in her eyes, begging me to go and retrieve some of her jewelry she had given me a few months before.
“What happened?” I asked.
“I had a dream.” I’m pretty sure she thought that would be enough information, but, you know, I’m American, so I ask questions.
“About the jewelry?” I was still not making a move for the steps to get the jewelry, so she gently guided me with her hands.
“No, about you and my son, and….” She sat down, started rocking back and forth, made repeated, furious signs of the cross, and began mumbling what I assume were prayers.
“What happened in the dream?” I stepped down two steps and stopped.
“I didn’t sleep all night,” she said, and continued saying prayers and crying. I didn’t see the conversation going any further, so I didn’t push it. I assumed that P and I had been dead in the dream–because if we had just broken up in the dream, that wouldn’t have been so upsetting? Right? Hard to tell. I went to get the jewelry.
“This is everything?” she asked as I handed her a few little boxes that contained earrings and a necklace I rather liked–it had a tiny ladybug charm, which, ironically, I always thought meant good luck.
“Yes, that’s everything. Do you want something to…”
“OK, I have to go,” she said abruptly and left, still saying prayers and still crying, but most importantly clutching the jewelry.
So I was left in the wake of this early morning encounter to consider not only my own and P’s mortality, but also what the jewelry had to do with any of it. Through various research including thinking back to my own grandmother but *not* including asking P’s mom, because this is a subject not to be discussed, I think maybe I’ve figured it out.
Among southern Italians, it’s a common practice that when one prays to a particular saint or the Virgin Mary for a request, one often promises something in return–many times it is a piece of jewelry to be pinned to the clothes of a statue.
I’m wondering if perhaps P’s mom had promised my pieces of jewelry somewhere along the way for some request, and then saw something bad happening in her dream because she gave them to me instead. Or perhaps she had simply promised away that jewelry in lieu of P and I staying alive and/or together. Or maybe she had seen something in the dream about the jewelry somehow causing trouble.
Like I said, I haven’t asked, because, truth be told, I don’t actually want to know the whole story. I’m definitely superstitious, and I believe in messages coming through dreams, so this was one time I was more than happy to live in blissful ignorance.
In fact, I didn’t even tell my own mom about this until I figured P and I were in the clear. Like birthmarks, superstitions seem to run in the family.
sharing a wonderful discovery
In honor of the Ultimate Blog Party, I’m going to direct you to one of my newest favorite blogs, The Life of Riley.
Now before you mistake “Riley” for one Mr. Bill O’Reilly (and me for a right-winger), let me show you a picture of the blog’s author:
Meet Olive Riley, a 107-year-old Aussie who has been graciously sharing her life and memories with the blogosphere since mid-February. Her friend does the typing for her “blob” as she has called it, and what comes out is nothing short of brilliant.
This is the beginning of Olive’s first post:
Good Morning everyone. My name is Olive Riley. I live in Australia near Sydney. I was born in Broken Hill on Oct. 20th 1899. Broken Hill is a mining town, far away in the centre of Australia. My Friend, Mike, has arranged this blog for me. He is doing the typing and I am telling the stories. He thinks it’s a good idea to tell what’s going on. He already made a film about me a few years back and people liked that, so they might like this blog too, he says. We’ll see.
What we’re seeing is that Mike was right. By its Third Post, The Life of Riley had amassed over 190,000 visits from all over the world.
With photos and stories from the last 100 years and topics ranging from Olive’s sipping shandy on a trip to Brisbane to see her son to her campaigning for a local “lettuces”-grower being kicked off his land to how she ended up with the same set of teeth since 1930, how could we do anything but read, read, and read (and want!) some more?
Olive’s blog is beautiful and inspiring, and if you don’ t contract a severe case of warm fuzzies from seeing how much she enjoys life, well, I doubt you’re human. It would be wonderful if more of our elders follow Olive’s lead and record their thoughts on this international forum; too much oral history has already been lost.
And especially during a time of war, we could all use a course in real human history.
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[tags]olive riley, world’s oldest blogger[/tags]
Michelle Kaminsky is an American attorney-turned-freelance writer who lived in her family's ancestral village in Calabria, Italy for 15 years. This blog is now archived.
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