Archive for the ‘scenes from village life’ Category
love thursday: all hail the prince(s)
This year’s Easter Sunday celebrations brought a special visitor to my village:
Emanuele Filiberto of Savoy, Prince of Piedmont and Venice
This is the prince* at his wedding to French actress Clotilde Courau in 2003.
But no, I don’t have a photo of the prince’s visit to my village.
How’s that possible?
Well my very own Principe P and I were busy enjoying a gorgeous, lazy Sunday morning capping off a gorgeous, lazy weekend starting from Friday afternoon when these photos were taken:
Fairy tales can be fun, but the real thing is fabulous.
Happy Love Thursday everyone!
*Italy was ruled by the royal family, the House of Savoy, until the monarchy was voted out in a controversial election in 1946. In the Constitution of the new “republicca” all of the Savoia family’s male descendants were exiled from the country.
This provision was removed in 2002 when Vittorio Emanuele, Prince of Naples, the last claimant to the House of Savoy, renounced all claims to the throne.
Just a year later, Prince Emanuele Filiberto, son of Vittorio Emanuele, married his bride in Rome’s Basilica of St. Mary of the Angels and Martyrs.
Six years later he came to my village. And I missed it.
The Signs of Spring in Calabria
Even though you couldn’t tell from yesterday’s cold, windy, rainy Pasquetta weather, primavera is definitely here in Calabria, and do you know how I know?
From the flowers on the trees.
I’ve always loved the season of spring and its gorgeous gifts, but before living here I didn’t pay much attention to what blooms when or even really which flowers belong to which trees.
Now I have the routine down and look forward to it every year, which you might be able to tell from my posting about the first almond blossoms–here are last year’s and remember these from January?
Yes, the almond tree (il mandorlo) always flowers first.
Next comes the apricot tree (l’albicocco):
Then the plum tree (il prugno):
And finally the peach tree (il pesco):
Watching this cycle with anticipation and excitement every year is so soothing to me–knowing that, without fail, these blossoms will usher in the new season, new growth, new opportunities, new possibilities.
Also? The figs are coming! The figs are coming!
I just love the sweet breath of inspiration that spring provides, don’t you?
La Buona Cucina America Plus Pasqua in Calabria
Even though there have been small celebrations all week, today really begins the Pasqua (Easter) festivities around here. They won’t finish until late Monday afternoon, so I won’t be back blogging until Tuesday.
But you know I wouldn’t leave you without at least some suggestions of what to do to fill your blog-reading time, right?
Want to experience what I’ll be doing this weekend?
1. Check out Pasqua in Calabria for a description of our day long procession on Sabato Santo (Holy Saturday) and the magical Easter Sunday meeting between the Madonna and Jesus.
2. Then see the photographic evidence in Pasqua in Calabria: The Photos.
3. And if you’re curious about why the fun in Italy continues on until Easter Monday, check out last year’s Pasquetta activities in Still Celebrating.
4. If you’re looking for traditional Calabrian Easter cake, check out Calabrian Cuzzupe.
5. And if you happen to be interested in one of my favorite childhood holiday memories, check out Deno’s Easter Eggs.
And now a very important announcement:
Have you noticed the new widget over in my sidebar? Looks like this?
Here’s the deal. Our philosopher in Umbria, Judith of Think on it!, is stufa of hearing that American food is characterized over here in Italy as unhealthy at best and downright poisonous at worst. We Americans know we eat “real food” and that it’s not all sweets and McDonald’s right?
Well it’s time to show the Italians “La Buona Cucina Americana.”
So Judith, Mary of The Flavors of Abruzzo, Barb of Barb and Art Live in Italy, Sara of Ms. Adventures in Italy, Cherrye of My Bella Vita, Judy of Over a Tuscan Stove, and I are going to be taking turns sharing real American food and recipes each Friday.
In the words of our fearless leader Judith:
Some friends and I are going to begin publishing weekly recipes for old fashioned American food, food like grandma used to cook and perhaps like you still cook, if you happen to be American. So what’s new about that? There are innumerable food bloggers in the USA pouring out magnificent food of every description as made in the USA. Yes, that is so, but they don’t do it from Italy and in Italian!
That’s right folks. All recipes will be in English *and* Italian so that Italians can stop by and enjoy some down home American food–so tell your Italian friends!
Mary is kicking off things today with American Style Shepherd’s Pie, and next week will be Judith’s turn with Chicken Pot Pie.
Mmm. I’m getting hungry…and homesick!
If there’s anything you’d like to see featured in La Buona Cucina Americana or if you’d be up for the challenge of sharing your American recipes in Italian (with ingredients available in Italy), leave a comment here!
I hope the Italians are ready for us.
Buona Pasqua to those celebrating–and buon weekend to all!
Dreaming About the Meaning of Life
I had a different post planned for today (come back tomorrow for more Sicilian adventures–sneak preview in my Flickr set!), but this morning I woke up after having a most interesting exchange with a random bearded man in un sogno–a dream.
In italiano.
We were in a souvenir store, and he was near the back listening to my conversation with the woman clerk about what I’m doing in Calabria.
He walked towards us, rubbing his hands together, turned to me, and said:
Cara signorina, mi dice, tra un Papa e un povero,
chi passa la vita migliore?
[Dear miss, tell me, between a Pope and a poor man,
who lives the better life?]
I paused, looked up to my left then into his dark eyes, and responded:
Caro Signore, questa non è la domanda.
La domanda è . . . chi ha apprezzato la vita di più?
[Dear sir, that’s not the question.
The question is . . . who has appreciated life more?]
When I told P about my dream and he said simply, “Hai risposto giusto.”
You answered correctly.
With all of this churning through my head, I took off for my morning walk with the pooches, and guarda!
The first margherita of the season:
Life is good.
Have a fabulous week my peeps.
what’s cooking wednesday: calabrian prickly zucchini
I hope you don’t mind, but we’re taking a break from Sicily to come back to Calabria for a moment.
Today’s What’s Cooking Wednesday recipe probably isn’t one you’re going to rush out and try, but I couldn’t let another week go by without writing about:
Prickly zucchini
Actually I didn’t even know that would be an acceptable name in English for them, but it was my guess, so that’s what I typed into Google, and found a post by Rowena at Rubber Slippers in Italy (Great blog! Go read it!) entitled: Prickly Zucchini from Calabria.
Bingo!
I asked around a bit here, and no one even knows the name of these spiny little things in Italian; in Calabrese they are “cucuzze spinusi” where cucuzze is a general name for zucchini/pumpkins and spinosi (spinusi in Calabrese) means spiny or prickly.
And because of Rowena’s commenters, I learned that our cucuzze spinusi are better-known as chayote, popular in many parts of the world, particularly Mexico. Also, Wikipedia tells me that the Italian name is zucca centeneria, but I’ll stick with cucuzze spinusi since no one around these parts would know what I’m talking about otherwise.
That same Wikipedia page gives some serving suggestions, which are basically all the things you’d do with un-prickly zucchini (yes, I was tempted to write “prickless”), but I’m going to share the way everyone eats them here–this according to a very informal survey at the local grocery store.
Fried Prickly Zucchini
Prickly zucchini
Flour
Salt
Olive oil for frying
So you’re probably wondering how to get the spines off.
First, these are real spines, not like the baby ones that prickly pears have. So first trim off the spines with a sharp knife and then peel it “come la mela” (like an apple) as P says.
Slice the zucchini to your desired thickness, discarding the innards along the way.
Mix a bit of salt with flour in a shallow bowl, and get dredging.
Fry them up until they’re a light golden brown (P left the ones in the photo in the oil *a tad* too long but they were still delicious), and you can taste your very first fried prickly zucchini.
Buon appetito!
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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