Cooking is a Foreign Language
No one has ever mistaken me for a great cook. Pressed, friends will admit that I have improved. How could I not, when the initial bar was set so low? I grew up with a mother proud of the shiny unused interior of her oven, whispering with dramatic overtones, "If one does not learn HOW to cook, one is not asked to do so!" Thanksgiving Dinner was Swanson Frozen Turkey, and one could only hope the foil was cut from the correct compartments. I never fed my own children frozen TV Dinners, but with a consuming career and a bookworm soul that preferred finishing Kristin Lavransdatter to deciphering a twelve step recipe, my culinary achievements tended toward salads, cheese sandwiches, grain-stuffed pancakes, and chicken in every fruit sauce imaginable. And too many pizza delivery- boxes to shake your Misono bread knife at. So, when I was negotiating with an old friend about where and what we could do on a vacation together, I was intrigued by just one of her two options: cooking school or beach. Since I did not want my mid-life skin to sizzle on a beach for two weeks, I thought - why not cook?! Not totally at ease with the idea of ten straight days over a stove, I wanted to buffer the experience, perhaps by also having it serve as language practice. My friend, a fantastic cook but always interested in learning something new, wanted Italian cooking, I wanted to improve my Italian (so I could read Italo Calvino in the original) and how better to remember "pomodori" then by the image of a chef holding the red, shiny skinned tomatoes overhead. Voila! From there, everything fell into place as if by magic. My friend and I, as cardcarrying members of Slow Food, receive a beautiful magazine promoting a more sustainable agrifood chain. (The history of Slow Food started as a protest against McDonald's at the foot of the Spanish Steps in Rome. It has grown into an international movement fighting globally distributed, industrialized foods and promoting local producers and honoring regional traditions.) Advertised in our magazine was a school in Jesi (pronounced "Yesee") in the region of Marche ("marka") offering two week courses in addition to full academic year-long cooking classes. This Instituto Superiore di Gastronomia, a school of Italian regional cooking (www.italcook.it) looked good and professional to both of us. And my friend, who does not speak Italian, was pleased that English translation would be provided by our e-mail contact at the school, Chiara. Next thing we knew, after overcoming jet lag in the Eternal City, we were down to the Termini train station getting tickets for the 9:36 to Jesi.
Within minutes we were out of the city watching the pastured sheep, olive groves, fruit orchards and bee hives go by, and I got to practice my fumbling Italian with a charming retired professor jurisprudence and a current writer of fantasy novels. Within three hours we were there. Jesi surprised us with its silence. Apparently our arrival coincided Sunday dinner at everyone's' mother's or in-law's place. Forty thousand people appeared to all be hidden indoors! We walked the cobblestoned streets, and viewed the encircling walls around the city center, but all we found open was our hotel, a few restaurants and a "gelateria.". We found the school just a short distance from our hotel and discovered that an "enecoteca" - a wine bar - shared the space. A little spooked by the silence we decided to unpack and get some of the local history straight from the guidebooks. We would soon discover that this was the only time the streets would empty during our stay. According to the Touring Club of Italy guide book, Jesi was first settled by the Umbrians, then taken over by the Romans in 247 B.C. It took on the more recognizable form of a town by the 11th century. Famous as the site of the precipitous delivery of Frederick II in the twelfth century (under a tent in the city square), it later became entangled in the bitter wars between the Guelphs and the Ghibellines of the 1300 and 1400s. The walls we had seen were 15th century renovations of Roman fortifications.
The next morning the school's front door was open and we walked into the kitchen to meet Chiara, who looked like a Renaissance artist's model. She told us that the class would be small, only six students total. The rest gradually wandered in and we all made introductions. I soon realized that I was to be totally outclassed (no surprise) by the class: a Japanese fusion chef, an instructor at a San Francisco cooking school, and three women (including my friend) who shared a passion if not employment in the culinary arts. One of those women came from a long line of Abruzzi fishermen, and her Italian (with the Abruzzi accent) would be an additional aid in translating. Next the introductory lecture to the school was made by the director Gianfranco Mancini in Italian with Chiara translating:
"This school is meant to teach foreigners and to promote the philosophy of slow food - the importance of regionalism in preserving differences and behaving in an eco-rational way in the global village of the world. "It's crazy to ship hazelnuts from Italy to California one month and from another place TO Italy the next! From September to October one should eat Italian grapes in Italy and not be eating Chilean grapes in February. Children don't understand seasonality anymore when they can get oranges at absolutely anytime of year." . Mancini used to be a professor of Italian literature and taught Dante. One of the original members of Slow Food, he appreciates the importance of the preservation of history and culture, including culinary culture. Regarding regionalism, Mancini acknowledged that "Fusion is and has always been an integral characteristic of cuisine: The Sicilian menu is infused with Arabic cuisine; the Piedmontese with French; and the Sardegna menu with Barcelona cuisine," thus gracefully acknowledging the creative fusion of Japanese with French cuisine to the notable chef in our midst. Mancini however stressed that the point of our classes was to show us as far as possible the purest form of the traditional Marche cuisine But before any thought of entering the kitchen could enter our heads, we needed to understand wine and olive oil. The morning session started with wine-tasting and Roberta Paccusse lead the discussion. We eyed the color, the limpidity, the fluidity, counted bubbles, made the olfactory analysis trying to narrow down the flower versus fruit versus metallic scents, and got to taste a lovely variety of locally produced wines. This was fun and interesting but it was the afternoon session with olive oil that really stretched my thinking - I had never even bothered to worry about test-tasting my olive oil! The testing of olive oil was done in blue glasses because whether an oil is more green or less green and more yellow is absolutely irrelevant to its quality. With the glass resting on one hand and covered by the other hand in order to institute a warming as the oil is gently swirled, the first step was sniffing. Bad smells were labeled "muffa", a moldy aroma ; "riscaldo", with the scent of fermentation; "avvinato", vinegary, with the scent one would expect from acetic acid; "morchia", a really foul smell apparently due to an oil that has been in contact with its own (lees) for too long, and of course "rancid" which even I could distinguish from the others.
(The actual taste testing of the oil was accomplished by transacting the movement of the oil from glass to tongue by means of a vacuum-like sucking action rather than a sip. For some of the "good" samples, there was a bitter taste followed by a "picante" - a taste of spiciness. This is good, but we were told it is also good in a "dolce" oil of both the bitter and picante are diminished but are in balance.) That was day one. The other cooks were like racehorses chomping at the bit. I, on the other hand, was a little nervous about what day 2 would bring. I knew I lacked knife skills (oh did I love my Cuisinart!) and just hoped I wouldn't screw up too badly.
Tuesday started off with official aprons and hats passed out by Chiara, before we assembled around the spacious steel prep table. Everyone was armed with a digital camera and a notebook for recipes. True to its mission, Paolo Piaggesi, the visiting chef, introduced us to the (succulent feast) of the sea. Jesi is close to the Adriatic Sea and takes advantage of the fishermen's bounty. Risotto alla marinara had "vongole" (clams), "alamar" (squid), "sepia" (cuttlefish), "cozze" (mussels ), "zongoro", mackerels, "mulle" mullets, "raguseae" (sea snails) not to mention local carrots, onions, tomatoes and fennel, "finocchio" in Italian. Everybody divvied up prep duties with the pros grabbing the more rigorous duties, while I happily found my place, debearding mussels and contentedly stirring the polenta. I did learn however, that absented-mindedly drawing various designs, flowers and Japanese kanji in the pot does not go over. One direction, one circle. The chef smiled sadly...yes, if he didn't know my level of culinary sophistication before, he knew now. However, as I soon discovered, this delightful school just wanted everyone to get the most out of their experience, whatever their background. The visiting chefs didn't mind that I had never deboned and beheaded a whole fish before. They were amused, rather than horrified that I was trying to chop soggy parsley rather than first drying it. And I LOVED the fact that they spoke totally in Italian. While Chiara was translating beautifully at the other end of the table, I could tune her out and try to immerse myself totally in the rhythm and vocabulary of this language that I was studying. And we were all talking about one of my favorite subjects. I might not cook much, but I do love food, and these young chefs were passionate about the flavors, the aesthetics and the entire
sensuous experience of preparing this food properly, while honoring the local producers of the raw ingredients. Some of those producers would deliver their vegetables and fish during our a.m. lesson. Baskets of herbs and ripe tomatoes would be piled up at one end of the kitchen, further reminding me to try to bypass my hometown fluorescent-lit supermarkets and go directly to my local farmers.
The morning flew by. Garbed in our white paper chef hats and cloth aprons, we cooked avidly and enthusiastically. Between stirring, chopping, taking notes and taking pictures, feasts were prepared. A big mid-day meal with wine would be the reward. And there is nothing quite like a kitchen full of aromas to really summon one's appetite. Unlike other cooking schools advertised principally as social experiences in a home kitchen, these chefs ran this kitchen like a restaurant or hotel. So there were multiple entrees, and "antipasti" all prepared at the same time.
While other
more detail-oriented cooks were scribbling furiously and comparing notes, I went for the gestalt of the experience so that most of my notes were of the vocabulary rather than what length incision where and what exact moment you did or did not add the herbs. But when we all flew from one dish to another to snap photos, I was right there with the best of them. While my husband might never taste these exact creations in this beautiful form, at least he could lust after them‌ The next cooking day started in controversy - but cooking and historical controversy only. Should the Brodetto be of the Ancona or the Porto Recanati version? Apparently there are two different schools of tradition as to how "brodetto", a fish soup, should be prepared. We went for the Ancona style, the oldest and least modified over the years. Tradition calls for thirteen varieties of fish, and once again I was stretched with bounty of the sea that I would never have been able to name on my own: cod, dogfish, ray, cuttlefish, octopus, red mullet, bluefish, John Dory, angler, mantis shrimp, squid, turbot shrimp, scorpion fish, weaver sole‌ While our chef offered us another recipe, he advised us that the one of S. Benedetto- style had too much pepper obscuring its taste. And we all had to agree the one we prepared was fantastic. Thursday was bread day: "pane pugliese", "pane con grano spezzato e farina di faro", "grissini stirati" and "focaccia". We all got our chance to knead and shape to our heart's content.
But on Friday, we left the kitchen to review the local produce. I do love field trips! We saw mozzarella cheese being prepared in huge vats and met the buffalos that were its source. We watched the boats bringing in the harvested mussels and cooked some up to eat in a hut on the beach in Portonovo with the local fishermen. The day was completed with a tour of a local olive oil producer.
Thrilled to be in Le Marche, a region neither of us had explored before, we decided to take the weekend for a little of the beach life my friend still craved. So off we went to Pesaro by train. We discovered that Pesaro is the birthplace of Rossini, and that there is an annual opera festival in his honor. That and the beach by the glittering blue of the Adriatic sea and a leisurely lunch of pasta, fish and wine are all lures to bring my husband back with me some day soon.
Week 2 also started in the classroom rather than the kitchen. Topics included cheese and "salumi". Cheese, as it turns out, does not start off in plastic-wrapped blocks. I learned more about cheese than I thought possible: the curd formation, breaking and separating, the cooking, molding and pressing, the pulling and salting, and lastly, the aging. We tasted pecorino, gorgonzola, parmesan, "fosse" apparently hidden away by monks under ground for four months (if my Italian was accurate). Then there was "salumi", a word derived from the Latin "salumen" for a product preserved in salt. We started off with the basic anatomy of a pig and the different pork cuts before proceeding to extensive tasting and evaluating. And when we proceeded to the cooking, it was once again an experience permeated with the history and the culture of le Marche. In "porchetta", the use of wild fennel is vital to the cooking of "coniglio" in a traditional Marche recipe. Our only divergence from tradition was that we used an oven, while it used to be cooked over steadily smoldering embers.
Recipes included Vincigrassi, a
lasagna Marche style with a bechamel sauce and a "peasant" styled polenta dish.
Mid-week
on a day when I could have learned how to do gnocchi, I elected to play hooky instead - but with
the benign – or was it relieved? - endorsement of the director of the school who gave me good information on the sights of Jesi. The city had already come to life with me in the evening promenades of entire families, and the friendly shopkeepers. I too had taken long evening walks over the entire old part of the town within the walls enclosing the seven original town gates and towers. And, I had sat in the square, local entertainment venue, for traditional dances and drama and had even heard a children's choir in rehearsal in the local cathedral. But rambling around Jesi while others cooked held a special appeal. And the day was magical. The skies were grey when I set out, and soon there was a steady trickle of rain lacing down my neck and back. But no sooner had it started then I happened upon the outdoor market, with its piles of hats and underwear, vegetables and candies. The allure for me - and many others - was the red nylon umbrella with a long curved handle. Under mine I walked on.
I started off at Piazza Federico II, with its 19th century obelisk fountain. It honors the Swabian emperor who local historians say was born precipitously under a pavilion or a tent at this location where a plaque now reads "According to an ancient tradition, the King of Sicily and Jerusalem, emperor and true genius in the fields of science and knowledge was born in a tent situated in this square 26 Dec. 1194." The square was bordered by two magnificent palazzo: The Palazzo Balleani and Palazzo Ripanti hearkening back to the 15th and 16th centuries respectively. Like so many Italian towns, historical and architectural gems are simply there, part of the landscape without fanfare. And in fact, because of local government economic issues, some of the noteworthy sights are not even really open, unless you do what I do - knock and ask. Lo Studio per le Arti della stampa in the Palazzo Pianetti Vecchio has a collection of ancient printing machines. Presses, cutters, machines for lithography, and typesetting benches are all on display here. Jesi was the first Italian town to build a modern printing house and in 1472, the first edition of Dante's Divine Comedy was printed in Jesi. A lovely young woman answered my knock at the door and let me see
this museum, and then took me into a tiny chapel that the Pianetti family had used in the same building. Another museum with antique manuscripts and ancient globes is the Biblioteca Planettiana in the Palazzo della Signoria. An aristocratic family donated over fifteen thousand volumes spanning four generations of knowledge. Genealogical and historical archives and the works of various composers (handwritten and printed) are displayed here as well. Unfortunately, an Archaeology Museum really was closed to the public, and while the second floor was apparently sealed off with artifacts that only scholars with appointments could see, the first floor honoring Valeria Moriconi, a famous actress of the Italian stage was open to all. Film clips, old costumes and photos gave a glimpse of her long career and life.
In another palazzo of the Pianetti family, far larger and more ambitious than the "vecchio" is housed the (Pianocoteca) civica, the city's picture gallery. Here is the largest collection of works by Lorenzo Lotto. My museum guide explains that he returned from Venice after being unable to compete with Titian, but apparently he was very successful and prolific here. She pointed out his masterpiece, the polyptych of St. Lucy being judged, then condemned, then dragged by oxen. A masterpiece of Italian rococo, I could look out the Pianocoteca's long facade with a hundred windows and see a beautiful overgrown garden, some statues toppled over in the tall grass, like a glimpse into the lushness of a secret garden, a fragment of a movie set. Other parts of the museum housed ceramics, old pharmacy vases and Della Robbia works in terracotta. And when I was tired of the tourist role, I sat in the square and talked to a young father of two who was playing with his children and their friends in a game that involved chairs, and an imagined street car. I tried to tell him in Italian that my husband had played the same game with cardboard boxes when our sons were little and he understood. He charmingly asked me where I was from and bragged that my Italian was wonderful (which it wasn't) but I was happy that I could talk to a complete stranger about something we had in common in a foreign language. So what was the end result of my time at Jesi and the school? The great cooks learned a ton. My friend fine-tuned her gnocchi. And I had a wonderful, memorable experience – one part
culinary, a pinch of local produce, two parts friend, and simmered in Jesi itself. I came home and confidently finished Il Barone Rampante by Calvino, made my husband a Marche pasta dish and hoped I could talk members of the school into visiting me someday in New Mexico (and cooking dinner). And I was right, in that there is nothing to make one remember the word "pomodori" like seeing, squeezing and smashing those juicy, bursting red tomatoes on the focaccia dough. And once again I was reminded that for me the travel experience can only be heightened by trying to experience the local culture, the music, the food, and at least trying to cross the language barriers. While I probably won't make the rabbit dish anytime soon, I did buy into the whole Slow Food philosophy with renewed enthusiasm. Regionalism rules...so pass the tamales and green chiles, locally grown here in New Mexico of course!