Il Forno

A helping hand

I'd like to point your attention, for once, to something hardly food related.

Everyone of us knows that while we live our lives free of basic worries, such as food or basic health care, there are plenty of people around the world who are not so lucky. Wouldn't it be nice to help? Pim has started a fund called Spare a grain of rice. The first recipient of these fund will be Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF), or Doctors without Borders, an organization that provides emergency medical assistance to populations in danger. Even a little donation could be of great importance. Follow the link to Pim's site for the details or go directly here to make a donation. Thanks!

Tearing down boundaries: a defence of British food

Prejudices are hard to fight. For example here in Germany a very diffuse prejudice on civil servants is that they're slow and unfriendly. After a week of fighting with German bureaucracy and the connected paperwork, the reason for the very little posting of last week, I could say one thing or two about the obtuse Beamter (civil servants) on meets here. But it wouldn't be fair to the two really nice ladies who took the time to help me in the end. Instead I want to try to get this out of my mind, otherwise I'll spend another embittered week. So I'll do something completely different: I'll try and fight a prejudice, a food one in this case. Taking inspiration from the ongoing elections for the European Parliament, and well, the European Football (soccer) Nation's Championship too, I'll try to fight probably the most diffused food prejudice in Europe. Ask which country has the worst food in Europe and the answer will be almost unanimous: the UK! (Holland, I must admit, gets quite a few votes too.) Interestingly even quite a few British believe in this prejudice, though many English-men and -women will say Scotland is the home of the worst possible food. It's time to stop this mean and gratuitous attack to the honest British cuisine. There's enough of an anti-European feeling in the UK without us "continental" people poking fun at this honest cooking with a long tradition. I know there would be other, more important prejudices to fight here in Europe but this is after all a food blog, so there you have it.

Sick

I intended to post two book reviews yesterday and today, but after what happened in Spain I feel writing about food is something I can't do now. It's hard to say something about what happened that doesn't sound superficial, hypocrit or that hasn't been said already. I'll try and excuse me if it may all sound a bit confused, mixed up. That's just the way I feel now.

I'm feeling sick and angry. I'm thinking about those people who died, wondering what their last thoughts were, what their life was like, and trying to immagine how hard it is for those left to mourn for them. I can't help thinking what would happened if I was one of them or if somebody close to me was one of the victims. Why hit those people? I know, we could talk for hours about why,but I just don't understand.

It makes me mad that everytime something like this happens some politician uses the shock effet and goes on and proposes some new restriciton to personal freedom. Today in Germany someone proposed that from now on train stations shoud have the same safety measures as airport. What next? Because if you think about it there are pleanty of places were crowds gatehr where terrorist could hit. Busses, shopping malls, cultural events and, hey, streets! Does the police plan to check everyone of these? Should we all be controlled like in an Orwellian nightmare? Excuse me if I say so, but sometimes I have the feeling that this is exactly what some politicians are aiming to.

I'm also feeling guilty. Guilty of speaking about these people without never before saying anything about the hundreds dead in Iraq, Israel and Palestine and other parts of the world were people are dying in some forgotten war I don't even know of. On the other hand I know that in a very egoistic way I can't mourn for world suffering everyday otherwise I would go mad.

I feel guilty because one of the first things that crossed my mind yesterday as I read the news was: if I had to die this way i'd at least hope to die after dinner, I'd hate to have breakfast as my last meal. I can't understand why I think something so silly but I did.

So sorry if you'll find no food around here today, it will be back soon enough.

Greek in Roman clothing

Last week I had a little tasting of a few bottles of wine made from one of the grapes I can honestly say to know a bit more in depth: Aglianico. The first time I heard about the Aglianico wines, as a teenager, I asked myself if the name had something to do with garlic (aglio in Italian). Who would drink such a thing? Today I know that wines smelling of garlic exist, but that this is a defect caused by too much sulphur in the wine. I soon learned that the name had nothing to do with garlic. Aglianico, as a name, actually derives from the old Ellenico or Hellenic, i.e. coming from Greece. This, as you'll see below is not the only present, as far as wine is concerned, the Greek left beyond. But back to the wines first. Aglianico is grown today in Italy in three main areas: that of Taurasi, the Vulture and the Sannio, all in Southern Italy. It is a grape that can give great wines, that age well, like Taurasi or pleasant simpler wines for everyday drinking. Of the three wines, all rather on the simple everyday wine side, I had, one came from the Sannio (quite disappointing) and two from the Vulture area (much better). I was particularly fascinated by one of these two: Aglianico del Vulture carpe diem 1997. A balanced wine, a bit old-fashioned (in a positive way) and showing some definite sites of (positive) evolution. At the same time a wine of strength without being a "heavyweight" as many modern-style wines are. And, most important of all, pleasant. But somehow this mix of Greek (Aglianico) with Roman (the reference to the famous "carpe diem" poem) got me thinking about wine, Greece and ancient Rome....

What do the little ones eat?

A few days ago I added a maybe somewhat headlong comment to one of Deb's last posts. In short I claimed that, as a parent with a small child, you're often better off ignoring the advice a lot of people give. I must admit that's probably way too harsh, and I'm sorry if I offended someone with my opinion. What's right for me might be wrong for someone else (exactly one of the reasons for my opinion on the matter, logic eh?). But this got me thinking: why do I have such a black/white opinion on this matter? It has probably a lot to do with my being an Italian in Germany. When you have your first child you're inevitably on the insecure side: everything is new. Relatives friends and even strangers feel they should advise you: most of the time with good intentions but sometimes just to be annoying. That in itself can sometimes make you even more insecure. But when the advices come from both Italian AND German child rearing mentality you just get mad. These two go together like water and oil. And that makes ME probably quite intolerant on the subject. Maybe now I start to see a way to "emulsify" ;-) the two. I can't avoid being a bit more partial to the Italian way, at least in some respects. Still the way Germans rise their children has many positive sides. Except one: what really annoys me is the food/eating tips you get here.

A small project taking shape

In the past few days I haven't been doing any major baking or cooking. Most of my time at home, after work and once Saami is in bed, has been spent on polishing off the last details of a small wine-related project I've been thinking about for some time. I briefly mentioned this idea previously without going into detail, so I'll take the chance to do it now. Since I'm (or better we are) bound to stay here in Jena for some time, Daniela working at her thesis and no concrete "life/job-change" in sight, something interesting "on the side", is probably the best solution for the moment. So, after some time needed to plan the thing out, I decided to organise a wine-tasting course for beginners.

Proposal for a Blog Cooking Day.

Since I've started blogging I noticed how my cooking has been influenced, directly or only more conceptually, by posts from other bloggers. I'm not the only one: there are a few recipes that have jumped between different food blogs. One example, between many, would be Maki's lentil and chestnut soup, which appeared more or less under new disguises on Chocolate and Zucchini and on The daily bread. Sometimes I even thought about cooking something and found a post about it on someone's else blog the next day... mind reading :-)?
All this started me thinking. Why not put up a day where, just for the fun, bloggers take up a certain theme and come up with a recipe (original or not) for it? It would be really interesting to see what people from different backgrounds come up with and a great chance to get new ideas. It would be even better if bloggers who don't usually post about food would take part... surprise us! In honour to cooking disasters (which everyone meets sooner or later) I thought that maybe calling it the "Is my Blog burning? day" would be a nice idea.

What does "authentic" mean?

In the last two months I seem to be stumbling upon posts, magazine articles and discussion that make me think consider what authentic food is. In my case the question is mainly concerned with Italian cooking bit probably the same applies to other cuisines which have a strong classic tradition. This thought is always at the back of my mind, as it is inevitable, me living abroad in a country (Germany) which seems to love Italian food but where real Italian food is a very rare find. Still I really started to think about the "problem" after I read Maki's very well written post on Fusion, on which I strongly agree. Recently two other posts on bruschetta, from Clotilde and Renee (great comment BTW Renee, I intended to reply but it sort of became this post), got me going at it again.

Che sara', sara'

The following post contains my thoughts about job/life changes and how my love for food is influencing me. There is no mention of food recipes, cooking or baking at all. If you are still interested continue reading and maybe share your thoughts with me. If not, see you tomorrow with a longish post on risotto, which I intended to post today.

Should I worry?

The British Thoracic Society says baking can induce asthma. Seems dusting with flour is the problem. OK, probably I don't bake enough to run the risk, but still, should I get worried? Or maybe the glorious EU bureaucrats will decide to prohibit the use of flour in baking ;-)).