Vive la French....Dressing

When I travel for business, I try to find at least one decent restaurant. And the only way I can get a decent meal in a decent restaurant is to blow my $50 per diem food budget. $50? Really?!  Hell, I can’t even have a non-boozy lunch for that price! A good meal on the road is a necessity—the perfect antidote after a long day of surly TSA agents, cramped seats on planes built during the Reagan administration, and meetings that would try the patience of a Buddhist monk.

I typically have good luck finding something, but the most recent business trip was different. This was Yuma, Arizona. I spent three days there without hazard pay. 

©2015 Chris Terrell

No, it's not 1975, but 2015!

Anyone who tells you that business travel is glamorous has never spent three days in Yuma. Dorothy Parker, when describing Los Angeles, reportedly once said that “there’s no there there.” Obviously, she never visited Yuma. The city is flat, uninspiring, and laid out in a Matrix-like grid with liquor stores, tattoo parlors, and tamale stands. It is also stuck in some kind of time warp, like 1975 came and went, leaving behind motels and restaurants with signs that disappeared from the rest of the country years ago.

On the first night there, I did manage to find a steak restaurant called “Hunter Steakhouse.” It got decent ratings on Trip Advisor and Zomato, so what the hell. The sign out front read proudly, “Established 1970.” When I opened the door, I almost expected steam to escape, much like Doc Brown’s DeLorean in Back to the Future. It was 1975; I was four years old; and I was having dinner with my parents in a steak restaurant in Burlington, North Carolina.

Hunter Steakhouse had the same wooden railings and red vinyl booths; the same wood-beamed walls and ceilings; and white tablecloths with burgundy napkins. Large pepper mills were housed in special racks throughout the dining room. The carpet was clad in browns and greens. The chandelier lights were covered with miniature shades. This place was old school.

An earnest, efficient maitre’d escorted me to my table. With a teutonic flourish, he snapped my napkin authoritatively into place. Next came the drink order. And while it may not be fair, I judge a steak restaurant on the quality of its martinis. There’s just something about starting off a steak dinner with a well-made martini that just can’t be beat. Hunter Steakhouse passed the test. Another requirement is good bread, and lots of it. Again, they didn’t fail here. The server delivered a whole sourdough loaf with a ramekin filled with whipped butter. Ah, butter! 

My love for butter began in that steakhouse I mentioned earlier. In my mind, my parents went there all the time, though truth be told, it was more likely a few times a year on special occasions. I wasn’t crazy about the place—too grown up; too dark; no T.V.  What I did like was the bowl on the table full of little paper squares with two-inch squares of butter covered with wax paper that read in bold red letters, “BUTTER.” I would grab a square, tear off the wax cover and gulp down the pat of butter in one quick bite. I would then repeat this process a dozen times until, during a lull in my parents’ dull conversation, my mom finally noticed and took the bowl away from me.

The other item on the menu that I looked forward to was the French dressing! Being five, I was usually uninterested in salad unless it came with lots of croutons, cheese, and French dressing. Yes, that sweet, ketchup-based, day-glo red dressing that is such a rare find on today’s menus. (Even Hunter Steakhouse in Yuma, Arizona didn’t have any.) But back in the day, no restaurant worth its salt would be without French dressing. And just as French dressing will forever be associated with the 1960s and 1970s, so will balsamic vinaigrette be tied to the late 20th and early 21st Century food scene. I could go the rest of my life without being offered balsamic vinaigrette dressing by an earnest, yet dull, server at the local Olive Garden or Applebee’s. 

Here’s the recipe:

Classic 1960s French Dressing

Ingredients 

1⁄2 cup ketchup
1⁄2 cup sugar
1⁄2 cup red wine vinegar
1⁄2 cup onion, grated
1 teaspoon paprika
1⁄2 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
1 cup salad oil
salt and pepper to taste

Preparation

Add the ketchup, sugar, vinegar, onion, paprika and Worcestershire to a food processor bowl.
Pulse until blended.
With the processor running, slowly add the oil.
Check the seasonings.
Cover and refrigerate until needed

I'm Thankful For Butter

©2015  Chris Terrell

Holidays On Ice!

It’s hard to believe that Thanksgiving was a mere ten days ago. The turkey and stuffing and pumpkin-everything have been replaced with tinsel and blinking lights. The last forkful of pumpkin pie was a starter’s pistol for the Christmas rat-race to follow.

This year, Thanksgiving planning began in August when I asked Laura if she would like to have her mother, sister, and brother-in-law visit Birmingham. Her expression when I mentioned this was somewhere between pity and horror. “Are you sure…you…really…want to do…this?” she asked me several times between that late August Sunday afternoon and Wednesday, November 25th.  

©2015 Chris Terrell

Not your typical Turkey Day salad!

The next step, of course, was the menu. I was told that, as wonderful as last year’s Thanksgiving meal was, it was a little heavy on the butter. I was politely asked to dial back my inner Paula Dean—less butter, more olive oil. 

Laura’s mom also wanted another chocolate cake. (Last year, she requested a chocolate birthday cake for Rob, Laura’s brother-in-law, on the morning after the Iron Bowl. If you can make a chocolate cake from scratch hungover, you can do anything.) Actually, I embraced the idea of chocolate cake for Thanksgiving because I've never been one for rules anyway. Besides, we were having pumpkin muffins, which I’ve been making every year since 1991.

©2015 Chris Terell

The Cake

Because Thanksgiving was on my turf this year, I had more time to prepare. Of course this didn’t stop me from over-planning. No joke, but this year I actually put together a three-ringed binder that I called the 2015 Thanksgiving Day Dinner Work Plan. It contained schedules, shopping lists, the menu, and recipes. I don’t recommend that you try this at home. Only professional Type As like myself can handle this kind of insanity. 

Here’s the recipe and planning schedule:

Wine

Schramsburg
Lioco Chardonnay
George Pinot Noir
Ca’Togni

Appetizers

Blackberry Farm Pimento Cheese
Bread-and-Butter Zucchini Pickles
Fried Okra
Charcuterie

Salad

       Endive with Roasted Yellow Beets, Pecans, &

               Sweet-Mustard Vinaigrette 

Soup

Carrot Consommé 

Sides

Orange-Cranberry Relish
Collard Greens
Haricots Vert
Sausage, Apple & Sage Stuffing
Roasted Red Potatoes with Garlic & Rosemary

Entreé

Turkey & Gravy (Duh!)

Dessert

Classic Chocolate Cake with Vanilla Ice Cream

2015 THANKSGIVING WORK PLAN

(Revised 11/24/15)

Thursday, November 19

✓Finalize: Shopping List, Thanksgiving Day Prep Schedule, and Thanksgiving Day Schedule

Saturday, November 21

✓Clean out Fridge & Freezer

✓Check Platters

✓Purchase Necessary Items at SLT (e.g., platters & cake pans)

✓Follow-up Text with Floral Designer

✓Purchase Decorations

✓Prepare Recipe Notebook

✓Double Check Shopping Lists

Sunday, November 22

✓Purchase Dry Goods  & Ingredients for Muffins, Cranberry Relish, Gravy, and chocolate cake

✓Costco Run (See Costco run shopping list)

✓Wash Linens

✓Purchase Ziploc Containers 

✓Purchase Frozen Turkey and begin to thaw

✓Make Zucchini Pickles

Monday, November  23

✓Prepare Cranberry Relish

✓Purchase Items for Pimento Cheese, and Carrot Consommé 

Tuesday, November 24

✓Prepare Blackberry Farm Pimento Cheese

✓Prepare Make-ahead gravy & Freeze

Wednesday, November 25

✓Purchase Remaining Fresh Produce

✓Prepare chocolate cake

✓Prepare Pumpkin Muffins

✓Fry Okra

✓Finalize De-cluttering & 

✓Roast Pecans

✓Wash Dishes & Tidy up as necessary

Thursday, November 26

See Thanksgiving Day Schedule

©2015 Chris Terrell

Dresden, 1945

A good time was had by all, especially because the chef had no major meltdowns. I emphasize major because there’s always a few radiation spikes when I cook. The consensus seems to have been that the carrot consommé, stuffing, and of course, the turkey, were the favorites.

At the end of the day, what you have on Thanksgiving makes no difference. Thanksgiving is more about the “how” than the “what”—how you decide to celebrate and how you decide who you will share the meal. 

By the way, I encourage you to make a chocolate cake. Be a rebel!

And now get back to shopping!

Where Are They Now?: Casseroles

What happened to the casserole? 

I just may try this one....

The casserole gets a bad rap. It is associated with uninspired family dinners --something harried housewives or new brides who lacked skill in the kitchen could easily make ahead. They also relied heavily on prepackaged like canned tuna or Campbell’s Cream of Mushroom soup. A Wikipedia entry on tuna noodle casserole states, without irony, that “Tuna casserole is convenient to the extent that it may be prepared using no fresh ingredients.” Wow, that sounds appetizing, doesn’t it?!

But casserole doesn’t have to be boring. I don’t think I’ve ever made one until recently for my supper club, and it was far from boring. So before I get into casseroles, let me digress.

I first heard of a supper club from one of my good friends and former law partners. I admit I was somewhat envious that I wasn’t a “member,” but I’ll save that discussion for my therapist. I was also intrigued. It sounded so grown-up, so sophisticated. I’ve wanted to be in a supper club ever since. 

And so one night about a month or two ago, still waiting for that invitation, I decided to form my own supper club. Maybe I was inspired by Groucho Marx’s famous quip about not joining a club that would have him as a member. And so I posted something on Facebook about starting one. The response was favorable; a charter was drawn up; and I was in business.

Then I got the email.

I forgot to mention that this crazy idea and Facebook post came about two weeks after a very frenetic behind-the-scenes experience for a nonetheless very successful dinner party; yet one that took about two days to clean up (yeah, that one: "Oh the Horror!").  Laura emailed me and asked me, and not without good cause, if I were crazy. “What are you thinking?!” She also stated that she would have no role to play and would certainly not clean up. (I must say that her stance softened a bit; she did both, with a smile – and not a forced one!)

I agreed to host the inaugural supper club dinner. I thought it was only sporting that I do so. But of course, being an attorney by training, I devised a few rules for the club. For one thing, each dinner was to have a theme, which is the responsibility of the host/hostess. Second, the host was in charge of the entree and the wine. Third, everyone else was to bring a dish—potluck—appetizer, side dishes, dessert, etc.

As the host of the initial supper club dinner, I decided that the theme would be “firsts” in the sense that everyone had to make something they had never made before. For me, that would be lamb and, initially, I thought about a roast rack of lamb. But then the memories of that last successful-but-frenetic dinner party came rushing back. So, I decided to keep it simple. I went with moussaka, which has lamb; is something I’d never made before; and is essentially a casserole that could be made ahead and thrown in the oven about an hour before the guests arrived.

Just because it’s a casserole, however, doesn’t mean it’s easy to make.

When I was kid, my friend and later first crush, Kristina Vacalis, whose family was Greek-American would always tell me excitedly whenever her mother made moussaka. She didn’t make it very often, and now I know why. It’s a labor of love.

Moussaka requires a lot—I mean a lot—of slicing of eggplants and potatoes and dicing of onions. And eggplant must be the most high maintenance vegetable out there. After you slice, it must be salted and drained to get the moisture out so it’s not soggy. After it’s salted, you must rinse it and pat it dry and then roast it. I must have roasted about 20lbs of eggplant two nights before the supper club dinner. And then there’s the meat sauce that goes into the moussaka, and then there’s the béchamel sauce that must be made. I’m glad I started two days before the dinner. 

But was it good?  Absolutely!  Despite the work, it’s worth it for a great dish.

And now I have my own supper club. Be careful for what you wish for, though.  Laura has made me promise not to host anything again for a few months.  Except Thanksgiving.  Oh, and except my annual holiday cocktail party.  And, well, given that, maybe there could be a small dinner party on the horizon in January . . . 

Like casseroles, old ways die hard.

Think Different. Cook Different.

A few weeks ago, on a rainy Sunday afternoon, I watched the movie Jobs—not the recent one with Michael Fassbender, but the one with Ashton Kutcher. I’ve always been intrigued by Steve Jobs. How could someone so brilliant, so revolutionary, be such a jerk at times?  But then again, do we really want our heroes to be saints? 

The last scene in the movie has Jobs narrating what would become one of Apple’s most famous commercials: Think Different. Interestingly, this version never aired. Jobs’s narration was replaced with Richard Dreyfus. I think Jobs’s version is better. Here's the original commercial. 

Julia Child and Steve Jobs were also outsiders who thought “different.” Jobs was an orphan who never graduated from college, and tall, gangly Julia Child could hardly boil water at 37, before she began her iconic—though very much an insider’s—cookbook.

There is one scene in the movie Jobs where Steve Jobs complains to Steve Wozniak that the transistors are not straight. Wozniak replies, with a certain degree of frustration, that no one will see them anyway. Walter Isaacson’s biography on Jobs, on which the movie by the same name is based, examined this in more detail. Jobs really did care and insist that even the parts that no one saw were perfect. 

Of all the cookbooks I own (and I own a lot), Childs’s Mastering the Art of French Cooking is still my favorite, even if I cook from it the least.  Even so, there are many times when I simply marvel at the detail and the precision. The recipes in Mastering the Art of French Cooking require focus and attention to detail. Many of the steps are like the transistors in the Apple I—your guests may not notice them, but you will.

Jobs once said that “[l]ife can be much broader once you discover one simple fact, and that is—everything around you that you call life, was made up by people that were no smarter than you. And you can change it, you can influence it, you can build your own things that other people can use.” I think these words could just have easily come from Julia Child.

So maybe the next time I want to try something new, something different, I’ll engage in a bit of a thought experiment: Steve Jobs and Julia Child in the same kitchen! That would be crazy, but then again, here’s to the crazy ones!

Where Are They Now: Chipped Beef on Toast?

It starts here.

Chipped beef on toast was once a mainstay on diner menus, but now it is about as rare as a plain cup of coffee at Starbucks. 

For me, living in a solidly middle class family in the 70s, chipped beef on toast was simply creamed beef. But to others, like my dad who had served in the Army, it was “Sh*t On a Shingle" ("S.O.S."). I’m not sure what my Dad thought about having S.O.S. for dinner, but if it brought back bad memories of basic training, he never showed it: “This is great dear!”

Chipped beef on toast was all-too frequently served to members of the Army during World War II. Before that, it sustained families struggling during the Great Depression because it was cheap and easy to make. Beyond that, no one seems to know where it came from. Some say Pennsylvania Dutch country. However, I suspect it’s even older because we have been mixing meat, gravy, and bread for millennia.

A lot of folks down here in Alabama have either never heard of chipped beef on toast or, if they have, then they’ve never tried it. Yeah, it is assuredly a mid-Atlantic/Northeastern dish, but it is no different than biscuits and gravy. And like any other well-worn traditional dish, there are many different ways chipped beef can be served. Some folks even serve chipped beef on waffles.

So what is chipped beef you ask? Nothing more than thinly pressed, salted, dried beef. It is sold in small jars rolled up like pieces of paper. Hormel and Armour sell most of it. It is certainly not something you will find at your local Whole Foods!

And the sauce? Well, here’s where I learned something interesting. The sauce that makes chipped beef on toast what it is, is really nothing more than a homespun Béchamel sauce. Maybe chipped beef on toast is not so plain Jane after all!. 

And so, now you ask, what is Béchamel sauce? 

Béchamel is a white sauce made by combining hot flavored or seasoned milk with a roux. The classic recipe for béchamel calls for milk flavored by heating it with a bay leaf, a slice of onion and a blade of mace or some nutmeg. Celery, carrot, ham, and/or mushroom peelings may even be added. This is then left to steep for thirty minutes. 

Armed with my new knowledge, I decided that I would tackle S.O.S. and try and improve upon it by making a Béchamel sauce and using something other than wonder bread for the toast.

But I also wanted to tackle perhaps the biggest issue with S.O.S.: saltiness. The dried beef used for S.O.S. is very, very salty. I read, however, that in the Army they would sometimes soak the beef in water overnight to leech out the salt. I tried it. It worked!

The finished product: for better or for worse.

At the end of the evening, the real test was whether the kids would like it. I loved it back in the day but let’s face it, “back in the day” ain’t what it used to be. I stood there in rapt anticipation whilst they took their first, cautious bite. Minutes seemed to pass before they both said, “this is awesome!” 

Nailed it! 

Here’s the recipe:

The Insouciant Chef’s Chipped Beef on Toast (a/k/a S.O.S.) 

Ingredients 

2 Jars of Hormel Dried Beef (2 ounces, sliced into 1/4-inch pieces)

2 tablespoons of butter

2 tablespoons of flour
1 cup whole milk

2 Bay Leafs

1 teaspoon of Worcestershire Sauce

1/4 teaspoon of fresh ground nutmeg

Salt and Pepper to taste

4 slices of good, fresh bread (Italian or French bread)

Preparation

For the Béchamel

Take the butter and melt it. Then add the flour and mix until you have paste. Whisk it for about five to eight minutes and then add the warm milk which has been steeped with the bay leaf and nutmeg for about 30 minutes.

Then add the beef. Mix it. And then pour it over the toast.

That simple.

Where Are They Now? (New Series)

I'm starting a new series for this blog called, "Where Are They Now:... ?" The posts in this series will appear from time and will be about foods or dishes that you don't see much anymore, either in restaurants or at home. Each one will begin with the title: Where Are They Now: [Insert Dish or Food].

In putting together the list of topics for this series, I discovered that a lot of them were based on foods or dishes from the Seventies. This makes sense personally but historically as well. How Americans ate really began to change when the Seventies gave way to the Go-Go 80s. Let's face it, for those who remember, the Seventies were kinda glum. There were the last dying gasps of Vietnam, Watergate, two oil crises, the hostage crises, and....disco. We cannot forget about disco. The food we ate, especially at home, reflected this period. It was simple, cheap, easy to make and unpretentious. And many times, not very good.

As for the personal, many of these foods or dishes resonate with me in both positive and negative terms. Some of them I loathed—others I loved. But love or hate, they bring back a lot of memories from my childhood. (Yes, I went all Proustian  there again—it's a common theme on this blog.)

Finally, I'm going to do something different for this series. I'm going to let my dear readers (all 10 of them) decide which of the following topics receives the honor of being the first post. And who knows? If this works out well, I may do other series as well. 

Ok, here's the list: 

Liver & Onions

Shish Kabobs

Casseroles

Beef Stroganoff

Goulash

Stuffed Green Bell Peppers

Jello Salad

Chipped Beef & Toast

Corned Beef & Cabbage

Chicken a la King

La Choy Pre-packed Chinese Food

Push-Ups

Hamburger Helper

Beanie Weenies

Fondue

Twinkies

Sherbert

Spam

Vienna Sausages

The polls are now open!

Buon Appetito! (Part Two)

©2015 Chris Terrell

When we met last, I was one week away from leaving for a quick trip to Rome for Labor Day weekend. During my trip, I had the opportunity of discovering whether the real Rome lived up to the romanticized Rome, at least when it came to food. Surprisingly, it did.

Some observations:

• Yes, the Italians eat a lot of pasta, but small portions;
• Italians don't really walk around snacking on food like Americans, except for gelato; 
• The mozzarella is a 1,000 times better than what we get here;
• The wine is good and inexpensive; and 
• Like France (my favorite foodie destination), it is hard to get a bad meal in Italy. 

Well, except maybe at McDonald's. 

Yes, I ate at McDonald's in Italy! Bear with me here, there's a method to my madness. Whenever I travel overseas, I like to have one meal at McDonald's because, invariably, there's always a few things on the "menu" that we don't have back here in America—items that are intended to invoke the indigenous cuisine of that particular country. For example, Belgium and France have the Le Croque McDo, which is Micky Ds version of a croque-monsieur. You can also get Macarons in a French McDonald's. Score! In China, you can get a mashed potato burger....hmmm. But my favorite, and though not international, is McSpam & Eggs in Hawaii.

On the morning we took the train to Bologna—the foodie capital of Italy and the home of the Culinary Institute of Bologna—we grabbed breakfast at the McDonald's across the street from Termini station. I ordered prosciutto on toast and a cafe Americano. I was thinking, "We're in Italy, this has to be good because this is the home of prosciutto, right?" Wrong! What I got was a lukewarm ham and cheese sandwich. I should have stuck with the Egg McMuffin, or whatever they call that in Italian.

At least all the other meals we had, made up for this momentary lapse of reason. So here's a re-cap of our culinary journey.

Friday, September 4th

Dinner

Ristorante Nino

11 Via Borgognona

www.ristorantenino.it

By the time we walked to the Trevi Fountain, sans water, as it was being renovated, and a brief respite on the Spanish Steps, we were pretty hungry for dinner—even more so because we took a nap rather than have lunch.

©2015 Chris Terrell

I found out about Ristorante Nino in an article in The New York Times. It has served traditional, home-style Italian food since 1934. And there's a reason why this place is still around. The fresh mozzarella we had as an antipasto may have been the best I've ever had. And talk about fresh! If you closed your eyes, you would actually see and smell the green, grassy Tuscan pasture where the cow that provides the milk for this cheese lives. 

For our primo I had fettuccine with mushrooms and Laura had the fettucino bolognese. Both were excellent. For my main course, I had ascé di Nino, which was a minced beef dish. Laura got tagliata, which is sliced steak seasoned with black pepper and parmesan—simple, but good. We washed all this down with a Cabot Mentin 2008 Domenico Clerico Barolo.

Saturday, September 5th

Lunch

Il Sorpasso

31 Via Properzio

Trip Advisor Reviews

Our first full day in Rome didn't have the best start. We had tickets for the Vatican Museum but had to endure a torrential downpour for 40 minutes under two tiny travel umbrellas that could have collapsed under at any minute. Fortunately, the rain stopped and the sun was shining brightly over St. Peter's when our tour ended around noon.

We headed over to Il Sorpasso, in the Prati neighborhood.This is usually only a ten minutes’ walk from the Vatican. I say usually, because it stretches to 25 minutes for two Type A American tourists who stop and argue over the map not once, but twice!  

Il Sorpasso is a cozy little restaurant that thankfully was devoid of tourists, something I always take as a good omen.  We started off with a great selection of local charcuterie and cheeses followed by tagliatell funghi (yes, again!) for me and orechietti pomodoro for Laura. Our wine was a 2014 St. Michael Eppan Alto Adige.

Saturday, September 5th

Dinner

L'Asino d'Oro

Via Boschetto 73, Rome

www.lasinodororoma.it

In English, the name of this restaurant is "The Golden Donkey," named after a well-known Italian story. But don't let the the name fool you. My notes for this restaurant begin simply with: "O.M.G.!"

But it almost didn't happen. 

On this trip, we were trying to be somewhat spontaneous, not a easy task for two Type A people. (See above reference to map reading.) And on this night, we really didn't have any plans for dinner. Luckily, I found L'Asino on an app called "Eat Italy" that I had downloaded just before we left. It may turn out to be the best app I've ever downloaded.

When we arrived at the restaurant around 9:00PM (very continental!), we discovered that they couldn't seat us until 10:00PM without a reservation. I was pretty hungry and didn't want to wait. We tried another restaurant that looked promising but the wait there would have been about 20 minutes. We really wanted to try this restaurant, so we hurried back and put our name on the list. Then, in order to kill some time, we went in search of a bar.

[Here comes another digression.]

Another instance where America and Italy, and most of Continental Europe, differ widely lies in what constitutes a bar. The bars in Italy are not really bars in the American sense. They are nothing more than a cafe that happens to serve some liquor and beer behind a cramped, standing-room-only bar. (And don't even get me started what most European bartenders can do to a martini!) If you want more of the kind of bar we are used to, then look for ones that describe themselves as "American Bars." 

But unlike an American bar, you are likely to get a plate of complimentary tapas to accompany your drinks. This came in handy that night because we were both hungry.  Laura had a glass of wine, while I had Jack Daniels on the rocks. Kinda hard to screw that up.

Ten o'clock finally arrived. It was worth the wait.

For our antipasto, we got an omelette with figs. The figs tasted like they had been picked off the tree around 8:00PM that night. Hard to go wrong with the sweet and savory combo.

For our primo, I got octopus with panzanella and melon and we split a dish of fettuccine with wild boar. For our main course, I had lamb meatballs with blue cheese and pears. Laura ordered rabbit with herbs, peppers, pine nuts, and black olives. It was clearly the best meal we had in Rome and one of the best meals we've had, period.

Oh, and the wine was damn good too: Casanova di Neri, 2008 Brunello, a wonderful wine that was about $50 cheaper in Rome than in the States.

Sunday, September 6th

Lunch & Dinner

Not much happened on this day from a culinary perspective.  We slept in. Had pizza at a nondescript restaurant in the Campo di Fiori; dinner at the hotel. I guess the jet lag caught up with us.

Monday, September 7th

Lunch 

Osteria del Cappello

Via Dè Fusari, 9, 40123 Bologna

www.osteriadelcappello.com

As much as we loved it, we decided it was time to leave Rome. We picked Bologna because it was a relatively short train ride (2 hours) and the foodie capital of Italy. (It's the home of the Culinary Institute of Bologna.) 

After several spats about who was better at navigating the streets of Bologna and a tug of war with the map, we found Osteria del Cappello on a short side street, where it has resided since 1652. 

We started with a prosciutto platter and a bottle of Lambrusco: CeCi Otello NerodiLambrusco 1813. Keep in mind that lambrusco, or good lumbrusco, is a great food wine and should not be confused with what our parents drank in the 1970s while sitting on the bearskin rug watching Sonny & Cher!

Dinner

Trenitalia #3557

©2015 Chris Terrell
No, this is not an episode of Jersey Shore;
that's a real cop.

Sandwiches from the dining car. Yeah, it was a major let down after lunch in Bologna, but the late lunch meant that we were not hungry before the two-hour train ride back to Rome. Besides, we had more fun sitting outside at a bar watching six police officers take 51 minutes to decide whether to arrest two hapless guys in New Balance sneakers. You have to love Italian inefficiency. 

Tuesday, September

Lunch & Snack

UA Flight #971

Somewhere over the North Atlantic

After such wonderful food, we had to slum it with airplane food. At least we were in business class, so not too bad. And the G&Ts were free!

So, there you have it. Our culinary adventure to Rome. Did it live up to my expectations? Yes. I found the food to be every bit as good as I remember and as I expected. Italians love to eat and they love food, and that is reflected in the quality of the meals I had. And like the French, the Italians are all about tradition and respect it highly. As Tara Gresco of the New York Times wrote recently, "When it comes to cooking like a Roman, there may be no absolute truth, but there are well-defined limits." 

Unfortunately, there were no limits to my waistline when I returned.