Italy

Well, if you've seen one mozzarella dairy you've seen them all. Or so I thought. Until I bumped into Raffaele Barlotti at his dairy's bar one Monday evening. Over a caffe' he invited me to come back the next day for a look around.I arrived at about 10:00 am the next morning. After just five minutes, my tour guide Sandro at Caseificio Barlotti, I forgot about the dozen or so times I have seen mozzarella at work as a chaperone on the obligatory school field trips. This time seemed like the first time. Sandro decided that we should begin in the production area which was in full swing. But first, he sais, I needed a little protection,. A pair of blue plastic baggies that I just slipped over my shoes and I was ready to go.Ready to observe all the action of mozzarella making Paestum style . So much activity going on all around. I listened attentively as Sandro explained the cheese making process...First of all...100 % buffalo milk...from buffaloes milked two times a day on Barlotti's dairy. Then a series of steps such as acidification and coagulation. I watched as the curd was broken up...the serum separated from the curd...Every now and then, Sandro told me to step back. This was the phase in which boiling water was added to the curd. Then, the cheese maker with his wooden magic wand stirred and stirred until he magically transformed the broken up curd into something smooth and beautiful.At this point, the mozzarella was almost complete. The mozzarella balls that we all know and love could be formed by hand or by machine. Either way, their last stop was into a tank of water to cool down. Then transferred into saline tanks so that the cheese can absorb some of the salt...some of the flavor. Fresh mozzarella that if conserved properly (4 to 10 degrees Celsius in the lovely liquid that it was sold with) for 8 days.As much fun as I was having in the production area, Sandro suggested we go and see the buffaloes. And why not? First a quick walk through the milking room to see where the buffaloes are milked, two times a day...at 3 am and 3 pm. All by machine with just one worker to man the equipment.Then I was ready to see the buffaloes. And there were plenty of them. First, the older females...some relaxing in the sun. Others eating an early lunch of straw, hay and corn. It was entertaining to watch a few who would toss up the mixture in the air with their snouts to search for the sweet dried corn.Before I could ask where the little ones were, Sandro explained that they were in quarantine...After a week or so with their mothers, the law requires that they are separated from the older ones. We stopped by for a visit.After several months in quarantine, they (females) would then be free to eat drink and be merry until the ripe old age of three. When the child bearing milk producing years would begin. Where their milk would be used to make mozzarella or other products such as ricotta, butter, caciocavallo, provola etc. Available for sale online, in their shop, or even in their small restaurant which is open for lunch. Over a glass of buffalo milk, I learned about how precious those buffalo were. Not only for their milk...but for their meat as well. :Lean. High in protein. Low in calories. And maybe on my next visit I'll try some. In Barlotti's small restaurant. A small table in the garden. A few slices of salami produced with buffalo meat. A side of ricotta. A few boccocini di mozzarella...and a glass of wine.Yes, that's what I'll do.Caseificio BarlottiVia Torre di Paestum 1, Capaccio Paestum SalernoTel. +39 0828811146Fax +39 0828721047

Regular readers of this blog will remember when I have written about our friends, Dinah and Allen and the place that they own in nearby Lucignano.  They have been having a lot of work done to the place and the wonderful terrace was turned in to a builders’ store yard.  But now the work is finishing; Allen is about to come for a stay; summer is arriving; so Dinah wanted to clean up the terrace add some color and make it an inviting place to sit. She asked me to go with her to help pick out plants.  Ohhhh, yeah, she really had to persuade me.  Nothing I like less that looking at and buying plants.  HA!     One afternoon, we went out to my favorite nursery and Dinah helped the local economy by buying a nice selection of plants.  The next day was cloudy and a good day to get all the plants in the ground. Here are the results.                       Here’s Dinah!             Dinah thinks that I was being sooooo helpful.  Little does she know, that like many gardeners,  I am always looking for more space to plant.  I was really just ‘colonizing’ her terrace.   Now if I could get her to buy a hot tub….

We were walking down to Sericciolo a few days ago to look at the progress of the bridge that’s been out for many, many months and ran into Enrico, the guy whose garden we graze on. “The most rain in 200 years,” he said, glancing up at the sky. And then there was the water rushing past the bridge. Usually it’s barely a trickle this time of year. Now it’s got some serious whitewater to it at times. Lots of water has consequences. Good and bad consequences I suppose. It makes your pictures look bad. Well, not really bad, but it looks like you put your picture in Photoshop and cranked up the green like an addict cranks up the crank. But really, the view below is the view you get when you take the narrow little road from Fivizzano to Comano. You’re almost to Comano, the Castle tower at Castello is about to come into view. There’s a space to pull off, pretty much the first one you’d dare use. Then this: See what I mean? Oh, yeah the lens had a smudge the size of Kansas on it, but what you see is pretty much the new growth green, scoured by constant rain until it’s polished like the silvery ball embedded in a pretty girl’s tongue. We’re looking at the edge of the Tosco Emiliano National Park. It’s pretty country all around. And if you noticed the picture way at the top, you’ll notice snow. It’s late May. What’s that doing there? Odd year, innit?

Suddenly, New York is awash in futuristic bike-stands, leading to typically New York laments.

Maybe it was a fad. After all, the torre pendente (leaning tower) of Vernazzano is just across the border from Tuscany, and was also built way back when. Granted, not as glorious or beautiful as its more famous counterpart in Pisa, but leaning nonetheless. Truth is, while the architects did of course know what a… (more)The Note Another Leaning Tower…? appeared first on ItalianNotebook.

Matthew McConaughey has an actor's movie breakout in Jeff Nichols' "Mud."

Fountain by the sculptor Arnaldo Pomodoro, in Piazza della Stazione (Train Station Square).(Why are we posting about Pisa? Click here for an answer)Versione italiana

The legacy of literary Paris is dense enough to make days pass in haste.

May’s ‘Food and Wine Interview’ is with Alida Zamparini, author of the food blog ‘My Little Italian Kitchen’ selected earlier this year as one of the Top Italian food blogs and websites to follow in 2013. Alida says: “I love to cook and I love to eat! I am an Italian living in England and like most Italians I am food-obsessed. I love to re-create dishes my mum would do for me as a child. The greatest reward is to be able to share your cooking with the people you love most. I believe in ingredients which are locally sourced and in season whenever possible as this is the secret for the greatest tasting meals. Let’s go back to how food used to be, made from wholesome, good ingredients. Let’s embrace the slow food movement. Taking time to cook yourself a decent meal should always come as a priority. After all we are what we eat!” The Questions and Answers: 1. Can you remember the first dish you learned how to cook? I started cooking as a teenager; my favourite hobby was baking during the long Italian school summer holidays. I first started baking simple cakes and only later moved onto cooking proper meals. My first proper dish was a simple pasta with fresh tomato sauce which I actually did with the help of my mum. Making proper passata takes a bit of expertise and experience. My family, having always been a voracious one, would polish up everything very quickly. That was certainly rewarding and made me want to cook more! 2. What three things are always in your fridge? Parmesan cheese, eggs and lots of radicchio or salad. I use Parmesan daily; a pasta without it is like a cake without a cherry on the top and I like my green leafs with every meal. You always need eggs in the fridge for cooking or in case you feel inspired to bake a cake. Inspiration for baking can come when you least expect it! 3. Best cooking advice or tip you ever received? Good things are made slowly. You cannot rush too much in the kitchen. Slow cooked food always tastes better than something made in a hurry. 4. What inspired you to create your food blog? Did you have a clear idea from the start? Being a full time mum has helped me improve my cookery skills. Weaning my two babies was when I really began putting all my beliefs into practice. I took great pleasure in making little meals from scratch. Sourcing organic and fresh ingredients daily, quickly became a job on its own along with an extraordinary euphoria and excitement for cooking, which was growing stronger and stronger; I just could never get enough of it. Fresh and healthy meals turned into little projects for me! As the children grew out of the weaning stage, I began cooking different meals every week so I decided to start a website about Italian cookery that would allow me to share my recipes and get feedback. 5. What do you know and think about other food bloggers? It is amazing how much you can learn from other food bloggers. By having a food blog you become part of an online community, you can make virtual friends who share the same passion for food and be inspired by their creations and ideas. There are many talented people out there who have lots to offer. I often see better recipes on blogs than anywhere else. You know that it is passion driving them and that’s why many blogs stand out. 6. Let’s talk favourite things, recipe and why? I love to involve my children in cooking . We often bake together and children are so keen on learning especially when there is pastry, cakes and pizza, a little bit like play-dough! Also we enjoy days out to farms and places to show them where food comes from. My favourite recipe is pizza. I make it every week. I love it because it is a treat for the whole family and if there is any left over it will taste even better the following day. 7. Ingredient? Olive oil! There is very little I could do without using olive oil. Of course this is a key ingredient in Italian cooking and most recipes require olive oil. It is light and easy t

Visiting Loreto Aprutino’s Festa di San Zopito got me more interested in the stories behind the monumental, 13-tonne white ox with his carefully trimmed and polished hooves,  multi-coloured ribbons and bells looped high over its head as it was led round the streets by an Abruzzese bagpiper, a Zampognari, whose job was traditionally a shepherd. For those not up-to-date with the Christian calendar (like me!), Pentecost was taken from the Jewish harvest festival celebration, Shavout, when 50 days after Passover the law was received on Mount Sinai, a week of refrain and a day of non work.  The Romans fashioned this into the Church’s birthday, Pentecost; instead of law, a time when the Holy Spirit descended and entered into the apostles on Whitsun or in Italian Pasqua rosatum, named after the priest’s red vestments, a colour symbolic of the Holy Spirit, those who receive their first Holy Communion on this favourable day wearing white. After reading Noel’s post about the event, there was a v short Comment referring to the Romans.  It seems they loosely wrapped up two of their April festivals into this new feria (non work day), the celebration of Ceres, Cerealiais’ who was, Jupiter’s wife, and goddess of fertility and whose followers wore white.  The Romans believed that it was Ceres who taught man to plough and sow, unusual because it was juxtaposed with the people’s favoured offering, the white ox, to her husband, Jupiter. Ovid, Fasti, Book IV: April 12: The Games of Ceres “Ceres delights in peace: pray, you farmers, Pray for endless peace and a peace-loving leader. Honour the goddess with wheat, and dancing salt grains, And grains of incense offered on the ancient hearths, And if there’s no incense, burn your resinous torches: Ceres is pleased with little, if it’s pure in kind. You girded attendants lift those knives from the ox: Let the ox plough, while you sacrifice the lazy sow, It’s not fitting for an axe to strike a neck that’s yoked: Let the ox live, and toil through the stubborn soil.” Floralia was the 6-day lascivious celebration, part of which became May Day, banned by the Pilgrim Fathers, and celebrating Spring’s baroque blossoms, it was a time to wear nothing(!) or highly colourful clothes red, green, yellow and floral wreaths.  A descendent of the flower offering remains in the traditional red flowers left at Church on Pentecost to signify the renewal of life, remembering family and friends no longer here and of course the warmth of the summer and blessed crops. Ovid, Fasti (V.185-190) “You start in April and cross to the time of May One has you as it leaves, one as it comes Since the edges of these months are yours and defer To you, either of them suits your praises. The Circus continues and the theatre’s lauded palm, Let this song, too, join the Circus spectacle.” San Zapito was a child martyr interned in Rome’s San Callisto catacombs in 300 AD Relics were brought in ornate box to Loreto in 1711, an arm and the skull donated by Pope Clement XI.  They passed a farmer, Carlo Parlione who complained that he had to toil granite fields on Pentecost, asking where the damn justice was in that.  Apparently the convoy shrunk back from such double blasphemy, but at that very moment, the farmer’s oxen walked toward the entourage ignoring the farmer‘s calls and knelt as if he wanted to pray. “A miracle”, they joyously proclaimed and the farmer repented, returning home to observe the Pentecost. The Festa di San Zopito is now a colourful 2-day festival celebrating this oxen moment.  The trained ox, nicknamed the ‘White Knight’ wearing a scarlet cloak with images of the Saints, carrying those same relics, kneels and gives praise in specific areas of the town as he is a tramite (vehicle of the divine).  A local primary schoolgirl stands on its back representing San Zopito, with floral wreath, silver wings, a red carnation (representing the Holy Spirit and harvest) in her mouth and carrying an umbrella to pro