ReallyGoodWriter | Food • Writing • Poetry Iambic Cafe

food & poetry, but mostly the poetry of food

Food • Writing • Poetry

So: we’ve done it, and here’s the proof… with the sad exceptions of Marta, Louisa and Donghyun who could not join us, being in the other three of the four corners of the world.

We’d caught that Colorno bus – here crossing Ponte Caprazucca just for us – one last time yesterday morning…

Climbed the stairs to our second floor hang-out…

And then had a subdued graduation ceremony, probably due to the late night revelries that preceded this particular morning after. There were speeches, from absent friends – Carlo Petrini was in Mexico warming up for the Slow Food world congress…

Unisg’s director Carlo Catani, and Slow Food Italy president Roberto Burdese…

After some frolicking in the garden with our diplomas, taking pictures

and being taken,

we returned to enjoy a Spigaroli buffet –

all our old friends were there, the king of culatello, Massimo Spigaroli himself

and lots of lardo,

a veritable blizzard of that puffy and insubstantial bread of Emilia Romagna…

a complete dearth of vegetable matter… ah, Italia.

So, thus fortified, dispersed to various napping venues where we readied ourselves for the last night party which I left around 1.30 I think, the dancing queens showing how it is possible to keep trim and limber over a year of food studies.

And now it’s all done, and we’ll spend the next few days securing the profitability of Poste Italiane before disappearing into new lives out there in the four corners of the food world.

On the way home this morning from another expensive trip to the post office, I had a farewell visit to my favourite Pugliese specialities shop where I have been buying quantities of taralli over the past few months. It was gratifying to realise I was able, after a year! to exchange a few Italian pleasantries with the shopkeeper. She was thunderstruck when I told her I would miss taralli when I was back in Canada – it hadn’t occurred to her these weren’t a staple food everywhere, I guess. Hers are particularly good so even if I do find a version elsewhere, well, it certainly won’t be the same. There’s the inescapable fact that food just tastes different in different settings: so here, with foodie classmates, in a land with well established food traditions, everything will taste quite different than it might on the most carefully-provisioned table in London or Victoria.

So, I prepare to leave with the sadness I’d feel leaving anywhere I’ve lived for a year. Lots to miss in the new food habits I’ve been cultivating. We’ve all noticed dramatic increases in the quantity of olive oil we consume. I’ve developed quite an Acacia honey habit. The fresh buffalo mozzarella, oh what can compare? And here’s one of my absolute delights: Visner di Pergola:

We had something like this in Le Marche, called Visciolato, a dark cherry wine made from the local sour cherries, Visciole. I would love the chance to taste that wine side-by-side with this one, which is absolutely delicious. It tastes like pure cherry juice, with a little kick of alcohol to warm it all the way down. Oh my my my my my.

And, yes, the taralli, oh the taralli.

Eerie symbolism or lighthearted public art? These appeared in the Piazzale della Pace just before our graduation. Turns out they are part of a gastronomic festival…

Yesterday was a long long long day for everyone at Unisg but particularly for the academic panel who had to sit through 24 oral presentations, including 3 of them by video link, using skype. The scope of what we had all done for our internships was huge, and it would have been entertaining had it not been so gruelling. Handicapped by a 45 minute late start, by lunchtime what with one thing and another we were running about 2 hours late, and we started a further half hour late after the break. By the time I started my presentation at 5.55pm (scheduled start time: 2.40) the panel and the unfortunates farther down the alphabet were looking decidedly peaky.

Those of us who were finished just barely in time to catch the last bus to Parma (6.15) ran down the stairs, our gleeful bubble rudely popped when we found the gates to the courtyard chained and padlocked, with no escape, cruelly in sight of the bus stop, where our orange beauty sat idling. Luckily, someone with keys emerged just then for a smoke and released us. We sprinted across the cobblestones to the bus’s shut door; we knocked and waved at the driver. He waved back. A comedian, just what you want after a blinding day of over-running presentations…

We did eventually get back to Parma, and had an over-indulgent meal at La Filoma which I’d been wanting to revisit since my first meal there just about a year ago. Here’s my seasonal booty, faraona, guinea fowl with, if memory serves, a bit of culatello in the middle and some buttery mushrooms next door.

Then followed an overindulgent farewell to Tabarro, our class winebar, opened to us for a private party:

Speaking of overindulgence, we made a farewell reunion celebratory finale visit to Ristorante Mosaiko on Saturday, where I sank into bliss with some foie gras on ricotta pancakes….

and ended up with just too much to choose from for dessert: a pear and almond slice, a chocolate of all chocolate tarts and a smidgen of heavenly tiramisu.

I happened to hear a song on the radio yesterday, that I’ve been hearing all year: Somewhere Over the Rainbow/What a Wonderful World and I looked it up to discover the singer, Israel Kamakawiwo Ole, has been dead for a decade. The single was only released last year which explains its late arrival in my lalala. Other than his gorgeous voice and great tunes, two things took me aback when I looked him up. One was the enormous girth of the man – it was this girth which ultimately killed him at the age of 38 – and the other was that he and I shared a birthday. Well, here’s his greatest hit:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2A2Jt4WOxN8]

Commencing the last seven days in Parma; my final report is done, and must only be presented at Monday’s all-day marathon back on campus. Then there will be graduation festivities of various times. A few more visits to my friends at Poste Italiane and I’m outta here.

Not the most enthralling week. Monday was enlivened by the visit of an aspirapolvere salesman – my first door to door salesman in Italian. He was, he swore, more eager to show me the wonderful cleaning abilities of his product than to sell me anything, but left swiftly when I said I would not be living there much longer. I would have thought the complete absence of carpets would be a bit of a drawback too, but never mind.

The rest of the week I can’t really account for; a couple of coffees with people, and a lot of report writing and packing of boxes, half maddened by dodgy internet connections. Yesterday a long walk in the twilight in search of a quad band mobile phone to replace my more limited relic; I ended up in the horrific churn of Esselunga (its name means ‘long S’ – just like its rather unattractive logo) and with the help of the kind man at the electronics counter managed to achieve my objective and leave quickly. Happier still when I managed to find the English language settings on the phone and get it operational.

Today I’ve been reading something of relevance, as I cook my way through the remaining dry goods in my cupboard. It’s a continuation of earlier reports that British shoppers throw away a third of what they buy – which when you think about it, as Wrap has, is like throwing one of every three bags of groceries straight into the garbage. I would be hugely surprised if other developed-world shoppers throw away anything less than this; I haven’t seen anything that reports on Canadian food waste, but I did find a report from 2004 that said Americans don’t eat half the food they produce, although other reports suggest a more conservative one-quarter waste rate. Which I frankly don’t believe. Be that as it may, I’ve enjoyed the challenge of using things up. Leftovers cuisine: can there be anything more random?

Oh some people never change their spots. My most visible spots right now are in a living necklace round my throat: a string of fading mosquito bites which were my farewell kisses from Jerusalem’s insect population– who will miss me more than I miss them. And the ones I’m not changing are the ones that make me dither, delay, dally and defer when I’m supposed to be ploughing ahead on my final paper. Therefore it seemed very important to say a couple of things about pumpkins and water before another moment passed.

At this time of year when they’re practically giving pumpkins away, check out some ways to use them for food. I came across a recipe for roasted pumpkin and tamarind soup today too, which sounds mighty good. Lucky for me and my paper I am in an uncertain location for procuring tamarind, although it is doubtless available at the Hello Food Store, Parma’s source for just about any unusual food item, particularly Asian or African ones. And wigs, lots of wigs… one of those retail pairing concepts I just don’t want to know too much about, frankly.

And finally, in the season of damp, thoughts turn naturally to water. Though where I am maybe I wish there was a little less of it in the air, other places of course long for more. But whatever the weather, we need to keep access to water free for all. Here’s a modestly narcissistic thing to do about that. World Development Movement is creating a poster in support of better access to water, and UK citizens can add your smiley faces to the cause and yourselves to an electronic petition at the same time. Or maybe you’re starting your Christmas shopping: in which case, you could visit the WaterAid shop and buy someone an unusually thoughtful gift.