Archive for August, 2009
Aug 2009
Kitchen life in Italy: We prep lunch, we serve, we nap. We prep dinner, we serve, we sleep. We prep lunch, we serve, we…
Here I am with the owners (Livia and Paolo) of this magnificent estate. They are absolutely wonderful people. They have made me feel like their family and Livia kisses me on the cheek and neck like I am her son haha!
This is the dinner we, the staff, had before the dinner service...nothing much...just stuffed pork with mushrooms, sausage and black truffle...freshly sliced proscuitto...mixed salad...Chianina beef tortellinis with a tomato herb sauce.
Chicken breasts stuffed with Prosciutto and mushrooms wrapped in pig fat. Yum!
Castello Delle Regine
On the afternoon of August 7th I arrived at Castello Delle Regine. This place is about 1,000 acres where they grow their own grapes (make wine) and olives (make olive oil) and raise their own Chianina beef. There are also farmhouses where guests can stay and a restaurant where guests can eat, where private parties are held and locals can come dine. The people here are unbelievably nice and have made me feel like I am part of their family, literally. I will be staying here for the next few weeks learning about food, cooking, wine, olive oil and everything and anything I can soak up.
Some of the grape vines...they are everywhere.
Casale Patata...one of the farmhouses where guests can stay. All of them are very beautiful. If you want, you can buy fresh ingredients on the property and cook your own meals in each farmhouse.
The storage facility for the wine.
Last night there was a birthday party which included the best Sommeliers in all of Italy. The man crouching down in the white shirt in the front is the most famous Sommelier in all of Italy, Alessandro Scorsowe. In this picture we are at a wine tasting...It's not everyday you get to drink some of the best wine around with some of the most knowledgeable and famous wine experts in the world! I was basically laughing and smiling the entire time because what I'm doing here is so much fun and exciting...and because sometimes I can't get over the stuff I get myself into haha...
Here is a view of the party which took place by one of the three pools outside the restaurant.
Garrett’s cooking adventure begins in Italy
"I was cutting tomatoes into little cubes until my back was just aching," Garrett told his sister on the phone last night.
He's spending a couple weeks in the kitchen at a Castello delle Regine in Umbria. Friends from the Bartollota Restaurant Group here in Milwaukee made the connection. Garrett's task? Learn as much as he can about cooking, restaurants, Italian food, the production of olive oil and wine. It's a rare and privileged opportunity.
Wireless is proving to be a little bit of a challenge out in the Italian countryside, but he hopes to start posting his own updates soon. Meanwhile, Twitter seems to work on and off, so you might try to follow him there: www.twitter.com/G_WeberGale.
Just a few minutes ago, I got another update by phone:
"They had me make an incredible herb sauce this morning--basil, marjoram, lots of other things, mixed with olive oil and put through a grinder. The chef said, 'Go, get you notebook. Write down these recipes.' "
More updates soon--Mark, Garrett's dad.
Birthday dinner at a neighborhood spot where everybody knows your name (Well, not ours.)
It's a good sign when you're the only English speakers in a little Italian restaurant, when the owner's parents come in to dine, when everyone seems to know everyone, when the owner's yellow lab roams the dining room, when the prosciutto is cut by hand from a cured leg sitting on a table by the door, when the buffalo mozzarella is bobbing in a giant bowl on a table. (No, some of this would not pass muster in the U.S.)
We had a memorable dinner our last night in Rome. It was good after an exhausting day in the Mediterranean--"Dad, let's swim out to see what's on the other side of that point. Dad, let's swim out to the white buoy and back. Dad, let's play paddle ball in the water. Dad, let's walk out to see if those guys are catching anything on the jetty."
More from Garrett when he gets set up in the countryside--Mark
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