oh so delicious on a winter’s eve… all porcini, pancetta and creamy goodness… with a little warm crusty bread… one of my favourites… shame you can’t smell it…
I love to cook. I’ve always loved to cook… I thought I knew how to cook… until I met him… he taught me how to cook, how to really cook… with love, with tenderness, with generosity… and how to eat… how to understand the meaning of ‘to savour’… whether it was an espresso in the morning sun in the garden or a pizza alle melanzane in a roadside bar or a linguine alle vongole in a marina trattoria or gnocchi made by hand at home…
He himself, from early childhood, had had trouble with eating and almost had to force himself so it had become a ritual and a discipline for him to take time to cook and eat… to do it mindfully… the expansive hand gestures which accompany the pleasures of eating are difficult to translate into words…
oh yes, it was eat, pray, love rolled into one fireworks of an affair…
Almost 20 years on, when I said I would come, it was on condition that he make me his carbonara… but he didn’t. No, he made me an intensely aromatic fish soup, simmered in a local red wine with sun dried tomatoes… all fresh, all natural… later, still hungry, we grilled lamb chops over the open fire… with crusty bread warmed on the hearth… and more of that delicious local wine… ate them with our fingers and then lolled by the fire happy and sated until we fell into the deepest, most peaceful sleep… can’t really complain, can I? still, he owes me a carbonara…
There is a recipe for the Zuppa with porcini and pancetta in the link below… sent to me by another Italian who came into my life not so long ago… he too can cook… and dance… but that’s another story for another day… check out the recipe here:
http://lericettediemilio.blogspot.co.uk/2011/02/zuppa-benpensante-con-porcini-e-patate.html
Leave a Reply