17 giugno 2009

What an absolutely awesome day. Despite the heat overnight I did manage to get some sleep, and I am getting used to these hard Italian matresses. It is too hot to get into bed and I have slept on top with not even a sheet over me for the last few nights and it is even stickier and hotter here in Firenze (Florence) I got up and packed my bag so the staff can shift it to my new room and then went down for breakfast. A good range of food for breakfast – the traditional bread and croissants, but as well fruit and cereal and yoghurt, cake (still can't get my head around eating cake for breakfast) as well as ham and cheese slices, and a huge big bowl of fresh fruit – peaches, apricots, oranges, apples and cherrys. But the big surprise was the push button coffee machine that serves latte, cappuccino, mocha etc like we get at home in places like Subway. I didn't expect to see one here, what with coffee being such a culture, but I guess when you have to feed a dining room full of people all wanting coffee for breakfast this is the easiest way to do it. The cappuccino isn't too bad actually and I have two of them with my breakfast.
I brought my notebook down with me, in the hope that I was going to be able to connect to wifi, but alas, still no joy (but of note I was able to connect when I came back in this afternoon and I can connect again tonight.)

I left the hotel early, I had about a 15-20 minute walk to Florencetown, and as I had no idea what I was looking for, I thought I had better set out early. Just as well, it was quite difficult to find and even a street seller selling belts and wallets and other leather goods didn't know where to send me. As it turned out it was about 10 doors up the road. But a tiny narrow door, I was worried I was going to have so slide in sideways, and the sign on the wall was smaller than a business card. My navigational powers seemed to be much more in control today, and I negotiated my way to the street with no trouble whatsever, and as I was early I went for a wander and found the piazza with the David statues. Most impressive, but these aren't in fact the original David and it would seem that I am not going to get time to go to see it because I have to catch my train reasonably early tomorrow. Oh well never mind, the substitutes were pretty impressive and I will make do with having seen them.
I wandered back to Florencetown to be met, downstairs on the street by the receptionist and the chef, Giovanni. They took me up a couple of flights of stairs to their office where I paid for my day and then Giovanni explained that I was the only guest today, so we were now going to walk to the market to buy the fresh produce for our meal.
We walked quite a way, but it was fun, and we walked through a huge big market (and I was hoping I could find my way back to it this afternoon or tomorrow morning before I leave but as it turned out that was a no to both those options)
At the market we wandered through all the different areas and Giovanni pointed out different points of interest along the way, including a stall that sold traditional street food including roast beef and tripe. This - market is huge and you can buy absolutely everything – bread, pasta, meat, chicken, wine, cheese and then we went upstairs to the huge big vegetable market. Giovanni led the way to the back of the market to a wee stall where he buys his fruit and vegetables for his cooking class, all locally grown products.

He picked out zuchinni (with the flowers attached – a lighter green than what we get at home and with ridged skins). He bought an aubergine and some parsley and a big tomato. While we were waiting he handed me an apricot to taste and a couple of cherrys. Again they were just so juicy and sweet. Back down the stairs to buy a half a loaf of fresh bread and back past the stall that was selling the tripe and Giovanni ordered me a bowl of it to try. Now trying very hard not to think back to that disgusting tripe we used to serve up in the hospital when I was doing my training, and not to think of what it is and where it comes from, I tried it. It was kind of chewy, despite having been cooked for a long time, but it had a tasty juice poured over it, and was served with a pesto and a chilli sauce, and all-in-all it wasn't too bad. Now i'm not sure that I would want to cook it, but I would try it again if it was cooked like that. (just an aside here - there is a group of people who meet regularly in Tauranga to eat tripe – I wonder if any of them cook it like this, or whether it is all done the English way – tripe and onions in a white sauce.)

So then it was on to the wineseller to get some wine to have with this meal, and it was here that I bought some wee bottles of Limoncello to take home. From here, we left the market and caught a bus to via Luca Vanducci where we were to cook this meal. What a fabulous place, quiet, relaxing and inviting, with examples of Giovanni's artwork on the walls.]

The menu was to be: bruschetta with garlic and tomato to start. This was very tasty and I will be able to reproduce this quite easily at home, using ciabatta which I buy from Foodtown.

Giovanni told me that the secret to good Italian food is simplicity and using the freshest of produce. Here they shop daily for what they want to cook that day. What a wonderful way to do it, but imagine at home having to go to the supermarket every single day. That would drive me nuts, but this experience has encouraged me to grow even more of my own food when I get home.
Next came the rissotto. I was so pleased he had chosen this dish, as I really wanted to learn how to do this, and I will cook this for you all when I get home. The secret here is to cook it slowly and keep adding a little stock to keep it moist. We used zuchinni and the flower. It was delicious, so tasty and so creamy. And here I made another promise to myself – Never again will I use a Rissotto mix from Continental or Maggie or any other pre-packaged variety. It really has no resemblance at all to the real thing.

Now for the main dish – beef meatballs and the side dish was aubergine, which was sliced then dry fried and topped with origano, mozarello, tomato etc and topped with another slice of grilled aubergine and then dry fried again until the cheese was melted.
All through the cooking Giovanni would give other suggestions such as how to cook pasta, what other ingredients could have been used etc. He always uses unsalted butter and then seasons to taste afterwards
The desert – fresh berries sauteed with sugar and rum, flamed and then served over plain ice cream. What could be better than that.
And all this washed down with a bottle of Tuscan red wine. What a perfetto way to spend a day – great food, good wine and pleasant company. Giovanni was a perfect host, great teacher and such a pleasant young man. His English was perfect, so I didn't get to practice my Italian, much easier to have a good conversation in English.

He showed me whereabouts I was on the map and explained that I could get a Number 6 bus back to the piazza, but it didn't look too far to walk and I figured it would do me much more good to walk – wear off some of these calories and also experience the city by walking through the streets. It was a lovely walk, past lots of shops, and again every shop is different here. Every shop has different merchandise, not like at home where each town is the same, a warehouse, a supermarket, all the food chains (McD, BK, Pizza Hut, Subway etc, for the food and all the other franchise stores – Mitre 10, Freedom, Farmers, Amcal's and Glassons etc etc.)
Here, small boutique shops, each one much different, not containing racks and racks of the same clothes. Even in the bigger department store I went into in Padova, there weren't racks of the same, just in different colours. Every second or third shop is a bar, or a gelateria, or a food shop of some sort. The variety of food is also amazing – the flavours of ice cream is extensive. The cake shops – chocolate, meringues, tarts, biscuits – so much to choose from – and I am very wisely resisting the temptation.

I really enjoyed my stroll back to the hotel – it took about an hour to slowly make my way back – looking in lots of shops as I went. It was very hot and rain was threatening, with a few large drops of rain, but it didn't come to anything. I stopped for a drink in a wee bar close to the hotel, and on my arrival at Hotel Byron I find the lobby full of people and luggage, spilling out onto the street. My goodness what is happening here. Fifty something tourists from Utah have invaded the place and are trying to sort themselves into their rooms, but they have taken over the whole place, the tiny little elevator and getting through to the reception desk to get my key (for my new room on the 4th floor) and then to try and get the elevator was a real mission. In the end I chose to walk up the stairs – phew, now for a shower and a nanna nap. I am getting used to this afternoon rest – hope I am not going to need them when I get back to work.
After my rest I decided I should try and book an hotel room in Perugia for tomorrow night and so go on-line to do this. And a chose a funky looking hotel called Etruscan Chocohotel. Do a google search for it and see where I am going to be staying. It is a chocoholics paradise. I check out the trains to Perugia and think I might rock on up to Florencetown in the morning and do the cycle tour through the city before I leave, and I decide to head out to the piazza now and take a ride in one of the horse and carts I saw last night. So I get myself spruced up for an evening stroll and head downstairs and hand in my key at reception. I am then grabbed by the lady at the desk, who tells me she has been waiting for me to come downstairs, and takes me by the arm and leads me through to the lounge, where she offers me food and a drink of bubbles and tells me she wants to hear all about my day with the chef. She had not booked anybody on this tour before so wanted to know all about it. It turns out that she in fact owns the hotel.
We talk and eat and drink for ages, she is just such an absolute delight, so friendly, so interesting and again speaks such good English. She wants to hear about the rest of my holiday and is amazed to hear that I am cycling around all on my own. We talk about our families and other travels (she goes to London and America frequently and in fact was in London at the same time I was). She tells me that she has a large group from Utah at this time every year, and that Florence is very busy this week particularly because there is a big Fashion Fair on where all the designers and buyers from the big European fashion houses are in town. We are joined by a delightful young couple and she tells them all about my cycling and the young girl asks politely if she could ask my age – I tell her and she claps her hand over her mouth and says how incredible that is for me to be doing this. (Actually Giovanni said the same thing this morning). The couple leave, they are going to the fashion fair - she is beautiful (dark curly hair, immaculate makeup, beautiful jewelled dangly earrings and a stunning outfit – black flowing pants in a very soft chiffon type material (but not see-through) gathered in at the ankles, giving them a look almost of harem pants but much more flattering; high heel shoes, a very wide belt worn over the hips and a strapless top. She looks stunning.
The hotel owner then asks me what I am to do tomorrow and I tell her I will catch the train to Perugia. She tells me that this is not as easy as a train from here to Roma. I will have to change and so she takes me to her desk and looks up on Google (whatever did we do before google) and prints out the details. I have to go to a different train station (so much for getting an hotel near the station) and it will be better to get a cab as it will be difficult with my suitcase to get on the bus. She tells me to go two doors down and buy the train ticket from her friend at the travel shop, and then she asks about a hotel. I tell her I have made a booking this time, I was not going to make the mistake of arriving in a town without one like I did when I arrived in Florence. I told her about the chocohotel and she said “surely not” she looked it up on google and when she saw the picture of the room with the basket of chocolate on the bed she said “Oh Jesus” and each page she looked at she said “Oh Jesus” again. By now she was wanting to come with me. She asked me to let her know what it is like as she had never heard of it before and would like to know so she may recommend other guests if they are looking for an hotel in Perugia.

By now it is getting late and she is needing to get away home, so off she goes. It is starting to get dark now, so I opt just to go across the road for an ice cream and a soft drink – have aborted the plan for the horse and cart ride – will have to do that another time. I seriously hope to return to Florence in the future, it is beautiful, it is friendly, it is bustling but not unpleasantly so.
When I get to the gelateria I choose instead an apple tart and an espresso and sit for a while just enjoying being out amongst the locals. Its 10pm and I don't feel scared or lonely at all. There are so many people about and I am, after-all, just across the road from my hotel.
Then it is back to my room on the 4th floor. There is a little ladder to climb up to open the window, but all you can see is roof tops. I open the window in the bathroom and look the other way, and again only roof tops, but with that window open I can smell the aroma of the city – food smells lingering in the hot heavy air. It is still very hot and I have another cool shower before shutting down for the night.

And sadly, that is it for Florence. The hotel owner suggests catching the 12.13 train from Campo di Marte train station and that I let the Estruscan know when I am arriving so that they will meet me at the station. She tells me it is 46km from Perugia (but I have checked again and it looks to me like only 1.5km from the station – let's see which one of us is right.
Oh darn there go those church bells again, what is the time? Wow it is 7.14am I had better close now, post this and get my shower and get down to breakfast before those 50 Americans.
Ciao for another day