Adam Balic

Later on in the day I went to the smaller Sant'Ambrogio market, near St. Croce. Similar food stuffs, but some differnces and a more rustic amtmosphere. Now I thought that the Tuscans had wiped out most small birds, but it seems not. These are sparrows (labeled 'imported from Tunisia') and a bargin at €1 per bird..

A quick trip into Florence today. First stop was the largest food market, Mercato Centrale, near/in the San Lorenzo market area. The small both on the left is one of the famous tripe and offal stalls of Florence (more on this later). The Market itself contains large sections dedicated to meat, fish, fruit and veg and also deli type ingredients. As you can see salt-cod is very popular! These are various grades of fish. Some bistecca in its crude form. Now for breakfast I had lampredotto in a roll. Lapredotto is the forth stomach of a bovine. This is the same type of acidi stomach as our own an is rather different in texture and flavour to conventional tripe. This image shows both tripe (the white stuff) and lapredotto (the brown stuff) in its pre-pared form. When bought from a stall, a crusty roll is hollowed out, massive amounts of lapredotto cooked in a tomato based broth is added and you can get it served with green sauce. Quality varies from stall to stall, but when it is good it is very very good.

Joe - thanks very much for the comments, I have had the camera for about four weeks and and any decent pictures are entirely due to it, rather then me as I don't really have much idea what I am doing. The camera itself is an Olympus C-765 UZ, 4MP, 10 X optical zoom. I am very happy with the image quality from such a cheap camera, the only real issue is the yellowing in low light, but this seems to be common to most DC.

Dinner tonight was simply some stuffed pasta and pesto, with salad. Followed by Prato's most famous food product, cantucci from Antonio Mattei. And obviously vin santo!

Well the zucchini were made into fritta for lunch. The most common zucchini used near Florence is odd in that in the unfertilised female floweres the "fruit" can be 6-8 inches long. In most cases the fruit is only an inch or so until fertilization. Hence in these local zucchini, you get the blossoms attached. In addition to the fritta, there is Mortadella di Prato (a local product quite distinct to the Bolongna type), wild boar salami and a bit of salad. For an afternoon snackette, we had some local fresh curd cheese, with prosciutto san daniele, olive oil and rocket.

Last nights dinner was a simple meal of pizza and gelati. A local pizza place offers four different styles of crust, I prefer the Northern Italian (I think) version with a paper thin crisp crust. For some reason I had seafood pizza. The gelati comes from a local shop that takes such pride in the produc that there is a glass observation window to watch them making it. Very few fruit flavours at this time of the year as they say that the fruit is not good enough quality. Icecream images are dull, but the wrapping of the take-away is cute. This morning I did a little shopping, here is a small selection. The beans are form the local baker, where they are cooked in the cooling bread oven. And finally my breakfast. It is a good thing when blood oranges are €1 per kilo!

Marco - thank you for the king comments. You were very lucky to live in Carmignano, I think it is one of the most attractive parts of Tuscany, very dramtic views, especially from the patio of La Delfina! I also enjoy the wine of Carmignano very much, more so then many of the C.C.s, prehaps this is due to the cabernet content, but I find them delicious with food. I think that I may have been to Fattoria di Bacchereto, at least the Medici hunting lodge bit rings a bell. Last night I had entirely too much grappa and vin santo, but I am sure I will have more in the near future...The think about vin santo is that when in it good it is so very good, but sadly most of the bulk stuff sold is really poor.

Kevin - we made this, rather then bought it, it is really a pseudo-porchetta, a compromise when you don't have an entire pig. Basically it is pork loin wrapped in pork belly. Personally, I could do with out the pork loin, but various members of the family don't like fat!

Actually, just stored in a normal kitchen cupboard. No deaths yet.

And for last nights dinner party of mainly Australian-Italians and hangers-on. We had pecorino with chestnut honey. Crostini Toscana (chicken livers with veg, olive oil, vin santo wine). Spanakopita (OK, this isn't Italian). For the main event there was the porchetta. The skin on this was so thin and crisp that it looked and crackled like toffee on a creme brulee. Some of my half mangled porchetta, sauted rape and potatoes. Dessert was simply the cakes from the shop that I had breakfast in. Small cakes are the alpha and omega of a days eating. Although Italians don't drink to excess, Australian-Italians do. So after dinner we went to the pub, had many beers and as at some point it was revealed that "Bomboloni" (donut) is local slang for "blow-job" we ended up storming a bakery and chatting about this amazing new fact to the bakers and anybody else that would listen. I had a Bomboloni con crema. No photo.

Priscilla - the familys prefered method is to bottle ragu, sugo, costini toscana prepared liver etc, under large amounts of oil. The freezer tip is interesting, but I suspec that it will take some time to catch on in Italy.

Priscilla - depending on wheather my wife kills me or the egullet server collaspes, there will be about two weeks of images to come. God praise Olympus.

It is a very common style in Tuscany, the Siena duomo (unfinished as it is) is interesting as it is largely black and white stone, where as many of the other structures have white, green and pink marble. My favourite is St. Croce, what a concentration of famous dead and wonderful frescos!

Mattei's biscotti are fantastic, I would love to make them, but I suspect that I haven't normally got access to the quality of eggs required. They taste veru much of egg yolks. While waiting for my order, I watched the production of the biscotti as they came out of the forno and finally were sliced. I'm not sure about the redness of the pork in Tuscany either. Although there are native breeds, this meat appears to be from commercial large whites as you say. Normally I would put it down to exercise and a difference in the type of muscle developed, but this is belly meat and that is not something that I would think go that much exercise. Still I am thankful. Divina - I have been to Luca Mannori's several times (in is just aoutside of the city wall from where I stay), he truely has some amazing products and that it one of the terrific things about Italy - world class produce and products tucked away where you least expect it.

I am staying with family for the next two weeks. We will will be based in Prato, which is just outside of Florence (actually in the industrial sprawl of Florence), although not really a destination, Prato is (by some accounts) the third largest city in Tuscany, famous for its textile industry, which exists to this day. Another item of fame is the 'Girdle of Mary', which was one of the most important Christian relics in Italy. This is the special balconey, where the girdle is displayed once a year at the duomo: But now the food. Today I actually had a hobbits breakfast, first breakfast was coffee at a local pastry shop: Second breakfast was after a visit to the very famous biscottificio "Antonio Mattei". Inside the small shopfront is essentially the same as the 19th century original: You may have heard of biscotti [di Prato]/cantucci. These shop is the origin of there popularity. More of the biscotti later, for today I had: A sweet focaccia, still the same flat bread flavoured with olive oil and rosemary, but sweetened with grapes. And also some "Brutto ma buono" ("ugly but good"), meringue of hazelnuts. For lunch I had a slice of pie from the local forno, which was basically left over bits and pies from the forno/deli, but very good for that. And also a simply pasta of the familys home made wild boar ragu. And an aged piece of pecorino di Piacenza. And wine obviously. My hosts are putting on a dinner party tonight, the main event will be a seven kilo porchetta (which I am quite happy about, as it is from my recipe). In the raw state. One think to note is that Tuscan pork tends to be much darker/redder then the pork I have seen in Australia and in the UK.

Um, I'm not sure this is entirely correct. Pancetta is simply the Italian word for "bacon" -- which is to say, cured pork side meat. It just so happens that Americans tend to like their bacon cured and smoked whereas Italians tend to like theirs cured but not smoked (bacon, I should point out, is cured). I have often heard Italians say "pancetta affumicata" to refer to American-style bacon. Fundamentally there is no difference between "American bacon" and pancetta affumicata, except perhaps in the style of smoking (although, of course, there are wide differences in the style of smoking within the category of "American bacon" as well). Just to clarify for non-American egulleters, panchetta is derived from the pancia, which means belly. It is essentially cured pork belly and there are many forms.

Interesting, wheat genetics isn't my field, but from what I understand the picture is even more complex in that although einkorn is often cited as an ancestor of more modern grains, it may infact not be a direct ancestor, more of a sibling to an unidentified ancestor. Also there seem to be both wild and domesticated forms of emmer and einkorn, and these seem to have different scientific names, so I am at a loss in terms of the various relationships. Anway, my interest in farro was after eating it and finding it to be excellent, I read that it was one of the main grains of the romans, but I have no information on what farro it was that they ate.

There are several different types of farro. The most common form I have seen is Triticum dicoccum, which isn't spelt. Although, Triticum dicoccum is both farro medio and emmer wheat, they aren't exactly the same thing although very similar. Farro medio/emmer was common in Italy, until it was replaces by durum type wheats (these have better gluten levels = development of pasta). Anyway farro medio is delicious and is great used as a base for salads.

The "brain" of a lobster is a slightly bigger collection of nerves then is found thoughout the rest of their body. They have similar collections of ganglion throughout the body. Cutting the "brain" may make it floppy, but if they do feel pain then there is no garantee that say the ganglion in the tail isn't experiencing pain independently. I tend to bung them in the freezer for a few minutes or put them into ice water. Seems to do the trick. The last lobster I cooked was about 3 kg and if it had not been innert by chilling, the effect would have been like trying to boil a small poodle.

All things considered, it may be best not to eat them at all. Eel population crash

I have since found out that 2004 was a very poor year for the elver havest in the UK, so I wonder how the prices may have changed over the last decade or so?

AlexP - thank you very much for the link. Ah, so they were fake, then is interesting (fish biologist friend will be happy to find this out) and now I don't have to feel guilty about eating them (although I still have to deal with the guilt of eating baby fish in Malaga). I had no idea that the elvers were now this expensive, reflects the population crash I guess. I had though I read that many elvers consumed in Spain were caught in S. England, I wonder if that price mentioned by vsera was for imported or local elvers?

The recipe was from the above mentioned Rosemary Barron book. Briefly, the red mullet are sauted, then removed. Garlic is then gently sauted then red wine vinegar and honey are added and reduced. Tomatos are then added along with cinnamon and raisins. This is then reduced somewhat and the flavours allowed to mellow. The key is the honey, I used a dark Greek honey which produces a very complex flavour profile without too much sweetness. This fish are then warmed in the sauce. This recipe was very good and definately the most requested recipe for the evening. My only complaint was that the sauce colour obscured the beautiful colour if the red mullet. But, given how many people seem to be looking at cooking as a visual art in the last few years, it is refreshing to find a new recipe that is so delicious and flavour orientated.

Yes, but Ye Olde Spellchecker is notoriously poor.

Shannon - this site has very useful information. Ivan Day Historical Food For original information: Slightly before your time, but interesting as the first collection of English recipes. Forme of Cury Again maybe a little early for you. Liber cure Cocorum From 16th century Canterbury. A Proper newe Booke of Cokerye A similar 17th century text. A NEVV BOOKE of Cookerie. A 18th century pastry/baking text by Kidder The university of Barcelona as on-line scans of 16-18th century cookbooks. Here is the 17th century page. Hannah Woolley's "The Queen-like closet, or Rich cabinet" is especially worth looking at and makes a very intersting comparison to Robert May's "The Accomplisht Cook", which is often considered on of the great books of English cookery. Sounds like great fun. Enjoy