Cooking Italian

Stan and I are always up to something.  Sometimes we even surprise ourselves.  We took an Italian cooking class yesterday and had a ball.  We made tiramisu, ravioli, and fettuccine.  Wow!  Let’s say wow one more time.  It was easy, especially with a good instructor and a pasta machine. I can’t wait to try it all again at home, the way an Italian Nonna would do it, sans the machine.  

Tiramisu is not my favorite dessert, but Stan and I learned how to make it the authentic Italian way.  Like learning to appreciate a dry martini, real tiramisu may someday grow on me.  Stan is already there; it is so much like banana pudding, how can he not love it?

Sixteen of us from countries like the US, England, Argentina, Spain, Morocco, Romania, and France showed up for the event, chomping at the bit, ready to go.  At first, our time together was a little tense, but as we got to know each other and figured out how to communicate, it very soon became a party, especially when the background music became Ray Charles’ rocking rendition of “Hit the Road Jack.”  Among the group were college students from OU, a five-year-old boy, a young man in the construction business, a teacher, a university professor, a veterinarian, and us, Stan and I.

First, we got a lesson about traditional food products from Italy.  Like French wines and cheeses, the real-deal products are government-monitored and regulated.  

Did you know that balsamic vinegar is not pure traditional balsamic vinegar unless it comes from cooked grapes grown specifically in the Modena or Reggio Emilia regions of Italy; nothing more.  Nada.  Aged a minimum of 12 years in oak barrels, labels on bottles of this fine balsamic vinegar carry a “DOP” designation, meaning government watched and inspected Protected Designation of Origin. These vinegars are thick, rich, and ideal for simply dressing dishes.  At $80 for 100 ml, or 3.3 oz,  DOP balsamic is very expensive.  Those aged for longer, like 75 years, are far more expensive, $40 to $1,000 per oz.  So if someone gifts you a bottle of DOP balsamic, just know they think you are quite special.

Other fine Italian balsamic vinegars are labeled “IGP,” meaning Protected Geographical Indication.  These are very popular, less restrictive, and far less expensive, yet quite nice.  Unless you are a purest, Costco Balsamic Vinegar is just fine for salads, but once you’ve tasted fine Modena Balsamic Vinegar ladled DOP, you will know the difference, and if you happen to have that $80 100 ml bottle, you will serve that good stuff, just one drop at a time, probably on a thin slice of Italian formaggio. 

Speaking of cheeses, similar distinctions apply to Parmigiano Reggiano.  If your canister of grated cheese or your block of cheese reads only Parmesan, it is not the real thing.  It is a substitute and may contain fillers, etc.    That’s a little sad for me to know since I like it all.  While I have bought and used the less expensive variety all my life, now I am spoiled.  Once you’ve tasted the Parmigiano Reggiano, there is no going back.  It is softer, milder, less powdery, and much more sweet. 

We tasted bruschetta with pesto rosso and another slice with pesto verde, both were really tasty.  New to me, bruschetta merely means toast with or without a topping.  We were reminded in a fun way that the word is pronounced “bru-sketta.”  I admit, when I see the word, bruschetta, in print, my mind says, “bru-shetta,” but Italians laugh when we say it that way.  Either way, bruschetta (bru-sketta) is a crunchy, delicious treat.  In our class, we also sampled a small piece of Parmigiano Reggiano dotted with GDP Balsamic Vinegar (tastes amazing) and finally, buttered bread infused with black truffle bits and another thin slice of bread smeared with truffle cream cheese.   Fantastico!

Wow!   And dinner was yet to come!  Meanwhile, the prosecco flowed freely. 

We finally got down to business and learned to make homemade tiramisu and pasta.  It is an easy task to make tiramisu, but making homemade pasta is another story.  Making fresh pasta is time-consuming and is rather exacting, but it’s delicious and worth the effort.  Homemade pasta has a much better texture and tastes so much better than grocery store frozen varieties and surely much better than pasta in a box. 

At the end, four hours from the start of the class, we were all a bit tipsy but not schnockered.  We all had become friends, and exchanged numbers, as we enjoyed a fine dinner together of our own makings of spinach and ricotta ravioli and fettuccine, topped off with our cups of tiramisu for dessert. 

This! This little cooking exercise may have been our favorite Roman activity!