Translating cranberries

Happy Thanksgiving weekend. To celebrate my first Thanksgiving outside the US, I've eaten lots all week. And I went to a dinner party on Tuesday night, which I'll use as an excuse to talk about the food here (and how very good it is). This dinner party was held by Piero, who works with two of my office mates. He has a house in the country with cats, dogs, and lots of nature. It's beautiful.

The dinner was held honor of mushrooms that Piero picked in Sardinia in October. Apparently Sardinia is a good place to pick mushrooms, though October is the end of the mushroom season. Luckily, one of our other co-workers has some sort of degree in mushrooms and is the head of the mushroom committee in Bologna (this is apparently a big deal). While climbing the mountains of central Sardinia Piero called this guy on his cell phone for mushroom-picking advice.

There were about seven people at the dinner, give or take Piero's 18 month old son. I was the only attendee with verbal skills who was under the age of 45. At around 7:45 pm we began with platters of cured meat. And bread. And cheese. Vittorio, another office mate, brought bread and wild boar prosciutto, both of which he made at home (!!). Piero also gave us plates of homemade picked olives, onions, and eggplant. My vinegar-loving sister would've gone to heaven. We also had pate, hot pepper spread, sauteed mushrooms on toast, and some other meat spread made of chopped . . . something. About an hour passed and we were still on the appetizers, all made by Piero (with exception of the wild boar business).

Once we had eaten as much as we could, we moved onto the main course, which was pasta with a mushroom sauce made from the aforementioned Sardinian mushrooms (and some milk, garlic, and bacon), made by Piero. This was good. I thought we were nearing the end, but I was wrong. Next came four kinds of cheese and four jams: onion/orange, fig, mint, and orange mustard. Piero made these at home as well.

After this we moved onto the dessert, which was a frozen cake made out of sour cherry jam and gelato. Keep in mind that with every new course, three or four bottles of wine were opened. Three hours had passed. Finally, at 11 pm, we had our after-dinner drinks - blackberry grappa, which was so strong that it made my throat close. In case you were wondering, Piero also made the grappa. I have requested cooking lessons.

Everyone was very intrigued by Thanksgiving, and wanted to know what it was that we used to stuff the bird. It was incredible to them that some people actually make the stuffing outside the bird - in that case, can you still call it stuffing? (According to them, no, you can't.) I tried to explain the Thanksgiving menu, but got stumped on cranberries. There aren't any cranberries in Italy (except, as I later discovered, at Ikea). Eventually we agreed that the only thing anyone knew about cranberries was the Irish band by that name - the one from the mid-90s. So, as far as my dinner companions know, my mother's recipe for stuffing goes something like this: "bread, celery, onion, walnuts, apples, olive oil, and . . . something from that Irish band." (Mom, I know that's incorrect anyway, but I couldn't remember the exact recipe.) I will try to find some cranberries for them when I'm home for Christmas.


Last night I made a dinner for my roommates to commemorate Thanksgiving. No turkey, because turkeys aren't sold here. Lucia told me that it's because Italian ovens are too small for turkeys, and then she opened her arms to represent the girth of a turkey. Anna and I tried to explain that turkeys are not four feet wide, but she didn't believe us. Anyway, to obtain a turkey you have to reserve it from the butcher first, which I like because it implies (in my head, at least) that the butcher will send out a hunting party for you. This is probably not true.

Thanks to Nilgun for my bidet explanation! Italians laugh about bidets too - last night Lucia's mother called to tell her that she was out to dinner with a high school friend last week. And this woman, now a university professor, has beautiful curly hair. Lucia's mother complimented her on it, and her old friend told her that she spends fifteen minutes every morning at the bidet, with ice cold water. She's not washing her head in it, though. But she claims that this makes her hair beautiful. Go figure.