Googling about aushak, or maybe I had it once at Square One...

At Rivoli, I ordered a non-duck entree, already stepping out of my "predictable" zone. At any given restaurant, I can be counted on to order the salad with blue cheese, the duck, the baked fruit dessert, and the California chardonnay, often Talbott, if it’s a special occasion. On this evening, in addition to non-duck, I ordered celery root soup, Austrian Grüner Veltliner, and the cheese plate. Must be the New Me, arriving for dinner.

[One of these days, I'll cook duck, I swear. In fact, last week's Chronicle food section had an encouraging article by Joyce Fletcher about overcoming duck-cooking phobia, and she included a Nancy Oakes recipe for Slow-Roasted Duck, and that's the one I think I'll try. I've enjoyed Oakes' elegant take on comfort food since she was at L'Avenue.]

So anyway, at Rivoli, I ordered

RICOTTA AND LEEK RAVIOLI WITH SLOW BRAISED LAMB SAUCE
SPICED CHICK PEAS AND MINT AND GARLIC YOGURT (20.50)

and when the dish arrived at the table (large transparent plump pasta squares, topped with a chunky mahogany meat sauce, capped with creamy yogurt, sprinkled with crunch), I immediately thought of Salang Pass. Some of us from the office visited this Fremont restaurant as a gesture of solidarity after the start of US bombing in Afghanistan, but it wasn't politics that's kept us going back. I like their aushak so much that I've rarely strayed to other dishes. At Rivoli, I couldn't remember what that dish was called, so when I got home, I went to the Salang Pass website to find it here: "Aushak: Afghani styled ravioli stuffed with leek and seasonings, topped with ground beef and a special yogurt sauce." The obvious differences between the Rivoli and Salang Pass versions: Rivoli includes ricotta in the raviolis, uses lamb instead of beef, and sprinkles the plate with "spiced chick peas".

The chick peas were awesome. They were crunchy, with a sandy finish, and spicy and oily enough to make you think they must be BAD for you, and they added a crispy contrast to the silken raviolis. I needed to figure out how to make these. They'd be great with martinis. A search for a recipe brought me, freakishly, to a food blog using the same polka-dotty Blogger template that I'm using now. (Joe's working on something custom for me, because the dots are "like the fourth most popular template on blogger", he says, so I'll be getting something along the lines of "random stripes" but he didn’t start working on it until after last weekend’s 49er game. If you are still seeing dots, the new template remains a work in progress.)

So I got the recipe for the crunchy chick peas, and I knew I could go online to find an aushak recipe but I had to hang in the kitchen because the pot on the stove needed attention so I started looking through cookbooks for inspiration. I grabbed "Back to Square One (Old World Food in a New World Kitchen)", Joyce Goldstein's cookbook named for her San Francisco Restaurant and one I use frequently. A quick look through the index brought me to “Aushak: Persian Ravioli with Leeks and Two Sauces”. Joyce says in her head note, “There are Persian and Afghani versions of this recipe for ravioli with two sauces. Traditionally the pasta is filled with just spicy leeks, but leek-filled ravioli have a tendency to fall apart in the water. So I added a little ricotta cheese…”

And I’ll add some spiced chick peas! And I’ll use won ton skins instead of pasta, for the ravioli. I’ll let you know how it turns out. (Look, I have the pasta attachment for the KitchenAid mixer, thank you Joe, but I've yet to use it. I'll make you "Beef & Pork Ragu Lasagne" from the December issue of Fine Cooking when you come home for Christmas, complete with homemade pasta. I promise. In the meantime, I got laundry to fold.)

I think the chances are good that I ate this dish at Square One in the early 90s. Wendy Bruckner, the chef at Rivoli, definitely did -- her on-line bio confirms that she worked at Square One before she and her husband opened a place of their own.

My dad used to say that there were only three original songs ever written. Everything else is “Variation on a Theme”.

§

MOCK DEEP-FRIED CHICK PEAS

1 19-ounce can chick peas, well-drained, rinsed and patted dry
Olive oil spray (or about 1 tablespoon olive oil)
Coarse salt to taste
1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper, or more to taste
1/8 teaspoon garlic powder, or more to taste
1/4 teaspoon dried oregano, or more to taste

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Place chick peas on a rimmed cookie sheet.

Bake, shaking tray every now and then, until golden brown and crunchy, about 35 minutes.

Pour into a large bowl. Lightly coat with olive oil spray. Add salt, cayenne, garlic powder, and oregano. Toss to coat evenly.

From Shape magazine, January 2005 issue.

§

AUSHAK
Persian Ravioli with Leeks and Two Sauces

Lamb Sauce
3 tablespoons olive oil
2 pounds ground lamb
3 cups diced onion
3 tablespoons finely minced garlic
2 teaspoons cinnamon
4 cups tomato sauce
1 cup lamb or chicken stock
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground pepper

Heat the olive oil in a large sauté pan or skillet over high heat. Add the ground lamb and break it up with a spoon. Cook, stirring occasionally, until browned. Remove the meat from the pan with a slotted spoon. In the fat remaining in the pan, cook the onions over medium heat until tender, about 10 minutes. Add the garlic and the cinnamon and cook a few minutes longer. Return the lamb to the pan and add the tomato sauce. Add the lamb or chicken stock, bring to a simmer, and cook about 25 minutes. Stir in the salt and pepper. Taste and adjust seasonings. (This sauce can be made 1 day ahead.)

Filling
8 tablespoons unsalted butter
6 cups chopped, firmly packed, well-washed leeks
1 teaspoon paprika
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1-1/2 cups ricotta cheese
Salt and freshly ground pepper
About 48 3” square won ton wrappers

Melt the butter in a large sauté pan or skillet over medium-low heat. Add the leeks and cook, stirring occasionally, until wilted and tender, 15 to 20 minutes. Add the paprika and cayenne and cook 1 to 2 minutes longer. Let cook. Then stir the cooked leeks into the ricotta and season the mixture with salt and pepper. (This sauce can be made 1 day ahead.)

Place 1 heaping tablespoon of filling on a won ton wrapper. Use a plant mister [I really like this tip!!] to spray lightly with water, then cover with another wrapper. Press gently around the filling mound to seal. Place the ravioli in a single layer, not touching one another, on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper or sprinkled with rice flour or Wondra. [If you don’t already know, Wondra is a very fine flour that comes in a blue can. It's great for making gravy, and preferred by Aunt Dorothy for pierogi.] Sprinkle the tops with flour. Fill the remaining ravioli in the same manner. Refrigerate the ravioli, uncovered, until serving time.

Yogurt Sauce
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
2 tablespoons finely minced garlic
2 cups plain yogurt
1/2 cup chopped fresh mint
Salt and freshly ground pepper

Melt the butter over low heat in a small sauté pan or skillet. Add the garlic and cook 1 to 2 minutes without coloring. Cool for a few minutes and then add the yogurt. Stir in the chopped mint and season to taste with salt and pepper. (This sauce may be made a few hours ahead and refrigerated.)

To serve, bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Bring the yogurt sauce to room temperature, if refrigerated. Reheat the lamb sauce in a large saucepan. Drop the ravioli into the boiling water, reduce the heat, and simmer 4 minutes. Remove with a slotted spoon or large skimmer, shake off the excess water, and place on 6 serving plates. Spoon the warm lamb sauce over the ravioli, then drizzle with the yogurt sauce.

This is where you’d sprinkle the raviolis with the chick peas.

Serves 6.

Adapted from Back to Square One by Joyce Goldstein (William Morrow and Company, 1992).

Whence came "Cooklady"?

Some people who know me in real life say that the cooklady moniker is flat and, well, boring.

I once received an “Industry Achievement Award” at a fancy banquet. When he introduced me, the organization’s president said that I was being honored because I was “nice”. He actually used that word, several times, and I immediately felt sort of patted on the head, even though he also gave me a lovely engraved crystal blob.

Over time, though, I’ve come to realize that in business, nice is not only desirable but rare. And if I turned out “nice”, in the view of the president of something, then my parents should feel like their efforts were rewarded.

That’s where the “lady” comes from. A lady, above all, is nice. (Don't be fooled: there's an edgy side there. But still, "nice".)

And as for the cook - well, I'm not, nor do I aspire to be, a chef. My culinary school education will not make me a chef. Even Julia Child didn't claim to be a chef, and she felt uncomfortable being called one. But I can cook, and I cook every day, and in culinary school, my cooking will improve. That's where the "cook" comes in.

I first used Cooklady a couple of years ago as my user name on the craigslist food forum, and I definitely didn’t spend a lot of time thinking about it -- I don’t have that witty creative mind that thinks up catchy nicknames and slogans. One of the “foodfo” regulars sent out cute little drawings s/he made, to all who requested them, and Cooklady looks good, don’t you think?

"It could be so exciting....

To be out in the world, to be free
My heart should be wildly rejoicing
Oh, what's the matter with me?"*

So, yeah, I'm just a little bit nervous.

I made pizza dough from scratch, hoping to replicate just a hint of the delicious thin-crust pizzas we enjoyed in Tuscany. Not only did they turn out undercooked and doughy, but as David picked up his slice, all the toppings (gorgeous slices of heirloom tomatoes, fresh mozzarella and torn basil leaves) slid off the dough and into a heap on the plate. "Uh, I think I'll need a knife and fork," he said. As I cleaned up the kitchen after dinner, I suddenly realized that I don't have any particular flair for cooking. People have been humoring me, the way people always do. What am I thinking? Who am I trying to kid?

A TV commercial for a medical website ran regularly during the baseball playoffs. Assorted people tell us about the emergencies that have them consulting the site, and one young man in a chef's coat says, exuberantly, "FIRST I burned my arm, THEN I fell backwards and hit my head!"

Will I require stitches?

"I've always longed for adventure
To do the things I've never dared...
And here I'm facing adventure....
Then why am I so scared?"*

My mother (baking all her life) quizzes me: "I've always wondered about the difference between salted and unsalted butter. I always buy salted, but sometimes the recipe calls for unsalted. Should I be making some adjustment?" She's my touchstone for making perfect oatmeal raisin cookies and her pie crust is always the flakiest. Why is she asking me for advice? I haven't even started school yet!

And I don't want to become be "The Person Who Cooks" and have to cook everything, all the time. I love eating out, and being invited over for dinner and I don't want people to assume that I'd rather be in charge in the kitchen. Or that I should be, by virtue of expertise. "Come to the table": music to my ears. But some friends already make those self-deprecating kind of comments (even before I made the cooking school decision). "You'd have done a better job, I'm sure," or "I'm not as into cooking as you are, so I'll apologize in advance."

I have to dissuade them from going there. I'll just serve some soggy pizza.

* credit to Oscar Hammerstein II

BROTHER JOACHIM'S COOKIES

These come from the San Damiano Retreat House in Danville, California. My mom mixes up a quadruple batch, in the Big Bowl, and wraps 3” diameter tubes of dough in freezer paper. She always has frozen cookies ready to slice and bake at a moment’s notice. On her copy of the recipe, in my dad's handwriting, is the note “Good with beer”.

13-1/2 ounces softened butter (3 sticks + 1-1/2 tablespoons)
1-1/2 cups + 2 tablespoons brown sugar, packed
2 cups granulated sugar
4 eggs
1-1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 cups + 2 tablespoons all purpose flour
2-1/4 teaspoons salt
2-1/4 teaspoons baking soda
1-1/2 teaspoons cinnamon
4 cups quick cooking oatmeal
1 cup chopped nuts
3/4 cup raisins

In a large bowl, cream butter and sugars. Add eggs and vanilla; mix well.

In a separate bowl, sift together flour, salt, baking soda and cinnamon. Add to butter mixture and mix well.

Stir in oatmeal, nuts, and raisins. Form dough into logs, 2” to 3” in diameter. Refrigerate until firm. (Or wrap well and freeze until needed.)

To bake cookies, preheat oven to 375°. Slice cookies into 1/4” discs. Place about 2” apart on greased cookie sheets. Bake for about 15 minutes, or until golden brown. Allow cookies to cool on cookie sheets for about 10 minutes, then remove to a rack and allow to cool completely.

[I know I should tell you how many cookies this recipe makes. But I got it from my mom, and she got it from the cook at the retreat house, and her notes don't include the quantity, either. Tell you what. I'll make the cookies one of these days, and then update this note. Or you could make them! and then let me know. They're good with beer.]

The Other Part of the Equation

At Preludio in Cortona, the tall young Egyptian waiter beams as he lights the candle on the table and pours our complimentary Italian sparkling wine. He grows stern and serious when I ask if I can keep the menu at the table for a moment. I need to remember what we're eating: "fonduta di fromaggi al tartufo nero di Norcia" and "medaglioni di anatra al miele e peperocino", duly noted in my little Florentine-paper notebook. "Why are you needing this?" he asks. "You will take our food and open your own restaurant?" "Oh, no," David says, "she's a writer."

As a present to myself, I took a great travel writing seminar on Saturday at The Writing Salon in Berkeley. Lisa Alpine led the workshop, which I thought would be only tangentially related to my long term goal of culinary writing. It turns out that travel publications are often looking for articles with a culinary focus. "Business travelers love to eat," she pointed out. "It's their only distraction." (I know this from personal experience, actually.) Most valuably, Lisa encouraged us who didn't want to be "half-time-sort-of-writers" to make an attitude adjustment: the definition of writer is NOT that you are making a living from it. "You need to start flexing this muscle now!" "This is your business!" "Rejection is GOOD! It proves that you are in business."

To facilitate the business of writing, I rearranged the books in my office - well, it's the guestroom when the boys are home but it's becoming my space. The desk is a drafting table, and high, so I can gaze out into the urban forest while I work. I moved all the cooking books and references and magazines to the shelves closest at hand -- all the Fine Cooking magazines, and the Oxford Companion to Food, and the Food Lover's Companion. I also moved a book that David gave me, called Becoming a Chef. It was a Christmas present. In 1995.

The Things I Worry About (Sunday morning)

After breakfast this morning, I picked up the dishes from the table, even though David usually does the clearing.

"I have to start practicing."
"Practicing what?"
"Clearing dishes -- that's one area where I'll be at a disadvantage."

(Part of the curriculum includes a stint in The Careme Room, the CCA's on-site restaurant. Before I'm finished with the program, I'll work both in the restaurant kitchen, and as a server in the "front of the house" (dining room). I've never worked as a waitress. Up to now, I've considered that a good thing. And I'm not especially, well, coordinated.)

David said, "I was just thinking that. I hope there's an allowance for broken plates."

Birthday Plans? This Year, No Bridge Involved.

We rarely go out to dinner, which is one of the reasons I've loved having a job that requires travel. It's been our habit to make a big deal on our birthdays and our anniversary, when our destination is almost always the City. The first restaurant that felt like "ours" was Joyce Goldstein's wonderful Square One (sadly long gone), and we've enjoyed many special evenings at Rubicon and at Hawthorne Lane. We've tried Boulevard and Town Hall and One Market and Azie and Bacar and A16 and La Folie and many others, but there's something about returning to a restaurant - it can't be your favorite unless you go more than once.

This year, after the Italian extravaganza (same word in Italian as in English!! Who knew?), and with my upcoming reduction in "billable hours", I don't need (or deserve) indulging, so we're sticking closer to home for the birthday dinner. We've got reservations at Rivoli in Berkeley, a restaurant that's been on the Chronicle Top 100 Restaurants list for six years in a row, and we've never been. Up to this point, it's been too East Bay for a birthday. But EVERYONE says that the portabello fritters are amazing, and so in the guise of "going low key" this year, I'll get to try a place that I've been eying for a long time.

What I REALLY want for my birthday is for David to oil my desk chair.

Everybody Wants to Do It!

This week and last, friends and colleagues have been responding to the official notice of my "career change". Phil, one of my clients, acknowledged how challenging the last year has been: "Now you'll have a chance to think about us when you're whacking off chicken heads." Phil and a cleaver - connected in my mind now, and for all time. I don't know if there are chicken heads in the curriculum, but there's definitely a session on butchery.

Michael left a long voice mail, saying, "I like cooking as a HOBBY, not serious like you. I hope you like it and can make a living at it. I guess that's the point." Tessie said, "I've always wanted to go to cooking school. But it's so... much... WORK!" But the thing is, making a living, the work - those don't feel like obstacles to me.

Greg was envious: "I would love to talk to you about career changes. Between you and me, high tech is burning me out." Julianne (always with the hip handbag, and little kitten heels even with jeans) told me that she'd spent the past weekend watching two years' worth of Project Runway episodes, and the part that she found most compelling: "They all spend their days working with such creative people! I work with engineers all day."

And that's exactly the frame of mind that I'm in: I would rather do virtually anything related to cooking, including peeling potatoes, and deveining shrimp, and washing pots, than what I do most of the time, during most work days.

Coat: S. Pants: M. Shoes: 8-1/2.

The uniform fitting was totally painless, except that I wore lace-up boots that I had to remove before I could try on the pants. I clearly don't go clothes shopping enough anymore to think through the try-on attire. I'll have to hem up the pants, and not gain any weight.

I overheard a counselor telling a prospective student (her mother in tow) that as a pastry student, she'll have her name embroidered on her coats. Apparently Culinary Arts students have to wear plastic name tags. I'm slightly miffed by this.

Seriously, I have always always wanted a chef's coat, and looked at them longingly in every season's Williams Sonoma catalog, but it seemed somehow wrong to wear one. Like wearing a stethoscope around your neck if you're not a doctor. Or wearing a shirt that says "Hank" over the pocket when you don't work in a gas station. But now! It's not only okay, it's REQUIRED.

Last night, I dreamed that four of my teeth fell out, and I was carrying them around in my pocket.

In today's mail, I got an invite to the first day of school: "Mandatory Orientation", where I will "meet classmates, hear from the CAA staff, pick up official class schedule, receive textbooks and uniforms." "Tool kit will be dispersed the following day." (Don't they mean "dispensed"?) I also got a checklist to review, another slap-upside-the-head reminder that I'll be the Old Girl in the class. Along with paperwork requirements, I'm encouraged to "secure housing", "open a local checking account", and "have a plan for getting to school on time every day".

Maybe I can embroider my own name on my coats.

School Update

I have an appointment next Monday to meet with JF, my admissions counselor, and have my uniform fitted. I talked to him yesterday and he was delightfully inquisitive about our trip to Italy. He told me that I've been scheduled for the 7 am to 12 pm class slot (the other shifts are 12:30 to 5:30 pm and 6 to 11 pm). I plan to take BART into the City most days, and do some sort of part time work, so I was really hoping for the morning schedule. David's not so thrilled about an earlier alarm. Everyone will just have to deal. We'll be up early, like farmers. (Or bakers.)

Several people have asked about the entrance requirements at CCA, especially after my boss sent out an email congratulating me for being "accepted for admission to the prestigious California Culinary Academy." Frankly, you need a high school diploma and the financial wherewithal to pay the outrageous tuition. There's no knife skills test, no multiple choice questions about the difference between braising and sauteing. There is a 10 minute quiz, along the lines of an IQ test, and I imagine it's useful in determining if a candidate's English comprehension is adequate. And I was interviewed. The counselors are probably prepared to weed out food-obsessed serial killers, or kids who are only there because their mother made them apply. ("Cooking school or the Marine Corps -- you decide!")

JF advised me to bring a roll-aboard-sized suitcase for my first day, November 13 -- to transport all my supplies! Megan asked if I had to take my supply list and go "back to school" shopping, but no, they're "included". (Note: not "free".)

Dinner with Luca, Erica, and Irena

Our rented farmhouse came complete with caretakers who live in a separate house on the property. Luca is "like a park ranger," and Erica works in a day care, and they have a charmingly shy 2-year-old daughter, Irena. Erica speaks pretty fluent English and helped us get settled, told us where to go grocery shopping, and provided the telephone from which we could get insanely slow 4800 bps dial-up Internet access (required for A's playoff progress updates). Luca took us on a field trip, a short walk from the houses to visit his beehives. We watched (from a safe distance) while he opened the hives, inspected the bees, and "fed them" with a big syringe of a protein- and vitamin-laden liquid. He also cooked us dinner.

We walked across our gravel drive in the light of the nearly full moon, arriving at 8pm with a couple of bottles of Brunello purchased in Montalcino, and a bottle of white wine from San Gimingnano. We sat around their large dining table in one of two rooms on their bottom floor -- down a couple steps and through a heavy wooden door was a second room from which special toys were retrieved when Irena needed a distraction. A narrow circular stair led to up to the rest of the house, presumably bedrooms and bath. Luca, the cook in the family, operates out of a tiny galley-like kitchen area that would be familiar to Manhattanites. Instead of counter space, he has a large wood-topped table, and instead of cabinets, dried goods are stored on open shelves and in baskets. The room also contains a chest freezer, a wall-mounted 19" television, a large couch, a child's table and chairs, a dish hutch, and the aforementioned dining room table, which was set with a gold-colored tablecloth and Cortona's noted ceramic tableware. We drank wine from mugs. We started with cheese: two kinds of pecorino (ewe's milk cheese), one fresh and soft, one aged, drizzled with chestnut honey from Luca's bees, and accompanied by a spoonful of onion jam, a local product made from special onions grown near Perugia, studded with plump raisins. There was bread. Erica translated while Luca praised the quality of the wine we brought.

Our second course was "spinach gnudi", "ravioli filling without the pasta," as Erica described it. We each got a shallow bowl filled with four green fist-sized dumplings, sitting in a pool of fresh tomato sauce and dusted with parmagiano. Luca was generous in sharing his cooking instructions (enquiring minds need to know). The gnudi were made of boiled spinach, drained dry and mixed with ricotta, egg, and nutmeg; they're shaped and dusted with flour, then boiled "until they raise". The sauce was made with fresh tomatoes, picked just prior to our visit, and peeled using a food mill, then warmed briefly with garlic, basil and olive oil. Though I kept telling myself that I needed to eat every bite, because they were delicious and I needed to be polite and, well, I was in ITALY, I could only finish two and a half of the four rich dumplings, knowing there was more food to come. Erica smiled when she removed my plate and said, "Lunch for tomorrow''.

Luca set a large cooking pot in the center of the table, and began ladling big portions of wild boar stew. When I asked if he caught the boar himself, he nodded and took down a plaque hanging over the interior door. The hand carved wood plaque was embellished with two pair of curved tusks, the largest about seven inches long. The plaque was engraved "128 kg / 2005". Luca shot the largest boar of the season. David said "I guess that's preferable to a whole head on the wall", and Erica made a facial expression easily translated as "Over my dead body."

The stew was dark brown, generously sauced, and very tender. Luca described his preparations, which included overnight marinating in water and wine with carrots and onions, then long slow cooking with tomatoes and more wine, carrots and onions. Erica served large slices of vegetable tart: sauteed eggplant and peppers, mixed with ricotta, eggs, and "provolone picante" in a puff pastry crust, mouth-meltingly tender and delicious with the boar sauce.

In order to get her to eat bites of stew, Luca tempted Irena with crunchy cheetos-like snacks. While she wasn't overly excited by the wild boar, the rest of us had seconds.

We ended dinner with slices of dense chocolate cake, baked in a very elaborately shaped bundt pan, and Luca poured shots of nocino, liqueur he made with walnuts, from a glass gallon jug into little gold-trimmed glasses.

We left as Irena got close to a late-night meltdown, but not before singing "Itsy Bitsy Spider" in both English and Italian. Luca insisted on giving us the pot of leftover stew for lunch the next day. We left overwhelmed and overstuffed, and very very satisfied.

As she showed us out the door, Erica said "You see why I have married him. It's not because he is handsome."

The Right Tools...

As the daughter and granddaughter of woodworkers, as the daughter and granddaughter of seamstresses, I grew up hearing "Use the right tool for the job." In the kitchen, the potential tool continuum extends from the bare necessities to cabinets full of single-purpose gadgets -- but what's the correct balance? Or the minimum? (Obviously, "too much" is when you need to store your equipment in room(s) outside the kitchen...)

I have to admit to struggling a bit with the implements available in our Cortona farmhouse. The knives, especially, lacked... well, TIPS, for example.

I mean, they were sharp and everything, but, well, they were SHORT: somewhat less than the length intended by their manufacturer.

I remember an episode of In Julia's Kitchen, where one of Julia Child's guest chefs stirred her several stove top pots and pans with tablespoons. Julia made one of her oh so polite yet snippy comments about "you young chefs" not using the range of implements available to them. My recent two weeks of lightweight vacation cooking reinforced my instinctive rule of thumb: a competent cook can do pretty much anything with a couple of sharp knives (tips recommended), and a pair of tongs. A couple of tablespoons will do, in a pinch...

We ate well, regardless.

"Che si sposano bene?"

...or, "What marries well?"

While David was taking pictures, I was tasting gelato, every chance I got.

I actually began the Frozen Confection Sampling Project on Aegina, the last stop on our one day "Greek Islands" ferry adventure. The island is known for its pistachio production; it's stark and rocky and covered with pistachio groves. So I snared a kilo bag of nuts (which were the salty snack of choice, in Tuscany), and had an ice cream, as recommended by our cruise director. The ice cream was bright green, studded with tiny bits of nuts, and totally luscious... with almost a hint of cherry flavor. Ah, but that was only the start.

In Montepulciano, I tried my first authentic Italian-made gelato: "ricotta e fiche" (ricotta and fig): pure white tanginess ribboned with honey-colored fig sauce. This seemed to be an entirely different fruit from the one that fills the Newtons -- no seeds, for a start. Fantastic.

In Cortona, I tried the local take on "pistacchio" -- this was an unfortunate Gerber's pea color, but the nut flavor and the smooth texture were unbeatable.

After a couple of purchases, I stumbled on to the important methodology involved in gelato eating: the "marriage". Most gelaterias charge the same price for two flavors on a cone as they do for one. Gelato is softer than ice cream and the server uses a flat scoop to pile the stuff into and on your cone. When you order two flavors, they are slathered side by side. The marrying question comes into play here. In Siena, I experimented with zabaglione and pistacchio: the sweet liqueur undertones married well with the nuttiness. Later the same day, I tried crema and amarena. Crema is like vanilla without the vanilla, and if that sounds like blandness on a cone, it's hardly that. It's the essence of sweet cream, and went perfectly with amarena, which is a dark slightly sour Italian cherry. Marriage is a cool thing.

But then, when I returned to Montepulciano, I had to have the ricotta e fiche again. It's sort of already married, anyway.

In Arezzo, I followed a somewhat confectionary theme, combining cantucci vin santo (flavored with sweet wine, and containing small bits of almond biscotti) and ferraro roche, milk chocolate and candy chunks (without the foil, of course). In San Gimignano, the first cone of the day was "tutti di frutta", deep red and sorbet-like, and a creamy peachy "pescha" (photo above). Before the trip out of town, I had ace (orange) and another take on pistacchio. The orange was the highlight of the project: intensely orange but creamy.

In Florence (where the small cone ran almost 3 euros, instead of the 1,80 I'd become accustomed to paying), I had a combination of "mezzanotte", a vanilla/chocolate/cookie blend, along with the amarena. Crema, in Siena, was the better partner to the cherries. A final trip to Cortona meant one last stab at a strong marriage: cioccolato and meringhe (which was crema studded with tiny chunks of white toblerone). The chocolate is amazingly intense.

I must make another trip to Italy, if only to continue to try new flavors and combinations. It's the search for the perfect marriage, and if it doesn't work out today, you can try again tomorrow. Or even later this afternoon.