Here a few things that we have made in the past week. Time to eat something healthy, fresh and it has to taste great. At the market Orlando suggested we try tomatoes stuffed with tuna, mayonnaise, hard boiled egg and some chopped olives. He selected some ripe ones and within the hour we were feasting on them. One of the benefits is no dishes to wash. Recipe for this dish is to add enough mayo and olives until it "looks good" according to Orlando's mother.
Stuffing things....well the yellow peppers and eggplant looked good so we bought a couple for dinner. Ground pork and beef with garlic, onions, bread crumbs some tomato sauce, add some parsley and top with cheese. You guessed it, add enough of everything until it "looks good". Bake until the peppers are done.
At the market we have seen trucks that are fully equipped to keep things refrigerated or set up to cook on site. Refrigerated ones have all types of cheese or the fresh fish. Surprising on how well these rigs are set up. The trucks travel throughout the region going to the weekly markets. Our prawns came from this truck.
One of my favorites is the truck with roasted chicken, fried potatoes and an assortment of other taste tempting goodies. The chickens come in two sizes 5€ or 6€ cooked and ready to eat.
A small chicken is good for a couple of lunches. Tastes good and zero dishes to wash. No picture as the chicken was eaten when I remember about the camera. Here is the next best thing a shot of the truck.
We have had fresh fruit all summer but now new things are being harvested. The apples are crisp and full of flavor, melons are unbelievable and we buy a couple every week, figs are sweet and we may try to make a pizza with them. A few varieties of pears are now ripe and these are good with marscapone cheeses on them.
Sometimes you have to treat yourself to a dish we made in Canada, Prawns Fra Diavolo. The Saturday market has a fish vendor with a huge selection of fish and shellfish. We bought a half kilo of prawns for 5.00€ to make this dish. I do not think this is too much for the two of us. This dish is a bit more time consuming as the prawns had to be shelled and deveined. It was very hot today so I did not mind as my hands were in cold water for this job. Prawns over rice and a glass of rose wine and then out for a gelato on a date with my friend. Bonus is we had enough for dinner the next night.
They say that food brings people together and this was true on Sunday night. This week I was finally able to connect with my cousin Adriano. The phone number that I had was wrong. Tried searching for him on the Internet but nothing showed up. Almost by accident I found that he lives about 15km from our apartment. Last time I saw him was 35 years ago when we went out for dinner with my Uncle, Aunt, Adriano, his wife Nerina and my cousin Elisabetta. That dinner was a high point of our first trip to Europe.
I phoned Adriano on Friday and his warm reception made me feel welcome. We talked about a variety of things and planned to get together for a pizza within the next few days.
Sunday was a rewarding day as I received a phone call from Elisabetta. My memory of her is the young lady that took us on a tour of Venice with my uncle. Now she has two daughters and we will be going to see them play in a musical recital in a couple of weeks. Adriano had also called and asked if we were free for dinner, of course we were! Plan was to take the train to the station close to his home, mother nature decided that it would be a good night to have the biggest rain storm we have seen. The street in front of the apartment looked like a river so plan B had to be used. Adriano called and said he would come to our apartment, thank you very much.
A short drive to his home were we saw Nerina. Danna remembered that Nerina's eyes were so bright and alive, they still are today. We talked about family and looked at some pictures then it was off to dinner.
It felt very confortable being with them. After dinner it was back to their home we talked about our children. They told us that their daughter Valentina is getting married on October 6th. We were honored to be invited to her wedding.
So much to talk about that before we knew it the night was over. No problem, that just means we will be getting together again very soon.
Yummy food, as always! Hey, I don't remember seeing any pictures of the front of your building, or maybe I just missed them. Can you take a photo so I can imagine you standing there?!
ReplyDelete