life and love at le fate

ok, so i realize i'm being inconsistent, but i am now beginning to write in standard case because... my articles are being published on aur's website and it's a pain to reformat them all! yay! here is an account of my last, lovely adventure...

Sunday afternoon, my three housemates and I had the pleasure of spending a few hours in the kitchen with Andrea Consoli, the sous chef at Le Fate restaurant (www.lefaterestaurant.it).

It was the perfect day to be in, as outside the pouring rain was finally giving Rome its much-needed relief from the stagnant humidity that had plagued it the entirety of of the week.

Although I had suspected this from the brief chats I’d with Andrea previously, the first fifteen minutes alone solidified what an open, friendly, and honest person he is. I appreciated his blatant opinions throughout our conversations almost as much as his obvious passion for food and teaching that was revealed throughout the day.

The menu, which was a standard four courses, included ratatouille, risotto with radicchio and speck, saltimbocca, and biscuits called brutti ma buona (ugly but good.) I was completely thrilled with his choices and felt an elated sense of excitement as I put on my apron. We began with cleaning and chopping the vegetables for the ratatouille, a peasant dish that was important long before the animated movie that made it newly famous in the states (although I DO so love the movie... the rat, how adorable...) Andrea explained the reason why the vegetables chosen for ratatouille have remained the same for ages- firstly, because they include all the colors of the rainbow; and secondly, because they all, when cut into similarly-sized pieces, have about the same cooking time. He explained how ratatouille’s ingredients should not be experimented with, as many other vegetables (for instance, a tomato), would virtually disintegrate when baked in the oven for the amount of time necessary for a carrot to simply cook through. Another interesting fact about ratatouille we learned is that it should always be done in the oven. I had heard of it being done on the stove, and Andrea clarified for me that that process was used when making caponata, a sweet and sour Italian antipasto that is not quite as revered by the masses. After selecting our eggplant, onion, carrots, zucchini, potatoes, and peppers (red and yellow), we cut off their ends, washed them, and chopped them into cubes. All the while, Andrea snapped pictures of our hands-on learning experience. Next, we dumped our beauties into a large pan, adding extra virgin olive oil and the chef’s version of salt, which to us was basically chicken bouillon in paste form. No herbs-not even pepper! This was my first insight to the truly simple way that Andrea works-trusting the ingredients he has and doing only what is necessary to awaken their fantastic flavors.

While the ratatouille baked in the oven, we started on the other courses. Andrea educated us on the difference of speck and prosciutto-speck being the shoulder of the pig (which is usually smoked); while prosciutto, slightly more recognizable, comes from the leg. He insisted on us tasting slices of speck before assembling the saltimbocca (again, honoring one’s ingredients...) As we layered slices of beef, edamer cheese (a taste similar to that of swiss, without the holes), and speck to be topped with sage and held together with a toothpick, Andrea explained to us why we were using beef and not veal. Although Americans have a clear idea of veal as being an Italian ingredient (veal saltimbocca, veal marsala, veal with lemon sauce), it was never used in traditional Roman (as well as most Italian) cooking due to its price. This was very interesting to note, as it reminded me how often we put Italian (as well as French) cuisine on a fancy pedestal, when actually the people that erected it were very poor and could only work with what was easily available to them. Oh, how we stress ourselves out with the prospect of cooking a good meal from scratch...

We set aside our tiny, toothpick-speared bundles of joy and started to work on the risotto and biscuits. To begin the simple process of the risotto, we chopped the onions (during which I received a much-needed lesson on the ease of using a knife) and radicchio. The key, Andrea told us, is to cut on a slight outward angle and hold the ingredient with the thumb in back, which eliminates any chance of cutting off precious fingers. After putting to use our new knowledge, we poured extra virgin olive oil (one tablespoon per person as the standard guide) into the bottom of a frying pan and added the onions. In order cook them thoroughly while preventing them from becoming brown, we added a ladle or two of our home-made vegetable stock. The stock included simply of an onion with skins to achieve yellow color, a carrot or two, and a celery stick with its nutritious leaves attached, all boiled in water for fifteen minutes. After adding the stock, we covered the pan with another one (impromptu lid- who says fancy tools of any kind are necessary for great cooking!) and let them steam to perfection. When the onions were finished, we pureed them as to avoid any overwhelming textures and/or tastes when added with the rest of the creamy perfection of rice and vegetables. We returned the puree back to the pan and added the radicchio and speck, simmering together the beautiful flavors. After cooking the arborio in water and more stock (about fourteen minutes), we joined everything together in the pan with some finely grated pecorino.

Making the brutti ma buona biscuits, which have been Andrea’s favorite since childhood, was a very interesting experience. The cookies, which are comprised of only egg whites, powdered sugar, and hazelnuts, can be very testy depending on the weather, although delicious no matter what their consistency in the end. We whipped the egg whites in the stand-alone mixer (about the fanciest tool in the entire kitchen) as Andrea explained the delicate nature of the whites, and therefore the cookies as a whole. Once whipped to perfection (lovely peaks), we added, bit by bit, the powdered sugar. Here, we received another reason for the light-as-air consistency of the biscuits, as granulated sugar would be much to heavy to use considering the base of the egg whites. Once the sugar was completely incorporated, we added the hazelnuts, which immediately flattened the mixture. Not to worry, explained Andrea, for the beauty of using well-tempered whites is that once they are whipped properly, even after they are flattened, their consistency will lighten up again in the oven. The next step to completing the dessert was to cook this mixture on the stove in a non-stick pan. Inevitably, the bottom started to burn, which Andrea explained was a by-product of cooking egg whites, no matter how low the temperature on the stove. After we left the sweet, nutty substance to cool for a bit, we placed small spoonfuls of the batter on cookie sheets to bake in the oven for “sixteen or eighteen minutes.” In our case, this was fifteen due to the humidity. Through the window of the oven, we were able to see why these cookies translate to “ugly but good-” the composition of the dessert caused it to take on various rock-looking shapes, each one slightly different from the next and not necessarily worthy of front-page photography.

At this point, Andrea set our table for us (how lovely to have a beautiful, gourmet restaurant all to ourselves!) and we sat down to enjoy each other’s company while he put the finishing touches on the meal. We asked him to recommend for us a wine to drink, and he suggested Civitella Rosso, which is composed of 80% Merlot and 20% Montepulciano grapes and aged in oak barrels. The wine is made at the organic, family-owned, boutique winery of Sergio Mottura in Civitella D’Agliano, which is in Lazio (also the home of Roma). Andrea made a point to tell us that his wines were the best in the entire region, and of the choice few that he actually drank (how about a plug-www.motturasergio.it). It was possibly the best red I’ve ever had-the first thing I was reminded of was chocolate, due to the way the liquid filled my mouth and subsequently lingered for just long enough. It was warm, hearty, and fulfilling-the perfect compliment to the incredible meal we were about to eat.

As we leisurely enjoyed one of the most fantastic gastronomic experiences of our lives, my roommates and I couldn’t help but feel the urge to congratulate the chef on his work-even though he had done nothing but give us the tools to create the incredible things of beauty before us. We discussed the important lessons we’d learned: to have faith in the things already given to us; to embrace good food as a necessity rather than viewing it as an elitist priviledge, thereby widening our options for happiness; and to open our eyes to the possiblities around us, realizing that we too are capable of aiding in the revolution of food. And although it had occurred to us that day, as I write now, it seems imminently clear how these lessons apply not only to food but to life in general.

Thank you to Andrea, Melissa, Monica, and Saskya for such a lovely day. Shall we go on to spread the beauty of good food and grand company? Yes, yes we shall.