Something like Ribollita

I'm back! Back to the blog, back to Italy, and finally back to normal life again. I know it's been a while since the last entry and much has gone on. I enjoyed a quick trip home where I was lucky enough to see many of you at least once, then experienced another travel disaster coming back to Italia: it was 30 hours of missed planes, trains and automobiles. I arrived in Florence a little after 2 in the morning, threw my bags down and went out for a drink before sleeping for 14 hours. We celebrated New Year's Eve at Andrea's and had a great time, then I headed to Rome for a quick trip to pick up my cousins and brother. The four of us terrorized Florence (with much help from others) until Emily and Mary had to head back to the U.S. 

Buon Anno!

Ciao Roma

Family and Enzo (who would like to be family)

And then there were two... Andy stayed with me for 11 more days. I had such a great time introducing him to my Florentine friends (both locals and transplants) and showing him around. However, I was also happy when I had my apartment back to myself. Getting back to normal life has meant dedicating myself to work, exercising, reading and getting back into a routine. I feel completely refreshed and have a new outlook on what I want to be doing in the coming year. For me 2011 will be about focusing on work - for current jobs as well as starting my own tour/trip planning business. It will be about taking advantage of all the wonderful things at my fingertips including studying the history of Italy and art history, really diving into the language, and learning how to cook Tuscan style. And starting tomorrow, enjoying being a young, lucky and healthy 27.

Beginning with the cooking, my first tries in the kitchen came from Andrea who taught me how to make his famous pizza dough and who gave me excellent directions on eggplant parmesan, both of which I tried out with my family while home. I think I did alright. My latest attempt was ribollita, or Tuscan bread soup. You can call it minestrone or poor man's soup, but whatever you want to call it, it's delicioso. Especially this week because I have been feeling under the weather, I want nothing else, only my warm bread soup. After ordering it at restaurants all week, on Wednesday I decided that I would try it on my own. I watched a few videos on youtube so I would know what to pick up at the store on my way home. Each video was different, but basically it's just vegetables and stale bread. After stocking up, I got into the kitchen and went to work. I once told my mother that anyone can cook if they simply can read and follow directions. I have in recent years found this to be blindly ignorant. Cooking takes a lot of practice, a dash of creativity and slice of raw talent.

After missing three main ingredients and adding my own flair in the form of red wine and sage, I had something that I was a bit fearful of what was bubbling on the stove. I also had two brave souls who were there to help me test it. Although it was not exactly the ribollita from Il Santo Bevitore, it was actually quite good. My seal of approval came from Andrea, the chef, who told me he was very surprised because it was actually very good (as proven by his three helpings). Here is the video I based my soup on: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2d4OjLIinMo **

I am hoping that 2011 turns out like the ribollita: a lot of different things going on at once, but with time to stew, might turn into something pretty good.

**My ribollita: missing cabbage and celery; my bread was moist instead of stale; I added garlic, red wine, rosemary, sage, broccoli, and instead of diced tomatoes mine was a tomato sauce with small diced pieces.