“Right now if I had to choose between my Italian lover Marco and Parmesan I’d choose Parmesan. He doesn’t mind. It’s Parmesan after all. Italian’s are rarely jealous if you choose food over them”
I don’t do romance. Having said that when you have an Italian lover a romantic dinner is a non-negotiable, even if he doesn’t finish work till 10pm and the restaurant is probably going to be full of couples having the same conversation about feeling coerced into feeling romantic. An Italian restaurant loves a 11pm booking. They welcome you with open arms and a knowing smile, Italian time. My Anglo-Saxon stomach has reduced to a trembling prune but my eyes conceal this with a bright eagerness to please. This is starvation to anyone who is not Italian. I take the hug. Maddalena is a family restaurant that knocks out tremendous wood fired oven pizzas and homemade pasta. My Italian lover lives across the road. He can smell the pizza from his bathroom. He rattles on in Italian to the waitress who shrugs a lot and smiles and then shrugs some more. The tables are all blotched by red wine stains and feather like shavings of Parmigiano-Reggianon. We were here at the tail end of a busy Valentine’s day. The place is all ours now except for the old Italian father snoring in the corner. I can see the point of a 11pm dinner. It’s very civilized. Damn it, I even feel a faint ripple of romance coming over me. He’s won again.
The first dish he made me when we were dating was Bresaola Carpaccio. Bresaola is a lean dried salted beef from the Valtellina, a long Alpine valley in the Lombardy region of Northern Italy. Pronounced breh-ZOW-lah. I’d read somewhere that Bresaola was made from depressed ponies but he disputed this with a fierceness (it’s not like I pushed his mother off a cliff) that made me think perhaps I was right. He made it clear in no uncertain terms that Bresaola can also be made from venison or horse meat, grass-fed, trimmed of all fat and then rubbed with salt and spices before being hung to air-dry for several months. The spices vary, pepper, juniper berries, cinnamon, cloves. The end product is far less fatty than prosciutto, and a bit firmer, with a deep red colour and delicate, aromatic flavour.
So Bresaola Carpaccio. Let me recount the ways. Start by arranging slices of Bresaola like flower petals on a white plate. Then drizzle with some extra-virgin olive oil, a squeeze of fresh lemon, and make a small pile of fresh arugula (rocket) in the center. Top it all with some shavings of aged Parmigiano-Reggianon.
I love Parmesan cheese. I often sit in bed and munch on a triangle of Parmigiano-Reggianon and wash it down with a bottle of Rioja. It’s my winter remedy for everything from the common cold to suicidal ideation. Do try it at home. I wondered why I loved it so much and then I discovered of all the cheeses Parmesan has the highest fat content. Ah yes, just another obsession that kills me. I eat lightning fast. If you’ve read my blog over the years you’ll know why (my mother starved me when I was a child). I eat a triangle of Parmesan in minutes, sometimes in seconds come mid-winter. It’s a triangle shape for easy munching and possibly for easy grating and shaving. I’m only guessing. Google it yourself (I’m devouring a triangle and a bottle of Rioja Alta 890 Gran Reserva 2005 as we speak and can’t help you). Right now if I had to choose between my Italian lover Marco and Parmesan I’d choose Parmesan. He doesn’t mind. It’s Parmesan after all. Italian’s are rarely jealous if you choose food over them. It’s crystalline, grainy texture makes my cheeks prickle and throb. When you wash it down with Rioja the sharpness is immediately dulled, and the fruity nutty flavours explode and you can feel a slight burning sensation in your sinuses. The first recorded reference to Parmesan, in 1254, documents that a noble woman from Genoa traded her house for the guarantee of an annual supply of 53 pounds of cheese produced in Parma. Today my Italian lover tomorrow my house.
I look at him and then open my phone to read a description of how Bresaola is made. I read aloud “Bresaola is aged two or three months until it becomes hard and turns a dark red, almost purple colour. It is lean and tender with a sweet musty smell” This is an accurate description of my dinner companion I realise. We acknowledge the coincidence, exchanging a curled lip.
“Season to taste with salt and pepper and serve. You could also add some thinly sliced white truffles. Alternatively, you can add small, sliced marinated mushrooms”
He snarls at the suggestion of truffles and now opens his phone. He reads aloud in strange English Italian.
“A strict trimming process is essential to give the unique flavour. The meat loses up to 40% of its original weight during ageing” he points at me and laughs.
Who said romance is dead?