A Slow Morning

The kitchen was relatively quite when I arrived and only two of the typical four main chefs were there, Giuseppe (who they call Pepe which means pepper) and Giovanni. Giuseppe was in his corner preparing the parsley and eggplant for the day, as he does every morning and Giovanni was making lunch for the staff and trimming a beautiful fillet mignon for later use. He used a very short, time-worn knife to trim the fat off the fillet and he preserved any little pieces that had meat on them to make ground beef later. It really impressed my how much care he (and everyone in general) took toward not wasting anything at all, especially meat and fish.

After he finished that he set to work on the frittata we were having for lunch. He put 25 eggs, good amount of salt, dried oregano and loads of grated parmesean into a large bowl. As he was doing that white onions and zucchini, some grated and some chopped, were cooking in a large pan. When they were good and brown he poured them into the bowl with the eggs and everything else and stirred it up. In a new pan with lots of olive oil on high heat he poured half the contents of the bowl and jostled it around a few times to make sure everything cooked evenly. After about a minute or so like he covered it and let it sit for 3-4 minutes. Then he poured a little bit of olive oil along the outside and picked the pan up and rotated it to make sure the oil get to under every part. Then he went around with a narrow spatula to make sure that nothing was still stuck to the pan. He put the cover back on and took the pan off the stove. With a large cloth he covered the top and flipped the whole thing over so the frittata ended up on the cover. Then he slowly slid it back into the pan to cook the over side. Looked pretty easy when he did it. That cooked for another three minutes or so and then he put a plate on top, took it off the stove and flipped it over so the whole thing was rested neatly on the plate. After that he grabbed another pan, poured in a good amount of olive oil, looked at me, looked at the second half of the eggs and said "Questo fai tu", basically "your turn" (You do this one), and then walked away.

I let the oil get good and hot and then timidly poured in the eggs and shook the pan around, at which point Giovanni came back and showed me where the hold the handle (all the way at the end) to get more leverage when you shake the pan. I got that part down pretty well and then covered the pan and let the eggs cook for a few minutes. When they were firming up I took the pan off the stove and grabbed the cloth and put it over my right hand, thinking that was how he did it. Of course I was wrong, on two points actually. First it should have been on my left hand, so my right hand (I'm a righty) would be free to flip the pan, and second that you put the cloth over the pan itself but make sure that it will cover your arm when you flip the pan so none of the hot oil drips on your arm. We got that straigtened out and I flipped it over with no problem and even managed to slide it back on to the pan, a little faster than Giovanni would have liked, but it worked nonetheless. A few minutes later it came off the stove and was ready to eat. It made a very nice side to pasta with tuna, onions and tomatoes that we had for lunch.

After we ate, an oddly quiet meal, I think largely because neither Lorenzo nor Roberto were there, Giuseppe showed me the beginnings of a few dessersts and pizza bread. I'm going back on Sunday night to see the end of the pizza and hopefully Giuseppe's Tiramisu.

On my way out of the restaurant I ran into Stephanie Levi who was having lunch with some friends and sat down for a brief chat and glass of house red before their appetizers came out. She gave me her copy of the "Miracle at St. Anna" which Spike Lee recently made into a movie and I am looking forward to reading.