Almost a regular

Last week I went to the kitchen on both Tuesday and Thursday, both days were pretty slow with more chopping than anything else. Thursday, however, we did make suppli al tartufo, suppli are little rice balls covered in bread crumbs and then fried, tartufo is truffle. So little truffle rice balls, delicious. I am going to try them at home one of these days and will report on that when I get around to it, the process is rather long, although if you stop about a third of the way through you end up with truffle risotto.

Yesterday was by far my busiest day in the kitchen to date, so busy I did not have a moment to write anything down, as I normally do. The hour and a half before lunch were pretty typical, sorting, cleaning, chopping tomatoes, sorting, cleaning basil, peeling pile of shrimp, and peeling eggplants. Just before we went to sit down for lunch Giovanni was spreading out some rectangles of dough, he called me over and asked me to finish up. I said sure, thinking it couldn't be that hard. It wasn't, but there were a few details I missed. The first thing you have to do is smack the dough, really smack it, so that it will open up more easily. The first go around I didn't do this and the roller practically got stuck. There needs to be plenty of flour on the counter top or the dough sticks to it instead of spreading, and finally, you need to shake the flour off before sticking the dough in the oven. We stuck the 8 trays in the oven and sat down for lunch, which consisted of spaghetti with a tomato basil sauce, potatoes with pancetta and red onion and sauteed beefs strips. When lunch was done so was the bread. They large flat pieces were a sweeter dough, they're used for desserts.

I drained the basil while Antonio was still finishing up his lunch, with requisite two glasses of wine. He came into the kitchen and gave me a tub of mushrooms to clean and cut. When I started cutting and he came over to correct me. Not on my technique, but the size of my cuts. The stems cook more slowly than the tops so the should be thinner, not quite sure why he didn't tell me this the first time I cut mushrooms, but I guess better late than never.

While I was working on the mushrooms Alfredo was going to town on a massive tuna head. The amount of meat he can scrape off a fish is incredible. Every nook and cranny is completely emptied. The scraps he handed to me to cut into smaller cubes to be used in various pasta sauces. After the tuna was done he gave another chunk of fish, something white, maybe a snapper, and I cut that into cubes. While I was working the cutting board, things were starting to pick up in the rest of the kitchen as a larger lunch crowd than usual filtered in. When I was done with all the fish I turned around the Antonio started ordering me around. "Fai uno alle vongole" (Do one with clams - meaning - make a spaghetti alle vongole) "Mi prendi la crema di scampi per due" (Get me crema di scampi for two). For about 15 minutes things were a bit hectic, nothing like a full-on dinner rush, but still, we were moving. I actually put together a good number of dishes and even put a risotto on the plate with a nice dash of parsley on top for some color.

When the rush passed there were still a few things to be done. We were out of squid so I had to slice some up and the cook them (with olive oil, scallions and lots of white wine). Giovanni gave me a stack of eggplant to finely slice for frying later. Then a little clean up and we were out of there. The chefs have a two hour break in the middle of the day and don't like to waste any of it so they do not waste time once three o'clock rolls around.

I had not been in the kitchen at a busy time in a while, in fact the only time was when I first went months ago, and it was very different this time around. What back them seemed like total chaos with everyone doing a hundred different unrelated things at the same time, now seems much more ordered. Still chaotic, but in a logical way, like the streets of New York. Giovanni mans the main courses and hot appetizers while Antonio handles all the pastas, and the two of them work together incredibly well. Shouting back and forth about how much longer things need to cook, how long to wait on a main course after a pasta has gone out, handing things off to others when they need a hand, etc. I think it's a combination of my Italian improving and understanding more about how the kitchen works, but I can know follow an order from when it gets printed up (or a waiter just yells it out), know who has to get started on what and why, and what the finally plate should look like.

I still miss have a sport to play, but walking out of the kitchen covered in sweat after 5 hours of constant action is the closest I've come to getting that fix in awhile.