Girls Day in Florence

It has been another whirlwind weekend for us in Italy.

Saturday morning Morgan. Sarah and I went to Florence, getting on the train late morning. We are heading there for a girls day of shopping and lunch. We arrived and after a short walk through Florence got to our lunch destination, Cibreo. Sarah has taken most of the interns here since she arrived, and there is no doubt why. From the first sip of Prosecco to the last little bit of dessert  we scraped off the plate we loved it.  Then it was some shopping… which it was so nice to have only 3 women trying to shop rather then having our whole household, sorry guys but it’s true.  

Before leaving Florence we had one more stop to make, once again Sarah does her best to introduce the interns to the World's Greatest Hot Chocolate. We stopped briefly at Rivoire, each of us got one and without a doubt the richest, darkest hot chocolate I have ever had!!! Then we grabbed the train back home, after which we had a bit of a disappointing dining experience which I don’t want to get into….

Let's move on to Sunday!

Susan had made us reservations at Dario’s Steak House for 1pm, none of us had been to his Steak house yet, including Sarah. I have talked about his restaurant where we have burgers, but this was a communal table dining experience where we would have four courses of his beef. This is one of his signatures, the same beef cuts he served at the Outstanding the Fields event.  The table is the middle in the room, and then in the middle on one side of the room they have two large wood burning grills. Then in the center of the table they place all of the MEP for the meal, a large wood board of BEEF! You watch them work, grilling, slicing the beef, and then walk around the table and serve it right on your plate. It also comes with bread, vegetables, tuscan beans, baked potato and Dario’s delicious house wine.

Something struck me about this meal, as first off Dario came up to talk and cut the Bistecca Fiorentina our last steak, the highlighting steak of the meal. Afterwards I noticed he was walking around looking at the room, making sure the guest are happy, his staff were doing what they were suppose to be doing, like most chefs do. The thing was he looked as happy as anyone sitting at the table - genuinely happy and so proud watching the success of another service, seeing the happiness of everyone sitting at the table chatting, visiting, eating.  I am sure he has done this meal a hundred times, yet still walks through the room glowingly happy!

We are doing a Culinary week at Petraia and Susan has organized a week of classes, dinners and lunches. So we will have guests staying with us all week enjoying each and every event. When you get to stay somewhere for a week, you meet the people who are with you in the classes and get to know all of the staff in the kitchen, and experience everything Petraia has to offer it makes it so much more enjoyable.  It will be a busy week for everyone at Petraia but it will be fun!!! Will keep you posted…

At Rivoire enjoying the unbelievable hot chocolate

It's all about the beef at Dario's

The kitchen team at Dario's

A Few Random Thoughts

I have been doing some reading since I have been here, whenever I can grab a quiet moment in our busy household. I gave myself some time tonight to sit down with a couple of books, my recipe notebook and a few cups of tea. 

It has been so nice to lose yourself in a cookbook, but also since I have been here I have been downloading books on my Kobo (amazing you can travel with an entire book store, but not add any extra weight) mostly chef/food related biographies. I will be mid-chapter or mid-sentence and think there it is - that is the reason I am proud to be a cook and why I take such pride in putting on my chef jacket. When you read about any chefs experience they all have different things that humble them, which is the fun part about this kind of reading. 

You know how everyone has there favorite book, it might sit on your bookshelf and some times you forget to revisit it as often as you feel you should?  Today I said hello to one of my all time favorite cookbooks, one of my very first... "The French Laundry" Thomas Keller.  Morgan had borrowed it from Susan, and as I was finishing one of the cookbooks I was reading, I picked it up and started flipping through the pages I remember so well from my early days in Culinary School when I still trying to perfect a bruinoise. Back then flipping though those white pages at the technique, skill and creativity that went into each plate, excited simply by the endless possiblities of what food had to offer. I got that same excitment today when I flipped open the book.  I began to read and wanted to share a few thoughts from this amazing book...

"There is no such thing as perfect food just the idea of it, then the real purpose of striving toward perfection becomes clear:to make people happy" Thomas Keller, French Laundry Page 2

 

"What I love about these braised items is that they're not just saute-and-serve. The process behind them requires thought on the part of the cook, and technique to create something more then what you started with" 

-Thomas Keller, French Laundry Page 186

 

"A cook sauteing a rabbit loin, working the line on a Saturday night, a million pans going, plates going out the door, who took that loin a little too far, doesn't hesitate, just dumps it in the garbage and fires another. Would that cook, I wonder, have let his attention stray from that loin had he killed the rabbit himself? No."

-Thomas Keller, French Laundry Page 205

 

So in a our busy lives it it easy to forget to pick up that favorite book or cookbook. Remember to take the time, pull it off the shelf and be inspired!

Ciao
 

Fall is for Inspiration

The weather has finally turned from the 30 plus degree weather, that left us coming home from grape harvest with sunburns like mid July in the Okanagan. Now in the mornings we see our breath as we head out the door at 7:30am but by the mid day it is still a comfortable 24 degrees and with the sun shining you can still take off the sweater and still stay warm. Welcome Fall!

We have been without the internet for the last week off and on thus the reason I haven't written this week so far. It has been a good week at Petraia, we have completed grape harvest this week. Now all the grapes have been sent down to the cantina. It has been a very hot summer in Tuscany with very little rain so the grapes suffered a little bit as a result effecting juice acidity etc. But we all have to make the best of what Mother Nature gives us. It has been a busy week for Marco Panichi overseeing things at the cantina, as the remainder of the grapes were being picked. Hopefully this week we will make it down to the cantina to see that side of Petraia's wine making process.
 

It's October 19th today I am sitting upstairs writing with the smell of risotto filling the apartment, and with music echoing from downstairs as the girls are busy in the kitchen. It is 8pm and has been dark for at least an hour and we avoid opening the door from the cold air. It's days like this that I find myself even more so inspired, fall reminds us about comfort food... in the culinary world translation: braising season, friends and spending time in doors, and BIG BOLD red wines.

 

Since my last blog seeming like ages ago, I do apologize for that. I have turned another page in my life as I have just celebrated my 27th birthday last week. But age not internet has been the reason it has been that long since my last blog. 

I found myself this year on my birthday away from the family I usually share cake with, the room-mate and best friend that I usually dine with,  and instead I was world away sitting at a table with 5 friends at 10:30am eating breakfast and mimosas. Then we were off to Petraia for work, where Susan was generous to give me a bottle of Nocino a Walnut Liqueur I had bottled the week before. It will be coming home with me, for friends and family reading this interested to try it. Then Susan handed me a box and said "This is from your mom and step dad."  My mom had called and arranged to have gift for me on my birthday of a bottle of wine. I was so touched, thanks mom! We went out on the Saturday night had a wonderful dinner with team from Petraia to celebrate both my birthday and Cecillia (one of the girls from Petraia) birthday and the best part was looking at the table of coworkers, their kids, friends, all these 20+ people sitting around laughing enjoying the company above and beyond all. It was a great birthday!!

This past weekend was great with Susan and Micheal taking us out for lunch on Saturday. To Da Delfina it is the hills outside of Florence. It was amazing to hear Susan talking about the history of this place. It was a windy drive that took us about an hour and half to get to from Petraia. But as we were standing outside the restaurant, she pointed out we had followed rivers all the way here that started at Petraia. Amazing that these narrow roads looking out to vineyards and valleys, there was a water the flowed all the way from Petraia. It was a great meal true with traditional Tuscan food. Much like a lot of meals in Italy it started with Prosecco, ended with Espresso and plates were passed back and forth across the table so everyone could try everything. It was a great lunch, and then a nice a walk that followed helped digest all the food. Thank you!

 

I has been a busy week for me in Italy and once again I will try to not let it be so long in between my blogs. One month left to go and I will be home, where has the time gone...

 

As I started my blog with ..for me fall seems to promote inspiration, time together and slowing down. We finished dinner tonight, Arugula with Balsamic and Olive Oil and the Risotto was great! We sat around the table three women at different stages in their careers, different stories, talking about cookbooks that have inspired, meals that were unforgettable, ambitions in the future, and culinary school stories.  I am inspired.  

 

Ciao!

Happy Thanksgiving!

This a very special blog entry.  When we created this blog page it was for me to be able to send my stories, adventures and educational expierences home for everyone to read what I am up to. And as this weekend gets closer and my tan progressively darker from grape harvesting and the team is just busy getting through another average week at La Petraia.  For me, my week is also filled with memories of cutting up turkeys at Burrowing Owl way back when, "turkey gold" (Chef Bernard's Turkey Gravy for those who don't know it), but most importantly I have memories of my family sitting around the table. We used to go to Grandma's house and now my parents house has become the place to go. It was always a family affair - parents cooked and I remember when I was young and my brother, sister and me playing board games or whatever till dinner.   After dinner the kids did dishes as Grandma didn't have a dishwasher... stuffing, mash potatoes, and gravy - followed by the feeling of needing a nap that always comes with turkey!

So for this blog I am asking everyone at home to leave me comment, favorite memory, dish, thing about Thanksgiving. We won't have a full dinner here so please Canada I have shared alot of stories of my adventures and I have just shared my Thanksgiving memory... I wanna hear it BEST THING ABOUT THANKSGIVING!!! Please warm my Canadian Heart with fond memories from home, eh?

I HAVE LOTS TO SAY

What an amazing week!!!

I sit here with a nice glass of vino as I take a moment and reflect...

First off I can't for the life of me believe it is October already, where did the time go? Hope wine fest is going well for everyone back home!!!

At Petraia everyone comes out to the vineyard to help harvest, especially us interns. We take off the Petraia whites and head out to the vineyard (with sunscreen on, of course still that hot during the day). La Petraia has experts testing the grapes as to which vineyard we are harvest which day and at what time of the day. They have a philosophy of "making the wine in the vineyard rather then in the cantnia", so with careful watching and planning they decide when to harvest. Which is why it is even more so important that the entire staff are able to help get the grapes off the vine on certain days. Also something else new and educational for me, we are picking grapes we pick off a bunch of grapes off the vine, then out in the field you clip off the bad, dried grapes off before putting them in your bin. Allowing the grapes to be sorted once again in the vineyard rather then the cantina. So one week into harvest, we have most of our white done and have started our red grapes. We were harvesting on one of hillside vineyards today, I turned around and looked at the amazing hills "I was oh my god I am actually harvesting grapes in Tuscany, wow". I will be heading off the cantina next week, where the wine is actually made, very excited!

Wwe got wild ducks and pheasant in this week. Susan took a picture of me holding the ducks by the neck, first time I have held something freshly dead. Then we plucked them the next day... There is a few more details about the experience that I am leaving out for those who don't wish to know the details of plucking wild ducks. I understand why people could turn vegetarian after an experience like this. At the end of the day, we were cutting them up. The next day we sous vide the breast then seared it, sliced it, and we tried it. Best duck ever... so tender. Wild duck taste completely different, its hard to explain to someone if they have never had it... Wow what an experience! I have pictures from feathers to plate!

This week Morgan's parents were visiting her from Canada. So we all went out for dinner to Il Canto del Maggio it was amazing to dine at a slow food restaurant. Check out the website www.slowfood.com Susan has a book with all of the slow food restaurants in Italy and recommended this one. Wow, Spinach Gnoochi was amazing, Chaniti Wine Braised Beef with Pears, Zabaione Cream Brule with Berries. We all started the night chatting and filled with excitement of the smells and the meal that was about to come... then by the end the entire table had mellowed to peaceful calm simply content and taking in the amazing evening we had just shared!

So two days after this amazing dining experience we went to Dario's Restaurant in Panazzo. I have mentioned Dario's in the Outstanding in the Field blog if you have read it and not gone to the link I left, shame on you! Here is it again, this is one of the best butchers in Italy!!!! When he was at Outstanding in the Field it was the best beef I have ever had, sorry Canada. Check out the website and make sure it is on your things to see when you come to Italy next time!! http://www.dariocecchini.com/   We had the burger it was unbelievable, the plate you get it has the burger patty (seems a shame to use that word to describe the amazing rare/med rare beef) sliced tomato, onion and roasted potato wedges on a plate. No bun, no need for a bun!!! 

Today the apartment got up early and out the door we went to the Outdoor Market in Panazzo, which the first Sunday of every month they have the larger market!  Us girls were thrilled to get out and maybe get some shopping done!! We are in Italy of course! Also this was the coolest thing... they had a bicycle race going through Panzanno today, we we stayed and watched for a while. This was amazing with these riders going up and down the hills of Tuscany. When we were driving home we were proudly cheering them on!! Here is a news caption from the event worth checking out if your interested! The thing about this race... we were standing by Dario's Butcher shop he had his team out front the shop all set up, handing out bread with spread, salami, and red wine for the riders. One of the guys from Dario's was standing out front a slice of salami in hand and the riders would go by grab it and keep on going...  As we drove home we cheered on the riders, in true Canadian Style!

 

It has been an amazing week... sorry for the long blog it should have been two I suppose. I also am thrilled to get the news that Evelynn Tackoff from RauDz Regional Table, Kelowna will be out in my neck of the woods next month. Susan has said it was ok, so she will be suiting up in her white chef jacket and hanging out with us in the kitchen!! Thanks Susan for welcoming Evelynn, and Evelynn I'm looking forward to seeing you. We have gone from Elementary Classmates to culinary co-workers to good friends traveling in Italy!! Cheers Evelynn!

 

 

Ciao Canada!

Feathered Friends

Slow Food dinner experience

Cyclists grab a salami snack & keep on going!

Peek-a-boo in the vinyard

My Petraia Family

I was talking with my family last week over the computer, and they were asking me about my living situation. I said to my mom, well 5 of us live together, we all work together, we eat dinner together with whoever is at home that evening, we go out together, we take turns ironing our chef jackets and we all seem to balance with one another. 

We come from all over world, British Columbia, Los Angeles, Prince Edward island, Lincoln (Britain) and then we have the blend of Italian friends. So this blog is for the new friends I live and work with. 


My life is enriched with the amazing tea from Yorkshire, the stories I have heard about the LA food scene and San Francisco scene...wow and the amazing things I am learning about Canada from the girls from PEI! Which I have to admit it is on my bucket list to go visit the Martimes, anyone wanna come?   I am enjoying learning about the culinary education from all of these points in the world, Sarah and Morgan both from PEI have told me so many inspiring stories about the Culinary Institute of Canada. If I make my way that far across Canada I will for sure have to stop in and see the kitchen and meet some of these instructors that have inspired my new friends! Oh and these girls are both proud members of the CCFCC.  Who knew you would travel half way across the world to get an education about Canada as well?  


I have had a couple days off from La Petraia, getting out and about enjoying Tuscany.  Greatest moment of the days off... Sunday we went out and were just out walking and discovered most everything was closed as it was Sunday but we were enjoying just being out walking. There was this little shop open, and out front a row of old Italian men sitting drinking a beer in the middle of the afternoon, pretty normal. As we walked by this little boy was in the middle of road kicking a ball or whatever, I am sure it was one of these guy's grandson. But there wasn't a car in sight, it was so quiet that the little boy could simply play. Wow maybe we should think about closing up shop on Sunday to spend time with our families. Or at least be inspired enough to make the time to sit around the table and have some quality time together.  At the same time, back home my family was having dinner together - parents, siblings, nieces and nephews...I love you guys! 


Back to Petraia we have started grape harvest and my next blog is in the works but this blog entry families and my new friends, cheers! 

Out for Pizza

The Petraia team