A Month Late Update

Went to Mama's Cafe today and got a bagel! What do I rate it? ... about a 8 1/2 to 9. It was quite good. Still not up to Kim's standards because it wasn't New York style (if you are from the South like me or perslaps live in another country where they might have it then a good freezer section bagel would be Sarah Lee). Chewey on the inside and fairly doughy on the outside. I forget if Kim said New York style had a crispy shell or not. Whatevs. Mama's bagel was pretty good and kind of reminded me of bagels from home. And it was a hell of a quest to try and find it too! It's very out of the way for me unfortunately. It's over the Arno via the Ponte alla Carraia which is 2 bridges down from the Ponte Vecchio and quite a few streets down from that. Luckily it's a pretty straight shot from where I live so I don't really need a map. When I started that way I was at the Duomo though and trying to find this one really good panini place. It's quite literally a hole in the wall but the paninos are amazing! I gave up because I couldn't find it and decided to venture over the river for the bagels that I've heard so much about. On my way back home I saw this awesome grocery store that sold a bunch of imported stuff. I found Duncan Hines cake mix and bought the Butter Recipe Fudge because it was on sale for € 3.10 (still a lot of money but it was usually € 5.50! My roommates were pretty excited. At least Anna Lee and Kim were when I showed them. Katie isn't back yet but she is probably going to flip out when she sees. She should probably tell me what her favourite flavour of cake is the next time she sees me so that I can make it for her some time!

So, we last left off after having met Brittany and leaving the horrible experience that was the "cocktail party". I don't really remember day to day after that so we're just going to talk about classes now. My schedule is as follows:

Monday: Intro to Professional Cooking and Italian Language: Beginning

Tuesday: Florence Food and Culture Experience

Wednesday: Contemporary Italian Cooking (dropped) and Italian Language again

Thursday: Wines of the World (added) and Italian Vegetarian Cooking

Intro to Professional Cooking

Got to the school about 20 minutes early and was very glad I did. I was kind of intimidated and there were a lot of other students around. There was a long line at the front desk so I figured I should stand in it like everyone else. The receptionist was pretty but also kind of severe. She spoke fluent Italian to her co-workers and did it beautifully with an enviable accent. She looked bored and a bit annoyed that we weren't just taking care of our own problems and at the fact that we couldn't pay our fees without her. I kind of think she hates me because I had a bit of a problem. I was supposed to be an Apicius student because I'm taking all cooking classes but it said on her information that I was an FUA (Florence University of the Arts. Sister school to Apicius) student. I was a bit confused, asked if I could pay my fees later because I was stupid and didn't bring my credit card and all I had was €90 on me. She said yes and I went over to my class. I saw that everyone was wearing chefs coats so I asked the professor and he told me to just get an apron for today. I went back to the grumpy receptionist and told her what he told me and she said, "The school doesn't loan out aprons- you know what... here" and she handed me two aprons. I guess she didn't want to deal with me anymore. So I was the only dork with an apron on in class. Everyone else looked amazing and professional with their white chef's coats and hats and knife sets. John was in the class and I talked to him in the beginning and told him that I was worried that I was going to get my but kicked but he assured me that I would be fine because it was an intro course. So I stood there in my green sweater and apron with my arms crossed because it was freezing in the classroom. There was a sliding door open or something.

Anyhow, we went around the room and introduced ourselves. In front of me was John from my school in Texas and it turns out he used to be a line cook! I never knew that! He's a big guy, about 6'2" or 3". John is quite nice and I'm glad we have a class together. Next to John was Sam. Sam is about my height with dark hair and square black glasses and he's from Belgium. Next to me is Kate who looked like she was about 24. She has a very soft, kind voice. Originally from the East coast I believe, but has been living in San Fransisco. Is a gardener and kind of reminds me of a hippy. Want to be her friend. Behind me was James from London who I was super excited about for obvious reasons and also a boy from Israel who's name escapes me. The guy from Israel is easily 6'5" and is kind of scary. He has kind of a pointed face and he was observing his knives at the beginning of class. When he introduced himself he said he worked in a restaurant as a cook but decided to get his culinary degree. I guessed that he was going to be really good.

In the middle of class Sam turned around, smiled and said he liked something and pointed to the neck area. I have no idea what he was referring to. Was he making fun of me for not looking like the rest of them and wearing an apron instead of a chefs coat? Was he making fun of the fact that I had a necklace on? I don't really know. He may not have even been making fun of me at all. I have no idea what he said. Whatever. I really started to wish that I had a chefs coat though. They seemed warmer than what I was wearing. And more secure. All buttoned up and such right up to the neck. So anyway, the professor told us to open the cupboard below us and take out everything we saw in there. At this point I started freaking out. "Eff! Are we going to Iron Chef this thing and have to make 16 amazing gourmet courses out of something crazy and weird like pork rinds??" It wasn't though. He was basically just having us see what was down there and where it was supposed to go. We put it all back and he showed us our ingredients and told us what we would be cooking that day. We talked about mussels and the correct way to clean them and then we cooked 3 different recipes with them. One was Impepata di cozze (mussels in a spicey broth. dry white wine, garlic cloves, parsley, and E-V-O-O! There's some pepper and salt to taste but that's pretty much it). It was pretty good. Then there was one that was stuffed with bread crumbs and then baked (Eh. Kind of dry like chewing carpet). Then there was my favourite with a saffron cream sauce. I love saffron (or zafferano). I think it might be my favourite spice. Hard to say though. I grouped with John and Sam and when I joined them at their table Sam said, "you better be good". I kind of smiled but I was like "Crap!" I kind of had a minisode during class because they all looked so much better than I did so I basically started the whole doubting whether I made the right choice and whether or not I'd be able to make it thing again. That isn't fun. Anyway, I did fine and the recipes all turned out quite good.

Next was Italian. Not too much happened except that I walked the wrong way around the Duomo which made me about 10 minutes late. I'm excited to learn Italian though.

Tuesday was Florence Food and Culture Experience which I had with Katie and we had a tasting of Pecorino cheeses (so good!) with pears, bread, and honey. I went home and had that for dinner that night. There was one girl in my class who wasn't there through a programme and had just taken a year off to take cooking classes. She's in Chocolate Artistry. I'm so jealous of her. I started wondering whether I should have done that because it seems like I'm wasting my time in classes that aren't for culinary arts majors. I guess I should explain that. Basically the only professional class I'm taking is my Intro to Professional Cooking. That was the only one I was allowed. I was very limited on my class choices because I'm not a culinary arts major because they don't have culinary arts as a major at my school. My plan is to get my degree in Restaurant Hotel and Institution Management and then go on to get my culinary arts degree but when I see people my age already in culinary school it makes me wonder if I'm just wasting my time. Why not just cut two years off my schooling and go to culinary school now. I don't want to own my own restaurant. I just want to cook. So I should be going to school for that, right? Unfortunately, it's all a bit more complicated than that.

Wednesday was Contemporary Italian Cooking and Italian again. Contemporary Italian cooking was a bust. The class was 2.5 hours and she had some people read the chapter aloud for the first 2. Then we made ground up chickpeas with shrimp, which is, rather lamely, exactly what it sounds like. We ground up chickpeas which took a ridiculous amount of time and then put some olive oil and a shrimp on top. I left without trying it as I think I had a pretty good guess as to what it tasted like. I dropped this class. Thank god.

Thursday was Wines of the World which was intimidating and everyone seems to know a lot about wine. I learned a lot though so hopefully I'll know a lot by the end of it. Italian Vegetarian Cooking was pretty cool. I like my classmates and I have the same teacher for this one as I do for Florence Food and Culture Experience.

Sorry if this was kind of boring again. I will leave a more entertaining post soon. I promise. I've actually typed it all out but am witholding posting it until this one has been up for about a day.

Gelato count: 9