La Dolce Vita: Tiramisu Edition

Friday night the four of us took a cooking class at Scuola Cucina di Lella. One of the program leaders walked us twenty minutes through the city of Siena and down about seven escalators. Right? Escalators in the ancient cities of Siena whose heard of such a thing? Supposedly it was a crazy steep hill that called for hundreds of motion-censored escalators. Well, given my fear of these moving stair, my complete intolerance for anymore walking, and me and Joey’s short attention span and playful manner, we fell behind the rest of the group and ended up missing one of the turns leaving us in the middle of a dark and deserted city square for a good ten minutes. Finally after asking for information with my impressive Italian vocabulary (Di dove la (I admit I said escuela instead of scuola but it got the point across) cucina?) we found our program leader in her puffy white jacket. She looked kind of frantic that she counted 15 children instead of 19, whoops.


On the menu was pici all'aglione, gnocci al gorgonzola, and tiramisu. The open kitchen looked staged like it was the Rachel Ray Show. It was filled with pots, pans and wooden spoons of all shapes and sizes and every gadget and gizmo a "pampered chef" like my mother could ever dream of. In the kitchen stood Lella, our little old Italian cooking teacher, her silent partner (literally this little woman did not say a word she just moved swiftly around the kitchen cleaning our stations and shifting things around), and our translator the Italian Jack Osbourne, though I never got his I do know that he was a foreign exchange student and Lella was his host mother. So now he helps her out translating for her American cooking students. Aww, SO CUTE! And now for the food...


Since the tiramisu needs to form in the fridge we made that first. To make tiramisu you will need 4 eggs, sugar, mascarpone (which I finally found out is a kind of cheese.. or butter? I'm still unsure), lady fingers or another kind of cookie that absorbs liquids or flavors and stuff, espresso, whiskey, and cocoa powder. So here's what you do first:

1) Crack the eggs and separate the yolk from the white. You will be using both components so make sure you do not dispose of one or the other. In one bowl combine 3/4 a cup of sugar and the four egg yolks until they are thick and frothy (whatever that means).

2) Add 2 cups of Mascarpone to the mixture and blend with an electronic hand blender (or else ladies will look like Schwarzenegger) until you begin to see peaks

This next one amazed me. . .

3) Blend the four eggwhites in a NOT hand electronic blender on the highest speed. The next time I looked the eggwhites I have when I diet looked like a big bowl of snow! Just from being blended for a few minutes at an ultimate speed my least favorite part of the sunny side ups looked like the top of a lemon meringue pie. I was flabbergasted! (Lol) So fascinating.


4) Add the eggwhites to the mascarpone mixture by folding the eggwhites into the other. Not mix, fold! This is very important although I cannot tell you why.

Lady fingers covered the bottom of a huge lasagna tray. The fingers were soaked in espresso and covered with whiskey. If your not a whiskey person, Lella says that any kind of alcohol will do. Some people even use martini! This is the part that causes me to never order or eat tiramisu otherwise. I hate coffee! Ever since I was young and would throw something in the garbage to find a smelly trash bag with smelly coffee grinds I have never had the desire to drink coffee or any of its cousins (the frappuccino, the espresso, the latte). I'm strictly a hot coco girl. So while lady fingers would be right up my alley if i were ever to make this on my own, my fingers would be soaked in hot coco or something like it. Next issue is the whiskey. First of all what am I a pirate? Why would I ever like whiskey? I don't even like the cheap Svedka we get at school, ugh shivers! So again my version would cut out the whiskey and use apple juice. Just kidding, but seriously no whiskey no hard liquor at all. Vom.


Now that you have all of your preparatory work done cover the lady fingers with the mascarpone and eggwhite mixture. If you would like multiple layers (it's just funner that way- i know funner isn't a word but it is funner) don't use the whole mascarponey thing in one shot. Lella used a little American twist by sprinkling chocolate chips ontop of the layer and then adding a bit of cocoa powder. 

Repeat with more lady fingers and more mascarponey stuff along with more chocolate chips and cocoa powder as you please. This is a dessert to be eaten the same day and cannot be frozen (Mommie) because it will lose it's form or something. Put it in the fridge for at least an hour before serving and Benissimo! Tiramisu :0)

Will tell you about the pastas later. Desperate need of a nap! Out tonight for the last night out in Siena. Florence this weekend finally! Oh yeah, and SWITZERLAND the weekend after that!

Hotter Than Brad and Angelina

OMG! It's been so long without internet that I actually forgot what this feels like.  We paid ten euros for 24 hours worth of internet and haven't been able to get on since.  Everyone is trying to get on at the same time so the internet totally crashes. But I'm back now and better than ever with a belated celebratory shout out.

Happy Anniversary Grandma and Grandpa!  I would never ever tell the story of the night you two got engaged but I am SO happy you did! You are the best grandparents anyone in this world can ask for and I am so lucky to have you both in my life! A thousand million bajillion times... I LOOOOOOVEEE YOUUUUUU!!!!!

Siena, So Far

I’ve been in Siena since Saturday but haven’t blogged once, except to tell you about London, so here’s the deal…

Siena is beautiful, there’s no doubt about that.  The city is old and remotely quiet with cobblestone roads built on upwards and downwards hills that are getting easier to walk- and regain my breath- as the days go on.  The windows have those wooden shutters painted in blues and reds and greens with tiny pots of flowers on the windowsills like something out of My House in Umbria.  The streets look like big alleyways with storefront and restaurant windows except these main road alleyways also serve as highways being that cars, buses, and motorcycles whip around the corners and speed down the streets.  Joey knows a girl who got her foot run over by a car in Florence and like… now I get how that happened.

It was a total culture shock when we went to a restaurant and ordered chicken parmesan to be stared at like we had three heads.  No chicken parm? No calamari fritti? I thought these were classic Italian dishes? WTF? Cul-ture shock.  We did manage to find some good gnocchi in a four-cheese sauce, a caprice salad (not really a salad just mozzarella and tomato), a pizza appetizer from every place we go and I even got a white slice with prosciutto.  So delish.  It’s been really hard to find chicken here too! We finally got a good piece of grilled chicken with a little bit of olive oil and lemon on it.  The gelato is fabulous!  I had hazelnut gelato on a cone with homemade whipped cream that was out of this world.  Speaking of hazelnut- to those of you camp people who only got Nutella as a special visiting day treat and finished it by the time Olympics broke out like us Lokanda-ers- they have it here like its strawberry jam or Skippy peanut butter, favorite.  Other than that tonight me and Joey split the grilled chicken and this cheese and pesto ravioli with a tomato cream and black truffle sauce on top.  Basically, we were licking the plate. 

The central point of the “city” is the Piazza del Campo.  Us dumb Americans just call it “the circle”.  There are restaurants and souvenir shops lining the circle on one side and a big church with a bell and tower clock on the other.  All of the restaurants have nice outdoor seating and they are all connected with similar menus.  After asking for tiramisu and watching our waiter go from our restaurant to the one next door, I’m convinced they’re all the same thing.  The middle of the campo is an open field except its cobblestone and not grass.  Still kids and couples and families sit and lay on the stone and talk or eat gelato or do homework or kiss.  Being single and living in this city must be devastating because the PDA is an orange on the terrorist scale and every beautiful guy is with a fugly girl.  Other than seeing couples there are so many cute dogs.  These dogs aren’t like the obese slobbery American dogs.  They’re posh and polished and even a not so big animal lover like myself finds them adorable. 

Like usual Pinot Grigio accompanies us at most dinners and some of our checks can be paid in AIFS food stamps… were on Italian welfare. 

TGIF.  We signed up for a cooking class for tonight and a tour in San Gimignano tomorrow .  Sunday were supposed to go to the torture museum so we should be in for a fun filled weekend.  More about that and classes later.

Grandma: Since the TV here is all in Italian, I've decided to start watching Parenthood.  Just one more show for us to talk about!!

Daddie: I've fallen asleep without the TV two nights in a row now.  Italy changes you.

Ciao Bella!

P.S. IT’S SNOWING IN SIENA!!

Ribs and Ice and a Zoo, Oh my!

So of course after all of the exhausting sitting on the tour bus we had to take yet another nap.  After our evening snug we freshened up and headed down to the concierge to find out where to eat and where to play.  We had heard about this place called Icebar where the room is completely made of ice and they give you big jackets and gloves to wear inside.  Lucky for us the bar was located right off one of the main streets in Piccadilly Circus, only fifteen minutes from our hotel.  The cabs are SO much better in London than in the U-S-of-A.  First of all they aren't that vile Macaroni and Cheese color (even though New York wouldn't be the same without them) and climbing into one feels like your getting into a Rolls Royce (that's just what Joey said I can't confirm).  It is so spacious i could fit this entire desk in it and there are seats that fold down behind the front row so you can sit facing each other not to mention of course the driver's side and the wheel are on the opposite side of the car yay!

We walked around for a bit looking for one of the 6,000 pubs in London but by that time they had all turned into bar-pubs if you catch my drift- and that time was 8:30.  Finally, starved we strolled into a second floor look-out called Adam's Famous Ribs.  We order a bottle of Pinot Grigio and the Mighty Meat Platter for Two (totally my idea).  It was AMAZING not to get id-ed to drink, never again since the day after i get home i turn the big TWO-ONE.  I also insisted that we order fish and chips cause everyone said london was famous for it and Dani insisted that we order another dish since shes famous for her eyes being bigger than her stomach.  We decided on fijatas and when all the food came at the same time we thanked our lucky stars to be eating (we hadn't had anything since the beef on the plane).  The chicken wings were legit and the fish and chips(fries) were so tasty.  They came with a side of peas- being the health food nuts we are, the peas were the only thing left on the table.  After a second bottle of Rose (with the accent so it sounds like Ros-ay) we paid our check in pounds and ventured to the IceBar. 

It turns out that you can only go into the Icebar for a 45 minute session and only a certain amount of people are allowed in at a time.  So when we arrived at 10:30 we ended up having to buy tickets for a 12:30 session and waited in the bar's adjacent lounge.  The lounge was pretty edgey, decorated in silver beaded curtains neon blue and pink lights and tall glass vases.  Since we had an hour to kill we decided to order a bottle of Chardonnay (fahncy right?).  The bottle was finished and an hour later it was finally time to go in.  Your 16 pound ticket got you in, a parka/pancho kinda thing with a fur eskimo hood and attached snow shoveling gloves and a free drink in an ice block with a hole in it.  

                                       

                                    

This place was more for the experience than the party.  The whole room (think a kitchen and dinning room combined) was made out of ice except for the metal floors.  Benches were just solid ice-blocks stacked on top of each other and the bar and walls were solid ice.  It was pretty chilly but not downright freezing.  We each had our drink and took a bunch of pictures (check facebook) but by the time the countdown on the door got to nine minutes we were ready to go.  Being jet lagged and schlepped around with baggage bigger than Brett we were ready to call it a night especially since we had to be in the lobby at 5:45 am for our next flight to Pisa.  Fortunately unfortunately our new friends (friends of mine and Corey's Camp Lokanda friend Lindsey Kraus, also on our program) were headed back to the bar they were at before we went to Ice so we tagged along.  

This right here is ZooBar.  To tap into my British lingo once more, we lit-rah-ley went from an Ice to a Zoo.  This was one of those classic European discotech clubs you always hear about where the multi-colored lights are flashing and the beats are playing and the sweaty 20 somethings are packed onto one dance floor like Crayolas in a box.  Towson- you know this was nothing new to us but Britt and Krum (happy bitches?  I bolded your name) you know better than anyone that in "situations" like these finding your spot is crucial to night-time enjoyment.  Of course at first by myself, then later followed by my friends I claimed territory on the small stage that was railed in like a toddlers bed.  There were a few kids on there most came and went but there were two who we will remember forever.  First the Indian (and i don't mean Native American) who was way too jumpy.  Think Kevin Gnapor (the G's silent when I sneak in your door) mathlete from Mean Girls but the skinny jeans, white belt, thick rimmed glasses, eminem cap, equally as faggy, possibly British technohead version.  This boy eventually jumped around so much that he shoulder planted at our feet so hard I thought he cracked the stage (three days later I'm still crying from laughing so hard thinking about it).  He actually went down so hard that I found his silver watch on the broken with one link attached to the other side of the clasp).  DUMB IDIOT.  The other boy I cannot even describe his looks but he was rolling so hard that his friends left without him cause he was too busy dancing with himself in the mirror and giving us high five after high five.  If you don't know what rolling is please don't try to find out, thank you. The first time we tried to leave "I'm in Miami Bitch" (house version) came on and you guys know what that beat does to me so we of course had to stay but half way through Sandstorm it was just enough and time to leave.  

Twenty minutes later we were snug as a bug in a rug (well twin size bed) with our alarms set for a mere 2 hours and 15 minutes later when we would wake up and once again shlep our stuff to the airport.  One roommate in particular was quite the Vom-monster and couldn't even enjoy a delicious croissant and scrambled egg breakfast at a cutie-patootie airport restaurant called Giraffe.  Planes were boarded and it was Italian from there on out.  

Oh... we will

London, You Did Me Proud

OMG I cannot believe how excited you guys are about this.. yayayayayay!!! So right now I'm writing from my little Italian desk (the only thing in the room that isn't covered with Dani's luggage) in the Hotel Athena in Siena, Italy.  It's taken so long to be able to get online- note to Americans if you want to make a good international living INVENT FREE EUROPEAN WIFI!  Like no free wifi in the airport.. complete rubbish! So I'll tell you all about London now...

Leaving JFK was sad and I went through security with my cell phone back in Brett's pocket (shock), but after that I had my head on straight.  It was so funny seeing the entourage of family waiting and waving goodbye until we were through security and out of sight.  Corey, Dani, Joey and I are lucky to have such amazing families.  The flight was long and hot but there were TV's in the seats with movies that weren't even on DVD yet!  We watched Life As We Know It (with Katherine Heigl and Josh Duhamel and that cute little red head nugget) and Social Network and Eat, Prey, Love (more boring on a plane but there's just something about that happy romantic Javier Bardem I just can't take my eyes away).  We slept a little and watched a little and while we thought we were just getting a small snack,  over rolls the plane cart with a flight attendant who looks like the british version of the red head from modern family and he says "Would you like the beef or the pasta?" We died- beef it was with mashed potatoes and a salad in which I only ate the mutz balls (obvs) and a roll and a cinnamon cake.  A Very classy british meal.

It was still dark out when we "touched down in London town" and the captain described the weather as "a bit soggy".  Well Captain, you hit the nail on the head.  We must have just missed a shower because the ground was wet and the sky was grey but the air was cool and fresh and we were just happy to be off of that plane! Getting our luggage was AWFUL! Dani has two hundred-pound (but seriously they're seventy pounds each it even hurts to roll them) duffels and a rolley carry on so thank god for the trollies. We got on the bus 20 minutes through the outskirts of London which was lit-trah-ley a miniature town.  All of the houses are small little cottages and the cars look like they could fit into Brett's old Matchbox case.  When we got to the hotel and got our rooms we made a quick attempt to stop shvitzing and took a nap.  Jet-lag is NO JOKE, I don't get how celebrities and business people do it.  Every free second we get were napping.  After our nap was a 3 hour sight seeing tour of London.  We started at the hotel which was pretty close to the Natural History Museum and down a few blocks from Harrods (windows and building is pretty and ginormous with purple flags down the block but at night it's lit up like a christmas tree, so beautiful) all the way down passed Buckingham Palace, Piccadilly Circus, and Trafalga Square.  I was familiar with these names because of the ever so cultured Valley Stream/Lynbrook area behind Buck named their streets after these famous Brit locations.  It's pretty close to New York except there isn't rubbish everywhere and it's like one third as crowded and the people walking around are fairly young and not a bunch of freaks.  The architecture was beautiful and every building is different neutral colors and carvings and wrought iron balconies.  We took the classic "Red Phone Booth" picture and even asked a local where Abbey Road was.  He said if we wanted we could take the train fourty minutes away and make the fourth left and a bunch of weird shit we just did not have time for... but enjoy the sights!

 Big Ben

 I want a balcony like that.

Sale at Harrod's 

I'll tell you about the London night life later. . . NEED PIZZA!

(Notice how I used my British vocabulary in italics)

Last Night in America

Even though the snow is pretty and i thoroughly enjoyed my day of doing nothing (since this break has been non-stop), i was originally supposed to be landing in London in about an hour or so.  Of course there would be a snow storm on the day I'm scheduled to leave for abroad.  However after months of planning, weeks of shopping, and a few agonistic (is that a word?) nights of packing I'm leaving tomorrow for four months in Europe.  I've created this blog so that all of my family and friends can stay updated on where I am and what I am doing each day overseas. 

Spring Semester
January 12, 2011 - May 6, 2011
Wednesday, January 12	Overnight flight from U.S. to London
Thursday, January 13	Arrive London. Free time
Friday, January 14	Morning sightseeing in London. Free time
Saturday, January 15	Fly to Italy. Transfer to Siena
Sunday, January 16	Orientation in Siena
Monday, January 17 to Saturday, January 29	2-week orientation
Saturday, January 29	Afternoon transfer to Florence
Sunday, January 30	Registration and orientation
Monday, January 31	Spring semester begins. Full-year students return on this date
Thursday, February 24 to Sunday, February 27	4-day visit to Rome
Friday, March 18 to Sunday, March 20	3-day visit to Venice
Friday, March 25 to Sunday, April 3	Spring vacation
Friday, April 22 to Monday, April 25	Easter break
Thursday, May 5	Spring semester ends
Friday, May 6	Return flight from Pisa or Rome to U.S.

This is a copy of my program itinerary so you guys will have an idea of what's going on.  Everyone has been asking what the best ways to contact me are: subscribe/follow/and comment on this blog! For those of you who are computer-savvy you can find me on Skype or email me at my Towson email address.  Please don't call or text me or leave a voicemail!  I promise this will cost the both of us A LOT of money!

Family: Thank you for sending me on this amazing journey.  I promise to come back a more worldly person because of it.  Words can't begin to describe how much I love you and will miss you (especially Grandma and Grandpa ugh love you)

Towson: Have an amazing semester even though you will be without a 2103 to party in.  Get ready for the fall because i will be 21 and NOTHING is holding me back!

Brittany Sloane: Chin up baby girl the four of us will be reunited again soon.  Don't be too psycho and know that no one loves you as much as we do so don't be surprised if no one wants to put up with your shit.  I cannot wait for you to come and visit and go wild in Amsterdam!

Everyone have a great year and please keep in touch!  Look forward to seeing everyone when i come back and all of the fam for our annual Mother's Day/Samantha's Day and my 21st BIRTHDAYYY!!!

As for the four months that lie ahead of me, well. . . 

You cannoli imagine :0)