Day 15: Cooking for a Class

On Monday I might have experienced a highlight of my Italy trip thus far..... Cooking class with Mary Lou! If you remember, Mary Lou is Marko's wife and she is around the age of 75. She's from South Africa so she has that gorgeous, British-ish accent with a hint of Italian mixed in -- this being said, you can imagine that it is so easy to sit and listen to her talk for hours. To preface this topic, I'll start by telling you that on Monday morning we had classes that lasted a bit longer than anticipated, so we were extremely antsy and hungry by the time 12:30 rolled around. At this time, after our final morning lecture, we all bolted from the classroom and headed straight to the kitchen. Mary Lou was there with her tomatoes waiting on us. After Cinzia got the rest of the ingredients for our meal together, we all followed our instructor to the kitchen area. She started off by telling us not to be scared in the kitchen -- learning to cook is all about making mistakes. She knows this first hand because when she left South Africa and came back to Italy with Marko as a young wife, she didn't know how to cook a lick. So Marko was stuck eating soup almost every day, until his mother (her mother-in-law) came over for dinner, and asked Mary Lou if she knew how to cook. Mary Lou took the honest route and told her no, so there starts the beginning of Mary Lou's cooking history. From there she has had many trial and error meals, but her knowledge has grown significantly.

For lunch she was cooking us pasta with a sauce consisting of only tomato, pancetta (Italian bacon) and onion. Even though our kitchen in the Palace has industrial appliances and big enough bowls to feed an army, it would have been difficult if we all tried to help. So a few girls volunteered to be her su chefs, while the rest sat and watched in complete awe (one of those girls being me). I stood over the stove and took in every word she was saying. She told us her number one rule -- don't over cook the pasta. When making a pasta dish, the pasta should always be cooked AFTER you have the sauce completely prepared. I didn't know this.. I usually try and multi-task to hurry things along (an American trait I suppose).

SO, the su chefs chopped the bacon, tomatoes and onions. Mary Lou put some Olive Oil (EVOO, always) in a pan to heat up. She waited until the Olive Oil was heated (enough to where you can drop a slice of onion in and it sizzles), then added the onions. She sauteed those for a while, then added the bacon. Let that cook thoroughly, and then added the tomatoes. Thats all people. She stirred and stirred it until most of the tomato juice had evaporated. When she thought the sauce was ready, then she added the pasta to our massive pot of boiling water. Once the pasta was cooked (al dente, of course), she strained it and mixed everything together. She served it up with some freshly grated parmesan cheese on top. Delicioso!! All 23 of us sat in the kitchen and ate our tasty lunch together. It was by far one of the most memorable and best meals I've had. I loved not only watching Mary Lou cook with confidence and ease, but also listening to her other tid-bits of information. Here are some things she said that I took note of:

• Mary Lou says Italian women age well because when they are cooking pasta over the stove, all of the olive oil and steam moisturizes their skin.
• She suggested not eating spaghetti or linguini on a first date with a boy because you don't want to wrestling with those long noodles during conversation. She pointed out that penne pasta or rigatoni would be a more appropriate choice. We all found this hysterical!
• Always use a wooden spoon when cooking with a metal pot/pan so you don't scratch the bottom (sounds simple but I know I've broken this rule many, many times in the kitchen).

Here are some pictures from the lesson at lunch:

Cinzia, Katelyn, Caityln, Peek and Emily being the best su chefs

The ingredients -- Pancetta and Tomatoes. This is just the beginning people -- Mary Lou was talking about all kind of yummy things you could add to this pasta. The options are endless!

Another lesson: if you don't want your eyes to tear up and hurt your eyes when you're chopping an onion, hold it under tap water for one minute and that will kill the vapors. Genius.

Caitlyn, Brittany and Katelyn enjoying the view from the other side of the stove. P.S. - incase you are wondering, there are 4 Caitlyn/Katelyn's on our trip. Confusing? Try adding a Katherine, Kate, Katie and Sara Kate to that equation. I think we all need to wear name tags.

The sweetest woman!

Check out that massive pot of pasta. And between the 23 of us, we were scraping the bottom by the end of lunch! Not a morsel left. That's when you know it's good!

Our view from the stove. It was like a 20 minute facial from all the steam.

After lunch, the rest of the afternoon was fairly simple. We went back to class until about 6. We watched a movie on Pompeii (where we are visiting Thursday) and learned about the devastating volcanic eruption that wiped out the coastal city in 79 A.D. Most of us cooked dinner in (Mary Lou inspired us), so we popped in a movie and all watched it together in the common room. It was a great day in Italy :) Another day in the life.... !!