Slow Food

(Steve)

Our last night in Florence we ate at the only place so far that had required a reservation. We had been there the night before but the first thing they asked was do we have a reservation, and we said no and they said ‘Ask the woman with the red hair.’ We looked around the corner but only saw an old man in a white chef's coat and white pants and a white apron with long white hair beneath a white chef’s cap. He was 75 at least, a wizard, and he asked did we have a reservation and we said no and then the woman with the red hair entered and asked did we have a reservation and we said no and she said 10pm. It was only 8 or so then (everyone eats dinner here at 8 or 9pm. Just tonight even, I saw someone stuffing spaghetti and chicken into their mouth at 11pm) and we were hungry so moved on but made a reservation for the next night.

“La Giostra” it was called, because it used to be a closet for a carousel. Somewhere in the timbers above you can find the notch where the top of the pole was secured. Check it, homies: http://www.ristorantelagiostra.com

There was a page and half handwritten welcome letter from the wizard, who turned out to be a Prince, in the menu, first in English, then in Italian, about childhood memories brought back by scents and tastes, and the magic that infused food for him, after watching balls of dough change shape and composition when fried. Slow food, it said. Recipes handed down through generations.

We asked the waiter to recommend a wine and he asked our budget, it starts at 30 euros and goes up into….very expensive.” I named a low number and by the end of the sentence had crept up into respectability “I can recommend a very good Chianti…” Another waiter brought the wine. There was the bottle, 3 glasses, 2 large for red and one small for white, and a carafe with a long neck and a wide shallow base.

He de-corked it, and gave me the cork to smell. Smells good, I said. What do I know? He poured first into the small white glass, about half full. He picked it up and stuck his nose into it, and breathed in deep. Wow, what liberties in Europe, I thought, for the sake of good food. He held it down to the candle and looked at it in the light. Satisfied, he poured a bit into my glass. I tasted it. It was so good I forgot to tell him so. I just looked at Courtney and tasted it. How is it? she asked, after 15 or 20 seconds of rapturous silence. Worth every minute of the half hour it took to pour.

They took our orders. We decided to do it like we had seen, an appetizer, a first course, and a second course.

Then a little witch attended, short, pretty, a colt’s tooth as they call it in the Canterbury Tales and a colt’s nose too, eyeliner dark as her hair and not 5 words out of her all night. Courtney said “ her power not for good” but I didn’t know. Just black.

She brought out a large plate: “A gift from the kitchen:” (Okay 6 words if you include 'prego') a sampler of bruschetti, chicken pate, caprese, and half a dozen other things I cannot remember.

I will leave out the words that are used too too too many times in describing food in travel and food guides. So you won't hear any sumptuous or delicate or exquisites outta me. Just holy crap for the good, and jeezopeets for the bad.

The antipasti was a giant shrimp on a bed of cubed kiwi and avocado with a lemon juice over it. My primo plattie was a pappardelle with some kind of beef chunk and boar sauce. Yes, as in the wild pig. Molto Bello! Mostly just tasted like ribs. Courtney got something with artichokes and cherry tomatoes. Very good, she reported. For the secondi plattie I got grilled Calamari. Not just the deep fried squiggly tentacles we get in Gli Estati Uniti but the tentacles and the cute little bubbly bodies too. Smoky from the grill. Yum! Holy Crap! And Courtney got a plate of spinach. Fresh, it said on menu. Soaked in butter, it appeared on the plate. It was really was an act of endurance to finish. We huffed. We wiggled to make room, we sat back and did nothing, all just in the name of doing what these beautiful skinny Italians apparently do: gorge. We finished. They took the plates. Coffee, dessert (we had been admonished not to skip their fabled Tirasmisu)? “No, grazie, Il conti per favore.” No thanks, the check please, we begged. And then we proceeded to undergo a full half hour (not kidding this time) wait, 3 times asking for the check, a slow food torture called the Invisiblati, and everything beautiful that had come before it scorched and ruined. Even now only a day later I struggle to remember what it was we ate, only able to remember that jeezopeets service.

Tonight though, in Venice, we sat down in a small café, and it was 15 hot, sticky, sweet-with-uriney-effluence minutes of being forgotten after being seated, until we said “not again” and I leaned waaaaaaaaay out into the aisle and flagged down the next waiter to pass and smiled the sweet smile of the mild-mannered American. He came next with attention, passionate answers to our questions, samples of the Canal scallop, and charmed us right back into a good time. The food was okay. C’s was better than my spaghetti and scallops soaked in olive oil. Her red sauce, this time just as at Antico Noe, blew every other red sauce I have ever had, to smithereens. Truffle oil, my friends. That is the axis upon which the gustatory universe revolves.