Blog # 8

I was not able to attend the cooking class with the rest of the Food and Wine class.  However, earlier in the week I had minestrone soup for the first time and polenta.  I tried minestrone because I had heard my friends talking about a really good minestrone they had eaten a couple of weeks ago and I was curious to try especially because I am always eager to eat veggies in Rome. I also wanted to try polenta when I saw it on the menu because we have talked about it in class multiple times. Cornmeal polenta was brought over to Europe from the Americas by Columbus in the 1500s and it was generally served to the poor people in Italy. The polenta I had was not made from cornmeal and was made with mushrooms. It was extremely flavorful and overall really good!

This weeks reading discussed the fish used in traditional Roman dishes. The reading included recipes such as Alci Alate (salted anchovies), Spaghetti con le Alci (Spaghetti with anchovies, without tomato, and Baccala’ al Forno Alla Monticiana (salt-cod baked with tomatoes). I was interested to read about so many recipes that included fish because I normally do not see these on menus in Rome. I know that anchovies are extremely popular and common but I usually do not see people eating meals with cod or eel.

I grew up with my Italian grandfather who loved anchovies on his pizza and would always order a half anchovy pizza and half cheese for me. However, the smell would spread through the box and my cheese half would taste like anchovies and I was disgusted. So ever since, I have not even been able to look at an anchovy.