I've been very busy fooding for the past week.
First, I started my semester, which includes a Vegetarian Italian Cooking class. We'll be studying the nutrition of a vegetarian diet, learning to cook vegetarian meals, and observing how the traditional Tuscan diet conflicts and coincides with vegetarianism. I look forward to using the information I get in class here in my blogs, as well as in my day-to-day Florentine life.
I've also spent a lot of time exploring the vegan and vegetarian options here in Florence. From pizza to gelato, there really isn't anything I'm going to miss out on by sticking to a mostly vegan diet while I'm here. I say "mostly vegan" because I am not being as careful about ingredients as I could be, but I am fully confident that one could remain 100% vegan without missing out on the Tuscan experience. All it takes is a little research. In a future blog, I will tell you exactly how to do that: where to find vegan food, how to tell people you don't eat dairy, how to avoid the looks of disgust after you tell someone you don't eat dairy, etc.
But more information about all of that will come later. Today, I want to talk about my amazing and food-filled weekend. On Saturday, I took a day trip out to Parma and Modena, on which I toured a cheese and a prosciutto factory, then toured and sampled from a traditional Modena acetaia.
If you've been in Florence for a few weeks, the trip out to these locations will be well worth the two hour drive for the scenery alone. This area has an abundance of the rolling hills that are so characteristic of Italian countrysides. I have neither a fancy camera nor the patience to really capture the landscapes, but hopefully you get the idea. The persistent rain seems like a burden here in Florence, where puddles in the cobblestone seem to last forever; but coming out here made it clear that the rain is what makes Tuscany such a big deal. The land was well-watered and I didn't feel that twinge of guilt I sometimes feel when I see a huge lawn in California.
That's the thing about Italy, though. I mean, there are thousands of cultural differences, but the big one that I've noticed is that things are done with a sense of permanence, and nothing seems to be manipulated too severely. They make one awesome looking church and it stays there for hundreds of years. They get some good grapes off of the hills in their natural state, and they make a bunch of wine and balsamic vinegar. They get one successful business idea, and their family continues the practice for generations. Extra care is given to delicate but simplistic processes: a lot of finesse but little fuss. The result, of course, is some pretty delicious food.
We started the tour early in the morning at “Azienda Agricola Saliceto,” where the family of employees showed us the production process of Parmigiano-Reggiano. It was a building the size of a large home surrounded by acres of grass for their cows to graze. Part of the "secret recipe" of each cheese maker's Parmigiano-Reggiano is the diet and lifestyle of their cows, and a similar level of finesse and control is placed on every element of the production process.
While the milk is boiled in large copper vats, they use what looks like a bird cage on a stick to whisk the milk into curds and whey. It's a really personal process: they put their hands right in it to make sure it is the right temperature, and they separate the curds from the whey with just their strength and a large cheese cloth, etc. I couldn't help but think about American health codes and wonder if they were as arbitrary as I think they are. The cheese goes into a mold to harden, which includes the label of the farm and the date it was created. From there, it soaks in salt water for 12 to 36 months.
Parmigiano-Reggiano includes three ingredients: milk, salt, and time. The quality of the milk is extremely specific and the process of adding the salt is controlled to a T, but it is the duration and specificity of the aging process that really makes this famous cheese what it is. The flavor of the cheese is attributed to not only the careful process, but the way the wind enters the soaking room, the difference in temperatures in Parma, etc.
A similar story was told at the "Salumificio La Perla." It was a large building perched high on the hills of Parma, equipped with immaculate views and a black lab to greet you when you arrived. Inside, there were three HUGE rooms full of hundreds and hundreds of the thighs of little piggies (well, large piggies, but still piggies) being cured. To the piggie-meat, they added only salt and, once again, time. The family of workers spread a layer of salt on the imported pork thighs, which are then hung on racks for a number of days (I was too distracted by all the meat to take specific notes). This layer is washed off and the pork gets massaged, and a new layer of salt goes on for the remainder of the curating process. As my tour guide said, "the pigs are treated very nicely, but only after they cannot feel it anymore."
Towards the end of the curing process, each individual thigh must be tested to make sure it has dried out completely. How do they do this? Carlo, the owner of the factory, personally pokes a needle made of horse bones (I
know) in five specific places on the thigh and sniffs it. He told us that he had an amazing sense of smell, and that his nose is ensured for three million euro! If he is satisfied by the scent of the thighs, the meat gets a branding stamp of approval.
Let's recap for a second. The raw meat hangs in a cold room. We put salt on it. It hangs in a cold room for a few more months. Then we eat it. I try to have an open mind about the food of different cultures, but I just want us all to absorb that in our minds.
Regardless of how you feel about the piggies (would it be easier if I stopped calling them piggies?), I know you would fall in love with the family that owned this factory. For generations, they have been processing their meat in this extremely specific way, and caring for it seven days a week. I had no idea what he was saying, but I know that Carlo was really welcoming and really charismatic. They made us a three-course lunch after the tour, and insisted we finish every bite. Beyond taking care to create quality prosciutto again and again, the family has created a facility that exposes thousands of tourists every year to a paramount element of Tuscan culture.
We finished the day with my favorite tour: the Acetaia Malpighi. Unassuming on the outside, the building had an ambiance that I can only describe as "a room full of tiny things I can't afford." The tour consisted of one room only: a little attic full of open black barrels, pictured here. The small opening allows for the water to evaporate from the grape juice, and is covered by a cloth napkin for sanitary purposes. To earn the title of Aceto Balsamico Tradizionale di Modena, the grape juice must age for a minimum of twelve years. Though they sell younger varieties in their facility, only the twelve year old and up vinegars can bear the prestigious label and be housed in the specifically shaped bottle.
After the tour we went into the tasting room and tried about fifteen varieties of Balsamic Vinegar: from young, white vinegar, made from only uncooked white grapes, to the 25 year old Aceto Balsamico Tradizionale di Modena, to their progressive combination vinegars. I was fascinated by the variety of flavors that came from the same one ingredient. The younger varieties were extremely bright, and the older were thicker and more warm. My inner foodie was perfectly content with the experience, even
before they brought out the balsamic vinegar-filled chocolates. Yeah, that is a real thing and it is amazing. I left with a young vinegar, meant to be paired with fruit and salads.
If you've read any of my other blogs or been a part of my recent life in any way, you know how I feel about cheese and meat. But even in the prosciutto factory, they do something that many people have completely lost sight of:
they take care of what they eat. In previous blogs, I discuss a person's relationship with food. The relationship that Carlo has to his food is much better than that of a person eating the standard American diet. Though pork and salt are by no means healthy ingredients in my mind, the way you feel about food once you are aware that this kind of process was necessary for production will deflect many unhealthy habits. When you know your cheese has been aged for twenty five years, your portion might be smaller. When you know that millions of grapes were necessary for your bottle of balsamic, you might choose to pair it with higher quality ingredients.
Though this is mostly a travel blog, I can't help but include a healthy call to action. For the next week, eat whatever you want. Anything you've already planned to eat, whatever diet you practice. But every time you eat something, pay attention to it. Consider what work went into getting it on your plate. Was the process harmful or helpful to the ingredients? Am I happy to be contributing to the process? Whatever comes to mind, take note of it. I think it will make you lean towards healthy choices.
