A Plague of Locusts...

...will presumably be the next thing!

At 10.00 this morning, in the middle of preparing a shamefully late breakfast for the Belfortini, who were here for dinner last night, and to stay overnight before heading off to the airport this morning, the power supply suddenly failed...in mid toast-making. Not just a circuit taking it into its head to pop its fuse - as anybody familiar with Italian electricity will know happens with astonishing regularity - but the whole bang-shoot. We had no power at all, anywhere. No sign of life in the system, and even the uber-fuse box out in the lane was dead as a dodo. For some reason, I'm not sure why, we assumed it was a power cut, affecting more than  just us, and we got on with organising breakfast as best we could using hob and grill and anything that ran on gas rather than electricity. TD bemoaning in the background the fact that our new generator, which has recently been installed at one end of the cantina, is still waiting for the plumber to come and attach it to the gas supply, awaiting the moment TD foresees when power blackouts will become the norm as National Grids the length and breadth of Western Europe give way beneath the combined pressure of increased use and decreased maintenance.

Breakfast completed, we had time for a stroll beyond the piazza, to see quite how much of the town was affected....only to find that very little of it seemed to be without power, at all - although, it was odd that so much of the place seemed not to be functioning, with half the shops on Borgo Largo closed and shuttered. Which seemed strange for a Friday morning. And which prompted a call on our return to Enel, to establish whether indeed it wasn't just we who were languishing in darkness.

Meanwhile, I departed with the Belfortini to drive them to the airport...only to find the Lungarno full of Carabinieri vehicles with flashing blue lights, and  the naval section of the vigili di fuoco, and vast hordes of the Italian military in drab camouflage, all milling around. Above the parapet of the Ponte di Vittoria  I glimpsed the Arno at an alarmingly high level, and realised that the past 48 hours of non-stop rain must have precipitated (literally) a state of emergency, and I drove to and departed from the airport in haste, since I didn't want to get caught on the wrong side of the river if they suddenly closed all the bridges. Which they were in the process of doing as I headed home, and it was only by a long and circuitous route via the one bridge that was still open that I managed not to be caught, and eventually made it back to the house.

To find that TD had, he thought, apparently reported our lack of power to Enel, whose response suggested that whatever the problem was, it wasn't general...and therefore we would have waited for a long time had we continued to assume that Enel must already know about and be in the middle of fixing whatever it was that had gone wrong.

With four-footed in tow, we thought we'd go and survey the river level, and in fact encountered the Enel repair man arriving just we set off (which is pretty impressive, since it can't have been more than fifteen minutes since the fault had been reported!) and we left him to it, as we headed off once more through eerily deserted streets in the direction of the river. A notice on the door of the School at Santa Caterina announced that the government, in light of the flood danger,  had ordered the closure of  schools and university and all public buildings, and indeed were advising everybody with any kind of choice to stay at home and keep away from Pisa Centro. Which explained much.

The river level was impressive, and for the first time we saw that flood boards and sandbags had been employed all along the river, to raise the level of the river wall by an additional fifty or sixty centimetres, as a defence mechanism. The river was in full spate, forcing islands of driftwood to collect against the bridges, where the spans no longer allowed sufficient headroom for flotsam to be carried along, and indeed where the height of the river threatened shortly to overflow the bridges themselves. But, in fact, by the time we got there, the 1.00 high water was already past,and it seemed clear that the immediate danger was over; as the barriers were removed from either end of the Ponte di Mezzo, we headed home, to find out where Enel had got to.

Which was up a ladder. To switch off the power supply, preparatory to replacing the section of main supply to the house which, it appeared, had worn through and shorted, causing  immediate loss of power and only a small fire in the process.

And so, as the rain started up once more, we left them to it, and went indoors to sit in candlit mid-winter gloom, and await further developments. I had my doubts that we wouldn't have a rain-stopped-play event, since Italians (men particularly) don't like getting wet or cold or muddy, and the steady rainfall that had now set in was quite likely to overcome any intention to reconnect the power supply. But it didn't, and they were stalwart, and suddenly, after about an hour, the lights suddenly and without warning came back on again.

Mirabile dictu!

So, we've already had fire and flood, in the space of half a dozen hours. Is it locusts that come next, or is it frogs? 

In fact, if anything, I suspect it will be a re-run of the flood, as the rain continues, and we have the next high water in about eight hours from now.

Watch this space.

Tonight's dinner:

Orange and Lemon fettucine.

Plaice, on a bed of braised leeks, with fish and red-wine sauce.

Vacherins with Crème Chantilly and Blackberries.

Pheasant with Juniper and Thyme

Adapted from a recipe of Roger Vergé, this relies for its wow-factor on the quality of the sauce. As ever, the secret to the sauce is slow reduction over time, and although the whole process may seem complicated, from the number of steps involved, in practice it is actually quite straightforward. And definitely worth the effort!
Boning the bird as a first step means that one pheasant will readily feed four people...and, as I've found in practice, probably with enough left over to give you the makings of a pheasant ragu to go with fettucine or as a risotto flavouring, or else to make stuffing for ravioli.

For four (with leftovers):

Ingredients:  1 pheasant; 2 large shallots; 6 juniper berries; 1 tsp dried thyme; 100g butter + 2 tbsp; 1 tbs tomato purée; white wine (approx 1 wineglass); approx 400 mlstock (chicken/duck/rabbit - whatever you have on the go); salt & pepper.

Method:


1. Bone the bird, removing the ribcage and the upper leg bones.

2. Finely dice one of the shallots, and mix this with 100g butter, the dried  thyme and the juniper berries (crushed and then finely chopped with a sharp knife). Season to taste - I generally use a generous half tsp of salt and a few grindings of pepper.

3. Slide your hand in and carefully part the skin of the pheasant from the underlying flesh, to create a gap into which two thirds of the butter mixture should be pushed, spreading it as evenly as possible around the bird; use the remainder of the butter mixture to make a poultice to put on the breast. Put the prepared bird into the fridge until needed (you will need to have done this prep work several hours before you want to cook the bird, to allow enough time to prepare the sauce).

4. Chop the pheasant bones, roughly, so they will  sit comfortably in a layer in the pan in which you will make the sauce.  

5. In the remaining butter, sautée the bones for a few minutes over medium heat, then add the remaining shallot, diced, along with the tomato purée. Once the shallot has softened, add the wine, to cover the bones and then simmer to reduce the liquid by half. Then, add enough stock comfortably to cover the bones and continue to reduce slowly, until you have the equivalent quantity of liquid to fill two demi-tasses. Pass the contents of the saucepan through a fine sieve (discarding all of the residue) and continue to reduce the sauce slowly until it is thickened to coating consistency and you have enough for a couple of tablespoons per serving.

6. During the final stage of sauce reduction, roast the pheasant for twenty minutes in an oven pre-heated to 250 degrees C, and then let it rest in a warm oven for ten minutes or so.

7. Slice and plate the bird. Taste and (if necessary) adjust the seasoning in the sauce, and spoon a couple of spoonfuls of sauce over  each serving. 

Twelfth Night...

came and went. Glorious sunshine, and deep blue sky, as the backdrop to dismantling the Christmas Tree - which, as usual, has been out in the barn for the entire Christmas period. Rather than go through the usual apologetic pretence of planting it in the garden, where it will struggle to survive for the next six months, only eventually to be removed to the compost heap once it has been finally declared dead sometime around the middle of June, this year I decided to cut to the chase, and instead fed it branch by branch into the stove, and enjoyed the flames and the scent, as it was devoured piecemeal, efficiently and in its entirety. Since it was still relatively green, the amount of smoke was impressive - worthy of the appointment of a dozen new popes - although we might not have been hugely popular with any of our neighbours who might have been taking advantage of the weather to hang out their washing. It might even have been that Monsignor G ended up with smutty smalls (with any luck!)

Christmas came and went, in a welter of  braising and stewing and roasting and boning and generally feasting. The Belfortini were here for Christmas Dinner (salt-cured foie gras, with toasted brioche; boeuf en croute with a walnut & coriander stuffing, roast celeriac; praline-flavoured Paris Brest, with blackberries in orgeat) and for lunch on Boxing Day (asparagus feuilleté, with savoury zabaglione; duck legs confited with cardamom, and duck breast roast, endives in cream;  blueberry and almond cheesecake), and then guests two days later en route from Naples to Milan (scallop mousseline; tournados rossini; christmas pudding and brandy butter - since the Belfortini eschew christmas pudding, but I like to find an excuse for it at some point)...a quiet New Year's Eve, with just the two of us and an early night (tart tatin of celeriac and truffles; roast haunch of pork; and an incomparably delicious soufflé of mincemeat).
In the doldrum period between New Year and twelfth night, the Pauli invited us for supper, since they had been given a white truffle that somebody had come across near San Miniato, which they thought we would appreciate. The thing was the size of a tennis ball, and we consumed it all, grating slices over meltingly splendid plates of fettucine in cream with the abandoned decadence of a collection of russian oligarchs!
And, finally, the Brancolis came for dinner on the 4th, and we effectively saw out the Twelve Days against the backdrop of a thunderstorm of transylvanianly dramatic proportions, whilst consuming pheasant roast with juniper and thyme, and finished off with burnt lemon cream, before a digestif (brought by the Brancolis) called Amaro Montenegro, which all present agreed was disgusting beyond description and fit only for cleaning the drains. Or possibly corroding holes in them. To be handled with great care.

The tree has gone; the decorations packed away for another year, and a host of new recipes added to the tried-and-trusted repertoire for future reference.

We re-plant trees later this week (Technical Dept currently awaiting a final confirmatory email), and at that point 2014 will be considered to have been well and truly kick-started.

Happy New Year!

Act of (Man of) God!

We got back from London on Wednesday evening, to the appalling discovery that in our absence a gang of chainsaw-wielding thugs had laid waste to everything growing in the lane, and along the south boundary between our entrance pergola and the adjoining field. And I do mean everything! Poplars, tulip trees, catalpas - all varying in height between thirty and sixty feet - as well as an entire row of enormous and venerably-aged bay trees, which had formed the backdrop to the view from the house and barn, across the water garden. And, just to make the point that this had been done with a generous dose of focused malice, they had also destroyed all of the climbing plants which have made the walls of the lane look so pretty over the past few years: clematis, roses, wisteria, hardinbergia, solanum, campsis, trailing capers....the lot. And, they've ripped down the creeper that we had painstakingly trained across the lane, to form a beautiful archway, green in spring and summer, and a glorious red in the autumn. All that now remains is bare electricity wires, and bleak, stripped walls. And the view from the house looking south is no longer of an idyllic,  giardino secreto, with the water garden enclosed within dense greenery, but of an urban landscape of houses, with a forest of windows and balconies all looking straight back at us. They've always been there, of course, hidden behind the dense foliage - but we've never actually seen them before; or been seen by them. Suddenly, from living in what seemed to be the middle of woodland, we find we're living in the middle of a city.

All this is the work of Monsignor G, who used to be Rettore of the seminary, until he retired fifteen years ago, but who just won't go away, and in fact now lives in a building on the Piazza, the rear of which overlooks the lane. He has caused us nothing but trouble since we arrived at Santa Caterina - it was he who sent in a bloke with a tractor, to plough up what we subsequently turned into the North Garden, in order to indicate his displeasure when we first arrived, and he again who was responsible for two oafs with chainsaws who vandalised a huge cypress tree behind the church - within our garden - about three years ago.  He gets away with a lot on the basis that he is elderly, and infirm,  and apparently well-intentioned, and that if he occasionally gets things wrong, it should be understood in the context that he's basically a harmless, sometimes confused old soul. Whereas, in fact, he's a deeply unpleasant old man with an agenda. And we now know what it is. He was born in this house, when his father was manager of the farm attached to Santa Caterina, and whilst Monsignor G climbed the ecclesiastical ladder to the dizzy height of becoming Rettore, his family continued to live in the old house. Until the last of them of his generation - a brother - died, about eight years ago. At which point, Monsignor G, we now understand, suggested to the seminary that the house should be passed to other members of his family for them to use rent-free for as long as they liked. Monsignor F, the current Rettore, thought this idea less than optimal, and decided otherwise, and after some years of faffing and general incompetent management by the seminary, we got our hands on the place, four years ago. Unbeknown to us, with Monsignor G still fulminating to himself in the background. Hence the various acts of destruction over the years, which have culminated in this most recent orgy of vandalism.

I doubt he'll do it, or anything like it, again - after the event, it seems that the seminary generally takes whatever steps are appropriate to rein him in. It's only a shame they don't act on occasion with foresight rather than merely vaguely-apologetic hindsight (anything too overtly apologetic might be interpreted as them accepting responsibility for what had happened.......and culpability isn't something they readily do).

We're going to re-plant. We had somebody come this afternoon to agree what should go where in order to achieve the best effect most quickly, and they will be coming to plant shortly after the New Year. A whole collection of poplars and catalpas, and quite a few golden bamboos. Being in this part of the world is very useful for large-scale giardino pronto,   and it's quite straightforward to get trees that are already five metres in height, without anybody thinking it unusual. It might take a couple of summers for us to get back exactly to where we were before, but at least it will be only a couple of summers...

In the meantime, if there are any sword-wielding knights within earshot looking to keep their hand-in with regard to turbulent priests, then they should try the brown door on the Piazza with the horse's head knocker. He's home most days. Fulminating.

Tonight's dinner:

Fennel Sformatini, with gorgonzola sauce.

Involtini, stuffed with lemon cous-cous; salsify, in cream.

Walnut Tart.

Savoury Zabaglione

A revelation. A lighter - and entirely foolproof - version of hollandaise, this sauce is made in only a couple of minutes. The recipe comes from the pages  of Luigi Carnacina's encyclopaedic tome on italian cooking, which I suspect has now largely sunk without trace. Technical Dept found references recently to Signor Carnacina in a list of italian 'greats', where he nestled alongside Artusi and Ada Boni... and a subsequent search on abe books led to the arrival several weeks later of this telephone directory of a book, its pages musty from decades of neglect, with the occasional illustration jumping out with all the forceful day-glo 'cheerfulness' of food photography of half a century ago.

Carnacina was a pupil of Escoffier himself, and was sufficiently well-regarded by him subsequently to become chef at Escoffier's hotel in Ostende, before also being head chef for the Italian Pavilion at a number of World Trade Fairs - including that in New York in  1939, when Pierre Franey was cooking across the way in the French Pavilion. Relative political positioning would have placed them on opposite sides in what was then happening in Europe, though, and whilst Carnacina could readily return home at the end of the event, Franey didn't have quite the same option, and chose instead, force majeur,  to remain in the States.

Currently, Carnacina represents half of the pile of 'food books' which take up the left side of my desk (the other half of the pile is Paul Bocuse's equally encyclopaedic masterwork, from the mid-seventies, which is also full of gems hitherto unknown), and I leaf through their pages at random when in retreat from the relentlessness of the computer screen.

Last night, we started dinner with Carnacina's completely delicious risotto verde,  where the base consists of a deep green purée of sautéed spinach, onion and celery, and a spoonful of ragu is mixed in at the end, along with the grated parmesan, in order to give an extra dimension to the finished dish. Excellent.

Anyway.....savoury zabaglione. It doesn't really merit being set out in recipe form, as simple and straightforward as it is - merely omit the sugar from classic zabaglione, replace marsala with white wine (or vermouth, for slightly more heft), and mix in a few tablespoons of softened butter at the end, along with a discreet amount of whatever additional flavouring ingredient you might wish to use (grated lemon or orange zest, for instance, or truffle, or finely chopped and sautéed porcini, or chopped herbs....). For a generous amount of sauce for two servings (to go with asparagus, or over chicken liver parfait) place two egg yolks in a simmertopf or double boiler and whisk over medium heat until frothy and significantly increased in volume, then add the wine (quarter cup, if using two egg yolks) and continue whisking over heat until the mixture has visibly emulsified, and the whisk leaves a distinct trail when drawn across the surface; mix in a couple of tablespoons of softened butter, and test for seasoning; add whatever flavouring you wish (or none) and serve.

Tonight's Dinner:

Parsley Ravioli, with melted butter and cheese.

Sea Bream, with Star Anise; braised cucumber.

Crepes Suzettes, filled with Creme Patissiere.

To Houghton, for the day

...to see Catherine the Great's pictures. Or, such of them as she'd bought from Robert Walpole's impecunious grandson sometime around 1790, at any rate. Back for the summer, while they did some redecorating in The Hermitage, it was a chance to see Walpole's collection hanging in exactly the places where he had chosen to put each of them, and exactly as he had enjoyed them when he lived in the house. It seemed a good idea to take a look while we could - although, unfortunate that the World and his wife, along with quite a few of their friends and relations appeared to have had the same idea.

Walpole junior had sold the pictures for the princely sum of £40,000. And Gary, our voluble taxi driver on a journey from the station at King's Lynn, the price of which threatened to rival the value of the pictures, opined that she'd got them cheap at the price. I'm not sure what Gary's bone fides are as a player in the Art Market, but I suspect he'd do well to stick to the day job. There are some excellent Van Dycks, a good Velasquez, a Lely, a Franz Hals....and after that, it starts to run out of steam. The Rembrandt is good, but not major; a beautiful, if slightly knocked-about del Sarto; a Murillo, good if you like that sort of thing (I don't; I find him mawkish); and a claimed 'Veronese' about which they ought to feel deeply embarrassed - it doesn't even come close to 'school of', and the fact that one can see it referred to in Walpole's own hand as Veronese speaks volumes for how much he actually knew about the subject.

It was thrilling to see them in situ from Walpole's time - knowing that it was a once in a lifetime chance to do so, at any rate. If they were there all the time and always hanging in those places, though,  I suspect the 'Walpole had them hanging exactly like this' element would become relatively uninteresting.

The house is a gem. English palladianism at its most complete. I've known it from pictures practically forever, but never before made the trek to go and see it in the flesh.  Campbell's harmonious proportions sing perfectly, and are impaired in no way by the leaden hand of William Kent as it blunders heavily across various ceiling treatments and decorative schemes within the house. The views through the windows are of avenues stretching off through parkland flecked with Gainsborough trees, and in the distance, glimpses of his Lordship's herd of white deer. Presumably, also unchanged pretty much since Walpole looked upon them. Personally, I decided after we'd been there for an hour or so, I would go stir-crazy if I actually had to live there (possibly, an entire weekend would be chancing it, even) as the lone and level landscape which stretches emptily away into the distance in all directions does so with so little drama of any kind that one could easily lose the will to live if one had to look upon it for too long.  It has been remarked before, and with good reason, that it is ''very flat, Norfolk". And I suspect not just topographically.

We traipsed the park, even as far as a rather pleasing garden pavilion that looked like the temple of the four winds, and was unsurprisingly firmly locked; admired the haha; considered the new-ish shrubberies (fortunately, not realising until I google-earthed it subsequently that part of the planting can be seen from above to be a facsimile of the present Lord Cholmondely's grandmother's signature); gave the once-over, with varying degrees of scepticism, to his Lordship's embryonic collection of garden sculpture; ...and we visited the walled garden. Which would have been worth the journey from London all on its own. Five acres (apparently) of no-holds-barred garden creation that would gladden the eye and quicken the pulse of any aspiring gardener. Oh, there are some things to criticise - the vistas don't draw the eye to their end points; the overall plan resembles a hotel corridor with a series of rooms  opening off it, rather than tantalising and leading you on, and round corners,  tempting the visitor endlessly on to something only half-viewed; there is an absence of an overall concept to give coherence to the entire design - but all of that is mere perfectionist nit-picking. The roses... the yew hedges...the greeenhouses...the fountains... the pergolas... the  borders...the scale...we only saw about half of it, before we realised Gary would already be waiting for us up by the stables, to return us to King's Lynn and all points South.

Partly in an attempt to forestall Gary's views on the Walpole artwork, which I suspected might be extensive, I praised the garden enthusiastically as we climbed back into the car. As a tactic, it couldn't have been bettered, as Gary responded merely with a grunt, before he lapsed into silence. Gary, it seems, didn't have any opinions about the gardens. Which, although surprising, was not unwelcome.

And we made the entire journey back to the station in companionable, tired-but-happy, end-of-a-day-well-spent silence.

Tonight's Dinner:

Savoury Clafoutis (with gorgonzola and prosciutto)

Young lamb, pot roast over leeks and tomatoes.

Apple and Vanilla Tarts.

The lights are going out..

..if not all over Europe, at least at the western end of the house. Davide, plus sidekick, turned up on Thursday to get started on a whole raft of jobs which had been briefed in before the summer, but then he fell off his motorbike and broke something, and then he had flu, and now we're in the middle of November, and it seems like a good time to get on with it.

They make a lot of noise, cheerfully shouting to each other as they work in different rooms...or on opposite sides of the same room....or, indeed, working right next to each other. The four-footed, a cautious animal at the best of times, stuck close while they were around, and occasionally shot me a quizzical look as if to say that he thought perhaps they weren't entirely a good thing.

And, as it started to get dark, around 4.30, they headed off, leaving behind little piles of debris...not unlike cat litter... which had been carefully collected wherever they'd had a task to do. It is an improvement - when Davide first started doing stuff for us, many years ago, he would happily just scatter rubbish in his wake as he went along. The neat little piles represent progress. Although, actually removing the debris to a rubbish bin is probably too much to ask, either now or at any time in the future...

And, half an hour after they'd gone, I discovered that there was no light in either the pantry or the laundry room. In and of itself, not a disaster, except that I then checked and found that fridges and freezers in those rooms weren't functioning, either

Since their last words as they headed out had been a cheery "Back on Tuesday", and since we were heading off to London for the weekend, this seemed like not a good idea.

I switched things on and off....checked the main fuse box....Technical Dept went and checked the uber-main fuse box, out in the lane....no change. Except, that he then also discovered that the light in the upstairs bathroom didn't work either.
I unplugged the light from the new socket that had just been installed in the kitchen. Nope - nothing changed. And then, apparently for no reason, we noticed that we had light again and power in general in both the pantry and the laundry room. Working out what the hell they'd done was like a deeply infuriating parlour game. And, in carefully retracing my steps concerning anything which had been switched on or off since they'd left, we got there! The entire electrical system in pantry and laundry room was now controlled from the light switch in the Pranzo (three rooms away) which has just been installed to work the lights in the display cabinets in that room. Go figure...

So, as long as the cabinets are happily blazing away, then we also have fully-functioning freezers.

And, by much the same token, we subsequently worked out that the upstairs bathroom light is now wired into the system for illuminating the south facade of the church. Which means that if anybody wants to have the light on when they go to have a pee, then about a quarter of an acre of thirteenth century brickwork also has to be lit up like Oxford Street at the same time, to entertain the entire neighbourhood.
If only they knew!