Rome sustainable food | The Roving Locavore

Posts Tagged ‘Rome sustainable food’

La Mura

Posted in Fruit, Meat, Shopping, tagged Amy Campion, Amy Campion food, eat locally, eating locally, local eating, local food, locavore, locavore in Rome, locavore Rome, markets in Monteverde Rome, Rome sustainable food, roving locavore on September 14, 2009| 3 Comments »

wall

just wide enough to look or shoot through

I had an interesting personal-historical palimpsestic experience this morning on my way home from dropping Jack at school. I wound my way to the market street, and went to the last stall, where there is a sign saying “Vendita Directa,” meaning that the fruits and vegetables are sold directly from farmer to consumer. I don’t know how to explain the presence of bananas from Ecuador on the table, but oh well.

On my way home, I decided to take a little staircase I hadn’t seen before, which seemed to lead in the general direction of the American Academy. It led to a sidewalk that ran along La Mura—the gigantic wall built around the ancient city. I knew that the Academy was situated just over the wall, in a sort of nook near the wall’s highest point. If I just walked along the wall, I’d find a way in. I kept walking and walking along the wall, as it started to wind down the steep hillside. Cars rushed by me on one side, and the high wall reflected hot sunlight on the other. I kept thinking, there has to be a way through this wall! And then I realized the historical and ironic nature of this walk—about a mile out of my way. My position on the outside, and my desire to get in, put me in the place of the barbarians the wall was constructed to keep out. I may be an American, and wearing jeans from the Gap, I thought, but I’m carrying a bag of figs, and I’m trying to learn Italian!

Finally, I decided to turn around, and this time, I spotted a woman pushing a stroller through a narrow doorway in the wall. This passageway led to the park and playground right near the Academy. I was in.

Now for some pictures. Last night, a bunch of us at the Academy did our best to eat as Romans do. We had a pot-luck barbecue, but there were no barbarian-style hot dogs or burgers on the menu.

I made pizza:

my pizza

Lars and Eva brought sausages to grill:

grill

When the rain let up, we carried all of the food outside to a table under the trees:

carrying

The fire kept burning, and more meat came out. This was the butterflied leg of lamb Russel and Annie bought at Testaccio on Saturday, along with some sweet cippolline:

lamb

It was a good spread:

the table

Read Full Post »

market at Testaccio

Posted in Shopping, tagged Amy Campion, Amy Campion food, eat locally, eating locally, local eating, local food, locavore, locavore in Rome, Rome sustainable food, roving locavore, Testaccio, Trastevere market on September 12, 2009| 1 Comment »

I went on my first major market excursion today. There’s a huge, semi-permanent haphazardly roofed, open-air market in the neighborhood of Trastevere, which is down the hill and across the Tiber from where we live. (I still can’t get over being able to utter that last phrase!) From the outside, the market looks a bit like a temporary shelter for disaster victims. But inside, the place is swarming with exuberant life in all forms. Along one side, all of the stalls sell meats of every kind and cut–from legs of lamb to the most unique salame. While I stood in line at one of these, the white-haired man running the shop handed Jack a large slice of the mid-priced proscuitto. Grazie!

I’ll put in a bunch of pictures of the highlights I was able to photograph. This was a bit challenging, since I had Jack’s hand in one hand, the handle of my rolling cart in the other, my purse slipping off my shoulder, and an inept vocabulary in my head.

A slice of some kind of heirloom pumpkin, anyone?

lg squash

What’s this mystery veg? (I’ll have to ask Mona, the chef here at the Academy.)

mystery veg

Chanterelles and porcini, like I’ve never seen before.

fungi

I was so awestruck by the porcini, I couldn’t bring myself to buy any. This is hard to explain, I know, but my first visit to this market was pretty overwhelming. I’ll work up to the awe-inspiring ingredients with some practice. Anyway, I asked for a handful of chanterelles, along with some marinating olives.

Another awe-inspiring sight was the tomato stall. It’s run by a farmer who grows only tomatoes. Thirty or so different varieties. He led our little group on a culinary tour, pointing to the tomatoes that are best eaten raw, those that are best in tomato sauce, those that are best with fish. The tomatoes ranged in size from perfect little 1-centimeter ovoids to fist-sized ruched, wrinkly balls, and ranged in color from a blackish red-green to summer sun orange.

Next, I bought bulk wine. A huge jug was only 5 Euros! Hopefully, it’s not unquaffable.

vino 1

All in all, here was today’s haul.

haul

We’re having a couple of the other families over for a casual dinner tonight. Looks like we’ll definitely start with prosciutto and melon. And if the figs last until then, they may go with honey for dessert. We’ll do some kind of pasta for dinner.

Read Full Post »

fagioli borlotti

Posted in Grain, Salads, Vegetables, tagged Amy Campion, Amy Campion food, bean farro salad recipe, eat locally, eating locally, fagioli borlotti, local eating, local food, locavore, Rome locavore, Rome sustainable food, roving locavore on September 11, 2009| 1 Comment »

fagioli

Prettiest when raw, these swirly colored pink and white beans are a satisfying bite-size. I bought a large handful at a market stand the other day, and Jack helped me shell them yesterday afternoon.

shelling

My idea was to mix up a nice cold bean and grain salad. In some chicken stock, I simmered the beans until al dente, not mushy, and in another pot simmered a friendly blend of whole grains: farro, brown rice, orzo, and some others. When these were done, I tossed them together with minced fresh herbs, cherry tomatoes and red pepper. Whatever you have on hand would be good. For lunch today, I dressed it with vinaigrette, and put a big spoonful of it on top of a mache and treviso salad.

Read Full Post »

first dinner at the Academy

Posted in Shopping, Trends, tagged Amy Campion, Amy Campion food, eat locally, eating locally, local eating, local food, locavore, Rome locavore, Rome sustainable food, Rome Sustainable Food Project, roving locavore on September 10, 2009| Leave a Comment »

Last night, the kitchen opened for dinner. The kitchen at the American Academy is not just any kitchen, but is the heart of the Rome Sustainable Food Project, which was founded a few years ago with the help of Alice Waters, and is directed by the former Chez Panisse chef, Mona Talbott.

We dressed Jack in his nicest shirt, and walked over from our apartment building, where all the fellows with children live, to the courtyard, where a long table was set for dinner. (The picture is dark, but you get the idea.)

table

Before dinner, some of us congregated in the little bar to sip prosecco and meet and greet. Most of our dinner companions had just arrived yesterday, after over-night flights, and were feeling pretty dazed. But what a nice reception for them! Here was the menu:

Spaghetti alla chitarra con pomodorini del orto
Pollo alla romana con I peperoni
Crostata di susine

Spaghetti with roasted tomatoes from the garden and breadcrumbs—bread chunks, really, toasted up with olive oil; chicken legs braised with red peppers; plum galette. Mmm… it was nice. Jack is learning how to eat like an Italian:

J spaghetti

He just needs a little help with technique.

This morning, after dropping Jack off at school, I set out to do some shopping. First, I had to buy one of the carts that Romans roll behind them when food shopping, because they do so much walking. I didn’t know what they were called, but I saw one hanging outside a little hole-in-the-wall hardware store. (Actually all of the shops are so-called holes-in-the-wall.) They weren’t displayed in the store, so I looked up “wheel” in my phrasebook, and asked in Italian for a “bag with wheels,” while pantomiming the pulling motion. The shopkeeper understood, and ducked into the back room to pull out a selection of colors. I picked out a purple one, and pulled it behind me as I set off to find the 2-block-long open air market in the neighborhood. First, I made a quick stop at the bread bakery I wrote about the other day. The line was long, as usual, but moved quickly. They also do a big restaurant-delivery business:

bread deliv

bread shop

I bought something I haven’t learned the name of yet. It was a flat roll the size of a large bagel, with green olives on top, surrounding a tomato slice. I also bought another bagful of those yummy little biscotti.

At the market stalls, where one could buy everything from socks and bras to organic beef (“biologico”), I bought a potted basil plant for the basket hanging from our kitchen window grating. I stopped at an “erboristoria” called “L’erba Gatta” (Catnip, I assume), where I found a nice selection of organic grains, sugar, and dried fruit, along with every variety of natural body product.

erboristeria

The place was pretty chi-chi, so I limited myself to raisins and red lentils.

raisins

On the way home, I saw a cute car for sale.

car for sale

No grand showrooms here, just narrow driveways and shop interiors, for displaying their small autos. Coming from the American South, it’s hard to get over the smallness of the cars here. Of course, they do just fine, and look fun to drive. An SUV is a real anomaly here. Americans should stop widening their streets, and start buying Smart cars.

Read Full Post »

fruit, and school lunch

Posted in Fruit, Pasta, Trends, tagged Amy Campion, Amy Campion food, eat locally, eating locally, Fontana dell Aqua Paola, local eating, local food, locavore, locavore in Rome, locavore Italy, Rome sustainable food, roving locavore, school lunch, Scuola Arcobaleno on September 8, 2009| 2 Comments »

We find ourselves snacking on fruit a lot. There are so many reasons why. First of all, there so much of the juicy stuff in season. I was walking along this morning, not planning on buying food, when I saw one lonely market stall, with the most bulbous figs! I bought a basket, and we ate most of them before I remembered to take a picture:

figgi

What I should have done is have my son hold his little fist on the plate, too. Then, you would have gotten an idea of the size of these gorgeously squishy, heavy fruits.

Jack loves the melon, though. He’s not a fig guy, so far:

melone

Jack had his second day of school today. I went with him again, and left for a short while. Tomorrow he’ll stay through lunch. I’m excited about their lunches. The culture of food in general at Scuola Arcobaleno is no less Italian than you would expect. Every morning, each parent leaves a piece of fruit in a basket by the classroom door. This week we’ve seen bananas, pears, apples, peaches, plums, grapes, and kiwi (some of which are obviously not of Italian origin, but some of which are very local). At 10:00, the teachers cut the fruit into pieces, and one of the children carries around a plate, and like a little caterer, offers everyone a piece.

Lunch puts a food-focused parent like me even more at ease. Each child lays out his own place setting, and pours her own water out of a pitcher. Then, they are all served a primi and a secondi. A two-course lunch, involving fresh vegetables and big bowls of pasta! And this is not the pasta that blubs out of a huge can with some sweet sauce distantly related to tomatoes. This is the real thing. The only thing that will disappoint me will be my four-year-old son’s ability to accurately report what he had for lunch. The usual answer to that question, for any kid, is, “I don’t know.” But I’m hoping he’ll be able to bring home some culinary tidbits in Italian for me.

It’s especially interesting to be having this school-lunch experience at the moment when there’s a parental, grass-roots uprising in the U.S. against the atrociousness of school lunch there. That problem, which I hope schools, cities, states, and the Obama administration will work to solve, is of course part of the much larger problem in the U.S.: the lack of a culture of food, and the economics of food, in which the cheapest food is the worst for you.

Anyway, though, I want to touch on our other fun today: checking out the view from Fontana dell’ Aqua Paola, which is on a hilltop in our neighborhood:

(Is this really my life?)

taking a bus home from a long walk in Trastevere, (which we got to by taking the long staircase downhill from this fountain):

Jack on the bus

and spotting a cool weather vane that reminded me of home:

weathervane

Read Full Post »

Gelato

Posted in Dairy, Ice Cream, Sweet Things, tagged Amy Campion, Amy Campion food, eat locally, eating locally, gelato in Rome, Italy locavore, local eating, local food, locavore, locavore in Rome, locavore Rome, Miami Gelateria Rome, Rome sustainable food, roving locavore on September 8, 2009| Leave a Comment »

We made our first gelato-destination-trek yesterday, after asking around about the best shops in the neighborhood. Miami Gelateria, conveniently located about halfway between our apartment and Jack’s school, makes theirs in-house, and offers an array of flavors, from the tangiest limone to the densest chocolate, with everything nutty and fruity in between.

gelateria

They serve typical cones or cups with large, melty scoops, and they also make mini, dipped cones. The minis are about 6 centimeters (trying to think metrically, here) high, are dipped in dark chocolate, then a bowl of chopped nuts, then served, to eager little hands. You can eat one in two or three bites.

After contemplating the selection, and learning new words in the process, Jack chose melone and Peter and I shared a creme caramel.

gelato

The texture is airy and fluffy, compared to the hard ice cream at home, and the flavors were undiluted essences.

Read Full Post »

bread and melon

Posted in Baking, Fruit, Shopping, Sweet Things, Vegetables, tagged Amy Campion, Amy Campion food, biscotti, eat locally, eating locally, local eating, local food, locavore, locavore in Rome, locavore Rome, markets in Monteverde Rome, pizza bianca, Rome sustainable food on September 7, 2009| 1 Comment »

On Jack’s first day of school, I stayed there with him for a couple of hours, to ease him into the experience of a new school in a new language. We left just before lunch, and took a looping, indirect way home, stopping at market stalls and shops along the way. One of my destinations was a half-block of street closed to cars, where vendors were selling fruits, vegetables, meat and cheese, and household odds and ends.

mkt st

We bought bags of the pink-and-white-swirled fagioli borlotti, and of blackberries that taste as sweet and meaty as pears. Not a trace of tartness, which is a surprising sensation! To be honest, I only bought the pricey 3-Euro basket because Jack fondled them. The unspoken rule of etiquette at the markets is: you touch it, you buy it.

veg mkt

Next time, I think I’ll get some of these elegant peppers:

peppers

The most delicious item we bought, though, was the melon. Sweet as honey and juicy as, well, juice:

melon

Next, we went to the bread shop, which is the most nondescript shop I think I’ve ever seen. What you have to do is follow the scent of baking bread with your nose, and look for a bunch of people standing around chatting happily, and moving in a constant stream in and out of a narrow door. That’s the line for bread.

bread store

Once inside, I was crammed shoulder to shoulder with people buying multiple bags of bread, biscotti, pizza, and cornetti (croissants). Jack stood in a corner, with his backpack and sunglasses on, eating an apple. He looked as nonchalent as a true Italian. The only proper name of a bread I knew was pizza bianca (what we call focaccia), so I asked for that and used gestures and alternate “grazie”s and “per favore”s to indicate how much I wanted. Then I asked for quattro biscotti, and pointed at these cute little lemony-almondy cookies:

biscotti