Mediterranean Summer (5 page)

In the hills outside of Lucca, at Il Vipore, I listened to the story behind Etruscan meat curing from the chef, Cesare Casella. While he explained the time-honored practice, he said that many of the recipes he used were hundreds of years old. “
Semplice ma buono
”—simple but good—was his cooking mantra.

One day I asked a line cook at the restaurant in Friuli how long he had worked there. I would watch him, focused on every dish he made, tasting as he cooked. He didn’t talk much, and it was clear that he was very proud of his work. “Nineteen years,” he told me. Then I asked how often the menu changed. “My station, never,” he said.

Many places used ingredients I never knew existed as foodstuffs. Duck eggs for pasta.
Cee
—tiny, just-hatched freshwater eels netted from a tributary.
Gamberetti
—small shrimp, no larger than my pinkie, deep-fried with the head on and in their crispy shells. Little game birds called
tordi
consumed whole, bones and all.
Filoni
—veal spinal cord.
Brovada
—fermented turnips. A rare and very expensive mushroom called
ovolo
, whose colors and form resemble a poached egg. A marjoram-like herb found in the woods called
nepitella.
One kitchen used black truffles with onions and celery in a base trio of aromatics for stews and soups. I worked with ingredients still used from lean times—wild greens, plant sprouts, flowers, nuts, seeds, roots, grape must, and even kernels from the pits of stone fruits. Understanding the constant recycling and reusing of natural resources brought home the idea of a nation at one with its ecosystem.

I kept in touch
with Faith all through my
stages,
letting her know not only how grateful I was but how much I had learned. One day she announced that I was ready for a particularly important
stage.
She was prepared to arrange a stay for me at the Michelin three-star Dal Pescatore in Lombardy.

“This one is truly special. Pay attention,” she told me. I was excited to see what it takes to receive the highest restaurant rating from the world’s most influential dining guide.

Antonio and Nadia Santini, the owners and operators of Dal Pescatore, had both left graduate studies in economics to run the family restaurant. Antonio’s mother and father, Bruna and Giovanni, had opened the original restaurant as a gathering place in the dairy-farming community of Canneto sull’Oglio, halfway down the train line from Brescia to Parma. With Antonio up front and Nadia in the kitchen, the restaurant built its reputation until it became one of Italy’s most important.

The cooking was firmly based in the classic menu of the Po valley repertoire, with a respect for tradition evident everywhere. The ivy-covered stone building housing the restaurant abutted the road, with only a brass plaque by its arched wooden door attesting to the continuity of cooking methods going back decades. The kitchen was warm, not only from the heat of the grill, but also because it served as the family hub. Nadia and her mother-in-law’s strong yet nurturing personalities were the soul of the restaurant, while Antonio administered and attentively watched over the sumptuous dining room.

During a slow weekday lunch service about two weeks into my
stage,
Nadia watched me take some quick notes between plate-ups. At night after service, I would elaborate on these notes in my journals. But that day she interrupted me, not upset that I was taking a break from work, but with a peculiar observation.

“David, I don’t understand why you write so much down. How can you make words for what I do?” she asked while basting a duck breast in a small sauté pan with a sweet-and-sour sauce known as
agrodolce.
She had a very pure and clean look to her, or what the Italians describe as
acqua sapone
—a nice compliment translated as “water and soap.”

“I am cooking from my soul, so there is no recipe for what I make. Tomorrow night be a little different because I don’t know how I am going to feel.”

I wondered if there would ever come a time when I would feel sure enough about my cooking that I, too, could cook from my soul. If there were ever a place to learn that skill, this certainly seemed to be it, for the owners made me feel more like extended family than an unpaid employee. One morning, however, toward the end of my two-month stay, I was offered the choice of two tasks: breaking down a large freshwater pike (time-consuming and I didn’t know how) or preparing a signature cake,
pipasener
(easier and part of my station). I chose the latter.

Something about that day’s service in the kitchen was different. It was quieter than normal, and Nadia and Bruna kept to themselves, saying very little to me. I could feel some tension. As I began cleaning my station after lunch, Nadia signaled me. “Come outside with me, David. I want to talk to you.”

I followed her outside, drying my hands on a precious kitchen towel, precious because Bruna was the caretaker of the restaurant’s linen supply. “Why did you choose the easy task?” she asked. I instantly knew what she was talking about. That morning my instinct told me to tackle the fish.

“I thought it was one or the other. What did I do wrong?”

Nadia blew right by me. “It’s not about the task,” she said. “It’s you—your strength and how you feel about being a bigger person than the job.”

Could there have been an adequate response to what she had just said? If so, I couldn’t come up with it. I looked at her for a moment, processing what should have been clear. I thought of her and her husband as friends as well as mentors. Now I had to face that I was their employee. If they thought me unproductive, they had a right to send me packing. I was prepared to do just that, hit the road. I needed no explanation that would give me more pain than information.

But she did want to give me an explanation, and she continued one notch higher in intensity.

“I want someone with strength in my kitchen! Where’s the chef in you? A chef is strong!” she said, clenching her fist and gritting her teeth. “Look at what I do. I have three jobs. I am the chef of the restaurant, but I am also a wife and a mother. I want to feel that I work for you when I come into the kitchen.”

Nadia went on. “Faith told us there would be a
bravo ragazzo
”—a great guy—“coming to the restaurant. Where? I don’t feel someone is here who wants to run it all.”

Once again I had been found wanting in some set of skills I just didn’t seem to have. And exposed to attitudes I had never known existed. Larry Forgione had never asked, “Aren’t you eager to fill my shoes?”

Nadia’s voice, with a new quality that pulled me up short, interrupted my thoughts, almost as if it were coming from deeper inside her.

“A chef has control over the whole thing. Everyone needs to feel there is a person that’s guiding every day of the business. Even if you feel like you don’t know what you are doing, make everyone feel like you do. Don’t be a follower. Be a leader. I want a leader in my house!”

We were in front of the restaurant next to the side of the road. Occasionally a car or truck would whiz by. At one point, Antonio poked his head through the restaurant door and said, “Nadia, stop already.”

“No,” she responded, starting in English and switching to Italian. “I have more to say.”

Antonio quickly retreated. I wondered if he had witnessed this scene before. I became tight, motionless, and just listened. And then finally all I could think to say was, “Sorry, I thought I was taking care of my station.”

“That’s not a chef’s answer!” she came back at me. “That doesn’t make me feel there is a chef in my kitchen.”

Nadia’s face softened while she fixed her apron. “David, you have it in you. Faith told me you took a risk and left a fancy job in San Francisco because you want to be a real chef, someone whose cooking is a vision into his soul. What happened to the person with courage who walked away from a good situation at home? Where did this
bravissimo
young man lose his
figura?
”

Figura
is one of those Italian words that doesn’t translate well. It can mean the impression you make on others, your personage. The way she used it, the best translation might be “unshakable belief in oneself.”

Maybe I didn’t have it was all I could think.

“Don’t be so solemn,” Nadia went on, her tone now motherly, smiling, almost teasing. “You are leaving us soon.” She took me inside and pulled an Italian cookbook from a shelf in the library. Before handing it to me, she said, “Just know I say what I say to help you, not hurt you. We will always be friends.” And then she reached for a pen and began to inscribe the title page. In Italian, she wrote: “
Per Davide. Buona fortuna. Ti auguro di diventare un grande chef
”—For David. Good Luck. I hope you become a great chef.

I went up to my room to think about what had just happened. Nadia’s eyes and words cracked the shell. It was three in the afternoon, and the bells in the local clock tower down the road started to ring. I recalled having seen the words in large letters painted under the clock:
è L’ORA DI FAR BENE
—It is the hour to do well.

Seasons changed one into
the next. My language skills increased, although to some Italians I had a Spanish accent. My clothes all bore the “Made in Italy” label, although I could never quite figure out how to wear them as well as the locals. I eventually became a legal resident with a work permit and an identity card. I began dreaming in Italian.

Italians feel an immense pride that tends toward the regional rather than the national and reveals itself in more than just the cooking. From cosmopolitan Milan in the north to history-laden Rome, each region has its distinct identity, style, and attitude.

My trip introduced me to many of these differences, and I knew I would be coming home a vastly better cook. Given the right ingredients, I could prepare numerous regional recipes. However, even though I had learned a great deal about Italian food, I wanted the opportunity to choose ingredients and write menus, if for no other reason than to reassure myself that my culinary grand tour had been worth one of the longest sabbaticals ever taken by a cook.

I thought about contacting some of my bosses in Italy to see if they had any real jobs for me, not another internship. But I didn’t love the idea of starting at the bottom. And once in, I wasn’t sure how long I could get away with the white lie a friend of mine recommended I tell people for acceptance in a class-conscious society: “Tell them you’re the chef, not a cook.” In a small town, I was bound to get caught.

While working in Milan, I contacted a yacht charter agent whose name I had been given by a friend in San Francisco. There were large yachts that plied the Mediterranean, he told me, and many of them had private chefs on board. The idea was intriguing.

The agent, Annie, was based in Antibes on the Côte d’Azur. I told her what I had been doing and that I was interested in possibly cooking at sea. She invited me to her office for an interview. She said my timing was good because the yachts were starting to return from the winter in the Caribbean. I made an appointment and went to Antibes during my next days off from work.

As the train made its way from Genoa west along the coast, I had a nonstop view of the Mediterranean. The most romantic body of water on the planet was right in front of me. Two vivid tones of blue—water and sky—filled the train windows. By the time I got to my destination, I would have said anything to get work on or near the sea.

At her office, Annie immediately asked me two questions: “Have you ever worked on a yacht before?” and “Do you get seasick?”

The truth came out like a reflex. “No, I haven’t. But I believe seasickness is a state of mind.”

She cracked a smile and probably sensed I was eager to get a job. We talked a long while, and then she said she would try to find something for me.

I went back to Milan seduced by what I had seen. The famous Côte d’Azur. Huge yachts. A thriving international community. The idea of an offshore adventure was alluring. Several days later, Annie called. “I found something.”

When she told me that the new owners of a sailing yacht called
Serenity
were looking for a chef that summer, I asked to hear more. The money was good, Annie assured me, but the owners would make demanding bosses. With scant tolerance for anything except the very best, they were the types of people who didn’t suffer fools gladly.

“Serenity
was purchased by a very wealthy and socially prominent Italian couple,” Annie explained. “The boat will now be based on the Côte d’Azur.”

She instructed me to refer to them always as
il Dottore
and
la Signora.
She also told me that
la Signora
was, in her own right, one of Europe’s most successful and admired businesswomen. Annie cautioned that she had heard
la Signora
could be quite blunt in voicing her dissatisfaction when something wasn’t done the way she wanted it.

“Think carefully, David,” Annie said. “I know you’ve spent four years in Italy learning the cuisine, but these people will know in an instant if you can’t meet their standards.”

All I could think about was the opportunity this offered for me to finally have my own kitchen and run my own show. I would be fully responsible for everything that went out of the galley. Another dozen
stages
could not make me any more qualified than I believed I was at that moment.

I asked Annie to set up the interview.

“Ciao!” the elegant, tanned
woman greeted me as I stepped from the dock to the boat.

“
Ciao!
” I responded and wondered if Annie had stressed that I was fluent in Italian.

It was warm even for late March, with an occasional strong gust whipping across the boat. Unruffled by the wind,
la Signora
indicated that I should follow her to the cockpit.

I was surprised by her appearance. Her high cheekbones and forehead, which in class-conscious Europe were said to confirm both breeding and intelligence, were accentuated by dark brown, almost black hair tied back in a long ponytail. Her untucked bright blue blouse was striking over beige slacks and white moccasin-type shoes. Born of a people who created it, style draped across her effortlessly.