What We’re Eating and Drinking: Pesto Cous Cous and Planeta La Segreta
We’ll eat anything with pesto here, so I can’t believe we hadn’t figured this one out yet. Luckily, the rest of the Bouvarez’s took off on Wednesday and I found myself having a leisurely late lunch at Eataly in Centro all by myself. One of the specials was this beautiful combination along with some fresh tomatoes, and I couldn’t wait to make it for everyone.
Christine: Pesto Cous Cous? Sounds like the perfect summer dish. And a leisurely late lunch out alone sounds even better. I’ve never been to Eataly in NYC (I really should get into the city more) but maybe I’ll make a date with some friends there and check it out. (La Planeta=yum!)
What We’re Talking About: Summer is Here
This is the view from my car as I drive back up to the house from drop off at school. Those are the Colli or hills to the Southwest of Bologna and Casalecchio. Things have been pretty green here for the last few months, but now the temperature is reaching 80, and the kids’ (and mom’s) nervous energy is rising with it at the thought of summer break just 3 weeks away. As I mentioned over there in my comment to your Friday post, summer appears to have arrived without our traditional Memorial Day weekend gathering, but we’ve had other cues! Last weekend, we were invited to dinner in the garden at another house on the vineyard. The renters are members of an old Italian family who had been aristocracy for centuries until a few generations squandered everything. As a result, they’re all, from the teens to the old members, incredibly poised, cultured and educated (as if it just came with the genes, but probably more likely from the stacks of books around the house), but also very well acquainted with hard labor. Very interesting folks. We ended up there via other very interesting folks, new friends that we made when they wandered on to our property last month, and ended up staying for a couple of bottles of wine and hours of conversation. But back to the cues of summer… let’s see. There are the giant (about 3 cm long) hornets that keep appearing inside the house. They’re called Calabroni, which is really close to the not-so-nice Spanish word, cabrón, which is something like bastard or s.o.b.. Given these could send a kid or a petit adult(!) to the hospital, the latter seems like a better name! There are also all those trips going on… This week, Leeloo and Stefan flew to London for my brother-in-law’s birthday. While there, Leeloo got to spend some quality time with Papa on Kings Road, had two sleepover nights with her friend, Lily, and got to go on stage at Miss Saigon rehearsals and meet some of the actors. She loved it all, but about seeing the Saigon dancers and singers, she said “I just stared in amusement!” And then Zoel is off in Torino with his 5th grade classmates. He gets back tonight, so we’ll see how that went! From the brief messages his teacher has sent, there’s been lots of hiking and exploring, but also dining and dancing! Finally, the summer calendar of visitors is filling up. We’re looking forward to having our first group – Melissa, Ollie, Natasha, Cedric and wife – for the last weekend of June, and then it’s non-stop until September. Casa Bouvarez is opening for the season!
Christine: I can feel the energy in your post–the same energy that I felt launch you guys on a variety of far-flung summer vacations during the years you lived here (Barcelona, Luca, etc.) and, finally, flung you out of our arms and to Bologna not much more than one year ago. I’ll save my mournfulness about THAT for a different post because it’s just so comforting and familiar to be hearing about all of this activity you Bouvarez get yourselves into once the weather warms. I loved those Memorial Day weekend celebrations at your house in Garrison! I think those are the weekends that we first met many of your other friends and folks–and we are grateful that some of those friendships persist to this day. Incidentally, Natasha WAS IN GARRISON last weekend (which would have made things feel a little bit more Bouvarez-y), but I was in Knoxville so missed seeing her. Ah, next time. Anyway, I can’t wait to hear about Zo’s trip. I know the boys have been texting a bit, but we’ll have to get them together on Skype this weekend so they can have a proper conversation about their adventures. As for Leeloo at Miss Saigon–it makes me smile to think of her there. I can just see her beaming and bouncing in her seat, ready to jump on stage and join the show. Happy weekend to you all!