le colline viola

Since spring came, this is what i see on my drive into Pacific Palisades to teach voice lessons to my 11 year old student…..

It’s purple heather, or wild mountain thyme, or something of that sort,

but it creates purple lawns and is just so darn pretty i nearly cacy every

time i see it against the hyper blue sky. I can’t help

sometimes but be reminded of italy by the landscape out here; the

rolling hills and cyprus trees

Lala cypruscyprus trees in my mom's town of Colonella in Abruzzi

Pa-nono

Aaaah.  Sad remnants of an Italian girl’s snack attack

it was violent

See my Nov blog about lupini beans here :

http://alasagnaintofuland.wordpress.com/2009/11/07/eda-mommy/ 

I got my lupini at Bay Cities Deli on lincoln blvd in lala

 (http://www.baycitiesitaliandeli.com/)

along with a few other ingredients like sicilian orange marmalade, big juicy capers, imported

anchovies, gardiniera, chinotto and sanbitter. I really like this joint. It’s already a huge crawl in

Santa Monica – it certainly needs no pitch – but it gives a good fix to a chick like me who craves

certain specialty ingredients not sold at Trendy Joe’s. (And i won’t do whole foods. I will walk

out with $75 worth of gourmet olives. Fail.)

There’s always a crazy long line at BCD of people ordering Italian sandwiches. Their fresh-

baked bread is very good, and so are their sandwiches, but the popular sandwich among the

native lala crowd is “the godmother”. Oy.

 (É su, or as my m.i.l. would say, feh.) It’s fine, i’ve tried a bite of a buddy’s, but it’s

got sauce and stuff on it that’s just very UN.

As in un-italian.

 This sounds so bad, but i find myself rolling my eyes at the tatooed, faux-hawked people

ordering their LOADED “italian” subs. Who cares? Let people eat what they like, i know. 

It’s bad. I’m such a jerk. 

I suppose the godmother sandwich is more Italian-American than Italian But i much prefer the prosciutto and mozzarella.

with nothing on it. niente. nind’. nud’.

A more perfect panino does not exist (not theirs, the sandwich in general) but theirs is quite

good. Of course when i order it,  it goes something like this:

Can i have prosciutto & mozzarella sandwich?

what kind of prosciutto?

ummm…the real kind…uh..imported, thin.

you want regular mozzarella?

i want mozzarella.

water mozzarella or regular mozzarella?

oh….no no no, i want “water” mozzarella. never heard of that term. can you get the kind my

uncle Massimo makes by hand in his garage? (more on that at a later date.) 

anything on it?

no.

nothing? no lettuce? no tomato?

no! I want a friggin panino. NO salad on it!

What’s with all the options? Certain things should be served almost “omikase” style where the

customer is forced to eat something the way it’s meant to be eaten with no choices. I realize this

is unrealistic. It’s a deli. People order what they like, how they like. But I wish i could

just walk in and order it and they’d know i didn’t want it with shredded polly-o  

merda or the salted kind of mozzarella.  

Prosciutto is salty. It goes with fresh, melty, un-salty mozzarella.

Nevertheless, when they put it together, the imported prosciutto with the

“water” mozzarella, bare naked with their fresh, flaky italian bread, it’s REAL

good.

I gotta take what i can get….m’sint’*? 

 Speaking of dialect, my cugene Roberto is gonna be in town in a couple days. He’s my cousin,

but more like a brother. And a brilliant photographer. He took these pictures of me last winter:

 We’ve been soul kin since i was 6 and he was called “the baby”. We’d

have sleep overs frequently, where we’d torture my sister in her sleep. More on that later.

But he’s a bit of an expert on italian dialects and how to spell ‘em, which can be weiry weiry

treecky. I need a coaching session from him. Or maybe just one of his epic hugs. 

Posts to come on his visit….can’t wait to see him and have sleepovers all week. And we don’t

have to beg our parents this time…maybe this time we’ll torture Andy in his sleep. . Ti vog’ buen

assai**.

 

*ya hear me?

**Bari dialect for ti voglio bene assai, pronounced tee-vog-bwain-ah-SIGH. I love you very much.

 

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sour

                                   Look at my wee lemon tree on my balcony!                                                                                                                                         

 

LIE.

THIS is my lemon tree

was.

The red arrow is to draw your attention to the pretty impatiens on my neighbors window sill pots. I see her water them regularly, her pale arms gracefully peeking out the window like Cinderella reaching for her bird friends.

Bitch.

But i thought….water. That’s how she does it. Go figure.

Then again, maybe it’s my Jersey hands that cursed the plant the day i brought it home. Lemon trees are EVERYWHERE here. I was just trying to fit in. Sheesh.

I’m going out and buying me a clothesline, and hanging my multicolored drawers out there as sort of a nod-to-my-roots decoration. See how cinderella puff feels about that. Think she’d mind?

bt dubs, i call her cinderella puff cause she also steps outside in her pink robe daily for an a.m. cigarette.

At least i’m not dry on the inside.

Buuuuuurn! (no she di – int).

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M-beh

Mrrp.

I have returned, chickens. From a long  journey to a faraway land, where

the internet does not exist.  A land called mrrp.

Not really. But mrrp does, unfortunately, describe my state of brain over

the past month or so.

 “How are ya?”

“…mrrp.”

I think all human beings hit moments of braindead mrrp-ness, where every day feels like a giant

shrug. Not sadness, just… mrrp. It sounds crazy, but i literally have had no thoughts or feelings

since early march. My opinions/inspired moments in March/early April are

expressed in the following time table:

March 18th, 10:24 a.m. I like toast

March 30th, 2:50 p.m. my pee-pee smells like chicken soup, but I haven’t had chicken soup. I like chicken soup though. Maybe i’ll make some tonight from the frozen bones in the fridge. No, it’ll make us too hot tonight. I need to buy a fan. I hate everything.

April 1st, 2:02 a.m. keys, keys keys. keys on van nuys. keys, keys, keys. keys on van nuys. 

That’s about it. (the last one is a local commercial jingle).  Is that bad?

I think a large part of the human population is often in a general state of mrrp. But work

deadlines, family responsibilities and the hecticness of day to day life keep most people from

noticing it. When you don’t have toddlers to chase and/or deadlines to meet, you notice it. AND,

when you’re an artist (stop rolling your eyes, i can SEE YOU you constantly crave that sense

of mental connection to something you can (healthily) obsess over. A role, a song, a class, an

audition.

Scratch that crap about being an Ah-tist. All people crave that. To wake up connected to a

healthy obsession. But the summer slowskies are about to hit. What’s a gal to do?

What do YOU do for mrrp?

For me, NEW things help. I’m talking anything, not just a new gig (given). I know this sounds

über lame, but new pens and pencils wipe out a margin of mrrp for me;  i think it’s a back-to-

school thing.

say it with me: geeeeeek.

So does trying a new exercise regime.

arms too short to box with anyone

(I know, i know, just your run-of-the-mill squirrel-in-boxing-gear reference )

But the best thing, is a trip back to the Jerz, to reconnect. It reminds me of where i came from

and what i left for. I just got back, actually, from an Easter/mom’s birthday visit, during which i

reconnected with an old friend and my old music teacher. Both put me right back in that

inspired place i was in at 17…sometimes all it takes is looking at a certain face, and you

remember.

Aaaalso, i spent my first visit at my parents’ new house in Cresskill, NJ, and after picturing my

childhood home with a sad face on it for months, last week I grew the hell up and set foot in the

future. It was, admittedly, odd at first, but after about 5 days of eating my

mom’s cooking in it and sleeping in their cozily set up guest room (which they

call Erica’s room – SCORE), it felt like home. this is “Erica’s room”. I love that

my parents knew that I needed a smooth transition into this

change and that having something i could call “my room” would help, even though i am grown

and married and i fully recognize that it’s weeeid to need such things. But here’s my excuse:   My

sister & her husband just moved into their new house…their first home. Andy & i have a

temporary apartment, not a house where we’ll be for the forseeable future, so i felt a

bit like my achor was cut & I was floating. This is a melodramatic excuse i realize as i’m writing this.

How about….call me Crazy McCrazerton?

I know the room is more for future grandkids/general guests but let the coo-coo call it what

she wants, ok?

i have a room i have a room i definitely, definitely don't not have a room

 

Selfishness aside, the new house is super cute and very new looking. It’s awesome to see my

mom so renewed and relieved, without the burden of a huge house. She’s trying to resist the

urge to West Elm it the hell out like she did for “my room”. 

The ooonly thing that bears mentioning is a moment my sister and i had

regarding the bed in said room….

It’s a craftmatic adjustable bed.

Well, probably not a craftmatic, but it’s got a remote to adjust leg height. It’s very comfy, but all

i could think when i saw it with the remote hooked to the headboard was…hospital bed.

My parents are both in great health. But they are…..how shall i say… in the senior category.

Thus my sister and i took to jokingly calling it the “death room” for the next couple of days, until

i finally asked them, what’s with the bed? Their reaction? M-beh.

Translation from italian: Mrrp.

 

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Gira-gira-tondo, casca l’mondo

It’s been a busy month for this Jerz girl….between pilot auditions and the wee film, I’ve had an

awful lot of distractions from what’s been bouncing around in my brain for the past few

months. Sigh. I’m gonna say it…

My parents have sold our childhood home.

I know. Der. Am i five, for making such a stink about it? Yes, yes i am. But it literally tugs at my

heart every day. Preparing for an audition, boom – sinking feeling. Making dinner, boom –

sinking feeling.  Falling asleep, boom - sinking feeling.  

I don’t roller skate, but if I did, I’d get that sinking feeling. It hits me multiple times a day. I’m

not a friggi anymore. I’m all growended up. Is my parent’s new house still gonna have that

smell when i walk in after a long flight from Lala that immediately puts my head and feet back

on and tells me who i am? Everyone’s home home has a smell. (Home home is different from home.)

177 Westervelt is a combo of wood, wine cellar, tomato sauce on the stove and ajax.

Take a sec to try and reconjure your home home smell. For some, there might be some bad

stinks in there. I’m lucky. All good smells. Very Lee Strassberg of me, I know…

My parents have been going thorough 20 years of STUFF for the past few months, purging and

keeping. Important childhood stuff is staying (certain Cabbage Patch kids, pound puppies,

italian children’s records, and of course the real precious stuff) but much of it is in the garbaj or

donated. My sister sent me an emergency text at 6 a.m. my time:

Natties - i found nonna’s pasta maker in the garage. Mommy’s gonna sell it so you better tell her if you want it.

 

(My sister and i call each other weird names from when we were little. Standard.) Anyway,  I

called my mom before i was even fully awake. É su. My nonna’s manual pasta crank? Are you

shitting me? I will USE that thing. I will get carpal tunnel from it, but i will USE it.

My parents sold my grandparents bedroom furniture from our basement but failed to sell my

old bedroom furniture….it’s white, and very 90′s i suppose . There’s also a big burn spot on

my bureau which i painted over with white out to hide it from my mom. I had left a tea light

candle burning on my Tori Amos shrine area overnight (shut up) and i woke up to find a black

hole in the wood. (Thing is, that kind of thing would still happen to me now. Only it wouldn’t be

Tori Amos. I don’t know who it would be…don’t really give that much of a cacy about anyone anymore.)

 

I think the main reason why it’s hitting me so hard is because I’m so far away. My sister is

handling it much better, and she’s usually the mushy one. But she’s a few streets away. 

One thing that’s helping me when my wheels start to turn is, appropriately, SPIN.

dont be scurred

Whaaa? I know, I know. That horrible sounding biking thing that makes your ka-chime-a hurt.

I tell you, it cures all ills.  When the instructor is good, that is, and plays good music. My body

cannot endure the torture if my ears are being tortured too. But when my fave instructor plays

a good slow, soulful one and i turn that resistance knob waaaay up and climb, it’s like a form of meditation; a moving meditation.  My head clears, I’m dripping sweat in

buckets and closing my eyes. I always feel better after. Brain cacy, cleared.

People talk about yoga out here all the time, and it is great. But I’d much rather spin. You can

hit that sweet spot in your mind and body without holding still. As long as your instructor is not

a “woo-hoo!” type. Then you’ll have to release your brain cacy by beating up the shtupt.  

As for the house….home is people, not walls. I’ll give my mom a month of living in the new place

before i bet it starts having the smell too. That’s all i need, and i’m good.

p.s. I already said goodbye to my room last time i was there. Literally. Talked to it in my old bed

at night. Der. Don’t judge, judge Judy.

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cappuccetto rosso

This week made me cacy. More than usual.

Why, you ask? I finally got to play an Italian. In an independent film called My Uncle Rafael, coming to a wee theatre near you this summer. I play Mariella, a native Italian who speaks broken English, waiting for her lover on a bench for 3 weeks without losing hope,  who befriends the rather lascivious but lovable main character and acts as a sort of angel of love who prompts him to change his ways.

girl in red on a bench

The film is a broad comedy and has been a blast to work on so far. All truly good eggs involved.

The reason why I cacied about being able to finally play Italian is because of my darned mop of auburn hair. Apparently NOBODY wants to see an Italian on screen or tube who is not olive-skinned & dark haired. FAIL, i say. Until now. I was told by the writer of the film that they liked that i was not typical Italian looking. It made for a more surprising effect.

So i dedicate this to all you 100 % Italian redheads out there…..i don’t know any who aren’t in my family besides Mario Batali and, i just learned, this dude:

carlo sartori of manchester united

And NOT this chick, though she’s listed online as an Italian redhead on a redhead dedication website…

Michaela Brambilla…aaaand roots.

But I know you’re out there….and you sure as hell AINT IRISH.

“Der” day

It’s almost Valen-times Day, as Kristen Wiig says, the day when men feel forced into romantic clichès. Flowers, chocolates, blah blah blah. My man and i don’t pay much mind to V day by way of gifts and things; we’ll go out to dinner (La Botte in Santa Monica this year) and that’ll be that. I’ve been known to sneak chocolate hearts in his coat pockets and briefcase compartments. But that’s it. My husband is not a V day fan. “what’s romantic about a gesture that you have to do because of a calendar date? It’s so much more meaningful to do romantic things on an ordinary day, when no one’s expecting it.” I of course agree. But I still don’t wanna be the only girl in the office without a flower delivery. (She says for effect, as she don’t work in no office) Call me uninventive. But i spent my summers on the Wildwood Boardwalk. I loves me a cheap teddy bear holding a polyester heart. I hate to sound so gauche, but i’m the kind of gal who doesn’t really know what gauche means.

I’m stupid, but don’t act like you don’t love me

I’m in a snuggly mood ever since the big blizzard on the Jerz these past couple days. I’m glad I don’t have to drive in it but my father in law just sent me pics from their house in Cherry Hill, NJ and it kinda makes me wanna spend Vday inside, in front of a crackling fire with some marshmallows and Vin Santo. Oh, and my husband .

hi, I'm Erica's favorite drink

Don’t they make you feel the same?

snuggly wuggly!!! Der. Screw the chocolates, gifts, dinner even. I’m gonna make-pretend we’re stuck in a storm. Maybe I’ll hire a snow machine to blow over our apartment. Or use dandruff. (Do people have dandruff anymore?)

Then on Feb 15th, I’ll drive with the top down on my car in nothing but a light jacket. Suckas.

  Ok, ever since i mentioned Vin Santo i can’t stop thinking about it. If you haven’t had it, first of all, what the hell? Second of all, dip some almond biscotti or even Stella Doro “S” cookies in it. It’s sweet and plummy and tastes like a grape make de sex with a plum using a wee vanilla bean. Dirty.

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cacy, honey

I just had the most perfect little snack. A cacy.

No, not a number 2 underpants nugget. The fruit. Otherwise known as a persimmon. (The big fat smushy kind, not the firm “israeli persimmons” you find in some supermarkets that you eat like an apple. ) I have no idea why, but in my family, we call them cacy. I googled “cacy fruit” and found no other references to the smushy, silky, honey-like, orange ball of deliciousness, so perhaps we’re the only ones who gave it such a ridiculous name. But I love them.

Of course, anyone who’s ever eaten one has encountered hairy tongue at one unfortunate point in their cacy eating lives. If the fruit does not have that seemingly overripe quality, that transluscent flesh that slides down your throat like a sweet, delicious ball of snot, you are shocked with a bitterness that leaves your tongue with a distinct furry after-sensation. Hairy Tongue. It’s happened to the best of us.

unfortunate.

But when they’re good, they’re soooo good. Plus, they’re really high in fiber…(perhaps thats why we call ‘em cacy at home) and have tons of other minerals and ingredients that prevent atherosclerosis, heart attack and stroke. And, they’re high in potassium, calcium and iron.

I just made that all up. Snore.

No, seriously, i didn’t! But who cares about all that when they’re so good. My best cacy memory (standard, to have tons of cacy memories) was one of the first times my husband came over for dinner, and my sister and i offered him an HTC (hairy tongue cacy), and went on and on about how good they are, and he took a bite and yelled “are you kidding me?” Since then, he always makes me have a bite first before he dives in. The first time he realized i was not to be trusted:)  But I’d happily be a guinea pig any day. Mind the cultural slur…but i proudly consider myself to be both those things. 

Speaking of furry little animals, i cant believe i haven’t yet mentioned my most favoritest little buddy at home….Elliot the duck. 

 

I’m not Elliot, but I look like him

Well, he’s a dog. But we call him “the duck”, or “the cat”. No clue why. He’s a black and white long haired chihuahua. My closest biracial friend. Yesterday i took him to the vet for a tooth cleaning and he came home drunk. Poor little stinker. He was completely out of sorts. But this morning after his walk his personality came back and i smothered him with a million italian kisses. By italian kisses I don’t mean both cheeks. I mean loud and many. In my family that’s the way you kiss someone when you really love them.

bacione

You smush your mouth and nose into their face, take a big whiff of their skin and smmmmack a million loud mushy ones, practically sucking their cheek into your mouth. It’s pleasant, I swear:) Kinda the way children kiss, and you know they always get it right. One of my favorite posessions is a locket my sister gave me her wedding morning with a childhood photo of her giving me that exact kind of kiss. You’ll notice, even if you watch italian tv, the romantic kisses aren’t slow and warm. They’re violent, and loud as hell.

Love hurts sometimes–don’t be afraid. Try it when your honey comes home. Give him/her a big italian one. And if he complains, give him an HTC.

 I’m looking at the duck right now and his stinky little ears have  got one coming in 5….4…..3…..2…. become a fan of me on facciabook!http://www.facebook.com/pages/wwwalasagnaintofulandwordpresscom/197407384778

TML

Mini-post! Mini-post! Just ordered the shoes I’ve been itching for, which i saw in Lucky mag. I hate to be such a target customer, but i’d been thinking about ‘em for 2 weeks.

www.shopjshoes.com

They’re so cute in a not-trying-too-hard kinda way. Can’t wait to wear ‘em with rolled-up jeans or thick grey tights. Yaaay, things!!! Don’t deserve ‘em. Need ‘em though.

                                                    Now lets talk about the FINER gifts in life, shall we?

 The real reason i needed to post was i had to honor this day….today my daddy turned 70. This picture was taken when we all went out to celebrate at The Harrison in NYC, the day after Christmas. I wish so much I could be with him today (G)! But we

love love love

talked while he was at work about how young he feels, and how well he takes care of himself every day. We 20 & 30 somethings have no excuse.  My dad wakes up at 4:45 am every morning to jog on the treadmill for 45 mins before work, and, on work days, also takes a mid-day strut around the upper east side after lunch. Is it too much of an understatement to say I’m glad for this?

You go, daddy.

making our table wine with my uncles

My dad loves to laugh and make jokes which sometimes come completely out of nowhere (the apple…) and when my sister and i were little, he loved to take us into the ocean at the Jersey Shore. Once as we tried to navigate the slippery, moss and mollusk-covered rocks and were a little scared, my dad hummed us a little song he made up on the fly…

                                                      It’s a treecky situatioooon,

                                                  which requires imaginatioooon.

Kinda applies to a lot more than he intended it to at the time, no? (Or maybe that’s exactly how he intended it..) Either way, I think of it often. How can I use a little imagination to wrestle myself outta this one?  

Let’s all use our imaginations more in 2010. Der. Happy birthday, daddy. Can’t imagine any kid luckier than me.

TML. (too much love).

absinthe makes the heart grow fonder

 

hello chickens…remember me? (she says sheepishly, with G*)

 It’s a frigid 66 degrees here in Lala this January morning , the mountains are

hyper blue, the  grass is a cheerful green. The post-holiday winter blahs are

a distant memory i have happily shaken off since ”the move” of 2008. I most

certainly do not want for the Jerz today. But those times when i do feel like yelling “E su! What

the frig am i doing here?!” and wish this town had a little more soul to it, a little more “piss &

vinegar” as my college acting teacher used to say, a weekend getaway is just the thing.

    Not a getaway to a serene beach. More of a get-to. Where? I went this weekend & fell

in luurve. With Seattle.

    A perfect 3rd anniversary trip for me & my old man. He had some shark-biting

to do there on thurs, so i flew up to meet him on friday. Two hours on a plane. Cake. And you

can feel the heartbeat of the place sooner than you get your landlegs back.

     When i say “heartbeat”, it’s something that-(bless her heart)- beautiful lala sorely

lacks. People from New York, Chicago, Philly, even San Francisco (i’ve only heard) know what i

mean. But like my Seattle-ite ex-wig guy from the Big Show and dear friend Fred said to me via

text, “You can sense the history like New York, but without all the filth”. So true.  It doesn’t

smell like the warm inside of a culie every 5 blocks. It doesn’t aggravate or exhaust you. It’s like

a seafaring hippie, old-nautical, more laid-back version of New York.  I took this picture from

the top of the space needle (the only tourist-nerd thing

we  did. Well, that and watching the Pike Place fish

market guys put on a show, but we were so cool the rest

of the time, trust:)).

    It only rained once. We walked through Capitol Hill, had really good

entrance to pike place market, so worth being a tourist

meals for the price, drank good coffee and saw an

incredible gypsy jazz band called Pearl Django play while snuggled up in our booth

at Dimitriou’s Jazz Alley in belltown. Truly nothing is better than watching a bunch of old farts

who adore what they do do it so much better than anyone else could do it.

    A close second to that experience was the Knee High Stocking co, a speakeasy in Capitol Hill.

This place is the kinda very un-lala place you don’t stumble upon often, but wish you had.

should i ring?...

There’s something very Lewis Carrollian about the whole experience as you approach the blank,

unmarked door with no one standing outside and ring the bell. It looks like an apartment. Some might fear they had erred and walk

away, and that’s the point. But as soon as you ring, a woman comes out and

brings you through the curtain into a little nook of a bar with

nothing more than plain wooden tables and chairs. 30′s hobo

music plays in the background with the clicks of an old record. And then there’s the

menu. Comfort foods like a soft pretzel with rarebit & chicken pot pie accompany such a

wonderfully peculiar drink menu. The drinks are described in such an enticing way, kinda the

way Lucky magazine describes their items in that way that makes you wanna buy the “quietly

sexy” shoes, The menu at Knee High Stocking co. makes you wanna try every drink, just to see

what they mean. It is not the place for a vodka & cranberry or a rum & coke (inner jersey girl

pouts). They’ve got unique libations with names like the “Gin Sizzle”, “the Stinger”, and

“Between the Sheets.” And a whole page on Absinthe. Pure Absinthe of different grades, and

drinks with absinthe in them. We’ve all heard of Absinthe; la feé verte-the green fairy, in old

tales of hallucinations and virtual poisonings. So naturally my husband ordered it. Of course, the

hallucination thing is a crock, and it’s quite delicious if you like black licorice (which i don’t, but i like a subtle hint of it.)

 They serve it here the tried and true way, by pouring ice cold water from a fountain over a

sugar cube in a slotted spoon over the absinthe. ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absinthe) 

   Rather than pure green fairy, i opted for a drink called “the Sazerac”

which also involved a sugar cube dissolved into peychaud’s bitters,

Sazerac Rye whiskey and an Absinthe rinse, with a lemon rim. I will

order anything with bitters since my childhood downing those little

glass bottles of italian bitter sodas like Sanbitter and Chinotto.

coke shmoke

 So the decision was easy. The combination of flavors in the drink conjured up so many different taste memories.  It was delicious, a 

slow-sipper with that whiskey burn and a bitter sweetness with just a touch of

that anise, licoricey flavor from the absinthe.

Those flavors: bitter, anise are

ones a big italian mouth are used to.

      Just as bitter soda was my coke, my oreos were Stella D’oro anisette toast. They’re

Italian-american, not Italian, (a bronx-based company) and very main-

stream. But I used to dip that anisette toast into milk EVERY day after school

as a kid. 

     In addition to ingredients from the wormwood herb, anise & star anise, La feé verte also has

fennel in it. Italians are all about, as my dad would say, “washing you mout” after a meal, hence

the salad-after-the-meal thing, and fennel is perfect for this. My mom would pack it in my lunch

as a kid and i’d chomp away happily at it while my friends would cringe and say “is that

an….onion?” ”No-wuh. It’s finocchio, duh.” (i only knew it as finocchio, which, by-the-by, is

also italian slang for gay). 

   Fennel is such a common ingredient in cooking, as well as fennel seeds and, my favorite,  

fennel pollen, but in my humble & correct opinion the flesh of the bulb will never be as delicious

cooked as it is raw. So crunchy, so refreshing, and in my family we serve it

so worth the childhood mockery. A mammata.

whole on a plate before dessert. Nothing is better for ridding your mouth of salt and

getting ready for sweet.

        Perhaps it is a test to my tangent-addicted brain that all this sense memory (childhood

mockery and such) is conjured by drinking absinthe…or perhaps i was

hallucinating….hmmm…

oh my god...i WAS the weird kid...

But after all, that’s why we continuously eat certain foods, no? The food we ate as a kid will

                               always be the food we love….why do i suddenly crave a booger….

*I’m gonna call guilt “G” from now on, since she’s more or less an entire being who lives inside me and all first generation European-Americans. (woot-woot!) Mark me.

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