Travel stories by a wannabe wanderer.
Viewing entries tagged
Food
The artichoke is an unfriendly thing. The whole purpose of its design is to keep you away from it. If you try to cut it or rip into it, it bites back with a sting. Most Americans don’t eat many artichokes. I suspect that its ominous nature is the reason why.
It was like an apparition. A road wound up a steep hill to its pinnacle. The cumulus clouds had parted so that only the summit was sunlit. It was there that we saw the medieval town of Castellucio. The ghostly structures were impressive, yet forbidding. When we reached the town there were no people, only a cutting wind that swirled scraps of litter around in a circle. A wild dog sniffed the street.
A round man sat down at the table adjacent to us. His elastic-waist pants gripped the full circumference of his belly, making his rotundity all the more prominent. Like the dome of the Pantheon, his girth appeared to be geometrically equal to his height.
Margherita handed me her longest matterello. Shaped like a dowel, it was three feet long and two inches thick. It was made of oak, smooth, very old, and of a deep rich color and patina. One end was shaped like a small doorknob while the other had a gentle taper resulting in a blunt point. I held it with caution. It looked more like a weapon than a kitchen tool.
