Today is the day the local Italians will experience a change of diet.
It’s the 4th of July. US Independence Day will be celebrated in northern Tuscany this year. Yes, even as the US falls like Rome, the grills will be smoking.
Foreigners are cooking dinner. We are “fixing” (what a strange term for crafting food) barbecued spare ribs, cole slaw, potato salad, and brownies. We are not fixing watermelon because you cannot fix watermelon. It will be sliced and set on the table as it is.
Without asking, Italians are fixing food for this celebration also. That’s because they want to have something edible to eat. They do not trust foreigners with an act so important as cooking. We are the ones who go to their restaurants and ask for one plate of pasta to divide between four people. We do not know how to eat. Even people who aren’t coming are fixing food for the others. They are sympathizers.
This isn’t the first time the residents of Piano di Collecchia will have had a change of diet. The small collection of buildings in which we live, set apart from the rest of “town,” was once an administrative center used to facilitate a change of diet in the late 15th century, after the Florentines had finally ousted the Malspinas and set up shop in Fivizzano with their nice Medici fountain.
At the time, the peasant diet was mostly derived from chestnuts. These foods are still celebrated in sagre today. You can eat chestnut bread, chestnut pasta, chestnut stew.
Shortly after the Florentines moved in, they found need to expand the diet of the locals. They thought it best to add some potatoes, some vegetables. So they set up administrative centers to help farmers get information and maybe seeds.
Each of these centers was self contained. That’s why it’s set a little ways from the main town. It’s also why there isn’t an ancient church around; the center would have had its own chapel built in.
Of course, the modern folks here have eaten grilled ribs before. They call them rosticciana. But they haven’t had barbecue sauce on them. You can’t get that here in the Lunigiana, as far as I know. They’re in for a treat—especially if I make it hot.
And the weather? Well, it’s what you expect when you set up a big barbecue or wash the car. It’s raining this morning.
I leave you with what might be a good read on a gray and rainy day.