Life in Positano July 19

I am living in Positano for the summer and I haven’t thought to write about it here once. I have been too caught up in Colatura di Alici di Cetara and Marina in Cucina. The former is a fish sauce from a small town near Salerno, which I’m researching for my Master’s degree at NYU. It is a huge endeavor, one that is overwhelming me daily, and I am wishing I had just a little more insight to what I am actually trying to get out of it. Hopefully writing my thoughts here will help me to figure that out. The latter is a home-restaurant and cooking school in an old villa, where I am working and living for the summer, with my host/ roommate/ friend/ boss, Marina.

Rather than lay out my situation further I think I should just dive in.

I am currently in my tiny apartment upstairs from the main house (a 17th century converted convent in Chiesa Nuova, Positano). The house, like all houses in Positano, is built into the mountain, therefore I have the particular pleasure of being both upstairs, but having all of my windows at ground level facing the only road in town. Busses, motorbikes, drunk Americans yelling (and pissing) is all a meter from my head at night. Currently a couple of New Yorkers are talking about their “douche bag” taxi driver “who fucking ripped them off.” I may spray their ankles with my handy bio-killer for the ants.

Every day here feels unreal, yet it’s become routine. I’m busy. I don’t know where the days go but they go much too fast, I’ve never experienced anything like it. Even days when I need to sit on the computer for hours and work, and I do, I work for hours, it feels like nothing gets done. Is is the heat and the ash from the not-so-wild fires on the mountains that stunts everything and everyone? Or is it the two hour lunches Marina and I revel in often, sipping cool cucumber soups and noshing on fried anchovy balls on our balcony overlooking Fornillo Bay? It could be both. It could be.

Wednesday July 19th:

Slept on the day bed downstairs which is just in the dining room as you enter, the main room, the foyer, it’s all the same. I did so due to the ridiculous Scirocco* winds which blew the contents of the forest fire into my upstairs apartment, as I left all the windows open when I went to Berlin for Leonie and Anael’s wedding*. The wedding was beautiful and lovely and picturesque in every way except for the DJ’s selection and confidence in it.

I was awoken around 7:15 this morning by the wine delivery guy but I couldn’t get up and pretend to be already awake because I was pantless. So I just sat in my day bed and waved.

Dozed off to sleep for another hour even though the gardeners came in through the same door a few minutes later. I told Marina I needed a snooze and so that’s what I did. I dreamed that Marina made a Moka pot out of two giant cast iron woks and they were boiling and overflowing coffee furiously. In the dream I rushed to turn off the stove and Marina genially scolded me, saying she wanted that to happen. I don’t wonder much what the dream means.

When she turned the corner into the dining room around 8:30 I woke in that way you just don’t understand– my sleeping brain just knew she was heading to the nursery and that brain knew I was not going to sleep through it. I bolted and said “I’m coming. Two minutes.” I put on shorts and brushed my teeth and grabbed my trusty *krewes* and was ready faster than Marina has seen I’m sure. We walked to the nursery and selected basilico, timo di limone, a little decorative pepperoni, and prezzemolo. All went to the gardeners to plant in our little herb garden, which we use often in our cooking classes and our smoothies and our cocktails.

Lunch:

Chilled Cucumber Soup with Greek Yogurt:
4-5 cucumbers, peeled and seeded (you don’t have to seed it)
1 1/2 cup greek yogurt (or buttermilk! or cashew milk! whatever you get it)
3 cloves garlic (I don’t mess around)
1 spring onion
1 Sfusato lemon, juice and zest
1/2 t white wine vinegar
1/2 C parsley and basil
little bit of water
salt
cumin

*Nutribullet* the shit out of everything and put it in the fridge to cool- best after at least 6 hours but you can eat it whenever it’s cold. serve with olive oil drizzle, garnish with chives and basil flower, add more water if you like to drink it instead of enjoy with spoon!

Note: This is a lot of raw garlic for some people. Not for me, but for some.

Bean Water Soup with Red Onion and Colatura di Alici

An odd little soup Marina put together, made with the fresh fagiolini in the red and white stripey pods that are around right now, they’re lovely to look at in a basket. She cooked some of the beans and left them whole, she cooked others and pureed them, and she sautéed the red onion with the whole beans. Then added the sautéed beans and onions back to the onion water and added some of the pureed beans. It was an odd mixture of textures to which we then added a our selection of two colatura di alici brands and one thai fish sauce at the table- always taste testing first. There is a lot of fish sauce that goes down in this house.

Uova in Purgatorio (Dante Eggs)

olive oil
5 cherry tomatoes, whole
3 cloves garlic, chopped
1/2 can whole pelati, juice and tomatoes
1/2 red onion, thinly sliced
5 cherry tomatoes, halved hotdog way
3 eggs
pepperoncino
S+P
pecorino
lemon zest
fresh herbs to garnish

Heat olive oil and add the whole cherry tomatoes letting them sizzle and burn a little before adding garlic. Once fragrant add canned tomatoes and let cook down a little, about five minutes. Crack eggs on top and place red onion slices and face up halved tomatoes around them. Cover and cook two-ish minutes on medium-low. Then put pan in broiler about four minutes. Remove, add spices and cheese and let cool a little, then add lemon zest and herbs.

Also awesome with hunks of crusty bread. Cook on stovetop covered longer if you prefer hard yolks.