Puglia

We started the day off not quite knowing what we were doing, but we later why we did not know, and it all began with the smile and charm of the beautiful Catarina. We were in lecture, which we do everyday before we get to cooking, when Catarina walks in, grinning from ear to ear. "Buongiorno Signore e Signori!" she exclaims with excitement,  and gives Chef Odette a big hug. From then on out, I knew we would be having a good couple of days.

The First day was a focus on the Basics of Puglian cuisine, which is made up of different seafoods and vegetables, my favorite being the fresh tomatoes that we used, which reminded me of the ones that I grow at home during the summer (before college took my life over). Many of the dishes we made that day were based off of flavor profiles that come from both the Local population, the Messapians, and the Greeks, whom found their way here many years before the death of christ. The Messapians were a body of people that lived in Puglia, and kept a very peaceful lifestyle, living off of the land rather than raging war like some other people I know (you know who). With these recipes, we found culture and flavors that we have not seen, such as cipolle di tropea, which are these small onions that, rather than just being an onion, are either eaten raw or cooked, and have a beautiful bitter-sweet flavor to them.

The second day was full of fun, as we were given the chance to make our own focaccia, which we took ever so gratefully. We also were graced with the chance to work with Octopus, that was caught early that morning. With the food that we made that day, came the smiles and joy of learning about the region in which we are staying. We had just touched on the culture of Puglia in our trip to Bari, but with these two days with Catarina, we got to understand what it was to be from Puglia, and what people who are native to Puglia eat and drink.

Along with the many different dishes we made, we also got to play with different ingredients that we had yet to see, such as the aforementioned cipolle di tropea, and my favorite so far, Sponzale, which is it's own species of green onion, that has all the great things about green onions, only better! Getting to work with what is growing around you gets kind of hard when it comes to working in major cities, so it brings me joy whenever I can walk into the garden and pick something that I want to use, and use it to my heart's content.