Food & restaurants

Eating in Italy is big business and it is also a serious matter for Italians, I say this if by simply looking at the magazines and periodicals on food, restaurants and wines on any news stand anywhere, quality is very important not only in the ingredients but also how food is prepared and presented, it is the topic of endless conversations everywhere. Appreciation by your guests or customers is sought after, if people say that you are a good cook or that you know food, it is the same as saying that you are an educated person, a serious person of worth.

What I find difficult is when you sit in a restaurant and you look at the menu, some items may not be recognizable, per example fish names, what is merluze or astriche.
What about cuts of meat, filet is easy but then there are other cuts which you might not know the Italian name. So you have to ask, this will show that you are unfamiliar with the language, ok fine not everyone is a linguist. Now your waiter may suddenly think, oh I have a group of foreigners who may not like anything other than spaghetti, lasagna or pizza. So let's not suggest items on the menu which they may shy away from. So to get around this situation you have to quizz the waiter about the special of the day or a dish which is the specialty of the house. If you do so you will probably be rewarded with some very interesting and tasty suggestions not to mention an appreciation of you the customer as a person who, though a foreigner, has a love of food and quality. It is important to note that Italian restaurants are not known for their decor or atmosphere, Italians do not care for this sort of thing, what they care about over anything else is food quality. So the decor is usually very simple, no candles on tables, no fancy elaborate decor, what you may find are often family pictures on the wall, a photo of a favorite soccer team, a picture of a long dead pope or trophies of the kids sports achievement. Any elaborate decor means the owner is trying to please the foreign tourists and that may also signal poor quality in food dishes.

I always try to find out what is different on a menu of a restaurant, I try to stay away from the prosciutto and melon which I can have at home any day. Even in the small Tavola calda, a comment on the dishes offered will usually get its reward from the server. This is somewhat difficult to do when we have guests. They may be difficult eaters or may not want to try food they don`t think of as Italian or do not want to try for fear it is exotic or are looking too closely at the prices on the menu.

Last month we went for lunch with this lady in our group after an archeological visit to an ancient Roman site, she was going on about diet and not wanting to eat anything too fattening or too this or that. But on the other hand she wanted us, the other people at the table, to order the rich dishes with heavy sauces, etc... many of which are winter dishes no one wants to eat on a summer day. Same thing with dessert, I only wanted fresh fruit, nothing else but she wanted someone to order a fruit tort so she could try it, I just want a bite she says. Someone did order the tort and then past it on to her to try, oh no cannot do that, blah blah, she says, finally she tries the smallest of morcel and makes a face and goes on to say all kinds of disparaging things about it to the astonished looks around the table and from the waiter. Traditionally in Rome, desserts or sweets are not the thing, many restaurants will have them for the kids or the tourists, most Italians just skip them or will order a fresh fruit salad or pineapple or strawberries with a bit of lemon juice or one of my favorites white peaches diced up in a glass of white wine or pear in red wine.

In Italy if you go to the restaurant it is for eating and meeting friends and having a good conversation. You do not go to the restaurant if you are not hungry, or want just a coffee or if you are dieting, because this means you are sick and sick people have to diet for health reason or so goes Italian thinking. You can well imagine what happens when silly foreigners come to Italy, go to the restaurant and then start with I only want a small portion of this or I am going to share my dish with so and so or this is too rich or I only eat pizza line on the waiter, pizza is a snack food not a meal food. You will get a funny look or the waiter will ignore you all together. Such attitude towards food at the time of ordering from a customer is seen as rude and not respectful of the restaurant chef and owner or the family who runs the place. Many restaurants have been in the family for years often close to 100 years, they are institutions not chains owned by big corporations. Same with waiters they are usually men in their 40 or 50 and even older in some cases, it is a profession not a job you do because you have nothing better to do with your life. If you are not very hungry just ask the waiter to suggest a light dish to you, he will be happy to do so, often taking the approach of concern for your well being.

A few weeks ago we had another guest who was visiting with an old friend of ours, she started to complain that her hotel room had no automatic coffee machine, sorry but this is not a common thing in Italy, if you want a coffee you go to the Cafe usually next to your hotel or to the bar of the hotel off the lobby and get one. We took this person to one of our personal favorite restaurant in Rome on the other side of the Tiber river. It is family owned and the 2 old brothers run the place while their wifes who tend the cash register and greet customers, one fellow is the server, he is in his 70's, his brother cooks. Menus are given to us, she did not appear to know what she wanted to eat and then declared she only wanted a main dish. When ordering you have to specify to the waiter if you want a primi or a secundi, pasta or fish or meat, you do not say I want a main dish. You should also have an antipasti to start which can be easily nothing more than a few olives or grilled vegetables on a small plate, then you can order your main.

So this guest of ours, says to the waiter that she is Italian, ok good, but she does not speak the language, that in itself is strange to an Italian in general, they will think that you will speak the dialect of the village or region you come from, which is true of most italians whose family immigrated to North America 50 years ago or more, but she did not speak the language of her region either. Italians are as a rule very clannish and stick together so they will speak the dialect of their region, so how come you do not speak the lingua franca?

So I asked her what she wanted to eat because the menu was in Italian only and had to translate for her the dishes and explain what they were. Now the waiter is watching me an obvious non-Italian explain to a self-proclaimed Italian the food of Italy. Our waiter was highly suspicous of this person, this was a fraud, bad enough you do not speak the lingua but you do not know the food of your Italian ancestors, what an Insult.

So I order the mix antipasti which is a bit of olives, prosciutto, some cheese and a few grilled vegetables, the plate arrives and we share this amongst ourselves, you eat what you want sort of a thing. The first thing she says, is this is too much food take it away, not thinking of us at the table with whom she is to share this antipasto, the waiter looks at me with a look of despair. Next comes the specialty of the house which in this restaurant is fettucini a la carbonara, she ordered this dish saying she loved it, this small restaurant is known in Rome for its fettucini, made on the premises for decades, it's a family dish. Many Officials from the Vatican also come to eat at this restaurant, it is that good. Again our guest pipes up, oh this is far too rich, too much for me, I cannot eat it all, oh no take it away. Well at that point I did not want to look at the waiter but after that he ignored our table, I was so embarrassed.

The final coup de grace came with coffee, either you have one or you don't which is fine, by law in Rome coffee is not made in a restaurant since only Cafe are allowed to sell coffee, so they send a boy, in this case the nephew around the corner for the coffee and he brings it back. Our guest asked the waiter, I want an American coffee because I can't drink that espresso stuff. Coffee in Italy is another sacred cow, you cannot compare what is considered a cheap imitation, American coffee, to the real thing which is Italian espresso coffee. Well we will not be going back to that restaurant for 6 months in the hope that the waiter will forget and forgive or maybe he will retire and it will be ok to go back. My question is why is it that for North Americans, eating has become a thing you must do to stay alive instead of a pleasure to be enjoyed.