Cooking with Luisa

What a fun day! We started the morning off with our guide and translator, Lilia, who took us to the market hall where locals buy fresh produce, meat, pasta, cheese, and fish. So many foods were not available to us at home, like the varieties and different sizes of artichokes: the produce seller described how to pickle the baby artichokes.

At another shop we watched a man making fresh mozzarella.



When they finally dragged me away, Lilia took us to Luisa's home where we were to spend the rest of the day cooking. Luisa belongs to a group of women called Caesarinas who teach Bolognese cooking. She was recently in New York and Miami with some colleagues giving cooking classes. Luisa, Dave and I made fresh pasta, each of us doing our own batch - such pressure! 

Half the pasta was set aside to dry while the other was used right away to make ricotta and spinach tortelloni. Next we cut the rest of the pasta in strips - just the right width or it cannot be called tagliatelle - to go with the Bolognese sauce Luisa had made previously. Lunch was served - tortellini in a butter and sage sauce followed by tagliatelle Bolognese, paired with a local Lambrusco wine. For dessert we enjoyed a dense chocolate cake that we had made when we first arrived this morning. This day is why I came to Bologna!