Cooking pasta and more

On Tuesday, I attended an Italian cooking class. It was the neatest experience. The participants mainly consisted of Navy wives, but there was one brave husband who went also.

We began our trip by taking a bus to a local town at the top of a mountain near the base. I thought we would never reach the top. The bus kept climbing and increasing altitude. Our tour guide had warned us that some of us may need a bag if we get car sick easily. Thank goodness, I was okay.

When we arrived at our destination, we were so high up that Mt. Etna seemed to be at eye level. Usually we have to crane our necks up to gaze at it. The restaurant was a quaint building that somewhat looked like a small castle. It was a family owned and operated restaurant.

Two Italian women taught our class. They had a long table set up for us with several bowls of different ingredients. Since neither of the women spoke English, our tour guide translated for us. It was so much fun. We learned to make Pasta al Forno (pasta with meat) and Crispelle (a fried dough dessert).

After we finished preparing our dishes, we sat down to a 5 course meal. We had antipasti first (Italian for appetizers): fried ricotta cheese, artichokes, fried eggplant, asparagus, and bread. Then we had our first pasta, which was the pasta we had prepared. Then we were served a second pasta, much like spaghetti. We were then brought all sorts of meat: lamb chops, sausages, steak, and beef. As we were all about to explode, they brought out dessert: crispelles and canoli.

Needless to say, I did not have to eat dinner that night! It was such an amazing feast. As we were walking out the door, our fabulous Italian cooks gave us a wrapped pan of the pasta that we had made to take home. This trip was well worth the experience and the pasta!

Trip to Palermo

Jeff and I took a bus tour to Palermo this past Sunday. Palermo is the capital of Sicily. We had a wonderful time. Not only was this city beautiful, the scenery on the bus trip there (2.5 hours) was awesome as well. On the bus ride, we saw green, lush rolling hills, mountains, and the coastline of Palermo. The water at the coast was bluish-green and looked crystal clear.

Once we got to Palermo, we toured a Palace, several churches, catacombs, and a gorgeous fountain. We also walked down several quaint streets where I bought some hazelnut gelato. We also walked by the Opera house where they filmed a scene from the movie "Godfather III." We really enjoyed ourselves. Oh, yeah...the bus driver for our tour knew Jeff because he used to work with Jeff when Jeff was stationed here before. The bus driver joined us for lunch and we chatted over pasta. Ah---good times. To see more pics of our trip, click here.

Our Italian Home

There have been some requests to see our home, so here are a few snapshots. We still have a lot of decorating and organzing to do, but here is our home! Click here for more pics.

More pictures from my trip to Catania

To view more pictures from my recent trip to Catania, click here.

My field trip to Catania

Last Friday my class took a trip to Catania. Catania is the closet urban city from our vast countryside surroundings. We had such a great time!

As I described in an earlier blog about Jeff's trip, I saw pretty much the same sites that he saw on his trip. However, hearing about it and experiencing it are definitely different.

Walking through the open air market was exciting and gross all at the same time. Gross meaning seeing the sight (and smell) of the raw fish and meat. A few of my classmates and I ate a raw oyster at the market. It was good! Thank goodness for the fresh lemon juice on it! There were also clothes, shoes, sunglasses, and faux designer purses. I bought a scarf in which I bargained with the vendor. I was so proud of myself!

We saw ancient ruins, a beautiful cathedral, and rows of cobblestone streets with beautiful buildings with wrought-iron balconies.

For lunch we ate at a delicious restaurant in which we had a divine 5 course meal. We had bruschetta, pasta, salad, chicken, calamari, and tiramisu for dessert.

It was definitely a day of rich European culture and food!

Ten interesting things about Sicily

This is just a random list of things that I have found either interesting or surprising about living in Sicily.

10. Geckos in our house.

9. Getting used to how Italians drive.

8. Learning to leave early for destinations as you may be delayed by a farmer and his herd of cows or geep (goat+ sheep=geep).

7. The Sicilians are very nice and love Americans.

6. You can travel from one end of Sicily to the other in about 2 hours.

5. The weather changes from cool to hot in a manner of minutes.

4. Using the metric system.

3. Learning Italian (and Sicilian dialect).

2. Italian women and men are fabulous dressers! They believe in "bella figura" which means that it is important to look nice. They would rather look good than worry about comfort. I must say...they are styling!

1. Living near an active volcano. White smoke has been coming out of Mt. Etna lately, but supposedly that's not a big deal! Eek!

Two busy weeks

You haven't heard from me in a few days because I have been in class. All last week and this week, I have been in class. The base requires all of the new arrivals, including their spouses, to go through an indoctrination and cultural class. Last week we learned how to function on the bases (i.e., go to the grocery store, find the post office and mail items, go to the library, etc). This week we are learning about Italian/Sicilian culture as well as some key Italian phrases.

Also this week our class will go on a field trip to the closest large city-Catania. There we will explore a Cathedral, do some shopping, see an open air market, and have an authentic Italian meal. The above picture was taken by Jeff when his class went out for a meal. I can't wait! Jeff told me I'll need a strong stomach for the meat market as they have raw fish out on display. Stinky!

Our biggest challenge has been having one car. Many mornings we've had to get up at 5am to get me to class and Jeff to work or to his workout. It makes for a long day!

I've also met some other wives in the class, which has been great. We are all in the same situation of adjusting to our new surroundings. Some of the ladies I have met are from VA. It's really a small world after all.

Stay posted for more fun info from my week in class as I learn more about Sicily. Ciao!

Another Roadtrip

Jeff and I decided to find another mall that we had heard about in Misterbianco. We heard that there was a HUGE new mall in the Motta/Misterbianco area. So we ventured out on Saturday in search for this mall named Etnapolis.

The drive to the mall was gorgeous and somewhat scary! We went through the town of Motta, which is a town on a hill heading towards the direction of Mt. Etna. We drove around beautiful landscapes and small winding cobblestone streets. There was one street on the way that made me feel like I was in San Franciso as we went straight up an incline that seemed like we were going up the side of a mountain--not around, straight up! I was enjoying the view so much that I forgot to take pictures. I did however snap a picture on Mt. Etna from the top of the mall parking garage.

It was neat seeing the local apartments, restaurants, bars, and pastry shops in Motta. We plan to make another trip to Motta one evening for dinner. I can't wait!

Now, on to Etnapolis! It is a modern European mall with over 100 stores and approximately 10 restaurants. We enjoyed looking around and window shopping. One thing we found funny was the abundance of underwear stores. Italians seemingly love underwear!

Our favorite store was Carrefour, which was very similar to Auchan--a European Walmart of sorts. We bought a few groceries: fresh Italian bread, veggies, juice, and a few other items. I asked Jeff to let me pay the cashier so that I could practice using Euro. (We exchange US dollars into Euro before going out into the economy.)

Perhaps one of the best things about this trip was tasting gelatto. I got a small scoop of half sweet cream and half coffee flavored gelatto. It was so delicious!

We then ventured home right after the sun had set. It was beautiful. Jeff was such a great navigator. I was so proud of his navigator skills through the narrow streets. This is definitely the beginning of many fun road trips around Sicily!

The return of Frank

My nephew Nathan once won a small plastic toy at Chuckie Cheese. The small toy was a green lizard that Nathan fondly named Frank. Whenever he sees the commercial for Geico Insurance with the gecko, Nathan says, "Look, it's Frank!!"

Therefore, Jeff and I decided, per my sister's suggestion, that if we ever saw the gecko in our house again, we would name him Frank.

This morning while unpacking some boxes, Jeff said, "Honey, Frank's back!" Sure enough, the green gecko was back. Like last time, he just sat on the floor looking at us. We shooed him outside with a broom. I have a feeling we'll be seeing a lot of Frank. Oh, well, at least he does eat bugs.