Best of British

Stumbled on Piacenza's very first European market on the way to the Vodafone shop today. It was all very exciting, with a bunch of men in uniforms or navy blue suits giving rambling speeches before cutting a ribbon. I'd had to throw my breakfast away this morning because there was a dried caterpillar in it (that's All Bran for you - I probably wouldn't have noticed the difference) so treated myself to some "dutch mini crepes" as a late breakfast, then marvelled at all the bizarre stuff on offer, including...

Surfboard size bread from Tuscany (strictly speaking bodyboard size, but still pretty impressive, a good four feet long.)








Giant sausage from Germany - quite frightening, but not as frightening as....








...This pig thing - not sure which country this was from but made me contemplate vegetarianism, except that in Italy I'd probably starve to death.







There were amazing things from each country - tulip bulbs and cheeses from Holland, amazing sausages and cold meats from Germany and Eastern Europe, delicious sugar laden cakes from Sicily. Ireland was represented by a giant Guinness stand, of course. And as for Britain - there was a great big stall draped with Union Jacks and emblazoned with a big slogan saying Best of British, and what did it sell?

Ah, of course, a big pile of tacky stuff!

It took about an hour to fix the dongle, which had gone wrong for absolutely no reason except to make life more challenging.

Lazy Sunday afternoon

When August turned to September it’s like some kind of switch was flicked. All of a sudden the weather is warm, but it’s not like being beaten over the head with a  hammer, the way it was in August. It’s warm and gentle and lovely to lie out in. And, without sounding too poncy, the light is all soupy and golden and rich and just different to August sunlight. I don’t know why all the Italians choose this time to go back to work.

My cousin A called me halfway through the morning and said she was planning to drive out to her in-laws’ empty house on the other side of the valley and sunbathe by their swimming pool – was I in? Of course I was.

So after a morning of cleaning the house and pushing a few words around on the computer, I bikini-d up and jumped in her car. Spent the afternoon with her and her sister in law, baking in the sun, cooling off in the pool, talking about work and relationships and other normal women’s stuff. Then afterwards we went to my aunt’s for dinner, where I was force fed tortelli followed by pizza, followed by crudo, coppa bread and cheese, followed by profiteroles (note the absence of veg once again). Afterwards my cousin and I climbed the steep hill to the Chiesa Madonna Del Castello, and listened to a flute and harp recital wending its way across the valley.

There are worse ways to spend Sunday 6th September than this.

Every vegetarian's nightmare

The only big bugbear about food in Italy is the lack of veg. Talk all you want about althose wrinkly old ladies living forever thanks to the Mediterranean diet, but that was in the days when women got up at 5am to scrub their front steps (I still see people doing this. Or hear them at least before I turn over and go back to sleep) the days before you could buy as much meat as you wanted at the local supermarket. In those old days when meat was a treat people fantasised about eating it every day - and now our dreams have come true. So why on earth would you want vegetables when you could have another helping of dead animal?

Last night I went to my cousin’s house for a barbecue, the menu for which was as follows:

Starter: Selected salami, Coppa, prosciutto crudo, bread, two small slivers of barbecued courgette

Followed by: Sausage kebab

Followed by: A big slab of steak

Followed by: Pork kebab

Followed by: Tiramisu

Followed by: Torta Crostata (a giant jam tart with a criss-cross pastry pattern on it)

Followed by: Fruit! Phew. Am not going to die of scurvy just yet.

Not complaining though – each animal fat based dish was more delicious than the last, especially the home made tiramisu. And my cousin’s place is beautiful, set high up in the mountains between two valleys, with nothing but fields and forests in view, it was incredibly peaceful. There’s also a new ‘English pub’ in the village which is about as English as Silvio Berlusconi but I didn't mind the absence of damp beer mats and sticky mahogany tables too much.

Signing off now - off to look up heart attack statistics for Emiglia Romagna.