Food

I thought I would explain to you how much food the ladies in my house and I have eaten in the past week. To expand on my last post, I think what I've heard is correct: the male students that visit Italy loose 10lbs. and the female students gain 10lbs. The ladies of my house, Stephanie, Carrie, Christie, Sam, and I have eaten a lot of food this week! We tried to count it out and it looks like we have consumed 5 loaves of bread, an entire wheel of cheese, a bottle of olive oil, 3 bags of crostini, 5 bags of pasta, and about 7 bottles of wine. Monumental to say the least. Well, I need to go, we're off to go purchase more food for dinner!

Pictures

Well, I am sitting in the "blue bar" in Orvieto using the internet on Christie's computer. I just enjoyed a delicious hot chocolate that was more like a chocolate pudding. All the food here is so delicious, but I think I won't gain any weight, mom, because of all the walking I have done today. Anyway, the pictures are from my cooking class. The first is with the restaurant's cat, Mio. Spinner should be jealous because this cat lives in the courtyard of the Zeppelin and gets fed pasta and salumi. It was so cute and jumped on my lap when I started petting it.

This is the "squadro pane" with our creations. Brad and Ryan are fellow architecture students and we had a great time learning to make the bread.

Here I am kneading the dough. The chef that helped us told me I was a natural and that he knew a few "artisan bread makers" who could take a lesson from me. I guess I have a backup if I can't find a summer job!

This is a picture from the market in the Palazzo Popolo. They sell dried goods at this vendor and they let us taste a lot of things because we were with the chef from the Zeppelin.

On Thursday I got to learn Italian cooking from a master. A group of KSU students got to take a cooking lesson with Chef Lorenzo at the Zeppelin in Orvieto. I have never eaten so much food in my entire life!
We started the day with a cappucino and went to the market in town. On the way to the market, we stopped for a cinnamon liquor at a chocolate shop. Amazing way to start the day! At the market we were instructed to taste everything, including delicious blood oranges from a Sicilian vender. We later went back to the Zeppelin to cook our lunch with the ingredients from the market. I was on 'squadro pane' or team bread and we made some delicious focaccia and rolls. We ate a huge lunch, which of coarse involved wine, and then headed out to tour a 'cheese barn' as my mom called it in her recent email. It was really a cheese factory, where again we were asked to taste everything. This was a little difficult after a wild drive through the hills and the strong smell of the cheese itself. After this we made our way to the extra virgin olive oil mill were we again tasted everything. I did end up buying some cheese, e.v.o.o., and olive paiste to share with my roommates. When we returned we had another delicious meal waiting for us at the Zeppelin.
The day was so much fun and I wish I could figure out how to load some pictures on this old computer, but that will have to come later.

I arrive.

Well, I arrived earlier this week to the beautiful city of Orvieto. The city is all I imagined it would be with it's medieval buildings and picturesque setting. Our apartment is so amazing. It has vaulted ceilings and, mom, it does have hot water and is pretty warm. I am sharing a room with Stephanie and we live in the 'spa', ie. we have a shower in our bedroom. I have had some great wine and food. Yesterday I enjoyed a day of cooking and more food than I could eat, but more about that later. I will try to post again soon.

The journey begins...

I begin my travels tomorrow with a drive to Kansas City International Airport with my buddy Big Chris, curtesy of my dad. From there we will fly with the group to Rome via DC (interesting place to be on January 19th) and we will arrive in Orvieto by bus on the morning of the 20th.
I tried to use a blog to communicate with people over my summer in London, but unfortunately I wasn't very good at keeping up with it. I'm determined to succeed this time, so stay posted!