Sunday, September 7, 2014

A month in Tuscany Day 2 - The supermarketo is not open on Sundays!

The second day at the villa started off beautifully, I was up early with a good strong cup of Italian coffee and this was the view in the morning light.


After a breakfast of yogurt and a bacon sandwich we set off to explore Sienna.  We discovered which was the best bus to take (not necessarily the first time) and arrived in central Sienna in the late morning.  We wandered around the narrow winding streets which, away from the Campo were quite deserted.


As we got closer to lunch time and the Campo, the streets started fill up and it became quit hot in the sun so we decided to find a shady pizzaria for lunch.  My husband and I split a insalata misto and a pizza with artichokes, ham, mushrooms and mozzarella. The pizza crust was very thin and crispy, and the toppings light, not heavy and soggy.


The salad was simple and fresh and the combination with a house red made a great lunch.


After lunch we wandered back through the narrow streets checked out the Duomo which reminded me of wedding cake somehow it was so white and the front facade was very frilly and highly decorated.




We then took the bus back to the villa as we had two long time friends arriving and we had to get to the supermarket to get something for dinner.  I was so overwhelmed the day before I had just bought enough for that nights dinner and breakfast.  Our guests arrived just as we had dried off from a cooling dip in the pool and we headed down to the supermarketo, only to find it closed as tight as a drum as it was sunday! Just about all the bars and restaurants were also closed for the afternoon and evening, we are not in North America! What to do?  I took stock of the contents of the fridge and raided what I could find in the kitchen cupboards.

I came up with about 3 cups of chicken stock I had made the night before from the roast chicken bones, 2 cups of cherry tomatoes, 8 eggs, a large block of Parmesan, a can of corn, two cooked chicken legs and 1 breast, 3 slices of bread, half a package of pasta bow ties and half a package of gluten free penne. This had to feed 7 so I made the following.

Chicken and corn soup with gluten free penne.


Bow tie pasta tossed with Parmesan cheese, cream and 1 beaten egg.


A tomato and cheese frittata


6 small bruschetta


We also had a few olives and I served the cold chicken legs seperately.


It wasn't an expansive meal and there was not a lot of any one dish, but in fact there was enough for each of us for dinner.  This was washed down with what we were calling jugo wine, 5 litres or red wine for 6.00 euros that my sons had bought.  Not what you would call a fine wine but it seemed appropriate for this cobbled together meal.

1 comment:

  1. So enjoying these blog posts, Gillian. ENJOY YOUR RETIREMENT!

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