Last night I did one of my favorite things so far while here in Italy. I took a cooking class. It was a group of 35, gathered around a burner and some metal cutting stations, learning how to make 2 sauces: ragu alla bolognese and sugo all’agliona, handmade pasta, vegetable flan (or béchamel), and panna cotta. My absolute favorite, to both make and eat, was the ragu alla bolognese (I will add the recipe at the bottom) because it had the most ingredients and smelled amazing. In fact, my clothes still have the aroma of onions and tomatoes. We put on our white aprons and got cooking.
This was my favorite part so far because the chief, who was our instructor, Walter, was a cute, rounder man who was loving the idea of having 35 young woman to teach how to cook. He was cracking jokes and making the whole experience entertaining and engaging. We all got to be hands on with chopping vegetables, stirring the sauces, melting the gelatin, and making the egg based pasta. It is so rewarding to make food from scratch and in the end be able to eat it, satisfied with the work you put into making it. I love seeing how involved in the Italian culture cooking is. Most of the natives know how to cook and know exactly what to pair with what, something I wish I was better at. Interestingly enough, since being in Italy I have done more cooking than when I am at school or at home. I constantly ask myself why this might be and I finally figured it out tonight; everything is so much more accessible here. You take a detour on your way home from class to stop by the fresh market for the vegetables, go to the bakery for the freshly made pasta, and stop at the deli for some Italian sausage and vualá, dinner for the night. (All of which is under 20 euro, in case you were wondering).
Making pasta from scratch is something I have always wanted to do and as a matter of fact, it is easier than it looks. (If you have never tried it, I recommend doing it!) We made fettuccine to pair with the Bolognese sauce. We made this pasta with egg instead of with water and began mixing it with flour until we had dough that could be molded into the pasta shapes. After about 15 minutes of rotating through the steps on flattening out the pasta, we had our finish product and were ready to start cooking it.
I wish I could go in depth about all of the things that we made but I would be here forever. Take away from my experience, defiantly learn to become a better cook. I found this to be very rewarding and want to continue to learn different aspects of this culture in ways that I normally wouldn’t do.
How to make Ragu Alla Bolognese:
500g ground beef, 1, sausage, 1 stalk celery, 1 onion, 1 carrot, extra virgin olive oil, salt paper to taste, a tablespoon of tomato paste or can tomatoes, white wine, nutmeg
Finely cut carrot, celery, and onion in the same quantities and put into frying pan with olive oil and aromatic herbs, white wine and allow to fry. Add the meat and break it up with the wooden spoon, add the tomato paste, stir well and cover with vegetable broth and cook until completely reduced. Add salt and pepper and serve over pasta. Your finish product is the picture below!
A Broad Goes Abroad 
My mouth is watering!
LikeLike