Window shopping in Genoa

Shopping in the old quarter of Genoa is always a pleasant experience, as the warren of narrow, winding alleyways hides a multitude of tiny specialist shops, many of which are Ali Baba’s caves of exotic foodstuffs, equipment and knick knacks. Even if I don’t always want to buy the stuff, it’s usually fascinating to look at.

Whenever we have Christmas lunch in Genoa we have ravioli and insalata russa, but next time I’m going to politely request some cappon magro.

An interestng and slightly disturbing pork display. Vegetarians, avert your eyes.

I can take or leave shellfish as a dish, but the colour of this display really caught my eye. They’re not branzini; that’s the fish in the background.

We stopped for a coffee. The “restroom” featured this intriguing set-up. My wife thinks the shower head is for the cleaner to clean the floor. I think it’s for the customers, because they didn’t have room to install a bidet.

Now wash your hands. Using only the finest English sheep soap, if you please.

However all is not cuteness and tradition in the streets of Genoa. Since my last visit there’s been a disturbing development: “automatic shops” taking the place of real shops. These alcoves containing a selection of Japanese-style dispensing machines have multiplied rapidly, most upsettingly occupying the space formerly used by a little secondhand book and CD shop just around the corner from our flat.

I shudder to think what the lasagne and cannelloni taste like.

Ginseng coffee is all the rage, but machine coffee never tastes any good, whatever the flavouring.

Back to something a little more healthy and locally produced. Fried, battered courgette flowers are one of the things I miss about my mother-in-law’s cooking. Besides, look how cute they are!

The fresh pasta shop on Via Cannetto il Lungo has the most mouth-watering display of pesto, although my mother-in-law’s home-made version tastes the best.

And finally, something we did, in fact, buy. Walnut sauce for the pansoti we ate with friends back in Brussels on January 1st.

This is why the internet exists

So that I can see a toad on a friend’s flickr stream, express my amusement and approval, and not long later receive my very own amusing toad ornament free of charge in the post.

T-shirt politics

I wouldn’t normally dream of using my child’s body as a platform for my political or ideological views, but I must say that I’m sorely tempted by this product from Stardust Kids Clothes.

We’ll be in America around the time of the Royal Wedding which will probably mute its potential for edginess and eye-catching dissent somewhat (or is California full of monarchists?), but I like the colour. The sentiment also strikes a chord as I will be doing my best to avoid as much exposure as possible to the event. No, we didn’t plan our holiday with the express purpose of getting away from all the royal hoopla, that was just a very happy coincidence. Now that I think of it, as Stardust Kids Clothes also sells adult sizes of this particular t-shirt, I can almost see us five in matching outfits, all walking around the Disneyland theme park on the actual day of the royal wedding. Maybe we could all get Johnny Rotten hairdos and snarl and spit on the ground a lot?  On the other hand, The Magic Kingdom probably has a zero-tolerance policy towards anti-princess agitators, and we’d be thrown out before you could say “Someday my prince will come”.

I have to say that the ladies in the family don’t all agree with me: my wife has set the DVR to record the BBC’s coverage of the ceremony so that she can show the wedding to our girls when we get back from California, reasoning that they’ll love seeing a real-life princess in a pretty dress. After all she still has a very clear memory of watching Charles and Diana’s wedding when she was about the same age our eldest is now.

Or maybe we could avoid all the potential offence and intergenerational conflict and simply get matching father and son Iron Man t-shirts…?

Italian leftovers

After returning from ten days in Italy this summer I found myself with the usual memory card full of photos, many of which didn’t make the cut for the family blog report, so I thought I’d dump some of them here in no particular order. Yay for sloppy, half-assed summer blogging!

First up, baby food. We stopped off in a supermarket to pick up some omogeneizzati (meat purée). Notice how they make no effort to disguise the cuteness and appeal of the thing you’re about to eat. I mean, I assume that the picture on the left represents the ingredient and the one on the right is the intended recipient…

And if your child’s feeling hungry enough to eat a horse:

Also, why don’t they put a picture of a pig on the ham flavour?

Off to the other end of the age spectrum. During a visit to a local cemetery to see a grandparent’s grave, we noticed this family tomb with two spaces already set aside for people still very much alive, awaiting only the addition of a death date and photo. Imagine visiting a lost loved one’s final resting place and seeing your spot there waiting for you.

Genoa always seems to have interesting grafiti. Much of it is anarcho-punk and very political, but often there’s a trend for one particular style of image or motif. This summer it was this one:

Look, there’s another one.

On Elba we visited an art gallery where we’d bought a couple of pictures on a previous visit. I liked this frame, but I think I’d probably change the photo inside before putting it on my own mantlepiece.

I also coveted these:

And either of these two. Then the owner told us that they cost 200 Euro…

Just before leaving Elba we stopped for a quick lunch. The food was simple but hearty fare, and the place was run by an entertaining old couple who constantly bickered as we ordered, contradicting each other about what was available.

His apron should give you an idea of what a classy restaurant this is.

During the 2000 election campaign Silvio Berlusconi distributed to every household in Italy a large, glossy, heavily illustrated book about his life and accomplishments called Una storia italiana. We still have our copy at home and it’s the source of much amusement, especially the part where, in order not to offend conservative Catholics, he glosses over the fact that he once got divorced by saying that his relationship with his first wife at a certain point “was transformed into a sincere friendship”. Now, perhaps aware that his popularity needs a boost (one of his key political allies recently abandoned him), he’s released “We Love Silvio”, a sort of greatest hits complitation of photos of himself as the “protagonist” of key recent historical events. Interestingly this time it’s not free, but costs 9.90 Euro.

And if you photos aren’t enough, you could also sing along with the official electoral campaign song “Thank goodness for Silvio”:

A face in the street.

And finally, one of the starters we had at our restaurant on Elba: octopus carpaccio. Not overwhelmingly tasty, but it looked pretty on the plate.

Coriander and Lime

I haven’t read Niki Segnit’s The Flavour Thesaurus, but this extract in a review caught my attention and made me smile.

“The first time I ordered Vietnamese beef and coriander noodle soup, a wedge of lime turned up in it, I put it to one side and left it there, grinning at me as it leaked tangy beef stock into my paper napkin. Lime, I thought, is sweet. Bear in mind I was brought up on Rose’s lime cordial and its matching alien-plasma marmalade: sweet and then some. The more I ate Vietnamese and Thai food, the more lime began to turn up in savoury dishes, most often in partnership with coriander. It wasn’t long before I was ordering dishes simply because they came with lime and coriander, which is a bit like buying a song because you like the backing vocals, and no worse a habit for that. Coriander and lime are the wooh woohs in “Sympathy for the Devil” – completely and utterly indispensable.”

Liège

Recently we decided to go on a daytrip to Liège, one of the largest cities in Wallonia and birthplace of Georges Simenon, Justine Henin and (allegedly) Charlemagne.

But we weren’t interested in history or culture, of course. We wanted to see the fancy new Médiacité shopping centre. There has been much media hoopla about this project which, along with the equally fancy recently renovated train station is intended to spruce up the image of a rather glum city more associated in most people’s minds with unemployment and depressing movies by the Dardenne brothers.

Much to our surprise (imagine that last phrase with a sarcastic tone of voice) it turned out to be…just another shopping centre, with the usual selection of shops (and a lot of empty space which has yet to be rented). The roof is pretty, though.

We made our way into the centre of town which, by stark contrast with the gleaming modernity of Médiocrité was quite picturesquely run-down and full of “character” (i.e. dirt). We found ourselves in a series of narrow, quiet streets full of Turkish restaurants – a kind of Little Istanbul, I guess you’d call it – and so we stopped for lunch at Le Raki Turc, which turned out to be really rather good.

We had a tasty mezze with some meltingly tender veal.

Then we headed back into the streets for some window shopping, ogling the macaroons…

roasted meat and potatoes…

toy alligator warriors…

and “reality wear”…

So a mixed bag, but not unpleasant overall, and I wouldn’t rule out a return trip someday if I’m in the mood.

Oh, and at least we got to see Mickey Mouse:

Easy Life

The Easy Life catalogue which fell out of my Sunday newspaper this week may not have been quite as wacky a collection of nonsense as Skymall or Maison et Confort, but it contained at least two amusingly silly products.

First up, vapour cigarettes:

 

How many times do you think you’d be able to blow “realistic” vapour “smoke” at people in a public place, while insisting that it wasn’t really smoke and was perfectly safe, before you grew tired of the endless confusion and aggravation and just went outside to smoke a real one?

Secondly, the hearing aid disguied as an “expensive” Bluetooth headset:

Personally I’d rather be seen wearing a traditional hearing aid than be mistaken for the kind of person who walks around with one of these plugged in 24 hours a day.

Maison et Confort

Not that this blog is going to turn into an endless series of posts mocking catalogue tat, but I found this one lying around, inexplicably abandoned in a bookshop the other day, so I had to pick it up. Pictures can be clicked to view large on flickr.

Erik and sgazzetti – you’ll both be receiving a set of these next Christmas:

Below: “The friends of Nature know that all trees have a soul. But now they also have a face! The separate elements are in synthetic stone; the eyes shine at night.”

Below, extract: “Simply plant the character in a hedge or behind a barrier with the aid of the large metal bar, and observe the magic effect he has on passers-by. He’ll put even the grumpiest people in a good mood!”

And finally, in the bathroom section of the catalogue…

 I love her pose and expression. Does she think it’s a telephone, or is she just cuddling it?

SkyMall

During our recent flight to New York, having exhausted all other entertainment possibilities, I took to browsing the SkyMall catalogue which was to be found in our seat-back pockets. Imagine my surprise to find such a cornucopia of delights, a small selection of which can be seen below.

I don’t feel the need to comment on the images as I think they speak for themselves, but suffice to say that I want them all (indeed, a couple of them would have come in handy during the flight itself).

guffaw

Two bits of nonsense:

• xkcd is always brilliant, but this one made me squirt milk out of my nose. Which is weird, because I wasn’t even drinking milk at the time…
• I know I said recently that I’m not interested in buying any more Star Wars merchandise, but today I find myself dreaming of a Jabba beanbag and a pair of Bantha Slippers.